Genesis

by Bernard Beckett

The sentries worked in pairs and their routines were strictly prescribed and monitored. Each watchtower consisted of a small observation box perched atop a high metal frame, surrounded by electrified fencing and accessed by a single ladder. The boxes themselves were small, with barely enough room for the two sentries to turn about. Their job was a simple one, to monitor the long unbroken line of the Great Sea Fence, a huge metal mesh fence, set fifty metres out past the low tide mark. The fence climbed thirty metres above the ocean. It was topped with razor wire and guarded by small floating mines. Should anyone or anything be seen to be approaching the fence from the outside world, the sentries’ duty was unambiguous. If it were a vessel of significant size, which was unlikely as most of those were dealt with by the roving satellite-guided mines of the outer defences, the sentries were to raise the alarm. Within five minutes, laser-armed helicopters would be hovering over it, and any disease it might have carried would be evaporated. For the smaller, more common vessels, which drifted towards the fence from time to time, usually with no more than two or three emaciated souls on board, the sentries’ task was more demanding. They were instructed to notify the station of the sighting, and then one of them would leave the watchtower and follow the path towards the firing post. There, a small-scale laser, armed with a random code memorised each morning by the sentry, would be u...