“Coincidences don’t work that way,” Hanover agreed. “Irony of ironies; the Artful did indeed suffer an engine failure.”
Stirling blinked. “The story was real?”
“The ship was under security during the mission,” Hanover said. “Only the Captain and two others knew the real targets, all zealots. The others were kept in the dark – later, they would have believed the tale about the American SSBN.” He smiled. “The best laid plans of mice and men…”
Stirling took a breath. “Why are you telling me all this?” He hesitated. “Am I…”
“Going to get out of this room alive?” Hanover asked dryly. “Yes, you are; you’ll keep your mouth shut.”
“Clive Pointing didn’t,” Stirling snapped.
“Pointing was an man responding to an idiotic act,” Hanover said. “Who cares about a enemy ship? Thatcher should have admitted it to the world – that we sunk the Argie cruiser – and that we would press the war with every weapon in our power.” He smiled. “Pointing could have brought down the government and Thatcher should have resigned; you could start a war.”
He looked up at him. “The world at large knows that a German u-boat sunk the ships,” he said. “Those inclined to believe the rumours of the American SSBN will be quietly grateful for the action – and there’s no evidence left to prove anything, one way or the other.” He shrugged. “Everyone would understand us removing the SSBN – it was too dangerous to leave floating around – and the absence of evidence, one way or the other…
“But if you talk, following the line that Hoover and MacArthur claimed, you might start a war,” Hanover said. “Look how much we’ve achieved; is it worth throwing it all away?”
“No,” Stirling said finally. “I’ll keep it to myself.”
“I thought you might,” Hanover said. He sighed. “Now you know what its like to make the big decisions, the ones that choose who lives and who dies.”
“It was a bad decision,” Stirling said flatly, and left. Hanover shrugged; the rudeness was understandable. He returned to cleaning up the room and packing up his merger possessions. He hadn’t made an impact on Ten Downing Street, not really.
“Pity, really,” he mused, picking up a folder from the secured safe. Like the other folders, evidence of actions taken without the knowledge and consent of Parliament, the papers in the folder spoke in riddles. A single line spoke of damaging a tiny component in Artful’s reactor, sentencing the ship and its entire crew to death.
He would never have accepted the deaths of British servicemen, Hanover thought coldly. The shredder activated as soon as he pressed the button; he fed the report directly into its maw and watched as it was chewed up and torn apart. The other reports followed, the death of Admiral Darlen, the assassination of people who would have posed a problem in the future… all went into the shredder. No paper trail, no proof that the operations were ever carried out… had they ever happened?
“Of course not,” Hanover said. The new Commonwealth would grow strong and prosper, using its advantages to build itself a powerful position before the rest of the world caught up, and no one would ever know the price.
“My conscience is clear,” Hanover announced, to no one in particular, and he swept from the office, turning the light out behind him.
Afterword
According to my computer, I began Second Chance three months ago, around the 19th of December 2005. The idea had been brewing in my mind for a long time, of course, and writing the entire three volume series, at least the first draft, was the work of roughly a month each. For the record, I finished the last part of The Long Hard Road on 5th March 2006. It’s been something of a wild ride…
I have always been fascinated with stories that place a small group back in time, but as it went on, it struck me that few of the groups had things their own way. Sure, the original – Island in the Sea of Time – had Nantucket enjoying considerable technology advantages, but their tech base was hardly self-sustaining. The same, more or less, goes for the 1632 universe, and the Axis of Time books. In both cases, the time travellers have a very small tech base, one that has to be geared down to allow them to survive, and, of course, it has to be done under high pressure. Alliances with the locals – agreements of mutual interest – have to be made; it’s the only way they can survive.
And so I started to wonder. What would happen… if an entire tech base – an entire nation – was sent back in time. Of course, it had to be done carefully; a modern nation travelling too far back would end up ruling the world – even France. I decided upon Britain in the Second World War – because America would be too easy – and then I shaped the plot around that. Britain has a working tech base, Britain has a powerful military machine, and while they might not be able to bring the war to an end in three months (as Dave Krudson suggests in AmericaISOT), they can prevent immediate invasion of Britain itself.
All of that, of course, affects the Axis powers as well. Would Japan jump on Britain and France in 1940 – perhaps their best chance to win their part of the war? Would Stalin make a grab for Iran? Would Hitler urge Franco – at gunpoint – to take back Gibraltar? What would the effects of knowing the future be on the Axis powers at large?
And then, finally, the rest of the world. How would American black people react to learning that they would continue to face discrimination for twenty more years; that in fact they would be ‘hewers of wood and drawers of water’ in the Army? How would Hoover react to the rumours about his homosexuality? (I left it unproven because as far as I know it was never proven.) How would America react to knowing about the War on Terror and a constant sore south of the border? How would…?
Well, you get the idea. I started to draw up a loose plan – very loose – and then I discovered that I had a two-book series, and then a three-book series. Jokes aside, I may or may not write a fourth book set in the 1960s, depending on the reception of this one. I’m very pleased with it; its an interesting book, I feel.
Now for the defence…
As I noted way back at the beginning, I can make only guesses as to what the future will bring, technology-wise. Advanced computers, satellites, SSTOs, hydrogen cars, viral contraceptives… these are all supposed to be in the pipeline. I avoided using the Royal Navy’s new carriers – which haven’t even begun construction yet, as far as I know – as no one seems quite certain of their capabilities. By and large, the British have some future weapons, but not many. To some extent, I had to make informed guesses about what the Germans could do with future technology and information; reasonable people can and no doubt will disagree with me.
I make no apologies for my treatment of General MacArthur. Suffice it to say that his blundering in the Philippines cost thousands of Americans their lives (and then he left them to Japanese prison camps (all right, he was ordered out) while he went to Australia), and then his need to satisfy his ego sent thousands more Americans to their deaths in the Philippines and probably put victory back by around six months, fighting an unnecessary campaign. I do feel that the reaction of the average GI, learning of this, would not have been kind… and he was certainly not the type to acknowledge his own flaws.