by Robin Crumby
After several wrong turns and dead ends, Zed finally found the staff bar situated on level three of the underground bunker complex at Porton Down. The lighting in here was so low it took him a moment to locate the person he was meeting.
“I was beginning to think you weren’t coming,” said Gill, seeing Zed squinting at the doorway.
“Sorry, I’m late, I got completely lost. This nightclub lighting doesn’t help either.”
“Don’t worry. This is probably the only bar on the planet where a female can sit in peace without being harassed by some idiot.”
Zed looked around the bar and saw what she meant. Everyone was working or reading, minding their own business. The couple in the corner were engaged in quiet conversation, interrupted by the occasional laugh.
The Porton staff had tried their best to make the place look like a traditional English pub, with stools at the bar, dart board, pool table, soft furnishings, and a large TV screen in the corner. Multicoloured chalk on the blackboard announced that they would be screening a recording of the 1981 FA Cup final between Tottenham and Manchester City with “that wonder goal by Ricky Villa”. Set around the walls were several seating areas with large black PVC sofas, several of them occupied.
The barman made eye contact as Zed approached, rubbing his hands together at the prospect of a new customer.
“What’ll it be?”
“I’ll have two more of whatever the lady over there is drinking.” He pointed to Gill back at her table as she raised her half-empty glass of dark brown stout.
“Two pints of Porton Dark then.” When he’d finished pouring the drinks, the barman held out his hand for payment. “That’ll be two tokens, please.”
Zed tapped his pockets and looked around despairingly at Gillian. She held aloft two red casino-style chips which he collected and handed to the barman. Placing the pints on the table without spilling them, he sank into the leather-backed chair with a weary sigh. He took a sip and winced at the bitter taste.
“I know what you’re thinking. It takes a bit of getting used to.”
“You could say that.”
She leaned forward in her chair. “So, listen, about Wildfire, I asked my team already, discretely, of course. A few of the senior guys have been here much longer than me. Even they only knew bits and pieces. Happy to share, if that might help you out.”
“Absolutely. I’m still getting the run-around. I’ll take anything. Right now, it’s like a giant jigsaw puzzle with most of the pieces missing.”
“I’m not surprised. First thing they teach us around here is not to ask questions. Everything is compartmentalised. Fraternisation between different teams is discouraged. From the sound of things, this project was off the books. “
“I get that impression. Don’t tell me, the only people with oversight of different programmes would be Doctor Hardy and Major Donnelly?”
“Correct. But since the outbreak, there’s been a steady collapse of those Chinese walls, at least unofficially. It turns out they had competing teams working in parallel, completely unaware that anyone else was involved.”
“I’m sure this place still has a lot of secrets to give up. One hundred years of military experiments must leave a few scars.”
“If you only knew the half of it.”
“Why did no one blow the whistle?”
“Look, we’re watched all the time. You just get used to it,” she said, noticing his scepticism. “See that guy over there by the dartboard, the one reading his book?”
Zed scanned the room and found the ball-headed man she was referring to. His body was angled towards them so that he could surreptitiously observe them, but he was too far away to overhear their conversation.
“He looks harmless enough. How do you know he’s watching us?”
“Trust me, he followed me down here. Since you arrived, I’ve noticed some new faces hanging around the department, spying on us. I don’t care. What are they going to do? Lock me up for having a drink with an old friend?”
Zed was encouraged by her defiance. If more people spoke up, maybe they would never have got into this mess in the first place, he thought to himself.
“What you need to understand is that here at Porton, we maintain a deliberate separation from the norms of society. First and foremost, we are scientists, we’re taught to be objective. I can see you judging us, but you’re wrong to do so.”
“Look, I appreciate your reality is somewhat different to mine, by necessity. I’m just trying to get to the truth, that’s all.” He shrugged, taking another sip from his glass. The stout was less bitter second time around, but still had a spice kick to it.
“Look, as soon as my teammate started talking about Wildfire, we all agreed that there must have been a link with the Common Cold Research Unit. They spent decades researching the flu virus. It’s an open secret. Maybe their work was merged with Project Wildfire. My friend mentioned something about an Iraqi translator who was relocated here. Does that mean anything to you?”
Zed sat forward in his chair. “Does he remember a name or what they looked like? Male, female?”
“He was a bit hazy on the details, but I can ask.”
“The colonel passed me various reports from the CCRU. It closed down in 1989.”
“Weirdly, the CCRU is what first brought me to Porton.”
“You were a volunteer?”
“I was desperate for money. Carol said they were looking for young, healthy professional people to take part in a medical trial for a prototype vaccine. It was easy money. I stayed here for a week.”
“How much did they pay you?”
“Not much, but there were a few of us who did it together. It was a laugh, a cheap holiday. They told us the vaccine was completely harmless. They injected us and then watched as we did all these mental and physical challenges. It was like a recruitment programme. They’d roll out the red carpet, make us feel welcome, encourage us to come back for the next round of trials. What can I say? I must have dazzled them with my charm and intellect. They ended up offering me an internship.”
“I always wondered who volunteered for those things. They make it sound so safe, and then you hear horror stories about toxic shock and adverse reactions. If you ask me, putting your life in someone else’s hands like that is terribly irresponsible,” said Zed bluntly.
“Not really. Clinical trials are the best way to learn about infections and how to stop them. Sure, they’re not without risk. A few years ago, we did a lot of work around Gulf War Syndrome. There was pending litigation claiming MoD negligence.”
“I remember. Did they ever figure out why so many veterans returned from the Gulf with life-changing conditions?”
“The symptoms were very broad. Headaches, asthma, dermatitis, chest pain, chronic fatigue, poor concentration. There were a number of theories.”
“Didn’t some people claim it was exposure to Saddam’s chemical weapons?”
“That’s right. Others blamed the Uranium-tipped munitions the allies used, but a silent majority believed that the inoculations themselves were to blame.”
“What do you mean?”
“The MoD was paranoid that one of the vaccine shots was contaminated. They worried it might have been rushed out and not properly tested. Or used in combination with other shots in a short period. The interaction of those different vaccines can prove unpredictable. It’s likely that in the rush to vaccinate the troops, they didn’t spend sufficient time checking whether they were safe or not.”
“So you think Gulf War Syndrome could have been self-inflicted?”
“I’m just saying it’s possible.”
“If that’s true, it would be the worst own goal since Lee Dixon’s back pass for Arsenal against Coventry in 1991.”
She seemed confused by the reference.
“Forget it. It doesn’t matter. So, reading between the lines, are you saying there could be a parallel between Gulf War Syndrome and the Millennial Virus?”
/> “How do you mean?”
“That the flu shot could have had unexpected side effects.”
“No, I wasn’t suggesting that. I’m just saying that a lot of the work we do here is actually preventative. Vaccines rather than weapons. Don’t go twisting my words to your purpose.”
“How much do you know much about the Spanish flu pandemic?”
“I wouldn’t be very good at my job if I didn’t know much. Spanish flu, H1N1, bubonic plague. They’re all core case studies. We use them to model future pandemics. Why do you ask?”
“Based on your models, is it reasonable to expect that the outbreak could die out abruptly, like the Spanish flu?”
“Sometimes one strain dies out, and a milder one takes its place. Mutation is non-linear. It can happen very suddenly. But frustratingly, it remains somewhat of a mystery.”
“There’s another question that’s always puzzled me…”
“Go on.”
“Why did they call it the Millennial Virus?”
“Good question. It’s actually a common misconception. When the outbreak first started, we identified anomalies in the data that suggested those most prone to fatality were young adults. At the time, the worse affected were born around the time of the millennium, hence the name.”
“Oh, I see. So it’s just coincidence. There’s no connection with the millennium itself?”
“It was the same with Spanish flu. It had a disproportionate impact on young adults. Around the end of the First World War, it was assumed that the higher mortality was related to wartime service in the trenches, or at least their exposure to others infected with the virus. Years later, they actually discovered that young adults were simply more susceptible, though they’re still not clear why this is the case. In the modern age, some experts blame lower rates of inoculation, but I’m not convinced.”
“Did they ever figure out the causes of the Spanish flu outbreak?”
“Not definitively. Some European experts suggested that infected poultry and pigs imported from Fort Riley in Kansas resulted in the flu virus jumping directly from birds and pigs to humans. Understandably, the Americans disagreed.”
“I suppose they’re hardly going to admit to causing a global pandemic.”
“A few years ago, I was corresponding with a US team trying to discover the origin of Spanish flu and why it proved so deadly. They managed to recreate the original 1918 strain from tissue samples they found frozen in Alaska. They were able to prove conclusively that most of the victims died from an overreaction of their immune system rather than the virus itself.”
“I’ve read about this. Is that what they call a cytokine storm?”
“I’m impressed,” she mocked, inclining her head. “If true, it would in part explain why the flu had such a dramatic effect on young adults. It stands to reason that their immune systems would have never experienced a virus similar to this. Their bodies simply reacted more strongly to rid the body of infection, and the consequences of that would have been terminal for the victim.”
“So an overreaction of the immune system can actually be more deadly than the virus it’s attempting to counter?”
“Precisely. A team at the University of Ghent in Belgium were trialling a new universal flu vaccine. They were able to fully sequence the influenza genome for the first time. That allowed them to substitute new antigens into a pre-existing vaccine strain and reprogramme the immune system to attack the flu virus. Unfortunately, their prototype was still in development when the outbreak occurred.”
“So, let’s assume that Porton has been tracking the Millennial Virus for nearly two decades. Why then has it proved so difficult to manufacture an effective flu vaccine?”
“It’s much more complicated than it sounds. I’m no expert, but from a modelling point of view, the continual mutation of the virus means it’s simply not possible to develop a vaccine until an outbreak actually occurs. They often don’t know what they’re dealing with until the first cases present themselves. Different strains of the virus compete with one another all the time, sometimes exchanging genetic material with other viruses.”
“So if your job is to model these outbreaks and predict the next mutations, it sounds like there’s a lot of guesswork involved?”
“You’d be surprised. We’re not just throwing darts at a board, blindfolded,” she said, pointing to the bar. “We make heavy use of tech. AI and phylogenetic analysis.”
“If you’re trying to impress me…”
“It’s sort of like building a family tree, to help determine the biological ancestry of a virus and map how it might spread geographically.”
“And that helps you understand why one strain is more lethal than another?”
“It provides clues as to how the virus might further mutate. It’s not a perfect science, but it allows us to zero in on the correct vaccine formulation and potential treatments for those already infected.”
“Between the two of us, how far away do you think we are from developing an effective vaccine, realistically?”
She shrugged her shoulders, taking another swig from her half-empty glass. “Hard to say.”
“Doctor Hardy mentioned in his speech that they have two promising clinical trials.”
“Don’t believe the hype. Even if they have had a breakthrough, the trials will be very small scale. They’ll have no way of knowing how effective it will be on larger groups. It could take months, if not years.”
“The stakes are sky-high. Every week that goes by, tens of thousands more people will die in this country alone.”
“I’m aware of that, but expectations are unrealistic.”
“So what does this testing process involve?”
“Typically, they would expose the test subject to a weakened strain of the virus to encourage the body to develop antibodies. This acquired immunity creates what we call immunological memory so that the next time they are exposed, the body knows how to combat infection.”
“So once they’ve landed on something that is effective, they can presumably mass-produce the vaccine quickly?”
“It depends. They have some state-of-the-art tech here. They use bioreactors to accelerate the manufacture of cell cultures so that, in theory, they should be able to produce a sufficient quantity of the vaccine to be able to deal with a large-scale outbreak.”
“What about the trials that are not successful? What happens to the test subjects?”
She looked over her shoulder to make sure they weren’t being overheard. “In extreme cases, injecting test subjects with even a trace element of the virus can be terminal. In others, those cytokine storms we touched on can ravage the body, produce swelling, rashes, fatigue, nausea, or worse, even organ failure.”
“Do people know the risks when they volunteer for those trials?”
“What do you want me to say? I’m not going to lie to you.”
“But, Gill, those people still have rights. Just because they’re volunteers doesn’t mean they’re expendable.”
“They gave their consent. They all signed a waiver.”
“I doubt that constituted informed consent in the eyes of the law.”
“Look, we’re well aware of our duty of care. We fulfil our obligations.”
Just then an orange flashing strobe blinked on and off in the corner, followed swiftly by the deafening wail of an alarm. For a moment, everyone in the bar seemed to stare at the strobe and each other in disbelief, until a recorded announcement began looping.
“Warning: containment breach. Please remain calm and await further instructions.”
“Is this real world or just a drill?” asked Zed.
“I don’t know. It wouldn’t be a drill at this time.” She pointed at the double doors to the corridor which had a red light flashing above them as the air seals activated around the doorway and the room began pressurising.
“What’s happening?”
“Any kind of leak detected in the facility and each room
seals automatically.”
“So we’re stuck here?”
“Until the all-clear is given, yes. Trust me, there are worse places to be stuck.”
Zed seemed reassured by her sangfroid. “If we’re not going anywhere, got any more of those drinks tokens?”
“We don’t have time for that,” she said, jumping to her feet. “We need to find out what’s going on. There’s a phone over here.”
Chapter Twenty-five
“There’s no answer,” said Gill, as she dialled the next number on the phone list attached to the wall. “Where is everyone?”
“Try Major Donnelly’s office. The colonel said he would be there.”
She hung up and dialled a different extension number. Someone answered on the first ring.
“Hello? Yes, it’s Gill Forrester.” She paused, listening to the request for identification. “Of course, it’s Delta-Sierra-Zulu seven-three-one. I was looking for Major Donnelly or Colonel Abrahams. Well, if you can let them know that I’m here in the staff bar with Zed Samuels. Yes, of course, let me just do a head count. There are seventeen of us here. Can you tell me what’s going on?”
She listened for a few seconds, nodding and exchanging concerned looks with Zed.
“Okay. Perhaps you can let us know as soon as they know more. We’re on extension 4378.” She replaced the receiver. “He said they’ve had sensor alarms sounding in multiple sectors.”
“What does that mean?”
“That there’s been some sort of breach event. Look up there,” she said, pointing to a grey electrical box near the door. “There are sensors in every underground section that go off if they detect any kind of airborne toxin. It’s only happened once before in all the time I’ve been here.”
“False alarm?”
“It’s possible. The laboratories are two floors below us. As soon as they detect a leak, all sections automatically seal to limit the spread of whatever set off the alarm. It didn’t sound like they knew where it originated from.”
“So it could be serious?”
“I doubt it. It’s unlikely to be coming from one of the P4 containment laboratories. Those are the ones that handle dangerous pathogens.”
