The driver swerved and pounded the steering wheel. The passengers in the back rocked around, and the mayor noted with disappointment his assistant's arms failed to jiggle. With his distraction gone, his nerves returned. He tugged at his cuffs.

"What on earth was that about sergeant?"

"Some tart outside a nightclub got in the way; you don't need to worry about it."

"Well could we maybe do this without causing a scene!?"

"We can get there however I deem necessary,” the driver sounded bored, as if stating the obvious, “you think about resolving that meeting quickly, I will focus on the delivery."

The mayor huffed and backed down, getting even more rattled by his smirking assistant. He returned to the flab on her arms and pondered how he got here.

Much of Rajesh’s life had been one of succeeding upwards. Naturally, being born privileged helped, but no one could not accuse him of coasting on papa’s wealth. His climb began with his masters - Contemporary Confucian Sociology - a subject of dubious worth, but that it came from Peking University with distinction rescued it. From there he climbed the volatile world of diplomacy, and became a success story by surviving it. He had trained his sights on the more palatable embassies, planning to finish his career ensconced in a well-guarded office, rejecting visa applications at leisure.

And where did he end up? As mayor for the world's most embarrassing capital: London. The jewel that just kept fading. Where the obscenely rich sat crowned atop crusting layers of dying communities. Where gentrified boroughs shunted out locals too poor to be stomached, until inequality caught the newer residents and pulled another rung of the middle class into the abyss of the third world.

After the latest wave of fascist populism fell to the newest wave of middling technocracy, his old Peking wingman - the current English President - convinced him London mayorship was the ivory tower’s surest ladder. Since then, Rajesh had crashed around a perfect storm of poverty, unable to piss in the wind for anyone's benefit without an opposing tribe attacking his efforts. Now the 90's were coming; a revolution brewed, terrorists swiped at everyone's ankles, and the Republic lingered docile and apathetic under two conquerors - the Chinese, and the wealthy. England, the architect of the modern world, was little more a latrine for greater powers to shit in, and occasionally, take from.

Tonight, in an attempt to rid the nation of a third conqueror, the President had packed him into an unmarked van with one uninspired assistant and three plain-clothes police officers. The mission was simple but scandalous: find out the revolution's terms for a truce, agree to whatever it is, and don’t get caught.

"Where's your mind off to this time? You’re doing that vacant gaze thing again," Samantha peered over her tablet, her face illuminated in a sickly green glow.

"I'm figuring out how to get this meeting done quickly," Rajesh nudged his head to the front of the van, "and you? Following your friends fake lives?"

"Just checking the venue! Doing my job, you know," she pointed at the tablet screen without showing him, "the front of the club is heaving with punters but the bouncers have kept anyone sneaking round the back for a fag. We should be all good."

"I hope so," Rajesh tugged his cuffs again, "if anyone recognises me I’ll have terrorists and Chinese soldiers fighting over my bones, with not a colleague in sight.”

"You will, so on that note if our host offers you VIP treatment, consider politely declining... tonight's not the time to drool over a Japanese maid, however hard she makes it."

"Samantha, if I was up to that kind of thing on the job, would I have hired someone as frumpy as you?"

She ignored him and raised the tablet between them, tapping and swiping orders to be passed around and ignored, pulling strings with nobody useful attached. He meanwhile returned to daydreaming, aided by Samantha's arms and their refusal to jiggle. The constable perched beside him browsed her phone, oblivious to the world since they set off. It didn't matter. The mayor had chosen his police detail carefully; those with too much personal dirt to sell tonight's story to the media, with too lazy an outlook on life to be in revolution channels or worse. The police were privatised now, deregulation made them difficult to control, but flexible when politics took him underground.

Samantha's arms at last obeyed his wishes, flapping dramatically. He chuckled. The van skidded to a halt.

They were parked in a dead end behind a nightclub surrounded by windowless walls. Convenient. The area smelt stale and pungent; cigarette stubs dotting the curb confirmed why. A woman with a mean face and thick arms waited for them. Several bouncers flanked her, all of them bigger than Rajesh’s feeble constables, adding to his sense of weakness. He lost a staring contest with one of them and waited for someone to speak.

The woman clicked a finger at the officers, "you can have them with you if they hand their weapons in, or they can wait out here with us, which is it?"

The mayor stammered. Security with him but defenceless, or armed but too far away? Either choice had him on the back foot. The fear of becoming hostage arose.

"Hurry please!" the woman clicked her fingers again, inches from his face, "we don't want you being spotted."

Rajesh flinched. "I'll leave two outside! And one… with me? You," he pointed at the the whitest of them, the sergeant, in case their host carried the old prejudices. The sergeant shot him a stern look until it was clear he had to follow. They followed the mean-faced woman inside and held their arms up in a crucifix to be searched and deprived of their devices. The sergeant’s taser, sleek and silver and designed to show off the highs of corporatism, passed through the hands of several curious bouncers.

The woman brought the guests to the nearest room, and without saying a word, shut them in.

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The room appeared to be a stock cupboard. Crates and barrels of alcohol were pushed aside and stacked precariously high. A fold-out table with three plastic chairs sat wedged between them. The mayor shook it gently, assuming correctly it wobbled on one of the legs. He took the chair facing the door, clearly intended for his host, and swung a second chair around for Samantha. She sank into it with a laboured sigh. The chair groaned in response. Both guests stared at their only exit as the sergeant sidestepped behind them to stand at ease. Fluorescent bulbs whined in their ears. The kick drum of a generic house playlist thumped from the club.

"I told you they'd take our devices," Samantha broke the silence, hissing through a whisper, "it's a good thing I thought to clear the caches, they're probably hacking them right now."

He hated that she'd suggested the idea before he could. Another chance for her to scrape at him with her neurotic chisel. "Yes well done Samantha, but all your talk of doing both our jobs conveniently changes tune when it suits you. Case in point: care to lead this meeting? Or would you remember to play the mental health card and wriggle out of it?"

"You should have brought another constable in, they're not achieving anything out there."

"I don't want to provoke our host."

"How?” Samantha side eyed him and scoffed, “you aren’t seriously buying the fascist rumour?"

"Of course I am. Look at me."

She waved him away, as Caucasians so often did, "a politician shouldn't base decisions on news feed rumours. It would be a good idea to not accuse anyone of racism tonight."

That was it. She was always her most antagonistic during tense meetings, always seizing the moment to overreach as danger distracted him. Tonight’s meeting - the prelude to potential civil war - was too far. He fixed his gaze on her. "Why don't you shut your fat mouth until after work for once? Hmm!? Slag me off online all you want, but we're dealing with killers here so do your job quietly or I swear, I will leave you behind as tribute. They might not be fascists, but believe me, all soldiers take an easy fuck, and you look very easy indeed."

Samantha shrunk. Rajesh relished the glee, pushing the guilt away to be dealt with later.

His eyes returned to the doorway, and his blood went cold. It was open, and his rival was standing in it.

"Stand easy..." the host raised an eyebrow. His guests fumbled for the chairs they'd kicked back after leaping to attention.

Such a striking sight; the boldness of wearing that uniform in the heart of London stupefied the mayor. That famous uniform: scarlet fatigues, silver breastplate wrapped perfectly around the chest, pristine dragoon helmet above. Across one shoulder he wore his rank; across another, the symbol of Revolution Britannia. The host took a seat and removed the helmet, resting it on the table with careful respect.

"You were bickering," the host’s second eyebrow raised to join the first, "didn't fancy having it out in the club?"

"Just a little stressed from the journey, damned driver nearly ran someone over!" Rajesh smiled through a wince. His attempt to salvage the blunder with informality faltered as always.

"And they say collateral damage is our thing,” said the host, “at least your lapdog friends in the media do. What was this morning’s headline again?”

Rajesh cleared his throat. “They’re saying that the revolution could only rule over rubble.”

“But can you make a pile of rubble out of a heap of shit?” the host raised a hand philosophically, “who was it that called London that?”

Rajesh’s smile had gone. The wince remained. “That might have been me…”

The room went still. Mayor and revolutionary locked eyes. In this small storeroom, surround by cheap booze and faint club music, sat on tacky plastic chairs, the fate of the capital was to be hashed out.

“Well!?” Rajesh kicked things off, “what did you want to talk about, ‘officer’? You called this meeting.”

"Tonight we talk about London, and your new neighbour. Specifically: me,” the host pointed at the brassard on his shoulder, "Captain Ibram Taylor, regional commander for Revolution Britannia as we set up in the city. You've left me a plenty to be getting on with."

Rajesh spluttered. This was one of those rare moments he needed someone from Westminster with him. Some egoist minister to butt in and make the meeting about themselves. "That's it? You're just going to move in and expect us to allow it!?"

"The police can't do anything, the public prefer us and China doesn't care either way, why wouldn't we move in?” Taylor calmed his guest with a lowering hand, “it will of course be non-violent, we wouldn’t be talking otherwise."

"And what does this 'non-violent protest' achieve?"

"Clean streets, safe citizens, that sort of thing," Taylor looked about casually.

Rajesh lifted his head and narrowed his eyes, "help the city, do it better than us, and boost your reputation. You might even get some recruitment in."

"And all you have to give us is a blind eye!” Taylor smiled. Rajesh recognised it as a power move.

"And what do I get from it?"

"A safe and prosperous London! Isn't that why you took the job?"

"Don't try that on me..."

"A better London with a better government in power, one who remembers those who were good to us at the start."

"How many of us are you expecting to snag with that line?"

"You'd be surprised. Many agree there is a bigger problem than either of us."

Rajesh blinked, and laughed; easing for the first time all day. "Opus Veda!? Can the glorious revolution not defeat them without the House of Commons releasing a press statement?"

"Hard to defeat an opponent who won't stand up straight, but we all need them gone and the longer we bicker the more damage they'll cause. Whatever the future of a united England is, surely we can agree it doesn't have them in it."

"Don't you mean a united Britain, Captain?"

Taylor paused. Rajesh watched him construct a workable answer. Realising he was caught Taylor slapped the table, jolting his guests as he eased into his chair. "Let’s agree to no hostilities for the next few days. We just want to talk."

Rajesh nodded once. He had found the reason for the meeting: the revolution wanted more time to access the mayor and negotiate him into dust. Favours first, blackmail second, a pretence of rational reason start to finish. A political parlour trick he had seen plenty of. He considered the outcomes. 'No hostilities' meant he could avoid committing in theory, but everyone else would think otherwise. The President requested only that he report back with terms, which appeared in this case to be ‘do nothing’.

But who cared about the President’s opinion? Oligarch and Emperor shared the real throne, and they couldn't care less if England was Revolution Red or Republic Blue. And if someone caught one mayor with his pants down and Reds behind him, what of it? He did want London safe and prosperous, and preferably during his tenure. The revolution could do better than the republic, with the Defence Secretary having drinks with their beloved General up north and the Home Secretary - the President's frustratingly attractive, plausibly nepotist wife - chasing terrorist shadows.

But in a rare episode for democracy the long-term mattered enough to consider it. If the revolution ran England, if the masses backed them with all their anger and dissatisfaction, fascism could be back on the menu. Who would be blamed and othered this time?

Samantha cleared her throat. Captain Taylor cocked his head. The sergeant shuffled where he stood. The lights buzzed and the same repetitive kick drum thumped the wall. Rajesh had to get away. He had to make a decision now.

The first words of an answer began to escape. But they were cut short. Darkness interrupted him. The lights died and the building powered down with a gushing sound that shook his body. The captain’s response told Rajesh this wasn’t planned.