The Grid 3

by Paul Teague

  The Grid 3

  Catharsis

  Paul Teague

  Contents

  Also by Paul Teague

  Chapter 1

  Chapter 2

  Chapter 3

  Chapter 4

  Chapter 5

  Chapter 6

  Chapter 7

  Chapter 8

  Chapter 9

  Chapter 10

  Chapter 11

  Chapter 12

  Chapter 13

  Also by Paul Teague

  Author Notes

  Get Connected With The Grid

  About the Author

  Also by Paul Teague

  Sci-Fi Starter Book - Phase 6

  The Secret Bunker Trilogy

  Book 1 - Darkness Falls

  Books 2 - The Four Quadrants

  Books 3 - Regeneration

  The Grid Trilogy

  Book 1 - Fall of Justice

  Book 2 - Quest for Vengeance

  Book 3 - Catharsis

  Writing Thrillers as Paul J. Teague

  Don’t Tell Meg Trilogy

  Book 1 - Don’t Tell Meg

  Book 2 - The Murder Place

  Book 3 - The Forgotten Children

  Chapter One

  Before the Plague

  The young doctor studied the viral modelling data on his computer screen, desperately trying to figure out why his attempts at creating a cure had accelerated the death toll. The information didn’t make sense. It was supposed to save lives, not take them. They had created two new strains of the disease, and the virus had mutated with a devastating impact. The deployment of a cure had just made the situation worse.

  The pandemic had come out of nowhere and was sweeping through urban populations at a rate faster than had ever been seen before. They knew it was airborne, it was infecting just over nine out of ten people and it was spreading like a bushfire across the planet. With two new strains now wreaking fresh havoc, even those who had survived the first wave were in danger once again.

  International travel had been stopped too late – they’d grounded the planes several weeks after they should have done. The advisory teams had warned the President at the briefing sessions but he’d ignored them. The Government always assumed the problem would be solved before it became necessary to pull the plug on the airlines.

  The protocols were in place, but world governments were always reluctant to shut down cross-border controls. They waited and waited, then acted too late. The plague was going to have to burn itself out, but it would wipe out most of the world’s population in the process.

  Gripped by a sense of guilt and anxiety, he stayed up into the night when the facility was deserted. They’d all been working ridiculous hours for weeks on end, and the team was beginning to tire. The problem with humans is they need rest, they have to take breaks, however severe the crisis.

  He needed to understand what he’d overlooked. He’d been sure he’d got the cure at last, but it had all gone so wrong. He tested and refined the data then started the process all over again to prove and then re-prove his theory. Every time it pointed to the same thing. There was a reason for the mutations, but so far nobody in his team had seen what was staring them in the face. Even the pooled information-sharing across the world had not spotted this. A single database updated 24/7 with the findings of the best scientific minds across the globe, yet nobody had seen what he’d seen. This was sabotage, and it had taken place at the highest level of government. They’d made him and his team the fall guys. They hadn’t even used his cure, they’d gone ahead and substituted the NiVac3 option. It had been hurriedly released and they’d been warned of the consequences. His own solution was more difficult to manufacture at speed, but it would have worked. Now they’d messed up, and they were pointing the finger of blame at him.

  The doctor sat in his chair and considered the world they were about to bequeath to the next generation. Towering walls were being built around major cities on the orders of President James Morgan. Those who’d survived each strain of the plague were being herded into segregated concrete fortresses. The voice of the President was broadcast constantly across all media, issuing instructions calmly and authoritatively. Armed checkpoints were being set up where those who’d survived the plague were to report for sanctuary, barricading themselves in infection-free ghettos, packed with Immunes and survivors. They were all that would be left – humanity was hanging on by a thread.

  The Government would struggle to maintain control after this. The existing world order would disappear. Too many people had died, and it was still far from over. But here was the secret, and nobody had seen it yet. This global catastrophe had been accelerated by the Government. President Morgan had overruled the advice of his advisory panel, rushed through NiVac3, and now the entire world was paying the price.

  Significant power resided in this information – he cursed that he hadn’t seen it earlier, before it had reached the endgame. It might have been useful then, but there was no longer the infrastructure to deliver a cure globally, not with three deadly strains harvesting so many lives. The plague would have to burn itself out as it would have done in the Middle Ages.

  As a doctor, he was accustomed to healing and curing, but that world of compassion no longer existed. Everything was simplified: you survived or you died. What was happening would divide mankind. Those with the contagion would be left to die and the survivors would cling together, desperate to grasp whatever scraps of humanity they could salvage. He could see it already as the cities were beginning to fall and huge fortresses were being built.

  He decided to keep the evidence to himself, removing it from his computer and securely encrypting it on a data card. He had no status now. He’d been shamed and it would take him some time to recover his reputation after such a disaster. The data card would be his free pass – with this knowledge he could wield massive power in the new world that would rise from the ashes of the plague. He had damning evidence against President Morgan and his senior team. Their negligence had caused the Earth to burn. One day, Morgan would be held to account.

  He took off his lab coat and placed the data card in the pocket of his trousers. As he was about to walk away, something sentimental in him made him step back. His name badge was still attached to the lab coat. He unpinned it and examined it, recalling the life and career that had once held so much promise for him. That world no longer existed. There was no need for these laboratories anymore, since the plague was unstoppable. They were being hurriedly relocated to a new and secure facility where they would make their final stand against the disease. It was all about the survivors now and the world that would arise from the ashes once the plague had burned itself out. He turned the badge over and put it in his pocket. There was no more need for Doctor Josh Delman. He would have to become something very different in this new world.

  Crisis

  Joe was stunned to see his father standing in front of him as the elevator doors opened. His heart was still pounding furiously and painfully from the events that had just taken place in The Grid. Matt hugged him hard, then surveyed his son.

  ‘You’ve done well to get here in time, Joe, but we have to move on straight away. Your entire Sector is going to be destroyed, and we’ve got to do something about it. The City will be wiped out in a matter of hours.’

  ‘What about the others?’ Lucy said. ‘We can’t just leave them there!’

  ‘You have to, for now. You can’t protect them in The Grid. In any case, you need urgent medical attention. Come with me, we must leave The TriPlex now. We have to get you patched up and fully briefed.’

  Joe was overwhelmed by these events. Over the past six years, he’d gone through all the stages of grief: anger, resentment and acceptance. He’d vowed to se
ek revenge for Matt’s death, yet here he was, alive and well. There was no conversation as Matt ushered them away from the elevator entrance towards a circular platform in the middle of the vast rotunda. He was serious and focused, there were no pleasantries. The place he called The TriPlex was deep underground, but high above them at the top of the structure was a massive glass dome through which the sky was just about visible.

  Joe looked around, taking in as much as he could while he struggled to process what was going on. He thought of his friends in The Grid and how they would be fighting for their lives. He wanted to run and help them, but he also needed to know more.

  They were in an empty triangular hall with three featureless elevator entrances situated equidistantly at the edges. They were marked ‘Sector 1’, ‘Sector 2’ and ‘Sector 3’. The only other object in the area was the central platform, which looked very similar to the one the Justice Seekers had been standing on at the beginning of their trial.

  Matt was flanked by two armed guards. They were not Centuria, and Joe had never seen anything like them before. Their weaponry too was much more sophisticated than anything he’d ever come across.

  Without warning, Lucy made a move for one of the weapons, pushing the butt into the guard’s face and making him stumble.

  ‘I’m going back up there to help them!’

  ‘Lucy, stop!’ called Matt.

  Lucy paid no attention. She was running towards the elevator entrance, intent on returning to The Grid. She placed her hand on the red panel outside the elevator in the Sector 2 area.

  ‘If you return to The Grid you will place all of your friends in immediate peril,’ Matt shouted. ‘Your actions could also lead to the annihilation of the entire population of your city. Please, Lucy, I know you’re desperate to help your friends, but you can only do that with our help.’

  Lucy stopped dead in her tracks and removed her hand from the activation panel. Joe looked on, unsure what to do next. The second guard pointed her weapon directly in Lucy’s direction.

  ‘The only reason you could enter that elevator is because you’re Immunes. Both of you are. If anybody tries to enter this area as a plague carrier, they’ll be eliminated before they get here. That applies to your friends too. If they’re carriers, they’ll be killed before they ever step into the elevator.’

  Lucy hesitated, looking from Joe to Matt. Her finger moved to the trigger of her weapon but she’d begun to doubt herself.

  ‘I’ll explain to you both when we enter Centrum. We need to run some urgent tests on you straight away. You have to trust me, Lucy. You’ll get the chance to enter your city again very soon, but I have to brief you both before you do that.’

  The elevator door opened, but Lucy let it close once again without stepping inside.

  ‘Joe, what do you think?’

  ‘We’ve come this far, Lucy. We set out to discover what happened to Dad …’

  Joe corrected himself.

  ‘We wanted to find out what happened to our dads … We’re getting close to the truth now, we need to find out what’s going on. Everybody gains if we succeed, Lucy. We’ve come this far – we have to carry on now.’

  Matt nodded. Lucy held out her weapon so it could be retrieved by the guard. His face was bloodied, but he took hold of the firearm carefully without any sign of threat to Lucy.

  ‘I’m sorry,’ she said. ‘Things were getting really stressful up there.’

  The guard indicated that she should step back onto the platform. When all five people were standing within the circular area, Matt activated a small device he’d been holding in his hand. The platform was surrounded by a bright red grid which passed over their bodies like a virtual net.

  ‘It’s alright,’ Matt tried to reassure Lucy. ‘This is just to make sure you’re not carrying anything that could contaminate Centrum. You’re about to enter a contamination-neutral zone – this is called a BioSweep.’

  Lucy was not consoled by this, but whatever scanning process had just taken place was now over. The platform was surrounded by a shimmering haze of light which ended after a few seconds. They had now left The TriPlex and were in a completely different location.

  ‘Welcome to Centrum,’ Matt announced. ‘I’ll be happy to answer all of your questions here. First, though, we need to run tests on both of you. Lucy, you’re in a bad way. We must get those wounds looked at.’

  Lucy nodded. She’d been impetuous only minutes before but now she felt exhausted. Her mind was going crazy with thoughts of her friends, and she felt guilty for finding this sanctuary when her companions were still fighting for their lives in The Grid. The guard she’d just assaulted took her arm and escorted her away from the platform.

  ‘Joe, stay with me for a while. We need to talk.’

  Joe looked towards Lucy.

  ‘Will she be okay?’

  ‘They’ll take good care of her. I want you to be checked out too; you don’t look much better.’

  oe scanned the area. It was lie nothing he’d ever seen before. Compared to The Climbs, Silk Road was technologically advanced, clean and well-maintained, but Centrum was something else.

  It was modern, antiseptic, calm and extremely hi-tech. There were consoles everywhere, vast arrays of flashing lights, information screens and data displays. Joe noticed how few people were around, but those who were operating the consoles were dressed simply in clean tunics and trousers. It seemed focused, purposeful and well ordered.

  There were huge digitized screens placed all along the corridors. They were counting down to zero with fewer than nine hours to go. What was going to happen? There was no indication of what the displays might be for, but Joe guessed the countdown was the reason for Matt’s urgency.

  ‘Joe, I’m so sorry I couldn’t tell you I was alive. It was impossible – I might have got you killed, and I couldn’t get a direct message to you anyway.’

  Joe’s eyes began to moisten with tears. Things had happened so fast, he’d barely had time to register what was going on. Now he was out of immediate danger and had made his escape from the prospect of a terrible death, he needed to let it all out. He was overwhelmed by the situation. One minute he’d been moments from death, the next he’d been reunited with the father he’d thought to be dead.

  Matt hugged him tight. It felt good to Joe to have someone taking care of him again. He’d been the strong one for six years, having to grow up fast and help his family survive. At last he’d got someone to take that weight off his shoulders.

  ‘What happened, Dad? How did you get out of The Grid?’

  ‘Similar to you, Joe. I thought it was all over for me, but then from nowhere I got a chance to get out.’

  ‘But how? I don’t even know how Lucy and I got out of there alive.’

  Matt seemed reluctant to give more detail. He was keen to move on with his own agenda.

  ‘We’re under a lot of pressure, Joe. There’s so much happening all at once. You got here just in time – you’ve given us all a chance. What’s going on in your Sector is the least of our worries.’

  Joe had never heard The City referred to as a Sector, though he’d noticed that three Sectors were marked when he and Lucy had descended to The TriPlex in the elevator. He couldn’t recall ever having been in a working elevator before. Everything was completely alien to him at Centrum.

  ‘In just under nine hours, Catharsis will begin. What’s going on in The Grid is insignificant in comparison to this. I know you’re desperate to help your friends, but there are many more lives in danger. Hundreds of thousands of people could die.’

  There was a lot to take in. Joe placed his hand on his chest which was tight and uncomfortable, but he put it down to the stress of the situation. It would pass, just like the pain from all of the cuts and bruises he had sustained.

  ‘Catharsis was set in motion a hundred years ago, before any of us were born. It was agreed as part of The Pact, after the plague had driven what was left of humanity into three separate cit
ies. We call them Sectors here.’

  ‘So there is something else beyond these walls?’

  ‘There’s a lot beyond the walls of The City, Joe. It’s what Tom and I had discovered when we were arrested.’

  ‘I thought there had to be more. Delman was speaking to somebody outside The City. He’s part of this, isn’t he?’

  ‘Delman has a lot to answer for, Joe, and yes he’s in this up to his neck. There are three Sectors – or cities – in all, and ours is just one of them. But there’s a problem, and that’s why The Pact was created in the first place. The three cities were our last hope. Each one housed survivors from a different strain of the disease. Catharsis was created to choose who would take humanity forward. If the disease remained uncured, the Sectors would be destroyed and Centrum would have to rebuild from the ashes.’

  ‘Where are we now? How come we’re all safe here?’

  ‘We’re all Immunes in Centrum, Joe. There aren’t that many of us in existence. As well as Immunes, there is a smaller group of people out there we call Conduits who have survived the plague and now carry the disease. They could spread it to other people who’ve never had the disease. It’s how Tom Slater and I were drawn together. Lucy is an Immune too. We can survive among the Conduits, but we’re not immune to all three strains of the virus. This entire unit at Centrum houses just over one thousand Immunes, made up of scientists, doctors, tech experts and their families.’

  ‘This is incredible. Are we in a Sector now?’

  ‘No, this is something different. Centrum is isolated – it’s located below ground at the centre of the three Sectors. The only way in and out of each Sector is via what you call The Grid. It’s there to serve as a barrier, a defence mechanism, it protects each Sector from entry, exit, attack or invasion. In our city it’s been abused and adapted as a system of punishment. It was never meant for that purpose – it was built as a neutral zone.’