I looked for more reports: it seems 'The Black Ring of Leamington' - as it's now being called - happened near Warwick Castle... which just so happens to feature in Chapter 2 of The Last Changeling:
‘It may
have stood for centuries, repelling many invaders and even making kings of men,
but Mr. Butterworth wasn’t sure if Warwick Castle
The
afternoon passed remarkably without incident. Picnics had been eaten on Ethelfleda’s
mound, the unbelievably high and winding stairway of Guy’s tower had been
climbed and the state rooms viewed. Year
Seven had loved the armour, the swords, the birds of prey, the cakes, the ice
creams and the horrific instruments of torture.
So far no one had been sick or fainted, or even dropped a water bomb
from the ramparts onto the unsuspecting head of an elderly tourist.
All
Butterworth had to do was get the little stinkers back to school and he was home
and dry for another term. He lined them
up again by the coach and repeated the head count. No, wrong number. He tried again.
‘WILL
YOU ALL KEEP STILL!’
Fidgeting
children stopped playing with their souvenir trinkets and lined up sulkily. Butterworth counted again - fast. Heart sink.
There was still one missing.’
THE LAST CHANGELING
Interesting... the ring is being described as a swarm of insects... VERY interesting if you've read The Last Changeling...
‘A decade or so after
Myxomatosis had been introduced into the barrows, as if in answer, Varroa Destructor had first appeared on
honey bees. Not properly identified
until years later, the deadly parasitic mite had continued spreading through
the bee colonies of the world.
Some years ago, at a covert meeting
of representatives from the nine governments signatory to the secret Reykjavik
Accord, Shiraishi had posited that the timing indicated that Varroa was a counter weapon that had been deliberately deployed by the metahominids.
The creatures lived close to nature
and, to a degree, appeared quite capable of manipulating other species to their
own advantage. Many of the signatories listening
that day considered Shiraishi’s theory on Varroa to have some foundation. Without any bees to pollinate them, crops would fail
causing worldwide starvation. Then the
vast edifice of human civilisation would be all but wiped from the face of the
earth, in a little less than four years.
Only the insects would remain. Making
up an astonishing twenty percent of the planet’s biomass, following any
catastrophe that might befall planet Earth, the last creatures standing, or
crawling would be certain varieties of insect. After the second world war, at Auschwitz where even the grass refused to grow, where no
birds were seen to fly overhead for many years, only the cockroaches
flourished.. Shiraishi had answered his critics, including D, agreeing it was a very high risk
strategy for the metahominids. Then he
had pointed out that the metas were just
insectlike enough to probably survive.
They would be free to re-colonise a world cleansed of humankind.' THE
LAST CHANGELING
’Then, rather clumsily, a second explanation of this eerie event appeared and it is now being ascribed as 'experimental fireworks.'
A Warwick Castle
Even this echoes The Last Changeling...
'The
conspiracy theorists had so much grist for their rumour mills that their
multiple contradictions quickly ground any grains of pure truth down into
useless dust.'
THE LAST CHANGELING
It'S ALL very PECULIAR, and VERY D9!!!
