Survival

by David Fletcher

  It appeared that the perils confronted and overcome included two serious road accidents, one very dicey landing on a flooded runway, one pugnacious drunk in an underpass, one avalanche, one black mamba, one collapsing chimney stack, and two incidents involving unstable extendable ladders. Given how many years the assembled six had spent on Earth, this litany of mishaps impressed nobody, and Alex definitely thought it did no more than demonstrate what cushioned, sheltered lives they had all led. Nothing had come their way that had even approached what Mike had had to tackle in the Falklands and the risk to life he had faced on that campaign. And how likely was it, thought Alex, that any real danger would arrive to meet any of them this late in their lives? It was almost inconceivable. Just as long, of course, as one of Roy’s icebergs didn’t get some other ideas…

  Back in their cabin, Alex and Debbie reflected on their supremely safe life, and how so many people in other parts of the world lived lives that were little more than an unbroken series of dangers. If they weren’t facing the threat of disease or starvation, they were fleeing conflicts or getting caught up in conflicts. And, of course, many of them were succumbing to these various dangers. Because, as Debbie pointed out as an example, not every barrel-bomb could land somewhere else. Alex agreed, and then he was reminded by that barrel bomb reference that he hadn’t plugged himself into the news today. Not that much of the ‘news’ currently being carried by either CNN or BBC World News would meet the definition of this word. It was more in the nature of reiteration, as, over the past three days, both channels were reporting not much more than Putin’s belligerence, Assad’s evil, Trump’s imbecility and Xi Jinping’s assurances to the rest of the world that the flu epidemic was totalitarianly under control in modern-day Cathay. Nevertheless, Alex was a bit of an addict, and even if his fix was going to be no more than a warmed-up dose of yesterday’s reiterations, he thought he would give it a try. If nothing else, it would fill in a bit of time before he and Debbie took themselves off to listen to a talk by Nick on the subject of penguins. This was a must, and even a report on the outbreak of hostilities between Russia and the US would not stop them going to that. Although the report they were about to hear on China might just possibly make them late…

  They tuned in just as a talking head in London was declaring that China’s current behaviour was unprecedented and impossible to interpret. It then became clear that Mr Xi Jinping had abandoned his efforts to reassure the rest of the world about the threat of flu, and instead had taken a vow of silence. This being China, so too, it appeared, had the other 1.4 billion Chinese who shared the country with him. This enormous global power was not saying a word to anyone beyond its borders, and neither was it allowing anyone into China or out of China. It was in complete shutdown. No internet connections, no phone connections, no cross-border travel, no cross-border trade, and certainly no responses to the world’s rising chorus of questions as to what the hell was going on there. What could possibly be making a country of this size want to seal itself off from all the other nations in the world? (As one of the talking heads said, even China’s old mucker, North Korea, was not being told what was going on. And apparently Kim Jong-un was now wetting his spider-silk pants.)

  Alex and Debbie had both become transfixed. They couldn’t take their eyes off the screen. Not because they were being fed any information, but because there didn’t appear to be any information to be fed. It was just repeated appearances by a succession of ‘experts’ who were doing little more than expressing their puzzlement while at the same time trying to retain their valuable oracle credentials. A couple of them did manage to make one valid observation, which was that, whilst the nation-wide shutdown of China might well be as a result of a deadly flu epidemic, the absence of flu cases outside the country almost certainly meant that the infection was transmitted through close contact and not through the air. However, most of the time these wise men and women were doing no more than making stabs in the dark that were no better than Alex could have done himself with a blunt butter knife. After all, an exercise in self-quarantine, a power struggle at the top of the Communist Party, a gigantic natural disaster and a tsunami of civil strife were all ideas that anyone could have come up with. Although few people would then have been able to support these ideas with any rational arguments. If it was a quarantine exercise, why would China’s rulers do this without telling the rest of the world what they were doing? After all, why miss out on the acclaim that such a selfless act of altruism would inevitably attract? As regards a power struggle or an outbreak of civil strife… well, could either of those events really close down an entire country; one that was so huge and one that was bound to have porous walls? Furthermore, civil strife – or even the evidence of a vigorous power struggle – would probably be picked up by a few hundred spy satellites, as would any very large natural disaster. No, something else was going on in China; something mysterious that Alex believed was beyond the imagination of any of those talking heads – and, very irritatingly, beyond his own imagination as well. Unless it was aliens…

  He made the mistake of proffering this visitation from another world as a possible explanation for China’s comatose state, albeit with the caveat that, given China’s population, there would probably have to be an awful lot of aliens. Debbie’s response to this suggestion was withering, but she did promise not to repeat it to anyone else. Just as long as Alex didn’t betray her own facetious remarks about the shutdown being the result of the world’s biggest game of hide-and-seek. Although, in a way, this idea had about as much credibility as all the other ideas they had heard. And, of course, a game of hide-and-seek might not be spotted from space.

  It was a frivolous way of dealing with what had been revealed about China’s condition. Probably because both Alex and Debbie were not just mystified by this huge dollop of real news, but a little bit scared by it as well. Would they soon be facing a genuine danger, and not as a result of meeting an iceberg, but instead as a result of having to deal with whatever the fallout was from nearly a quarter of the world succumbing to an extreme form of introversion? Something was going to happen as a consequence of this extraordinary and bewildering event, and neither Alex nor Debbie could see how it might be good – for them. And they weren’t even sea cucumbers or civets.

  Anyway, Alex reckoned that most of their fellow passengers were a bit unnerved as well. That was probably why so many of them had turned up, along with Alex and Debbie, to listen to Nick’s penguin lecture, and to lose themselves in a bit of normality for a while. After that, they could return to their televisions and start to come to terms with the magnitude of what they had heard and try to work out what it might mean for them, here on the Sea Sprite, even if at the moment they were about as far out of harm’s way as they could possibly be. After all, whatever might be going on in China was on the other side of the world and they were way beyond its reach. God, not even a Chinese Chernobyl could get to them here.

  Alex had the very same thoughts himself, and the reassurance provided by the Sea Sprite’s remote situation did allow him to put his concerns to one side, at least for long enough to allow him to concentrate on Nick’s presentation. This shift in focus was helped by the fact that, despite the new China-size enigma in his life, he really did want to brush up on his penguin knowledge, which was currently at the level of embarrassing ignorance. He knew what general shape penguins were, and he now knew a lot more about those he had encountered on the Falklands, but that still left a lot to be learnt, and a lot that could successfully distract him. And it was all interesting stuff. How, for example, the macaroni penguin, with its elaborate crest, earned its name from Maccaronism, a style of men’s fashion adopted in England in the eighteenth century, notable for its flamboyant or excessive ornamentation, and earning its devotees the nickname of ‘maccaroni’ (or ‘macaroni’). Then there were the chinstrap penguins, reckoned to be the most aggressive species of penguin; probably, suggested Nick, because they knew that in d
isrespectful circles they were referred to as ‘jockstrap penguins’. And finally, how about the reported fact that massed ranks of king penguins have been known to follow the movement of an approaching helicopter so very intently that when it passes overhead they continue to observe it, and thereby fall over backwards in an act of splendid synchronised unanimity.

  There was, however, no such unanimity when Nick’s presentation came to an end, and people began to gather in little groups to discuss the Chinese puzzle. Alex and Debbie’s little group – which included Derek, Elaine and Roy – certainly came to no consensus on the cause of China’s behaviour. Roy was convinced that the Communist Party was in its death throes and had wrapped the nation in some sort of despotic cling film in a last-ditch attempt to survive, whereas Elaine thought that just possibly it was a classic case of mass panic. The flu had wreaked havoc, she suggested, and people were now just looking to their own situation and ignoring everything else. The only thing that was still operating was the state, and this wanted to keep the news of the panic from the rest of the world. Other (very flawed) explanations were offered, but Alex offered no hypothesis himself, primarily because he didn’t have one but instead only a firm belief that it wasn’t the demise of the party or a case of mass panic or any of the other ideas put forward by members of the group. Nothing fitted, nothing worked, and nothing would be gained by continuing to stumble around in the dark. Which is why Alex decided he should take his wife back to their cabin and watch some people on the telly stumble around in the dark instead. There was another presentation in the lounge on offer – on Antarctic climate research – but Alex knew that this wouldn’t do what Nick’s lecture on penguins had done: successfully distract him for forty minutes from thinking about China. So, he might as well concede defeat and sit himself in front of a screen to witness a new clutch of talking heads attempting either to comprehend the incomprehensible or resolve the irresolvable. If nothing else, it might provide him with some more possible theories for China’s actions, which he could then discount along with all those he had already discounted. And that might assist him in contributing to the inevitable China discussion over dinner.

  Well, in the event, dinner was just generally unenlightening and not specifically unenlightening on the subject of China. This was because Alex and Debbie had made a tactical error on entering the restaurant, and had ended up on a table for six with the four people they had been carefully avoiding since their first meal on the ship. They hadn’t got any better, and they were certainly incapable of grasping the undeniable significance of whatever might be going on in China. Or its potential ramifications. In fact, Alex had to admit to himself that they were more realistic in their ignorance than were many of those pundits on the telly. In a way, he found their performance perversely refreshing.

  It did, however, leave him wanting more. He hadn’t quite had his fill of China, and so, at the end of the meal, he convinced Debbie to accompany him to the bar, where he knew he’d find a new crop of both concerned fellow travellers and improbable opinions. And he did. But he also discovered a new snippet of information. It appeared that one of his new acquaintances had heard of somebody who had heard somebody talking about some unspecified sort of trouble on China’s border with Myanmar. Well, this second- or third-hand piece of gossip got Alex thinking, and what he thought was that he was thinking far too much about something that was happening on the other side of the world, and that he was on this side of the world with the prospect of arriving in South Georgia in no more than a few hours’ time. And whatever delights South Georgia held in store, they would not be affected by events in China. Nor would those events affect his ability to savour these delights. In fact, the only potential impediment to his relishing South Georgia’s promised natural wonders would be his not getting enough rest tonight. And, as it was now nearly midnight, hadn’t he better take his wife back to their cabin so that they could both go to bed?

  Even if, as was quite likely, they might not immediately go to sleep…

  eleven

  He had sent in a report to HQ. Stuart had known it would be futile, but in his organisation one ignored the protocols at one’s peril, and he was certainly not keen on the prospect of having to defend his inaction at a later date. Nothing had happened, of course. He hadn’t even received an acknowledgement. Although, there again, that wasn’t unusual. He’d thought on many occasions that if he stopped putting in any reports, nobody back in Blighty would notice, and ultimately he would be forgotten about completely. Indeed, he had fantasised about this eventuality, wondering whether he could clear off for the rest of his scheduled stay on this island – to somewhere like Thailand – and then just pop back in time to catch his homeward flight to Brize Norton. And nobody would be any the wiser.

  However, he was still here, still in one of the dullest places in the world, which had suddenly and unexpectedly exploded with a burst of genuinely riveting interest. That was why he was again in his box, and although it was just ten in the morning of this new day, he had already been at work for nearly three hours. And there was so much to do. And only him here to do it. There had once been three monitors in this station, but the powers back home had cut that down to two, and when those two had reached the end of their posting, only Stuart had been sent to replace them. There was supposedly an active search for another mug to fill the vacancy, but nobody stupid enough had yet been found. And anyway, Stuart suspected that they weren’t looking very hard. This monitoring set-up duplicated a lot of what could now be done back in Britain, and if one factored in the quality and the relevance of what was being monitored, it had to rank as one of the least significant sets of eyes in the whole organisation, and one that might one day be relegated to a stand-by function, only ever activated if Argentina showed any signs of getting stroppy again. And that was unlikely, and even less so now, now that its regime, like all the other governments in South America, was fixated on what was going on in East Asia. Yes, it wasn’t exclusively China in all those signals any more, but also Myanmar, India and Nepal.

  The first indication that China’s syndrome was on the verge of leaking into neighbouring countries was another report from Madrid that spoke not just of more fires in more Chinese cities, but also of confirmed fighting on China’s border with Myanmar. This, the report said, involved Chinese border guards and what were presumably Chinese citizens, and was interpreted as the Chinese authorities trying to maintain the integrity of this border. Or, in other words, they had decided to shoot their own people rather than let them escape from the country.

  This was very significant, and one would not have needed extensive training in intelligence work to realise that it was very significant or, indeed, to realise that it pointed to the presence in China of something that people wanted to avoid at all costs. Even if it might mean getting shot.

  And then it got a great deal worse. Similar reports were being made about shooting being heard – and observed – on the country’s borders with Nepal and India. It was only a matter of time, thought Stuart, before more reports emerged from maybe places like Vietnam or Mongolia, or anywhere with a common border with China that offered a gateway out of that troubled country.

  He also thought that he should again make a report to HQ. It would be just as meaningless and futile as the one he’d submitted yesterday, but simply composing it might help him to assemble his thoughts and come up with his own tenable theory of what might be going on in China. It might even help him to compile a theory on what might be about to happen next. In the event, it did neither, but it did make him think about one aspect of the flu that was now beyond doubt. In fact, he’d even seen it confirmed in a discussion he’d caught on the canteen telly, and this was that the flu could only be transmitted from person to person. After all, there had been no reported cases of this flu in any other country. And taking account of the fact that nobody was being let out of China, that had to mean that it was this person-to-person route and that it wasn
’t being transmitted through the air. The epidemic was trapped within China’s borders and it wasn’t being given the chance to become a world-wide pandemic.

  Yes, the guys on the telly were right. It had to be person to person. That’s the only form of transmission that made any sense. Until, that was, the late afternoon. This was when Stuart came across an encrypted message to the Peruvian government – from that country’s ambassador in London – mentioning an unconfirmed report of multiple deaths in India and Pakistan. There was very little detail to accompany this bombshell, but it did make clear that those who had died had not died as a result of bullets or some other munitions, but as a result of some invisible affliction, something probably airborne and something that brought about death very quickly.

  As he finished digesting this latest piece of information, Stuart put his hand to his chest. It was as he thought. His heart was racing. And then he realised he was feeling just a little bit nauseous. He therefore sat back in his chair, took five deep breaths and then supped from the bottle of water on his desk. He was a professional, he reminded himself. And professionals do not have an attack of the vapours. Particularly when they have another futile report to compose. And when they have to prepare themselves for a late night of monitoring followed by an early start to a full day of monitoring in the morning.

  Maybe, thought Stuart, it was a really good job that he hadn’t taken himself off to Thailand…

  twelve