I take a mouthful of lukewarm bunker-oil-flavored cow piss and try not to gag as my Weltanschauung strips its gears. His optimism is sunny, invincible, and just slightly pitiable. I’m about to open my mouth and say something inadvisable when I realize that, actually, I don’t want to do that. I may be turning into a cynical old fart, but that’s no reason to drag down everyone around me at the same time. So I open my mouth and say something else instead: “I think I can agree with the sentiment, if not the details.” Then, moving swiftly on, “But they wouldn’t have dragged you in here just for a mug of coffee, would they?”

“No. They said they want me to know where the archive stacks are, and how to access them. Then I’ve got what they called a ‘training wheels’ assignment, after which I go back in the box until they need me.” He sniffs, mildly disapproving. “It’s supposed to demonstrate competence with the library system, I gather. After I told them about my doctorate.”

“Yeah, right.” I roll my eyes. “They’re big on that. Assuming the ‘they’ we are talking about is someone in Induction and Training . . . ?”

“Does Ellen McQueen ring a bell?”

“Yes, yes it does.” I shrug. “Did she give you a time scale or a classification level for this assignment?” I begin walking slowly back towards my office.

“Yes: it’s open-ended and the material is intended for public dissemination when the time comes—meanwhile, it’s considered confidential. Is that . . . ?”

“Huh. The confidential bit is reasonable; no offense, but we don’t hand secret materials to trainees, even if they’ve passed positive vetting. But open-ended?”

“Apparently it’s expected to take some time. ‘You are not expected to finish this job,’ she said. Those were her exact words.”

“What—?” I think for a moment. “That doesn’t make any kind of sense to me. What did she say you were to do?”

“There was some sort of civil defense program from the 1970s called PROTECT AND SURVIVE, she said. That was back during the Cold War. It was a booklet and posters and a bunch of recorded radio and TV broadcasts about how to survive a nuclear attack, and in event of a war situation breaking out they were going to distribute the booklets and run the broadcasts. Sort of a public information thing, I gather, although the main effect was to drive graphic designers to suicide.” He chuckles.

“Oh dear fricking . . .” What he’s telling me finally sinks in. “You mean the Laundry has a public information campaign stored up and ready to roll in event of CASE—sorry, in event of us being invaded by tentacle monsters from another dimension?”

“Yes! That’s exactly it. Only it was last updated in 1983. ‘Take a look at it,’ she said, ‘and write a proposal for bringing it up to date.’”