Z-Minus (Book 6)

by Perrin Briar

  “You’ve got more in you than I thought,” Daniel said.

  “Thanks,” Hamish said.

  It was a backhanded compliment, but he supposed Daniel was entitled to it. He had just been on a date with his sort-of girlfriend, after all.

  They walked down the corridor toward the infirmary, where everyone else was gathered.

  “How’s he looking?” Hamish said.

  “Not good,” Kate said.

  Jeff wore a doctor’s coat, Lindsey a nurse’s uniform. Ian lay in bed, struggling, his arms flailing and striking the walls, the table, even Jeff. Ian’s exposed skin was blue, dead, rising up from under his heavy black boots, stretching up under his pants leg. His fingers were twisted and shriveled from the extreme cold. He was going to lose his hands and feet for sure, maybe even his arms and legs up to the knees and elbows. But the worst thing was his eyes.

  They were cloudy white, blinded by the snow. His mouth mawed open in a terrible death mask.

  Jeff glanced up and saw the others watching. He nodded at Lindsey. Without a word, she went over and shut the door.

  Perhaps leaving him out in the cold would have been a greater kindness.

  Z-MINUS: 4 hours 12 minutes

  Patrick paced up and down the common room, running his hands through his hair in a state of agitation. He kept shaking his head. The others were staring into space, the excitement of having found Ian now only a distant memory.

  The storm had only grown in strength, roaring like a terrible beast. There was no way a helicopter would come pick Ian up.

  A door down the corridor opened. It could only have been the infirmary. Everyone jumped to their feet and met Jeff and Lindsey.

  “How is he?” Patrick said. “Is he going to be all right?”

  Jeff and Lindsey dabbed at their brows with handkerchiefs. Evidently it had been quite an ordeal.

  “He has some kind of virus,” Jeff said.

  “A virus?” Daniel said. “What kind of virus?”

  “If I knew that, I’d know what was wrong with him, and how to treat him,” Jeff said.

  He handed a vial of blood to Hamish.

  “Hamish,” he said. “I took some of his blood. Run some tests. It might be useful to know what he has. All I can do until then is keep him comfortable. Has anyone else here been sick recently? Noticed any vomiting or nausea? Weakness or pain in the joints?”

  Everyone shook their heads.

  “If you do, come to the infirmary immediately,” Jeff said. “The last thing we need is for more of us to get infected.”

  “What’s going to happen to Ian?” Patrick said. “Is he going to get through this?”

  Jeff’s eyes were bloodshot and pained.

  “Only time will tell,” he said.

  Z-MINUS: 3 hours 56 minutes

  Hamish placed the slide under the microscope and peered through it at Ian’s blood. He turned the little focuser dial on the side. The image was fuzzy at first, and then clear, like taking an eye exam.

  The image reverted into a lake of red. Hamish could see the individual platelets doing the backstroke. They were not what he was expecting. Usually, the blood of a living person was jittering and constantly moving, a hive of activity. But Ian’s blood was sluggish and slow, like it was thickening. Such things only happened within clogged-up arteries, or the blood of a recent corpse. The cells were also turning black, wiped out and murdered by this virus.

  Then something even stranger happened.

  The cells were dead, but then they started moving again, jittering in place like belly dancers. Hamish dismissed what he was seeing. He clenched his eyes. He must have been tired. He was seeing things. He added a blob more of Ian’s blood to another slide and peered at it. He saw the same thing.

  That can’t be right…

  Hamish looked closer at the cells that were touched by the virus. They too stopped moving. Life was taken away, and then they too began to move again.

  Hamish gasped and pulled away from the microscope.

  “What?” Kate said. “What is it?”

  Hamish considered what he was seeing, running it through all the textbooks and lectures he’d experienced in the past. It was like everything he’d ever read and learned had suddenly been disproved, that two plus two didn’t equal four, that the Sun was not at the center of our solar system. And dead things didn’t always stay dead.

  “Take a look,” Hamish said, stepping aside.

  Kate gasped the same way Hamish had.

  “What?” Daniel said. “What is it?”

  “Take a look,” Kate said.

  “Just tell me,” Daniel said.

  “It’s Ian’s cells,” Kate said.

  “I figured that much out myself, thanks,” Daniel said. “What about them?”

  Kate’s eyes scrubbed left to right, thinking it through, putting into words what she’d just seen.

  “They die and come back to life,” she said.

  “They die and come back to life?” Daniel said. “So?”

  “So, things don’t work like that,” Kate said. “When something dies, it’s the end. It’s dead.”

  “I see,” Daniel said with a frown. He still didn’t get it.

  “The real question is, how did he contract the virus?” Hamish said.

  “Isn’t it more likely he brought something with him?” Kate said. “After all, he’s the only one infected.”

  “So far,” Hamish said. “We need to be sure how he contracted it. I’ve never seen a virus like this before. Reanimating dead cells? It’s unheard of.”

  “How will we find out how he got infected?” Daniel said.

  “It’s most likely Ian would have caught the virus here, from somewhere only he went,” Hamish said.

  “That follows,” Kate said. “Where would you suggest?”

  “His room,” Hamish said. “It’s the place he would have spent most time alone.”

  “I’ll go,” Kate said.

  “No,” Hamish said. “I’ll go. There’s no reason for both of us to risk getting infected. Besides, I’ve worked with the police before and picked up a few tricks.”

  Kate’s eyebrows drew down.

  “When did you work with the police?” she said.

  “To help analyze evidence,” Hamish said.

  “Maybe it’s best if we don’t go inside,” Kate said. “If there’s a virus in there, the last thing we need is to bring it out here for all of us to catch.”

  “So long as everyone stays in the communal area, it’ll be fine,” Hamish said.

  “Are you sure about this?” Kate said.

  “I’ll just have a quick look round,” Hamish said. “Won’t take long.”

  “All right,” Kate said. “But you’ll have to wear a quarantine suit. Just in case.”

  Kate led him to the main changing chamber. She opened a box underneath the rack.

  Great, Hamish thought. More thick clothes.

  Kate helped him on with the suit. The familiar stink of sweat.

  “Doesn’t anyone wash anything around here?” Hamish said.

  Kate was a bit rough with the gloves and pulling the straps tight.

  “Will you take it easy?” Hamish said.

  “Why did you lie?” Kate said.

  “What are you talking about?” Hamish said.

  “What use would the police have for a biologist?” Kate said.

  “You’d be surprised,” Hamish said.

  “Too right I would!” Kate said, pulling the second glove on tight. “I don’t need you to protect me.”

  “I wasn’t protecting you,” Hamish said. “I’m the most qualified person here to do the job, so it should be me who does it.”

  Kate pressed her lips together, not happy with Hamish’s logical argument.

  “I’m just going to be having a poke around anyway,” Hamish said. “It’s not like I’m doing anything dangerous.”

  “Like running out into a storm,” Kate said.

  “Thank
s for worrying about me,” Hamish said.

  “You don’t have to do this,” Kate said.

  “Someone has to,” Hamish said.

  Kate didn’t say anything and only pressed her lips together firmer. Her eyes looked sunken and gaunt. Kate put the mask on over Hamish’s face.

  “I’ve got one problem,” Hamish said.

  “You’ve got more than that wrong with you,” Kate said.

  “I don’t know which room is Ian’s,” Hamish said.

  Z-MINUS: 3 hours 47 minutes

  The door creaked like the hinges had never seen an oilcan. The room was of the standard size, kitted out the same as the others – simple, clean, efficient. The bed was recently made and crisp with OCD. The room was sparse, with little in the way of personal effects.

  Hamish opened the cabinet drawers and found them empty. Next, he opened the wardrobe doors. The hangers rattled lightly from their hanging positions. No clothes or personal items?

  Hamish got to his knees and peered under the bed. He pulled out a single hard shell suitcase. He opened it, fumbling with his gloved hands on the zipper. The suitcase was full of clothes, perfectly folded. Various electronic devices stored carefully to one side. Clearly, Patrick couldn’t wait to get back home.

  There were pictures on the walls of desolate landscapes and forbidding places. The place hardly needed it. Just look out the window.

  The walls creaked and groaned under the overbearing wind. The structure of the building felt very weak. The wind would yank the roof off any second like a tin can’s lid.

  There was nothing to suggest the origins of a dangerous virus. It was an average room full of average things. Nothing obvious to suggest how the virus might have spread. Ian must have caught the virus elsewhere, from some other method.

  Hamish turned on his heel. Thunk! His foot met something. The bin. He turned away. Then something caught his eye. He peered inside the little bucket.

  A little figurine man stared up at him. It was made of plastic, with an oversized head. It was one of Dr. Scott’s bubbleheads. Clearly Ian hadn’t thought much of Dr. Scott’s parting gift. The bubblehead had a crack across the forehead and lay in a puddle of water.

  Hamish moved to the door.

  “Go into the next room,” Kate said from the end of the corridor. “There’s no one in there and you can make sure you don’t infect anyone in case something’s on you. Leave everything in there.”

  Hamish did as she said. He rejoined the others in the communal room.

  “Well?” Kate said.

  “Nothing,” Hamish said. “I didn’t find anything suspicious.”

  “Everywhere Ian went, Patrick went,” Kate said. “And he isn’t infected.”

  “Then where did he catch the virus?” Lindsey said.

  “I don’t know,” Hamish said. “Your guess is as good as mine. But you can begin by telling me everything you know about Dr. Scott’s disappearance. Somehow these two things are related. If we can figure out the linking factor we can figure out how the virus got started.”

  Z-MINUS: 3 hours 37 minutes

  “We only realized Dr. Scott was missing about two days after he disappeared,” Kate said.

  “How do you know it was two days?” Hamish said.

  “That was the last time anyone saw him with their own eyes,” Kate said.

  “Why didn’t someone notice he was gone sooner?” Hamish said.

  “Because he often locked himself in his room,” Kate said. “He’d often lock his door when he didn’t want to be disturbed, only coming out to eat and relieve himself, often during the wee hours. It was only a couple of days later, after he hadn’t eaten for nearly thirty-six hours or so that we started to get worried.

  “We knocked on his door and he didn’t answer. This wasn’t unusual, as he was often deep in the middle of whatever he was working on. He wouldn’t have noticed if the station was burning down around him. So we kept knocking. He still didn’t answer. We broke down the door, expecting him to be unconscious or dead on the floor. Instead, we found his room empty. We searched the station, each of the buildings, but found little sign of him.”

  “Except his Carhartts coveralls in the immersion shed?” Hamish said, thinking back to the evidence suggesting Dr. Scott had drowned himself.

  “Right,” Kate said.

  “Was he sick?” Hamish said.

  “Sick?” Kate said. “No. I don’t think so. Was he?”

  “No,” Patrick said. “That doesn’t mean he wasn’t, though. We didn’t notice anything suspicious. We’re all kind of absorbed with our own work.”

  Absorbed was the right word. Hamish had seen the near-obsessive behavior that consumed many scientists deep in research. They were single-minded, unable to think or enjoy anything else while they were doing it. It was like meditation, in a way. Or a spell. They were completely and totally absorbed by it, in their own little worlds. But he supposed that was what made this such a good place to work: it removed all distraction, made them focus entirely on what they were doing. Hamish was surprised any of them noticed anything at all.

  “But then Carl noticed Dr. Scott’s coveralls in the immersion shed,” Kate said. “It couldn’t have possibly been in there unless it was the last place he’d gone.”

  So, Dr. Scott had drowned himself. But why? And how did that have anything to do with Ian’s virus? None, that Hamish could see.

  Jeff came into the communal room.

  “How’s Ian?” Kate said, getting to her feet.

  “He’s all right,” Jeff said. “Stable, at least.”

  “Do you have any idea what’s wrong with him?” Hamish said.

  “No,” Jeff said. “It’s hard to pin down exactly what it is he has. One minute he has a high fever. The next, it’s so low I thought I’d left a window open. He sweats, he throws up, and then his muscles fidget and jerk uncontrollably. His eyes flicker behind his eyelids like he’s in the midst of REM sleep. He could have malaria, or something like it.”

  “Malaria?” Kate said. “Out here?”

  “I know how it sounds,” Jeff said. “But that’s what I’m seeing. It’s the last disease I’ve seen with these symptoms.”

  “My God,” Daniel said. “Is it infectious?”

  “Trust you to think of yourself first,” Carl said.

  “Jeff just said Ian is stable,” Daniel said. “The next thing to worry about is us catching it, and trying to reduce the chances of that happening as much as possible.”

  “He’s right,” Kate said. “Hamish went into Ian’s room earlier. But he didn’t find anything suspicious.”

  “How long can a virus survive outside the body?” Carl said.

  “Viruses on hard surfaces can survive for up to twenty-four hours, on tissues for fifteen minutes,” Hamish said.

  “We’ll just have to quarantine ourselves for a day,” Daniel said.

  “That sounds fun,” Carl said.

  “We should send a message out as soon as we can,” Hamish said. “For someone to come pick us up.”

  “The storm interferes with our signal,” Patrick said. “I’ve been trying to get through to them since the storm began. But even if we could send a message they wouldn’t be able to get to us. Not with the storm as strong as it is.”

  “But they could arrive soon after the storm passes,” Lindsey said.

  “That’s not a bad idea,” Carl said.

  “Someone needs to be here to send a message,” Daniel said. “That way, if the storm dies down even for a few seconds there might be enough time for the rescue services to know we need help. They’d be on their way here even as the storm is blowing itself out. There would be no wasted time.”

  “That’s a great idea,” Kate said. She turned to Patrick. “Can you set it up?”

  “I can,” Patrick said.

  He turned to face the computer monitor and began tapping at the keys.

  “When is the Laurence M. Gould coming back to pick us up?” Hamish said.
>
  “In about two months,” Daniel said.

  “How long exactly?” Hamish said.

  Daniel closed his eyes and counted the days.

  “Fifty-nine days,” he said.

  “We’ve got plenty of food,” Hamish said.

  “Yes,” Daniel said. “But the truth is, the storm is unlikely to last that long. They generally blow themselves out within a couple of days.”

  “Then we just have to hope Ian’s condition doesn’t worsen in that time,” Hamish said.

  “What if it does?” Daniel said.

  “There’s nothing we can do anyway,” Hamish said. “We’ll just have to keep him comfortable as best we can. We’re scientists. I’m sure we can keep him comfortable for a day between us. We’ll keep watch on him, just in case he needs something.”

  “Yes,” Daniel said. “We should arrange a schedule, an hour each, and keep changing over so everyone gets a go and everyone can do their part. In the meantime, the rest of us just hang out, watch TV, do some work, if we can.”

  “I can’t believe this is happening,” Kate said. “One minute we’re fine, and then the next…”

  “You can’t plan for these kinds of things,” Jeff said. “All we can do is try and cope with them the best we can. We don’t want this virus spreading through the rest of us. We just have to be careful, and we’ll be fine.”

  Beep beep! Beep beep!

  Jeff glanced at his beeper.

  “What is it, Doc?” Kate said.

  Jeff said nothing, and rushed away, back to the infirmary.

  Outside, the wind howled. Something rapped against the window, but was gone a moment later. The storm was just beginning to kick up into high gear.

  Hamish had never felt so vulnerable his whole life.

  Z-MINUS: 3 hours 20 minutes

  “Restrain him!” Jeff shouted. “Now!”

  “I can’t!” Lindsey shouted. “He’s too strong!”

  “Use the tranqulizer!” Jeff said.