Blackout (2 page)

Shakespeare was proud to be part of the family. He fitted in well and was thoroughly enjoying his two roles. He was playing the ‘traditional cat' role, which involved sitting on people's knees, sleeping on duvets, snaking round ankles and treating the family home like a hotel. He was also doing what he called ‘cat chores' and was especially proud of how he'd rid the house of mice. He doubted the Cook family even knew they had a mouse infestation. But he'd worked tirelessly, mostly after dark, using his night-vision to seek them out and his sharp claws to scare them away. He'd decided not to kill the mice.
I'll just put the frighteners on them
, he thought.

He was adored by the kids, particularly Sophie. And he was especially delighted with
the way he'd managed to get along with the dogs. In feline folklore, cats failed to mix with two things: water and dogs. Kittens were taught from an early age that both were evil. Water was OK – if you were desperate that is – as a drink. But it came way down the pecking order: miles below cream (number 1), milk (2) and tea (3). Yet cats' failure to swim was legendary so open water was to be avoided. As
were dogs. The canine v. feline wars had raged since the battle of 1632. Cats were taught that dogs started it. Canines vice versa. The facts had been forgotten years ago. Either way, there was a general hatred between the species. But Shakespeare had learnt that cats and dogs can be best buddies. All you needed was an open mind and a positive attitude.

Shakespeare marvelled at the family's head dog. The Cook family had adopted Lara, code-named GM451, from the RSPCA. Although little did they know that in reality it had been Lara who had adopted them. Lara stood for Licenced Assault and Rescue Animal, and she was the world's first ever Spy Dog, a highly trained secret agent who was now posing as an ordinary family pet. But Shakespeare had learnt there was nothing ‘ordinary' about Lara. Any dog who could ride a bike, play the guitar and surf the Internet was a pretty cool mutt. And now Shakespeare had the opportunity to be part of the team, learning the ropes and becoming the world's first ever Spy Cat.

Professor Cortex was the mastermind behind Lara's accelerated learning programme. And
now Shakespeare was catching up fast. The scientist didn't call him Shakespeare. To the professor, Shakespeare was ‘Agent CAT' or ‘Classified Animal Trainee'.

Except I don't want to be a trainee any more
, thought Shakespeare.
I want to be a proper qualified spy. Solving crimes, fighting evil, sweeping the streets clean of baddies. If GM451 is the coolest dog on the planet, I want to be the coolest puss
.

Shakespeare had already had one adventure.
A sort of practice mission
, he thought. His paw went to a ripped ear, a souvenir of a close encounter with an evil baddie. He glanced in the mirror, reassuring himself that his translating pet collar was still flashing.
This collar is the professor's finest invention
, he thought.
It allows me to understand human language and read human writing
.

Although Shakespeare had conquered his fear of dogs, he had a very special reason to be terrified of water. Sitting on one of the highest branches in the beech tree, he shuddered at the sight of the squirting hosepipe below. Ben, Sophie and Ollie loved the sunshine and had taken advantage by getting into their swimming costumes and splashing around in a small inflatable paddling pool. Ben had arranged the
slide so they could plunge into the cold water. There was plenty of joyful screaming and excited splashing. Shakespeare watched, unblinking, from the shade of the tree. Inside he was shrieking with horror.
Water and cats don't mix!

His cat's eyes peered from the tree as he watched the puppies joining in. Star was first down the slide, hitting the water with a howl of glee. Spud was next. He stood at the top of the slide, blowing kisses to the audience, before launching his furry tummy down the slide and hitting the water with an enormous puppy splash.

‘Nice one, Spud,' yelled Sophie. ‘A doggy bellyflop!' Water sloshed over the side and Ollie took charge of the hosepipe, squirting more ice-cold water into the pool.

Shakespeare's tail swished.
There's only one thing worse than water and that's cold water!

Spud splashed his way out of the pool and stood, shaking from nose to tail, water spraying everywhere. He eyed Shakespeare sitting in the tree. ‘Come on down, puss,' he woofed. ‘The water's lovely.'

Shakespeare dug his claws into the branch and shuddered again, terrible memories flooding his
head. He watched a little longer, wincing uneasily.
I need to take my mind off it
, he thought, grabbing his iPad and climbing even higher, making sure he was out of range of the snaking hosepipe.

The cat lodged his iPad against a branch and clicked on to the Internet. His collar blinked brightly as he settled on to the BBC news page.
The usual stuff
, he noted.
Boring business reports, celebrity tittle-tattle and rain on the way
. He stifled a yawn and stretched, considering a catnap.
But here's an interesting one
, he thought, clicking on to a news item about an Internet blackout in Wales.

He watched a short Internet news clip, delivered by a worried Welsh reporter who'd driven over the border into England to deliver the message. ‘I'm unable to send you this report from Wales,' she said, creases etched into her brow. ‘Satellite communications are down and all Internet and mobile-phone connections have been lost. The country has ground to a halt. Wales is, quite literally, offline.'

Shakespeare loved the Internet. It was the source of all his information and he enjoyed playing Xbox Live with Spud and Star. His paw went to his translating collar.
I'm not sure how this works
, he thought.
But I suspect there's a
Wi-Fi connection involved somewhere
. He glanced down at the fun below.
Yes, water is bad. But going offline is probably worse
.

His name was Eddie, but his team knew him only as ‘the Past Master'. At eighty, he was the
youngest in the room. The old man's arthritic hands fumbled with the parcel. He reached for a knife and slid it down the side of the brown paper, easing the box out of its wrapping. A postcard fell out and he smiled at the swirly writing.

He looked around at his assembled team. ‘It's from Iris,' he announced. ‘From the cruise ship. It's got a stamp on, from Italy.'

‘Oooh,' gasped the audience, sitting up in their chairs.

‘What does it say?' inquired one of the pensioners, fiddling with his hearing aid.

For a moment, the Past Master was lost in thoughts of the holidays he used to have.
Seaside trips, donkey rides, bucket and spade, rolled-up trouser legs
. He fought back a tear.
Good times. And such innocent fun
. He considered it a shame that hardly anyone sent postcards any more.
It was one of life's little pleasures: going to the seaside, choosing your postcards and scribbling the headline news of your holiday adventures. And
, he remembered,
sometimes the postal service was so slow that you'd beat your postcard home
.

He thought about his own children, all grown up, and seven great-grandchildren.
None of them have ever sent me a postcard
, he thought.
Sometimes they show me their pictures, on a tiny screen on their new-fangled mobile phones. But with my eyesight …

The Past Master composed himself. He perched his reading glasses on the end of his nose and scanned Iris's writing, her style all loopy and swirly.
And that's another thing
, he considered.
Handwriting isn't what it used to be. It's all text language and slang. ‘LOL' indeed!
Eddie didn't have a mobile phone. He sometimes sat and listened to his great-grandchildren and struggled to comprehend what they were talking about. He longed for the day when ‘pants' meant undergarments, ‘sick' was vomit and ‘wicked' described an evil witch.

He cleared his throat before reading the postcard aloud. ‘Having a fabulous time and I have been productive,' he began, beaming at his audience. ‘I've met lots of lovely people. Easy pickings. Please find enclosed eighteen of what you wanted. Wish you were here. Yours sincerely, Iris.'

‘Oooh, she's having a good time then,' nodded one of the old ladies in the team. ‘I hope she's not had any tummy troubles. That foreign water always disagrees with me.'

‘I was in Italy,' piped up a voice from the back. ‘During the war.'

Silence fell once more as the Past Master opened the small box. He tipped it up and eighteen diamonds cascaded on to the table.

His eyes sparkled. ‘We're nearly there, everybody. Just a few more robberies and we'll have enough diamonds to take the whole of Europe offline.'

This time it was daylight robbery. The Orient Express prided itself on the fact that it was the world's most expensive train ride. London to Venice, in total luxury. The manager was delighted to have a full train and, as always, the price meant no riff-raff. The cabins were small put perfectly equipped. The food was cooked by the finest chefs and served by the world's stiffest waiters and waitresses.

The train had hardly pulled out of London before the passengers had been approached. ‘Champagne, madam?' offered the waiter, hoping his grin would eventually earn him a massive tip.

‘Not for me, deary,' nodded the elderly lady, sitting alone, reading a romance novel. ‘Gives me, you know … wind,' she said, mouthing
the final word of the sentence and waving her hand at her nose.

‘Quite, madam,' agreed the waiter, his smile sagging ever so slightly.

‘And so does posh food. But I like pork chops. And Spam. I do hope you can serve me some Spam. I've still got my own teeth.' She grinned scarily to reveal a row of mostly gaps. ‘It's twelve o'clock you know,' she said, tapping her watch impatiently. ‘I always have my lunch at twelve. On the dot. And I'd love some sherry. I'll tell you what,' she suggested ‘why don't you have my champagne and I'll have a drop of sherry. In fact,' beamed the old lady, her wrinkles gouging even deeper, ‘I insist.'

The waiter, sniffing a lonely old lady whom he could befriend and get written into the will of, jumped at the chance. He served the other passengers in double-quick time before bringing the old lady a very large sherry and parking himself opposite her. This time his grin was genuine. It wasn't often he got to sip the expensive stuff.

‘I'm Margaret,' said the old lady, offering a hand that was mostly knuckles. ‘Do you know how old I am, young man?'

The waiter took Margaret's fingers and shook
her hand. ‘I've no idea! Twenty-one perhaps?' he said cheesily, thinking 121 was closer to the truth.

The old lady cackled. ‘I can't remember,' she said. ‘I stopped counting after ninety.'

He lifted his champagne and the lady raised her sherry. ‘To the journey of a lifetime, Marge,' he proposed.

‘Believe you me, young man,' smiled Margaret, her remaining teeth glowing yellow, ‘it will be.'

Shakespeare had forgotten about his catnap. He was totally engrossed in the news. While
the children and dogs splashed below, he clicked on several news channels.
They're all saying the same thing. Wales is having an Internet blackout. It seems there's no TV
,
Wi-Fi, Internet, satnav, email or mobile-phone signals. How weird
.

He checked Twitter. A picture taken by an amateur astronomer showed an explosion in space.
Welsh comms satellite goes bang #nightmare #walesdown
read the caption.

He clicked on another message:
Wales satellite shot down #interNOT
.

Shakespeare's spine tingled with excitement.
Someone's shooting satellites to smithereens
. How he longed for an adventure like this.

The Orient Express powered through the Channel Tunnel. Margaret was hugely disappointed that it was such a modern train. She'd been hoping for a steam train.
Like in the olden days
. She longed for those times when engines chugged through the countryside, smoke billowing, whistle tooting, with the driver's mate shovelling coal into the furnace. The ‘Orient Express' had sounded so romantic.
Old-fashioned even. And here we are, whizzing underneath the sea at 120 mph
. Margaret was in
no rush. ‘Romance is well and truly dead,' she tutted as she struggled to raise herself from her seat.

Everyone else was sleeping, intoxicated by too much of Margaret's drugged champagne. She tottered to her feet and picked up her walking stick. She swayed down the aisle, a little tipsy after a midday sherry and her hip playing up. She plonked herself down with the first group of sleeping passengers.

‘Hellooo!' yelled the pensioner. ‘Mr Baxter, can you hear me?' The family snored on. Margaret took her walking stick and prodded the man in his chest. Still nothing. It was fiddly trying to undo Mrs Baxter's necklace so the old lady reached into her handbag for her nail scissors. She snipped the thread and the diamonds poured off. One or two fell to the floor, but Margaret caught what she could and spread them out on the table.

‘Oh, the Past Master will be pleased,' she purred. She unscrewed the bottom of her walking stick, turned the stick upside down and, one by one, dropped the diamonds inside. It took an age but she didn't mind. After screwing the end back on, she checked Mr Baxter
for valuables, just in case. He had 3,000 euros of spending money in his wallet, a £5,000 watch, a 24-carat gold wedding ring and emerald cufflinks. The old lady tutted. ‘No diamonds – useless.'

She leant on her stick and raised herself to her feet. She tottered to the next group of dozing passengers and her search for diamonds continued.