The Hurst Chronicles | Book 4 | Harbinger

by Crumby, Robin

  “Does the latest formulation work as well as they say?”

  “We wouldn’t give it to people if it didn’t.”

  Riley accompanied the medical team to the guardhouse inside the covered entrance where they spent several minutes changing into protective equipment, donning masks, gloves and gowns.

  Riley still remembered the excitement when they first announced the breakthrough with the vaccine. The promise of increased protection for all. Privately, she doubted their claims. Most of the newsflow from St Mary’s was overblown, propaganda to maintain the flow of refugees needed for the work camps. Carter’s quiet cynicism seemed to confirm her worst fears that reality was somewhat different.

  Once the doctors boarded the patrol vessel, Riley returned to her room to wash up before lunch. She brushed her hair, made herself presentable in the broken mirror hanging over the communal washbasin. After her day out on the Nipper, her cheeks and forehead were noticeably weathered. Another few years at the castle and she would have the leathery skin of a fishwife, she chuckled.

  Picking up one of the leaflets Doctor Jeffries’s team had left behind, she set off towards the canteen, sneering at the choice of language to describe the Ventnor programme’s ‘luxury accommodation’, in a ‘purpose-built facility’, ‘overseen by the sisters’. No mention of the inherent dangers of a drug trial or personal risk to the so-called volunteers.

  In the castle canteen, Zed’s teenage daughter, Heather, and some of the others assembled for this morning’s work party wolfed down bread and soup ahead of their shift planting vegetables at Aubery Farm in Keyhaven, some twenty minutes’ walk from the castle.

  Riley poured herself a cup of strong black coffee. She handed Liz the leaflet and waited for her to digest its contents.

  “Listen to this,” said Liz, reading from the sheet. “Sanctuary for women. The best of everything. Doesn’t sound half bad, does it, girls?” Liz nudged the woman next to her.

  “Compared to the castle, it’s like a holiday camp,” added Greta.

  “I hope I get selected,” blurted Heather.

  “You? You’re much too young.”

  “Not according to the leaflet. I’m fourteen in June.”

  “What would your dad say?” asked Liz.

  “I’m old enough to make my own decisions. Anyway, you lot are just jealous. Most of you are too old.” Heather sniggered.

  Riley bridled at her youthful over-confidence. “Not while I’m responsible for you. Liz is right. It’s ridiculous having girls your age enrolled on the programme. Remember what happened to Adele. Those drugs nearly killed her.”

  “One in a million they said. You can’t blame the doctors. It was an allergic reaction.”

  “We should all do our bit,” added Heather. “It shouldn’t be up to the men to save the world.”

  “It’s got nothing to do with gender,” corrected Joe. “I’d sign up in a heartbeat if they asked me. I still remember those days locked up at the hotel as some of the best, and weirdest, days of my life.”

  “No offence, Joe,” interrupted Liz, “but why would they want us lot when they’ve got all those fit young soldiers and brainy scientists queuing up?”

  “It should be voluntary. You make it sound like some social engineering project.”

  “Isn’t it? It’s more than just boosting the birth rate,” insisted Riley, “they’re hand-picking the best to join the programme, trying to create a new generation immune to the virus.”

  “You don’t know that,” countered Liz.

  “Open your eyes. What do you think this is really all about?”

  “You’re beginning to sound like Heather’s father,” sighed Liz. “The only conspiracy around here is there are no conspiracies.”

  “It’s discrimination,” suggested Joe, “that’s what it is.”

  “Listen, sweet cheeks, if you don’t have the right genetic profile, you don’t have a hope.”

  “Anyway, it says here they’re only taking a handful of women that match their requirements. And, for once, women are in the ascendancy.”

  “Sounds like some big experiment in equality, if you ask me.”

  “What? Since when did equality become a numbers game?” warned Liz.

  “Since the Sisters saw an opportunity to purge generations of bias. They’re trying to rebalance gender roles, reset interdependency on different terms.”

  “Meaning what?”

  “Ask Joe. Sister Theodora believes men should be downgraded to workers and breeding partners,” asserted Riley, to the disbelief of those sat opposite.

  “About time,” said Heather, emboldened by Liz’s radical idealism. “I never understood all those stupid quotas for female representation. Equal opportunities yes, but discrimination is still discrimination, in any form. I grew up listening to my mum’s stories about not getting paid as much as men for doing the same job. It’s about time.”

  “What would your father say if he heard you talking like this?”

  “I wouldn’t know. He’s never around.”

  “You know, your father used to say that women made better hunters than men.”

  “My Dad is a feminist?”

  “You’d be surprised,” insisted Riley. “When you get to know him, he’s alright. Stubborn as a mule, head-strong, impossible at times, bit like you, but, deep down, he’s got a heart of gold.”

  Heather puzzled over her description, as if realising something for the first time. A smile crept across her lips. She leaned in close and whispered in Riley’s ear: “You’re in love with him, aren’t you?”

  Riley ignored the question, rising from her seat. “Come on, we should make a start. Those fields aren’t going to plough themselves, you know.”

  Chapter 6

  Terra thanked the chauffeur and slammed the passenger door of Briggs’s executive saloon, striding towards the front entrance of Lymington’s New Forest Hospital in high heels. The receptionist looked up from her paperwork and stared open-mouthed. It took another woman to recognise the effort Terra had put into her appearance this morning. A full hour of hair and makeup. Head-to-toe designer clothing. She looked a million dollars and wanted everyone to know it.

  The girl on the front desk directed Terra upstairs to the end of the hall where she found Professor Nichols working in one of the laboratories. She studied him through the observation panel. Glasses perched on his forehead as he peered down the lens of an enormous microscope, oblivious to her presence.

  Physically, the professor was almost nondescript. Limp grey hair, wire-framed spectacles, corduroy jacket with leather patches at the elbows that reminded Terra of a maths teacher. His movements were awkward, gangly limbs like a daddy-longlegs. An introvert more comfortable listening than speaking, no doubt somewhere on ‘the spectrum’, though his lengthy career advising cabinet ministers suggested, at the very least, that he was high functioning. In a world turned upside down, she came to rely on the professor’s impeccable logic to make sense of their new reality. His was one of the few voices Terra trusted, she enjoyed his company, not unlike a troubled daughter might develop an affection for an uncle or blood relative.

  She finally appreciated Briggs’ prescience in capturing the professor. After all, the scientist had been at the centre of the Allies’ early research on vaccines, overseeing the quarantine protocols, the refugee processing centres, even assembling the clinical trials team before Doctor Hardy took over. After many years serving on various government subcommittees, including SAGE, the Scientific Advisory Group for Emergencies, he had issued immunisation guidelines to health departments and hospitals. Terra believed he was as qualified as anyone.

  The laboratory assistant finally spotted Terra, nudging the professor. He finished making notes in the small pocket book he kept with him at all times before levering himself upright.

  “Terra, I didn’t know you were coming today. You should have said.” He seemed genuinely pleased to see her.

  “I don’t suppose you’ve
got time for a quick coffee? I wanted to pick your brains about something.”

  “Of course,” he said cheerily, closing the door behind him.

  “I hope I’m not interrupting anything important. I’m sure you get bombarded with questions all the time.”

  “Not at all. I always look forward to our conversations. You have an enquiring mind.” Terra smiled in gratitude. “And a thirst for knowledge.”

  “It must be so frustrating being surrounded by all these Luddites,” mocked Terra. “If I knew half what you know about science and the world, I would consider myself a genius,” said Terra, trying not to sound too sycophantic.

  “Most scientists, myself included, have a common-sense bypass,” he joked. “If truth be told, we understand little about why humans do the things they do. It’s why we maintain a healthy scepticism, even when evidence appears incontrovertible.”

  “You’re much too modest.”

  “Not in the slightest. Even the greatest scientists seek out data that supports long-held beliefs, whether on climate change or vaccine programmes. It’s the reason we come to rely on peer review to expose our ideas to appropriate scrutiny and challenge.”

  “I don’t suppose there are too many experts like you left.”

  “Mine is a narrow field, but there are others joining the fight. Right now, innovation is refocused where it’s needed most. Elsewhere, scientific progress has ground to a halt.”

  “I was going to say, it feels like we’re going backwards.”

  “It’s funny. Before the outbreak, I earned a small fortune doing lecture tours in the United States pontificating about man’s search for new purpose, how natural threats become manageable risks. For most of recorded history, the same questions have consumed the attentions of scientists, namely, how to improve human health and prosperity. The biggest killers were no longer plague, famine or war, but old age and obesity. Sugar killed more people than war.”

  “Surely, famine is the least of our problems? With fewer people?”

  “That’s what the Allies want you to believe. Famine could soon overtake disease as our biggest threat. Things are much more precarious than you realise. Far from recovering, population numbers could actually collapse. Briggs knows it and seeks to take full advantage.” He glanced over his shoulder to make sure they were not being overheard. “If there aren’t enough workers to farm the fields, then crop yields decline and harvests fail.”

  “But we keep hearing that the darkest hour has passed. There must be an endless supply of labour now the refugee processing centres have reopened. Thousands arriving each week from the mainland.”

  “Exactly. The Allies built a hungry machine that requires vast quantities of labour to function. All those new recruits need training and feeding. They’re seizing more private land every day, evicting island families that have lived in the same place for generations. Meanwhile, those in power monopolise precious resources, unwilling to share with those most in need. Briggs is smart. He understands that sympathy for the rebels will only increase, especially if they can’t contain the outbreak.”

  “Professor, you overestimate Briggs’s ability to disrupt Allied operations.”

  “I’m not sure. Mother Nature has a curious way of reminding us who’s really in charge. Trust me, we scientists keep learning this the hard way. We came to think of death as some technical problem we might one day solve.”

  “I don’t understand.”

  “Well, it sounds crazy now, but some of my University colleagues believed life expectancy would double in another century or two. The speed of scientific conquest breeds overconfidence. Retiring at fifty would seem absurd when you might live to be one hundred and fifty. Imagine how that might have influenced human relationships and expectations of working lives?” He laughed at the thought. “No state pension could afford to support you for a hundred years. Look at us now. Life expectancy has collapsed. The current generation will be lucky to get to forty without falling victim to any number of once curable diseases.”

  Terra struggled to hide her disquiet at the prospect of dying so young. “Hope is a choice, Professor. Between all those scientists in Porton Down, St Mary’s and here at the hospital, surely it’s just a matter of time before you discover the cure?”

  “I wish I shared your confidence. Don’t be taken in by their illusion of omnipotence. Compared to bacterial infections, our understanding of viruses, and how they work, is surprisingly limited. Only a few years ago, the equipment to study something so tiny simply didn’t exist.”

  “With or without a vaccine, you said we would develop natural immunity or the outbreak would just disappear.”

  “True, but that could take years. No one said we had some God-given right to survive. Mother Nature is not benign. If humans cannot adapt, then our remaining time on this planet could be just as limited as the dinosaurs.”

  “But Professor, there must be something you can do to increase the chances of success.”

  “Sadly, our best defence remains unpopular lockdowns, travel restrictions, and effective quarantine controls. Contain the virus and you limit its means of transmission.”

  “Hence the attraction of the island?”

  “Correct. A physical barrier against the spread of disease. If it hadn’t had been for Briggs’s interference, the Allied plan might have succeeded. I had rather hoped that, by now, St Mary’s would have made a breakthrough, but they appear to have focused their energies on improving what they already had.”

  “Didn’t you say Doctor Hardy had pioneered alternative approaches?”

  “So they say. Much of what goes on at Porton Down remains classified. Of course there were rumours. Gene-therapy techniques gleaned from illegal weapons programmes. What I wouldn’t give to get inside those labs. Think what we achieved with our meagre resources here at the hospital. Whether we like it or not, Briggs and King proved that scientific research is sometimes just a numbers game. Throw enough resource at a problem and you can get lucky. Our technicians successfully recreated the most virulent strain of the virus. Even a minuscule release on the island was devastating. Thankfully, it killed people too quickly, limiting its spread.”

  “Why use disease as a weapon against Camp Wight when you know it might spread back to the mainland?”

  “Unless you don’t care about the consequences. Why do you think he’s vaccinating so many of his people? There are always winners and losers in any outbreak. Discoveries come through accident as much as deliberate action. Unintended consequences are part and parcel of scientific progress. One often learns more from failure than success.”

  “Briggs is smarter than you think.”

  “Oh, I’m well aware of the danger he poses.”

  “He’s not some suicide bomber who thinks his reward will come in the next life.”

  “Then what’s his plan? He must have an end game.”

  “For Briggs, it’s always been about the island. After all, why engage your enemy in open warfare when you can simply incapacitate them, tie up doctors, nurses, administrators to care for the sick? That way he can strike at the heart of the Allied base of operations without having to put boots on the ground and risk the lives of his own people. He’ll never stop until he’s driven them all away.”

  “Perhaps he’s overlooked one small detail.”

  “Which is?”

  “The latest outbreak has sharpened their focus, redoubling their efforts to find a cure. It’s surprising what can be achieved in a relatively short time.”

  “But you said vaccines take years to develop.”

  “And decades to perfect. That’s why Briggs is hedging his bets. He’s got teams scouring every health centre and hospital from here to Salisbury, stockpiling medical supplies.”

  “Even though he knows most treatments are ineffective?”

  “In the absence of a cure, people are desperate, vaccines are a tradable commodity. Not just for the flu, but for other diseases: cholera, rabies, typhoid. I heard
a whisper he’s got his hands on a small quantity of smallpox. It would give him ultimate power over his rivals.”

  “Only if he secured quantities of smallpox vaccine too. And there’s only one place that could have come from: Porton Down,” admitted Terra with a sigh.

  Chapter 7

  Zed knocked on the Commander-in-Chief’s door and waited for the colonel’s usual curt ‘Enter’. Back amongst his own, the career GCHQ intelligence officer had become a stickler for protocol. St. Mary’s had reminded Zed of the formality of school life, both as a student and latterly as a teacher. How much he loathed all those rules.

  The colonel sat stiffly behind an ebony mahogany desk in his usual swivel chair. Other than a black and red notebook, his work surface was the polar opposite of Zed’s. An in-tray contained the day’s correspondence, already catalogued and ready for filing by one of his staff. Zed reached into his pocket and produced Gill’s letter. Before he could say anything, he realised they were not alone. He turned to find Doctor Hardy and Major Donnelly relaxing in the visitors’ armchairs. Hardy cradled a cup of tea with both hands. He sat up straighter on seeing Zed.

  The colonel checked his wrist watch, a vintage time piece with a leather strap. “I wasn’t expecting you until two o’clock.” Zed detected a slight edge to his voice that suggested he was interrupting something important. It was no secret the doctor had made several complaints against Zed which the colonel had done his best to bat away.

  “I can come back if I’m interrupting,” started Zed.

  “No, now you’re here, you may as well stay. Doctor Hardy was just giving us an update on the vaccine trial. Perhaps you can give Mister Samuels here a quick recap.”

  “Of course,” he began tersely, as Zed took his seat. “Nothing he hasn’t heard before. The revised containment measures are in place and working. We’re predicting a significant drop in new infections. All we have to do now is wait for this current spike in cases to run its course.”