Utopia: A Dark Thriller: Complete Edition

by Adam Steel

  “So, later that day, we have to go and tackle this raving loony. Jessica was working with me that day and she was as nervous as hell about dealing with him. They didn’t tell us his name. The clients that go in there don’t have names just their UTO numbers, so we don’t know their real identity. It’s mainly because when they get better, they don’t want the freelance press getting hold of the story and the clients being stigmatised. So I believe. He was still in the strait jacket when we pulled the tape of his gob. He started spitting and shouting the minute it was off, and boy was he furious. If I had counted the number of F words he used in the first few minutes it would have been a lot. Jessica stuck him with a needle to try and get him to calm down, but he was still ranting on about “how the masons were cannibals and they would eat our brains and suck out our insides” or some such madness.

  Strange behaviour.

  I know I’m a psychiatric Nurse and I’ve seen a lot of nut jobs in my time, but he sounded pretty determined and believed what he was saying for sure. We took him on a trolley to the treatment room where they gave him a course of the stuff.

  We had to check on him a few days later and the guy was just sitting on the end of the bed like nothing had happened. He even asked me politely for breakfast. I could have sworn it was someone else in that cell, but it was him alright. He was released within a month, completely normal! It’s incredible. Brian says I’m lucky to get this opportunity to help people who would otherwise be a danger to the public. He reckons it must save Utopia a fortune in medical costs. That means more funds available for the dentistry industry!”

  The inevitable mention of ‘Brilliant Brian’ and his ‘Dynamic Drills’, had brought that phone conversation to a polite, and overdue, end.

  Ellie was not keen to repeat it.

  Her heart sank at the article Bridget was now proudly displaying in front of her as though she herself had written it.

  She eyed the headline.

  MEMOREXEN SUSPENDED AT BLAIR RIDGE?

  ‘So is it true? They’ve suspended that wonder drug?’ Ellie mumbled.

  Bridget held the magazine to her chest as if it were a shield. She looked wounded.

  ‘How am I supposed to know? I’m just a nurse. But as far as I can see it’s a load of rubbish. This is Informer after all. Not worth the paper it’s written on,’ she replied defensively.

  Ellie opened her mouth to comment, before Bridget butted in front of her – yet again. Instead, she took a cool sip of her steadily disappearing wine Spritzer, as Bridget reinforced her opinion.

  ‘I mean look at this!’ she exclaimed, brandishing another article.

  The headline screamed out at Ellie.

  THROWBACK COMMUNITIES THRIVING OUTSIDE OUR CITY WALLS!!

  ‘They seriously expect people to believe were surrounded by tribes of cavemen!? I don’t know why anyone would read this crap,’ Bridget snapped.

  Ellie nodded in response. It’s comforting to know you’d rather read that crap than talk to me, she thought angrily.

  Bridget screwed the magazine up and threw it into her bag. ‘Ugga bugga!’ she muttered under her breath.

  Ellie glanced at her watch. Her patience with Bridget and Irene was just about drained, when a commotion at the end of the row of café’s caught her – and quite a few bystanders – attention.

  A man in an electric car had pulled up.

  He was arguing with a pile of shopping bags and bouncing red curls in his back seat.

  The window on the car was rolled down giving the nearby people a taste of the desperate conversation.

  ‘I can’t drive down there!’ the driver spluttered.

  His face was red and flustered.

  ‘It’s pedestrianised! There’s no road!’ he protested helplessly.

  ‘I’ve driven down there before!’ the pile of shopping argued. ‘Its fine, comon were nearly there now!’

  Ellie rolled her eyes.

  Irene had indeed driven down into Diamond Square before. Ellie was unfortunate enough to have been her passenger at the time. The usual café patrons had been forced to dive out of the way of the rogue car, wrecking some very expensive suits, and disrupting lucrative business lunches in the process. That’s how Irene had lost her license, and why, she was now in the habit of getting a lift off poor unfortunate drivers who got too close.

  ‘Oh well. This will do,’ the shopping bags said. ‘I’ll walk from here. Thanks a lot.’

  The car door opened and Irene spilled out of the back; pulling three shopping bags in each hand as she did so.

  She was wearing a shocking green dress that complimented her fantastic, curly red hair. The material shimmered in the afternoon sunlight. The red bombshell wore a matching wide brimmed hat, which was threatening to take off in the blustery wind.

  She was beautiful and although years of chain smoking had etched early lines in her face, it had failed to spoil her natural beauty.

  She immediately disregarded the irritated driver and fumbled: trying to light a cigarette, whilst still holding onto her shopping bags.

  Ellie closed her eyes; certain it would result in an ‘Irene catastrophe’.

  Bridget spotted the new arrival and waved enthusiastically. Another target for the ‘Bridget news!’

  ‘Reeeeenieeee!’ she called. ‘Over here hun!’

  Irene sparked the cigarette, keeping it perilously close to the flammable shopping bags, and looked around disorientated. It took her a few seconds to pinpoint Bridget and Ellie, and when she did, her face lit up with a wide beaming smile, to reveal her perfect white teeth.

  ‘Hey-Hey! I’m here!’ she called, at an inappropriate volume and completely ignoring the fact that she was almost an hour late.

  Her high heels clicked along the pink marble, as the shopping mountain approached the table.

  Ellie chanced a peak as Bridget and Irene embraced.

  Irene’s shopping crashed to the floor as she received the hug. Something made of glass shattered, causing Ellie to cringe.

  Irene didn’t seem to notice, but the holographic goldfish in the vase, scattered in shock at the noise.

  Ellie had no idea how the holographic strip had been programmed to react like that, but it was very impressive.

  ‘Bridget. Hi Hun. Long-time no see!’ Irene said, hugging Bridget tightly.

  Bridget beamed back at her, ‘Hi Reenie! I have so much news to tell you!’

  Inwardly Ellie groaned. Not again, she thought despairingly.

  Irene dismissed Bridget with a wave of her hand. ‘Nope, sorry Hun, but I got better than that! Besides you’ve probably already bored Ell stiff with it,’ she said, demolishing the pending ‘Bridget news,’ like a bulldozer.

  Ellie smiled inwardly. She really loved Irene. She wished she could have had that kind of relationship with Bridget.

  ‘Hi Reenie, did you get everything you needed?’ Ellie offered, eyeing the copious shopping bags.

  Irene nodded enthusiastically. ‘Yep. Oh, By the way, Bridget, I’ll be up to Eden City soon. Brian can do some more cosmetic dentist work for me. Free of charge of course,’ she laughed.

  ‘We need some drinks!’ Bridget exclaimed, recovering rapidly from the red-haired demolition and thankfully by-passing any opportunity of Brian doing ‘Free Work’.

  Bridget went to signal the waiter.

  Irene halted her.

  ‘No need. I got it covered. It’s all right here…’

  Irene began rifling through the hastily discarded shopping bags.

  To Ellie’s growing horror she produced a selection of four, boxed, wine glasses. Irene tore into the packaging, and plonked one of the glasses unceremoniously on the table in front of her.

  ‘Oh. Oops. Had an accident. Wonder how that happened?’ she said, as she withdrew the top of a broken bottle of wine from the bag.

  Droplets of wine dripped off the bottom when she put it back into the shopping.

  Ellie was somewhat relieved. She was thinking that at least they’d h
ave to order wine from the waiter, and not risk being thrown out of yet another café.

  Ellie liked Jo Jo’s’s café, and didn’t want it added to Irene’s growing list of ‘banned’ premises. Her hopes were soon dashed when Irene produced another undamaged bottle from one of the bags. In full view of everyone she uncorked it with a blisteringly loud ‘pop’ that caused people on the next table to duck in reaction, and poured herself, and Bridget, a full glass.

  ‘Want some Ell?’ she said, brandishing the bottle threateningly close to Ellie’s half full glass.

  ‘Um. No thank you, I have one,’ Ellie replied, trying to stay reserved.

  She hoped that the waiter had not noticed, and mentally ‘willed’ the offending bottle to retreat back to its shopping bag safely out of sight.

  ‘In a minute then!’ Irene declared loudly, as she stuffed the bottle back in the bag.

  Three people on the next table frowned at Irene. She didn’t notice.

  Ellie had a mounting fear that she could see where this was going.

  Both Bridget and Irene were drinkers. Separately they didn’t overdo it, but put together, things could rapidly devolve into an ‘all-night drink-a-thon.’ Unlike her, neither of them worked Saturdays. With the bottles Irene had brought with her, things were looking bleak. Ellie had lost count of the nights where Bridget and Irene had got hopelessly drunk, and she had been forced to remain sensible, while they worked their way along every bar they could find. Worse yet, they expected her to get them into places. Exclusive, expensive places.

  Ellie got them in. Irene and Bridget got them thrown out.

  Ellie’s carefully conceived plan of a nice cultured afternoon, taking in the sights and sounds of Diamond Square, and relaying her unbelievable news about her tour in the morning, were on the verge of being drowned under a tidal wave of wine and vomit. She had absolutely no intention of being hung-over or tired for her trip to ‘Genie.’

  Irene looked manic as she guzzled her wine. She was having one of her ‘Off’ days. Ellie was thankful that Irene’s ‘Off’ days came rarely these days, but when they did, they were disastrous to the point of being catastrophic.

  One of her ‘Off’ days had resulted in her starting two affairs with the doctors in her department at the same time. Both men were married, and when they discovered each other, it had resulted in a departmental punch up so fierce that Ellie had been forced to perform two, extra, ‘nose-jobs’ that day. She also suspected that Brian had two new clients for his ‘Dynamic Drills’ too. After the nose jobs, and teeth repairs, Irene had decided that she wasn’t really interested in either of them.

  Another off her ‘Off’ days, had resulted in her taking out a huge loan on a brand new electric car without taking into account the small fact that she didn’t actually hold a valid driving licence. The fine for driving the car without a licence was almost as large as the loan she had taken to buy it. Aunty Audrey (her long suffering relative who she lived with) had been left with the bill.

  Her last ‘Off’ day had her deciding on a change of career. She had suddenly decided she would like to apply to manage a new night club down in Sector Seven. It was called “Ladies of Leisure” and it was owned by a seedy Jamaican man. Ellie had only just managed to rescue her before her ‘interview’ (which strangely enough) involved her taking off all her clothes.

  Ellie and Audrey had worked hard to keep Irene above water and away from the sharks. Sadly Irene was a wrecking ball that went through people’s lives. For all her misgivings they loved her. She had an unpredictable, naive way about her. Inside she always ‘meant well’ but her execution of her bizarre schemes caused hideous repercussions. It was hard, sometimes very hard to keep Irene afloat, but it was a labour of love, and worth every minute. Irene’s loyalty to Ellie was unquestionable.

  Ellie secretly prayed that one of Irene’s ‘Off’ days wouldn’t culminate in her deciding to become a lesbian, or things could get very awkward indeed.

  ‘So, what’s the news Reenie?’ Ellie said, cheerfully hoping that talk would distract Irene from the wine draining away in her glass.

  For a moment Irene looked confused, and then she smiled so much that her whole face seemed to shine.

  ‘I’m going to have a baby!’ Irene announced proudly, as she lit another cigarette.

  Bridget ‘exploded’ a shower of wine across the table, as she coughed into her wine glass ‘mid-gulp.’

  Ellie raised her eyebrow. Oh. My. God, she thought. Desperately she slapped a smile across her face. Her mind raced to digest the news. It tasted of an ‘Irene-sized’ catastrophe. She took a long draught of her Spritzer, which she had previously vowed not to completely drink. The news was an emergency that warranted it.

  ‘You mean, you’re thinking about it right?’ Ellie said, hoping that the answer would be “yes” while eyeing Irene’s wine glass and lit cigarette.

  Irene burst out into a laugh. ‘Thinking about it? I’m twelve weeks gone!’ she cried.

  Ellie closed her eyes. Irene’s ‘Off’ days. Just when you think it can’t possibly get any crazier. She began to explain, in a calm and steady voice, to the exuberant Irene why it was that “she absolutely could not continue to drink the wine and smoke the cigarette.” She chose her words slowly and carefully. They had utterly no effect on the beaming mother-to-be.

  ‘Not a problem!’ Irene answered back. ‘Little ‘Irene junior,’ she said, and patted her stomach gently, ‘won’t be affected. She’s going to be a ‘Super Baby!’ she exclaimed happily.

  Ellie closed her eyes again. A what? This really is a bad one, she thought despairingly.

  Bridget piped up amongst the awkward silence after she’d finished wiping the wine from her chin, clothes and table.

  ‘You never mentioned a man. Was it an accident?’ Bridget queried and frowned. She had a concerned look on her face.

  ‘Accident? Accident?! An expensive accident if it was,’ Irene laughed, and added, ‘No it was most definitely planned. It cost more than my last car!’

  Ellie sat back, staring into her wine, and pretending the last few minutes had not happened. With a growing sense of dread, she listened to Irene’s latest ‘hair-brained’ scheme.

  ‘You know it’s always been about the career. Took me years to get where I am and I love it. Don’t get me wrong and I’m not giving up either. I love working at Plastic Paradise but times been a ticking and I’m not getting any younger. Mr Right hasn’t showed up. Well that’s not exactly true. Mr Right did turn up a couple of years back in the form of Doctor Alistair Luxley, but as you both know, he turned out to be someone else’s Mr Right but forgot to let me in on that little secret. Two years of screwing a man who had his nuts snipped. What a waste of time, and then to find out he was already married to little miss rich pants. Anyway, I digress. After that fiasco I got to thinking that if I was going to get what I wanted, then I was going to have to plan for it, and pay for it.’

  Ellie took another sip of her Spritzer.

  It was precisely Irene’s plans that started the trouble.

  Each time Irene decided what it was that would finally make her happy she pursued it with reckless abandon. A new career. Dr So-and-So. A new Car. A baby. The list was on-going, disastrous and endless.

  Bridget looked worried and Irene continued her story.

  ‘That way I get exactly what I want – no strings attached. Aunty Audrey’s been an angel you know. I can’t thank her enough for taking me in when mum and dad died – you know – back in those days. It’s a good arrangement living with her.’

  Ellie nodded. Audrey hadn’t really had a choice after Irene had blown three months wages on a car that she couldn’t drive.

  Irene tossed her head back and her red curls bounced across her shoulders.

  ‘She said she would love to look after little ‘Irene junior,’ while I worked, and that meant there was really nothing standing in the way. She got a bit sad when she thought about her sister, ‘my mum,’ and how she’s not g
oing to see her first grandchild. I hate it when she starts getting all melodramatic and stuff.’

  Ellie imagined Audrey hearing the news about ‘Irene junior’ and suspected that Audrey’s reaction would have been similar to her own. They were very alike (her and Audrey), both horrified by Irene’s schemes, but hopelessly embroiled in them at the same time.

  Irene took another slug of her wine and Ellie looked at her with a look of growing concern. Irene continued her story unabated and seemingly unconcerned.

  ‘Anyhow, you know they have a fertility clinic at Plastic Paradise, and it’s run at the top end by Mason De-Barr. They offered all staff the opportunity to have exceptional donor implants for a reduced fee. Some sort of new piece of research they were doing. Well I went along to that clinic and they were brilliant. I got to choose what I wanted right down to the genetic profiling. Do you know they can even show you a projected holograph of what your child will look like at different ages by taking the profile of the donor, and the mother, and matching them up. They charge different prices depending on how good the donor is. Well I picked a dear one and he was worth it. The profile was fantastic and the holographic images of ‘little Irene junior’ when she’s five. Oh it was just angelic,’ she said, putting her hands to her mouth in glee.

  Bridget was staring at her with mouth agape. She looked at her with disbelief as she concluded her story.

  ‘So, with Mega Man’s sperm, and De-Barr’s programme, this baby is going to be invulnerable! The only stipulation was that they got to keep a few of my eggs for research purposes “in the interest of genetic improvement of diseases,” they told me. Sounded like a good cause to me, so I say to myself, what the heck.

  Ellie had to try really hard to not shake her head, but look pleased and supportive. She was glad for Irene, but something niggled. Her own biological clock was ticking far too fast for her liking, and like Irene, there had been no Mr Right, just a few nearly, but not quite, Mr Rights. She told herself she wasn’t jealous. She was lying. Her career just didn’t cut it enough. She longed for a man to fill her empty bed and a child to cherish. With Irene now being pregnant, Ellie stared dumbfounded at the lit cigarette in Irene’s shaky hand, and knew that she would be ten times the mother Irene could be. It seemed unfair. She wasn’t crazy enough to do what Irene had done. She wanted a man to go with her child. She wanted Mr Right to help her take care of her ‘Ellie Junior’.