I left the toolbox in a wooden shed not far from the entrance, a store for ‘dirty’ items that couldn’t be brought safely inside the base. The kitbag joined me in the first room of the HADU, a small shower with nozzles sticking out from the walls and ceiling. CCTV cameras monitored safety protocol at all times. A red LED winked and I wondered who was watching me.
Someone sure as hell is.
The doors slid shut with a pressurised hiss. I hit a button on the wall, dropping the bag and holding my arms up as jets of bleach assaulted me from all angles, pelting my mask like hail on a windscreen and finding all the tiny holes in the tape around my suit. A few seconds’ roaring deluge and the spray shut off automatically. I threw my mask on a bench and tore myself out of the protective suit, pushing it into a chute for incineration. After pulling out a sealed plastic sack, I stuffed the kitbag in too.
I poured the seawater out of the boots, dunked them in a tub of bleach, placed them upside down on a rack. Running a tap, I splashed clean water across my face to wash the stinking chlorine from my eyes. I blinked away tears to inspect a line of hooks running along the short wall, leaning closer to read the names scrawled on strips of tape above them.
Some had clothes hanging from them, most were empty. One stood out: A. Kyle.
My predecessor didn’t need his hook any more, so I dipped the gas mask in the bleach and hung it up.
The next room housed a couple of normal showers and toilet cubicles. I tore the plastic bag open, dumped out the contents, and pulled out a new rucksack, some clean clothes, dropping a pair of scuffed Adidas shelltops to the floor. The rest of the contents were stuffed into the rucksack. With another glance at the ever-present CCTV cameras, I lugged it into a cubicle, locked the door, sat down.
The bundle of clothes I’d just stuffed in the rucksack spilled out again as I rooted through, unrolling a sweater to reveal a brick-shaped parcel, tightly bound with bin bags and tape. Lifting the top off the cistern, I dropped it into the water then stuffed the clothes back in the bag, gave the toilet a flush, left the cubicle for the next shower.
I turned up the heat as high as I could take, practically scalding myself clean. As I scrubbed, my aching limbs stretched, pulling at old wounds that seemed to be causing me more aggro these days, rather than fading away. I was in decent shape for someone approaching forty but a far cry from the peak specimen I had been, deteriorating too quickly for my liking.
When I finally got out, the clock above the door said 8 a.m. I’d spent hours stewing in my own sweat and felt better for the shower: human again.
Almost, anyway. This was a last-minute rush job and I’d languished between assignments, allowing fitness levels to drop and my usual stubble to grow into a beard almost as wild as my hair. As I dressed, joints clicked, healed bones creaked, ligaments popped. Oil and dirt was ingrained in calloused hands, embedded in dents and scrapes, scars and burns glowing pale against suntan and tattoos. All reminders of similar jobs… of danger money. It’d felt like a good idea back in Yorkshire, and Christ knows I needed a decent payday, but here, on the island, I wondered what new scars would be added.
Pulling on my T-shirt, I stared at my reflection in the mirror, rubbing dull eyes. Deep furrows surrounded them, dark circles beneath. The jagged scar bisecting my right eyebrow itched like crazy.
Always does that at the start of a job.
I grabbed a hip flask from the rucksack, took a swig, washed down my concerns with visions of the cheque for all this overtime.
Time to see what lay on the other side of the door. Pocketing the flask, I breathed deeply, reaching for the entrance to the base. A skeletal figure pounced as soon as I pulled it open.
‘Tyler, you made it.’ Glancing at the small porthole in the door, I wondered how long I’d been under surveillance. He extended a hand. ‘Dr Donald Clay, project head.’
Right. The handshake was limp, the cheap, ill-fitting suit incorrectly buttoned – guys like Clay are never really in charge. I guessed he was about to hit retirement based on the wispy hair and sunken features, but he could have been decades younger, a dull life in the civil service can do that to people.
‘I must say, I don’t approve of civilians on site –’ his lip curled at civilians, despite the fact he wasn’t Army either – ‘but Porton thought differently. I see you fixed the HADU.’
‘Nah, decontamination’s still not working, but I came in anyway.’
He looked at his clammy hand in horror, the sarcasm initially lost on him. His eyes hardened as he found it.
‘Civilians…’ he muttered again, rubbing bony fingers into a tightly stretched scalp. ‘Stay away from the labs and we won’t have a problem. How much do you know about our operation?’
‘I know it’s top-secret.’ I couldn’t help it. ‘Must be why you painted it bright orange?’
He shot me a dark look, the sentence hanging between us. Maybe I shouldn’t have antagonised him so quickly, but I’m a firm believer in starting as you mean to go on.
‘Okay, I don’t know much, but I’ve signed the Act.’ Official secrets were nothing new, it’d be interesting to see what he told me.
‘I can’t share much, but I’ll give you the tour before you start.’ He saw me glance at the winking light above the door, the CCTV camera watching us.
‘What do you know about anthrax?’ he asked.
‘I skimmed the Wikipedia article on the way up.’
‘Civilians,’ he said again, condescendingly. ‘We take decontamination seriously here. Everyone is monitored to ensure no one carries anything into the base, accidentally or… otherwise.’ He pulled the door open. ‘I trust you left your tools in the shed?’
‘Believe it or not, we take decontamination seriously at Rafferty-Nath too.’
He glared again as he turned, he must have heard me mutter about decontamination being our whole fucking business, but chose to ignore me.
I followed him into the tunnel connecting the entrance chamber to the first hut. Thick opaque plastic wrapped over circular hoops, forming a short passageway – like being inside one of those polytunnels on my dad’s allotment. Drizzle tapped softly as we walked through.
‘Other than your HADU there are ten huts. You’ll keep to the first six, the communal areas and bedrooms.’
‘And the other four?’
‘Are off limits. The base is transportable, with each hut connected either end by these link bridges. Allows the layout to be reconfigured to suit the terrain. Here they’re arranged in a sort of a U shape, you may have noticed from the air. As you say, bright orange; obviously it wasn’t designed for a Scottish island. Chaudhary can tell you all about it.’
‘Chaudhary?’
Clay stepped off the walkway into the first hut. We emerged into a narrow corridor with a door on the left and another connecting bridge at the far end.
‘Chaudhary is our facility specialist, I’ll introduce you in a minute, but first you must meet PDBRG lead bacteriologist, Dr Marie Leroux.’
Yet more acronyms, this time Porton Down Biological Research Group, the department responsible for the survey and clean-up operation. He opened the door, coughed, and moved aside. I stuck my head into a lounge area; pop music blared from a radio on a shelf overflowing with stacks of board games and dog-eared paperbacks. The woman lying on a sofa peered out from behind a smartphone, did a double take, and jumped up. She pushed her hands through a springy afro then, clearly embarrassed by a stranger’s presence, smoothed down a T-shirt several sizes too big and crumpled as if it’d been slept in.
Clay introduced me as the new technician, I walked over to shake hands. As we did a strange look flashed across her face, she stared so deeply into my eyes I had to blink and look away.
‘All fixed?’ she asked, with more than a hint of a French accent, reeling me back in.
‘All fixed. How come you got to keep that?’ I pointed at her phone.
‘No SIM, I just use it to record data.’
Clay frow
ned at me.
‘Don’t panic,’ I said with accompanying eye-roll. ‘They took my smartphone off me, God knows why.’
I was looking forward to being phoneless for a while; no pinging texts hounding me for payments or telling me I was over my overdraft, as if anyone who’s over their overdraft doesn’t already know it.
‘It’s standard practice.’ Clay continued to scowl.
Considering I was the one digging him out of a hole this seemed a pretty tepid reception. He’d made it obvious they didn’t want outsiders here, much less a tech like me. Unfortunately for him, Rafferty-Nath owned the decon chambers; the military weren’t qualified – or contractually allowed – to work on them. Clay knew there was nothing he could do about it, but the prick’s ego wouldn’t make it easy. I could see we were going to get along brilliantly.
‘I’ve got to get moving,’ said Marie. ‘I have work to do.’
Clay turned to her. ‘Hang on, Marie, I need you to take Mr Tyler to Camp Vollum.’
Marie looked less than impressed at the prospect of chaperoning a newbie, which suited me; I was hoping to have an unescorted wander. ‘Only the bank calls me Mr, and I can find my own way around, cheers, Clay.’
‘It’s Doctor Clay, and you have work to do. We’ve got five colleagues at the other base suffering from cabin fever.’
‘The other HADU’s out too?’
‘Not yet,’ Clay snapped. ‘They were stranded outside yesterday when your door here failed, and couldn’t get back in. They spent the night up there.’
I was about to reply that I knew all this, but thankfully it clicked just in time: their disposable suits had been destroyed entering that base. ‘So because they decontaminated to get in, they can’t leave?’
‘They don’t have enough spare suits up there, which is where you come in. More importantly –’ he lowered his voice and gestured between us, though clearly Marie could still hear – ‘we have a disposal issue to deal with.’
‘We?’
‘Or rather, you. Take it to the beach for transportation to the ship.’ I had no idea what he was talking about. Clay’s eyes were cold. ‘He was one of your lot, it’s only right you handle it.’
Over his shoulder I could see Marie grimacing. My intestines tightened as the penny dropped; he was talking about my predecessor. About Andy Kyle’s corpse.
Chapter Four
I’d assumed the body had been stored here, in the main base. I ran a finger across my eyebrow, pushed my knuckles into my eyes. ‘You realise I haven’t slept in thirty hours?’
Clay’s expression said he did realise, and didn’t give two shits. The good news was this could work to my advantage; an opportunity to get to grips with the geography of the island, so when I sighed, it was just for effect. ‘Guess I’ll have a kip later, then.’
‘Good man.’ He turned to Marie, still lingering in the doorway. ‘You go and get ready. Is Chaudhary in the kitchen?’
She nodded, adding a lukewarm smile for me. ‘See you in a sec.’
I watched her saunter up the corridor, maybe for a little too long as it provoked a grunt from Clay.
‘Three women here,’ he said, ‘though all fairly competent.’
‘Are any of the men?’
He grunted again, switched off the radio, and led me along the corridor. We followed in Marie’s wake, floral perfume temporarily displacing the clinical bleach all the way through the tunnel into the next hut. Clay stopped and opened the door.
‘The dining room – or as the captain calls it, the mess.’
‘And I didn’t bring my dinner jacket.’
This time he muttered something about millennials under his breath as I peered into a room with all the joys of a morgue, shiny furniture and wipe-down walls. I could imagine him at work, shirtsleeves rolled up, opening cadavers, stitching together his own monster.
Onward, another link bridge, another hut. I looked back, a clear view all the way through the cabins and link bridges to the entrance.
‘Each cabin has a corridor running down one side,’ Clay said, ‘so we can cut through easily. You’ll get used to the layout.’
The layout was fine, it was the inability to swing a cat that worried me. The walls were already contracting.
Clay opened the next door. The sounds and smells of frying food hit, making my mouth water. Clouds wafted around a shiny stainless steel galley that looked like it’d be more at home on the destroyer anchored in the channel.
‘Dasharath Chaudhary’s an American, but don’t let that put you off,’ Clay said under his breath. ‘Chaudhary, this is our new technician, John Tyler.’
A giant of a man, as wide as he was tall, turned through the cloud of smoke. He beamed, wiping grease from a chubby hand on a T-shirt that barely covered his belly, then thrust it out.
‘Call me Dash,’ he drawled. ‘We were wonderin’ when you’d get here. Clay showin’ you around?’
‘Just the bits I’m allowed to see,’ I said as I shook his hand, grateful for a friendly face. ‘Door’s fixed, you’re free to leave.’
‘Buddy, I’m used to Phoenix; it’d take a fire to get me outside in this weather.’
I glanced round the kitchen; similar size to mine at home and I don’t live with nine other people. ‘You don’t get cabin fever?’
‘Not when the alternative’s that cold and wet.’ Dash nodded towards the rain-streaked window. ‘What’s the matter, you don’t like my ice station?’
‘Ice station?’ He didn’t look old enough to own a house, let alone this base, though as I get older everyone else seems to get younger.
Clay clicked his tongue.
Dash grinned. ‘Dr Clay’s sore cos we’re taking it back soon. This here’s our latest Antarctic research outpost.’
That explained the bright orange paint job, the stilts, the unnecessary windows on what was supposed to be an airtight bioweapons lab. ‘Dunno how to tell you this, mate, but have you checked a map?’
He was in his element, explaining that the facility had been developed by Miskatonic University for their research in the Antarctic mountains. They needed new outposts for their archaeology programme, and this was the concept they’d come up with. He waved his arms, wafting smoke around his head and sending Clay into a coughing fit. ‘The modular construction allows it to be set out any which way, as many units as required. Labs, living quarters, kitchens…’ He tipped the pan, a concoction of pancakes and mushrooms tumbling onto a plate, then poured half a bottle of maple syrup over the lot. Suddenly I wasn’t hungry any more.
‘Must be more money in archaeology than I thought,’ I said, though I couldn’t see Bradford Uni stretching to a facility like this.
‘Department of Defense are behind it. The current administration has a bee in its bonnet about Antarctica, don’t ask why. The scientists want the funding, big money comes from the military, so…’
‘What Chaudhary has omitted is that we’re doing him a favour,’ Clay cut in. ‘The Americans needed a hostile environment to test the airtight design…’
‘And you Brits needed a rapid solution for your clean-up problem,’ Dash countered, jabbing a fork at the pile, shovelling a mouthful. ‘So a word in the right ear, some old-fashioned transatlantic cooperation, and we’ve turned our latest portable polar outpost into a research lab.’
‘With a little help from us at RNDS.’ I winked. ‘How’s it working out?’
‘Designed to stay sealed in Antarctica, so a rainy Scottish island is no problem.’
‘Which is more than can be said for your HADU.’ Clay was scowling. ‘Can we rely on it?’
I went straight for a lie. ‘Looks like the fuses worked loose during transport.’
‘We can’t have any more setbacks at this late stage, we’re pushed for time as it is.’
‘Give the guy a break,’ Dash mumbled through a mouthful. ‘It’s hardly his fault. Besides, he fixed it quick enough.’
‘I didn’t see any air tanks,’ I said, swer
ving the subject. ‘Where’s the supply?’ I was already thinking of ways my experienced predecessor could have been exposed to the lethal bacteria outside.
‘No tanks. Air comes in through there.’ Dash pointed his fork at a vent on the wall. ‘The ducting runs through heaters under the floor. We’ve added filters for the nasties, obviously. Vents operate continuously, otherwise the air would get stale quicker than you’d think. Most of the water’s filtered too, sucked straight from the sea. You know, down at the pole we bore a well, melt the ice under the base. Best drinking water on Earth…’ He waved his fork, grease dripping onto the worktop.
Clay coughed again. ‘You can educate Tyler on the technical aspects later, he has work to do. And do be sure to clean up after yourself this time.’ He was already holding the door open.
‘Hey, John!’ Dash shouted. I stuck my head back round the kitchen door. ‘You a poker player?’ he asked.
Clay answered for me. ‘No poker tonight, Mr Chaudhary; Gambetta’s already on the warpath.’
I wondered about this comment as he ushered me away, along a corridor that was different to the others, longer, curving through ninety degrees. We turned the corner, into the base of the ‘U’ formation, Clay continuing the commentary.
‘These are the dorms. Two rooms per hut, two beds per room. Stick to your own.’ He pointed all the way to the far end of the base where a similar connecting tunnel curved away. ‘Comms room towards the end, though you shouldn’t need it. The following labs are off limits. In fact, you’ve probably no reason to go further than this; you’re bunking in here with Demeter, our lead bacteriologist.’
I followed him into a small room, a bed on either side – both taken – a couple of bedside tables and a tiny wardrobe the only furnishings. The huts were split into two rooms here, half the size of the common areas. It wasn’t even Ibis standard, comfort wasn’t a priority. I’ve slept in worse places, but only ones with names like Kabul, Aleppo, Mosul and Lancashire. He pointed to the bed on the right. The covers were thrown back, strewn with clothes. Three words flashed through my mind.
Anthrax Island Page 2