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go_exchange2018-12-03 05:37 am
Happy Holidays, Cutethulu!
Rating: G
Word Count: 25XX
Characters: Anathema, Newt, Aziraphale, Crowley
Genre: Historical AU
Anathema stepped down from the train and surveyed the Bletchley platform, fingers tightly gripped around the leather handle of her suitcase. Glancing at the slip of paper held in her other hand, she checked her bearings and gamely started plodding in the direction of the private home that would serve as her accommodations. At the corner, she shielded her map from the noon glare and squinted up at the street sign, quizzically comparing it to the scratchings on her map.
“Can I help you, Miss?”
The young man shoved his glasses back up his nose. He was tall and thin, and his hair looked like a pile of dead pine needles had been dropped haphazardly on his head. He must have noticed the hesitation in her eyes, for reflexively he shrugged and said, “It’s okay, I understand if you don’t want…”
“I do want.”
Startled, he turned around. “What?”
“I do want you to help me.” As a practical person, Anathema had quickly assessed the situation and found the danger negligible. It would be silly to turn down an offer of assistance. She put down her suitcase and adjusted the scarf that covered her dark curls. “Can you help me with this address?”
The young man peered at the map she handed him. “Oh, sure! Let’s see – you’ll want to go down this road, turn west on Buckingham, and Cottingham Grove is this road that goes in a loop.” He traced it with his finger and stopped. “Your billet at the Asters is here.” He returned the map. “I’m Newt Pulsifer, by the way. Have you come to work at Bletchley Park?”
Anathema nodded, but didn’t elaborate. Newt tried another tack.
“Everyone always asks why I’m here instead of ‘fighting with our boys.’ Well, look at me. I’m too skinny. But I’m doing what I can.” He grabbed Anathema’s suitcase and they set off down the road. “What’s your story?”
“I was a second-year at Cambridge, reading mathematics. When the government started conscripting women, I volunteered instead for the Wrens.” Anathema vaguely waved toward the neat gardens lining the macadam street. “When I was assigned to the HMS Pembroke, I never thought I’d end up here, a hundred miles inland.”
Newt leaned toward her conspiratorially. “Actually, I’m a computer engineer.”
“Oh?” A newly-struck spark of interest animated the syllable.
“Yes.” Newt looked incongruently smug. “I work directly with Alan Turing.”
Anathema almost tripped in her tracks. “The inventor of the Turing machine? We’ve studied his concepts at uni. His work with algorithms is ground-breaking. To use mathematical logic to create a methodical process of operation that performs multiple analyses at incredible speed…” She glanced at her companion for concurrence with her enthusiasm.
Newt trudged beside her, his face a blank mask. “We’re not allowed to talk about our work.”
Disappointed, Anathema said, “Yeah, I had to take that oath too. Well, this is it! Thank you again for walking me here. I’m sure I’ll be seeing you around, Newt.” She produced a half-smile. “You see, I have this knack for predicting the future.”
Anathema took her suitcase and opened the gate to the house where she was to spend the rest of the war.
“Excuse me,” called Newt from the pavement. “Could I know your…”
“It’s Anathema Device,” she called back.
“Anathema, what do you predict about the future of computers?”
Newt was still smarting from the scathing reprimand he’d received from his supervisor. The brilliant engineer had detected two minor calculation errors when glancing through the pay ledger Newt had prepared for this week’s wages.
It wasn’t the primary reason he was brooding, though.
At the canteen, Newt grabbed two coffee mugs of hot water and scooped some instant-coffee crystals into them before crossing the lawn to where Anathema was seated on the green by the lake with their sandwiches. Lunch was usually just a half-hour break, but it was nice to spend some time outside from being cooped up in the stifling, noisy huts. Anathema’s exacting work of setting rotors and plugs on the Bombe decryption devices required a great deal of concentration and she always seemed grateful for the break.
“Thanks,” said Anathema. “Did they have any sugar today?”
“I thought you liked yours black.”
“I do. But I know you like sugar in yours.”
Newt folded his gangly legs to sit and sipped his coffee with a disgusted look. “The sugar helps. But I’ll never get used to this.”
Anathema nudged Newt with her elbow and looked over her shoulder toward a middle-aged gentleman sitting alone reading an extremely thick leather-bound book. “See that guy over there? He’s the one who won the Daily Telegraph’s crossword competition. MI6 recruited him to be a code-breaker. It’s said the skills that make one good at puzzles correlate to the type of work we’re doing here. I think he’s already made some progress.” The bow-tied civilian looked up and caught Anathema’s gaze. He frowned and buried his nose back in his book.
“Not very friendly, is he?”
“It doesn’t really matter if you’re good, does it?”
Newt finished chewing a bite of sandwich before responding. “My grandmother always said there’s a world of difference between being good at what you do and being a good person. To tell the truth, I’m not sure I’m either.” He put his mug down and fidgeted. “Anathema, I need to talk to you about something.”
Anathema smoothed her utility skirt across her lap. “Go on.”
“Remember when I admitted to you I wasn’t a computer engineer?”
Anathema laughed. “It was rather apparent. But I’m glad you came clean. What’s up?” She reached over and patted his hand.
“Do you like like me? Even though I haven’t always been honest with you? Even though I’m always messing up?”
Anathema sighed and leaned back. “Of course I like you. You’ve got some faults, but don’t we all? My spelling is atrocious. Your boss chews his nails. Even that guy,” she said, nodding her head toward the reticent gentleman, “probably has some demon he’s dealing with.
“I’ve told you the reason I’m not pining for my Johnny to come home from the war. I’ve never had a Johnny. I’m not interested in having a Johnny. All my life I’ve been told it’s my destiny to find a guy, get married, and have kids. That’s not what I want. Did you know that Cambridge only allows women to earn certificates and not degrees? I’m hoping things will change and I want to be part of it. I want to earn my Ph.D. I want women to be empowered to do whatever they choose, to have the freedom to use their primal creative energy to…”
“Um,” interrupted Newt, “yeah, and I support you in all that. Just like you’re always there for me by being my go-to girl when I need one for show.” He sighed and stared off toward the lake. The water surface undulated with sparkling ripples stirred by a gentle breeze. “I’ve got a huge crush on my boss.”
Anathema’s eyes widened. “On Dr. Turing? But he…”
“Yes, I know.” Newt muttered, watching some ducks paddle along the shore. “He announced his engagement to Joan Clarke this morning.”
“Oh, Newt,” Anathema consoled. “Yes, I’d heard that. It’s all over campus. I’m so sorry. I didn’t know how it would affect you.”
“Yeah.” Newt filled the awkward silence by crunching up his sandwich wrapper into a tiny wad of waxed paper. “I’m gutted. And he thinks I’m an idiot. I botched up the wages report this morning. Right now I’m too embarrassed to go back and face him. I can’t do anything right.”
Anathema hesitated, knowing that in his current mood, Newt could misconstrue anything she might say.
“You’re good at being my friend.”
Newt huffed in disappointment and continued staring at the dabbing ducks. “He’s working to save the world, and I’m a good friend. It doesn’t quite measure up.”
“But being my friend is…” Anathema stopped, noting the inconsolable gloom shading Newt’s profile. “Newt, we’re all working together to save the world. Maybe working with numbers isn’t your thing. Maybe computers isn’t your thing. Maybe your strength is…” her gaze darted about, finally landing on the crossword champion, “…cryptanalysis!”
“My lack of strength in everything is why I’m here at Bletchley,” Newt bemoaned. But Anathema had already scrambled to her feet.
“Hello,” she greeted the tartan-clad code-breaker, holding out her hand. “I’m Anathema Device, and this,” she gestured, “is my friend Newt Pulsifer. He’s been working with Alan Turing but is interested in cryptography. Will you support his transfer request to your unit?”
Both men looked at each other and then back at Anathema, who held up her right hand with two fingers in a V. “For victory!” she said with a bright little smile. “It’s a little something I picked up from BBC Radio-Belgium. It stands for Freedom and Victory in Dutch and French. One day it will stand for Peace.”
Scattered across the country were pockets of resistance – citoyens doing their best to make the lives of the occupying forces wretched and their time in country short. Through guerilla acts of thievery and vandalism, their intent was to keep the invaders always on guard and not able to trust even their own.
This clandestine cell of résistants had focused on operating an illicit printing press with which they’d created forged documents and underground propaganda – until the arrival of the SOE operative with the dark hair and shaded eyes.
Although he hailed from London, he spoke impeccable colloquial French. His expertise was the production of explosive and incendiary devices, intended for the sabotage of railroads, factories, and communications networks usurped by the occupying forces. At times he seemed almost fatalistic about his own personal safety – as if death was of no consequence to him. His concern for his colleagues, though, was extreme. It ranged from repeated warnings about the dangers of contact with certain chemicals to ensuring that they always had a ready supply of tea from his private stash.
The agent tended to keep to himself. He muttered a lot under his breath about the idiocies of starting wars, his superiors, and an acquaintance of his who owned a bookshop.
The sunlight slanted low through the windows of the cellar where he was at the workbench performing the final nitration step for TNT. The creak of an opening door caused the man to look up, irritated at the break in concentration.
“I am very sorry to interrupt, Monsieur Rampa,” Marie-Clémence said, remaining a respectful distance away. “But a sealed letter has just arrived. I thought that it might be an important communication about the mission tonight.”
“Who delivered it?”
“Je ne sais pas. It appeared from out of nowhere. It is addressed in code.”
Crowley pulled off his goggles and removed his gloves, reaching for the missive. Marie-Clémence gasped in shock. “Rampa! It is as you warned us! Your eyes have turned yellow from the TNT!”
“That will hardly matter if the location of this cell has been compromised!” Crowley slapped the gloves on the table, then softened when he saw the neat copperplate handwriting on the envelope. “Tout va bien, Marie-Clémence. Do not worry yourself. Thank you for bringing this letter to my attention quickly.”
As the diminutive woman closed the door to return the agent to privacy, Crowley retreated to the corner of the cellar. He knew well that Marie-Clémence understood the need to be discreet – her son had been betrayed by an informant and his whereabouts were now unknown; her daughter had been executed by the occupying forces after being caught tearing down a poster. He’d accepted that Hell had sent him here to find a way to make these people’s lives even more miserable. It was the kind of mission They’d always assigned him. But nothing he could do was half as bad as what they were already doing to themselves.
He pulled out a camp chair, waved his hand to produce a cup of steaming Earl Grey, and sat down to read the letter.
My dear Crowley,
(he read in Enochian)
We on the home front have been encouraged to write letters to servicemen to improve morale. Thus, I’m doing my duty and hoping this counts, as I’m fully aware that you are neither in the service nor human.
It’s odd that our respective Sides have inadvertently positioned us on the same side in this war. I want to argue that our faction has moral superiority, but your concurrent assignment has raised uncertainty I’ve been unable to resolve. I suppose it is ineffable. I trust that you are tempering your evil-doing in accordance with our Arrangement, especially since I cannot be there to thwart you.
I’m currently situated at a country estate in Buckinghamshire, working with GC&CS to decipher coded enemy messages. It’s quiet and bucolic (I would imagine particularly so in comparison to your posting), with the exception of the RAF squadrons that fly regularly out of Tadfield Air Base on their way to the Continent. There are even some ducks, and I think about us the ones at St James’s Park as I watch them during noon respite.
I wonder if the ward I placed over the bookshop still holds. I remember well how last September we huddled in the cellar drinking the last of the Côte-Rôtie as bombs fell from the sky. My dear boy, I hope you now understand why I couldn’t shield all of London – or even Soho and Mayfair. I simply am not allowed to interfere in the affairs of humans. Keeping the bookshop and its priceless contents safe from damage and fire is the best I can do.
A young man of my acquaintance has made a breakthrough in decoding the Enigma messages – he was brilliantly able to replicate the same encryption error made by the encoder on the opposite side. It produced insight into the mechanics of the encoding process that has allowed our unit to more quickly reconstruct the original transmissions.
From him, I have picked up some technical jargon about the new electromechanical computers that assist us such as ‘GIGO,’ user error,’ and ‘endless loop.’ If only they were smaller in size! I can envision a computer being a useful tool in future for keeping accurate accounts. I have been assured by the young man’s lady friend that computers ‘are’ the future. There is something odd about her, but I can’t quite put my finger on it…
In conclusion, I must confess that there are times that I miss wish we were both back in London. There is an ancient book of war strategy by Sun Tzu that counsels: Keep your friends close and your enemies closer. I believe this to be wise advice. Until THE war to end all wars (we’ll win, of course), I look forward to once again dealing with the demon that I know best.
Cordially yours,
Aziraphale
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