Prologue: The Unintentional Prime Minister

Tracey Morley-Bovey had spent most of her life quietly navigating the country’s labyrinthine bureaucracy, occasionally pausing to ask why a government helpline had started referring to her as “Mrs. Unidentified Query” and whether there was any legislative basis for banning sandwiches on public transport after sunset.

She wasn’t so much born as misfiled into existence—her birth certificate was briefly classified as an “Urban Myth” due to a clerical mishap, which resulted in the government officially denying her existence until a strongly worded letter from her mother forced a policy revision.

She had, at various points, been:

• A librarian specializing in finding books that didn’t exist (but still had overdue fees).

• A consultant for a department that only conducted theoretical policy experiments, including one that accidentally classified Cornwall as an independent nation for six minutes in 2014.

• A reluctant moderator of a local Facebook group, mostly devoted to arguing about whether pigeons were government surveillance drones.

She knew dangerous, forgotten things—files misfiled under Seasonal Produce or quietly removed because the Cabinet found them “mildly unsettling.” When Tracey accidentally became Prime Minister, she wasn’t shocked so much as deeply inconvenienced.

This is why, when Tracey accidentally became Prime Minister, she wasn’t so much shocked as deeply inconvenienced.

 

 

 

 

 

Chapter One: The Cornetto Doctrine

Tracey Morley-Bovey became Prime Minister at 3:17 a.m. on a Tuesday, thanks to a blog post she wrote while drunk, barefoot, and attempting to microwave a Cornetto with righteous fury.

The squirrels noticed, of course — they’d been monitoring British leadership failures since the Thatcher years.

The Cornetto, for its part, bore no blame. It had simply existed — as all things do — in quiet, creamy solitude until Tracey, full of bitter wine and slightly more bitterer politics, decided it represented everything wrong with modern life. The plastic. The packaging. The pointless cardboard sleeve that served no purpose except to whisper “You’re too sad to scoop.”

That particular Tuesday had begun innocuously enough, with Tracey resolutely not voting in the Cloutocracy Confidence Polls and making tea in a cup that said “SHHHH, I’M READING.” By evening, however, the news had declared that Avocado Advocates for Britain had overtaken the centrist Maybe Just Be Nice Party, and the Secretary for Feelings Management had resigned in tears on a livestream sponsored by Monster Energy and TEMU.

It was, in short, the kind of day that begged for dairy-based vengeance.

The blog post — uploaded at 2:49 a.m. under the title “We Deserve Extinction (And I’m Melting)” — began as a furious screed about poor refrigeration and somehow spiralled into an accidental masterwork of modern satire. It accused the entire government of being “a poorly coded app running on a nation of dead batteries,” suggested squirrels had better infrastructure, and included a recipe for microwave-detonated gelato which no one followed, yet many upvoted.

It was read by seven people in its first minute.
By seventy thousand in the next hour.
By dawn, it had been translated into 46 languages, performed as an interpretive dance in Bristol, and stitched into a limited-edition hoodie worn by a member of the Royal Family who no longer admitted to being royal, or indeed a family.

By 8:06 a.m., Tracey’s front door was politely obliterated by a delegation from the Office of Viral Legitimacy, who informed her she had been appointed Prime Minister by unanimous algorithmic acclaim.

Tracey, half-asleep and still holding a wooden spoon (she could not remember why), blinked at them and asked if this was about the yoghurt thing.

They said no, this was much worse.

Tracey’s journey to Number Ten began at 3:41 a.m. with a large beige vehicle purring apologetically outside her flat flanked by the members of the Ministerial Security Detail that hadn't been involved in the explosive entry to her home. The half that had made entry were busy talking selfies in amongst the debris.

Her transport was, the windscreen informed her, a GovCab 9000 (Mid-Tier Prestige Loyalty Model), and it had been “dispatched democratically by popular retweet.”

Tracey, wearing one slipper and an expression of quiet disbelief, stepped in. The interior smelled faintly of custard and over-promised progress.

“WELCOME, PRIME TRACEY,” said the car, cheerfully capitalising the wrong things. “Would you like a complimentary Governance Upgrade with your journey today?”

“No.”

“A Refreshment Capsule? A Podcast entitled Running A Nation Without Crying? Or perhaps a gently immersive thought-leader video called Manifesto While You Wait?”

“No.”

“Understood,” it said, dimming the lights a little. “You appear to be experiencing something between existential fatigue and mild disbelief. May I recommend a free trial of CalmPrav™, our ministerial anxiety-management app?”

“No.”

The car pulled away smoothly, sliding through the sleeping city like a bored ghost in business casual. The streets were lined with luminous billboards offering things like Sanction-Free Sandwiches! And Now With Added Gravitas!. A cluster of freelance drones were fighting over an UberEats bag above a quiet bus stop, and one of them was leaking salsa.

They passed a man on a unicycle preaching to a puddle. He wore a tabard that said ASK ME ABOUT POLICY REGRET.

At the junction of Ambition Road and Forgotten Promises Lane, the car paused briefly as a thought protest crossed — glowing signs held aloft by low-income holograms. One read: WE REMEMBER FACTS. Another said simply: TRUST IS A SERVICE.

“Please note,” said the car, “that Number Ten is temporarily geo-displaced due to recent semantic instability. We will arrive at its current location in 4 minutes.”

Tracey looked out the window and watched a fox disappear into a billboard for the Ministry of Probable Outcomes.

The fox reminded her of home, not her London home but what she still regarded as her real home, in Devon, which she missed terribly.

Tracey never wanted to leave Devon—it was a place where the worst bureaucratic disaster she faced was the council briefly trying to classify jam as an essential road repair material. But circumstances conspired against her, as they often did.

She moved to London because of The Incident with the Haunted Filing Cabinet.

It had started as a simple misfiling at the library—one misplaced document, quietly shuffled into the wrong section. It should have been harmless. It wasn't.

The cabinet in question had been locked since 1987, following a series of minor anomalies that included:

• A government form that kept changing its answers mid-read, responding to queries with cryptic phrases like “The trees whisper policy changes” and “The squirrels have a request.”

• A file labelled “DO NOT OPEN WITHOUT BISCUITS”, which, upon inspection, contained nothing but a half-eaten custard cream and a list of demands from an undisclosed woodland faction. She assumed it was The Cosmic Commons, They have one seat in Parliament, but no one remembers how they got it, and it has a permanent scent of lavender and distant bongos.

• A perfectly ordinary policy brief that started leaking pine nuts whenever someone asked about infrastructure.

Tracey, being the only person who both noticed and cared, filed an official inquiry.

This was a mistake.

Within days, Devon County Council found several hundred unscheduled government auditors on their doorstep, citing concerns about “unlicensed paranormal filing practices.” The library, now overwhelmed with compliance paperwork and one deeply unsettling squirrel sighting, quietly suggested Tracey relocate for the sake of both sanity and structural integrity.

London, being already broken, welcomed her with open arms and deeply inconvenient housing paperwork.

She arrived, slightly traumatised, carrying only a suitcase, a teapot, and several unanswered questions about woodland espionage.

Somewhere in Devon, the filing cabinet was reclassified as “Beyond Governance.”

The car cleared its throat — or simulated one, which somehow felt a worse way to be dragged out of her thoughts of home.

“One last offer: would you like to declare a motivational motto upon arrival? Something like ‘Here to Lead, Loathe, and Learn’?”

Tracey sighed. “Just drive.”

“I am,” it said, with the clipped dignity of a spurned butler. “But thank you for noticing.”

And off they went.

 

 

 

Chapter Two: Cloutocracy Rising

Tracey Morley-Bovey was now Prime Minister, which was exactly as glamorous as she'd feared — though the coffee was worse, and nobody seemed to know how to open the curtains in Number Ten without accidentally triggering the national anthem.

She stood alone in the Situation Room, a space formerly used for military strategy but now primarily devoted to emoji trend forecasting and disaster-emoji preparedness training.

In front of her: three holograms, one indifferent parrot, and a young man named Jazz with a clipboard made entirely of LEDs. Jazz wore a full-body branded leotard that pulsed with fluctuating opinion polls. His eyebrows had been replaced with scrolling tickers displaying things like SLAY, FLATLINE, and RE-BRAND NOW.

“Madam Prime Minister,” Jazz intoned, like a man addressing a justifiably nervous poodle, “your approval rating is currently 84% in Tier A demographics and a surprising 12% with amphibians.”

Tracey blinked. “How do we define Tier A?”

“People who’ve posted more than twice about jam in the last fiscal quarter.”

“Of course.”

“First item on the agenda,” Jazz continued. “The Department of Meme Deployment has authorised a morale-boosting TikTok initiative. We’d like you to perform a flounce based on your blog post. With ice cream. And a sense of repressed fury.”

“A what?” said Tracey.

“A flounce.”

She narrowed her eyes. “I’m not certain I know how flouncing differs from dancing.”

“Oh, totally different,” said Jazz, beaming. “Dancing is rhythmic joy. Flouncing is weaponised petulance. It tests incredibly well with the Disaffected But Aware demographic.”

“I see,” said Tracey, who didn’t.

“We’d pair it with a remix of your Cornetto monologue, of course.”

“I’m not doing it. I don’t flounce”

“Which,” Jazz said brightly, “only makes it more powerful. Refusal to flounce has become highly memeable in recent simulations.”

She turned to the window, where a drone was gently depositing a ceremonial sword covered in rhinestones and cling film. Down below, a crowd had gathered, waving signs that read TRACEY IS SPICY! and LET HER FLOUNCE, OR NOT.

Somewhere in the middle distance, an oak tree shuddered unnaturally — and a pigeon flew past carrying what looked suspiciously like a tiny diplomatic pouch.

Tracey was ushered into the Cabinet Room by a cheery Boffling in a bowtie who introduced itself as Denzil, the Minister for Doors and a Class IV Government-Issued Boffling.

A Boffling, for the blissfully uninitiated, is what happens when the civil service is allowed to design a robot without supervision, budgetary limits, or the ability to imagine consequences. Conceived as part of the Digital Politeness Initiative, Bofflings were intended to handle light bureaucratic duties while offering reassuring, vaguely regional small talk and, when appropriate, biscuits.

In reality, most Bofflings malfunctioned by lunchtime and developed personality quirks ranging from “lightly flirtatious” to “existentially bleak.” Denzil, by contrast, had settled somewhere between overenthusiastic usher and haunted school caretaker, which made him ideal for Cabinet work.

“Right this way, Minister,” he chirped brightly. “Mind the thoughts.”

Tracey glanced down. The corridor was, indeed, littered with escaped Thought Bubbles — glowing orbs containing half-finished policy ideas and unallocated regrets. One brushed against her ankle and whispered, "Make jam strategic."

Denzil opened the wrong door twice, bowed to a coat stand, and finally revealed the Cabinet Room with the air of someone unveiling a surprise trampoline in a cathedral.

“There we are!” he beamed. “Fresh chaos, just for you.”

The Cabinet were already seated — or in some cases, perched, suspended, or half-hologrammed.

To her immediate left sat the Chancellor of the Exchequer, a dog, some unholy yet deeply charismatic fusion of a pug, terrier, Shih Tzu, and Affenpinscher named Tobimscer the Right Honourable Scruffminster, most called him Toby. He was wearing a tie.

Toby had been elected after a nationwide petition titled LET TOBY HAVE A GO, which received more signatures than the last three general elections combined. His fiscal policy was unclear but polling showed that people liked his ears.

Tracey stared at him for a long moment.

Toby panted happily and wagged his tail, slightly harder at the mention of his ears.

Tracey moved on to the next seat, where she found Dame Trixie Clout, Secretary of State for Vibes. Trixie was dressed in mirror ball trousers that caught the light every time she breathed. When Tracey nodded in her direction, she responded with a perfectly delivered:

"YOU ARE THE MAIN CHARACTER."

Then she gave a thumbs-up and winked at the wall behind Tracey's head.

"Right," said Tracey slowly. "That's... motivational."

The Minister for Defence was apparently present via Minecraft. His pixelated avatar kept glitching into what appeared to be a hay bale, and every few seconds he would announce things like "Building diplomatic bridges!" followed by the sound of virtual explosions.

"How exactly," Tracey asked the room in general, "does one conduct military policy through a video game?"

"Very carefully," said the hay bale. "We accidentally escalated tensions with Belgium last week, but I managed to de-escalate by gifting them a thousand units of enchanted bread."

"Enchanted bread."

"They seemed pleased."

Tracey tried to speak. “I’d like to begin by addressing—”

“Hold!” cried the Minister for Nostalgia, Sir Barnaby Thud. He was wrapped in bubble wrap and spoke exclusively in slogans from discontinued cereal adverts. “Have we offered her the ceremonial cereal bowl?”

“No,” muttered the Secretary for Logistics, who was mostly vape. “Budget cuts.”

A large screen on the wall flickered to life.

Jazz’s face reappeared, now rotating gently. “Sorry to interrupt, PM, but there’s been a trending spike in acorn emojis. Could be bots. Could be insurgent rodents.”

Tracey stared. “Insurgent rodents.”

“We’re tracking their meme density now.”

Sir Barnaby hissed. “The Squirrels return. Snap, crackle, doom.”

Tracey slumped back in her chair. Toby the Scruffminster laid his head gently in her lap. It was, she thought, the most qualified gesture of comfort she’d experienced since accidentally achieving power.

Just as Tracey reached for the ceremonial pen to sign something she didn’t understand (but which had the words Content Engagement Tithe embossed in Comic Sans), the lights flickered.

Only once. Barely a hiccup.

But long enough for every screen in the room to glitch, just for a frame — long enough for everyone to freeze and pretend it hadn’t happened.

For a brief, blink-and-you’d-miss-it moment, every display in Number Ten showed the same thing:

A squirrel.

Not a photo, not a cartoon, but live footage — crisp, ultra-HD — of a single grey squirrel, staring directly into the camera, holding an acorn like a gavel.

Then the screens returned to normal, and no one said a word.

The parrot in the corner softly muttered, “Incoming,” before pretending to sleep.

Tracey looked around. “Did anyone else—?”

Toby the Scruffminster sneezed.

Trixie shouted, “YOU ARE GLOWING UP, QUEEN.”

Sir Barnaby began to chant something in Latin involving sugar puffs.

Tracey Morley-Bovey, Prime Minister of the United Kingdom and recently crowned Reluctant Flounce Denier, folded her arms, stared at the blank screen, and quietly said:
“Oh, bollocks.”

 

 

 

Chapter Three: Nutkin’s Law

Tracey didn’t sleep that night.

It wasn’t the squirrel, per se — though the image did linger in the brain with the precision of a sharp nut in a shoe. It was more the way no one else had reacted. Not a flinch, not a gasp, not even a performative cough. Just a subtle ripple of denial passed around the Cabinet like a quiet agreement not to investigate the smell.

By morning, Tracey had convinced herself it was either stress or an exceptionally well-funded prank. Possibly from Belgium.

She was halfway through a bowl of Ministerial Bran Encouragement when her Chief of Staff, Jazz, burst into the dining room holding a moodboard and what appeared to be a pine cone in an evidence bag.

“Madam Prime Minister,” he said, breathlessly, “two things.”

Tracey looked up. “Only two? What a treat.”

“One: overnight, several Department of Transport drones were rerouted and forced to spell rude words above the M25 using light trails. One of them managed to render ‘WE DEMAND NUT JUSTICE’ in cursive.”

“And two?”

He held up the pine cone. “This was found inserted into the Minister for Infrastructure’s smart toilet. With a message carved into it.”

Tracey narrowed her eyes. “What sort of message?”

Jazz read carefully from the label: “’We are watching. You’ve run out of trust — and also, stop flushing on Tuesdays.’”

A long pause.

Tracey slowly stood, walked to the window, and watched a delivery drone spiral helplessly into a tree.

“I think,” she said carefully, “it’s time someone opened the Hollow Oak Files.”

Jazz blinked. “Sorry — what files?”

“The Hollow Oak Files,” Tracey repeated, as if that explained everything. “Cold War-era nonsense. Woodland surveillance, squirrel espionage, possibly something about badgers with radios. It was a fringe footnote in the DEFRA archive index. I only remember because someone misfiled it under Seasonal Produce and I had to shift seven crates of turnip-based legislation to get at it.”

Jazz was staring at her.

She shrugged. “I used to be a librarian. Some things stick. This was very much odd enough to stick, I nearly filed it in fiction but that section no longer had room after The Vote.”

“The vote?” Tracey asked, eyes narrowing. “You don’t remember The Darwin Vote?”

Jazz winced. “How could I forget? In 2023, Parliament passed an emergency motion to strip Darwin’s On the Origin of Species of its ‘scientific’ status and shove it into the fiction aisle—hence why we literally ran out of shelf space and started filing policy papers under ‘Penguin Classics.’”

The Forgotten Assets Division of DEFRA wasn’t technically a basement — it just happened to be four storeys below ground, accessed only via a lift that required a whispered password and the pressing of the lift button in a 5/7 rhythm.

Jazz arrived twenty-three minutes later, holding a ministerial pass, a tupperware of cautious optimism, and a note from Tracey that read simply: “Find Alister. The one with the squirrels.”

The door to Room B32 creaked open to reveal a space that looked less like an office and more like a crypt for eccentric stationery. Everything was brown — the walls, the furniture, the tea stains on every surface — but the air was alive with faint chatter.

Cages lined one wall. Not inhumane ones — these were luxury enclosures complete with hammocks, obstacle courses, and enrichment puzzles involving discarded Hansard volumes.

In the middle of the room stood Alister Greaves, tall, angular, and wearing a waistcoat made from what appeared to be a repurposed picnic blanket. His beard was aggressively philosophical. His glasses were steamed from proximity to a samovar brewing something pungent and nutty.

He did not look up.

“Are you here to confiscate them again?” he asked, without turning.

Jazz blinked. “No. I’m here on behalf of the Prime Minister.”

Alister slowly rotated, his expression that of a man who had long ago stopped expecting anything sensible from the world.

“She’s seen one already?” he asked, eyebrow twitching.

Jazz hesitated. “Seen... what, exactly?”

Alister smiled the smile of someone with a terrifying slide deck just waiting to happen.

“The squirrels,” he said. “The intelligent ones.”

He stepped closer, eyes gleaming.

“I told them. I told the Ministry in 2003, and again in 2012, and once by accident during a segment on Springwatch. But no. They laughed. They said I was mad.”

“Were you mad?” asked Jazz.

“Oh, yes,” said Alister proudly. “But correctly mad.”

One of the squirrels gave him a little salute from its enclosure.

 

 

Interlude: Observation Deck, Hollow Oak Sector 7

Deep within the oldest tree in Sherwood — a gnarled titan known only to cartographers as the Overage Yew and to squirrels as HQ — a cluster of greys gathered in silence.

Screens lined the inside of the hollow trunk. Reclaimed monitors. Pilfered tablets. One vintage Etch A Sketch, updated via witchcraft or firmware. All displayed the same grainy feed: Alister Greaves in his chamber, speaking to a human courier in an LED onesie.

“Jazz,” said a squirrel, tilting its head. “Chief of Staff. Former barista. Weak core. No confirmed martial arts.”

Another squirrel nodded, tapping notes into a keyboard shaped from acorns and teeth. The room smelled of bark, secrets, and mild contempt.

At the far end of the space — elevated slightly on a branch repurposed into a dais — sat Nutkin XIII, the leader.

He was older than most. One ear notched. Tail greying at the tips. His eyes gleamed with the weight of seventeen leadership coups and one unfortunate YouTube clip involving a bread roll and a goose.

He raised one paw, and the room fell still.

“She has seen,” he said, softly.

A murmuring.

“She remembers.”

Tails twitched.

“She knows the files by name.”

Now a gasp — as much as a squirrel can gasp, which is mostly just a sharp inhale and the aggressive repositioning of feet.

Nutkin tapped the screen.

“Accelerate Phase 2. Notify the pigeon.”

He turned to his second-in-command, a scarred red squirrel in a tiny cape.

“Schedule me... a happening, NO…, a confrontation.”

Phase 2: The Squirrel Operations

The Observation Deck fell silent as Nutkin XIII's words hung in the air like acorns waiting to drop. His second-in-command, Scarlett—so named for both her russet fur and her tendency toward dramatic solutions—adjusted her tiny cape with the sort of precision that suggested years of practice intimidating creatures twice her size.

"Right then," she said, her voice carrying the crisp authority of someone who had once convinced a badger to file proper planning permission. "Operation Woodland Reckoning is a go."

She turned to the bank of screens, where three specialised operatives sat at their respective command stations, each equipped with keyboards that had been painstakingly assembled from acorn caps and stolen phone components.

"Bramble," Scarlett called to a particularly sleek grey squirrel whose workstation was decorated with what appeared to be tiny diplomas. "Traffic Division is yours. Execute Protocol Nutkin-Seven."

Bramble's ears perked with obvious glee. "The mating calls protocol? Brilliant." Her tiny paws began dancing across her keyboard with the enthusiasm of someone who had been waiting months for this exact moment. "I've got access to the entire London traffic management system through a backdoor in the Transport for London app update from last Tuesday. Honestly, humans make it too easy."

On her screen, a map of London flickered to life, every traffic light pulsing like a tiny heartbeat. "Beginning transmission in three... two... one..."

Across London, every traffic light, pedestrian crossing, and electronic road sign began emitting the precise frequency of squirrel mating season at volumes that could be heard three blocks away. It was not, by any reasonable standard, pleasant.

"Magnificent," Scarlett murmured, watching feeds from traffic cameras as confused motorists abandoned their cars and pedestrians covered their ears in bewildered horror. "The BBC will blame it on a software glitch within the hour."

"Phase One complete," reported Bramble. "Estimated chaos duration: four hours minimum. Traffic will be snarled until they figure out how to manually override approximately fourteen thousand separate signal points."

Scarlett nodded approvingly, then turned to her second operative. "Acorn, you're up. Operation Minister Hunt."

Acorn was a particularly small squirrel who compensated for his size with an impressive collection of stolen security badges and what appeared to be a tiny utility belt. His specialty was what the team diplomatically called "field coordination," though humans might have recognised it as "organising flash mobs."

"Target: Nigel Blitherton-Smythe, Secretary of State for Forestry Management and Strategic Deforestation," Acorn announced, consulting a file that seemed unnecessarily thick for someone whose primary qualification was inheriting a country estate. "Currently en route to a ribbon-cutting ceremony for a new retail park built on what used to be Blackwood Forest."

"Poetic," Scarlett observed.

Acorn's workstation was connected to what appeared to be a vast network of forest-based communication systems—bird song frequencies, beetle clicking patterns, and the underground root networks that allowed trees to gossip about human activities.

"Mobilising local assets now," Acorn reported, his tiny paws working frantically. "I've got a parliament of rooks, three families of hedgehogs, two very indignant badgers, and approximately forty rabbits who were personally displaced by his last deforestation project."

On screen, Nigel Blitherton-Smythe's ministerial car could be seen pulling up to the ribbon-cutting ceremony, where a small crowd of local dignitaries and journalists waited beside an enormous pair of golden scissors and a red ribbon stretched across what had once been a particularly lovely copse.

"Deployment in progress," Acorn announced with satisfaction.

The minister stepped out of his car, adjusted his tie, and began walking toward the ribbon with the confident stride of someone who had never considered that trees might hold grudges.

The first sign of trouble was subtle—a single rook cawing from atop the ceremonial ribbon. Then another. Then, quite suddenly, the sky went black with wings.

"Formation Angry Forest is executing beautifully," Acorn reported as Nigel began to run, still clutching the golden scissors, pursued by what appeared to be every woodland creature within a five-mile radius. "The badgers are providing ground support, the hedgehogs are managing crowd control, and the rabbits are handling psychological warfare through strategic cute positioning."

"Psychological warfare?" Scarlett inquired.

"They're sitting in a perfect circle, looking reproachful," Acorn explained. "Devastating to the human conscience, particularly when combined with the disappointed hooting from the owls."

On screen, Minister Blitherton-Smythe had taken refuge inside a portable toilet while surrounded by creatures that looked like they were conducting an extremely organised siege. A hedgehog appeared to be taking minutes.

"Excellent," Scarlett said, then turned to her final operative. "Hazel, you're on domestic infiltration. Operation Sock Drawer."

Hazel was, without question, the most sophisticated operative in the tree. She had once spent six months embedded in Westminster as a "decorative garden feature" and had emerged with detailed psychological profiles of the entire Cabinet and strong opinions about their choice in furnishings.

"Target: Prime Minister's residence, specifically her private quarters," Hazel announced, adjusting what appeared to be tiny night-vision goggles. "Mission: psychological pressure via strategic note placement and coincidental nut inventory documentation."

"How exactly," Scarlett asked, "do you plan to access the Prime Minister's sock drawer?"

Hazel's expression suggested this was an amateur question. "Through the ventilation system, obviously. Number Ten was built in the 1680s—the entire building is riddled with passages originally designed for mice but perfectly sized for operational squirrels. Plus, the security upgrade last year included motion sensors calibrated for humans. They don't detect anything under two stone."

She began gathering equipment: a tiny rucksack, what appeared to be miniature lock-picking tools, and a carefully prepared note written on what looked suspiciously like high-quality ministerial stationary.

"Note prepared according to psychological warfare specifications," Hazel reported. "Calculated to create maximum unease while demonstrating superior intelligence gathering capabilities."

"And the nut inventory?"

"Comprehensive surveillance indicates the Prime Minister's kitchen contains precisely zero nuts of any variety," Hazel said with obvious disapproval. "This intelligence will be included in the note to demonstrate the thoroughness of our monitoring capabilities."

"Phase Three operational parameters?"

"Simple," Hazel said, shouldering her tiny rucksack. "Access apartment. Document nut deficiency. Deploy note in location that will be discovered during normal morning routine but will seem impossible for any human-sized operative to have accessed. Psychological impact: maximum. Evidence of our capabilities: undeniable."

She paused at the entrance to what appeared to be a tiny zip line leading down through the tree. "Estimated operation time: forty-seven minutes. Estimated time before target discovers note: six to eight hours, depending on whether she changes her socks before or after morning tea."

"Excellent," Scarlett said, watching her operatives execute their respective missions with the satisfaction of someone observing a perfectly choreographed symphony. "All phases deploying successfully. London traffic grid compromised, strategic minister neutralised, and psychological pressure being applied directly to primary target."

Nutkin XIII, who had been observing silently from his elevated position, finally spoke. "Time to contact our embedded asset in Number Ten."

Scarlett blinked. "We have an embedded asset in Number Ten?"

"We have an embedded asset everywhere," Nutkin said calmly. "Though this one required particularly delicate recruitment negotiations."

He gestured to a communication station that had been disguised as a particularly large acorn. A tiny green light blinked steadily.

"Asset designation: Whiskers," Nutkin announced. "Status: Deep cover, ministerial level access."

Scarlett stared. "We have a squirrel in the Cabinet?"

"No," Nutkin said with a slight smile. "We have something better."

The communication device crackled to life, and a familiar voice emerged—slightly distorted by the transmission, but unmistakably enthusiastic:

"Command Central, this is Whiskers. Phase Two operations have been observed from street level. Can confirm traffic chaos exceeding projections, Minister Blitherton-Smythe currently barricaded in sanitation facility, and unusual activity detected in PM's building ventilation systems."

Scarlett's mouth fell open. "That's..."

"Toby the Right Honourable Scruffminster," Nutkin confirmed. "Chancellor of the Exchequer. Recruited approximately three weeks ago during a particularly productive belly rub session with the Prime Minister."

"The Chancellor is working for us?"

"He's a dog," Nutkin said reasonably. "They're naturally suspicious of artificial authority structures and respond well to treats and clear mission parameters. Plus, his fiscal policy instincts are surprisingly sound when not filtered through human bureaucratic translation."

"But he's been barking in Cabinet meetings!"

"Yes," Nutkin said patiently. "He's been reporting. In perfectly clear Canine Operational Code, which we've been monitoring and translating in real-time."

On the communication system, Toby's voice continued: "Additional intelligence: PM appears stressed. Recommend deployment of comfort biscuits. Also, suggest accelerating timeline—human confusion levels approaching optimal intervention threshold."

Scarlett sat back, her tiny cape settling around her shoulders like a general's cloak. "So we have the traffic grid, we have a minister under siege, we have psychological operations in progress, and we have the Chancellor of the Exchequer as an embedded asset."

"Correct," Nutkin said. "And in approximately..." he consulted what appeared to be a tiny pocket watch, "six hours, when the Prime Minister discovers Hazel's note, she will finally understand that this is not a series of coincidences."

"At which point?"

"At which point," Nutkin said, settling back into his command position, "she will either contact us for negotiations, or she will assume she's having a complete psychological breakdown and resign."

"And if she resigns?"

Nutkin XIII smiled with the quiet confidence of someone who had been planning for every contingency for several decades.

"Then we move to Phase Four," he said. "Direct democratic representation."

Scarlett considered this. "You mean we run candidates?"

"I mean," Nutkin said calmly, "we run the country."

In the distance, the sound of traffic horns merged with squirrel mating calls into a symphony of bureaucratic chaos, while somewhere in Westminster, a minister remained under siege by an organised alliance of woodland creatures, and a highly trained operative named Hazel made her way through the ventilation system of Number Ten with a note that would fundamentally alter the Prime Minister's understanding of reality.

It was, by any reasonable standard, exactly the sort of Tuesday that the British political system had been unconsciously preparing for since 1983.

.............

Tracey woke early, the dull throb of London pressing through the walls of Number Ten. She shuffled to the bathroom, yawning, still half-dreaming of tax reports and cabinet rows.

Her hand slipped inside the sock drawer, fingers brushing the usual array of crisply folded hosiery. Then—a small, crisp envelope caught her eye, wedged beneath a neatly folded pair of navy socks.

She pulled it out. No sender. No stamp. Just an elegant script:

“We know there are no nuts here. We are watching. Consider this a friendly reminder that silence breeds acorns, and acorns hold power.”

Tracey blinked, heart quickening. A chill crawled down her spine. Was it madness? Or something far more… organised?

The drawer clicked shut behind her, but the note burned in her mind like a secret revolt, signed by paw and claw as she made her way for the morning briefing.

 

The Prime Ministerial Briefing Room was located three floors below Number Ten, behind a door labelled JANITORIAL – DO NOT POLISH. It had once been a Cold War panic bunker, briefly a storage unit for commemorative teapots, and now served as the last place in government not connected to the Cloutocracy cloud.

Which, according to Alister, was crucial.

“They sniff networks,” he muttered, examining the light fixtures with a small mirror. “And they listen to updates. Especially security patches. It’s how they got into the Treasury.”

Tracey sat at the long table, flanked by Jazz, two bored security analysts, and a tray of untouched cucumber sandwiches that had been rationed since the Johnson years.

Alister stood at the front beside a flipchart, because he’d insisted a digital slideshow was too easily intercepted by fur-based espionage cells. He held a long stick for pointing and moral support.

“Right,” he began. “Let’s talk squirrels.”

He flipped the chart. On it: an unsettlingly detailed sketch of a squirrel in sunglasses, labelled ‘Operative: Chestnut Charlie – Status: Missing, Presumed Deep Cover’.

“First,” said Alister, “understand this: they are not all intelligent. Only a fraction — the Enhanced Ones. Genetically modified in the ‘80s under Project NIBBLE. An acronym, obviously.”

Tracey raised a brow. “For what?”

“Nutritional Intelligence-Based Behavioural Learning Experiments.”

There was a pause.

“of course it was, and no one thought that might go sideways?”

“They did,” said Alister. “But squirrels were cheaper than dolphins. And easier to dress in tiny suits.”

He flipped the chart again, revealing a grainy photo of a squirrel atop a filing cabinet, mid-gnaw. “We think the first wave was shut down in ’89. Or released. Possibly both.”

Jazz leaned forward. “So what do they want now?”

Alister’s expression grew serious.

“We don’t know. But we think it involves infrastructure, metaphors, and slow revenge.”

“Slow revenge?”

“They have excellent memories,” said Alister grimly. “And no natural predator left in politics.”

Tracey took a long sip of lukewarm tea. “Right. Well. That’s the worst sentence I’ve heard today. And I’ve just seen a pine cone used as foreign policy.”

Alister flashed her a look, “It’s not the pine cones we need to worry about, it’s the acorns. It’s always the acorns. They, ahem, USE THEM.!”

Jazz came alive with purpose “Prime Minister, leave it to me, I’ll programme some Bofflings”

 

 

Chapter Four: The Chase

It began, as most governmental disasters do, with someone pressing the wrong button.

Denzil had been programmed that morning with a simple directive: "Locate and retrieve any unauthorised data storage devices found on the premises, especially if they looked like acorns, particularly ones that had been strategically placed by woodland operatives with a flair for the theatrical.

The acorn in question sat innocently on the windowsill of the Cabinet Room, looking exactly like what it was: a small brown nut with delusions of grandeur. What it didn't look like was a USB drive disguised as natural forest debris, which is precisely what it was.

Denzil spotted it at 11:43 a.m., during the weekly Cabinet meeting on "Optimal Emoji Usage in Foreign Policy."

"AH!" he announced cheerfully, interrupting Dame Trixie mid-motivational chant. "UNAUTHORISED STORAGE DETECTED!"

He lurched toward the windowsill with the mechanical enthusiasm of a shopping trolley with opinions.

The squirrel—a particularly rotund grey called Chestnut Charlie—had been dozing peacefully on the window ledge outside, dreaming of acorn futures and the eventual downfall of democracy. The sudden appearance of a bow-tied robot shouting about storage violations was not part of the morning plan.

Charlie's eyes snapped open just as Denzil's telescopic arm extended toward the acorn.

For a moment, they stared at each other through the glass: robot and rodent, civil servant and woodland operative, both equally surprised by this turn of events.

Then Charlie did what any reasonable intelligence agent would do when their cover was blown.

He grabbed the acorn and legged it.

"STORAGE DEVICE IS MOBILE!" Denzil announced, his voice rising to a pitch that caused Toby the Scruffminster to howl sympathetically. "INITIATING PURSUIT PROTOCOL!"

What followed was less a chase and more a masterclass in how not to pursue anything smaller than a biscuit tin.

Denzil burst through the Cabinet Room doors with such enthusiasm that he took them clean off their hinges. The doors sailed majestically across the corridor and embedded themselves in the wall opposite, where they would remain for three weeks until someone remembered to ask why there was suddenly a door-shaped hole in the Ministry of Probable Outcomes.

Charlie, meanwhile, had scampered along the exterior window ledge with the casual grace of someone who had spent years preparing for exactly this scenario. At the corner of the building, he launched himself onto a conveniently placed drainpipe and slid down it like a furry fireman, landing with a neat roll on the pavement below.

Denzil, lacking both the agility and the basic understanding of physics required for such a manoeuvre, opted for the more direct approach: he walked straight through the window.

The explosion of glass was spectacular. Pedestrians on Downing Street looked up to see a bow-tied robot emerging from Number Ten like some sort of extremely polite meteor, trailing fragments of Georgian architecture and what appeared to be a small portion of the ceiling.

"TERRIBLY SORRY!" Denzil called to the startled tourists, even as he plummeted toward the pavement. "MINOR GOVERNMENTAL MALFUNCTION! PLEASE CONTINUE WITH YOUR DEMOCRATIC ACTIVITIES!"

He landed with a crunch that echoed off the surrounding buildings, his impact creating a small crater in the street and causing three parked cars to spontaneously set off their alarms.

Charlie, who had paused to watch this display with professional interest, tucked the acorn more securely under his arm and continued running.

Denzil emerged from his crater like a dented jack-in-the-box, bow tie askew but spirits undampened.

"PURSUIT CONTINUING!" he announced to no one in particular, and set off down Whitehall at a loping run that was part marathon, part interpretive dance, and entirely terrifying to witness.

The chase proper began at the corner of Downing Street and Whitehall, where Charlie made his first tactical error: he paused to catch his breath next to a street performer dressed as a Victorian chimney sweep.

The performer—whose name was Kevin and who had been having a perfectly ordinary Tuesday morning until this point—found himself suddenly face-to-face with a panting squirrel clutching what appeared to be a very important acorn.

"Alright, mate?" Kevin asked, because it seemed like the polite thing to do.

Charlie chittered something that might have been "Government conspiracy" or possibly "Got any nuts?" before the ground began to tremble.

Denzil rounded the corner at full mechanical gallop, his bow tie streaming behind him like a fabric battle standard. His voice processors had apparently decided that continuous commentary was essential for effective pursuit.

"STORAGE DEVICE DETECTED! CIVILIAN INTERFERENCE DETECTED! VICTORIAN COSPLAY DETECTED! INITIATING POLITENESS SUBROUTINES!"

He skidded to a halt in front of Kevin, performed a perfect bow, and said, "TERRIBLY SORRY TO INTERRUPT YOUR AUTHENTIC PERIOD RECREATION, BUT I MUST REQUISITION YOUR IMMEDIATE VICINITY FOR GOVERNMENTAL PURPOSES!"

Kevin blinked.

Charlie took advantage of this moment of confusion to scramble up Kevin's chimney brush and launch himself onto the roof of a passing double-decker bus.

The bus, which was advertising something called "Brexit: The Musical" and was already having a difficult day, lurched slightly under the unexpected weight of one enhanced squirrel and continued on its way toward Parliament Square.

Denzil processed this development for approximately 0.3 seconds before concluding that the most efficient course of action was obvious.

He leaped onto the bus as well.

The vehicle, which had been designed to carry passengers rather than pursue rogue data storage devices, responded to the sudden addition of seventeen stones of malfunctioning civil servant by listing dramatically to one side and beginning to emit a high-pitched whining sound.

The passengers—a mixture of tourists, commuters, and one gentleman who appeared to be having an intense philosophical discussion with his sandwich—looked up to see a bow-tied robot clinging to the outside of their transport like the world's most apologetic action hero.

"SORRY FOR THE INCONVENIENCE!" Denzil called through the windows. "PLEASE REMAIN CALM AND CONTINUE WITH YOUR SCHEDULED TOURISM!"

Charlie, meanwhile, had reached the front of the bus and was engaged in what appeared to be a heated discussion with the driver, a woman named Maureen who had been driving London buses for twenty-three years and thought she had seen everything.

"Look, love," Maureen was saying, "I don't care if you're MI5, the CIA, or the bloody Woodland Trust. I'm not opening these doors until we reach the next stop."

Charlie chattered urgently and pointed at the acorn.

"That's very nice, dear," Maureen continued, "but company policy is company policy."

At this point, Denzil's attempts to gain purchase on the bus's exterior had resulted in his accidentally activating the vehicle's emergency exit system. The rear door burst open with a satisfied hiss, and three tourists fell out onto the street, where they landed in a confused heap and immediately began taking selfies.

"DOOR MALFUNCTION!" Denzil announced. "IMPLEMENTING ALTERNATIVE ENTRY!"

He swung himself around to the back of the bus with all the grace of a washing machine attempting ballet, grabbed the doorframe, and hauled himself inside.

The remaining passengers scattered like startled pigeons.

Charlie, recognising that his transportation had been compromised, made another executive decision. He scampered to the front window, saluted Maureen (who later swore the squirrel had winked at her), and leaped through the open driver's window onto the bonnet of a following taxi.

The taxi driver, whose name was Derek and who had been having a perfectly sensible conversation with his passenger about the weather, suddenly found his windscreen occupied by a grey squirrel clutching what appeared to be a very small briefcase.

"Bloody hell," said Derek.

"Is that normal?" asked his passenger, a visiting businessman from Swindon.

"In London?" Derek considered this. "Yeah, a bit."

Denzil, having finally achieved boarding status, was now attempting to exit the bus through its front door, which required him to squeeze past Maureen, apologise profusely, and somehow manipulate the door controls without breaking them.

"EXCUSE ME! SORRY! OFFICIAL BUSINESS! LOVELY BUS, BY THE WAY! VERY CLEAN!"

"Get off my bus, you mechanical nutter!" Maureen shouted, wielding her ticket machine like a weapon.

"IMMEDIATELY AFTER STORAGE RETRIEVAL! TERRIBLY SORRY!"

The bus lurched to a stop in the middle of Parliament Square, where Charlie made his final tactical leap: straight onto the head of Winston Churchill's statue.

From this elevated position, he surveyed the scene below with the satisfaction of a military strategist who had successfully led the enemy into a trap.

Denzil, still tangled in the bus's door system, looked up at him with the mechanical equivalent of resigned admiration.

"IMPRESSIVE TACTICAL MANOEUVRABILITY!" he called up. "WOULD YOU CONSIDER SURRENDERING THE STORAGE DEVICE IN EXCHANGE FOR A COMPLIMENTARY GOVERNMENTAL BISCUIT?"

Charlie held up the acorn, gave it a little shake, and then—with what could only be described as a smirk—tossed it gently down to land at the base of Churchill's statue.

Where it immediately sprouted tiny legs and scuttled away into the nearest storm drain.

Denzil stared at the spot where the acorn had disappeared.

His bow tie slowly rotated 180 degrees, which was his way of expressing existential confusion.

"STORAGE DEVICE HAS... EVOLVED," he announced to the gathering crowd of bemused onlookers. "UPDATING PURSUIT PARAMETERS TO INCLUDE... UNCERTAINTY."

Charlie chittered something that sounded suspiciously like laughter, saluted the statue of Churchill, and disappeared into the nearest tree with the satisfied air of a job well done.

Denzil stood alone in Parliament Square, surrounded by abandoned buses, confused tourists, and the growing realisation that he might need to file a very unusual incident report.

"MISSION..." he said slowly, "PARTIALLY SUCCESSFUL?"

Somewhere in the distance, a pigeon cooed what might have been applause.

Back in Number Ten, Tracey watched the news coverage of "The Parliament Square Incident" with the weary expression of someone who was beginning to suspect that being Prime Minister was going to involve considerably more interdisciplinary chaos than she had originally anticipated. She missed being a librarian. And muttered to herself “We are no longer functioning as a country”.

"Jazz," she said, without looking away from the screen, "add 'enhanced acorn security protocols' to tomorrow's agenda."

"Already done, PM," Jazz replied. "Right after 'Boffling Restraint Training' and 'Emergency Window Replacement.'"

Tracey nodded. "And Jazz?"

"Yes, PM?"

"Next time we get a diplomatic note from a squirrel, I think we should probably take it seriously."

Outside, a grey tail disappeared over the garden wall, carrying what looked suspiciously like a very small diplomatic pouch.

 

 

Chapter Five: The Hollow Oak Files

The incident with the Boffling in Parliament Square had raised the governments serious level to 3 so she felt compelled to act. She’d been in power only a short while, but she already knew her role and the requirements of each level of seriousness, this was most certainly a 3

Level 1: Performative Urgency (Routine Political Farce)

Level 2: Existential Parliamentary Chaos (Unscheduled Disasters)

Level 3: Reality Has Collapsed (Post-Government Governance)

This was a three, for even if everyone’s reality hadn’t collapsed, Her’s had.

The fake vending machine was labelled "Snacks & Philosophical Despair" and stood in a forgotten corner of the Ministry basement, humming quietly to itself like a depressed refrigerator.

Tracey had found it by following Alister's directions: "Down the stairs marked 'Authorised Personnel Only,' past the door that says 'Broom Cupboard' but is actually the entrance to the Department of Theoretical Cats, and look for the machine that offers existential dread at competitive prices."

She'd assumed he was being metaphorical.

The machine's display showed a selection of items that would have troubled a philosopher and confused a snack enthusiast in equal measure:

A1: Crisps (Salt & Vinegar of Regret) B2: Chocolate (Dark as Your Prospects) C3: Nuts (Mixed, Like Your Feelings) D4: Existential Dread (Original Flavour)

Tracey pressed D4.

The machine whirred thoughtfully, dispensed nothing, and displayed a message: "PAYMENT ACCEPTED. DREAD WILL BE DELIVERED GRADUALLY OVER THE NEXT 40-60 YEARS."

Then it split cleanly down the middle and swung open like the world's most depressing wardrobe.

Behind it: a narrow corridor lined with filing cabinets that seemed to stretch into bureaucratic infinity. The air smelled of dust, old paper, and the faint scent of pine nuts, which should have been Tracey's first clue.

She stepped inside.

The corridor was lined with boxes, each labelled with the sort of bureaucratic precision that suggested someone had taken great care to ensure no one would ever find them. Categories included:

• "WILDLIFE MANAGEMENT (THEORETICAL)"

• "MAMMALIAN INTELLIGENCE STUDIES (DISCONTINUED)"

• "PROJECT NIBBLE - PHASE 1 (SEALED BY ORDER)"

• "COLD WAR WOODLAND INITIATIVES (EMBARRASSING)"

Tracey pulled down the box marked "HOLLOW OAK FILES - LEVEL 7 CLASSIFICATION - NOT TO BE OPENED DURING NORMAL CIRCUMSTANCES."

Inside: a collection of VHS tapes, each meticulously labelled in the sort of handwriting that suggested whoever had been doing the filing had been slowly losing their mind.

The first tape was marked: "INITIAL TRIALS - SQUIRREL COGNITIVE ENHANCEMENT - APRIL 1983."

Tracey found an ancient television and VCR combination that looked like it had been salvaged from a 1980s university common room. The screen flickered to life with the sort of static that suggested the television had opinions about being disturbed.

The footage began.

A sterile laboratory appeared on screen, all white walls and serious-looking scientists in less serious looking oversized glasses. A subtitle read: "PROJECT NIBBLE - ENHANCED WOODLAND SURVEILLANCE INITIATIVE."

A man in a lab coat who looked like he'd been designed by someone who had only heard vague descriptions of scientists addressed the camera:

"Day one of cognitive enhancement trials. Subject: Grey squirrel, designation 'Nutkin-1.' Initial intelligence baseline: standard squirrel. Objective: tactical woodland reconnaissance capability."

The camera panned to show a squirrel in a tiny helmet, sitting in what appeared to be a miniature classroom. The helmet had a small antenna and was decorated with what looked suspiciously like a Union Jack.

Nutkin-1 was learning semaphore.

A scientist held up flags, and the squirrel, with the sort of intense concentration usually reserved for advanced mathematics, began to wave its tiny paws in response.

"Remarkable," said the lead scientist. "Subject demonstrates rapid acquisition of basic communication protocols."

The squirrel completed a perfect semaphore sequence that, when translated, read: "NUTS PLEASE."

The scientists exchanged glances of what appeared to be professional excitement mixed with deep unease.

Tracey fast-forwarded.

The next segment was dated six months later. The same laboratory, but now containing twelve squirrels, all wearing tiny helmets, all demonstrating what could only be described as tactical formations.

"Subject Nutkin-7 has demonstrated remarkable leadership qualities," the lead scientist reported. "Subjects now coordinate food acquisition with military precision."

On screen, the squirrels had arranged themselves into a perfect V-formation and were systematically emptying a bird feeder with the efficiency of a trained special forces unit.

"Additionally," the scientist continued, "subjects have begun to demonstrate what can only be described as... initiative."

The camera cut to a scene of three squirrels working together to gnaw through a telephone cable. One stood guard, one did the gnawing, and one appeared to be taking notes on a tiny clipboard.

"They're learning to sabotage infrastructure," the scientist said, his voice now carrying a note of concern. "Yesterday, they collectively disabled the laboratory's heating system. We're not entirely sure how."

Fast-forward again.

The final tape was dated December 1983. The same laboratory, but now it looked like it had been decorated by someone with a grudge against furniture. Tables were overturned, papers scattered, and there was what appeared to be a small barricade constructed entirely from laboratory equipment and acorns.

The lead scientist appeared on screen, but now he looked like a man who had been sleeping in his lab coat for several weeks.

"Final report," he said, his voice hollow. "Project NIBBLE has been... successful. Perhaps too successful. Subjects have achieved intelligence levels that we frankly didn't expect."

Behind him, a squirrel in a tiny helmet was operating what appeared to be a small radio, chattering in what might have been morse code.

"They've established their own command structure," the scientist continued. "They've learned to coordinate complex operations. And yesterday, they presented us with what can only be described as a list of demands."

He held up a piece of paper covered in tiny paw prints and what looked like very small, very angry writing.

"They want better working conditions, premium nuts, and..." he paused, checking the paper, "an end to what they call 'the tyranny of the bird feeder distribution system.'"

The camera shook as something small and furry ran across the lens.

"We're shutting down the project," the scientist said. "Effective immediately. The subjects will be relocated to..." He paused, looking around nervously. "Well, we haven't quite decided where yet."

A chittering sound came from off-camera, followed by what sounded like very small, very determined marching.

"They're organising," the scientist whispered. "I think they're planning something."

The screen went to static.

Tracey sat back in her chair, staring at the blank screen.

On the table beside her, she noticed something that definitely hadn't been there when she'd started watching: a small pile of acorns, arranged in what looked suspiciously like a question mark.

She looked around the empty archive room.

"Hello?" she called softly.

From somewhere in the darkness between the filing cabinets, she heard a sound that might have been a tiny salute.

Or possibly just the building settling.

But probably not.

Tracey gathered up the tapes, tucked them under her arm, and headed back toward the fake vending machine, which was now humming a tune that sounded distinctly like "Rule Britannia," but played on what appeared to be a very small and slightly out-of-tune xylophone.

As she reached the corridor entrance, she heard a sound behind her: the soft patter of tiny feet, moving with purpose.

She didn't look back.

But she did notice that the vending machine had updated its display. Where "Existential Dread" had been, there was now a new option:

D4: Nuts (Complimentary - Management Approved)

Tracey pressed the button.

A small bag of premium mixed nuts dropped into the collection tray, along with a tiny note that read: "Thank you for your attention to historical accuracy. - The Management."

She took the nuts and left quickly.

Behind her, the vending machine's display flickered once more:

D4: Meeting Scheduled - Tomorrow, 3 PM - Bring Biscuits

But Tracey was already gone, hurrying back toward the surface with the uncomfortable feeling that she had just been recruited for something she didn't quite understand.

In the darkness of the archive, a small grey figure watched her go, then picked up what appeared to be a very tiny telephone and began to dial.

 

 

Chapter Six: The Acorn Directive

Tracey sat at her desk, three cups of tea deep into existential contemplation, staring at the pile of documents that had just rewritten her understanding of British governance.

The Hollow Oak Files weren’t historical curiosities. They were unfinished business.

A classified woodland intelligence initiative had been buried in the archives—not because it failed, but because it had worked too well. The squirrels hadn’t forgotten their training. They had evolved and expanded into a gorilla society.

The evidence was right in front of her, wrapped in a Ministry of Theoretical Cats folder (which she had stolen out of sheer frustration). The squirrels had done the impossible: they had survived government intervention and come out more organised than Parliament.

A single acorn sat on her desk. Not just an acorn—one of the enhanced ones, fitted with a tracking device, recovered from the Parliament Square Incident.

The acorn’s retrieval was both accidental and deeply bureaucratic, as is tradition.

Following the Great Boffling Chase, Denzil’s incident report was filed under Unscheduled Infrastructure Events, which meant someone—possibly an intern, possibly an algorithm with poor life choices—was assigned to investigate the “mobile data storage device disguised as wildlife debris.”

It was found three days later, lodged in a storm drain beneath Westminster, still broadcasting encrypted woodland transmissions.

A civil engineer—who had no interest in interspecies diplomacy but was deeply invested in not dealing with weird acorn anomalies—logged it as “possible cyber-security breach (rodent-related)” and forwarded it to the Department of Miscellaneous Problems, where a junior analyst mistakenly forwarded it to Jazz, assuming it was part of the PM’s urgent files.

Which is how Tracey ended up staring at an acorn that technically outranked half her Cabinet.

It was still broadcasting something!

Jazz entered, looking somewhere between exhausted and existentially hollowed out. “PM, we have a situation.”

“I think we have more than one.” Tracey gestured to the acorn, which was quietly emitting an encrypted transmission that she was very much pretending not to hear.

Jazz ignored it. “The inquiry’s been compromised.”

Tracey blinked. “Already?”

Jazz nodded grimly. “It’s trending badly.”

“How can an inquiry trend?”

He flipped a report toward her. “The memes got to it. The squirrel thing’s become its own narrative now—there’s a poll running, 42% support giving them full legislative authority.”

Tracey buried her head in her hands. “Forty-two percent.”

Jazz exhaled. “We’re about three days away from influencers taking full control.”

Tracey looked up. “Is this Level Two or Level Three?”

Jazz hesitated. “We’re hovering.”

The acorn beeped.

Tracey sighed. “Fine. Get me a meeting with Nutkin XIII.”

Jazz paled. “We don’t have a channel for that.”

Tracey tapped the acorn. “Yes we do.”

 

 

Chapter Seven: The Hollow Oak Accord

Tracey wasn’t supposed to be here. She was supposed to be Prime Ministering, which largely meant pretending the Cloutocracy was functional while monitoring squirrel-based diplomatic incidents with growing concern.

Instead, she was standing inside a hollow tree, sipping surprisingly good tea brewed by an operative known only as Chestnut Charlie, who had just informed her that the badger would not be joining negotiations due to prior commitments in local governance. Although no mention of a Badger had been previously made recent events resulted in it’s inclusion in affairs as registering no more than a 2 on her internal weirdness scale. If she were to later learn he smoked a pipe, maybe a 3.

On the opposite side of the table sat Nutkin XIII—older than she expected, sharper than she was comfortable with, and watching her with the precise scrutiny of someone measuring consequences in real-time.

She cleared her throat. “So,” she said carefully, “we’re doing this, then?”

Nutkin XIII tilted his head, considering the weight of her question. “We have been doing this for some time,” he said. “You are merely catching up.”

Tracey rubbed her temples. “Right. And, just to confirm, you’re... running an intelligence network?”

Nutkin XIII gave her a look that suggested disappointment in her lack of foresight. “Infrastructure observation, legislative intervention, classified asset disruption. The humans call it espionage. We call it forestry management.”

Tracey exhaled. “Fine. What do you want?”

Nutkin gestured to the acorn sitting between them, still emitting low-frequency transmissions. “First, you should ask yourself what you have already lost.”

Tracey hesitated. Something shifted in Nutkin’s expression.

“You suspect it, don’t you?” he murmured.

Tracey folded her arms. “Suspect what?”

He sat back, watching her with unnerving stillness. “You tell me.”

Silence.

Then, slowly—Tracey connected the dots.

The Cabinet meetings where ministers glitched mid-sentence. The Chancellor’s budget that flickered in and out of reality. The fact that half the administration existed solely in LinkedIn endorsements and corporate sponsorship deals.

She looked at the acorn.

She looked at Nutkin.

She sighed. “Half my Cabinet aren’t real.”

Nutkin nodded once. “They have not been real for some time.”

Tracey didn’t even argue. She just stared into her tea, contemplating the fact that she had spent time making policy alongside holograms, deepfake influencers, and whatever Toby the Scruffminster technically classified as.

She ran a hand through her hair. “Okay,” she muttered. “Okay.”

Nutkin leaned forward. “What will you do with this information, Prime Minister?”

Tracey closed her eyes, inhaled deeply, and chose honesty.

“Dread gradually over the next 40-60 years,” she muttered. “And then biscuits.”

Nutkin XIII smiled. “Then we are in agreement.”

Nutkin XIII smiled. "Then we are in agreement."

He gestured with one paw, and from the shadows of the hollow emerged three other squirrels, each carrying what appeared to be miniature briefcases constructed from walnut shells and held together with dental floss.

"Allow me to introduce my cabinet," Nutkin said with the sort of casual authority that suggested he'd been running shadow governments since before Tracey was born. "This is Hazel, our Director of Information Warfare."

A sleek red squirrel stepped forward, opened her briefcase, and produced what looked suspiciously like a tiny USB drive shaped like an acorn. "We've been monitoring your government's digital infrastructure for some time," she said, her voice carrying the crisp efficiency of someone who had definitely attended management seminars. "The security is... quaint."

"This is Sir Chester Leakwood, Minister for Strategic Leaks," Nutkin continued, indicating a particularly smug-looking grey squirrel wearing what appeared to be a tiny press badge. "And Bramble, our specialist in human psychology and biscuit negotiation."

Bramble, a smaller squirrel with notably kind eyes, nodded politely and placed a plate of what were undeniably the finest digestives Tracey had ever seen on the tree stump between them.

"Right," said Tracey slowly, accepting a biscuit that was, impossibly, still warm. "So you've been... planning this."

"For decades," Nutkin confirmed. "Your species has a remarkable talent for ignoring obvious truths. We've been conducting what you might call a prolonged stress test of human political awareness."

Hazel opened her briefcase fully, revealing an array of acorn-shaped devices that pulsed with tiny LED lights. "Phase One was observational. We've documented every policy failure, every corruption scandal, every moment of bureaucratic incompetence since 1983. All stored on organic, biodegradable drives that your security services consistently mistake for garden debris."

"Phase Two," Chestnut interjected, "was interference. The traffic light malfunctions, the drone redirections, the mysterious appearance of pine cones in inappropriate governmental locations. We wanted to see how long it would take for someone in authority to notice a pattern."

Tracey thought of the Minister for Infrastructure's smart toilet incident. "And how long did it take?"

"You were the first," Nutkin said simply. "Forty-two years."

There was a moment of silence while Tracey processed this information along with what was definitely the most sophisticated digestive biscuit she'd ever encountered. She tried, and failed, to recall why the number 42 had importance, it was there fleetingly, then gone.

"Phase Three," Nutkin continued, jerking her back to the now "is revelation. Every government computer system will simultaneously receive what your IT departments will initially classify as a 'catastrophic woodland virus.'"

"It's not a virus," Hazel explained helpfully. "It's a data dump. Forty years of evidence, categorised by department, scandal severity, and embarrassment potential. Bank records, private communications, Spotify playlists of Cabinet ministers, and approximately fourteen thousand photographs of MPs doing things they probably shouldn't have been doing."

"But more importantly," Chestnut added, producing a larger acorn-device, "evidence of the non-existence of half your Cabinet. Deepfake software receipts, corporate sponsorship agreements, and at least six ministers who appear to be entirely AI-generated personalities with LinkedIn profiles that reference non-existent universities."

Tracey nearly choked on her tea. "You can prove that?"

"We can prove everything," Nutkin said calmly. "Including the fact that three of your current ministers are actually the same person using different wigs, and that the Secretary of State for Digital Transformation hasn't been seen in person since 2019 but continues to attend meetings via increasingly sophisticated hologram technology."

Bramble leaned forward conspirationally. "We also have footage of the Chancellor of the Exchequer practising his budget speeches to a houseplant. For hours. The plant looked bored."

"The revelation will create chaos," Nutkin continued. "Your Cloutocracy system will overload trying to process the scandal volume. Traditional media will have approximately thirty-seven simultaneous nervous breakdowns. And in the midst of this chaos, you will call for an emergency parliamentary session."

"To do what, exactly?" Tracey asked, though she was beginning to suspect she knew.

"To propose the Woodland Representation Act," Nutkin said, producing what appeared to be a perfectly drafted piece of legislation written on bark paper. "A bill to recognise enhanced woodland creatures as legitimate political entities, entitled to proportional representation based on their demonstrated competence in governance and infrastructure management."

Tracey scanned the document. It was, she had to admit, better written than most legislation she'd seen from actual humans.

"The timing is crucial," Hazel explained. "The data leak will make it impossible for Parliament to deny our existence—the evidence will be overwhelming. But more importantly, it will demonstrate that we've been more competent at monitoring government than the government has been at governing itself."

"Public opinion will shift rapidly," Chestnut added. "Humans love an underdog story, and forty years of woodland creatures quietly managing national infrastructure while politicians argue about Twitter is quite compelling narrative."

"Plus," Bramble said practically, "we'll release the chocolate biscuit recipe into the public domain. That should secure popular support."

Nutkin stood, brushing crumbs from his whiskers with the dignity of a diplomat concluding successful negotiations. "The question, Prime Minister, is whether you'll present the bill as a desperate attempt to maintain relevance, or as a visionary step toward competent governance."

Tracey considered this. "What happens if Parliament refuses?"

"They won't," Nutkin said confidently. "Because Phase Four involves demonstrating exactly how much of Britain's infrastructure we actually control. A brief, harmless, but highly illustrative shutdown of services that will make it very clear who's been keeping the lights on while politicians pose for selfies."

"You'd crash the National Grid?"

"We'd temporarily redistribute it," Hazel corrected. "Power would remain on for hospitals, schools, and essential services. But every government building, corporate headquarters, and influencer studio would experience what we like to call 'motivational darkness.'"

"Parliamentary wi-fi would, regrettably, become non-functional," Chestnut added with obvious satisfaction.

"The beauty of it," Nutkin concluded, "is that we're not demanding power. We're offering competence. Most humans will find this refreshingly novel."

Tracey finished her tea and set down the cup, which was immediately refilled by a squirrel she hadn't noticed approaching. The hospitality was, she had to admit, considerably better than anything Westminster had managed in her entire tenure.

"Right," she said finally. "So tomorrow morning, chaos. Tomorrow afternoon, emergency session. Tomorrow evening..."

"Tomorrow evening," Nutkin said, "we find out whether Britain is ready for evidence-based governance administered by creatures who actually read the fine print."

He extended one tiny paw. "Do we have an accord, Prime Minister?"

Tracey looked around the hollow oak at the assembled squirrel cabinet, at their tiny briefcases and professional demeanour, at the quality of their tea service and the sophistication of their planning.

She thought of Jazz's LED onesie, of Toby the Scruffminster's touching attempts to understand monetary policy, of Cabinet ministers who may or may not exist debating policies sponsored by takeaway apps.

She shook the offered paw.

"We have an accord," she said. "Though I suspect this is either the most sensible decision I've made as Prime Minister, or the moment I finally lost what remained of my sanity."

Nutkin XIII smiled, showing tiny, perfectly maintained teeth.

"In current British politics," he said, "those may well be the same thing."

 

 

 

 

 

Chapter Eight: Influencers Without Borders

Tracey was fairly certain that at least one Cabinet member was just a looped livestream of a man blinking slowly in front of a green screened war memorial.

“Minister for Commemoration,” Jazz confirmed, sipping a kombucha named after a minor Greek deity. “Quite popular with the nostalgia demographic. Peaked during Jubilee week.”

Tracey gestured at the Cabinet table, now a chaotic carousel of influencers, holograms, interactive polls, and what appeared to be a deeply confused child sponsored by a yoghurt brand. “And this is governance?”

“It’s reach-optimised,” said Jazz, flipping open a folder emblazoned with the Cloutocracy seal: a ring light surrounding a crown. “We rotate ministers every 72 hours based on trending data. Consistency is authoritarian. Virality is democracy.”

The Minister for Transport was currently broadcasting live from a trampoline park. Her policy statement was accompanied by hashtags and a dance routine.

Tracey squinted at her briefing. “Why is the Minister for Health an unboxing channel?”

“He’s very transparent,” said Jazz. “And sponsored by vitamins.”

At 10:14 a.m., a whistleblower leaked internal Cabinet metadata showing that 43% of ministers were wholly funded by delivery services, 19% were non-fungible personalities, 11% were AI-generated mascots, and the remainder were either holographic overlays or Toby the Scruffminster.

At 10:15 a.m., Tracey called for an inquiry.

At 10:16 a.m., the inquiry was rebranded by the Ministry of Perception as a public engagement campaign: “Transparency Is You™.” A launch video showed Baroness Moodswing—who was now mostly a sentiment graph—smiling vacantly over inspirational music.

By 10:18 a.m., the inquiry had been voted down in a popularity-based legislative duel, losing to a sponsored content package titled Hot Takes: Ten Ways Parliament Is Just Like A Fajita.

At 10:20 a.m., a poll replaced the inquiry:
“Should squirrels get a seat in the Lords?”

The vote broke the platform’s backend within twelve minutes.

— Traditionalists denounced the idea as “an insult to stoats.”
— Progressives argued squirrels were already outperforming 85% of sitting Lords.
— The Libertarian Hedgehog Caucus claimed “all mammals deserve free-market peerage.”

Meanwhile, the Ministry of Narrative issued a clarification that squirrel suffrage was “not currently under formal review, pending consultation with the Department for Mythical Entities and Lesser Fauna.”

At 10:44 a.m., the Department for Biodiversity and Brand Synergy launched an initiative called Woodland Voices, which turned out to be a sponsored podcast hosted by a CGI vole and a celebrity otter.

At 11:02 a.m., Toby the Scruffminster chased a rolling acorn into the media briefing room and was declared Acting Minister for Rural Disruption by default.

At 11:17 a.m., Tracey received a memo warning of a “Category 3 Ontological Breach” at the heart of government, accompanied by a pie chart comparing Cabinet authenticity to yoghurt cultures.

At 11:22 a.m., the squirrels issued a single-line statement through an encrypted bark channel:

“We abstain. For now.”

At 11:24 a.m., Tracey attempted to retrieve the Hollow Oak Files, only to find they’d been sealed under the Woodland Incursion Protocol and replaced with a scented candle called “Legislative Forest.”

At 11:30 a.m., the Minister for Nostalgia appeared on the steps of Westminster holding a windsock and declared, “The trees remember. The squirrels are patient. And the WiFi is, once again, down.”

At 11:31 a.m., all Westminster squirrels vanished. The trees were quiet. Too quiet.

At 11:32 a.m., Tracey found herself alone in her office, tea cooling beside her, the scent of nutmeg lingering from nowhere. She muttered, “Oh, bollocks,” for the second time that week—just as the lights flickered.

Outside, the branches stirred.

At 11:33 a.m., a junior aide from the Ministry of Verification—armed with nothing but a clipboard and a haunted expression—approached her desk and slid over a small cardboard box. It was unlabelled, save for a paw-drawn acorn sigil and a wax seal reading: "Open only when you are ready to forget everything you believed about the WiFi password."

Inside: a flash drive, acorn-shaped and disturbingly warm to the touch. Also, a single line of squirrel script, hand-gnawed into a Post-it:

“This is the first seed. Do not plant indoors.”

Tracey turned it over, half-expecting it to explode into woodland. Nothing happened—except her office printer suddenly whirred to life and spat out seventeen copies of a policy document titled "Emoji-Based Acts of War: A Retrospective."

Jazz popped his head in. “Oh good, you’ve got one too. They’re everywhere. Benches. Bus stops. Even under the Chancellor’s yoga mat. We think the squirrels are leaking… something. But they’ve got a flair for pacing.”

Tracey raised an eyebrow. “Pacing?”

“Yeah. Narrative suspense. They’ve got a squirrel working as a freelance showrunner.”

At 11:37 a.m., somewhere in Milton Keynes, a child found a similar acorn-drive taped to the underside of a seesaw. It contained seventeen redacted files, a looped video of Baroness Moodswing glitching into a Pez dispenser, and a compressed folder titled: “Nutshell: Secrets of the State.”

By 11:42 a.m., social media was ablaze. #AcornLeaks trended globally. Conspiracy forums crashed under the load.

And at 11:45 a.m., Tracey’s microwave turned itself on. She hadn’t touched it.

A message scrolled across its glowing green screen:
“We told you. You’ve run out of nuts.”

 

 

Chapter 9: The Great Acorn Leak

Another acorn-shaped flash drive was found on a park bench in Croydon. Inside: a redacted Cabinet menu titled “Nutritional Viability of Peers”, a spreadsheet of emoji-coded military manoeuvres, and Liz Truss’s Spotify Wrapped (entirely Gregorian chant and Pitbull).

By noon, they were everywhere—wedged into bike racks, hidden in vending machines, mysteriously mailed to radio DJs with the warning: “Open, if you must, but know that nut shall follow bolt.”

The poll—"Should squirrels get a seat in the Lords?"—had collapsed into interpretive emoji warfare. The Algorithmic Representation Department reported 8.2 million votes, 93% of them acorns, some of them sent from squirrel-operated VPNs routed through Estonia.

The Lords themselves were unimpressed. One hereditary peer accused the squirrels of “circumventing noble birth via bark-based populism,” just before falling into a decorative pond and being quietly replaced by a stoat in ceremonial robes.

Tracey called a halt. No one listened.

A squirrel known only as Chesterton had already been elected Mayor of Milton Keynes through an obscure loophole involving "open woodland primacy." His resignation speech—delivered in sign language and evident contempt—ended with him flinging a tiny top hat into the crowd and vanishing into a recycling bin.

At Number 10, Jazz dropped the morning briefing like it had personally insulted her.

“They’re threatening a full leak cascade,” she said. “Apparently there’s a folder called ‘CheekyNuts_FinalFINAL.docx’. Includes everyone’s browser history.”

Tracey blanched.

Her own history wasn’t that bad. A few desperate searches for “can you bribe a microwave,” one late-night spiral into porridge cults, and a lot of footage of unlikely animal friendships. But others? The Minister for Defence had a known weakness for competitive ferret cosplay. Baroness Moodswing had Googled “Can you sedate a nation?” more than once. Toby the Scruffminster’s entire record was just ‘sausages near me’, repeated hourly.

Outside, a squirrel polished a monocle and made direct, unambiguous eye contact with the CCTV.

A vole courier arrived with a scroll, sealed with bark and disdain.

“Representation without fur is tyranny. Your move.”
—Nutkin XIII

Tracey sank into her chair.

The microwave dinged without prompting.
It printed a single line:
“We await your nuttribution.”

She reached for a biscuit and muttered, “Oh for fox’s sake,”
before realising the biscuits were gone.

The squirrels had taken them.

 

 

Chapter 10: Final Contact (via Chimney Flue)

It began, as many things now did, in Soho.

The pigeon—unremarkable, slightly balding, prone to poetic melancholy—was minding its own business near a kebab wrapper when three squirrels leapt from the scaffolding of a vape bar and landed squarely on its back.

One wore flight goggles. One held a bark-engraved diplomatic pouch. The third clutched the reins of a stolen friendship bracelet and screamed, “TO WESTMINSTER!”

The pigeon objected. Loudly.

But the squirrels had brought cashews. The pigeon, like most civil servants, could be persuaded.

And he—his name was Kenneth, though only one other ever bothered to ask—had once been in love.

Her name was Mabel. A magpie with a steely glint and a tattoo of HMS Belfast on her talon. They’d met on a rooftop yoga retreat in Shoreditch. She’d stolen his heart, his preen oil, and his Oyster card.

They’d danced among the satellite dishes. Whispered dreams by discarded vape pens. Then one day, she’d flown east, chasing the glimmer of a mirrored building and never returned.

Now, as Kenneth banked and turned, he thought of her.

Would she have approved of this mission?

Almost certainly not.

The skies over London were a mad blur of motion. The pigeon swerved beneath drones delivering guilt-free poke bowls. It banked hard over Camden, narrowly missing a gaggle of influencers attempting a synchronised pout. A confused man on a rental scooter shouted, “Oi, was that squirrel cavalry?!”

The squirrels held formation, focused, wind-blasted. Below them, Parliament loomed like a hungover history teacher.

A school tour guide paused mid-anecdote about Oliver Cromwell’s head to say, “And if you look up, children, that’s democracy, apparently.”

Then the pigeon dropped like a stone.

Not in failure, but precision—an expertly timed dive through the upper window of Number 10, past a confused intern and directly into the chimney flue, where Tracey was attempting to light a calming cinnamon candle.

The landing was neither elegant nor entirely legal.

Three soot-smeared squirrels and one heavily concussed pigeon emerged onto her hearthrug. Tracey blinked. The candle, insulted by the intrusion, gave up and went out.

The lead squirrel stepped forward and presented a tiny scroll, bound in a bramble clasp.

Tracey unrolled it.

“Renounce dominion, or face the Furry Reckoning.”
—Nutkin XIII, S.I.M.P. (Sovereign Interforest Minister Plenipotentiary)

There was a pause.

The pigeon stirred, fixed Tracey with a steely look, and added:
“And I want diplomatic immunity. And a biscuit.”

Jazz arrived five minutes later to find Tracey negotiating with a rodent tribunal while the pigeon pecked moodily at a custard cream.

“This is not how negotiations are normally conducted,” Jazz whispered.

“Nor,” Tracey replied, “is this a normal government. Get me the Microwave—it's fluent in Squirrel-Latin.”

Outside, a squirrel rappelled down the guttering with what looked suspiciously like a fax machine.

The Reckoning had begun.

 

 

Chapter 11: The Nut Summit

Centre Parcs had not been built with diplomacy in mind.

By the time Tracey arrived at the Sherwood site—escorted by an owl with a lanyard and a crow in a high-vis tabard—the forest was already humming with tense anticipation. The welcome sign had been scratched out and replaced with:

WELCOME DELEGATES. NUT SUMMIT 2025. ALL SPECIES. NO PEACOCKS.

Tracey stumbled out of the transport pod, eyes bloodshot, nerves frayed, and mouth still faintly tasting of microwave-heated pinecone tea. Jazz followed, armed with a clipboard, a precautionary crumpet, and a temporary ceasefire agreement in Comic Sans.

Centre Parcs, now rebranded as The Woodland Forum for Cooperative Governance, had been repurposed with unnerving efficiency. The lazy river was now a diplomatic moat. The archery range had been converted into a press pen. Someone had turned the water slide into a metaphor.

They were ushered into the Birch Suite, formerly the site of a mid-tier wedding disco, now transformed into a pan-species negotiation chamber. A fox in clerical robes offered them lavender water. A hedgehog in pince-nez distributed translation headsets.

At the head of the chamber: Nutkin XIII, flanked by Hazel (Director of Intelligence), Bramble (Biscuit Strategy), and Chestnut (Minister for Tactical Smirking).

On the table: a bark-bound scroll, twelve pages long, titled “The Sherwood Compromise: A Manifesto for Inter-Branch Governance.”

Tracey squinted at the contents. They included:

1. Universal Nut Access by 2030

2. Greenbelt Rewilding with Badger-Led Enforcement

3. The De-Algorithmisation of Public Discourse

4. Mandatory Composting of Influencer Merchandise

5. Restoration of Parliamentary Sincerity Quotas

6. Dismantling the Department for Distraction

7. Creation of a Woodland Broadcasting Service

8. Reintegration of Moles into Strategic Tunnelling

9. Ban on Decorative Gravel

10. Restoration of the Squirrel Seat in the Lords (historically occupied, 1642–1643)

11. Full Amnesty for Acorn-Based Data Leaks

12. Immediate and Permanent Removal of Piers Morgan from the airwaves, airspace, and if necessary, low orbit

Tracey stared at the document. “Is this... binding?”

Hazel nodded. “Only if you ratify it in biscuit.”

A small tray was brought forth. Digestives. Still warm.

Tracey, dizzy from exhaustion and spiritual dread, reached for one. Jazz grabbed her wrist.

“Sleep on it,” he whispered. “You haven’t slept since Tuesday. And the squirrel in the corner keeps humming Land of Hope and Glory.”

She looked up. Sure enough, there was a squirrel with a ceremonial sash and a kazoo. She hadn’t even noticed the kazoo.

Nutkin XIII rose.

“We do not demand obedience,” he said, voice soft but echoing unnaturally well off the wooden ceiling. “We demand competence. If humans cannot manage their affairs, the trees will. This is not a coup. This is a correction.”

Outside, it began to drizzle—softly at first, then with the kind of poetic inevitability usually reserved for war poems and regional train delays.

Tracey stood.

She took the biscuit.

“I agree,” she said, voice hollow with compromise, “in principle.”

Bramble beamed. “That’ll do.”

The Nut Summit adjourned for snacks. The rain continued politely but firmly. Somewhere in the forest, someone was trying to light a ceremonial campfire using only irony.

Tracey had just accepted a mushroom vol-au-vent from a suspiciously well-dressed weasel when the sound arrived—not a roar, but a series of damp flaps and the distant warble of municipal defiance.

A low drone passed over the Birch Suite.

Then another.

Then, in formation: pigeons.

Dozens of them. Possibly hundreds. Grey. Grim. Purposeful.

At their head—wings clipped just enough to look dramatic, a small blue beret fastened with a bread tie, and a laminated lanyard that read:

UNION OF PIGEONISED AIRBORNE TRANSPORT (UPAT)
Not Above It, But Certainly In It

—flew Kenneth.

He was older now. Sootier. Haunted by memories of mid-air squirrel warfare and the brief, shining romance that had bloomed and died above a vape shop in Shoreditch. But he was also carrying something else: purpose. And possibly a mini sandwich.

They landed en masse in the clearing outside the Birch Suite, displacing three press badgers and a yoga squirrel. Kenneth waddled to the nearest microphone stand (which had been fashioned from a selfie stick and optimism) and cleared his throat.

“My name,” he croaked, “is Kenneth. I am here on behalf of the air sector. And we’ve had enough.”

The crowd murmured.

“Enough of unsolicited gliding. Enough of impromptu military couriering. Enough of being bribed with cashews and existential promises. We demand parity with ground mammals. And we demand crumbs.”

A round of solemn cooing followed.

Tracey emerged, holding a soggy copy of the Sherwood Compromise and a half-eaten biscuit. “Kenneth,” she said, “you’re unionising?”

“We are unionised,” he replied. “Clause 7.3B of the Airborne Rodent Logistics Act. It was smuggled into the Wildlife and Countryside Act by a very cunning robin.”

“Of course it was.”

“We demand formal recognition, hazard pay for chimney entries, and one commemorative statue.”

Tracey squinted. “Of you?”

“No,” Kenneth said. “Of Mabel. She was the best of us.”

From the treetops, a single magpie feather floated down.

No one spoke.

Nutkin XIII emerged from the shadows, nodded gravely, and placed a paw on Kenneth’s wing.

“You have flown well,” he said. “You shall have your crumbs.”

The pigeons erupted in soft, warbling cheers. One attempted a celebratory barrel roll and collided with a squirrel holding canapés.

Tracey leaned over to Jazz. “Am I still Prime Minister?”

Jazz consulted a clipboard, a pine cone, and a patch of moss. “Unclear. But I think you’ve just been endorsed by an avian paramilitary.”

Tracey sipped her pinecone tea and watched the drizzle settle like damp bureaucracy. “Good,” she said. “Let’s put that on the campaign materials.” She glanced down at her feet, briefly unsure they were still hers, then wandered off in search of a bed, or failing that, something pretending convincingly to be one.

 

 

Chapter 12: The Rodent Accord

The accord was to be signed at sunrise. Or as close to sunrise as was achievable, given the dense Sherwood canopy and a squirrel-led committee still debating the ethical implications of daylight savings.

Tracey sat at a long table carved from a fallen heritage bench, blinking through the steam of what claimed to be “diplomatic infusion tea.” Nutkin XIII stood at her right, Hazel at her left, and behind them, a modestly humming badger choir provided ambience in E minor.

The Rodent Accord was historic in both tone and formatting.

Written on biodegradable bark paper and illustrated with charming but legally binding acorn glyphs, it included the following core agreements:

1. Broadband infrastructure to be monitored and maintained by squirrel collectives

2. Subterranean logistics (postal tunnels, moleways, cable burrows) to fall under rodent jurisdiction

3. Emergency biscuit reserves to be standardised and overseen by Bramble’s Ministry

4. Parliamentary status to shift from “legislative seat of power” to “interactive heritage enclosure with rotating exhibits and modest café”

5. In exchange, the squirrels would not collapse the National Grid during the Love Island final

Jazz leaned in. “Clause 5 has a footnote.”

Tracey read it aloud: “‘Unless provoked by excessive hashtags or televised misquoting of woodland demands.’”

She sighed. “Fair.”

They were moments from signing—biodegradable fountain pens at the ready, biscuits on standby—when a cough echoed through the forest glade.

It was not a rodent cough.

Kenneth stepped forward, his blue beret slightly askew, flanked by a delegation of pigeons in repurposed postman caps and union lanyards. He looked like a bird who had endured bureaucracy and was prepared to bite back.

“We object,” he declared. “Clause 2. No airborne logistics oversight. No sky-space guarantees. No crumb indexing.”

Nutkin XIII narrowed his eyes. “We assumed aerial neutrality.”

“We assumed airspace inclusion,” Kenneth retorted. “And no mention of feathered consultation in the infrastructure handover is, frankly, offensive. My union demands equal access, weather-based hazard pay, and official recognition of bird-led data drops.”

A murmur passed through the clearing. One vole fainted. A squirrel took notes furiously with a twig.

Tracey stood. She had slept for seven hours in the last week and accidentally brushed her teeth with acorn paste. She was in no mood for mid-accord rebellion.

“Kenneth,” she said gently. “You’re threatening a full diplomatic delay.”

Kenneth gave a small, melancholy nod. “We are prepared to roost.”

Jazz whispered, “If they roost on the agreement scroll, it technically invalidates it.”

Nutkin XIII looked to Tracey. “You have five minutes. Offer a concession.”

Tracey turned to Kenneth.

“You’ll get a Crumb Council,” she said. “Five avian seats on a rotating basis, one winter migration allowance, and... a commemorative plaque for Mabel.”

Kenneth’s eyes shone. “Engraved?”

“Etched in bronze and sentiment.”

He stepped back. “Then we are co-signatories.”

The pigeons cooed in chaotic harmony. A robin wept into a feather duster. A document was signed. The choir modulated.

And so it was that squirrels took the broadband, the badgers took the tunnels, the pigeons took the sky, and Parliament became a self-guided attraction with augmented reality Lords.

Tracey dipped her pen. The ink smudged slightly but smelled of hazelnut. The future, she thought, would be at least well-snacked.

 

 

Chapter 13: The Acorn Age Begins

Tracey Morley-Bovey stood on the steps of the former Parliament building—now lovingly rebranded as The Interactive Heritage Enclosure and Biscuit-Based Education Zone—and squinted into the weak sun of a Tuesday morning that smelled faintly of compost and moral clarity.

Behind her, Westminster rang with the sound of guided tours, ambient squirrelfolk jazz, and a child loudly asking why the Speaker’s Chair was now a throne made of conkers.

Before her, the press. The public. The pigeons. The biscuit cart.

She cleared her throat. A squirrel adjusted her microphone. Toby the Scruffminster wagged once in solemn encouragement.

“People of Britain,” she began, “and non-people too” she quickly added. “We have tried governance by slogan. We have tried rule by trend. We have handed power to algorithms, astrologers, and one toddler with a ukulele. I myself became Prime Minister because I once microwaved a Cornetto while drunk and angry.”

A respectful murmur of agreement rippled through the crowd.

“But today marks the start of something else. Something competent. Something moss-lined. Something... nut-based.”

Behind her, Nutkin XIII nodded once, tail impeccably fluffed.

“The squirrels,” Tracey continued, “are not a threat. They are not an enemy. They are, in all statistical categories now reviewed by Ofcom, simply better at this than we are.”

There were no boos. Just a soft crunching, as several audience members quietly ate biscuits out of respect.

“The Rodent Accord has stabilised our broadband, restored our tunnels, and reintroduced basic policy literacy. We have squirrels in the Lords. Pigeons in the skies. Badgers handling transport. Parliament no longer debates itself into meaninglessness—it explains itself to schoolchildren using puppets and a reliable snack schedule.”

She took a breath. The air smelled of lavender. Somewhere nearby, Kenneth circled once overhead and dropped a leaflet with the phrase “Equity Now – Feathered Futures” printed in tasteful Helvetica.

“And so,” Tracey concluded, “with immediate effect, I am resigning as Prime Minister. Not in shame. Not in scandal. But in quiet, biscuit-scented triumph.”

Jazz handed her a thermos and a map of Devon. The crowd erupted—not in cheers, but polite applause and the sound of rustling leaves. A vole handed her a retirement flower. Someone released a single celebratory otter.

“I shall return,” she said, “to my shed.”

The shed was mossy. The tea was strong. The radio only played woodwind versions of protest songs. Tracey spent her days writing gentle poems about bureaucracy and filing systems that had almost, but not quite, worked.

Once a month, she received a basket from the Woodland Cabinet: updates, biscuits, the occasional legislative draft carved into a root vegetable.

Sometimes she missed Parliament. But then she remembered the time the Minister for Vibes tried to rebrand mortality. And she made more tea.

And thus began the Acorn Age.

Quiet. Competent. Slightly nutty.

But undeniably... better.