Five Seconds

The dust I blew off had been gathering there for eight years, as I realised when the date became visible. 22nd January, 2992. Just over two years after the Children bought their way into power. The anniversary had been in the news at the time of course, but portrayed very differently to the way I saw it. Under the capable thumb of the Children, the newspapers had been allowed only to write stories showing them in a good light- hence they were all about how the Children had saved us from the dangerous powers of Europe which threatened to overpower Britain, and the wonders which their religious militant regime had done for our society. They assured us that we were working towards bettering God’s land, in preparation for his Coming.

I smoothed the thin, yellowing sheets between my fingers and scanned the text. Just eight years old- not really old at all- but it crumbled at my touch. Economy paper. The ink must still have been old-style though, because after the time which had passed since its printing it was still legible, if not particularly clear.

As my eyes ran over the columns, I got an incredible feeling of déjà vu. Eight years on, the single weekly newspaper was still printing the same xenophobic rubbish as today- blatant propaganda to try and disguise the absurdity of sealing ourselves of entirely from the rest of the word. The Bomb was mentioned too, in a paragraph about “Keeping the Peace”, but only briefly. By then they were already getting it out of our system, until the bomb which “harnessed God’s power” slid to the back of our minds, until we forgot that someday it would be let off.

I refolded the newspaper and shoved it roughly into a desk drawer amid a cloud of yellowish dust. I kept any proof of and nostalgia for the past in there. Most of it was from before the Children, but not all. Any of it could have got me killed, were I on the outside. The irony tickled my brain, though there was nothing funny.

A resigned tick-tock wafted through the air as yet another hour faded away, and then the clock fell back into silence, the hands moving seamlessly. I looked around the single room which was my entire world, and knew that this was all that my ambition had led to. A minimally furnished room, too large for the contents; the silence rung in my ears.

As usual when the awful oppressiveness of my situation overtook me, I resorted to the trick which had stuck with me since my youth, and stretched flat on the sofa. The hard floor was no longer bearable for my back. I closed my eyes and crossed my arms like an Egyptian pharaoh, knowing that I would be asleep within minutes. It was a trick which had proved priceless when life was too much and I needed to escape, or when I simply had too much to think about to use the night for sleeping and so instead would catch half-hour breaks throughout the day.

It had never been more useful than now. Darkness curled in front of my eyes, and then the weight of the world was off my shoulders and I was free.

I didn’t wake up until an automated voice told me calmly that the coming week’s rations had been extracted from my supply and deposited in the provided storage tray. Twenty one sachets of powder with the same instructions printed on the back of each: Add Water To The Fill Line. Leave For Ten Minutes. I sat up slowly and stood even more so, before scooping the whole lot off the tray and chucking them on the floor. Small rebellions; they make my day. I looked at the mess of shiny silver packaging and it made me want to cry. I was twenty nine, and I was acting like a child. For ten years I had been all alone - it was a situation unimaginable to any other human alive. Even the hermit had a choice, but mine had already been made.

I went to the single window, a tiny egg-shaped pane of transparency a foot thick and reinforced a hundred times. Outside in the square below, two men were systematically working their way around the central podium clearing the leaves. Soon they would begin to spread away from the centre, until their shift ended. The task was endless, but in – I glanced swiftly at the clock – thirty five minutes it would be postponed by prayer. It was Sunday, which meant that at exactly twelve noon a representative from every household in the country would take to the streets and the Children would lead the Weekly Calling from the speakers on each corner.

It was only the Ultimate Calling that would require complete attendance- except for me of course.

I wondered sometimes what it would have been like if the Children had never formed, if they had never come to me and promised me eternity; if they had never offered me The Deal. I hated myself for what I had done, but at the same time I made excuses.

When I made the decision I was nineteen. Having officially reached adulthood, I was no longer kept on a leash by a team of ministers who did my job for me. I had advisors but they could only advise. I had more power than any one else in the country. I was scared and alone, stuck in a life chosen by my parentage, a life from which the only escape would be to run, and consequently be hung for desertion of duty, and for disgracing the blood that ran through my veins.

I was the Prime Minister of England, and They offered me a way out.

In a twisted way, the Children were indeed my saviours.

I wish I could have said as much for the other citizens of the world.

I slept through nearly an hour of this week’s worship meeting, not that it mattered. It was even longer than usual because an announcement had been made.

4 O’clock on May 3rd, Central Square, Meeting with God. All must attend.

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I feel sick to my stomach and damp all over with sweat. I can’t sit still, although I have barely slept since the announcement was made three days ago. What do I do? I know what the Children have done, the Children of Angels; and I know what has been done in return.

I look outside, and see the leader of my home-city, the son of the obscure angel David, leading the crowds.

This is the ultimate calling. I grip the window ledge until my fingers burn, and I peer out at the spectacle below.

“We, the Children of Angels,” the voices chant, “Are here to save, to redeem, to bring to the people of earth the Word of God.”

SonDavid’s face is turned to the sky in rapture, the hologram above his tiny figure seems to shout with a hundred voices, and the sea of subjects cloaked in white imitate him with accuracy sprung from total and complete belief.

“God!” They cry, every person in Britain on their feet, the cacophony of sound exploding into the air like a cruel presage of what is to come, “We are ready! Our Father in heaven above, hallowed is thy name, We Are Ready!”

The images of the forty angels swell into the sky, one from each city, crowding the skyline until each could be God himself. Blaspheming in this manner cannot hurt me now. They are almost identical, with manes of black hair streaming down onto shoulders dressed in white cloaks like shrouds. Again, again, again- forty huge mouths chant in perfect unison the Calling every child knows better than his own name. All the citizens of Britain are here, they are One, and the sound fills my ears to the point of bursting - even from within the protecting walls of my prison.

There are forty million people left in Britain, and every last person is out on the streets which spiral towards the single great square in each city. Every last person is shouting the calling, and the majority have eyes filled with tears.

If the figures of 10 years ago still ring true, then there are six billion people left in the world; however if mighty England lost so many in the fertility crisis of ’94, others must have too.

It makes no difference, but I would estimate the new population of earth as five billion. Some countries will have suffered less than mine. Or what was My country. Of the billions of people in the world and of the forty million on my doorstep, I am the only one who knows what will happen. I look at the hugely enlarged images of the angels and my mouth fills with bile. I was wrong. They know.

For twenty-three hours, fifty-nine minutes and fifty-five seconds the light has been flashing, that forgotten red beacon in the dusty wooden panelling of the nuclear-bunker walls. America’s president must be seeing the same. I wonder if the Americans, also, believe this is God’s Coming, the harnessing of His power.

I put my head in my shaking hands.

Five billion people have five seconds to live.