Embankment Station (audio story)

was the first story of the audio anthology Charlotte Pollard: Series Two. It was written by Nicholas Briggs and featured India Fisher as Charlotte Pollard, James Joyce as Robert Buchan and Dan Starkey as the Rogue Viyran.
== Publisher's summary ==
A bumpy arrival, journalism, politics and a security crisis.
== Plot ==
Charley, who says that she must be long dead if this message is being read, introduces her story as a general warning that one can never be sure of anything, particularly history.
As Charley and Robert's pod is torn apart whilst entering the Prolixity, people board a train on the London Underground and are told by the guard that it will not be stopping at Embankment station and that he could not care less why. Charley and Robert spot the Rogue Viyran, having lost his suit, falling into the Prolixity and, believing their deaths to be imminent, share a kiss.
On her way to the studio, Naomi Davies and her taxi driver feel some sort of tremor. Naomi calls a colleague, saying that she thinks there might have been a bomb and telling her of the presence of police, ambulances and the fire brigade. After requesting a camera team, she has her taxi driver follow the emergency services towards Embankment. The sirens wail.
A being detects an unexpected arrival.
Charley and Robert awake on the London Underground and, after Robert has been sick, they agree not to discuss the fact that they had sex in the pod and Charley tells him that she is a time traveller from the 20th century, not having realised that she had not told him yet. They wonder about where the pod has gone and where the Rogue Viyran is when they hear radio interference and are tranquilised on Woking's orders.
Naomi arrives at Embankment and is ordered back by a police constable, but she spots and records Charley and Robert being transported away on stretchers and into a black van.
Charley wakes up and finds herself with a man. She deduces that she is in the early 21st century and tries to find out where Robert is to no avail.
Naomi shows Madeline her video, but Madeline says that she does not believe that there is a story. She does not forbid Naomi from investigating further but warns her not to embarrass Night News. On the Lunchtime News, David Shillingford mentions the matter only briefly as "a minor earth tremor" amongst stories on overspending by NHS trusts and the popularity of the royal family. To Naomi's irritation, the main story is of six identical, almost simultaneous road deaths and storms out to speak to "a dubious friend".
When the man returns to Charley, she can tell by his demeanour that he has seen photographs of her from the early 20th century and wonders if this is part of a Viyran test. She sees something inexplicable and tells the man to check the camera to see what it was, refusing to answer any more questions until she sees Robert.
Naomi meets with Rab in a café and asks him what he has heard about the incident at Embankment station, which he suggests could somehow be connected to the simultaneous suicides. She presents him with the video she took of Charley and Robert and he uses homemade intelligent software to extrapolate their faces. He says that he will try to find out who they are and will come up with some form of payment in the future.
The being monitors "the first batch", saying that the modification was excessive and that adjustments are in progress.
Robert is sent in to see Charley and she asks him if he has seen the walls "ruffle" as she did, which he says he has not. Observing the pair, the two men rewind the footage and see what Charley did, after which one returns to the room and continues asking questions about their connection to the Embankment disturbance. Whilst they initially deny any connection, Charley wonders if their arrival was the disturbance.
The being has assessed the arrivals and labels them as a threat. He spawns two further beings from his body, calling them Factor 1 and Factor 2, and sends them to integrate themselves with human society and remove the threat.
The Minister picks up Woking on the street and he tells her that there was an "unprecedented and unknown percussive release of energy" near Embankment. He tells her about Charley and Robert and that they are human but show signs of having come from alien environments when he receives a video which disturbs him and the Minister.
Charley talks to Robert about whether they are temporal refugees when they both see the ruffling happen again. Meanwhile, Woking closes Embankment once again and is joined by the Minister, whom he tries to make leave. He takes her to Mobile Operations Control.
Naomi is irritated by the choice of lead story and raises the possibility with Madeline about the tremor and the suicides being connected. Madeline instead tells her to focus on her interview with the Secretary of State for Health. She gets a call from Rab, who tells her that Embankment has been closed again after a naked body was found on the station, after which she leaves her interview to Lysette.
Woking and the Minister discuss the video that they watched, that of two naked men walking out of the tube tunnels before the picture broke up. He tells her that two naked bodies have been found on the platform: a man and a woman showing no obvious cause of death. He receives a call telling him that his men are unable to get into the interrogation room.
Every surface of the interrogation room but the floor is covered by the ruffling. Charley hears the voice of the Rogue Viyran saying her name.
Woking demands that Charley and Robert continue to be monitored and is informed by the team leader that the two naked men have been seen heading for Department 001, one of them wearing women's clothing.
With the threat soon to be eliminated by the Factors, the being prepares for Phase 2.
The ruffling stops and the Rogue Viyran appears, explaining that the ruffling was him struggling to maintain molecular cohesion due to the scattering effect of the Prolixity. He says that he dispersed the pod in order to use the energy to cushion Charley and Robert's arrival and ensure their survival and that there is a threat greater than the people holding them captive and whom he is keeping at bay by holding the door closed.
Woking's man follows the two Factors, who are on the same street as Department 001. Meanwhile, Naomi returns to the café, where the barista is rude to her, and meets with Rab to discuss what he has found out about the strange goings-on, namely the two Factors who are forcing their way into Department 001. Rab shows Naomi that the Factors are identical and lacking genitalia, shows her a picture of Charley from 1930 and tells her that the six people who committed suicide were the only ones on a train to Embankment the previous night, Ricardo Gonzales being the driver.
The Factors enter the interrogation room and tell Charley, Robert and the Rogue Viyran that they are a threat and must be neutralised. They prepare to release a pulse to do this and the Rogue Viyran says that they cannot be overcome, leading Charley to shout that they should run.
== Cast ==
* Charlotte Pollard - India Fisher
* Robert Buchan - James Joyce
* Rogue Viyran - Dan Starkey
* Naomi Davies - Deirdre Mullins
* Woking - Kieran Hodgson
* Rab - Ashley Kumar
* Minister - Rachel Atkins
* The Identical Men - Colin McFarlane
* Madeline - Karen Henson
* Captain Warwick - Gary Turner
* Sergeant Hunter - Ben Crowe
* David Shillingford - Glen McCready
* Lysette Allegro - Helen Goldwyn
== Worldbuilding ==
* Naomi works for Night News.
* David Shillingford is a newsreader.
* Lysette Allegro is Lunchtime News' Home Office correspondent.
* The victims of the road deaths are Angela Galliard, Stephen Ashcroft, Donald Hadley, Ricardo Gonzales, Lynn Oliver and Najmieh Alawi.
* The correlation of the deaths was spotted by a junior reporter at the London Evening Herald.
* A barista serves a decaf latté and a bacon muffin with brown sauce.
* The Minister met Woking at a Home Office reception.
* The Minister mentions the Thames Flood Barrier.
* The Minister was at an anti-terrorism secret subcommittee session when the tremor occurred and says that the Home Secretary almost hid under the table.
* Rab hacks the CCTV at Embankment.
* Naomi asks for a double espresso.
* Naomi mentions MI5.
* Ricardo Gonzales was known to his friends as "Speedy Gonzales".
* Rab mentions Facebook, Twitter and Tumblr.
== Notes ==
* Rab says that Charley would be over a hundred, setting this story after 2012.
== Continuity ==
* The Minister references the "breaching of the Thames flood barrier". (TV: The Runaway Bride)
== External links ==
Category:Charlotte Pollard: Series Two audio stories
Category:Stories set in London
Category:Stories set in the 21st century