A new force occupies the school

A return to school – and what a return. Exactly as predicted by my new employers in military intelligence everything has changed. We have a new headteacher: Mr Putin. Of Mr Berlusconi there is no mention and no record. Amazingly people can hardly even remember his name – and Mrs Marchmount actually said, “isn’t he the prime minister of Italy or something?”

Likewise there is no sign of Columbus – the company that took over our local authority, nor of the local authority. Instead we have a new power to whom we are answerable: New Progress.

Upon arrival I was not allowed into the office, but had to present myself at the door my Mrs Bland, my new senior manager. There being no reply at the door I sat and waited, and was about to start flipping through my new MI5 handbook when I noticed a CCTV camera trained on me. I slipped the book back into my bag, silently cursing myself for making such a basic error on day one.

Eventually Mrs Bland emerged from her room and invited me in for what turned out to be a lecture.

Things, she said, were changing in the school, and indeed I would find that the new regime had already made significant progress in turning around the corrupt old system. (I was about to ask a question but it became clear that questioning the statements of Mrs Bland was similar to questioning the authority of Mrs Bland and that in turn meant questioning New Progress – which meant that I had then sacked myself).

The new academy, as the school is now known (although I am certain that we have never applied for or been granted Academy status) would be a model occupation of the school. (I looked up sharply on the word occupation, but Mrs Bland seemed to see nothing wrong with her vocabulary.)

It would be a model of co-operation between the new forces occupying the school and those of the old regime who were still in place (that seemed to include me).

In essence, her talk said, we don’t talk about it. And with that I went about my work – which seemed to involve reconciling what I thought happened last term with what New Progress wanted written in the official record. Janice was not there, so I had no one to talk to.

In the evening I hoped for further contact from military intelligence but there was none. I felt alone, an isolated agent in a foreign land.

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