The Yeomen of England (Posleen in England)

Ten Downing Street

London, United Kingdom

14^thth April 2007
The Darhel were always careful to avoid being photographed, the Prime Minister knew. It was clear why; close up, the Darhel were nothing like the elves of human myth. Their teeth, he was certain, were those of a predator, not of the vegetarians they claimed to be. He knew that there had been a near-disaster at the White House, when the Darhel had almost been served a meat stew, but no one had ever seen the Darhel eating at all.
Looking at the Darhel teeth, and the way that the Darhel was slicing through the carrots that had been provided, the Prime Minister understood why. Hidden cameras were recording the entire scene; the Darhel was slashing at the carrot as if it were the face of an enemy. A human would have been very aggressive indeed to have eating food in such a manner; human teeth simply weren’t sharp enough.
“Thank you for seeing me on such short notice,” the Darhel said. His rank was Tir, the Prime Minister knew, a mid-level executive. If the Darhel had a name, it had never been spread around, another curiosity of the Darhel psychology. He was polite, more polite than most people who came to see the Prime Minister, and yet the Prime Minister could not escape the feeling that the Tir was plotting out his neck for the noose.
“You’re welcome,” the Prime Minister lied smoothly. His people had kept him aware of Darhel financial manipulations through the GalTech group; manipulations intended to give them control of a large part of Earth’s economy. He smiled suddenly, keeping his teeth hidden; that was why the Darhel would lose, in the long run. All they understood was profit, loss – and contracts.
“Your people are facing defeat,” the Darhel said. “Your own information medium reports that the Posleen will be in London within a week.”
It took the Prime Minister several moments to realised that the Tir meant television. “I think that that’s a little…pessimistic,” he said. “The general estimate is one month.”
The Tir’s teeth worked grimly. The Prime Minister chewed his own carrots, thinking furiously. “Regardless, it is imperative that I myself and the embassy does not fall into the hands of the Posleen. The race as a whole may be stupid, but there are some smart God Kings out there.”
The Prime Minister was almost disappointed. He’d half-expected the Darhel to be offering salvation, in exchange for service or something else. Were the Darhel cowards, or were they simply scared of the madness that enveloped them if they tried to fight? There was no way to be sure.
“You would like to leave,” the Prime Minister said flatly. “I would have to consider it at length. How do you propose to leave?”
“A Himmit stealth ship could carry me over to the redoubt on the land of ice,” the Darhel said. The Prime Minister realised he meant Iceland, which was useless to the Posleen, but held a large Darhel embassy. “It does, however, require your permission to land.”
“How true,” the Prime Minister mused. The Darhel seemed to be moving like a child who needed the toilet, but was too proud to admit it. “On the other hand, there is the morale implication of your departure.”
The Tir frothed around. “It is not a major issue,” he said, and remembered himself. “I can arrange for more supplies for you on Iceland, where I can testify to the strength of your defences.”
The Prime Minister smiled. “It will require time to get all the orders out to the anti-lander weapons,” he said. It was partly true; some of the SHORAD units were scattered around the country in inaccessible places. The other reasons…
“We have placed our faith in your people,” the Tir said. It seemed agitated, on the verge of bursting out. “I will wait, for a few days.”
“Thank you,” the Prime Minister said. “You honour us with your confidence.”
***

“We cannot let him go,” Sir Robert said, later. “It’s time, I think, to start asking Mr Griffin some extremely pointed questions.”

The Prime Minister nodded. “Is it just me, or are the Darhel cowards?”
“I don’t think they look upon the universe the same way we do,” Sir Robert said. The intelligence chief smiled grimly. “In the long trips to their worlds, they didn’t make any real preparations for our troops, which had a natural effect on morale. You should read General Crenaus’s report on the subject.”
“That man should be with the French now,” the Prime Minister said. The French had been reduced to a cowered isolated remnant. “He is vastly more competent than anyone else they have.”
“No argument,” Sir Robert said grimly. “As far as they were concerned, the troops were bought and paid for; they were pretty much Darhel property, like pets.”
The Prime Minister thought of the millions who had died across the world when the Posleen landed. “Bought, paid for, and needlessly spent,” he hissed. “Yes, it’s time to have Mr Griffin interrogated.”
Sir Robert bowed his head. “I will have Margent Hammond inform him of new and vital information,” he said. “I am certain that he will talk, once we interrogate him.”
The Prime Minister nodded. “See to it,” he said.
***

Margent Hammond skimmed through the information that Sir Robert had given her. “Are you sure that this is a good idea?” She asked. “Look at it.”

She scowled down at it. The information concerned the defences of the Exeter Line; the line of defences protected Plymouth from the Posleen. It wouldn’t be long before they fell, but if the information on the sheet was accurate, and the Posleen attacked at the right time…the city would fall far quicker than could be expected.
“It would brighten my declining years to watch the Posleen try to act on that information,” Sir Robert assured her. “There will not be anything like an attempt to remove the troops and let the civilians starve or be eaten.”
Hammond nodded. “I’m glad to hear it,” she said. “Shall I call him?”
“Yes, please,” Sir Robert said. “After all, it’s almost over.”
Hammond smiled sadly. She had hated every last bit of turning her beloved organisation into a nest of spies, even as the underground – the network that spoke of rebellion on behalf of an impossible dream – whispered of great successes in France and Germany. She shuddered; the great successes had resulted in thousands of millions of deaths.
“That’s good to know,” she said. She’d wanted to leave London, but the MPs seemed determined to remain within the city. She sighed. “I’ll call him now, then.”
“You may not see him today,” Sir Robert said, after she’d made the call. “But if you do, that’s the information.”
He departed before Hammond could ask him what he meant, but she decided to wait for Griffin. She waited…and waited…
***
William Burns slipped through the darkness of London, watching the occasional burst of fire as a refugee lit up a cigarette. As a dangerous man himself, Burns had no difficulties in passing through the roughest areas of town, making his way to the Darhel embassy. The embassy itself was a neat business office, set within a field of empty business offices.
He smiled. Unable to buy a large land space – he’d heard that the Darhel had tried to buy Buckingham Palace – they’d settled for buying up all the buildings nearby for privacy, and buying off the local police to keep the refugees out of their cosy area. He checked ahead; the main door was opening.
I bet they wanted something with more glamour, he thought, as Griffin stepped out of the door and headed towards the Houses of Parliament. He’d been scared that Griffin would have hailed a cab, but instead the Darhel agent kept walking, heading north. Burns tailed him at a distance, knowing that other agents would be converging on their position, heading into the best position to intercept Griffin.
Section C²⁴, he thought. We do the real work around here.
He smiled as Griffin headed along an almost deserted road. It was feeding time and the crowds were at Hyde Park, being fed whatever passed for a living diet in these troubled times. The timing hadn’t been an accident and he closed in on Griffin quickly, ignoring the other man as much as he could.
Showtime, he thought, as another agent came up from the front. The second agent rabbit-punched Griffin before he could react, making him gasp in pain. Burns lashed out with his injector, injecting Griffin with a sedative and watched him fold to the ground.
“This guy will keep us going for a while,” he said, affecting a common accent. He stripped Griffin quickly, removing the AID and anything that might be taken in a common mugging, and put them in his bag. If the Darhel were listening through the AID, they would see only a mugging.
“Take the dead guy to the river,” he said, continuing the charade. “I’ll take this lot to the black market.”
“Be seeing you,” the street tough said. Another agent, he lifted up Griffin as if he weighed nothing. Burns left quickly, not giving the AID anytime to react, and walked though several streets before dumping the entire lot in a dumper. Tempting as it was to keep the AID for himself – AIDs commanded a high price on the black market – he knew that it was too dangerous. AIDs recorded everything that happened near them, up to and including sexual congress.
Success, he thought, as he caught up with the van later. Griffin was in for a very rough time indeed.
***

The Tir was annoyed, as far as it could be annoyed, when Griffin’s AID suddenly reported that its holder was under attack. The message from Hammond, reporting a vital piece of information had been extremely important, but losing Griffin was…annoying. The Tir did not, of course, care much for Griffin, despite his usefulness. In fact, the knowledge of what Griffin had done in America had fuelled the Darhel leader’s decision to recruit him; in a time of war, he could expect no mercy from any nation’s authorities.

The Tir used one of his puny swearwords again. The Darhel were hated by many races, but they had never engaged in the sort of perversions that Griffin had, before nearly being caught by the American FBI. The Darhel had intervened, and there were times that the Tir regretted it. Not least because if anyone identified Griffin, they would hang him at once, depriving the Darhel of a valuable operative.
This is most…irritating, the Darhel decided finally. Not for the first time, he wished that it could curse using human swearwords, ones that carried real force. He couldn’t, of course, unless he wanted to risk madness.
“Now…what do I do?” He asked himself. Asking the senior Darhel on Earth, the Tir Dol Ron, was out of the question. It would call into question his very competence, as would asking the representative in Germany, or France. Besides, with the way that the German Ambassador’s schemes had been falling apart even before the Posleen landed, associating with him would have…negative career effects for the English Ambassador.
“Unable to supply a suggestion,” the AID chimed in. The Tir ignored it, taking deep breaths and muttering a mantra under his breath. He would be lucky not to be stripped of all rank and position for this, if his superiors ever heard of it. The Hammond women had accepted an AID, one of a handful outside the military. Carefully, grimly, the Tir ordered his AID to establish a covert link with her AID, ordering it to download the information within her AID.
Useless, the Tir thought coldly, five minutes later. Hammond was something of a technophobe, a human condition that the Tir had rated as ‘useful’ five minutes ago. Whatever information Hammond had would remain with her, unless…
The Tir ordered his AID to send a message directly to Hammond’s AID. The next time she looked at it, if she ever did, she would see the message. The Tir was reduced to praying; this was the last chance for any status at all when the war ended.