Experiment With Destiny by Stephen Carr Page A

forgotten his chips. “It was a public highway.”
                  “The bodies I took pictures of are not those of the non citizens named here. One was wearing some kind of uniform, another looked more like late forties, early fifties than 21!” Steven gestured at the printout again as Jerry’s chips were deferred to the conference table. “And they say the third victim was a Sally Redmountain, aged 22, no fixed abode, loss of citizenship through repeated drugs offences. The woman I saw was much older…well groomed, well dressed and certainly no waste-dweller.”
                  “Let me look at that!” Jerry snatched the printout. “You’ve got pictures, you say.”
                  “Yes, they’re on my desktop.”
     
                  Jerry’s chips were stone cold by the time Steven left Thomson House for the weekend. It had been decided that Menna would type up the story according to the official police line, the picture of the paramedic aiding the walking wounded from the wrecked bus would be published alongside it. There were only two editions of the Echo on a Saturday – the first and the late extra – and Jerry had given him until Monday morning to dig around for more information about the real identities of the three bodies pulled from the ‘stolen’ government Jaguar.
                  “This could be a cracking yarn,” assured Jerry, slapping him heartily on the back. “Maybe a real big scoop. We can’t afford to jump to conclusions but something ain’t smelling too sweet about this.”
                  “I couldn’t hang on to the pool car over the weekend, could I?” Steven ventured, already knowing the answer.
                  “Bugger off! See you at seven, Monday. Now, where did I put my chips?”
                  Armed with his contacts book and printouts of the JPEG pictures, two of each, Steven made his way along the corridor, down the steps and out through the side lodge into the rain, acknowledging security as he passed. He was tired but excitedly happy. A story like this could provide the platform he needed to make the jump to television, maybe even to International News Broadcasting, the 24-hour state-funded digital news network forged from the ashes of the BBC. That would be an irony…earning a place as a roving reporter for Ted Hallder’s prime time Eurostate Today show on the strength of uncovering a government conspiracy.
                  “This is Steven Elan, reporting for Eurostate Today…” he rehearsed aloud.
                  It was only when he reached the bus station that the first major clue to his conspiracy mystery returned to his attention. It clanked in his coat pocket as he brushed against the neon-lit shelter as he waited for the 10.40pm service to Ely. He pulled it out and examined it in the orange-yellow neon glow. It was a round medal, perhaps made of brass. He remembered picking it up from the roadside where it lay among the sea of glass that had been a Jaguar’s front windscreen. One side bore a semi-relief of the Eurostate circle of twelve stars, each representing one of the federation’s founding member states. Inside the circle was a winged dagger and the words ‘Who Dares Wins’. The other side was inscribed with the words ‘Awarded for exceptional valour in the call of duty’ and then ‘Abamae’. Finally, there was a date – some 20 years had elapsed since this medal had been issued.
     
    * * *

V
     
    STEVEN Elan awoke to a cold flat and the sound of drilling from the road outside. The cold was something to do with the communal heating system being out of sync with Greenwich Mean Time and his landlord’s unfulfilled promises, dating back weeks, to get it sorted. The drilling, he guessed, was something to do with the cabling work for the new closed community opposite. A company called CyberVision was planning some kind of