Terminal

by Roderick Gordon

  ‘Ah, that’s so good!’ he exclaimed, his eyes rolling in ecstasy before he promptly downed the rest of the bottle. ‘Lemonade!’ He immediately grabbed another two bottles and popped off the lids. ‘Elliott’s not going to believe this,’ he said, rushing back towards the door with his bounty.

  As he exited onto the pavement, he stopped dead on the spot.

  There was a small figure standing there in some kind of protective suit, a gun in its hands. The barrel was shaking, but the weapon was pointing in Will’s direction.

  Blast it! My Sten! Will thought to himself, kicking himself for leaving it on the counter. But it wouldn’t have done him much good right now. He slowly raised his hands with the bottles still in them, the chocolate bars he’d been holding under his arm falling all around his feet.

  The suit was an opaque white and appeared to be made from some type of plastic. The figure’s head was totally enclosed in a cylindrical helmet with a flat top, and there was a filter at the neck from which Will could hear a low hissing noise. The helmet was clearly being fed with a constant supply of oxygen or air from the cylinder slung over the figure’s back.

  ‘Who are you?’ Will asked, as his mind raced, wondering how anyone could have been left alive in the metropolis. He squinted at the rectangular area of clear plastic in the helmet, making out the frightened young eyes peering back at him. It was a young boy – probably no more than ten years old.

  At least it wasn’t a Styx, Will consoled himself. ‘You’re … you’re just a kid, aren’t you? What on earth are you doing here?’ he asked.

  The child made no response, but kept the gun pointing at Will.

  ‘Can you understand me? Just keep calm,’ Will said, trying his hardest to keep calm himself in the circumstances. ‘I’m not armed,’ he added. He suddenly realised that this was a ludicrous statement to make, with his bottles of fizzy lemonade still held high in both hands.

  The boy’s arms were shaking as he held the gun.

  ‘Look, can’t you understand me? We’re not going to hurt you,’ Will said again in exasperation.

  The boy began to gesticulate wildly with his handgun. It was an odd-looking weapon, a Broomhandle Mauser, similar to the German side arm from the First World War. And it was unwieldy for a child, which was probably why the boy needed both hands to keep it levelled at Will.

  The boy stepped nearer to Will, jabbing the Mauser at him until the muzzle was less than a foot away from his face. There was sheer panic in the boy’s young eyes, and it was difficult for Will not to notice how tightly his finger was gripping the trigger. That wasn’t good.

  There was the slightest sound, like a gust of wind. Then the click as a safety catch came off.

  Elliott was there on the pavement beside the boy. Her rifle was to her shoulder, aimed directly at his temple.

  ‘I want you to lower your weapon,’ she ordered him. ‘Nice and easy.’

  The boy jerked as if he’d been stung, but he kept his head resolutely towards Will.

  ‘I said lower your weapon,’ Elliott tried again.

  The boy still showed no sign of complying, although his eyes were flicking back and forth between Will and Elliott.

  ‘Come on, kid, put it down,’ Will pleaded with him, then spoke to Elliott. ‘It’s useless. He doesn’t seem to understand anything.’

  ‘No, he doesn’t,’ Elliott agreed. ‘And if he doesn’t lower that weapon soon, I’m going to put a round into his wrist.’

  The boy clearly didn’t like it that Will and Elliott were talking. He began to jab the handgun in Will’s direction and shake his head, while his helmet steamed up a little on the inside.

  There was another click.

  ‘Ah, but we both understand you very well,’ a man’s voice said. ‘And you’re not going to shoot anyone, Fräulein.’ He was armed with another of the odd-looking pistols, and the end of the barrel was pressed against the back of Elliott’s head. She rolled her eyes upwards, furious that she’d allowed someone to sneak up on her.

  The man was also wearing a protective suit. ‘Might I suggest that you lower your weapon,’ he said in very formal English.

  ‘Not a chance,’ Elliott replied coolly. ‘If I do that, we lose our leverage. Right now, if you open fire I may die, but my finger will contract. At this range, the kid is certain to catch a bullet. He’ll go down, no question. Do you want to take that risk?’

  There was a pause as the man thought this over. ‘And before he dies, the boy may also get a shot off at your friend too.’

  ‘Maybe, maybe not,’ Elliott said.

  Will took a breath. ‘If it’s okay with all of you, I’d really rather not find out.’ The heat on the pavement was oppressive, and the sweat was trickling down his back as his arms began to tire from holding the lemonade bottles above his head. ‘Tell you what,’ he said, forcing a smile, ‘how about if I go first and put these bottles down?’

  No one replied or seemed about to follow his suggestion, all gripping their weapons firmly. Without moving his head, Will slid his eyes over to try to see the man more clearly. ‘You’re wearing that suit because of the virus, aren’t you? But you don’t look like a soldier.’

  ‘No, I’m not a soldier,’ the man answered.

  Will frowned. ‘It’s a no-brainer that you’re New Germanian, but how did you survive the virus? And what are you doing here?’

  ‘I might ask you the same question,’ the man countered.

  ‘We came here from the surface to stop the Styx … to stop them breeding. It all went wrong and a deadly pathogen was released. It was an accident,’ Will said, realising how bad that sounded. ‘So who are you exactly?’ he asked again quickly.

  ‘I was a science officer at the Institut für Antiquitäten,’ the man said. ‘You would call it the … er … Institute of Antiquities.’

  Will’s ears perked up at this. ‘Antiquities? So you know all about the pyramids and the ruins in the jungle?’ he ventured.

  ‘As much as we were allowed to, with the military breathing down our necks,’ the man replied.

  Elliott cleared her throat. ‘Can we please stick to the point? We’re in a situation here!’ she said through clenched teeth.

  Will ignored her comment, feeling a little light-headed from the heat of the sun. ‘My dad and I were studying the pyramids too,’ he said. ‘In fact, we ended up inside one of them, when we were running from the Styx. The bloody bushmen let us in, but then gave us up. My dad was killed as a result.’

  ‘So that was you,’ the man whispered. For a second he didn’t speak, clearly considering what he’d heard. ‘Then you can tell me something,’ he finally said. ‘What was the name of the army officer who took you by helicopter so th—’

  ‘Bismarck,’ Elliott jumped in before the man had a chance to finish. ‘The Colonel helped us to escape in his helicopter so we could take the route back to the outer world. That’s where we met up with him again – on the surface. He was our friend.’

  The man appeared perturbed by this. ‘Was your friend?’

  Will nodded sadly. ‘He was killed by the Styx when they ambushed us. Just before the void was plugged by the explosion, and the virus released.’

  ‘I knew Bismarck too. He might have been in the military, but he was a good man,’ the New Germanian said. He took a step back from Elliott, but kept his pistol on her. ‘So you know about how the plague started. And both of you are exposed to the air, but neither of you are showing any symptoms.’

  ‘We were given shots against it,’ Will answered, scrunching up an eye as sweat trickled into it.

  Will’s answer seemed to have impressed the man, who was silent for a second. ‘So … so we’d have immunity against it too, if you allowed us to take blood from you,’ he finally said.

  ‘If it means it’s not going to be splattered all over the pavement,’ Will replied, now focusing on the end of the barrel of the boy’s handgun, ‘be my guest.’

  ‘Okay,’ the man said, and without fur
ther ado both he and the boy holstered their weapons. He went straight to the boy, and spoke to him in hushed tones while inspecting a gauge on the cylinder on his back.

  With a sigh of relief Will put the lemonade bottles by his feet. He was stretching his arms and rubbing his cramped muscles as he met Elliott’s gaze. ‘What?’ he asked. She hadn’t yet lowered her guard, her rifle in a semi-ready position at her waist. Then she gave a small shrug and slung the weapon over her shoulder with the others she was carrying.

  The man came over to Will, proffering a gloved hand. ‘I’m Jürgen, and this is Karl, my son.’ It felt a little strange to be spoken to by the cylindrical helmet, with only the man’s eyes visible through a window of clear plastic.

  Will introduced himself and Elliott. ‘We didn’t think anyone else was alive,’ he said, the surprise that anyone had survived in the city only now sinking in.

  ‘I think we’re the only ones,’ Jürgen said. He chuckled as he glanced at the doorway behind Will. ‘And not even a plague can keep Karl away from a Süßwarengeschäft … a sweet shop.’ His voice turned serious. ‘But now I need you to come with me,’ he added, also addressing Elliott.

  She was immediately suspicious. ‘Where?’ she demanded. ‘And tell me something first – how is it that your English is so good? The Colonel mentioned that all New Germanians learnt it at school, but you have even less of an accent than he did.’

  ‘The scientific fraternity here in the city employed it as the main language in their everyday work and for record keeping,’ Jürgen replied without missing a beat. ‘It started out that way because most of the scientific journals in the archives that were flown into this world back in the 1940s were in English. And many of the scientists at the time were reacting against the Third Reich and only too happy not to use their native language.’

  ‘Okay,’ Elliott said, still not wholly convinced that the man was to be trusted. ‘And where do you want us to go?’

  ‘To the hospital. Karl and I have to return there before our air runs out, and that’s where my brother Werner will be able to use the antigens in your blood to immunise us. You see, he was a doctor in the infectious diseases unit of the hospital,’ Jürgen explained. ‘When the first reports of the outbreak began to come in, he rushed my son and me into the quarantine ward just in time. That’s why we’re still alive.’ Jürgen paused. ‘So you’ll come with us now?’

  ‘Sure, let’s go,’ Will said.

  They moved off, a watchful Elliott following a few paces behind Will who was walking with Jürgen and Karl. As they passed them, Jürgen indicated the buildings on the other side of the avenue, which Will had taken for museums. ‘When the plague swept through the city, the concentration of people was high in this area. We think they were rounded up and brought here for the breeding programme.’

  ‘I suppose for Vane,’ Will guessed. ‘She was the Styx woman.’

  ‘I don’t know anything about that,’ Jürgen replied, ‘but it’s clear that the principal site for the breeding was in there.’ He swung round to look at the large glasshouse, giving his son a passing glance as he turned back to Will again. ‘I haven’t let Karl go in there because the human remains left inside are indescribable. And we haven’t begun to clear it out yet, but you can see that we’ve made a start in the streets … by burning the corpses on pyres.’

  ‘That explains all the ash,’ Will said.

  ‘Yes, we’re doing all we can to eradicate any pockets of virus.’ There was despondency in Jürgen’s voice as he continued. ‘It may be too late for the city, but we’re hoping that our people in the remote outposts are still safe from the disease. With time, the high levels of ultraviolet light from the sun should destroy any free-living virus, although Werner is worried that the avian species might have become the vector – the birds might be carrying it to the far reaches of this world. So we might be hoping in vain.’

  Will raised his head to the bright sky, watching a lone vulture flapping languidly across it. ‘Yes, because the birds have been eating the flesh,’ he said, then frowned. ‘I just hope they don’t spread it to the surface.’

  ‘The odds of a bird making it through are pretty slim,’ Jürgen answered, then pointed down a side road as they came level with it. ‘The hospital is this way,’ he said.

  Several streets on, Will saw two large barrows in the middle of the way. One was stacked high with jerrycans containing petrol or something similar – the smell was strong in the air as they passed them. On the second barrow were several layers of bodies – skeletons still wearing their stained, tattered clothes – all heaped untidily on top of each other.

  But Will didn’t dwell on this because, at the major crossroads thirty feet away, he spotted what appeared to be a small hillock rising from the surface of the road. As they came closer, he could see it consisted entirely of bones. The mound was as black as charcoal, and rose to almost the height of the first storeys of the surrounding buildings. And dotted all over it were glowing red pits where fire still burnt, wisps of grey smoke snaking from them until they became lost in the haze of the sun.

  Will heard Jürgen speak as he led them towards the mound. ‘That this is how it should end,’ he said. And nobody else had anything to add as they walked in a solemn procession around its circumference. The smell of the burnt bodies was so pungent that Will cupped his hand over his nose and mouth, trying not to gag at the smell, while Jürgen and his son in their airtight suits were completely insulated from it.

  Will spotted a shoe lying on its side in the road which had managed to evade the fire. He couldn’t take his eyes off it. It was a woman’s shoe, of highly polished dark blue leather with a shiny chrome buckle. The shoe looked brand new, as if it had been bought from a shop that day and hardly worn.

  They continued on and, after a few minutes more, they’d reached the hospital, a gleaming white building that was very out of place against the drab stone facades that bordered it. As they entered through the main doors and went into the unlit interior, it seemed so dark inside now they were out of the blazing sun. Their footfalls on the lino floor were the only sound in the entrance hall where there were several waiting areas, with ranks of empty benches facing unmanned reception desks.

  Jürgen had been silent since they had seen the pyre outside, but now he spoke again. ‘When we emerged from the quarantine area after a couple of days, we found that people had come here in their droves, desperate for help from the doctors,’ he told Will and Elliott, a hoarseness to his voice. ‘How do you say it – they were packed in like sardines. And that’s how they died – many still standing up. So many that we had a struggle to get the doors open into this area.’

  Will could see that around the walls there were several more barrows of the same type as the one by the pyre, and knew that these must have been used to remove the bodies, although they were now stacked with boxes of supplies.

  Jürgen beckoned them over to a doorway leading from the main area. As he took out a torch and turned it on, they followed him down several flights of stairs until they passed through a pair of swing doors and into a large room. The walls were hung with polythene sheeting, and lengths of yellow cable ran between the temporary lighting that had been rigged up.

  Jürgen lifted aside some of the sheeting to reveal a solid-looking door, then pressed a button on an intercom. Will heard the distant sound of a bell ringing. ‘Just letting my brother know we’re back,’ Jürgen explained. Seconds later a voice came on the intercom. ‘Werner,’ Jürgen began, then the lights flicked on in the room and he proceeded to have a rapid exchange with his brother in German.

  Elliott came alongside Will. ‘We don’t know what we’re walking into here,’ she whispered. ‘This could be a trap.’

  Will was dismissive of the suggestion. ‘But they need us more than we need them, don’t they?’ he replied.

  ‘Werner says we have to bring you inside to take your blood under sterile conditions,’ Jürgen said, breaking into their conversation.
‘That means you have to be decontaminated, and this is how we’re going to do it. Karl and I will go through first, then it’s your turn. On the other side of these doors you’ll find the primary sterilisation chamber, where we wash down our suits and go under the banks of UV light before we remove them. In the next room is the secondary chamber where we shower again and dress before we can enter the quarantine ward.’

  ‘But are we really able to go in there too? We can wash, but what about any virus in us? Will asked.

  ‘My brother’s an expert in these procedures, and he thinks we can minimise the risk,’ Jürgen said. ‘Just remember that you have to leave all your clothes and equipment in the sealed boxes in the primary chamber before you go through the rest of the procedure I’ve described to you. Once you’re finished, you should don the gowns I’ll put out for you. And you should wear face masks to ensure that you don’t exhale any virus into the ward.’

  ‘Got it. Okay,’ Will replied, pretending to be comfortable about the process.

  ‘We’ll let you know over the intercom when you can enter,’ Jürgen said, hesitating before swivelling his cylindrical helmet in Will and Elliott’s direction. They could see his eyes as he added, ‘And thank you for helping us. I can’t tell you what this means to us … to me … it means Karl has a chance.’ Then he put his hand on his son’s shoulder, guiding him away. There was a hiss of air and the polythene sheeting around the room stirred as he pulled on the heavy door, and they both went in.

  Twenty minutes later Jürgen’s voice came over the intercom, telling them it was their turn. As Will came to the door, there was a clunking sound as solenoids drew back the bolts in the heavy steel door and he was able to open it. There was another rush of air – a higher air pressure was clearly being maintained in the quarantine ward to stop any air from leaking in.

  Although everything was made of stainless steel, the interior of the first decontamination area had the feel of a changing room, with lockers and showers down either side of it. Will squashed his Bergen into one of the lockers, followed by his Sten. He began to unbutton his shirt, but then twisted around to Elliott, who was standing quite still in front of another locker. She’d been about to deposit her weapon inside a locker beside the other two Limiter rifles she’d been carrying.