Chapter six

Published: Aug 25, 2026 by

Lily felt the van decelerating, unable to see what was happening due to the hood over her head she was listening out for as much as possible to determine where she was being taken. There was a short and faint screech of tyres against the tarmac as it came to a complete stop. The next noise was the two back doors of the van opening. She felt the hands of the escorts help her up and out of the vehicle. Together, they walked a few steps and entered a building, the noise of her shoe heels changing to a more solid click as they stepped over the threshold and onto a solid, and probably highly polished, floor.

They followed a long straight corridor, before coming to a stop. A short pinging sound, followed by the sound of doors sliding open, indicated they had arrived at an elevator. They stepped forward, Lily still being guided by her handlers. Once they were in, one of them released her right arm and there was the sound of six beeps, followed by a longer positive sounding beep. Probably a six digit pin code, Lily thought to herself. The elevator started moving down at a fast pace and took at least ten seconds before it stopped again. Another six beeps sounded, followed by the longer positive sounding tone once more. The sound of the metallic elevator doors sliding open sounded once more. The hand returned to her right arm and gently encouraged her forward along with the other hand on her left arm.

After a few steps, she heard the elevator doors sliding shut once more.

The trio stood still now. Someone else lifted the hood from Lily’s head. She blinked as her eyes adjusted to the harsh, bright LED lights on the ceiling above her. The hands holding her steady were released and she stepped forward instinctively, away from the two people that had been guiding her.

The room was small and square, more of a corridor or lobby. The walls and ceilings were plain white, with a dark coloured flooring. There were no windows. The only real feature of the room was the double doors ahead of her. She took another step forward towards the doors, looking back over her shoulder seeing the two guards that had escorted her here, along with a third who was standing guarding the elevator doors. None of them moved, standing at ease with their arms behind their backs.

Turning back towards the double doors, Lily stepped forward again and gently pushed open one of the doors with her right hand. It swung freely, revealing the next room ahead of her. This room was as big as a warehouse. The same white walls and ceiling, with the same bright and artificial LED lights were lighting the space, except the floor was much lower. A metal staircase led along the side wall of the space, down from the double doors to the floor. The wall opposite the doors was like one giant television screen, probably made up of several large screens wired together in a matrix to create the illusion of a massive single screen. It showed a large digital clock, each second ticking away. There were several desks around the edges of the room, each with their own four screens, just like the screens in her own office. Various people were sitting at the desks looking over arrays of data and graphs on the screens, Lily recognising fellow academics when she saw them, working on solving some urgent problem. They ignored Lily as she entered the room and walked down the staircase, concentrating on their task at hand.

In the centre of the room was a large, long mahogany conference table. All the seats were taken, with the exception of one chair nearest the staircase and furthest from the video wall. The person sitting at the opposite end of the table stood up and adjusted his horn-rimmed glasses. He was in his late fifties or early sixties, with a full head of black hair, but greying around the temples. He was wearing a smart navy blue suit, with an id card hanging from a black lanyard around his neck. It was too far away for Lily to read his name.

“Miss Kortuga, welcome. Please take your seat and we can begin.” the man standing up motioned with his right hand towards the empty chair at the opposite end of the table.

Unsure what to do or what was going on, Lily politely took her seat at the table, the rest of the table’s attendants turning to look at her as she sat down. They turned back to face the man as he took his seat once more.

“Ok, we are ready to begin the call.” The man said, pointing his index finger towards one of the technical staff at the edge of the room.

The huge video wall flickered to life, the clock disappearing and replaced with a new interface. A ‘Leave’ button appeared at the top right of the screen, indicating they had connected to a video call. One by one, various other callers joined the call, filling the screen with the boxes getting smaller and smaller as more of them joined. Lily looked at one of the boxes in more detail. The person staring down at her from the video wall seemed oddly familiar. The smart suit and well styled hair as well as the friendly, charming, smile was instantly recognisable. The Union Jack flag draped in the background confirmed her suspicions, but she read the name at the bottom of the box to double check it was who she thought it was.

It read “Charles Devan-Smithe - UK Prime Minister”.

She looked around the rest of the faces on the screen, recognising the other world leaders that she knew from the news, reading the names again to confirm they were who she thought they were. There must have been over fifty world leaders on the same call.

“I believe that we are all here now. Let’s get down to business.” The man opposite Lily at the head of the table spoke. “Miss Kortuga, please provide your brief.”

All of the people sat at the table and all of the faces on the screen were all looking at her expectantly, waiting for her to talk.

“Sorry, my brief?” Lily asked shyly, before going quiet. The whole room remained silent for what felt like an eternity. Finally someone spoke.

“This is Charles Devan-Smithe, UK Prime Minister. Don’t worry Miss Kotuga, I will take it from here.” Charles said, his charisma and calmness soothed the attendees as they all looked back towards the screen as he spoke. “There was an explosion outside an office block on the outskirts of Slough at eight thirty five GMT this morning. We are still investigating the cause of the explosion. We cannot confirm or deny that the source of the blast was from an extra terrestrial origin, which is where Miss Kortuga and her team come in. Once they have made their analysis they will be more than happy to share their findings with everyone on this call.”

“Thank you Prime Minister. May I suggest we adjourn this call for now and rejoin at 10am for the next update.” The man at the head of the table spoke clearly and confidently in his monotone voice.

The various heads on the screens nodded in agreement, the people sat at the polished wooden conference table nodded back in agreement. The man at the head of the table nodded to someone sitting at one of the nearby desks and the conference call ended. The video wall turned off, before being replaced with the clock displaying once more. It read 09:15:03. Less than 45 minutes until the call resumed.

The people sitting at the table slowly stood up and walked away from the conference table, some heading towards the desks, others heading for a small kitchen space just off to the left of the video wall where they formed an orderly queue for the coffee machines.

Lily stayed sitting down, unsure what she was supposed to do. She looked back at the table and saw that the man at the head of the table was the only other person still sitting at the table. He had a stern look on his face, as if he was making up his mind over something. He scratched his clean shaven chin for a moment before standing and walking over towards Lily. She hoped he would walk right past her, but instead he sat down in the now empty chair next to her.

He held his hand out for Lily to shake as he introduced himself, “Rodger Harrison. I’m the coordinator at this place. We call it the bunker. Unoriginal, but it does what it says on the tin.”

Lily shook Rodgers hand politely and introduced herself. “Lily Kortuga. I work at the National Organisation for Space and Extraterrestrial Exploration.”

“Yes, I know.” Rodger smiled back. “I’ve been here a few years now and I can tell a few things about people. If you don’t mind me saying so, you seemed a bit like a rabbit in the headlights just now. I’m going to be blunt with you and tell you what I’m thinking. You don’t know where you are or why you are here, do you?”

Lily smiled a friendly smile back at him, trying to fake confidence, but had to stop smiling and admit it was true. “No, sorry, I have no idea where I am and why I am here. I just work in a monitoring station.”

The man’s smile faded for a second and he looked down at the table top as he gathered his thoughts. Raising his head to look at Lily, he started speaking again. “That’s ok Lily. Sometimes the chain of communication gets a little fragmented between the various agencies and departments. It’s just the way the government works. Do you know when Professor Rang will be available?”

“Professor Rang? No, he left the agency a long time ago. I’ve been working here for almost a decade and he left before I started.” Lily replied with confusion showing in her voice.

Rodger’s friendly smile turned into a look of sudden disappointment. He breathed in deeply and breathed out a sigh. “Ten years, huh? We really need to get on top of these communication issues. Ok, what can you tell me? Anything different happen this morning? Anything unexpected?”

Lily thought back to the ringing noise of the alarm coming from the secret room in their office and the equipment they discovered. Someone hid it very well. She didn’t even know about it after working at the agency for a decade, so there must be a really good reason for it to remain hidden.

It was Lily’s turn to take in a deep breath this time. She let out the breath slowly and calmed her nerves before she began. “First things first, Rodger. I need to know where I am, who you and all these people are and why we were on a conference call with fifty of the world’s leaders. How do I know you are who you say you are? How do I know you aren’t some rogue foreign agency that has kidnapped me against my will and faked this room full of people just to get some confidential information out of me?”

Lily suddenly realised she was speaking loudly and gesticulating wildly with her hands as she spoke. The rest of the room had gone silent and was looking at the two of them.

Rodger looked intensely at Lily, a discerning look on his face. He breathed in lightly through his nose and raised an eyebrow.

“Now those are the right questions to be asking.” Rodger smiled proudly back at Lily. He stood up and motioned to a desk in the corner of the room, next to the video wall. “Let’s get the introductions done and the security issues resolved, then we can start working.” he said as he walked over towards the desk.