Epilogue

July the fourth, 2025. The day and the year were easy to remember. The 4th is Dependence Day in America Inc, and 2025 was the year that the Ultra Conservatives were swept into power in the UK on a platform of "traditional" values and male empowerment. It was Friday, and while most Londoners were heading home for the weekend, Major Peter Taylor was lying on the highly polished floor of the Signals Center communications room beneath a coding module trying to diagnose a faulty connection that had been causing problems all afternoon. Standing over him, pressing buttons on the console was a communications analyst by the name of Kiara Anand. Although Major Taylor had only been in charge of the Signals Center for four months, they had know each other for a little over three years.

In his previous career as an MI6 operative, Peter's coded messages came to and from Kiara, and Kiara alone. The relationship between an agent and the signals analyst were very personal. The analyst could tell by the syntax of a coded message the state their agents were in. Were they relaxed, or rushed, or under some sort of duress? Likewise, the analyst was often the only connection to the homeland for an agent alone in what might be hostile territory. So it was for Peter and Kiara.

On this particular 4th of July, there were no urgent messages being sent or received. It had been designated a maintenance day, and only in the most dire of circumstances would an agent in the field be sending any messages. This gave Peter and his team the time needed to conduct repairs and upgrades to the aging equipment and install any new equipment that was available. They had already decided to call it a day after this irritating glitch was corrected when a commotion near the entrance to the communications room caused Peter to pull himself out from under the machine and sit up.

Pushing their way through the door was a squad of militia men, dressed in black combat gear with no apparent insignia. Peter had seen these troops around the city once or twice and knew they were part of what was being called the MRU. Moral Regeneration Unit troops. He could hardly believe they had the legal authority to operate on British soil, but apparently a recent Act of Parliament had given this new organization an open ended charter to do as they pleased. What seemed to please them the most was ferreting out lesbians and dragging them to some compound they had on the outskirts of the city called a Regeneration Facility.

"Kiara Anand!" shouted a man who was, most likely, the person in charge of the raiding party. He held up a photo and looked around the room at the women standing frozen in their places. One or two glanced reflexively at Kiara, and the MRU man followed their line of sight.

Moving towards the shocked analyst, the man said loudly, "Kiara Anand, you are under arrest for deviant sexual behaviour. You will come with us."

"What?! No! Peter, they can't just..."

The man and two of his comrades quickly closed in on Kiara and managed to handcuff her wrists behind her back. "Don't give us any trouble, dyke," he snarled as he pulled up on her wrists, forcing her to bend forward to relieve the pain in her shoulders.

Peter had known Kiara was a lesbian, but it had never been an issue for him or any of the others who worked in the Center. "Now just a minute!" he reacted. "You have no right to come in...." His protest was stifled as two heavily armed militiamen stepped in front of him with their rifles pointed directly at his stomach. He might have been able to disable both of them, but what of the other four men standing nearby?

"Stay out of this, sir," the leader said as he held onto Kiara's arm and led her towards the door.

Peter stood helplessly by as they led his friend out of the room. He'd heard rumors about the Regeneration center and jokes about the techniques used there. 'Fuck 'em 'til they love it' was a popular one. 'Shock the lezzie right out of them' was another. The notion that either method would be used on Kiara snapped Peter out of his temporary daze and he ran to his desk to grab his cell phone.

Bounding down the steps of the rear fire exit, he called his friend, a fellow ex-spy, John Waters, and told him what had just happened. John was equally outraged and agreed to make some calls and then meet Peter at a location close to the MRU facility.

Between the two men they had assembled a small force of nine heavily armed men, two trucks, and surprisingly, one bazooka! It took a heated argument to persuade Peter to stay in his car a block away, but in the end he agreed that the MRU would recognize him from the Signals Center and track him down later. Besides, they needed someone to serve as both the lookout and the driver of the escape vehicle.

While he waited, Peter decided to call his former boss, the MI6 Director of Special Actions, Jessica Smythe, to apprise her of the situation and to ask her advice. Being of the sapphic persuasion herself, Peter hoped Jessica would be sympathetic to Kiara's plight. Not only was she sympathetic, but it seemed she had a fledgling network of contacts at the ready that had already spirited a couple of women to safety in Scotland where the new British laws did not apply. He was given an address on the north side of the city, not far from where he was, to drop Kiara off. Jessica promised she would be in good hands and out of the country by the morning. Before hanging up, the spy chief invited him to dinner the following day to discuss the little support network she was putting together. The fact that this covert network was not sanctioned by the new regime appealed to Peter and he gladly agreed to the meeting.

The ambush of the MRU jeep went off without a hitch, and as promised, Kiara was whisked out of the country the following day.