The answer may lie in the personal fortune of Brian Ransom, known by many as The Pill Guy for his vitamin pill giveaway to pregnant women. The head of Ransom Incorporated, who has consistently featured in the top ten of The Times’s rich list, is widely regarded as one of the few men who could fund such research. Furthermore, his personal relationship with Prime Minister John Pankhurst (Ransom was one of the main financial contributors to his last election campaign) is likely to be behind the quick adoption of cure clinics by The Department of Health.
Ransom has been no stranger to Number 10 this past year. His visits to Downing Street are a matter of public record, but attempts to interview him about it have been constantly turned down by his people at Ransom Incorporated …
Jennifer had had the same problem. She’d been constantly on her phone trying to get Ransom to agree to talk to her. She even tried turning up at his offices claiming to have an appointment, but the receptionist had been immune to her girlish charm and turned her away.
Michael scrolled back up the article and clicked on the link to The Pill Guy. It took him to another article about Ransom’s pill giveaway. This one, however, had video. Michael clicked:
Ransom stood in some sort of factory, with his arm round the waist of a heavily pregnant woman. He was neater and a little older than he had been in his photograph: his black hair was cropped at collar length and he was dressed in an expensive dark suit and tie. The woman smiled at his side.
“When Mary and I embarked on the adventure of having a baby,” he announced to the camera. “We were lucky. We had money to buy the best care and the best doctors—”
Loud guitar music burst from Michael’s hands. He jumped in surprise and dropped the phone. It rolled to the floor where it continued to blare raucous guitar riffs – Otis’s ringing tone.
Otis – blurry-eyed and wearing only pyjama bottoms – staggered out of the bedroom.
Michael picked up the phone and held it aloft. “It’s ringing,” he said.
Otis gave him a that’s-skanking-obvious stare and grabbed it off him.
“Hello?” He put the phone to his ear and walked to the kitchen where he talked to the caller in hushed tones.
Jennifer came out of the bedroom in her short nightshirt and disappeared into the bathroom.
Otis finished his call, went back into the bedroom and emerged fully clothed. He knocked on the bathroom door. “Jen?”
“Yeah?” she shouted from inside.
“Something’s come up, I gotta go out. Won’t be back till late this afternoon.”
“Okay,” she replied, and the sound coming from the bathroom changed to that of the shower running.
“What’s come up?” said Michael.
“Analysis on the cure’s done,” said Otis.
“What’s in it?”
“Dunno. Gotta pick it up.”
“Can I come?”
“No!”
“Come on, Otis, you wouldn’t have had it to analyse if it weren’t for me.”
“It’s a three-hour round trip to collect an envelope. It ain’t a day out at skankin’ Alton Towers.”
“I can keep you company,” said Michael.
Otis gave Michael the most filthy look. Like he was his little brother begging to play games with the big boys. “Okay, if you must. You’ve got two minutes to get dressed.” He tutted to himself. “Norms!”
~
FOR THE SECOND time in a week, Michael sat in the passenger seat next to Otis as he drove out of London. It was a pleasant change to look at the city from the safety and warmth of the car. He could observe the passing grey, crowded streets without people staring at him and wondering if he was a perceiver.
Otis took the Blackwall Tunnel to get to the south side of the River Thames. Descending into the concrete tube was unnerving for someone who – as far as Michael remembered – had never been in it before. Artificial lights in the tunnel roof softened the transition from daylight to underground, but he and Otis were still enclosed deep beneath the surface, with tonnes of earth and millions of litres of water above them.
Traffic crawled to a stop.
Otis turned on the radio. A pop station was playing the latest bland number by a female vocalist Michael didn’t know the name of. It faded out and the urgent beat of a news jingle crashed on top of it.
“It’s 10 o’clock. Good morning, I’m Rob Flintoff. At least two teenagers have been killed and many more injured in a fight at a school in Essex. It’s thought the cause is perceiver-related. George Aziz has more …”
Another man’s voice: “It was just after eight o’clock this morning that the fight broke out at Mountbatten High School in Romford. It’s believed several teenagers who had been diagnosed with perception were taunting other children about secrets they had pulled from their minds. When a group of normal teenagers tried to intervene, a fight broke out. Police believe as many as fifty teenagers were involved at its height. Paramedics took twelve to hospital where two were pronounced dead on arrival. They are a thirteen-year-old girl and a fifteen-year-old boy. Their names are expected to be released later today.”
“My God, it’s getting worse,” said Otis.
“The news?” said Michael.
“If those two dead kids turn out to be norms, they’re gonna blame us.” He pulled his phone from his pocket.
“What are you doing?”
“Texting Jen.”
The car in front of them eased forward. Otis pocketed his phone and put the car into gear. They crawled along.
“Fancy listening to some decent music?” said Otis.
“Yeah.”
He leant over and switched from the radio to a pre-recorded track. Soft rock guitar flowed from the speakers. Soon they were out of the tunnel and into overcast daylight.
Michael became lost in the music. The guttural vocals drifted up and down with a melody that was both familiar and moving. The people and the streets and the cars went by the window, while the lyrics told a story about lost love.
“You’re singing,” said Otis.
“Was I?” said Michael, embarrassed. “Sorry. I’ll shut up.”
“I’m surprised, that’s all,” said Otis.
“That I can sing?”
“That you remember the lyrics.”
“So?”
“This track is five years old,” said Otis. “If you remember the lyrics, maybe you can remember other stuff.”
Michael got excited. But as soon as he was conscious of the song lyrics, they fell out of his mind. In a panic, he tried the thing he used to do in the park, to think himself back to before he ran from the office building. The place where his memory should be was still dark and empty. He listened to the song again and tried to remember where he had heard it. He couldn’t.
“God,” said Otis as the track played. “Five years ago.”
“Five years ago, what?” said Michael.
“Five years ago, I was … nothing … doesn’t matter.” Otis reached forward and turned up the volume. It caught the last few chords of the song and then there was a moment of quiet before the heavy guitars of the next track crashed through and chased away the reflective mood with their adrenaline-thumping vibe.
Otis kept the music loud as they drove down the A2 out of London and across the border into Kent. At the outskirts of Chatham, Otis turned off the main road into an industrial estate. It was full of modern, glass office buildings and anonymous cubed warehouses interspersed with small sections of landscaped greenery and acres of black, tarmac car parks. It took a while to find a space, but eventually Otis squeezed in on the end of a row of other cars.
Otis, with the confidence of someone who knows where he’s going, led Michael to a large building with a sign above the entrance, announcing: Randall Miller and Parnell Research Labs. They went in through the rotary doors to a spacious reception area with comfortable seating, several large palms in pots and a fish tank. The reception desk itself was a large semi-circular affair with one
woman sat behind it. If Randall Miller and Parnell intended to impress visitors when they walked in, they had succeeded.
Otis approached the desk and said hello to the receptionist. She was immaculate. Smart black jacket with the collar of her white blouse lying crisply on her shoulders. Hair tied back neatly at the back of her head. Flawless make-up. Perfect nails painted a subtle pink. Michael wondered how long it took her to get ready in the morning. She gave Otis a corporate, welcoming smile.
“Hi,” said Otis. “Doctor Smith’s left a package here for me.”
She looked puzzled. “I don’t think so.”
“Are you sure? He said he’d leave it at reception.”
“I’ll call him,” she said. Otis tried to stop her, but the receptionist had already picked up the phone.
“Doctor Smith? There’s a young gentleman out here said he’s come to pick up a package? … Yes, that’s right … I’ll tell him.” She put the phone down and gave Otis another one of her corporate smiles. “He’ll be right out. Why don’t you take a seat?”
Otis looked like he absolutely didn’t want to take a seat, but he still wandered over to the comfy chairs as instructed. Michael tagged along and actually sat on them, while Otis hovered beside him nervously, with his hands in the back pockets of his jeans.
Michael watched the fish. They swam in a tank about the length of Otis’s car, lit from above by a soft blue light. They were beautiful, luscious colours. Some yellow, some striped white and black, a few orange ones, a shoal of small blue ones. All living in one tiny little world. He didn’t know whether to envy their simple, carefree lives or pity them for being trapped in the tank with nothing to do all day except swim.
A man in a lab coat came out of a side door behind reception and walked towards them. Otis was fiddling with his phone and didn’t notice.
“Hello, Oliver,” said the man.
Otis twizzled round. “Dad,” he said instinctively.
Dad?
It was hard to see the resemblance between the teenager and the man. The man, who had to be Doctor Smith, must have been pushing fifty. He was balding and, if he’d ever had Otis’s shocking blond hair, then grey had long ago chased it away. He wasn’t overweight, but neither did he have the muscular frame Otis had. He wore a pair of dark-rimmed glasses, while Otis had naked eyes. But, as Michael looked closer, he realised there was something similar in their faces.
“We can talk in the boardroom,” said Doctor Smith.
Otis shuffled his feet nervously. “It’s okay, I’ll just take the envelope.”
“Sign in, Oliver,” said Doctor Smith, dismissing his son’s protest. “You can bring your friend if you want.”
Otis didn’t argue anymore. He gave his father an annoyed look, then went back to the desk where the receptionist provided him with a pen. Michael signed in after him. He saw that Otis had scrawled O. Smith into the book, confirming that he and the scientist were father and son. Michael used the same false name he had used at the clinic.
“Oliver?” whispered Michael as they followed Dr Smith through the side door.
“Shut up,” said Otis.
The boardroom was only a couple of doors down the corridor. It was a rectangular room dominated by a long wooden table with a dozen chairs placed around the edge and a neutral beige decor that was as corporately neat as the receptionist.
Doctor Smith flicked the catch on the door so they wouldn’t be disturbed. He pulled out two chairs for them to sit in. Otis gave him a suspicious glance, then sat down next to Michael. He shifted on his seat like a nervous child sent to the head teacher’s office.
“How are you, Oliver?”
“What’s this about, Dad?”
“Still living in that filthy squat?”
“Dad!”
Doctor Smith turned to Michael. “And who are you? Involved in one of Oliver’s scams, I suppose.”
Michael leant back from the coldness of the man’s disapproving eyes. “Just a friend.”
“If you’re a friend, can you get him to call his mother a bit more often. And tell him a visit at Christmas wouldn’t come amiss either.”
“Dad!” Otis stood up. “We came for the results, not an interrogation. If you haven’t got them, then I might as well go.”
“For goodness’ sake, Oliver, sit down. I did the analysis.” Doctor Smith pulled a folded piece of paper from the pocket of his lab coat and laid it out on the table in front of them. Otis sat back down and perused the piece of paper. Michael looked over his shoulder to see it was a printout, listing a series of chemical names and percentages. It wasn’t the exciting result he was anticipating. Just a lot of scientific gobbledygook.
“What does it mean?” said Otis.
Doctor Smith reached into his lab coat again and pulled out a glass vial which appeared to be the one Michael had taken from the cure clinic. “I suppose it would be pointless to ask how you got hold of this?”
“Pointless,” agreed Otis.
“You’re certain this is the drug injected into perceivers to cure them?”
“Certain,” said Michael. “Why?”
“Because it’s not what I expected.”
“What is it?” said Otis.
“It’s Midazolam,” said Doctor Smith. He folded his arms and sat back in his chair, as if that explained everything.
Michael looked across at Otis. He seemed just as lost as he was.
“What the hell’s that?” said Otis.
“It’s a sedative.” Doctor Smith was smiling, pleased with himself.
“It puts you to sleep?” said Otis.
“Depends how much you inject,” said Doctor Smith. “Could put you to sleep. Could make you drowsy. It’s often used by dentists to treat nervous patients or to carry out lengthy procedures. It makes patients relaxed or sleepy. Most people don’t remember the treatment they had when they were under. Useful, if you’re having root canal.”
Michael sat forward in his chair. “It destroys memories?”
“Patients only forget what happened while under the influence of the drug,” said the doctor. “It won’t make you forget your ex-girlfriend. Sadly.”
Otis looked confused. “That’s the cure? A sedative?”
“The cure, I don’t know about,” said Doctor Smith. “But that drug is Midazolam.”
Otis turned to Michael. “You took the wrong drug.”
“I didn’t!” said Michael.
“You must’ve. Going to sleep don’t do nothing to ’ceivers.”
“It was the only stuff in the treatment room,” said Michael.
Otis turned on his father. “Then you made a mistake.”
Doctor Smith picked up the vial and looked at it. “I tested the stuff you gave me.”
Michael took the vial from him and turned it over to read the label. It said: CLINIC #1. 50ml. Serial no. 537986B. It was the same vial, now with only a dribble left in the bottom. “This is what I took. It’s what they were injecting into perceivers, I swear.”
“What if,” said Doctor Smith. “They are using that drug, but that drug isn’t the cure.”
“What do you mean?” said Otis.
“The teenagers get injected with Midazolam,” he replied. “It makes them drowsy and compliant, then the doctors at the clinic carry out a second procedure. It’s that second procedure that actually cures them of perception.”
Michael sat, dumbfounded, letting the words sink in. It made sense. The injection was a smokescreen. Whatever the cure was, it was something the doctors wanted to keep secret. That was why the injections couldn’t be given by ordinary doctors in ordinary hospitals and GP surgeries. It’s why there were so few clinics. It was easier to keep the secret the fewer people knew about it.
It also meant they were no closer to finding out what the cure really was.
Otis picked up the printout, thanked his father and headed for the door. Michael was about to follow him when Doctor Smith pulled him back. Michael tensed at his grasp. He look
ed at the man’s fingers digging into his arm. It scared him a little, but the man didn’t look like he was going to hurt him.
“How is he? Honestly?” asked Doctor Smith, his voice quiet so Otis wouldn’t hear.
“Otis?” Michael didn’t know what to say. He shared a flat with the teenager, but he didn’t really know him. “He’s all right. I think.”
Otis’s voice came booming down the corridor. “Michael, are you coming or what?”
“Yeah,” Michael called back. He went to go, but Doctor Smith was still holding his arm.
“He knows he can come to me if he’s in trouble, doesn’t he?” said Doctor Smith. “He knows me and his mother worry about him?”
Michael looked at the man’s face. He wondered what had happened to keep the two of them apart. “He’s a perceiver,” he said. “I’m sure he knows.”
CHAPTER TWELVE
“SO,” SAID MICHAEL as they got into Otis’s car, “are we going straight back to London, Oliver?”
“Don’t call me that,” said Otis.
Michael grinned at his discomfort. “Why not? It’s your name isn’t it?”
“If you really want to know, my name is Oliver Terrence Ian Smith. My initials spell Otis – and that’s what you’re gonna call me, unless you want my fist to rearrange your face.”
Otis started up the car. They drove out of Chatham, back to the A2 and towards London. Music blared out of the car stereo, most of it by a band called The White Rhinos. Otis tapped the steering wheel with the fingers of one hand and, after a while, started to sing along. Michael found some of the lyrics were in his head. He joined in. Much of the journey back was spent singing.
They got to the flat to find Jennifer sitting on the sofa reading a book on her phone. She put it aside when they entered.
“You wanna beer, Mike mate?” said Otis, going into the kitchen.
He’d never offered Michael a beer before. Otis kept a few cans in the fridge, but Michael always thought it was better to leave them alone. “Sure.”
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