He thought about how he could do it. He didn’t want to cut himself; that would be too difficult. Hanging was off the cards; there was nowhere in the hotel room he could suspend himself from. He went over to the window and considered jumping, but he was only two storeys up and that wasn’t high enough. Then it dawned on him: an overdose. Quick, painless and it would be easy enough to get hold of the drugs to do it. He could leave a note saying he was infected, warning people to dispose of his body properly. That would work. All he had to do now was to go out and purchase the painkillers, and hope that he had enough time to return to his room before the disease finally overwhelmed him.
***
The mounted policeman nudged his partner and pointed down Argyle Street. ‘Effin’ drunks,’ he looked at his watch. ‘Just gone midday an’ he’s aff his heed already.’
‘He’s better dressed than your average Jakie, though,’ his partner replied.
‘Bein’ rich don’t stop you bein’ an alkie, does it?’ He watched the man stagger a few yards further and then collapse. A knot of people quickly gathered round to gawk. ‘I suppose that’s the cue for one of us to get involved.’
‘Usual way?’
Rock, paper, scissors had been their way of deciding who got to do any unpalatable tasks ever since they’d first been teamed up. ‘Yep.’
‘On the count of three.’ They held out their fists. ‘One, two ... three.’
‘Bugger! That’s the fifth time in a row you’ve won. How the feckin’ hell are you doin’ that?’ Still grumbling about his run of bad luck, the policeman slipped from his horse and gave the reins to his partner. He spoke into his radio, calling for an ambulance as he walked towards the small crowd. When he got there, he knelt down beside the man; he was unconscious, but still breathing … just. The policeman put a hand on the man’s neck: his skin was red-hot and his pulse was racing. Then the policeman noticed something unexpected: there was no smell of booze. Usually drunks reeked of the stuff, especially when they’d had enough to pass out. As he stood up, a thought flashed through his head: maybe the man was sick rather than drunk. It couldn’t be the disease the Prime Minister had talked about on the news that morning, the one from Miami, could it? He hesitated for a moment and then reached for his radio again; better to be safe than sorry.
Suddenly, the man’s eyes snapped opened. His breathing was now slow and steady: something had changed. The man sprang to his feet and lunged at the policeman, clawing at his face and throat, sinking his teeth deep into his neck. The policeman punched his attacker as hard as he could, sending him staggering backwards into the surrounding onlookers. A woman screamed as she jumped out of the way and the man seemed to notice the bystanders for the first time. He leapt onto the nearest one, pushing her to the ground and biting savagely at her face. In an instant, there was pandemonium, with people tripping over each other as they tried to scatter. Distracted by all the movement, he broke off his assault on the woman and went for a middle-aged man who’d fallen and was now scrabbling to get back to his feet. He was only on him for a moment, just long enough to bite and infect him, before he went for another, then another, bringing each one down before moving on to the next.
In all the confusion, nobody noticed the injured policeman slump to the ground, his wounds searing with pain as the infection took hold. Suddenly, he was burning up, his heart was pounding, his breathing growing shallow. He tried to work his radio, to get a warning out, but he was losing coordination in his fingers; his eyes drifted out of focus and slowly his world faded to black.
***
‘Sierra six-one to base. Sierra six-one to base. Man down, I repeat, man down. We need backup. We’re on Argyle Street. There’s a man, he’s gone berserk; he’s attacking everyone.’
The voice on the radio crackled with a mix of panic and confusion, and it was clear to all who were listening that something serious was happening. ‘Scott’s down. He’s been injured. I think he’s unconscious. Hang on, no it looks like he’s okay. He’s getting back up.’
The voice sounded relieved, but only for a moment. ‘Shit! He just bit a woman ... Now there are more of them. People are just attacking each other.’
Fear replaced panic in the voice. ‘It’s just like on the news; it’s like what happened in Miami!’
Those listening heard the transmission key being released, only to be pressed again a fraction of a second later. ‘I’m getting the fuck out of here!’
Chapter One
I stared down the length of Buchanan Street. It was amazing to think how much it had changed since I was a kid. Back then it had been little more than a cut-through from one shopping street to another, but now it was awash with posh boutiques and fashion-hungry shoppers. Even the steps I was sitting on were new, built on what had literally been a bomb site in my youth. Now, in its place, stood a concert hall where the more cultured could come to listen to operas and orchestras, but for most, it was a place to rest from the hustle and bustle of the street, eat lunch, meet friends or just watch the crowds going by. I glanced at my watch; it had just gone quarter past twelve, but the street was already packed and, as usual, Tom was late.
I’d met Tom not far from this very spot, just after I’d graduated from university. He was working as a street entertainer and helped me turn juggling from a hobby into a lucrative money-spinner. For the rest of that summer we worked a patch halfway down the pedestrianised street, performing our show four or five times a day, and earning enough money to ensure that I didn’t have to think about getting a real job right away. Soon, I’d wasted a couple of years. Well, not really wasted, as I’d had a lot of fun, but it wasn’t something I wanted to do forever and I thought I should at least try to make use of my marine biology degree.
Tom wasn’t pleased, but he understood, and whenever I was in town I’d make sure I made time to catch up with him. He was still working our favourite spot, and every now and then he’d persuade me to join him in a rerun of the old show. Whenever I did, I was reminded both of how much I enjoyed it, and why I didn’t want to do it for the rest of my life: it was just too nerve-wracking, especially the finale which involved flaming torches, blindfolds and some unsuspecting volunteer we’d dragged from the audience.
As an alternative to juggling, I’d taken a job as the resident expert for a whale-watching company in the Azores. I’d intended it to be a stepping stone to a research career, but as my first summer there wore on, I realised I’d found my niche in the world and that I wanted to stay. I’d worked my way up until I had the knowledge and the connections I needed to start my own company. Ten years later, I was living the dream: I spent my summers on the west coast of Scotland, taking tourists out on my forty-five foot sailboat to see minke whales and other local wildlife, while I wintered in the Canaries doing a similar thing, but with different whale species.
Like the birds, each spring and autumn, I’d migrate between my summering and wintering grounds. And each time I passed, I’d stop off in Glasgow to meet up with Tom. A couple of days of drinking too much and talking over old times twice a year were enough to keep our friendship going.
The day before, I’d sailed up the Firth of Clyde on the west coast of Scotland, past the lighthouse on Ailsa Craig, keeping clear of a red, white and black ferry as it made its way from Ardrossan on the mainland to Arran, the southern-most of the inhabited islands in the Firth, and on past the cooling towers of the Hunterston power station. As I turned eastward into the river itself, the land closed around me. The residential town of Helensburgh was to the north, while the more industrial Greenock lay to the south. Ahead, the span of the Erskine Bridge stretched from one side to the other, a hundred feet above the water. Few people ever approached Glasgow this way these days, but for me, passing under the bridge always meant I was home, even though it would be several more hours before I’d reach the city itself.
As I sailed on, I was eager to see what had changed in the six months since I’d last visited. Glasgow had been making a concer
ted effort to redevelop a river front that had once been dominated by shipyards, and there was always something new. This time, it was the sleek metal lines of a new museum squatting beside the water. I saw that the tall ship I usually tied up next to had been moved down to a new berth beside it, meaning that I’d have the floating pontoons just west of the city’s exhibition centre all to myself.
By sunset, I’d settled in and phoned Tom to tell him I was back in town before arranging a time and place to meet the next day. After that, I turned on the TV: things had been getting pretty weird in the last couple of weeks, and I wanted to see what the latest news was. What I found out wasn’t good. It seemed they’d finally confirmed this new virus everyone had been talking about was, in some way, linked to the violence that had been bubbling up here and there in various US cities, and to the unrest that had been erupting across the Caribbean. Nobody seemed to know how it had got into the US, but rumours suggested a contaminated drug shipment out of Haiti. Yet, that didn’t quite seem to fit with the way it was spreading, especially in the islands. I was just about to switch it off when they cut to some breaking news, and I watched in horror as Miami descended into chaos, live on air and right in front of my eyes.
Sometime in the night I must have fallen asleep, because I woke in the morning to find I was still sitting in the saloon. The television was still on and the news was even grimmer than before: Miami, it seemed, had been overrun. It was still unclear what had happened, but all indicators pointed to it having something to do with the disease; the one they were calling the ‘Haitian Rabies Virus’. It seemed that it was now jumping from person to person, being passed on when infected people attacked others. The Governor of Florida was trying his best to reassure everyone that they’d get things back under control, but his eyes and the slight quiver in his voice told a different story. They were sending in the National Guard and trying to enforce some sort of quarantine, but it was too little too late.
At nine, the Prime Minister came on. He looked like he hadn’t slept and his usual air of self-confidence was noticeably absent. He stumbled over his words, but his concern and his intentions were clear: Britain was sealing its borders to stop anyone who might be carrying the disease from getting in. I knew other countries would follow Britain’s lead, but I wondered if it would work: if people were pushed hard enough, they’d always find a way in. I hoped the Americans would somehow get it under control before it spread much further, but it seemed unlikely. It was dark in Miami by then, and all that could be seen on the live news feeds were flames leaping high into the air.
Just after eleven, I remembered I’d agreed to meet Tom at twelve and tore myself away from the news to walk the mile or so along the riverside to the city centre. As always, I was struck by how much Glasgow had changed over the years. When I was young, the riverside had been little more than a wasteland of abandoned shipyards, but gradually it had been transformed. Now, both sides of the river were cluttered with oddly shaped buildings, clad in metal and glass, which housed cinemas, media companies and conference facilities. These seemed to sprout and multiply with every passing year, and I could see the steel skeleton of the latest addition rising up into the sky.
Further on, I passed under the bridge which carried the railway lines to all points south and turned north, crossing Argyle Street and walking up Buchanan Street itself. I looked at my watch: I’d arranged to meet Tom at the steps of the concert hall in fifteen minutes’ time. Usually, a walk up Buchanan Street would have been a leisurely stroll, while I gazed at the sandstone architecture and watched the people moving around me, but this time it was different; I couldn’t get the thoughts about what had happened in Miami out of my head and I was so distracted that I almost walked into a pair of mounted policemen as they plodded in the opposite direction.
When I reached the top of the road, I climbed the steps and sat down to wait, my eyes drifting lazily across the people on the street below. Mostly, they were shoppers, but here and there were gaggles of foreign exchange students talking excitedly in languages I couldn’t understand. Further down the street, I could hear someone playing a guitar, while closer to me a man in a dark suit prattled on about God through a tinny PA system. Around me, on the steps themselves, some were eating an early lunch, or maybe it was a late breakfast. Others, like me, were waiting for someone and would glance at their watches every now and then. A few feet away, some teenagers were hanging around the base of a tall statue, the boys trying to climb on to it, the girls laughing and taking photos of each other on their phones. I wondered how many of them had seen what I’d seen on the news. They all seemed so calm while I was churning up inside, worrying about what would happen next. Maybe they’d been reassured by the Prime Minister’s announcement at breakfast time, but for me, all it had done was reinforce just how worried those in the know must be.
I saw Tom in the distance. He’d just emerged from the underground station further down the street, a battered suitcase in one hand and a hand-rolled cigarette in the other. I knew the case would contain his equipment: juggling clubs, flaming torches, three large machetes and a bottle of paraffin. As he passed a living statue dressed as a vaguely familiar character from Scotland’s past, he dropped some loose change into his hat. It was a ritual I knew well: Tom always thought it was good luck to start the day by giving another busker some money, and that he’d get more in return for doing so. He’d do the same on the way home as a thank you to the universe for another successful day.
Once he was closer, I could see that, as ever, little had changed. Unlike me, he still sported his long hair, currently tied back in a ponytail, but then again, despite being a few years older than me, he could still get away with it. The beard was new, but it was little more than stubble, so it was hard to work out if it was a fashion statement or just laziness. He wore the same black leather biker jacket he always did and dark jeans. Again, he managed to carry off this youthful, rebellious look, while others, including myself, had been forced to smarten up as we grew older.
Tom waved distractedly as he clambered up the steps and sat down beside me. ‘Sorry I’m late. I got caught up in the news. You see what’s been going on in Miami? It’s fucking mental!’
‘Yeah,’ I stifled a yawn. ‘I was up most of the night. I couldn’t take my eyes off it.’
Tom took a draw on his cigarette and turned to me. ‘You know about this kind of thing. Can you explain all this virus stuff to me?’
I shook my head, ‘I’m a marine biologist, Tom, not an epidemiologist.’
‘But you know more about this sort of thing than I do.’ He took one last drag on his cigarette and dropped the end onto the step below before grinding it out with the toe of his boot. He slowly blew out the last of the smoke, waiting for my answer.
I thought for a moment or two before I replied. ‘I really don’t know much about this kind of thing, but it seems to be something different from anything that has ever happened before.’
The disease had first appeared in Haiti, where a vaccine trial had been taking place. It had all seemed manageable at first, meaning that it had earned little more than a footnote on the evening news. When it first leapt to Miami and on to other US inner cities, the reporters started investigating and asking awkward questions. Contaminated drugs were blamed at first, but then it started spreading from person to person as they attacked each other. Still, it had all seemed like something that could be dealt with, and as I’d watched the news broadcasts while I sailed north from the Canaries, it looked like there was little to worry about, particularly not where I was heading. All the experts reckoned the outbreak would burn itself out eventually.
Then Miami happened, and it was while watching all that go down that it had started to dawn on me that this wasn’t something that would simply go away if we waited long enough … this was something which was here to stay.
‘Ben, are you listening to me?’
‘Huh?’
I turned round to see Tom had taken out his t
obacco tin and was rolling another cigarette. He looked up at me. ‘I asked what you thought about what happened in Miami last night.’
‘I think it’s a mess, and I’m not too sure if there’s anything they can do about it, not now; there are just too many people who are infected or who’ve been exposed. The system’s not set up to deal with something this big. I’m just glad that it’s over there and we’re not.’
Tom placed the cigarette he’d just made between his lips as he prepared to light it. ‘So you think the PM was right to close the borders?’
‘Damn straight! I think it’s probably the first time in his life he’s actually done the right thing at the right time. It’s the only way we can stop it coming over here, at least for now.’
Tom took a long draw on his new cigarette and blew a steady stream of smoke into the air. ‘Maybe if they can keep it out long enough, someone will be able to come up with a cure.’
‘I doubt it.’ I leant back on the steps, watching the people around me. ‘They’ve been trying to cure rabies for 150 years, and they’ve got absolutely nowhere. Once you start showing symptoms, that’s pretty much it.’
‘Shit!’ Tom paused for a second and we both stared off down the street. ‘Did you see the footage where the man got ripped apart by those children?’
I had; I think everyone had by then. A reporter had been standing in the street doing a piece to camera somewhere in Miami when some kids appeared out of nowhere and set upon him. The oldest was maybe about ten, the youngest was dressed in Spiderman pyjamas and couldn’t have been older than four or five at the most. The cameraman dropped his camera and ran, but it had carried on broadcasting live to the world. The reporter tried to fight them off, but there were too many of them. Eventually, he stopped moving, but the children kept on attacking him. The network finally pulled the plug when they’d started eating him, but not before everyone watching saw the oldest child tear open the man’s abdomen and pull out his intestines.
For Those In Peril (Book 2): The Outbreak Page 2
