* * *

“Shots fired!  Shots fired!”

“Understood.  Wait one, repeat, wait one.”  The commander at the scene, Superintendent Evan Davies, had been watching the video feed and heard the report from Sergeant Williams just as the scene unfolded on his laptop.  His orders were to observe and report only until he received direct instructions from HQ, regardless of what happened.  Headquarters would have seen the shooting, and moments later he got the call he was expecting.  “Stand down.  I say again, stand down.”

“We have shots fired,” Davies said, more for protocol than to enlighten his superiors.

“Confirm shots fired, looks like one hostage down.  We have no authority to engage at this time, so continue to observe and report only.”

“Roger that, observe and report only.  Out.”

Davies glanced again at the map of the target building and the surrounding area.  It was covered with markings showing Gray’s defences, and truth be told he was glad their remit was limited to observing and reporting.  Davies was ex-Army himself and he knew that a half-decent soldier could prepare formidable defences overnight: Gray had been preparing his for months, and what he saw didn’t exactly inspire confidence in a successful outcome.

He had passed these observations on to his superiors and they had acknowledged his assessment, along with his recommendation that this was more suited to the guys at Hereford.  He didn’t consider this suggestion cowardly, just the optimum way to get things done with the minimum loss of life.  His unit had handled many armed sieges with great success, but they had usually been dealing with a single person trapped with nowhere to go, one person who suddenly finds themselves in a situation they never contemplated.

This was a completely different ball game.

* * *

The call from the Home Secretary came three minutes after the shooting, and Hammond took it in his office.

“Tell me I didn't just see a British man execute another British man, on British soil, live on the internet,” Wells said without preamble.  “The PM is livid.”

“Mr Home Secretary, I did explain that the plan to manipulate the votes wasn't guaranteed to succeed, but it was the best – no - it was the only option we had at the time.”

“And it got a man killed,” Wells shouted down the phone.

Hammond did his best to hold his own temper.  “With respect, Mr Home Secretary, even if we hadn't changed the votes, the result would have been the same.  The country voted for that young man to die, and I think that should concern the PM more, as it shows how out of touch he is with the electorate.  At least now the PM can deflect attention from that fact, and spend the next twenty-four hours convincing the population not to sentence the next man to death.”

There was silence for a while as the Minister considered the suggestion. “I shall pass that on to the PM, but needless to say he will not want a repeat of tonight's debacle.”