Let the blade do the work, a voice from his memory told him, don’t force it.
He didn’t force it, and the blade had soon eaten its way through to the other side of the thin prong and he watched it fall gently to the floor with a tinkling sound. Assessing his handiwork, Peter thought that the now three-pronged pitchfork looked odd and lop-sided, so he loosened the vice and spun it over to repeat the process with the odd tine. When the second tinkling noise of metal hitting concrete sounded, he was far more satisfied with the results and was looking at a more streamlined version of the tool. Restoring the hacksaw carefully to its allocated slot on the wall, Peter selected a metal file and rounded off the rough sawn edges of metal. He worked like an artist creating something, moving the file in meticulous, measured strokes to create a smooth edge that wouldn’t cut or catch.
Reapplying that level of attention to the other side, he turned his attention to the tips of the curved prongs and worked at them to elongate and sharpen the points.
His tongue popped out of one side of his mouth as he worked, lost in the attention to detail that the task allowed him to apply. Standing tall and happy with the two business ends of the now adapted weapon, he restored the file to its proper place and selected a short, rectangular wood saw, which he used to remove the bottom foot of spare handle.
Taking both the pitchfork and the off-cut of wood to one of his favourite things, he clamped the weapon into the grips of the big lathe and pressed the green button to start it spinning.
The wall beside the lathe had two distinct sides, each with their tools marked out in the same fashion as everywhere else. Selecting a scooped chisel from the woodworking side, Peter rounded the end of the handle in a few seconds, then stopped the machine with the dirty red button and waited for it to cycle down. Swapping it for the off-cut, he worked more delicately by first rounding the cut end, then reducing the overall thickness of the piece so that it better fit his small grip. Taking it out and replacing the chisel, he dropped the cut handle into the vice once more and used a hand-turned drill to bore a hole directly downwards, deep into the wood from the most tapered end. Picking up the discarded metal prong of the fork that hadn’t been bent, he used the hacksaw once again to render it into a single curved piece, then used a ball hammer to straighten out the curve. To finish his piece, he forced the single spike down into the hole drilled into the handle, using the hammer to tamp it down hard into place and blunting the end. He rectified this by retrieving the file before using the hammer again to straighten the two remaining prongs of his fork.
Each time he had selected a different tool, he had painstakingly replaced the one he was using before picking up another. This was not a side-effect of Peter’s upbringing, where he had lived in permanent fear of punishment, but an indication of his ordered, logical mind instead.
When he had finished and cleared up the workshop, he switched off the lights and went back outside, carrying his two weapons. His trusty stickers, as he called them on a whim; so named for their primary purpose of sticking bad people through the eyes.
EIGHTEEN
“Next,” called Sergeant Croft as he waited for the well-dressed young woman to shuffle along in the line to approach his desk. “Name?” he enquired tiredly, having been inundated with another fifteen civilians, or more like refugees, on the return of half of the troops to complement the already steady trickle of inbound human traffic.
“Kimberley Perkins,” Kimberley said, feeling annoyed at having to wait in line to get any answers, after the uncomfortable hour they had been bounced around inside the back of the van. It wasn’t that she was ungrateful for their sudden and unexpected rescue, but she was rather in need of some information that could help her rationalise everything that had happened that morning to lead her there. Not least because she was wearing just her working clothes and had had to abandon everything she owned, as the thought of going back to the town was the least sensible thing she could imagine.
“Miss, Mrs or Ms?” Croft enquired without looking up from his clipboard.
“It’s Miss,” she replied, reading the list upside down and answering the next three questions with, “twenty five years old, bank clerk, and I’m here alone,” she said, prompting an annoyed look of pursed lips to cross Croft’s face as he finally glanced up to let her know he was annoyed.
That look of annoyance quickly melted away in embarrassment as he found himself looking up into a well-defined face framed by dishevelled brunette hair in tight curls.
“Thank you, Miss Perkins,” he said as he averted his gaze again, “if you wouldn’t mind waiting to this side of the hall now, and we can process everyone through to give you some answers very shortly.”
She was used to that. People looked at her, then looked away out of shame or embarrassment, but mostly to stop themselves from staring. She was not ugly, nor was she overly disfigured, but the scar that marked the left side of her face was puckered and slightly more pink than the rest of her face. The scar, a cruel reminder of a past best forgotten, served as a way to unintentionally repel people. Although she had grown accustomed to the few predictable responses people usually gave her on seeing the scars for the first time, each occurrence did nothing to remove the stab of pain and shame she felt at recognising it. She’d experimented with her hairstyle in an effort to hide it but had decided that the Farrah Fawcett look was just too much work. Absent-mindedly tipping her head to bring her hair down over her left shoulder to obscure where the rippled skin went over her ear, she thanked the soldier in a formal tone and followed the directions she was given.
When they had first arrived, she had discovered it was an army base by blinking into the sunlight after the gloom of the rear of the van, to find herself staring directly at a large white sign denoting that the fenced enclosure was, indeed, an army camp. She had watched as the other people she had shared her escape with had hugged and thanked the soldiers, who all seemed to want to line up for the attention. Some made a direct line for her, seeing a tall and slim young woman, but almost all of them shied away when they saw the mess on one side of her face.
Same story as anywhere else, she thought, it’s like I’m contagious.
She had asked to speak to whomever was in charge and was politely yet firmly instructed to wait with the others in a small holding room by the gate. The room was too small for all of them, much as the rear of the van had been, but she endured it for as long as she was able, until they were brought forward one by one to give them their details.
Having waited in three separate lines for the purpose of simply waiting with a feeling of achievement, they were herded through to another building where there were big metal tins of hot water.
“Tea,” yelled the sergeant pointing at the first one and giving it a rap with his knuckle as he passed, “and coffee,” he called, dinging the other one and making a noise that sounded less echoing than the first. Kimberley, seeing the masses head towards the tea urn, opted for the coffee as the line was shorter and the chance of running out before it was her turn was greatly reduced by the simple evidence she had interpreted through logic and hearing.
“Take a seat, everyone,” the soldier said in a raised voice to cut through the din of conversation regarding sugar and milk, “and I’ll try to tell you what’s been going on.”
That got everyone’s attention, and the rush to take their hastily made drinks to a spare seat became the number one priority for people.
“As you have found out today, the UK has gone more than a little off the deep end,” he began, apparently attempting to make light of the events. “Three days ago, our command structure in London went down. By that I mean that it stopped broadcasting radio signals and picking up the phone. We are, all of us, in the dark about what is currently going on.” Realising that he wasn’t filling people with confidence, the soldier cleared his throat and tried to pick up the tempo in his voice, which was in danger of becoming dreary.
“The disease is believed to have originat
ed somewhere near central London a week ago and has spread rapidly outward from the capital to outlying areas. As of yesterday, it has hit our county.”
Tell us something we don’t already know, Kimberley thought unkindly to herself.
“Reports from other areas of the country indicate that there are outbreaks further north and west, also…” he paused, prompting total silence in the room, interrupted only by the gurgling of the overused tea urn, “…also, we have received radio contact from the continent and our bases in Germany. They appear to be engaged in heavy fighting with the same enemy over there,” he said with reluctant finality.
“So, what do we do?” asked a woman hesitantly from the front row of chairs.
“You wait here, and we will keep you protected and informed of the situation as and when updates arise,” answered the man woodenly, using the words in such a fashion that made Kimberley think of the terminology she had heard once.
Bullshit baffles brains, she told herself, bullshit baffles brains.
As Kimberley and all the other civilians were herded out of the mess hall where they had been assembled, a burbling, rolling thunder headed towards them from the gate. The group watched the return of the four-wheeled tanks and the one squeaking metal wedge that stood alone, as it was only one of the small convoy moving on tracks. They rolled straight past the small crowd who, in the predictable behaviour of humans all over the world, stopped to stare at the display of mechanical and military might that is a line of light reconnaissance tanks.
Their staring wasn’t just in the usual vein of normal people watching the rare sight of military vehicles, because their faces were registering horror and disgust.
Sergeant Strauss, his head and shoulders protruding from the open hatch of the lead vehicle, offered the crowd a smile of greeting that spoke of duty more than any genuine emotion of happiness. Seeing their looks of repulsion and horror, his own smile faded as he wondered what he could have done to cause such a response. They passed quickly just as one thin man turned and fountained vomit over the shoulders of two other people, who shrieked in response.
Strauss turned his eyes back to the front and waited until the small convoy came to a noisy stop outside the building being used as the squadron’s temporary command centre. Only then did he see the source of the looks his small column had received.
“Jesus bloody Christ,” he groaned out loud as he looked at the side of his own four-wheeled car in the lead. Looking down the line he saw that the others were just as bad if not worse, but the lower-bodied, tracked vehicle of the Sultan command car looked as though it had driven through a butcher’s shop, then a clothing store, then back through a slaughterhouse. Thick gore and patches of material from the clothing the things had been wearing were splattered all over the wheels and axles, and now dripped or fell off in small chunks whilst the cars were stationary.
“Fuck me,” he muttered to himself in disgust and disbelief, “Corporal McGill?”
“Sarge?” McGill answered from inside his mount.
“Get all of these cleaned down,” he instructed, “thoroughly. I don’t want to find any fingers or anything in my running gear.”
“Sarge,” McGill answered simply, in a tone that conveyed his understanding and intention to comply as instructed.
Strauss watched as the cars revved up and moved away to leave him in a thick cloud of rich exhaust fumes. Turning back after the cars had rolled away, he found himself beside Lieutenant Palmer, who was wearing a face of thinly veiled annoyance.
Strauss knew that their brief interaction of earlier that day would bring with it a reckoning at some point, which he knew would not be now, as Johnson would be less than impressed with a pissing contest when there was work to be done. But he strongly suspected that Palmer had other ideas.
Setting off for the door at the same time, the smaller stature of the junior officer forced him to step faster than Strauss’ long gait to make the door before he did. The sergeant smiled to himself, anticipating the cutting report the Lieutenant would give about him, and mentally prepared his bingo card.
He was certain that the word ‘insolent’ would make an appearance, as the man had used it at least twice already, along with ‘disobey orders’, ‘mere Sergeant’ and his personal wildcard of ‘protest’.
He did not have to wait long, nor was he disappointed with his predictions as the anticipated words almost tumbled from him.
“Sergeant Major,” he snapped peevishly as he strode in, making Johnson, who was hatless yet still wearing his webbing, look up from a table covered in maps and squint his eyes through the cigarette smoke at the intrusion.
“What can I do for you, Lieutenant?” Johnson asked slowly, as though he knew that whatever was troubling the young officer so much wouldn’t feature high on his own list of priorities.
“Sergeant Major,” he said once more as he glanced around the room at the busy soldiers in earshot, “perhaps we should retire to have this conversation in private?”
“Lieutenant Palmer,” Johnson said tiredly as he cast his eyes back down to the map, “I’m waiting for your report and have plenty of other things to be doing, so if you please, Sir?”
Johnson’s tone and good manners should have told the young man where to pitch his response, but instead, the years of entitled upbringing and reinforced classicism exerted itself without a single care for the environment and situation.
“Very well,” Palmer began, “I must protest, Sergeant Major, about the behaviour of Sergeant Strauss,” he began, totally misreading the dangerous look on the SSM’s face. “He deliberately disobeyed my orders to retreat and insisted on remaining in the open after I had given the command to withdraw, and then,” his voice rose half an octave, “when I gave orders to return to base, he ignored me entirely and led the troop on a wild jaunt all over the county,” Johnson shuddered internally at the way he pronounced the word as Kine-ty, “and, furthermore, had the audacity to presume to give me orders!”
Johnson sighed and stood up straight. He was a man who observed the proper way of things, even in wartime or when the world turned itself upside down like a snowglobe filled with body parts, so his next words were, for him, a marked indicator of the stress of the situation.
“Lieutenant, perhaps you’re right,” he said, seeing the man almost retract his chin in confusion, “we should have this conversation in private.” With that, he nodded to a Corporal who muttered words of instruction for the others to leave the room.
“Sergeant Strauss?” the SSM added, “please wait outside.”
Strauss, his expression unreadable, stamped to attention and took his leave of the room.
Palmer hadn’t recognised the simple display of power Johnson had just treated him to, and he lacked the experience of working with other men to know that his implied request for the room to be cleared was obeyed not out of fear of punishment by the more senior soldier, but out of respect for the man and his rank. Further demonstration of Johnson’s respect for the authority of rank was that he gave his response to Palmer in relative privacy.
Relative being the operative word, because not even a hardened shelter could have stopped his raised voice from letting everyone within a twenty-yard radius know his thoughts on the matter.
“Lieutenant,” he began, “what were my last words to you before I left you in nominal charge of the detachment?”
Palmer’s chin flapped open and closed, unable to decide which retort to use first. The time it took him to think of a response gave Johnson the incorrect sense that he believed the first question to have been taken as rhetorical.
“To remind you, Sir,” he continued mockingly, “I left Sergeant Strauss in command of the detachment with my orders to follow to the letter, as I would expect him to do. But you, Sir, had to try and take over, am I right?”
“Sergeant Major, I really must prote…”
“No, Sir,” barked the bigger man, “you must not protest. You must not give orders. You must not overri
de my instructions to the men and you must not ever be under the impression that you know enough about anything to take charge.”
Johnson’s voice had grown louder and louder with each sentence, until his final word on the subject left a ringing, reverberating boom that assaulted Palmer’s senses and made him flinch.
Outside, the words only slightly muffled, Strauss ticked off his bingo card with the anticipated words.
“But,” Palmer managed weakly, “in front of the men, for a mere Sergeant to…”
“Mere Sergeants, Lieutenant, are all that stand between the enemy and junior officers. They are also often all that stands between the men and junior officers. Try to remember that, Sir,” Johnson said in a lower voice that was more fatherly.
“From now on, just to be absolutely clear, your only job is to watch and learn. If you can’t do that, Sir, I will have to ask you to take up duties managing the civilians.”
That last statement seemed to shock some sense into the man.
“That won’t be necessary, Sergeant Major,” he said in a small voice, “but if I may offer a suggestion?”
Johnson fixed him with a stern look but nodded.
“If, perhaps, I was privy to those instructions, then I would know not to try and change them. Simply a suggestion, Sergeant Major,” he said with unconvincing deference, then turned and left the room to walk ignominiously through the assembled men with his eyes cast down.
Death Tide Page 14
