Seen And Not Seen: The Veil, #1

By William Bowden

How far is humanity willing to go to preserve its way of life?

In the End there are only Beginnings.

The Veil, a mysterious organization playing all sides, has deposited evidence of a terrible calamity at the United Nations—but is it a horrifying crime against humanity, or a terrifying weapon?

A clandestine agency seeks to find out and fast, unaware that the answer lies at the center of one man's dramatic spiral into an abyss of despair and mania, already playing out on the world stage.

Seen And Not Seen is a technological thriller set in the near future, telling of a world that needs to face up to its stretched resources, a bold endeavor to preserve our way of life, and the dark road that some elements of the Human Race would have us take.

That which is seen is fleeting. It is the unseen that remains forever.

• Language: English
• Publisher: William Bowden
• Release date: Dec 27, 2016
• ISBN: 9781386658535

William Bowden

William Bowden is a British Science Fiction author. He lives near the city of Bristol and when not writing rules over his unruly garden.

Book preview

sans title

Self-published by William Bowden in 2016

Text Copyright © 2016 William Bowden

All Rights Reserved

The right of William Bowden to be identified as the author has been asserted by him in accordance with sections 77 and 78 of the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988.

This is a work of fiction. All characters in this work are fictitious and any resemblance to any real person, living or dead, is purely coincidental.

Cover art by Vladimir Arndt/ PiXXart/ Shutterstock.com

SEEN

The lush green canopy and bright colors of what presents itself as a most peculiar jungle appear almost black in the still twilight, the giant leaves and fronds of the megaflora sopping wet from the rain cycle just ended. And amidst it all, nothing stirs, no insect, bird or animal—not even the machines tasked with its maintenance.

No animal save for the two of them, that is, their vantage point a clearing of neatly clipped grass glistening with a uniform sheen of water droplets in the fading dusk.

A deceptively young-looking couple, their complexion as much a misdirection as their retro-Edwardian garb, a century-old style reinvented for some supposed modern era, with only the subtlest of tailoring to reflect gender, given the practical trouser style, the hems soaked through from the wet lawn.

A veritable garden of Eden, the man says, a chirpiness to his aristocratic English accent. Creation reimagined?

They see, and they do not see, sighs the woman, her heavy European lilt laboring over the lament. And I see only the folly of Man.

"Of Man or of men? It is said that the female of the species is more deadly than the male."

The species of which we find ourselves part? asks the woman, raising her eyebrows to counter what she considers to be an attempt at inappropriate jocularity.

I believe the debate to be still inconclusive—

You play with words and sentiment, while all about us conceals a dark horror.

The horrors are below us. And we have seen far darker.

* * *

Possessed of some other intent, the sight that now presents itself garners no interest from either of them, a vast space easily three hundred meters across, enclosed by a gently curving wall dropping away to depths unseen, the walkway clinging to its side having brought them to a vault door sunk into a recess.

As if needing no introduction, the vault yields to them with neither request nor action being required, the cavern within instantly brought from an impenetrable blackness to full illumination, the couple stepping forth into its interior in unison.

The white, boxy machine running the length of the cavern is as equally ignored as the spectacular vista outside. It is the far end of the space that draws them forward, a flawless expanse of obsidian glass reaching from floor to ceiling and spanning the cavern’s full width.

Contemplating the glossy surface, the man sees in its reflection his companion turn away, finding her with shoulders slumped under the weight of some great sorrow.

We already know what we will find, he says to her. And it is you that brought us here.

She returns her gaze to him, eyes wet, as he gently places the flat palm of his hand on the glass surface.

An outline appears in the material, and a panel sucks inward, sliding to one side, a gentle red glow emanating from within the chamber beyond.

The woman cannot help a muted gasp.

We can only take the one, says the man.

NOT SEEN

The United Nations building dominates the area, lit up like it might be any other night, the light traffic passing it by punctuated only by the occasional pedestrian.

A town car peels away from the center lane to the curb, a passenger window lowering to reveal a face set in what might be a permanent scowl, were it not actually so, its lines etched in by the fifty or so years endured by the man whose furrowed gaze now looks up at the structure.

Lucius Gray’s eyes drift down to the General Assembly Hall, and with a fixed stare he gets out, shoving the door shut behind him, the ride sliding back into the night traffic.

Alone on the sidewalk, his attention turns to the security gates. A suited figure lurks. Surely this is some mistake. He’s only been on the List a month. And the brief, such as it was, sounded like the stuff of—

The groan of heavy metal hinges. For some reason, Lucius finds this almost funny. Laughing in the face of adversity perhaps. Or maybe at the gates of hell. Abandon hope, all ye that enter here.

Nevertheless, he stiffens his resolve into action and strides to the gates. He’s already made up his mind to give the suited fellow a good stare as he passes through, but when he comes to it, he finds a rather disconcerting set of dead eyes staring back, tracking him with an unnaturally steady gaze.

Having left the United States of America and entered the United Nations, Lucius is perplexed by his apparent solitude. The various shadowy figures positioned around and about don’t count in his mind. Where is everyone? The place should be crawling with UN security, and they are not them.

The clack of his shoes echoes around a deserted lobby. Lucius’s nervous eyes find directions to the General Assembly Hall. He has purpose again. Anything to quell the increasing sense of dread that he cannot immediately account for, despite his obvious circumstances and what he has been told thus far. This must be a mistake.

The lounge area outside the General Assembly Hall is a frenzy of activity. Agents in body hugging hazmat suits attend to a large mobile containment device—a sort of stainless-steel tank.

Lucius steps through the melee without so much as a glance his way as equipment is unpacked from crates and agents check each other’s gear. From the crowd, a pale, gaunt man in a hoodless hazmat suit heads straight for him.

Are you the psychologist? the gaunt man asks.

Gray.

Felton. Follow me.

Felton leads Lucius past the steel tank. There is an odd stiffness to Felton’s motion. That and the manner of his speech leads Lucius to conclude that this is a spook with a military background. They’re similar in age—Felton a bit younger than himself, perhaps. Lucius finds it difficult to tell, there being a sense that the man’s years weigh on him in an unusual way. Things seen, perhaps.

Sorry about the hour, Felton says. Needed someone quick and you were the closest on the Agency’s List.

The Agency. Just six weeks ago, as he was taking a quiet moment on a park bench, a man and woman had sat down next to Lucius. He had sat in the middle of the bench so as to deter such invasions, but there they were, on either side of him, and quick to strike up a conversation, much to his irritation. Even his carefully cultivated irascible nature had failed to discourage them.

A relatively young couple suited to each other in appearance, yet with some strangeness about them—particularly the man—the same strangeness Lucius now sees in Felton. 

The conversation, largely one-sided as it was, had initially been rather disconcerting, the assertion being that it was not a chance meeting in the park but an intentional one, so as to facilitate the sort of proposition inappropriate at Lucius’s place of work, or his home, or, for that matter, most of the public spaces within the environs of New York City.

There was an organization in need of particular talents possessed by those with a certain moral fortitude. Individuals not to be swayed by money or power or intimidation and with a mental resilience capable of navigating the…unusual.   

A clandestine organization, to be sure, but a necessity to operate effectively in the unseen world that lay beyond the arenas occupied by