Adventures into the Future

Part 1: When The Wind Blows

London, 10:27 PM, Tuesday, 26th June, 2018.

"So tomorrow is going to be a hot one. That high pressure system which has been baking southern and central Europe for the past week will be pushing up temperatures into the low thirties right across the country. East Anglia and the South East could even reach highs of 34 degrees Celsius, 93 degrees Fahrenheit, although we don't think it will reach the highest recorded June temperature, from 2015, where the mercury soared to 36.7 Celsius, 98 Fahrenheit.

With the heat, sadly, comes a warning from Public Health England. Tomorrow, we are likely to experience raised levels of pollution in the South East, particularly in London. Those with heart conditions and asthma are urged to stay inside. There are two main factors at work here. Strong winds in the Sahara have kicked up a lot of dust and this has been slowly moving up and over Europe where it has been picking up unusually high levels of pollutants on its way towards us. Conditions are expected to be similar to those of April 2014 when we all woke up to find our cars covered with red dust. Towards the end of the week, however, conditions will change considerably when a low pressure front moves in from the west bringing with it, rain. For further information go to...."

Fiona McCallister closed the lid of her laptop and switched off the TV. After checking that the intruder alarm had been set, she headed up the two flights of stairs of her Georgian, Dulwich Village home to bed. In her right hand she carried her phone, and her tablet and a planner were shoved under her arm. Her left held a small, plastic beaker of water, which Lily would no doubt be calling for at some point during the night. The nightlight's warm glow from underneath her seven-year-old daughter's bedroom beckoned her. She approached the door, gently pushed it open, and peeked inside. As usual, it was difficult to pick out her sleeping daughter from the legions of teddy bears, stuffed animals, and Barbie dolls that also shared Lily's bed. Unable to resist, she crept forward, leant over her daughter and kissed the top of her head, inhaling the sweet scent of the strawberry shampoo she'd earlier used to wash the mop of thick, blond curls. Lily stirred briefly, shuffling until she was comfortable again, the ever-present rattle in her little chest the only sound in the room as she breathed in and out. Fiona placed the beaker on the bedside table and carefully backed out of the room. Taking one last glance, she went to her own room and prepared for bed.

By lamp light, Fiona reviewed her to-do list. Unlike, it seemed, all of her contemporaries who spent their lives controlled by their digital diaries, Fiona liked to have everything written down in front of her. In fact, her dog-eared, leather-bound planner (sold to her years ago by a man promising to make her "one hundred percent more effective with one hundred percent more me-time") was a source of great amusement for her friends. How many times had she heard the joke, "How do you ruin one of the world's richest venture capitalists? Why, steal her planner, of course," or something like that. Yes, it was by today's standards antiquated, and it didn't automatically sync with her PA or anyone else's diary, but she'd done ok thus far with it, so why change?

The diary was crammed tomorrow with back to back meetings, as was every Wednesday. The first appointment was with the Business Editor, David Parker, from the Guardian. The focus of the interview was to be her recent acquisition of a struggling frozen food manufacturing company. The headline for the piece would probably be some play on words about the 'Ice queen and the Ice-cream.' The rest of the day, broken down deliberately into twenty-minute chunks, looked long and demanding. With a sigh she pushed the planner away, turned off the light, and forced herself to sleep.

Cambridge, 11:32 PM, Tuesday, 26th June, 2018.

Sixty-five miles north of London, Joe Grayson turned the key in the door of his terraced house in Cambridge. Joe stowed his shoes and briefcase under the stairs, grabbed a bottle of beer from the kitchen fridge, and reheated a bowl of pork and black bean stew in the microwave. At the small kitchen table he read a note from his mother.