Hey hey hey. Idek where i got this idea from... still i think it should be a good read. Wanted Gaga in this because i am a hau. Oh and i cant tell the different between past and present tense. Want Ziall because i am so niche... Twitter - nigellatommo A03 - ladygagasbitchben am i seeing 1d in june? - yes
I live for the reviews, reviews, reviews.
Ha.
Really, I do.
Eradicate! isn't a government-based organisation designed to kill people living on their own in really big houses so bigger families could replace them. Well, it is, but that's a secret. It also may or may not be run by none other than the not-so infamous Mr. Cowell, a Simon, who actually isn't known to the British public – or any other public, for that matter. Not even all of the government know about it, bizarrely enough; no, David Cameron was notified before he became prime minister, and yes, it was a shock to him, but in order to keep his place at Downing Street he has had to accept it.
Eradicate! didn't kill people over the age of 50. Anyone under that with a perfectly well functioning body, living in a house worth over £450,000, is to be killed. Not brutally, mind you, no; the workers are sent in to break in to the house at three in the morning and slip some cyanide in to a place where the person is most likely to drink from, like the bottom of the kettle, or a few glasses. The deadly substance is transparent, and closes up the gullet, killing the opponent in thirty seconds flat. The reason why people aren't killed over fifty is because either they are widowed and have lots of family constantly around, or because they actually have paid off the mortgage. Aside from this fact, no one, no matter how forced they are, would have the heart to tip off an OAP.
These people do not have families. Simon's PA and office worker, Nick Grimshaw, looks up information on the person, sees everything logged on the person, locates the whereabouts of the person's family. Therefore, nobody wonders why the person has gone missing, and Sky news and other major news companies are paid off to say nothing about, so the police are rendered useless.
And so you may be wondering where people get employed from. Yes, it's a valid point – Mr. Cowell can't exactly put up posters reading 'HIT MEN WANTED' around the streets of London. No; the workers aren't employed.
They are kidnapped.
Shrewd, intelligent teenagers who have finished their A-levels and received all A*s are kidnapped from their homes by other workers and are drugged to sleep. When they wake up, they would be in a completely new environment, sharing a room with two single beds in a fancy apartment with a fellow newbie. The apartment is in a swanky, tall building which blends in with other London buildings. The building doesn't have a website or a name – or a front entrance – and so people do not talk about it.
The workers and bosses call this building the 'Base'.
The workers are extremely well looked after. After being kidnapped, a letter is posted through their freshly re-painted door, telling them to meet in the Barnden hall. Attached is a map of how to get their, and once they are in there Mr. Cowell himself would introduce himself, Nick Grimshaw and the head and assistant head boys and girls.
And this is the point where Harry Styles got to with his new roommate, Zayn, two years ago:
"You have been chosen as the cleverest bunch of the British public of your age, so I believe a congratulations are in order." Mr. Cowell had stepped down from the podium and, along with Nick and the over-enthusiastic heads and assistant head boys and girls, given the crowd of around fifteen a long and painfully awkward clap. Harry had half expected to hear a cricket chirp. He'd shared a frown with Zayn at that point. "Now," Cowell'd stepped up on to the podium already, "listen." And with a deadly set face, his tone switched borderline terrifying, "we are a government based organisation, so before I go on, I mean it when I say that you are safe. Your families have already been told why you are here, what's going to happen and when you'll get back." After this, the crowd of fifteen had turned round to each other and murmured in an indecipherable mutter. "Quiet," Cowell declared, "you will be part of Eradicate! until you are twenty-one, where you will be free to live your life with a job found for you by the government. But until then, you are under our control. Eradicate!'s aim is improve the cost of living crisis in England. By doing this, the government must not constantly shell out money to build more expensive houses only for young, rich individuals to occupy for the rest of their lives, when a grand family of even twelve could live there instead. Do you understand so far?" He'd raised his eyebrows expectantly at the audience, who all nodded meekly. Harry looked around at that point: people were shifting awkwardly in their space, unsure of where this was headed. "Good," Cowell had interrupted Harry's thoughts, "so you do understand why such necessities must be done to ensure improvement. These necessities are extreme. They involve committing the most injustice crime of all. Murder." Cowell continued, rather casually, to room full of sharp gasps and teenagers covering their mouths in withheld fear. "Yes, yes. Murder. Get used to the word. Now, you may think that we are bluffing, that we actually are a murdering company that have nothing to do with the government. Fair enough. That's why we picked you lot out – but here is labour MP Ed Milliband to further elaborate." And as the tall, handsome MP stepped on to the stage, Harry, and a few other people who had obviously taken law or politics in college, visibly relaxed at the sight of a well known and respected figure. Ed cleared his throat, tapped his fingertips on each side of the podium and gave the crescent shaped crowd a sympathetic furrow of his brow before speaking.
"Do not panic," he'd spoken softly, Harry would distinctively remember, but at the time it was somewhat irrelevant, "I have been aware of this organisation for eleven years now and since I have funded it I have become attached to all of our workers. You are, as Simon previously said, the brightest bunch of them all, and so we can rely on you to do a good job. And I'm not prepared to lie, here, we also chose you guys because you could easily suss us out." He gave a small grin which no one returned. "Now, do not get it in to your heads that you will be brutally murdering people every week. No; you will be thoroughly trained for a year, when the other people your age are retaking failed courses, to break in to people's houses. You will then deposit some cyanide in to a place where people either drink or make drinks, like a kettle or a cup. The cyanide is transparent, so therefore they would not notice. However, for the people who do actually rinse their cups and kettles before they drink – hardly anyone – we would send in an undercover agent, posing as a salesperson, to check if the person is still alive. But you don't have to worry about that. You go in the house, slip in the cyanide and leave. Simple as that.
"Do not worry about the police," Ed continued, "all authorities are under control. Again, you do not need to worry about any of that stuff. But we wouldn't want to leave you in the dark, so if you really want to know about any of 'that stuff', feel free to ask. But for now, are there any other questions?" Harry remembered looking round at that point, face turning incredulous as a girl with a big bust and big red curly hair rose her arm shakily, to which Ed raised his eyebrows, surprised. "Yes?"
"H-huh-huh-how many times do we have to k-kuh-"
"It depends how many jobs need doing. You have five year groups above you, and as you progress you will do more jobs per year. Usually, your average second year – the first year when you start actually breaking in to houses, i.e. a year from now – would kill around four, five people a year." After Ed had said this, the room visibly relaxed. "Back to Simon for one last talk."
"Thanks, Ed," Simon winked at Ed as they switched positions, "you will not talk about this to the general public. Your families have been sworn to secrecy, too. You are not to leave the premises without signing off and you will not back out of a job. Training starts on the 19th of September – two weeks tomorrow – and until then you are given time to settle in, get used to things a bit and make friends. Breakfast is at 8am sharpish, but being the bright lot that you are we are sure you are used to early mornings anyway. Lunch will be served at 12.30pm and dinner at 6.30pm. Breakfast and lunch will be served in here, the Barnden Hall, whilst dinner will be served in the Lautus hall, located on the right of your maps.
"Right. This is it people. You are free to do anything you want that is above the law and rules, so off you go." Mr Cowell nodded, then left down the side of the stage along with Nick, heads and assistant head boys and girls and Ed, and that was the last Harry would see of them in two years.
"What the fuck is this?!" Zayn stormed in to his and Harry's room, fisting bunches of his dark brown quiff in his hands. Harry had watched him kick the metal railing of the bed frame before sitting on the mattress itself, tucked away in the corner of the living area. Harry sat on his own bed a metre and a half across it, admiring Zayn's aggressiveness with a smirk.
"I know." Harry replied with his own northern accent, "but we just have to go with it. There's no going back."
"And how are you so calm about this?"
Harry shrugged. "As long as my family's safe. It could be a lot worse if you think about it."
And then a knock at the door. Harry raised his eyebrows as a girl peeped in, "sorry, the door was ajar. We're all meeting in Barnden right now to get to know each other." And with a smile, she withdrew. Harry gave Zayn a defeated look, before sighing and getting up.
"C'mon. We need friends to get through this, don't we?" Harry also remembered offering Zayn his hand, which Zayn almost reluctantly took and used to haul himself up.
There were nice enough people there. Four girls were glued to each other's sides – Jesy, Perrie, Jade and Leigh-Anne – and also four boys were equally as close – George, JJ, Jaymi and Josh. A girl was sat on her own, called Stefani, who came across as very eccentric – she was wearing a coconut bra and seaweed skirt – and asked people to refer to her as 'Gaga'. She had moved to England the year before over from New York. This left two other boys, turning out to be Harry's and Zayn's next door neighbours, called Liam and Niall to join the former two to make a group. It was simply fascinating; they hadn't even met each other, and the groups they would be in for the next five years were supposedly set in stone. And they were.
Now, two years on, Harry, Zayn, Niall and Liam have not only gotten over puberty and developed in to squeaky clean and smooth-skinned eighteen year olds, but also everyone has settled down, accepting their job and getting on with life. Harry has done four jobs so far – the same as everyone else, except Gaga who has done eight. Each 'job done' earns three thousand pounds, on top of a weekly pocket money of twenty pounds.
Harry found himself a nervous, shaking wreck on his first job. He knows exactly what to do – even back in his first job, which was last January, four months after training. But the actual fear of being caught, fear of knowing that he will kill this person was absolutely terrifying. But now, after doing five, he has learned to accept it and goes about it in a very relaxed manner. He doesn't think about it too much – I mean, what is there to think about? He does it or his family die. Simple as. And it's not like he can call the police – who would they incline to believe? A bunch of kids or the higher authorities?
An unspoken rule, also, is that relationships from the outside are not allowed. Harry did want – wants¬ – a relationship. Preferably Zayn, but Harry doesn't think he's gay. Hm.
Harry is snapped out of his thoughts when he is in the library and a couple of long fingers create to loud flicks above him. He looks up, and there, right there, a man who he hadn't seen in just over two years, Mr. Cowell.
"Styles," he says, as Harry immediately snaps his Harry Potter book shut and stands up sharply.
"Sir."
"Follow me." And so he does. Harry trails Simon through the compound, walking past a group of friends who whistle lowly and mutter, "woah, that boy's in the shit." And with that, Harry's adam's apple seems to blow up and block his throat and his heart hammers loudly in his ears and chest – is he going to die? His mother, Anne, his sister, Gemma and his step-dad, Robin... are they going to die? Or... are they already dead? Maybe Simon has their severed necks stuck up on pikes in his office- "Jesus Christ, Harry, sit down." Simon suddenly says softly, and he is sitting in his leather wheely chair and already pouring out a couple of whiskies in a couple of gleaming glasses. "You look like you've seen a ghost. Here," Simon hands Harry a glass, and Harry doesn't drink whisky, much prefers the softer taste of vodka or rum, but he takes it with a weak smile anyway, swirling it around as Simon empties his own. "C'mon, boy, drink up." Simon smacks the desk in front of him then, and Harry looks down at the coffee coloured liquid which seems to be teasing him. Nonetheless, he raises it to his lips and tips the contents in to his mouth, swallowing before the burning freezing liquid burn freezes his mouth. Too much. But seemingly enough to make Harry screw up his face, as Simon lets out a loud laugh that sounds genuine and somewhat patronises Harry. "Harry," he says after flicking away a single tear under his eye, "do you have any idea why you are here?"
"No sir." Harry replies politely after a few seconds, not answering straight away as he didn't want to come across as snappy.
"Hm. Well, your mission controller, Ben, is on holiday in Australia at the moment, so I'm going to be briefing your next job. Which is tomorrow. Lucky for some, eh?" Simon says all in an outward breath, and Harry can't control letting out a laugh through his grin. Hahaha, that was funny. He only laughed because the whole thing was a bloody juxtaposition – the image of his mission controller drinking a Pina Colada in some sunny beach, whilst he is stuck here until he is 21. Simon seemed to have understood, though, as he smiles too. "Yes, yes. Well, here you are." Harry is handed the dreaded brown envelope, which reads in red stamped ink at the front: 'PRIVATE AND CONFIDENTIAL INFORMATION NOT TO BE LEAKED. PERISH AFTER USE.' And this is known as 'the stamp'. When Harry went away with his first envelope, everyone muttered around him 'has he got the stamp?' and 'poor kid'. So Harry picked it up and uses it and passes it along to lower year groups to this day. When Harry opens the envelope and pulls out the letter, under the repeated message on the front of the envelope is his mission brief, which he reads whilst Simon watches him judgingly:
LOCATION: DONCASTER, NORTH-WESTERN ENGLAND
VALUE OF PROPERTY: £610,000
OCCUPANT(S): 1
NAME OF OCCUPANT(S): TOMLINSON, LOUIS WILLIAM
AGE OF OCCUPANT(S): 21
Harry looks up to Simon as something weird goes off in his chest, as Simon nods encouragingly at him and pours out another two whiskies.