by Frank Tayell
She slammed, head first, into the glass cabinet containing the vials of the virus. The glass door broke. So did the vials.
She fell to the floor surrounded by glass and liquid and blood.
“Interesting,” Quigley said, calmly. He wasn’t even out of breath. “Hold him,” he added. My arms were grabbed and pinned behind me. I hadn’t even noticed the guards approach. My attention had been on the pinpricks of blood dripping down Jen’s hands and face.
Quigley took another step back.
“Well, you are a cruel man, aren’t you?” he said. “Not satisfied with just killing her, you wanted to infect her too. My, my, what a lot of hatred you do have. She turned, naturally, and was shot. It was self defence,” he paused. “I said she was shot. One of you, please?”
“Wait,” I said. “Don’t.”
“Why not?”
That was a good question. It was because she might be immune. I wasn’t going to say that to Quigley. Instead, my imagination working on overtime, I said, “The blood. My blood. Maybe it has something in it, the same thing that protects me, maybe that can be passed on. If I injected those samples the doctor took, my blood into hers, then perhaps she’d live.”
“I don’t think viruses work like that,” Quigley said.
“The small pox vaccine did, didn’t it? Jenner, cowpox and all that. Perhaps it won’t work, but what if it does? It’s got to be worth trying. Imagine if a vaccine was just that simple. Do you realise what that would mean? How easy everything would be?”
He hesitated.
“OK,” he said, slowly. “Try it.”
I doubted it would work, in fact I don’t think I believed it at all as I scrabbled around the floor for a syringe. All I could hope was that a few more minutes of life gave me a few more minutes to come up with some plan. I grabbed the samples, still cold from the fridge, scrabbled about for a needle, and injected them into her.
“That it? You done?” Quigley barked impatiently.
“What? Yes,” I said quietly, not standing up. I was scanning the ground, looking for those scissors, but they’d been kicked out of sight.
“She doesn’t seem to be getting any better.”
“She’s got concussion.” She might have done. I bent over her. Her pulse was weak, she was barely conscious, and I had no idea how much of that might be the virus and how much her injuries.
“Help her up. Take them up to her room. If it doesn’t work then we’ll say he broke in and infected her as she slept. That will fit the story. Even better if he dies in there too. There’s poetic justice in that. It’ll make a good cautionary tale for our children.”
I think that’s when I understood the depth of his madness. But it was too late. I carried Jen awkwardly back up stairs, the guards behind. They closed the door to her room behind us and locked us in. This time I could still hear them waiting outside.
Endings
“Bill?’ she mumbled as I carefully laid her down on the bed.
“It’s alright. It’s going to be alright,” I murmured. I tried to pick out the fragments of glass. It was futile. There were too many and they were too small. I gave up, and knelt on the bed next to her, her head in my lap, stroking her hair as I felt her heartbeat flutter. I knew she was dying and there was nothing I could do.
“Bill?”
“Hey Jen.”
“They made me promise not to tell you.”
“Tell me what?”
“Your brother... I went to my father... He... I left you the book... I thought you’d get the... I’m sorry.”
“Me too.”
Then she died.
My mouth was dry. I tried to let go of her. I knew what was going to happen. I knew what I had to do. I couldn’t do it. But I had to. She would come back and I had to kill her. The idea was so repellent I pushed the body away and staggered to my feet. Perhaps it didn’t have to be me that killed her.
“She’s died,” I called out. “It didn’t work.”
There was no answer.
“Didn’t you hear me?” I yelled, “I said she’s dead. She’ll come back. She’ll turn. You need to come in here and finish it.”
I waited. I wasn’t sure an answer would come.
“Then you do it.” A voice finally said.
I didn’t know if I could. To start with I’d need a weapon, something heavy. That was something I could do. Find a weapon. And not think about what I’d have to do after that.
There was an old Victorian washbasin and water jug on the dresser. It was delicate, fragile and useless. I opened the drawers. They were filled with nothing but clothes. I tried the wardrobe. More clothes, all silks and satins fit for a Queen. I lifted the chair. It was heavy, but too cumbersome to be used as a bludgeon and too sturdy to break.
Fear growing, I bent down and looked under the bed. Nothing. Of course not. Quigley had his plan, he had it all planned. He knew he’d have to get rid of her one day and he wasn’t going to make his own life difficult. I cursed. Her door had been locked, hadn’t it? I’d not thought what that meant. She’d been as much a prisoner as she’d been anything else, though no doubt he’d told her it was for her own protection.
I half lifted, half dragged the body off the bed and onto the floor by the chest of drawers. I had a vague notion of lifting it up and letting the heavy oak fall down on her skull. I gripped and pushed and pulled and managed to lift it two inches.
Frantic panic now replacing the last vestiges of reason, I went back to the wardrobe. The dresses hung from a brass rail. It was flimsy but there was nothing else. I tugged. I pulled. There was a ragged gasp behind me. I stopped. I turned around. Jen had rolled onto her side.
“Jen?” Maybe I was wrong. Maybe she hadn’t died. What did I know about illness and heartbeats?
“Jen?” I asked again, taking a step forward.
She was on her knees now, her back to me. Her hands grasping at the carpet, her lungs grasping for air. She was alive! Perhaps it had worked. Perhaps by some crazy lucky chance I’d been right and my blood was all that was needed. Perhaps this was the answer. A genuine vaccine, and it would work for us and for everyone else on the planet. We could save so many. We’d all be safe. We’d...
Then she turned her head and I saw her face and I knew she was as dead as all of the others.
Her eyes were flecked with grey, her mouth opened and closed with a snarling snap of teeth. Her left hand swung out towards me, clawing through air. The movement unbalanced her and she fell back onto her side again. Her feet kicked and her hands clawed. The motion twisted her round and brought her back to her knees so that she was facing me once more.
And all that time I didn’t move. I couldn’t. I couldn’t believe the person I had known so well, the girl I’d grown up with, the woman I’d loved, in my own way, had become this.
She lunged again, the movement brought her first to her knees, then to her feet and her hand snaked out, her nails gouging the flesh from my hand. I hadn’t even realised I’d been holding it out to her.
The sudden pain brought me back from the edge of shock. I stepped back just as she sent her right hand swiping forward. I skipped backward again. My legs banged against the bed. She lunged. One hand gripped and grasped at my shoulder, nails biting deep, pulling me towards her and down onto one knee.
“Jen, please!” It came out as whisper, drowned out by the guttural rasp of air as she jerked first back and then forward, her teeth snapping towards my neck.
I got my left arm up. My forearm connected with her windpipe with a sickening crunch. She didn’t notice. Her teeth kept snapping, her hands kept clawing and I knew there was only one thing that would stop her. Only one thing that could finally bring her peace.
It was the hardest thing I have ever done and I think it destroyed some small part of me.
Ignoring the pain from my shoulder I pushed myself back up to my feet. I punched, twisted and shoved until her grip loosened and I could pull myself free. I grabbed her arms and, with all
the strength I could muster, lifted her from her feet. She struggled. I couldn’t hold her. Together we fell in a heap onto the floor. Her hands were everywhere, tearing and clawing as her teeth kept snapping down.
I pushed her down, raised my fist and brought it down onto her face. The blow knocked her back, her skull hit the carpet. I hit her again. And again. And finally I was free.
I got back to my feet.
I stamped down on her head.
And again.
She stopped moving.
She was dead.
I don’t know how long I stood there. It was long enough for the bloody gore to stop pooling around her body. An hour. Perhaps two. Perhaps less. I couldn’t say except that it was still dark outside, when the door opened.
There was a grunt as a powerful light was shone down on Jen’s corpse.
“Right,” a voice said. The light shone on my face. “The Prime Minister wants to see you.”
I didn’t move.
“Now.”
Quigley was in The Gallery, in the same chair he’d sat in at dinner. He wasn’t alone. Behind him stood the General. Opposite was my brother.
“Sorry Bill,” Sholto said as I walked into the room. His eyes widened as I walked into the pool of candlelight and he saw me properly.
“Turns out you did have some use,” Quigley said. “You two can leave us,” he added, and the two soldiers left the room.
“She’s dead. Jen’s dead. I killed her. I had to kill her with my hands because you...”
“Yes, yes,” Quigley interrupted. “The big boys are talking, so why don’t you just be quiet.”
“The old man tricked you, Bill,” Sholto said, “or he didn’t tell you the whole truth. As soon as I realised you’d gone I got it out of him. Not that it took much to work it out. He asked you to radio the submarine, to get it to surrender or stand down or something.”
“No, to get Jen to... to persuade them it was over.”
“Which, if you’d taken the time to think about it, was not going to happen. He just wanted the submarine to break radio silence so the Vehement could find and sink it.”
“Oh.” I didn’t care. It didn’t seem to matter.
“We’re doing a trade,” The General said. “Your life for their submarine.”
“Two nuclear powers was always one too many,” Sholto said. “It’s too dangerous. So one has to go and it doesn’t matter which. If the old man had told us the truth, and not sent you out here on your own, then it would have been his I’d have tried to save. But he did, so it’s Quigley who’ll win. For now. He reckons he’ll rule the waves. I say he’s wrong. In five years, ten at the most, that submarine will have broken down. It’ll be useless. But he wants ten years and I want an end to all of this. So I’m going to give him the Vehement. That’s our deal. He gets our submarine, and we get to disappear.”
“Yes, yes,” Quigley said impatiently, “and now that you’ve seen that he’s alive, can we get to it?”
“Wait,” I said.
“What now?” Quigley snapped.
There were so many questions.
“Why did Prometheus even exist?”
“What do you think the word Strategic in Strategic Nuclear Weapon means? Where do you think the word comes from? If you have a deterrent you have to have a strategy to use it.”
“But everyone had the same plan. Russia, China...”
“Well of course! What’s the point of a deterrent if the other side doesn’t know about it? Carrot and stick, that was our approach. The vaccine and Prometheus. The new way forward for the new millennia.”
“Join us or die?”
“When has it ever been different? For God’s sake man, we were the good guys. We were trying to save the world. You’re stuck in some idealised version of an Orwellian fantasy. If you’re looking for a devil in all of this look to him.” He pointed at Sholto. “The man who rigged elections, the man who blackmailed Senators and planned assassinations. Now, please, can we get on?”
“I’ve one more question,” I said, I didn’t know what was going to happen next, but I knew there would be no other chance to ask. “Why did you kill the evacuees?”
“Because,” he said scornfully, “there was never going to be enough food for everyone. We couldn’t trust them to stay at home and starve to death. They would all have gone out looking for food, beating at our doors, forcing a way in and bringing the infection with them. Some had to die so others could live. Not that it mattered in the end. It all fell apart. But England will rise again. She always does.”
“But does that mean you had that poison already waiting? Was it stock piled somewhere?”
“Oh, come on! Does every trifling detail matter?” he asked, addressing my brother.
“No,” Sholto said, “let’s finish this.” He stood up and took a phone out of his pocket. It was a smart phone, but with a host of wires and a small black box plugged somehow into the back.
“Take it,” he said, holding it out in front of him, “I’ve set up a receiver outside your perimeter. That’ll relay the signal up to a satellite I’ve had waiting.”
“How did you get hold of a satellite?” the General asked, as he stood up and walked towards my brother.
“Money and influence. Like Quigley said, I used to own Senators. Type the following, 2, 3, 8, 9, 7...”
The General snatched at the phone, but the moment his fingers tapped at the screen, the windows filled with light, then shattered as the house was rocked with an explosion. I staggered, half falling.
So, I thought, was my brother. But what I thought was a stagger, was a lunge. His hand plunged forward, straight at the Generals face. The General stopped moving. I saw why. The hilt of one of the knives from the silver dinner service was embedded through the man’s eye.
Quigley was off balance, his hand moving to a pocket. I scrabbled around looking for a weapon, looking for something to throw. I didn’t need to.
Even as the General began to collapse Sholto had moved forward, grabbing the pistol from the man’s belt. The gun came up, pointing at Quigley.
Quigley saw it. He froze.
Sholto fired.
Quigley jerked back, his hands moving to his chest.
He collapsed.
Escape
Sholto straightened.
“Right,” he said. “Right.” he said again. He looked down at the two bodies, then fired again, once into the General and again into Quigley.
“Right,” he said, then paused, then aimed the gun down and fired twice into Quigley’s head. “Just to be sure, you understand. Now, Bill, look...”
The door opened. The two soldiers who had escorted me down from Jen’s room came in. Sholto’s hand came up. He fired. Twice. They both died.
I wanted to ask him what he was doing there, but the words that came out were, “Who the hell are you?”
“Look in a mirror and ask yourself the same question,” he replied. “Now come on, here.” He ran over to one of the soldiers, picked up a rifle and threw it over to me.
“Grab a coat. In this chaos it might give us an extra few seconds.”
I started dragging off the coats. That’s when I noticed that he’d shot both of the soldiers between the eyes. Exactly between the eyes.
“That was all over in less than a minute. Less than a half a minute,” I said.
“I told you I’d been planning to kill Quigley for years. What exactly did you think those preparations had been for?”
“But he died not knowing why.”
“You think I should have said that this was for our mother and father or your lost childhood? What’s the point of speeches? What good have they ever done? Now grab that coat and let’s find the radio. Any idea where it’ll be?”
“The generator was on the south east,” I said, trying to think. “There were cables and wires running up from a window to the flag pole... It’s probably in the library.”
“Library? Good. We need to send the message, then w
e can get out of here.”
“Then that part was true?”
“That there’s only room for one submarine in the Atlantic? Yes, that’s what the old man is after. Personally I’d rather they’d all been sunk, but if it’s a choice between one and the other I’ll pick the one that’s on my side.”
“You’ll use a satellite...” I began, trying to keep up.
“There is no satellite. That’s the same thermal explosive we used in the tunnel, mixed with some C-4 I got from Leon. We need to hurry. Which way’s the library?”
I pointed.
“Good,” he said, “Stay three paces behind. No more. No less. You’ve got the rear. I’ve got the front and sides. Is there anyone in the house we need to rescue? You said Jen was dead. Anyone else?”
“No, Jen’s dead.”
“Yes, I know,” he said, patiently. “But is there anyone else?”
“No. No. Quigley killed them all.”
“He did know how to do a job thoroughly. Three paces. No more. No less. Keep looking behind. If you see anyone, then shoot first, because there’s no questions this lot can answer.”
Even under the circumstances I rolled my eyes at that line.
We made it to the library unseen, and just before a half dozen uniforms ran past.
“They’ll look outside first,” Sholto said. “We’ve got ourselves about ten minutes grace.” He walked over to the radio.
It wasn’t at all what I was expecting. I suppose when I thought about military radios I thought about old war films, not something that was more keyboard and computer than dials and knobs.
“Let’s see.” He bent over the keyboard and began typing.
“The Doctor wasn’t here,” I said.
“Of course he wasn’t. Quigley would have killed him if he knew where he was. He was a witness. The last witness.”
“The old man knew that? Then is he holding Kim and the girls hostage?”
“Of course not. They’re perfectly safe.”
