This is a work of fiction any resemblance to anyone alive or dead is unintentional.

There was enormous distraction in the room, filled with pictures, wall hangings, painted ceilings and gilt covered furniture. In the antiques market, there must have been thousands if not millions of pounds of stock in this one room alone.

Despite my enjoyment of this distraction, I tried to centre down on the job in hand. I began to survey the room for places where I could hide a bomb. The one which nearly killed Maggie Thatcher in Brighton, was planted weeks ahead in a video recorder.

There were not that many, save for a few French made cupboards, which I suspect were Louis XlV, or thereabouts. Dad was always better at these things than I am. When I began poking about around them a furious young man came running up to me.

“Hey lady, keep away from those. They are private property of Her Majesty.”

“Who are you?”

“I’m Gavin Spencer, from Her Majesty’s housekeeping and furniture section.” He was a caricature of a gay man. Dressed immaculately, he made me feel scruffy and I was wearing a Chanel suit. He flounced and lisped all over me. It was embarrassing.

“So who are you?” He flounced at me. I pointed at my ID badge. “Captain Jamie Curtis, SIS/RMP. Category: 00” He read out aloud. “Ooh, what does all this mean?”

“What it says, Special Intelligence Service with double O category.”

“What like double O seven?” He asked mouth agape.

“The same.”

“I thought that was just Ian Fleming’s bit of nonsense. License to kill and all that stuff.”

“Think again.” I hissed at him.

“Oh my God,” he gasped to himself, “I’ve just met Jane Bond, licensed to kill. Oh my God. This is amazing.” He was twittering to himself, drawing attention to us, and getting up my nose.

“Gavin, when were these cupboards last inspected?”

“They are checked and polished every week, why is there a problem?” He stood with one hand on his hip and the other on his cheek. It was as much as I could do not to laugh.

“I’m just doing my job, making sure they aren’t containing a bomb or similar device.”

“Oh my God, that would be sacrilege. These are Louis XlV, they’re priceless.” He turned pale at my question. “That would be so uncouth.”

“Terrorists tend to be a little on the vulgar side, they kill people as well as damage old bits of furniture.” I said deliberately touching his precious antiques.

“Ooh how awful! I hope you shoot them all.” He produced a clean white hankie and began polishing where I had touched his precious furniture.

“Is there any way we can do a quick check to make sure there are no nasty bombs in them?”

“Ooh, I don’t know about that,” he lisped.

“Have it your way, but don’t blame me if one of your precious cupboards gets blown up.” I said miming something blowing up. His expression was priceless, his mouth fell open and he nearly burst into tears. Much more of this and should need to find a toilet.

“Oh alright then, but I shall touch the furniture, you just look.”

“Fine by me Gavin, let’s get going.” We set off and began the long haul of opening and checking each one of the cabinets. I didn’t expect to find anything, and thus wasn’t disappointed, but it was better than standing around. About an hour later, we had finished and another security officer came up and told me to move to my station, the VIPs would be here within the hour.

More standing around, my feet and back were aching. I watched the man sat in the gallery in front of the high windows. He must have been over twenty feet above us. He wasn’t moving and the angle of his posture looked uncomfortable. There was something not right about him, or the way he was sitting.

I walked over to another security man. “Who’s that up there?” I asked, “He looks very uncomfortable.”

“Dunno.” He answered then spoke over his mini radio. “Captain Curtis is concerned about some guy in the gallery. She thinks he’s fallen asleep.” I heard him laugh and supposed that the person he was talking to, was also laughing. I turned on my heel in disgust.

I spotted Gavin, wiping a soft cloth on one of his Louis cabinets. “Gavin, be a love and help me,” I said to him.

“Just let me wipe this. Look, some pleb has left bloody finger prints all over this.”

“Gavin, please.” I implied urgency in my tone.

“Ooh, alright then. What do you want me to do?” he asked standing upright.

“How do I get up there?” I asked pointing at the gallery.

“What do you want to go up there for, you’ll get a much better view down here?”

“Gavin, I need to go up there, now.” I emphasised the ‘now’, then added, “Please.”

“If you must, follow me.” He minced off at a sedate pace, which quickened when I told him we needed to run. I followed him up and down corridors of wainscoting bedecked with portraits of goodness knows who. Some with lights fitted before them, others without. Some were very large, others much smaller. As we hurried along I began to think there was something very wrong with the man in the gallery.

“Up here,” he said as he turned abruptly up a narrow flight of stairs, they were stone and our footsteps echoed. “Not long now.” He puffed as we reached the top. “Round here.” He was about to move off, when I grabbed him and pulled him back. “Watch the suit, Miss,” he began to squeak.

“Shush.” I hissed at him. “There’s something not right here.” I felt the presence of evil, now very strongly. I pushed him behind me, why I wasn’t sure, except I didn’t really feel he’d be much use if anything started. Who was I trying to kid? I couldn’t knock the skin off a rice pudding either, but I was supposed to be the security officer here, not him.

We crept forward, now only about fifteen feet from the man in the gallery. He was slumped forward in his chair. He was either ill or unconscious. I approached him very warily, feeling his neck, he was cold and with no pulse. He was dead and had been so for some time. The clown I had spoken to earlier was waving to us from the floor below.

“So captain,” he sneered over my transceiver , “is there anything wrong with him?”

“No.” I replied, “He’s probably the fittest looking corpse I’ve ever seen.”

“Corpse!” shrieked Gavin, and promptly fell into a faint.

“Isn’t life just too wonderful!” I thought to myself. I now have a corpse and a casualty.

“What’s going on up there?” came a new voice, one I recognised from earlier, the man in charge, or thought he was.

“We have someone who appears to have died and a palace monkey who has just fainted.”

“Is that you Curtis?”

“Yes, sir.”

“What the hell are you doing up there? I’ll deal with you later.”

“I think you need to deal with our recently departed colleague first.” I bent down to read his name from his ID badge. It was then I noticed the wire. It was barely perceptible and I only saw it because it caught the sunlight. It was as fine as a hair. In fact, I first thought it was a hair. But on closer inspection, it was too long and taut.

“Sir, I think we may have a small problem.” I said down my microphone.

“Don’t be ridiculous.” Came the response.

“This man is wired.”

“Of course he is, the same as the rest of us.”

“No sir, wired as in bomb.”

“If you are pissing me about Curtis, you will be on a bomb. I guarantee it.”

“This is no joke, sir. I can see a fine wire running from his body.”

“Keep still woman, I’ll get someone straight up there.” I also heard him talking off mike. “Bloody idiot woman thinks she’s found a bomb. Time of the month I expect. What are women doing in here anyway?” “One of them is a Queen and the other a President,” someone replied, which made me smile.

The floor below looked a long way down. There was now much more activity. I presumed they were considering where else they could hold the reception. I wondered about this human bomb. It was too far away to do much damage, but it could cause panic and pandemonium, and perhaps cause a dropping of our guard to enable a shot at the president or Her Majesty, or maybe there were other bombs.

I glanced down at Gavin, he was coming to. He looked very pale, I hoped he wasn’t going to be sick. The rush of multiple feet meant the cavalry had arrived. Three agents rushed in. I pointed out the wire. The one in charge, whistled through his teeth. “Christ woman, you must have wonderful eyesight. Looks like you are right though. Commander, we have a situation here, looks like a device, and I can confirm we need a body bag.”

I heard a reply that sounded like ‘duck’, but by now I was trying to get Gavin to his feet and back downstairs.

“Well done, Gav, you might well have saved the day and all these wonderful bits and pieces.”

“What do you mean?” he asked somewhat groggily.

“The bomb you spotted up there.”

“Bomb!” he gasped, “What bomb?” Then collapsed again. I managed to help him slump into a chair. It looked old and probably valuable. I hoped he wouldn’t be sick, but that was his problem, mine was now to try and work out what the hell was going on. Was all this related to the plot we had uncovered or a separate one. Who was responsible? Who was the agent they had killed and was he involved or just unfortunate?

I stood to one side as a screen was brought up to hide what was happening, followed shortly by lots of sandbags, and eventually someone in heavy protective clothing. Presumably, the bomb disposal man. Sooner him than me.

This was all getting so convoluted, or was it. If there were separate groups involved, all oblivious of the other’s actions, it would make more sense than just one doing several distractions before the main event tomorrow. Surely that would just cause everything to tighten up. Or would it? Would they consider the safest place to be the US Embassy, and bring forward the attack? If that was so, things were getting even more desperate.

I made my way down to the reception room. Why did I have this strong sense of evil? Noises off meant the president was arriving. I glanced around the room once more, the American secret service guys were rushing in. I watched as they went through their paces. Then my blood froze. One of them was Oliver. Surely not? He looked straight at me and gave me a lurid smile. It was him. “Oh shit!” I thought,” how many times have I got to zap him so he stays zapped?”

I’m sure, someone must have wished me, ‘an interesting life’. It couldn’t get much more complicated, unless the Devil himself, appeared. Obviously, in his absence, we had Oliver. Just how had he managed to infiltrate the US secret service? Don’t answer that, I think we all know. New question, ‘How do I deal with him now, in front of all these people, plus the world’s press stroke media? Was he on his own? Was he involved with the bomb up in the gallery? My intuition thought he was. Why was a magickal group using bombs? This was all getting too much. I knew I should have stayed in bed.

I began to feel his evil presence trying to affect me, it began as a sense of nausea, with a choking sensation in my throat. I threw a wall of light and fire around myself. The sensation eased. I knew the next attack would be worse and I would fend it off, then they would escalate and so would my defences. What were they hoping for, me to set off the bomb? Could that be it? Provoke me into throwing so much energy around that the bomb detonated, and then in the confusion……what? What were they going to do? Kill me, or the president or the Queen, or even the PM? There seemed only more and more questions. The truth was, I had no idea, except that I needed to deal with Oliver more subtly than I would normally. This was making the big assumption that I could deal with him. Were any of his creators here, too? If so, would they be helping him?

With my shield of light around me, I couldn’t scan the other people in the room. Maybe that was the plan, tie me up in a battle of the psychics and then someone else I would normally spot, pops up and pops off one or all of the VIPs. Simple and dreadful. But was I only daydreaming?

Oliver began to up the ante, as I knew he would. Along the floor marched an army of ants. They were about six inches long and there were thousands of them marching towards me. Normally, I’d flip into Sekhmet form and give them a quick sun tan. Given the bomb upstairs, this now seemed a less than good idea. As the insect army clomped, yes clomped, their way towards me, I imagined a glass chute into which they all marched. The glass then curved its way back to Oliver. I was tempted to run it into his trousers, but it was time to be more serious.

As the ants dropped off the chute above him, they disappeared. I seemed to be the only one who could see all this going on. We were fighting the battle of the thought forms.

I set a lioness in each corner, they were microscopic until I gave the command to grow. It was becoming like a psychic chess match. What would he do next? I waited, I needed him to move towards a corner and one of my girls. He wasn’t moving anywhere, damn.

I moved away from his line of vision, behind a very large cabinet. The world’s media were filling up the assembled chairs. I needed a distraction. I imagined one of the reporters tripping over a carpet and knocking some others over as well. It happened, Oliver glanced at the melee and I was gone. I slipped through the door and walked as fast as I could down the corridor towards the door at the other end of the reception room. A US secret service man, stopped me as Her Majesty and the President, accompanied by the PM were processing up the corridor towards me.

Suddenly Oliver emerged from the room, saw the processing VIPs and hurled something at them. Everyone seemed to stop, I imagined he had hurled a feather and it became so. He quickly scanned around him as his colleagues hurled themselves upon him. He just threw them off. Others shepherded the VIPs into a side room.

I imagined time stopping. It was going to be a difficult one, requiring some multitasking. I needed to see a clock with a stationary second hand, at the same time call up the heavy brigade. Oliver advanced towards me, so he didn’t see the lioness leap upon him from behind.

He dealt with her, and although torn and bleeding continued his advance towards me. I was working on a vortex just in front of me, which was hidden by just the carpet and a layer of light Oliver would not be able to perceive. He walked on towards my trap. Another lioness jumped him, but he stopped her before any contact was made.

“You’re slipping Jamie,” he called at me, smiling.

I had erected another firewall before me, hoping it would work like one on a computer and keep out nasties. It did until he got within a few feet of me. Then I felt his horrible energy, it hit me in the solar plexus and I fell backwards, as if kicked by a mule. Despite the pain, I had to maintain my time stopping concentration. No one else was moving or even aware of what was happening.

I crawled away backwards pretending I was more hurt than I really was. Oliver took the one step too many and disappeared into the vortex. I sealed it and cleaning up the mess, ran the clock backwards. Once more I was stopped by the secret service agent, but this time the VIPs were unhindered. The PM and his American guest both saw me and smiled.

Now I was able to talk my way past the security and observe the room. I began scanning the assembled throng as they were addressed by the politicians and the monarch. She was quite remarkable for someone in their eighties.

I picked up on a man sat right at the back of the press seats. He had a mobile phone out. This was against all the protocols of such an occasion, did anyone else see him. I saw him press the keys and the person next to him, gestured for him to put it away. He ignored his neighbour’s instruction, which was becoming ever more insistent. The tussle between them continued culminating in the neighbour snatching away the phone. It was like two choirboys squabbling in the stalls, trying not to draw attention to themselves. I saw the blade flash and the neighbour screamed and collapsed in a writhing heap, blood spurting from his neck. A secret service man fired once and the attacker fell dead. It was some shot.

Once more the VIPs were shepherded away by security men. The place was buzzing. I moved towards the stab victim, someone was trying to staunch his injury, with not too much success. I called upon my Lady to spare him, and saw the blood flow stop, and although unconscious he was still alive. The mobile phone he had confiscated was examined by another secret service agent.

“Be careful with that, I reckon he was trying to detonate the bomb above us in the gallery.” I said this quietly to the agent, there was already too much movement and restlessness.

“What?” he hissed at me.

“Up there,” I indicated with my eyes to the screen on the gallery, “there is a device, which I hope they have neutralised, but just in case don’t press anything.”

“You reckon this is the signal.” He said, showing me the phone.

“Why else would anyone be wanting to make a call during something like this?”

“Taking a photo for his family?”

“Is it a camera phone?” I asked.

“No it isn’t,” he replied examining the instrument in his hands. “It’s a very basic phone, especially for a reporter. I’d have expected a something better.” I nodded my agreement.

The body had been removed, and was being searched. Apart from a security pass, he had no identifier upon him. The rest of the public and press group were now buzzing and wanting to get off and file their copy. Thankfully none of them had twigged what was going on. But they had a story to write up and the wires would be buzzing.

We had demanded they not use mobiles until permission was given, citing some sensitive surveillance equipment which would be damaged by them. For some reason they accepted the instruction. A wave from the gallery, meant the bomb was defused and the mobile ban was lifted. The first one to use their phone caused a small bang up in the gallery, which caused some to turn around, but the story of an assassination attempt at the palace. Well, that was story enough.

“How did you know about the bomb?” asked my companion.

“They discovered it just before the VIPs arrived.”

“And they let the reception take place?” he was horrified.

“It was all under control,” I said tersely.

“You have gotta be joking,” exclaimed my associate.

“Did the bomb detonate?” I asked, to which he shook his head. “Well then, how much more did you want?”

“But someone got stabbed, possibly fatally….”

“He’ll survive.” I said optimistically.

“Thank you, Dr Kildare.”
“I mean it, I used to be a nurse.”

“Did you now?” He paused for a moment and I was unable to guess what he was thinking. I half expected him to be considering, ‘nurses as swingers’ instead he said,

“Why the career change?”

“I couldn’t stand all the sex and violence,” I said. His face was a picture.

Computers were flashing details of the dead man around the world, searching databases for anything which might identify him. The president was safe for the moment. I needed some fresh air. As I walked towards the door I was accosted by Mr Acland. “Just what I need!” I sighed to myself.

“Ah Captain Curtis, just the person…” he caught my arm and led me off into an alcove. “Good work earlier Curtis, I’ve been asked to tell you to contact your office. Oh and I think they want you to go to the US Embassy.”

I nearly jumped for joy. If I could get in there, I might be able to make a difference. On the other hand, were Oliver or his creators involved with the embassy? If so, it could be the last place I needed to be. Life continued to be interesting.