Tamsin Beech Ch. 13: Bath

Cornwall, 2051.

"We could build a house here overlookin' the entire bay Mrs Beech-Hamnavoe," suggested Hamnavoe.

Jessamy looked up at her new husband, "Stop calling me that. Why build a house? There's plenty of empty ones we could just move into."

They sat, snuggled close in each others' arms on a cliff somewhere near Mullion on the Lizard Peninsula. The sun sparkled on a calm blue sea and before them all of Mount's Bay stretched across the hazy horizon in the far distance. Hamnavoe kissed the top of her blonde stubbled head, "I prefer to build ma own, lass, with ma own hands. A new start. But I think that you, ma wee darlin' should be entitled to whatever the hell ye want after savin' the entire fuckin' planet."

"As I remember we both had a part in that ... Major Banavie."

"Och. Have ye no' put sunblock on yer bonce today JB?"

"No," she answered, "but thanks for your concern. That's why I love you."

"And yer sweet tits is why I love you."

Jessamy punched him in the arm, "Git."

. . .

"TARGET ACQUIRED AND CO-ORDINATES LOCKED IN."

. . .

Jessamy poured herself some coffee from their flask and turned her attention to the view. There was much to be done back at Madron village and a few days camping was likely to be the only honeymoon they'd get. Besides, after six months away from her daughters Phoebe and Ada saving the world, she still had a lot of catching up to do as a mother.

"Ye were fuckin' insatiable last night lass," Hamnavoe observed.

"Cos I know we're going back today," Jessamy grinned. She'd lost track of how many times Hamnavoe had made her orgasm the previous night and guessed that she'd never grow bored of what he could accomplish with his tongue. Her knees ached from crouching on all fours while her new husband serviced her from behind and her nipples stung from where he'd nipped them between his teeth. But it had been amazing ...

A few yards behind them on the muddy track leading down to their clifftop picnic spot, one of Madron's pickups sat loaded up for the hour long drive back.

"Can ye see it from here lass?" Hamnavoe squinted at the coastline across on the western side of the bay.

"What, the village?" Jessamy thought for a moment, "uh, yeah ... that farthest bit is near Lamorna - Penzer Point. Then you've got Mousehole, Newlyn and Paul to the right of that and Penzance is the big flat area where the tsunami hit. Madron is just up the hill inland from that."

. . .

"Thank you Laura. Stand by to fire."

"STANDING BY, CAPTAIN AUBREY."

. . .

Hamnavoe waved as if his step daughters could possibly see him from a distance of some twenty miles across the vastness of the bay, "Hiya Phoebe and Ada - ye wee lassies. An' hiya to all the rest o' JB's smashin' family too."

"You're an arse!" Jessamy grinned.

. . .

"Fire!"

. . .

"Takes one tae know ..."

A painfully bright something bloomed in the middle of the distant coastline. An immense searing white fireball like a nuclear explosion, sending a blast wave of debris and boiling seawater erupting outward in a devastating sphere of destruction.

Seconds later they heard the sound. A dull crack like a lightning strike but amplified a million fold. The ground trembled. A ripple across the surface of the sea grew to become towering whitewater as the shockwave tore across the bay annihilating the tidal island of St Michael's Mount, fishing boats and every village within a five mile radius.

Even at this distance, the wind knocked Jessamy and Hamnavoe clean off their feet, flipped their old Toyota pickup onto its roof and blasted chunks of the granite clifftop away, leaving the air scented with a choking stench of ozone and burning sulphur.

"What the fuck?" Jessamy gasped as she crawled shakily to her feet.

Hamnavoe just stared, unable to find words.

As far as they could tell, what had been left of Penzance and the surrounding area for miles in every direction had been completely vapourised. Obliterated. No ruins, bodies or smoking crater. Heamoor, Gulval, Newlyn and Mousehole were gone. The village of Madron, was simply ... gone.

Jessamy fell to her knees in the mud and screamed until she could scream no more.

CHAPTER THIRTEEN: BATH

Thirteen years later. Tamsin Beech fumed as she draped her sopping wet spare socks over the makeshift clothes line she'd strung across the deserted cottage's kitchen. What else could possibly go wrong? Everything was wet through - their clothes, footwear and what remained of their dried food. Beyond the stained stone walls of the building, the rain continued. A torrential downpour. A biblical deluge that had turned every track into deep, sloshing mud and pushed landslides of debris cascading down onto the roads from the steep slopes of the surrounding hills.

Squatting on the tiled floor beside the meagre fire she'd built, Kim Yeonmi Gylan rotated a skinned and spitted rabbit a quarter turn. Without so much as glancing up, she murmured accusingly, "If you'd been concentrating on your driving instead of whining about your resistance scum friends ... we'd still have transport and be well on the way."

Tamsin had to admit that she'd probably nodded off at the wheel for a few seconds. Following Yeonmi's convoluted directions south around what had once been Manchester and the vast irradiated wasteland of Birmingham, they'd both been utterly exhausted when their BTR-94 armoured personnel carrier had hit a bandits' explosive boobytrap just north of Gloucester. One wheel had been blown clean off, the rusting armour plate down one side buckled beyond repair. It was a wonder they'd both survived with no more than superficial scrapes.

Tamsin shivered as she glowered down at the petite North Korean woman. For the sake of modesty she'd kept her patched thermal underwear on, dripping puddles of water on the mud streaked floor as she moved about. Now she wanted nothing more than to sit close to the fire and warm herself. Being in closer proximity to Yeonmi was all that was stopping her.

Yeonmi. Who'd betrayed their trust in the most callous way and kidnapped their baby son.

"My 'resistance scum friends' that you Coalition cunts murdered you mean?" Tamsin snarled.

Pulling a sleeve down over her hand to avoid being scalded, Yeonmi lifted a hot mess tin of simmering freeze dried noodles from beside the fire. With nimble fingers she picked slivers of meat from the browning rabbit carcass and dropped them in, "It was inevitable. Novaya Nadezhda ... Birmingham ... or whatever you called it ... needed to be eradicated," she looked up at Tamsin, the fire reflecting redly in her dark eyes, "like a nest of plague carrying vermin. A cancer. It was only a matter of time before my brother discovered where they were skulking."

It had been Yeonmi's brother - Kim Napp Gylan, who'd given the order to launch a nuclear attack on the resistance headquarters.

Only by sheer chance had Tamsin and her family escaped death in the subsequent holocaust. She spread her arms wide, "There were families there! Women. And children!"

The week it had taken to travel this far south from Windermere had been an uncomfortable ordeal. Yeonmi still refused to openly reveal the whereabouts of the aircraft carrier Baekdusan and had made no secret of her hatred towards Tamsin. She scoffed as she stirred the broth and gently blew on a sporkful before tasting it, "Children who would eventually grow into enemies of the Coalition. And ... you say that as if all women should be considered delicate and defenceless. Aren't we both proof that's most certainly not the case?"

She had a point. Tamsin sat down heavily with her back against her battered rucksack. When the bandits had attacked their beleagured vehicle in the wilds - not Reivers this time thankfully - they'd been hard pushed to hold them at bay while trying to salvage as much as they could. They'd made their escape under cover of the storm, leaving the valuable APC for scavengers before their attackers could call reinforcements. The ammunition, food and spare clothing contained in two bags had to keep them alive until they reached their destination.

Wherever that turned out to be. And assuming the bandits weren't still hunting them.

"The fucking Coalition's invasion of my country made me what I am," Tamsin shouted, her temper getting the better of her. She angrily slapped the damp floor beside her with the palm of one hand, "I didn't choose to be this person! I'm only standing up for what's right and I won't rest until every last one of you twisted fucks is out of the UK."

Yeonmi calmly slurped at a sporkful of steaming rabbit and noodle broth, "But at one point weren't you going to marry my brother?"

That had been the plan. Why Tamsin had been kidnapped from Berwick Upon Tweed and kept prisoner on the island of Lindisfarne in the first place. Tamsin sneered, shaking her head, "My grandfather's idea. Not mine."

Yeonmi ate in silence for a minute. Then looked up with hate filled eyes, "So you decided to murder him instead?"

It had been a spur of the moment reaction. Back on Kerrera over a year earlier. She hadn't been going to give up without a fight. Making the most of the North Korean leader's momentary distraction, Tamsin had snatched up her axe and spun around towards him. She remembered screaming as the pain in her injured arm and knee threatened to overwhelm her. Then with a single blow, Kim Napp Gylan's head had left his shoulders and hit the road with a dull crack.

She held Yeonmi's gaze, "Self defence. But ... weren't YOU going to assassinate my grandfather - the president?"

Yeonmi stirred the broth and ate some more. There would easily be enough to provide them both with a much needed hot meal.

They were both tired, stressed, cold and hungry. But Tamsin had to admit the other woman's reflexes had still been scarily quick. One moment they'd been walking into Brimscombe, on the outskirts of the deserted Cotwold town of Stroud searching for shelter in which to dry off. The next, Yeonmi had raised her weapon and blasted a rabbit that had peeked out at them for no more than a moment from an overgrown hedgerow.

A single bullet straight through the eye ...

Yeonmi wiped her narrow chin as a dribble of broth dripped off her spork, "That's irrelevant now. Good that the union never happened. I wouldn't want my family's bloodline tainted by the likes of a Zakhvatchikov. Dangsin eun muji han nongmin sonyeo ipnida ..."

Fuck these North Koreans. Why couldn't they have the decency to speak English? Or at the very least, Russian, thought Tamsin, "Isn't it already tainted? Your own daughter is President Zakhvatchikov's."

Yeonmi didn't respond to that. Any mention of her daughter Jag-eun Neugdae - Little Wolf, was a taboo subject. The daughter who was hopefully safely back in Fort George by now, with Leonid Denisovich and their own son Angus.

Tamsin's nostrils flared, "And besides ... I'm not a fucking Zakhvatchikov. I'm a Beech."

Yeonmi clenched her teeth as she stared murderously at Tamsin in the gloom. They both knew that Jag-eun Neugdae was effectively no more than a hostage of the resistance. An insurance policy to persuade Yeonmi to reveal the Baekdusan's whereabouts.

"You can deny it all you like ..." maintaining eye contact, Yeonmi spat in the remaining broth, "but you're still half Russian. Japjong."

Then slowly, deliberately, Yeonmi extended the arm holding the mess tin of broth, and upended it over the fire - extinguishing the flames in a cloud of fragrant steam.

"Now ... if you're not eating, I suggest we get some sleep."

. . .

A week earlier ...

"OPEN THE GATE! IT'S ONE OF OURS!"

With a squeal of rusting metal, the portcullis in Fort George's sallyport was cranked open, allowing Leonid Denisovich to drive their last remaining GAZ Tigr quickly inside. At once, men and women spread out along the rampart above to scan the approach road from Ardersier for any sign of pursuit in the approaching blizzard.

But there was none. The reason for Leonid's haste soon became apparent however when the Russian screeched to a halt and clambered out. The wailing of two hungry infants strapped securely into the back seats pierced the early afternoon quiet.

"What happened?" called Ross, emerging from the barrack blocks with Merida trotting along close behind, "where's Tamsin? Where's Yeonmi?"

Merida looked frantic, "Leo! Where the fuck is my daughter?"

Leonid raised a hand, "Give me a minute. Please. The children are both hungry. They need feeding."

"Children?" Merida frowned.

Leonid nodded, "Angus and Jag-eun Neugdae. They were fed a few hours ago. But they've both been screaming like this since Aviemore."

Merida hurried over to the Tigr, shouting orders to another of the fort's women, "Bring blankets. And see if you can find one of our breast feeding mothers."

Ross urgently gripped Leonid's arm with his one hand, "Is my daughter alright?"

Leonid regarded Tamsin's father in silence for a moment, "She's fucking stubborn and, uh ... sumasshedshiy?"

"Crazy?" Ross supplied, raising an eyebrow.

Leonid nodded, "Da. Crazy. But yes. She's alright."

From the barrack block's covered walkway nearby, Tamsin's cousin, Phoebe Beech watched the reunion in silence.

. . .

Somewhere near Derriford Hospital, Plymouth ...

Jessamy Beech stamped on the GAZ Tigr's brakes as she heard the unmistakable sounds of gunfire from somewhere up ahead. The worn tyres slewed across the ice covered tarmac until the vehicle came to a complete standstill. She guessed whoever it was doing the shooting was so wrapped up in their own business they hadn't even heard the Tigr's engine.

Scavengers? She had no idea what might have happened to the balance of power in Plymouth once she'd disposed of Jack Aubrey and the HMS Poseidon years earlier and was therefore reluctant to get involved.

But then again, if the very people she'd come to see were in trouble, what better way to get in their good books? Jessamy grabbed her AK12 from the passenger seat and checked the magazine was full. Then she restarted the engine and steered the vehicle carefully forward at walking speed.

. . .

The downpour continued for two more days. Tamsin Beech and Yeonmi stayed out of one another's way as much as possible - building small fires in the cottage in Brimscombe from the sad remains of broken furniture in order to dry out their clothes and keep warm. Even their sleeping bags were wet through.

Tamsin pondered the wisdom of her decision as she dismantled her Grach and AK12 to clean them. Sending Leonid back to Scotland with Jag-eun Neugdae effectively their prisoner. As much as Yeonmi loathed the situation she knew she'd be unlikely to see her baby daughter again if anything untoward happened to her travelling companion.

Tamsin was holding a tiger by the tail. But once the North Korean had led her to the Coalition's last remaining warship and their entire nuclear arsenal, what then? Not for the first time, Tamsin wished Leonid or her parents were around to offer their advice.

The heavy rain turned to sleet. And the sleet turned to snow as the temperature plummeted. The two women hunted separately in the hills surrounding Stroud - keeping a watchful eye out for the bandits they'd encountered as well as on one another. After Yeonmi's blatant refusal to cooperate in anything whatsoever, they each prepared just enough food to feed themselves and ate in separate rooms - alone with their thoughts.

Tamsin considered the obvious risk that Yeonmi might sneak away at night, to make her own way to the Baekdusan or even north again to rescue her daughter. Or simply slit her throat while she slept. The woman was a trained assassin after all. As a precaution, Tamsin kept her handgun loaded and close by at all times.

Where was the Baekdusan? Having spent most of her life in the north or Scotland, Tamsin's knowledge of the south was sketchy at best. But there must only be a few harbours big enough and deep enough to take something that size she reasoned.

They'd been heading roughly south, but most definitely not in a straight line. Yeonmi had been directing them on a seemingly random course, zigzagging their way down from Cumbria as if consciously striving to keep the carrier's location a secret for as long as possible.

And one woman against an entire warship of vengeful North Koreans armed with nuclear weapons. Honestly, what chance did she stand? Tamsin could travel back to Fort George and alert the resistance, but what use would that be? The Baekdusan would simply be gone again by the time they mustered enough people to launch an attack.

One thing was certain. Tamsin could sense it as clearly as she could feel the chill wind through the bare branches of Brimscombe's stunted oak trees. Either she or Yeonmi would be dead before this thing was over ...

. . .

"So Tamsin is forcing Yeonmi to lead her to the Baekdusan?" Ross asked. While Angus and Jag-eun Neugdae were taken away to be fed and changed, the others had gathered in Fort George's mess hall. Phoebe, Finlayson and a dozen more.

Leonid clutched a battered tin mug of hot herbal tea. He'd explained how they'd encountered raiding parties of Reivers and finally managed to track down Yeonmi and the babies in the town of Windermere, "I can see her logic. If we'd let Yeonmi go we'd never find out where it's hidden. If we'd killed her or brought her back, we'd never find out where it's hidden."

"But what's she planning to do when they get there?" asked Merida, "take on the Coalition's flagship single handed?"

Leonid shrugged, "She didn't think that far ahead. Yeonmi won't betray our whereabouts while we have her daughter, Jag-eun Neugdae here. I'm not comfortable using a baby as a hostage but as far as I can see there's no alternative."

"Yeonmi is only one voice unfortunately. Whoever's in charge of the Baekdusan and its nukes might not have any qualms about blasting all of us," Ross leaned back in his chair.

Leonid looked uneasy, "Uh ... that's the other thing. Yeonmi is ... Kim Napp Gylan's sister."

Ross and Merida exchanged a look. Gasps of shock sounded from the others gathered in the room.

"So I'm guessing that's why Yeonmi kidnapped baby Angus?" Merida chewed her lip, "revenge for Tamsin killing her brother?"

Leonid nodded, "I don't know how much authority that'll give her, being their dead commander in chief's sister. She might be welcomed back with open arms, and then again she might not."

Ross shook his head, "Any idea which direction they took?"

"South."

Ross blew out his breath, "South? They could be anywhere. And the Baekdusan could be anywhere. Jessamy's still out searching for her youngest daughter Ada, so maybe she's had better luck. I can't imagine how this might play out, so in the meantime ... I think we should start preparing to evacuate."

"To where?" called the fort's original inhabitant, the old man Finlayson, "ye just said yersel' ... the west coast is full o' fuckin' Reivers. And so's the north west. It's the middle o' winter and we've wee 'uns. We don't have enough vehicles or supplies, so we cannae just up sticks an' move out now, lad. An' besides, this is our home now. It's my home."

Ross closed his eyes, not knowing what else to say.

Leonid Denisovich looked at the old Scot for long seconds. Then finally nodded in agreement. Whatever Tamsin was planning, they had to trust that she'd make the right choice.

. . .

Plymouth, with its sprawling naval dockyards as a prime target, had been decimated by the Luftwaffe's bombs during the Second World War. During the 1950s and 60s it had been virtually rebuilt from scratch - the magnificent Georgian townhouses and cosy Victorian terraces replaced by acres and acres of concrete.

Only the Barbican and Plymouth Hoe had survived that first calamity almost unscathed. Sutton Harbour and the Mayflower Steps from where the Pilgrim Fathers had reputedly set sail for the new world (before it was discovered that there'd been a cholera epidemic in the city at the time and that their last landfall had actually been Newlyn in neighbouring Cornwall), the Royal Citadel and the red and white striped lighthouse of Smeaton's Tower.