Chapter 86 Under new management

Tuesday 24th August

‘Kidnapped by who, Mike?’ asked Justin Troughton with alarm.

‘We’re pretty sure it was the Chinese, although they were a bit more professional than when they tried to kill him. We don’t have any leads, and we’ve no idea where they might have gone. Nevertheless, signals on the jungle telegraph point pretty clearly to Peter having been taken on the orders of Beijing.’

‘Why would they?’

‘It makes no sense at all. Starchild can run without him, and the Chinese obviously have all the Starchild manuals plus scientists who, with all due respect to Peter, are cleverer than he is. They’ve no obvious reason to kidnap him or kill him.’

‘Where are you now?’

‘I’m at Shorncliffe Army Camp.’

‘You had a lot to do with the production of those Starchild manuals, didn’t you, Mike?’

‘Yes, I worked with George and Max Paterson, before he died, in layout, formatting and proofing.’

‘Would you be in a position to initiate Starchild?’

‘The idea of the manuals was to make the whole process very clear so that it would never be dependent on any individual. Whilst I don’t understand the full details of the underlying theory, I could certainly implement channelled multi-target sub-ego imperatives over specific geographical areas. I would just need a channeller.’

‘I’d like you to take over the implementation of Starchild, Mike. Make whatever arrangements you need for a launch on the fourth of September. What was it you were just saying about the need for a channeller?’

‘That’s been taken care of. In the absence of George Mackenzie, Peter had arranged for the best channeller they’d found at Diss to arrive here this morning. I’m picking him up from Folkestone station shortly.’

Mike Han smiled to himself as the Prime Minister ended the call. Things were working out much better than he or Beijing could possibly have anticipated. Not only had he provided China with all the Starchild manuals, but he had now been put in charge of Starchild in the UK. If this was, one day, known in his homeland, his father would finally be proud of him.

Mike’s father, mother and two sisters lived in Hangzhou, and Mike had not been in contact with them for fifteen years – since Mike had joined the British Security Service. His family were unaware of his role but assumed him to be spying against China. Security meant they could never know that he was really a Chinese deep-cover agent.

Mike wondered how many more Chinese deep-cover agents existed in positions of influence in the UK. This sudden promotion seemed uncannily fortunate. Was there an unseen hand at work?

Chapter 87 An early morning flight

Tuesday 24th August

The minibus had collected Sam, Sahadeva and Max from the home of Grace Clarke at three in the morning. It had taken half an hour to drive to the old RAF airfield at Brenzett, where they had boarded a Bombardier Global Express executive jet.

The aircraft was designed to carry eight passengers, although there was no one occupying any of the remaining five passenger seats at take off.

One of the two Chinese women who had collected them, Anna, had spoken good English. From pick up to the airstrip, however, Anna had said little other than explaining her orders to transport them to Lhasa Gonggar Airport in Tibet. Those orders, it seemed, had come from the highest level. Given the circumstances, further social conversation had seemed inappropriate on both sides, and so Sam, Sahadeva and Max had simply done as requested, trusting that it was all part of Zoe’s plan.

About five minutes after takeoff, the door to the cockpit opened and Anna walked back down the plane to join them. In the better light of the aircraft cabin, they could see she had short, black hair and was around forty years of age. ‘Is everything OK?’ she asked.

‘As far as we know,’ Sahadeva replied.

Anna smiled. ‘Yes, this is an odd situation, isn’t it? Just to clarify things for you. I have orders to get all three of you safely to Lhasa Gonggar Airport in Tibet, where you will meet other Chinese officials. I was told that you pose no risk in relation to the flight, but beyond that, I know nothing. We have a security protocol which specifies that I don’t talk to you about who I am or about any other operational issues, and you don’t tell me who you are or why the Ministry of State Security wants you in Tibet so quickly. There are listening devices in the plane, but they’re all switched off. If I’m not within earshot, I can’t hear anything you say and nor can anyone else. It’s up to you if you believe that, but it’s true. It would be best if you treated me as if I was a flight attendant and our conversation was restricted to exactly the things you would talk to a flight attendant about.’ Anna smiled again. ‘And relax, I’m not going to put on a dummy lifejacket and give you a safety talk.’

Sam, Sahadeva and Max felt themselves warming to their charming and amusing air hostess.

‘So, ladies and gentlemen,’ Anna continued in a manner that parodied her hostess role. ‘We have a good selection of excellent food, a well-stocked bar and, best of all, the bill will be paid by the People’s Republic of China.’ She pointed to a large monitor that was suspended from the ceiling in the middle of the cabin, forward of all the seats. ‘We can also conjure up pretty much any film or audio you’d like.’

Sam smiled at Anna. ‘Thank you very much, Anna. You’ve been very kind. If ever you get tired of espionage, I’m sure there’ll be a job for you with an airline.’

‘I shouldn’t tell you this, but actually I used to fly with an airline of sorts.’

Max looked at Anna. ‘So, in-flight service is second nature to you.’

‘Up to a point. Except that I was a pilot.’

Sam looked at her watch. ‘It’s four-thirty in the morning. What’s our time schedule?’

‘It’s an eleven-hour flight. We’ll probably touch down at about three-thirty this afternoon by your time. That will be around eleven-thirty at night in Tibet.’

Max yawned. ‘I think it may be time to go back to sleep for a while.’

Chapter 88 Another pick-up

Tuesday 24th August

Mike Han watched the passengers exiting the barriers at Folkestone railway station. He noticed a short, stocky man of about thirty years of age with short, black hair.

Mike checked the photograph in his hand and then walked towards the barriers, meeting the man just after he’d passed through. ‘Captain Fenchurch?’

‘Yes.’

‘My name’s Mike Han. We’ve never met, but I was a colleague of George Mackenzie and Peter Rogers, and I’m now coordinating the project they were undertaking. I’ve come to take you to your quarters at the Camp.’

‘Hello, Sir. Thanks for picking me up.’

They shook hands, and Mike led the way from the station.

‘Why did you say you were a colleague of George and Lieutenant General Rogers, Sir?’ asked Ollie as he lifted his case into the boot of Mike’s car. ‘Are they not involved with the project anymore?’

Mike stopped and looked at Ollie. ‘I’m sorry, there’s no reason you would have known. I’m afraid George has been killed and Peter has disappeared.’

Ollie registered the information as being concerning and sad, but he was not as taken aback as might have been the case had he not been an SAS officer prior to his medical leave. He had always suspected the experiments at Diss to have been about more than just the trialling of a new treatment for PTSD. If there had been a covert military purpose, then dangerous plots and counterplots were to be expected.

Ollie waited until they were driving to the base before clarifying whether the death and the disappearance had innocent explanations.

‘I’m afraid George was murdered,’ Mike clarified. ‘We don’t know who or why.’

‘What about the Lieutenant General?’

‘We know very little about that, either. We believe he’s been kidnapped.’

‘I’ve been certified as fully fit for operational service, Sir,’ Ollie confirmed with a smile. ‘Which is just as well because Folkestone seems to be about as risky as Helmand Province right now.’

Mike smiled and glanced sideways at Ollie. The comment seemed to demonstrate that Mike was sitting next to a soldier who was indeed ready for action and unphased by uncertainty and potential danger – and who also possessed a dark sense of humour. ‘There’s no reason to assume that we’re at any risk. But, of course, I don’t think you’ve had any explanation as to why you’ve been sent here.’

‘No, Sir. I gathered when the MOD phoned that it’s something to do with my time at Diss.’

‘Yes. You remember the tests that involved injections and those helmets.’

‘Yes.’

‘You were the best subject in all the experiments.’

‘Can I assume, Sir, there was more to what was happening than just developing a treatment for PTSD?’

‘I’ll explain more about all this when you’ve settled in.’ Mike decided to draw a line for the moment under the current conversation. ‘How was your trip?’

Chapter 89 Reshaping the material world

Tuesday 24th August

Sam sat back in her seat and looked from the aircraft window. She then glanced at Max, who was peering through a window on the other side of the plane. ‘Every seat’s a window seat,’ she said, referring to there being just one seat on each side of the aisle.

‘Stops us fighting over them, I guess. I think that must be the Caspian Sea below us.’

The seats were very wide and Sam moved to sit closer to the aisle, nearer to Max. She looked around the cabin. Sahadeva appeared to be asleep in the seat behind Max. The doors fore and aft were closed, and Anna was elsewhere.

‘I wouldn’t have believed, Max, that your mathematical model of the Universal Awareness could be used to connect with it?’

Max moved closer to the aisle to be at a normal conversational distance from Sam. ‘I don’t want to believe it either. The E8 quantum algorithms which model universal fields also model the Universal Consciousness, and Starchild technology can interface with the Universal Consciousness in a manner analogous to the way laboratory hardware can interact with other fields that permeate the Universe. If I’d have known the full implications at the outset, I might have had second thoughts about opening Pandora’s Box.’

‘What do you mean?’

‘There’s a conclusion from the Starchild research that no one’s yet thought about because the wider scientific community doesn’t know about the research and the military is only interested in its weaponisation.’

‘What’s the conclusion?’

‘We could simulate unmanifest reality with a computer model that would need computing power not too much greater than we have right now. More critically, it wouldn’t be a model in the usual sense. It wouldn’t be an analogy. It would be the same unmanifest reality that is the Universal Consciousness.’

‘Are you saying that with sufficiently powerful quantum computers, the model of reality that your algorithms could simulate would be indistinguishable from the reality we currently experience?’

‘I’m saying that such a computer simulation would replicate a Universal Consciousness that would be the same as the one from which this material reality derives because there can only be one Universal Consciousness.’ Max spoke more quietly – as if to avoid being overheard. ‘I did some additional work on the E8 quantum algorithms in my spare time. I went beyond considering transmigrations, sub-ego imperatives and channelling. I found that the material manifestations of the Universal Consciousness we experience – this physical world around us – could theoretically be adjusted by changing the parameters within the simulation. Material reality could change even though the simulation would exist within the material reality that it was changing.’

Sam breathed out in a gesture of surprise and shock. ‘I don’t fully understand the process, but you’re saying the form of the objects we perceive around us now could be altered?’

‘This entire material reality, in fact. We teach that the manifest Universe is maya – an illusion. When you stop and think about it, it’s not too surprising that something which is an illusion in the first place could be morphed into a different illusion.’

Sam looked at Max. ‘What level of computing power would be needed to test your theory about altering the material world?’

‘As you know, we talk about the effectiveness of a quantum computer in terms of a metric called quantum volume. The set-up for Starchild at Shorncliffe has a quantum volume of six hundred and forty. I think a QV of twelve hundred and eighty would be enough to run Starchild algorithms that would reshape matter in the same way existing Starchild algorithms can reshape minds.’

At that moment, their conversation was interrupted by the aft door opening and Anna entering their compartment. She was carrying three folders. ‘I hope I’m not interrupting. I’ve got some menus here. I was wondering if you were hungry.’

Chapter 90 Changes

Tuesday 24th August

Zoe was driving towards Tiananmen Square to begin her day at the Ministry of Public Security.

So far, her plan to bring Sam and her colleagues to Tibet appeared to be working well. Zoe had possessed sufficient authority to arrange their transfer from England to Tibet, and the secrecy within her organisation meant that it had been straightforward to maintain such a minor operation as highly classified.

If the Party discovered her actions, there would, of course, be questions about why three people from England were being given total access to a facility engaged in one of China’s most secret military research programmes.

If such questions were to be asked, Zoe knew she could provide no credible answers. Saving the world had become her priority above China’s military superiority, and she believed that Samantha Martin was the only person who could achieve that. This was, however, a conviction that would be impossible to justify to others.

As she drove, Zoe began to develop a sense of unease – a feeling that something was not quite right. She noticed that signboards on several familiar shops and restaurants had changed – either to a different style or to denote a new business. This seemed odd because there had been no indication of these developments when she had driven home to her apartment on the previous evening.

Zoe parked in her designated space and walked to the rear door of the Ministry. The door was different from that through which she had left yesterday. It was now made from glass. During the ten years in which she had worked at the Ministry, this door had been made of wood.

‘Good morning, Li Colonel,’ said an unfamiliar security guard.

‘Good morning,’ Zoe replied.

Zoe walked up the stairs to her office. As she entered the room, an unfamiliar man was laying out papers on Zoe’s desk for her inspection.

‘Hello,’ said Zoe, ‘where is Zhang Wei?’

‘Where is who, Li Colonel?’

‘Zhang Wei, my personal secretary.’

The man looked puzzled. ‘I think you are joking, Li Colonel. I am Yuan Shaoqi. I’ve been your personal secretary for the past five years.’

As Zoe reached her desk, two women entered the room. Zoe was relieved to recognise them. Ting Chen and Wan Huang had been good friends as well as colleagues for many years.

‘May we have a private word, Li Colonel?’ Ting Chen asked anxiously.

Yuan Shaoqi looked at the three women and then tactfully left the room, closing the door behind him.

‘You have to get away, Xiu,’ Wan Huang said urgently. ‘The Party has issued a warrant for your arrest. The police will be arriving here in thirty minutes.’