‘Probably the same pocket knife he had used to trim his toe nails, peel an apple and remove a thorn from his dogs’ paw earlier in the day. No Dettol in them days mind…’ I chimed in. She was giving me a ‘Shut up while I’m teaching you something’ look. So I shut up.
Sue continued. ‘It resulted in a little blister on his hand after a day or so and that was that. A few days later he invited the boy back and scraped the skin on the boys’ hand again with his little pocket knife, but this time the blade had a little bit of small pox matter on it. The boy was kept under close observation but never developed small pox. The world’s first inoculation was born simply and effectively and the lives of countless millions were saved around the globe.’
‘And you think this might be Jenner like in its simplicity?’
‘Maybe not in its simplicity, though we will try it as simply as just giving them some blood and see where that goes at least.’
‘We just suck it and see then?’ I said almost absent minded, forgetting the dirty mind that Sue seems to have developed.
‘Ooh, offering?’ She said with a cheeky smile.
Before I could answer, Kev came back with a huge grin and gave us a thumbs up before disappearing to no doubt find a phone and memory card. Looked like we were on. Sue headed off to her car to get her medical kit.
Once we were all reassembled, Kev with Phone and memory card, Sue with her vial of blood, needles, medical kit, notepad and me as a fifth wheel, we made our way down to the tennis courts. Kev had cleared it with the guy guarding that we could just come and go as we needed and to keep it to himself for a bottle of his favourite drink. The two people Kev had spoken to were housed in a tent locked in one of the tennis courts as quarantine area. Cynthia and her grandson Dale had been two of three surviving bite victims last night. The other guy Daniel had also been bitten at the same time but was in the next court and was to be the control as it were in this experiment. They had all been bitten at the same time, but he would receive nothing but company and constant care through to his death, Cynthia and Dale would receive a dose of blood each but differing amounts to see if that made a difference.
Both Cynthia and Dale had been bitten thirteen hours ago and were sweating like race horses on their way to the glue factory. Kev introduced us all whilst filming and Sue explained to them what she was about to do. She said that at this stage it was unlikely to cure them, but who knew? Mostly what she was looking for was if it made any change to them in their last few hours which we tried to make more comfortable, same with Daniel, with blankets, food, water, books, someone to be with them for comfort. No-one wants to die alone, and no one should if we could help it. Daniel was unaware that the other two were guinea pigs though, that was the only difference between them all.
Sue had a note book that she had found in the back of the 90 and had been writing furiously in it since she found it. She laid out two syringes and alcohol wipes. I know it was all in aid to help these people, but it reminded me of what I had seen of death row. I never understood why on death row they bothered with cleaning the area and using sterilised needles, the whole idea was to kill them so what did it matter? They were going to be dead in a few minutes so what did the tiny chance of tetanus, HIV, Hepatitis or some other infection matter? Kind of the same thing here, we were pretty sure they wouldn’t be cured, certainly not with the first thing we tried so why was the sterilization important? You could argue, it was taking another variable out of the equation I suppose, I had no medical knowledge, so I kept my thoughts to myself.
Sue took a bottle of her blood out and shook it vigorously, then taking the top off, she drew 5ml into a syringe then turned it up and squirted the air out. Sue carefully took Cynthia’s arm and wiped her forearm with the alcohol wipe, before finding a nice juicy vein, inserting the needle and slowly emptying its contents. With the needle out, Sue pressed a pad of cotton wool over the pin hole for a few seconds before placing some medical tape over it to hold it in place. She repeated the process with Dale with the only difference being he turned white as a sheet on seeing the needle and he was given 10ml of Sue’s blood.
I’m not sure where the volumes of blood to be injected came from but I’m sure Sue did; it was all going down in the book. She even wrote frantically without having to stick her tongue out as she concentrated. That’s a sure sign of someone with brains, not somebody just bumbling through life like me. I stole a look and she was umpteen pages through it already, it was full of her thoughts and observations so far, temperatures, heart rates, BP etc. Basically as much as she could record with the facilities that she had available.
Dale had been bitten on the lower left leg and Cynthia had been bitten trying to rescue Dale. We hadn’t promised them anything we couldn’t deliver, they understood that they were to be guinea pigs as such, but both showed good humour. Now the injections had been administered we just had to wait and see. We three took it in turns to visit all three bite victims and record anything we thought noteworthy whilst Sue kept up with the medical tests, videoing all the time.
In the early morning Sue turned up to the tennis courts looking like she hadn’t slept and moaning about how uncomfortable the back of the x5 was. She soon shut up about her stiff back and neck when she saw what we had been seeing and recording through the night. Cynthia and Dale had stopped sweating completely and were no longer complaining of splitting headaches. They also showed no more signs of the shakes, but their sallow complexion showed they were far from cured. Poor Daniel on the other hand was wet through with sweat no matter how cool the water was on the towels we were using to combat his temperature and try and give him some feeling of comfort. He was in and out of consciousness and away with the fairies when he was awake, so much so we couldn’t ask him how he was and what he felt was wrong. Poor bastard.
It had now been knocking on thirty odd hours since they had all been bitten, from the news and what I had heard and seen, most people die then turn from the bites in around two days so it wouldn’t be long before we reached the outcome. We kept up our visits and the outcome was that poor Daniel died bang on 48 hours, give or take twenty minutes, I wasn’t that worried about being so precise, but Sue obviously was, and turning just four minutes after his last laboured and incredibly painful human breath. He was tied down to the cot bed at this point due to the violent convulsions he was suffering prior to death so it was fairly easy to just slip a sharpened screw driver through his ear and quietly kill him. Cynthia and Dale fared a fair bit better, slipping peacefully into comas at the fifty-three-hour mark within minutes of each other and dying five hours later, again within minutes of each other but… they didn’t turn. They were strapped to their cots for security reasons when they went into coma in case they turned but even ten hours after they had died, they just didn’t turn which was a breakthrough on its own.
We were all made up! Plenty of questions that none of us could answer but surely, we had something of huge importance here. We had just enabled two people who were bitten and infected thirteen hours prior to injection and who were showing the first symptoms to live ten hours longer than expected without the sweats, headaches, delirium, convolutions and most importantly not turning into a zombie after death!
The outcome was the same in both victims even though there was a 5ml difference between them. If the dose had been different, if it had been administered earlier and if the antibodies could have been separated and given in a different dose would it have helped, were just a few of many questions floating around. Sue was still furiously writing in her note pad; she was a woman on a mission for sure and it was great to actually see someone thinking not just of the future like Christopher, which don’t get me wrong is great and many wouldn’t be here without him, but also of the entire world.
Whatever, this was a huge breakthrough, more than we had heard of so far. Actually it was the only breakthrough we had heard of. We had done what we could with what we had here. From here on we would need professional help, people that
knew how to create medicines, knew how to extract anti bodies, knew what the fuck they were actually doing with the kit to do it. Kev beat me to it. ‘We need to contact Bristol with this.’
I Agreed but was sceptical. ‘What do we say though Kev? It’s not like we can call them on the phone or via a secure radio. If this goes out over the airwaves, we may attract the wrong type of people who want this before the right people can help us out.’
Sue nodded. ‘I agree with Kev but also share your concerns. This is big, even if a I say so myself. It needs to be handled with as gently and as secretly as possible for everyone involved… like me and possibly the people of this camp.’
I had an idea. ‘I’ll have a word with Camouflage.’ They both looked at me blankly. Camouflage, or Marc his real name, certainly was a big marine. I had thought of him as no doubt he had to use open radios in times of being in the shit when serving. ‘Marc, I mean. He was a Royal Marine out in Afghanistan etc, I’m sure he has had to radio sensitive info over open channels when on operations out there. He might have a few ideas and pointers for us.’
Kev nodded. ‘Bloody good idea. I’ll get some peeps down here to shift Cynthia, Dale and Daniels bodies. The grave has been dug, makeshift head markers have been made and the others have already been covered, everyone agreed to wait until these guys passed before having the burial ceremony though.’
Shit I had forgotten about the ceremony for those we lost, I had been out of sorts and circulation the last two days. ‘When will it be Kev?’
‘Tomorrow, 11am mate. We are organising a load of wine and glasses, well, plastic beakers, so everyone can toast the dead after the ceremony, can I have Sarah to help pour and hand out?’ He asked.
‘Of course you can mate, as long as she is up for it and I’m sure she will be… she is bound to tax the odd glass for herself mind.’ We both laughed. ‘I’ll see her in a bit and ask her, it’ll be a yes unless you hear otherwise.’
Kev went off to arrange the body retrieval for our two guinea pigs and control bodies and I headed off to see Camouflage whilst Sue headed back to camp mumbling about cups of tea and her notes. I found Camouflage at the base of his tree house chopping up wood for his wood burner made from an old propane cylinder and exhaust pipe.
‘What can I do for you chap?’ he asked as he lined up for another huge, tree splitting swing of his axe.
‘I’ve got quite a delicate problem that I hope you can help or advise with if that’s okay?’
He did a theatrical look around to see that no one was looking. ‘Go on. Get it out and I’ll tell you if it’s the clap!’
I Laughed, not a normal laugh mind you, but a laugh with a snot bubble popping from my nose he had taken me so off-guard with the response. ‘As much as you may want to see my old chap mate it’s about something far more important.’ I lowered my voice a bit. ‘You might not believe me until you meet them, but we have someone in camp who might hold the cure, or at least a good portion of it. Only thing is, we have gone as far as we can with the facilities and knowledge that we have in house as it were and are now in the need of professional help before news of this gets out here in the camp. You know what it’s like, no matter how hard you try and keep a secret, the more people it involves, the more likely it is to get out.’
He whistled a low long whistle. ‘Shit mate, that’s some big-time news. Need to keep that on the low down for sure! Though I’m not sure where I can help mate, I can just diagnose sexual diseases what with being a sailor and all.’ He said mockingly.
I smiled and shook my head trying to stay serious despite his efforts to the contrary. ‘We need to get a message out to Bristol without blabbing it all over the airwaves for everyone else to hear.’ I paused. ‘I thought there may have been times when you’ve been on operations when you’ve had to send sensitive info over a non-encrypted line maybe?’ I Stopped there as I was aware I was sounding like a bloke with no clue, which I was.
He smiled, obviously aware that I knew sod all. ‘Good question. We only have unscrambled communications here so you will have to use veiled speech.’
I looked blankly at him and nodded. ‘And that is..?’
He let out a huge laugh this time. ‘Bloody civvies. Veiled speech is where you tell someone something in a way that doesn’t sound that way to someone else.’ I must have still looked blank, as that was the way I felt. ‘Bloody hell, and people think I’m thick!’ He thought for a moment and continued. ‘Ask to speak to a high up doctor, and when he or she answers or you get put through or whatever, say that “Dr Jenner may have a partial answer to the most asked question of the year.” Or something to that effect.’
I looked at him incredulously. ‘How in the bloody actual fuck do you know about this bloody Dr Jenner bloke? First thing I ever heard about him was first thing this morning for god’s sake!’ I exclaimed.
‘It’s local and worldwide history and I bet every doctor worth their salt have learnt or at least heard about him too!’
‘Okay, cheers.’ I turned to leave.
‘But…’ I stopped in my tracks and turned back towards him. ‘Don’t give these co-ordinates in any correspondence over the air. We don’t want the wrong type of person or agency getting hold of them and coming here paying us a visit.’ He did the inverted comas with his fingers as he said visit. ‘If they get what you are talking about.’
I looked around making sure no one was taking any interest in our conversation and walked back towards him. ‘What do you suggest?’
‘Well, without working out the particulars in detail, and only knowing what I know at this exact time, I would recommend Stinchcombe Hill Golf course. It’s located high above us at the top of the wood’s opposite the school, behind this housing estate. There are many escape routes by vehicle if the shit hits the fan too. You’ve got the far end of town, into town, Waterly Bottom, that lane opposite.’ He pointed to the dark wooded lane opposite by the bus stop. ‘We used to call it dog shit alley when we were here at school years ago and had to run up there for cross country, one up by the police station and others in the village of Stinchcombe. Then of course if the shit is very runny when it hits the fan then the options for escape back here are almost limitless on foot but a lot slower and massively more dangerous.’
‘Are you thinking of a helicopter meet?’ I asked.
‘Yep. Easy for them to get to, hides our real location, easy to ambush them if they double cross us, keeps it relatively secret from the rest of the camp, if shit does go down it will be away from the camp protecting them and I do like a day out in the woods.’ He smiled at me. ‘I do get bored here sometimes.’
I slapped him on his muscular shoulders. ‘I’ll have a word with Kev and get you in on it when we have to talk details yeah?’ He smiled and nodded his approval as he picked his axe up again and I left him to it.
Back at the camp Sue had yet another cup of tea on the go, at this rate my UHT milk pots were disappearing quicker than the amazon rain forests were a month ago. Hey, that’s a thought! One good side effect of all this zombie shit! The rain forests, the lungs of the planet, may get time to recover for whatever animal supersedes us if we do all finally get wiped off the face of the earth. Come to that, fish stocks and Whales should flourish without over fishing for a bit never mind no poaching of elephants and Rhinos. No more large scale C02 released into the skies from massive car factories, the list went on. This zombie thing could be mother nature’s way of healing herself! I’m sure that’s the way Greta Thunberg would probably see it. I also wondered if she had escaped the zombies where she was by jumping on a yacht and going with the wind or as far as a battery powered bicycle could get her? Sorry, that’s as cheery a thought as I could get on that subject.
‘Well? Got a way to contact Bristol?’ She asked, bringing me back to the real world and away from my green peace saving the planet thoughts.
‘Veiled speech is our best bet.’ I said. ‘May mean that not everyone will know what we are talking about but th
ere is a chance that some careful listener might.’
‘Do you envisage that to be a problem?’ Sue asked as she sipped on her steaming cup of tea and more milk.
‘Who’s to know? There must be other places like us all around the area but would any of them want to attack us for a possible cure when it is in everybody’s interest for it to get to Bristol to be mass produced?’
‘Okay, when do we contact them?’
‘I suggest we meet Kev and Camouflage in the morning and discuss the details, we’ve got to consider camp safety, our safety and keep it all to a need to know basis as much as possible.’
‘Okay.’ Said Sue. ‘Next question is… where can I sleep tonight as that car is getting too damn uncomfortable.’
I got up and went to the back of the 90, opened the door and started delving inside. ‘Depends what you want. Do you want a hammock or a one-person tent and sleeping mat?’
There was no thinking time, she just replied quickly. ‘I’ll go with the one-person tent please, can’t see me getting on with a hammock. Too much swinging around for my liking.’ I got it out along with a roll mat, blanket and sleeping bag and plonked it all by her chair. She looked up at me as I sat opposite her. ‘Where do you want to pitch it?’
I took a long swig of my drink and smiled. ‘Next to the hammock and still under the protection of the tarp should be pretty good… you can do it when you’ve finished drinking your tea though and I’ll watch as I finish mine in peace, no rush.’ I smirked and she stuck her tongue out at me in mock defiance.
The Reanimated Dead (Book 2): The Answer Page 2