Chapter 3: Ten, Twenty, Thirty, Forty

Lestrade

'WHEREAS it has pleased Almighty God to call to His Mercy our late Sovereign Queen Elizabeth the Second of Blessed and Glorious memory, His Royal Highness the Prince Charles Philip Arthur George, and His Royal Highness Prince William Arthur Philip Louis, by whose Decease the Crown is solely and rightfully come to the High and Mighty Prince Henry Charles Albert David of Wales:...et cetera, et cetera...last known to be with the Army Air Corps overseas: His Royal Highness The Prince Andrew Albert Christian Edward has authorised and empowered an expedition to retrieve His Majesty...furthermore proclaims...blah blah blah...truly and faithfully execute the office of Regent...et cetera, et cetera...true Protestant religion...legalese...So help me God. Given this Twenty-Third day of April in the year of our Lord two thousand twelve.'

Lestrade scratched at his face thoughtfully as he read the proclamation taped to the window of the Coventry Telegraph office. So the Queen was dead, and Prince Charles, and Prince William. How about that. He wondered how many people there were left in the London area capable of reforming an actual functioning government. Coventry had heard little from the outside world in the three months since the bombing. The proclamation he was reading had been carried from London by a messenger on foot. Lestrade would have thought NATO or the U.N. or someone would've done something useful by now. Lestrade looked over his shoulder as Sherlock and John walked up to him.

"Donovan saved you one of Vera's donuts," John said to him.

"Oh, really? I haven't had a donut in forever. It's all potatoes, all the time."

"What, you're not into the whole Mad Max thing?"

Lestrade laughed, saw Sherlock's confused face, and laughed a little more.

Sherlock scowled and then smirked before saying and said, "How do you know the donuts aren't made-" and then his voice trailed off as he looked up into the sky.

John and Lestrade stood next to Sherlock, following his gaze. There was a small spot in the sky. As Lestrade looked up at the spot, he realized he could hear a very quiet engine noise.

"That's a Hercules," John said as he shaded his eyes. Lestrade and Sherlock exchanged confused looks. "That isn't right," he continued as the plane got closer. "We don't have any Hercules gunships; only the Americans have those. Sherlock, have you seen any bomb shelters near here?"

"No, but the Tourist Information Centre sits on top of an old undercroft that made it through the Blitz."

"Right, how far's that?"

The plane was moving unusually slowly. It had been heading straight for the city centre, and now it began to swing out to the right.

"Less than a kilometre."

"Let's go. Right now."

The three of them set off at a jog.

"What about everyone else?" said Lestrade.

Sherlock answered. "The shelter will only fit a few dozen people. We'll probably have that many following us if they start stampeding."

The plane was now circling to its left around the city centre. It was a very slow-moving plane, and Lestrade could now see that some equipment was showing out of the bottom port side of the plane. Then the plane began to fire.

Lestrade, Sherlock and John almost fell to the ground as the ground shook under them. It was loud beyond anything Lestrade had ever heard, and the air filled with dust. Sherlock led them down through one street into the next. Lestrade looked back and saw that they had indeed gathered a few followers.

The guns paused, and through the stuffy, fuzzy feeling in his ears, Lestrade could hear screaming. John peeled away before Lestrade spotted the source. A woman was fluttering around a pile of stonework that had been knocked off one of the historic buildings. A huge, huge crash and a metallic whirring noise rang out as another huge cloud of dust flew up into the air.

Sherlock started to follow John, but Lestrade grabbed him by his collar, almost knocking him down. He dragged the younger man back into the group. "These people are following you! Get them to shelter!" Lestrade thought he had shouted that; it was hard to tell over the high-pitched whine in his ears.

Sherlock clenched his jaw and ran on. He came to a basement door on the back of a building, tried the doorknob, and then kicked it in. Dozens of people had crowded up behind them. The guns started up and a small landslide of humanity carried Lestrade down into the basement as the guns started up again. The other people who had come in with them were moving back and forth nervously in the low-ceilinged room, holding their ears, some crouching, and the air had already started to fill with the sour smell of fear sweat.

Lestrade looked over bowed heads and saw Sherlock's lower half as he lurked on the steps. John ran in, carrying a dust-covered girl over his shoulders. The woman who had been screaming scurried in right behind him, waving blood-covered hands. Lestrade assumed she was the mother, but it was hard to make out details through the dust that caked everyone's skin.

John pushed through the milling adults, setting the girl against the wall away from the door. Lestrade caught a glimpse of the girl's blank staring eyes before John pushed the mother into a crouch over her, so that she was covering the girl's head and her own head. John then crouched with his face to the wall, covering his head. He looked as calm as though he was counting for hide and seek.

Lestrade saw Sherlock and a few other of people copy John's brace position. After a last look at the door, Lestrade crouched down as well, waiting for the shooting to stop.

John

John Watson stood looking into a rectangular ditch dug through the middle of a street at the Coventry city limits. He had some long wooden measuring sticks balanced over his shoulder to properly lay out the width and depth of the ditch. Anti-tank ditches had to be wide enough that the tanks couldn't drive across them, but narrow enough and deep enough that the tank would get stuck once it had driven in.

Since the EMP event, the city was becoming more united and working more as a community. The steampunk club from Coventry University, especially, was very involved with helping the police and the mayor. The French students and the French constables had set off towards the coast in hopes of finding a boat to take them back home, but most of the conference attendees and university students had stayed in Coventry.

John was leading a group of Coventrian ditch-diggers composed mostly of people who lived in the area of town where they were digging, and some of the university students. The students seemed to have gone a little overboard with the post-apocalyptic fashion choices, though. One kid was wearing a top hat and had some kind of rags wrapped around his ankles. The university students were certainly young and energetic about everything, and spontaneous merriment and laughing would burst through the sombreness. God, some of the kids were annoying.

And it certainly had been a sombre week. John had started triaging as soon as he heard the plane flying away. He had done essentially the job of a medic during the first several hours after the strafing, since his hands weren't quite up to the cutting and stitching. When the surgeons had done all they could for the red-tagged patients, John assisted as a surgical nurse, handing the surgeons supplies and adjusting the light as they worked on patients who were not in immediate danger of dying.

47 people were confirmed dead in the air assault, but not all the buildings had been excavated yet. Sherlock was off identifying bodies as they were pulled from the wreckage. No one John knew had died, although Anderson had managed to break his ankle.

The tower of the old St Michael's was knocked down, but unfortunately not the new St Michael's. The fleche really was as hideous as Sherlock had claimed. The mechanical clock in the tower of Holy Trinity fell to the street when the tower was hit, but apparently the mechanism might still be usable. Holy Trinity had made it through the Blitz, but it hadn't stood up to the slightly more modern AC-130 firing on it.

After the air assault, they had found little yellow pieces of paper scattered around the city that said, "Come and play." Sherlock had had a stack of them gathered for him. They were all handwritten, by several different people, and one said very small in the corner, "Help me." That was a pretty clear indication that Moriarty knew where Sherlock was. So perhaps John and Sherlock wouldn't be going back to London any time soon.

Sherlock appeared with a swoosh at the end of the pavement next to John. John turned around to face him slowly so the measuring sticks he had wouldn't hit anything and break. Sherlock squinted at John briefly. "No nightmares since since the strafing? Interesting," Sherlock said.

"Well, one can always hope. Keeping busy at the morgue?"

"Not too busy. The bodies were fairly intact, and most of them had identification. As for the rest, identifying their occupations was child's play. There's certainly something to be said for artificial refrigeration, though. The coroner thinks they'll probably have a few more to identify tomorrow."

"We were about to stop for a break. And someone's made us vinegar punch to drink."

"Vinegar punch? Well, it'll probably kill the smell, at least."

"Oi, you lot!" John shouted to the diggers, "Time for a break!"

Some of the diggers put down their shovels faster than others. Some of the university kids were concentrating so hard that John had to yell at them again. The kid with the top hat stuck his shovel upright in the dirt, checked his mustache, and then loudly started telling some girl about how all the water in the world had at one point been dinosaur urine.

Sherlock was uncharacteristically quiet as he stood drinking his beverage. The vinegar punch tasted a great deal like salad dressing.

"How did you know about the undercroft?" John asked.

"I read a paper about its 18.9 Hz standing wave, which causes people to think the undercroft is haunted. Coventry University offers a parapsychology degree."

"You would think to hide in a haunted house."

"Mortui non mordant, they say, 'The dead do not bite.' Well, unless you're Sigurd Eysteinsson. Probably shouldn't have attached his enemy's severed head to his saddle."

Vera

Vera walked up to the William Dunbar Primary School. The two-story building was made of yellowish-brown brick, and the school was abandoned now because part of the side had slumped over during the New Blitz. She could see into the courtyard of the school from the sidewalk, now. Vera climbed up over the rubble pile, a large bag slung across her shoulders. She was meeting Sherlock here for fencing. The usual fencing place, Salle d'Armin, was still standing, but it had no windows, and fencing by candlelight, while romantic, seemed rather dangerous. But the school was about halfway between Vera's house and the motel where the Londoners were living, so neither she nor Sherlock had to walk very far.

Vera looked back sadly at the mound of bricks. When the shooting of the New Blitz started, she thought someone might've hit another old German bomb while digging. She had grown up in Coventry, and even though her parents didn't talk to her anymore, she still remembered their stories about the Blitz and how shattered the town was. And there were all kinds of pictures of the destruction in the Herbert Museum. Since this strafing thing had happened-well, really since the Londoners had come to town-life had been even more complicated than it was after the Carrington event.

Vera heard a brick slip and rattle down the pile just before Sherlock's head appeared over the mound of bricks. He got to the flat part of the courtyard, then took off his shoes and took off the extra set of trousers he had over his fencing breeches. It was July, but Vera wouldn't walk down the street dressed in just a fencing outfit, either. Where he could have found a fencing outfit, Vera had no idea.

Sherlock was an odd duck. Not as odd as Evan, certainly, but he had his moments. But on the plus side, he had never made one single comment about her body. Vera had first met Sherlock when he walked into Cooper's Donuts, looked her all the way up, all the way down, and then NOT made a comment about her having a dick. It was endearingly refreshing. Sherlock had, instead, gone on to rattle off comments ranging from Vera's naval service and her move to Intelligence, to the print of Kwan Yin hanging on the wall of her living room at home. Vera wouldn't describe herself as the most trusting person who ever existed, but Sherlock's description of how he came up with deductions just rang true.

Usually, people who came into Vera's shop dressed the way Sherlock was, were asking about the leftover donuts she gave out at the end of the day. Vera supposed she collected intelligence agents automatically now. But with all these strange police in town, it was good to keep an eye on things. Vera brought donuts to the police as part of getting information from Sherlock about the police. The brick oven donuts were proving pretty popular, but she was getting low on sugar and flour, so she also had Sherlock keep his feelers out for possible sources of baking supplies.

Vera and Sherlock fenced somewhat informally, chatting as they attacked each other.

"A steam train passed through Rugby going southbound on the evening of June 30th," Vera said. "Apparently the only likely candidate is Union of South Africa, which is usually operating in Scotland. There are three other similar trains, but one was in London, and the other two...oops... are probably not running. He didn't have an estimate on how many people were on it, but he only cares about the trains, not the passengers."

Sherlock said, "And he's very sure about that?"

"Well, if there's anyone I know who can identify an unlit train in the dark, it's Evan. Sometimes I have to walk him back to the train station myself to stop him lecturing the donut shop customers about trains. He really will keep talking until his throat goes dry if you let him."

Sherlock dropped his wrist and hit Vera in the foot with his epee. "Touchee," she said.

She was pretty sure he had hit her hard enough that the touch would have registered under the usual circumstances. This would've been so much easier with an electrified fencing piste with a metal grating on the floor.

"I was fine after the blitzing, by the way," she said. "Thank you for asking. I've got an Anderson shelter left over in my garden from the war. It was just me and the pruning shears."

"Did you see the plane?"

"No, I was sitting on the sofa. I thought somebody might've struck one of the old German bombs, under the ground, but then it kept going, so I ran out back to the bomb shelter."

Sherlock stood still, apparently pausing to think, so Vera held off on her attack. She rarely had the opportunity to get a touch in on him, and she might've been able to get one just then. It wouldn't have been quite gentlemanly, though. Although Sherlock wasn't the vengeful sort, or the sort who would throw his masque across the room in a fit of pique.

Sherlock started speaking again. "But where did Moriarty get an American plane on such short notice? Did he have a standing order for one? He surely couldn't have begun moving on it before the Carrington event hit."

"You don't think it was the Americans starting a war? They've attacked everyone else in the world."

"Why won't anyone believe that it's Moriarty? Nothing could be more obvious!"

"Well, why don't you show them some evidence, then?"

"Oh, what's the point? Who can tell what their primitive little minds would accept? Something has to be done about Moriarty. He was the one who dropped that bomb on London, and everyone else who would've done anything about it is dead." Vera heard Sherlock's voice shake just a little on that last word. There was a backstory to that statement, but she didn't know what it was. There was no point bringing it up now with someone who protested so often that emotions were useless.

Sherlock started advancing again. All in one smooth motion, he did the loveliest four-seven transport you ever did see. She couldn't even move her arm fast enough to disengage as the tip of the epee clacked against her chest plate.

Sherlock whipped his mask off and saluted with his epee. He moved very quickly and Vera hadn't got her mask off, yet. Sherlock was still holding his epee in front of his face, and had not relaxed, and had gone very still. Vera started to reach for her mask, but she heard a sound behind her; it sounded like someone clapping. A voice came out of the darkness. It said, in a phony German accent, "Mein friend, vee meet again!"

Who the hell was this? Had he been in the building this whole time? Vera watched this man in his suit walk around her towards Sherlock, who had now straightened up and lowered his blade. And then a swarm of laser lights appeared on Sherlock's chest. No one told her to freeze, but they didn't have to.

This other man, who could've been no one else but Moriarty, looked Vera up and down and then turned to Sherlock. "Got yourself another little toy soldier, Sherlock? Now that you've got two, you can have them fight to the death! That'll be fun. I'll have my Mummy call your Mummy and we can set up a playdate."

Vera's brain was going a mile a minute. There were laser lights on her chest, as well. She hoped she wouldn't wet herself. That would look terrible in fencing whites. This man, Moriarty, had the oddest way of talking. His voice was going up and down, and his words seemed to slide through a variety of different accents. What was wrong with him? Could someone that off-balance really accomplish all the things Sherlock had claimed? But something was very, very cold about his face.

As Moriarty circled Sherlock, looking him up and down, Vera wondered what made her look military. When Sherlock had judged her to be Navy, she was wearing her usual street clothes, but here, in her fencing whites, she was covered head-to-toe except for her left hand and the back of her neck. Could someone really figure that out just by looking at that much of her? Perhaps it was her stance Moriarty was looking at?

Vera told her self to pay attention, concentrate. Everything was wrong about this situation. Why would someone go to all the trouble of finding guns with visible laser sights on them when they could have telescopic sights or reflex sights and not be seen? The building was only two stories tall with a courtyard; there were no tall towers nearby; the snipers couldn't be far away at all. They must be in or on top of the school. If they had telescopic sights, they could count Vera and Sherlock's eyelashes from that distance. The laser sights could only be for intimidation. So then the crazy voice was also for intimidation?

It was certainly easy enough to follow the lights back to the weapons themselves. Vera looked around very carefully, as far as her peripheral vision would take her, holding her head still. She was standing in the sunlight, so her eye movements were probably not visible through the wire mesh grating of her mask. Yes, she would have been able to point to where all four of the laser lights on her fencing jacket were coming from. She could only see one of the snipers aiming at Sherlock without moving her head, but she had no intention of moving, herself, unless it became necessary. She decided if there was a good opportunity, she would run off to the right, but the only certain way to escape the courtyard was back over the brick pile. She prayed she wouldn't have to scramble over all those loose bricks with people shooting at her back.

She zoned back in. She didn't think she had absorbed any of what Sherlock and Moriarty were saying to each other.

"Why bomb London?" Sherlock asked Moriarty. Sherlock probably thought he sounded cool and collected, but no one who had transcribed interrogations for 15 years would've believed it for a second.

"It was so much fun! Oh, Sherlock, Don't I love London? I love England so much I will not part with a village of it, and will have it all mine. Tell me, what do you think are the odds of the Russians bombing us now that we've already been nuked? And the air burst was far less damaging, radiologically, than a ground burst. Besides, what's life without the simple pleasures? There are only so many ants you can burn with a magnifying glass before it gets deadly dull."

"But when you've burnt all your Myrmidons, who will be left to fly your aeroplanes?"

"I've already done everything that's interesting to do with aeroplanes. Why do I need more ants? Come with me and think up marvelous ways to kill all the ants."

Sherlock didn't say anything. Moriarty walked another half circle around him and then continued, "You know, I was going to get you back, for getting in my way. I had something delicious all planned out, and then this-this magnetic field thwarts me. What else is there but to close up shop? Wind down, put all the toys away, and go to bed. Come on. If you help, we can get the toys put away twice as fast."

"You know my answer to that hasn't changed."

"Oh, I change everything. I! I am an accelerant!" Moriarty giggled. "Things that stay the same are boring. Don't be boring, Sherlock."

Vera stayed just where she was as the madman walked away. She heard a door slam. After a moment, the laser lights disappeared.

Chapter title is from "Snoopy Vs. The Red Baron" by The Royal Guardsmen