"Will you join us, Mr Ryan?" said Sigismund Grieg.
"I would love to, Mr Grieg". Barry Ryan sat down at the table's empty seat and poured himself a cup of coffee.
"So Ryan, you've turned?" said Claire.
"Turned?" said Ryan.
"You’re not one of us anymore, I can see that. "What did they do to you? How long did you hold out?"
"They didn't really do anything to me", answered Ryan. "Mr Grieg found the time to have a few chats with me, and the more I talked to him, well the more I found myself thinking that he was the man with the answers. I looked back on the work we do for the Organisation, and I could see how pointless and futile it was. But being given a chance to fulfil my potential with Mr Grieg – that was an opportunity to really do some good, to help make the world a better place. I don't feel like I've been turned, Claire. That would imply some kind of coercion, or that I have been brainwashed or been forced into some kind of breakdown. That's not what has happened at all. I've just had a chance to reflect and to think about what I'm doing with my life – and what I want to do is help Mr Grieg in his great work".
"You've really swallowed the kool-aid, Ryan", said Lexa.
"It's not like that at all!" Ryan protested. "I'm not some kind of brainwashed automaton. I know what I'm doing. And if Mr Grieg is able to talk to you, well then you'll know what you're doing too. If you think about it all you will realise that what we are doing is not just right, it's necessary".
Grieg smiled indulgently at Ryan. "I find false modesty worse than arrogance", he said to Claire and Lexa. "So I must tell you that what Mr Ryan is telling you is correct. I have generally found that when I talk to people about my plans, well they end up wanting to help me achieve them".
"I don't buy this", said Lexa. "There must be something funny here. Brainwashing, drugs, some kind of neural reprogramming".
"There's nothing like that", said Ryan blandly. "I simply listened to Mr Grieg and reflected on what he had to say".
"Oh come on!" snapped Lexa. "You're saying this isn't some kind of mind control cult, but if it isn't what's with the moustaches?"
"Eh, what do you mean?" said Ryan, sounding a tad defensive.
"You know what I mean. How come everyone who works for Grieg has moustache?"
"Well I don't think everyone who works for Mr Grieg has a moustache", fumbled Ryan.
"No not everyone – most of the women don't. But the men. The men all have moustaches. You didn't have a moustache at home, Ryan, but now you do. What's that all about?"
"A moustache just like Grieg's!" added Claire, doing her stating the obvious thing.
"Well, I don't think it means anything…" said Ryan. But he was clearly a bit confused and now gave the impression also of feeling a bit on the spot. "I mean, I just started thinking I'd like to grow a moustache… they look smart, that's all…" He trailed off.
"There's not really much to it", said Grieg. "I have a moustache. I like them. I've always liked them. I know they are a bit unusual these days and that they have certain connotations, but that doesn't bother me. So I have a moustache. But I've found that the people I take onboard, well with the men anyway, a big part of it is that when they start appreciating my goals they don't just want to follow me, they want in a sense to be me. It's not always entirely conscious, but the moustache is the easiest way for them to take on something of my appearance".
"What about the women?" asked Claire. "They don't start wearing comedy moustaches. Don't they want to be you?"
"It's a bit different with the women", answered Grieg. "The men want to be me, but the women, well, they want me. I said earlier that I hate false modesty so you will understand that I am simply telling the truth when I say that as women get to know me and my plans they increasingly feel an attraction to me. From a photograph you wouldn't think me much, but in person, while I just somehow seem to have something. For whatever reason, heterosexual women find me irresistibly attractive – as I think you are beginning to find yourselves".
Claire and Lexa squirmed uncomfortably. Grieg smiled.
There was an awkward pause. Eventually Claire spoke. "I still don't understand what you are doing here – why would a technology entrepreneur feel obliged to abduct Ryan here?"
"I am so much more than a technology entrepreneur, Ms Maguire, though I will give you that I am one of the most gifted computer scientists and electronic engineers the world has ever seen. I have considerably wider interests, both scientifically and also politically. That shouldn't surprise you. I am working to re-make the world, to make it a better place for everyone. Technological baubles are all very well, but I realised some time ago that if I was to change the world I would have to control it. Mr Ryan was unfortunate – or perhaps fortunate – in that he stumbled accidentally onto one of my more covert operations in London".
"You are behind the passport forgeries?" said Lexa.
"The passport forgeries? Oh no, nothing of the sort. That kind of petty criminality really is beneath me. Mr Agaskayon is the front man for a criminal operation stretching back to a couple of crooked civil servants in your passport office. I have nothing to do with them. No, with Mr Ryan it was your organisation's choice of where to have him stay in London that brought him too close to my operation for comfort. You see, the Cartwright Friendly might look like an ordinary low budget hotel to you, but it is one of a number of such establishments under my control across this city".
"So what, you are some kind of fleapit entrepreneur?" said Lexa. "And you kidnapped Ryan because he was going to expose you as a secret hotelier? This really is a bit outlandish".
"Would that it were so simple, Ms Hackett. No, it's a bit more complicated than that. I mentioned that my scientific interests go beyond the electronic. Another area in which I have made numerous breakthroughs, which I have chosen not to publicise, is in the area of the mind and psychic energy. Something I discovered some time ago was that it is possible to tap psychic energy from people while they sleep. If this is done carefully then the 'victim', so to speak, does not even notice, especially if they are only tapped for a short period. And another of my discoveries is the simple one that it is possible to store this psychic energy and keep it in a reservoir for later use. Unfortunately, it turned out that your colleague Mr Ryan here is a latent sensitive. When he was in the Friendly, the presence of all that stored energy above him fed into his dreams and led to the strange hallucinations you may have heard of. My people realised this but let him be, thinking that it was just a coincidence that a sensitive were to find himself in the hotel. When he returned, however, they jumped to the false conclusion that he was actually investigating them, so they took action".
"That's why I was abducted", said Ryan. "It may sound terrible, but I realise now that it was the best thing that ever happened to me".
"Yeah whatever", said Lexa.
"|t was all an unfortunate misunderstanding, but it does mean that Mr Ryan is now realising his potential with my organisation", said Grieg.
"I see", said Claire.
"Look Grieg", said Lexa, "you're losing me now. I had you down as one of those megalomaniac geniuses who come up every so often, trying to use your skills with computers to make yourself rich and powerful, but with all this psychic crap – well, you're obviously barking mad. Next thing you'll be using evil Reiki to strike down your enemies".
Lexa's comments caused a sharp intake of breath from Barry Ryan and all the armed men that Grieg had standing around the room. There was another awkward pause in which she felt it not impossible that she would soon find her body riddled with bullets. Grieg himself just looked at her intently and then smiled indulgently.
"Oh Ms Hackett!" he said. "I forget that you have not been in my presence for that long and so have not yet come round to my way of thinking. I remember when I was making my own breakthroughs in the psychic field, I was astonished that something that seemed like such pseudoscientific nonsense could turn out to be real. But it is real, as the world will soon see when I make the most spectacular demonstration of the uses to which psychic energy can be put".
"What do you mean?" said Lexa.
"Think about it for a bit", said Grieg. "Put aside your scepticism and accept for the moment that what I am saying is true. Now, what have I told you? That I have discovered how to tap psychic energy and that I have discovered how to store it. But what would I be planning to do with all that energy".
"I really haven't the faintest idea", said Lexa.
"It's quite simple. My establishments have been draining people for years. The reservoirs of energy they contain are enormous. And what am I going to do with it all? Why, I am just going to release it".
"That does seem like a bit of a waste of all that effort", said Lexa.
"Oh not at all, Ms Hackett. Think back to the 1940s, when the American scientists discovered how to release the energy contained in the atom. When they released this energy, they did not just pour it down a drain – they used it to destroy cities. It is a bit like that with my psychic reservoirs. When their vast store of energy is released then it will send a psychic shockwave across London. It will incapacitate everyone here for twenty-four hours, apart from those of my people who will be wearing special helmets I have designed to resist such a shockwave. After twenty four hours, the victims will be right as rain again, though I do accept that there will be some fatalities, say from people who are driving when the psychic bomb goes off".
Claire and Lexa did not know what to make of this. On the one hand, it was the most outlandish thing they had ever heard, so it was something that would be easy to dismiss as the ravings of a madman. But Grieg seemed so matter of fact about it all, and seemed to sincerely believe the nonsense he was saying, that maybe, just maybe there was something in it. If so then this new truth was disturbing.
"Alright Grieg", said Claire, after letting his revelation sink in for a few minutes. "For the sake of argument I will accept that what you are saying is true. But why? Surely there are easier ways to demonstrate your psychic breakthroughs?"
"Oh of course, of course, but incapacitating London for twenty-four hours, that provides me with an unparalleled opportunity".
Claire and Lexa now found themselves thinking of a city of people dead to the world with only Grieg and his cronies immune. All kinds of opportunities presented themselves.
"What are you going to do?" said Lexa. "Rob banks, raid art galleries, use this huge disaster you have created as an opportunity to enrich yourself?"
"Oh no, Ms Hackett, nothing so vulgar". Grieg smiled again, now looking almost beatific. "I am not a monster, nor am I a criminal, even though I admit that what I am doing is illegal, at least by the laws now in force. When I said I want to make the world a better place, I was not lying. So I do not want to loot London, I want to conquer it. When people wake up from the coma the psychic bomb engenders, they will find that the Transition is over, that instead my people rule here".
"Now you really are being mental", said Lexa. "We've gone through this building, we know how big it is. Even if everyone here is one of your zombified minions, there is no way that the couple of hundred Grieg Industries employees would be able to rule over a city the size of London".
"Of course not, Ms Hackett. But I have many more bows to my quiver than Grieg Industries. Where did you think the money for all this was coming? I get some from technology investors, but the psychic reservoirs cost far far more to run than this humble technology company. Private investors do not have resources of that kind. But governments do. And a government would be happy to throw money into a project that would allow them to conquer the United Kingdom, particularly if the UK were the last real barrier to their dominance of the Eurasian continent".
"What government are you speaking of?" said Claire, though she already knew the answer.
"Do I have to spell it out, Ms Maguire? If I were to tell you that a vast fleet of airships was even now massing in the North Sea, waiting for the psychic bomb to go off so that they can fly in and take control of first London and then the rest of this country -would you know who I was talking about then?"
"The Zeppelin Confederacy", said Claire, and shuddered.
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