Chapter 21: A diplomatic reminder

Jamie had an internal debate with himself the next morning as he ate breakfast. Skibo was an absolutely fabulous location, but it hadn't worked out as he had planned things and it left him and the girls kind of isolated. He now wondered whether it might not be better to move down to Fort William to be with the others. He decided it was only fair to ask the girls what they thought.

"Girls, I've been wondering. Do you think we're too cut off here at Skibo? Maybe it would be better if we were working alongside the others at Fort William?" he asked them.

He was surprised by the force of their response. All three were dead set against the idea, believing that they should maintain Skibo until after the terrorists were all out of the picture. They indicated that there was no knowing when someone could turn out to be a traitor or a 'plant' amongst the Fort William survivors and they felt far more comfortable with the idea of Jamie being with them at Skibo each night.

Jamie shrugged his shoulders at what seemed like a pretty thin reason for remaining isolated. He told the girls what his plans were for the day. He wanted to pick up Stuart from Fort William and make a trip to the Dreghorn barracks to visit the teenagers who had liberated themselves. Gaz's message indicated the need for some organisational skills and Jamie knew Stuart would be in his element. He kissed each of the girls before he set off, once more finding Debbie and Christine vying with his sister to demonstrate their affection for him. As a result of the three passionate hugs he found it difficult to walk comfortably out to the Lynx.

"Okay you two, what are you playing at with my brother?" Laura asked, but not unkindly.

Debbie's face grew red and Christine giggled nervously.

"I'm serious you guys. What's going on here?" Laura repeated.

The two girls looked at each other and nodded.

"We watched you both last night, we couldn't help it, it was so hot," said Christine.

"We, ah, we got a little carried away ourselves it was so hot and the thing is, we really wanted to feel Jamie inside us too. He looked so big and you were obviously enjoying what he was doing. We got a bit jealous," said Debbie.

"You must be kidding! Are you asking me to share Jamie with you both?" Laura asked, disbelief in her voice.

"Would that be so bad? I mean, there's a need to try and rebuild the population somehow. Haven't we all got a responsibility as girls to get pregnant as soon as possible?" asked Christine.

"But I thought both of you were gay. Why are you suddenly interested in Jamie?" Laura asked.

"See! You're making our point for us. We just grew close when we were trying to comfort each other when we were in the mosque. Neither of us has ever thought of a girl before, but the situation probably did some funny things to us. When we saw Jamie's, err, cock, we knew we were normal and we both wanted to feel what you were feeling," said Debbie.

Laura was taken aback at the obvious depth of feeling from the other girls about Jamie. She still didn't feel threatened in any way and, in a strange kind of sense, she understood their need. She was acutely aware of how she relied on Jamie for her security, how she was felt his maleness was somehow an anchor in the turbulence of everything she had been through. It wasn't a surprise to her that the other girls would be feeling something similar. There was something else that she was curious about however.

"Emm, what does the girl, girl thing feel like?" she asked the other two.

When Jamie arrived at Fort William to pick up Stuart he found the town very organised already. All of the survivors had found accommodation and Stuart had already begun the skills audit that Jamie had suggested. He told Jamie it had been a fairly easy job to allocate people to different roles so that they could have some order in their lives. The teenagers had been split into four main groups - defence, food scavenging, power and water.

Stuart explained how he was insisting that every teenager continue to practice daily with their weapons and a firing range had been established on the quayside overlooking Loch Linnhe. Rotas had been drawn up so that the defence force worked shifts to make sure they had plenty of sleep and remained alert.

The skills audit had already thrown up some potentially useful people. Stuart had found someone else who had some experience of flying, admittedly she hadn't flown solo yet, but she had the fundamentals down. There was no shortage of teenagers with technical expertise to match that of the 'geek' who had fixed up the sound system on the Lynx the previous day. Stuart had also found several other people who had been army cadets and he had immediately put them in charge of the weapons training. Three boys had quite a bit of experience of mechanics, having pottered around dismantling and re-building car engines and various household appliances. There was even the son of a Church of Scotland Minister who knew the bible backwards and was happy to lead church services.

"Perhaps the best find of all though," said Stuart, "is your friend Lee Chan. He claims to be a strategist."

Jamie actually laughed at this.

"Some strategist. I mean he was nearly wiped out along with the entire group he was with. That's hardly strategic," Jamie replied.

"He said that himself when he told me he was a strategist, but the problem was that none of the group would listen to his advice. He's studied strategy and is heavily into war gaming. He keeps going on about the 'Art of War' apparently it's a book written by some geezer called Sun Tzu or something," Stuart explained.

"Well, there might be an opportunity to test out his abilities today," said Jamie. "I really came to pick you up to come with me on another little trip."

"Where to this time and what are we doing?" Stuart asked, his interest piqued.

"You're not going to believe this, but after we flew over Edinburgh and Glasgow yesterday, the teenagers at the Dreghorn barracks turned on their captors. They killed seven and 'arrested' eighteen more. According to an e-mail I got last night, there are nearly eight hundred heavily armed teenagers now in control of the barracks and they don't have a clue what to do next," said Jamie.

"You're joking!" exclaimed Stuart.

"Nope, we now have around thirteen hundred survivors on our side," grinned Jamie.

The two boys went in search of Lee Chan and explained to him what the situation was. Lee was just as excited as they were and agreed that he would like to go with them to the barracks.

The trip to Edinburgh was a short one and Jamie approached Dreghorn with some caution. From what they could see on the ground there was no sign of anyone who looked remotely like a terrorist, but just to be on the safe side, Jamie dropped Stuart and Lee outside the camp and then took the Lynx up to watch what happened. When he saw Stuart make the same sign to wave him off, he knew that it was safe to land inside the barracks and he took the Lynx down once more.

It looked as if the entire population of the barracks had come out to meet the pilot of the helicopter that had flown above them playing music the day before. Jamie was hoisted up and tossed over and over into the air. He was red with embarrassment over the way the teenagers were treating him as if he was some kind of hero. Eventually his shouting led to him being set back down on his feet. Jamie turned slowly in a full circle, taking in the expectant faces all around him. He gulped as he realised all of these people were waiting for him to speak, to tell them what to do next.

As he began to speak the crowd fell silent so they could all hear him.