The ground floor of V was a real show-off piece of engineering. It was walled entirely in glass, all the way round. The only opaque surfaces were the eight elevator tubes clustered like thick power cables in the centre of the floor. From the outside they appeared to hold up the building. The floor was highly-shined stone so seamless that Kester wondered if the place was built on one huge polished rock. There was nothing there except the reception desk, space, the odd piece of art. Kester made an appreciative face as he walked past a long swoosh of metal close to the reception desk and tilted his head to show that he was considering the piece.
At the front desk, Kester said, 'Hi,' exactly as planned. 'My name's Kester Lowe. Alexis Farrell's expecting me. She said –'
'What time is your meeting?' asked the receptionist with a clinical smile.
'Meeting?' The unexpected question flustered Kester. 'No – I'm sorry – I'm not here for a meeting.' As he fumbled in his bag for his Book the receptionist started to look nervous. 'It's my first day. Mrs Farrell said I should see her for my induction.'
Kester pressed his thumb to his Book and sought out the acceptance note with the instructions to come to reception.
'Let me see.' The receptionist studied the message with a frown. There was an odd metallic sound to her voice. Kester couldn't tell if it was her or the acoustics of the reception. She had tawny hair that was nearly the same colour as her tanned skin. She was a mannequin that hadn't been painted yet. She glanced down at Kester's jacket and failed to prevent her eyebrow from rising. So he was well-dressed enough to be a client but not to be an employee? Kester could feel the colour rising in his face.
'That should be sufficient, sir. A representative from V Division V will be down shortly to escort you to your department. Please take a seat.'
The receptionist indicated the bank of shiny metal behind them. The one Kester had assumed was a piece of art. Was this a test, perhaps? As he walked closer to the cantilever wave, he saw a slightly dulled patch in the shape of a pair of buttocks, the signature of the last person to sit there. If it was a test, he wouldn't be the first to fail. He chose an alternative dip in the wave and sat, straight-backed, wondering if he should get his Book out and load something impressive-looking to read. No. Someone was bound to appear before the jacket ad changed and they'd see what he'd been reading last – a gun firing, blood seeping down the cover, gold lettering too big to hide with his fingers.
As the minutes passed, Kester's mind started to wander. What would happen, he wondered, if whatever was holding the bottom floor together gave? Would the whole building just shunt down a floor and stop there? He imagined the thousands of workers on the floors above bracing themselves suddenly with bent knees and outstretched arms, and then standing up straight and continuing what they had been doing. Would a building be able to take that? No, the glass would break. He replayed the scene in his head. This time, everyone stopped and braced as the glass exploded outwards from the windows; then they stood up straight again and continued what they were doing.
Kester looked around the vast room again, his eyes lingering on the back wall. Slowly, it dawned on him that it wasn't clear glass at all. Of course it wasn't. The whole building backed onto the City perimeter, so if it had been glass he would be looking at a car park, grass, or the back wall of a train stop, not a square full of people going about their business. So how could it look so convincingly like the world continued beyond it? Just a big holoscreen? He was itching to go and look. And that must be what was holding the building up – the wall. He felt a little more comfortable. But was that any way to support a building, he wondered, just down one side? What if something fabulous happened in the square below and everyone rushed to the front windows…
'Doctor Lowe, sir.'
Kester had heard the footsteps but had been away in a dream, half listening for lift doors, but not for footsteps. He stood up to greet the stocky young man who had come to fetch him. The man had an open face and slicked back hair, giving a charmingly old-fashioned appearance. He looked to be about the same age as Kester, perhaps a few years older.
'I'm Gerald.' The man introduced himself with a vigorous handshake.
'Kester Lowe,' Kester said. Then he laughed and added, 'But you already know that.'
To his relief Gerald laughed too. Some people's laughs disappointed Kester to the gut; Gerald's was a little piece of truth that lit up his eyes.
'I've just moved from viral screening,' Gerald said, eyes still sparkling. 'I'll be your head technician. Mrs Farrell sends her apologies. She wasn't able to greet you herself, but she said she will come down to the lab later to see that you've settled in properly.'
It was an odd feeling: disappointment and relief swirling together, mingling like currents of hot and cold water to become something tamer.
'That's great. I'm dying to see the lab.'
'In that case, sir, follow me this way!' Gerald strode towards the lifts.
'Please, call me Kester.'
The doors breathed open and they stepped inside. Kester hadn't noticed the extraordinary quietness of the doors at the interview, but then that day his ears had been filled with the constant woomf of his heartbeat.
'You know Farrell really wants us to get ahead of the game on this one,' Gerald said, 'so it's great that you could be involved from the start.'
Gerald's informal demeanour was helping Kester to relax. He realised that he had been holding his shoulders tight up towards the sky. It was a relief when he relaxed the muscles and let his arms hang softly.
'But you already have a viral department,' Kester said.
'Yes.' Gerald nodded. 'But its primary focus has been viral screening and the production of antiviral agents and vaccines. I was getting a bit bored of it to be honest. I've been there a good few years now, so this is a welcome break.'
'Screening? I thought you said that before, but I don't remember seeing that anywhere in my research. Who needs screening inside the City?'
'Mm. I guess that's why they don't normally let me out of the lab. It's not something that we publicise. We provide the service outside the City. It's still a lucrative business, especially with the high MR we're seeing at the moment.'
'MR?'
'Sorry – V-speak – mutation rate. We're seeing an all-time high. In the cities, the mutations are given room to flourish by the screens – so you might see a person who has previously had a virus reinfected, the infection quashed by their screen, but any mutation that has occurred in the meantime hanging around. Sometimes it takes long enough for the screen to report it or the adjusted uploads to deal with it that it gets passed on. Of course we know very little about it until the person it's passed on to happens not to have a screen. The screens report, adapt, report, adapt and so on, but in practice Stark don't have the time or the inclination to document all the new strains outside the database. There's an arms race going on. We just can't see it. Until a casualty pops up extra-city.'
'Yes. I just wrote a related article for New Scientist about how the screens are influencing the presentation of STVs –'
'A subject close to our hearts here. Yes, I read it and I confess it hadn't even occurred to me that widespread facial symptoms were a new thing for sexually transmitted disease.'
'We change our behaviour, we influence which mutations thrive and are passed on. Simple and beautiful.'
'Well,' Gerald said, 'beautiful once we're done with them.'
Kester's mind wandered back to Gerald's screening services. 'So there are more viruses out there for you to pick up in your screening, but presumably that doesn't make it more lucrative?'
'No,' Gerald said. Then he paused. 'But it makes it all the more interesting to us as scientists.'
The lift stopped at the twelfth floor and the doors opened onto a stark white room with a set of sliding doors on the wall opposite. It was very different to the glassy floor where his interview had been held.
'You must excuse the look of the lab. Consensus amongst th
e designers was apparently that this was what a lab should look like. Their ideas are so clichéd sometimes. Still, better they went down this route than the benches full of bubbling test tubes in the basement route. You ever been to the LayTech lab in old Kensington Palace?'
'No.'
'Hm,' was all Gerald said. He raised his eyebrows and laughed to himself. 'It all looks a bit more V when we get through security. Right, you had your biometrics done as part of the security checks so we should be good to go.'
'Welcome…Gerald,' said the doors in a monotone voice. 'Welcome…Doctor Lowe.'
The doors slid smoothly apart and they walked through into a small anteroom in which hung a row of white coats, each with a pair of boots sitting neatly beneath them. Beside each coat was a tall thin locker. There was a liquid alcohol dispenser on the wall and not much else.
'This is our basic infection lock,' Gerald explained, 'but don't worry, we've got far more thorough screening and scrubdown booths for the higher-risk stuff. Your coat and boots are at the end. Your locker should recognise you. Just be sure to shut it after you're done. They open every time you walk past which is a bit of a pain. I'm sure it seemed very smart to the techies, but you don't always want them to open. Just like you don't always want to leave the room when you come within three feet of the doors. You won't have much call to use it anyway, I shouldn't think, as you'll have direct access to the lab floor from your private quarters. All that can be infection-locked too should the need arise.'
Gerald gabbled on as he pulled on his labcoat. Kester went to his station and put his jacket and shoes in the locker. He felt like he was going swimming.
'Will I need this?' He lifted his bag and looked over to Gerald.
'Not for now. And you can always come back for it if you do.'
Kester put his bag in his locker and pulled his coat and boots on.
'We had nothing like this at the Institute.'
Gerald laughed. 'Maybe that says something for us and maybe it doesn't,' he said. 'Oh – step away from your locker. It'll scan you and open again any minute.'
Kester stepped away a moment too late and the locker pinged open again.
'I see what you mean,' he said with a chuckle, then pushed it shut once again and stepped towards the lab doors.
'Let's go then,' said Gerald and led the way.
'Welcome…Gerald. Welcome…Doctor Lowe.'
'Don't worry,' Gerald assured Kester, 'after a few days you won't even hear the constant welcomes.'
'Nice to be in such a welcoming place…'
Kester's voice tailed off as the lab doors slid open. He had expected to come in at the edge of a room. He put his hands out as if he had lost his balance and looked around to get his bearings. They were stepping out of a central hub. The elevator tubes and the decontamination room were enclosed by a smooth circular white wall.
'A bit disorienting, isn't it?' Gerald said. 'This way.'
The central part of the room was a large open-plan work area with white benches and crane-legged stools. Hundreds of pieces of equipment were suspended from the ceiling on swoop-down apparatus; a flock of elbowed machines roosting above them.
'If you face this way.' Gerald put out a hand. 'That's the front of the building. We did manage to persuade the designers that we needed some sunlight. Of course, it will be misted down to some degree most of the time to help regulate the temperature.'
Kester nodded. The lab took up a whole floor of the building. He felt like he had been unexpectedly kissed and for a moment he swore he could smell Farrell's perfume. He glanced behind him.
'On either side and at the back we've got the viral manipulation rooms and the isolation suites, thirty rooms in all. We thought you'd need somewhere to keep subjects comfortable and monitor them in isolation.'
'Yes,' was all Kester could muster.
He looked around the side and back walls. They too were white and were divided evenly with further sets of white sliding doors. Each one must have been the size of his Institute lab.
Kester suddenly realised that there was something missing: people.
'Where is everyone?' he asked, starting to walk round the workbenches.
'Farrell wanted you to be the first to see it – except for me of course. I've had to do some basic testing to make sure everything is fit for purpose and built to spec. It's been such a short turnaround.'
'But this must have taken months,' Kester said, looking up at the ceiling in wonder. It was a vast clinical cavern, apparatus suspended like stalactites.
'The floor has been earmarked for a while and we already had most of the kit on order, but Farrell wanted to wait until she took someone on to set out the final spec. This place was empty a week ago, if you can believe it. I wouldn't lean on any walls in case you get paint on your coat – it'll never come out.'
Kester looked at the white walls, then down at his white coat and laughed. It was true; the air had a just-painted chill to it. Many smells of newness mingled: polished metal, new plastic, electronics just unpacked. None of the usual lab smells were there. He remembered his post-interview talk with Farrell. He had raved about his perfect lab. She had asked him what he needed and she had delivered.
'I thought I'd leave you to yourself for a while, let you settle in and get together a plan of action. As you need people we'll draft them in.'
'Great. Thanks Gerald, that's great.'
Kester needed some time to think. The only time he had worked in a large lab like this had been on his various secondments and even then he had worked alone on his projects, or with a couple of postdocs max. He could get so much done with a whole staff. But first he would need a plan.
'Farrell wasn't sure if you were going to live in,' Gerald said, 'but I've set up a corner suite for you just in case.'
Kester walked over and entered the front left corner office. It was like a miniature of Farrell's, with a huge glass desk in the centre, eight feet long at least. Light flooded in from two sides. On the wall to the left was a sliding door which withdrew and welcomed him as he walked towards it. A room twice the size of his Lambeth flat opened up. It was undecorated and unfurnished except for the bathroom suite which was done out in small tiles the colour of brown-trout scales. Kester noted a little shelf at arse-height in the walk-in wet room and smirked to himself. Then he laughed out loud.
'I can't believe it!' he said to himself, turning to see Gerald standing in his office by the desk.
'Mrs Farrell will send someone down to consult you on the fittings and furnishings,' Gerald said, with a slight smile.
'Wow,' Kester replied. He walked back out into the main lab. 'But for now, I'd like to be at the centre of things.'
Kester walked back out of his suite to the central workstation and sat down.
'You'll need this,' Gerald said, rushing over, digging in his pocket. The Book he produced was sleek, next generation. 'It controls everything – just have a play with the menus. Give me a shout if there's anything you can't find. It'll know which workstation you're at, so just tell it what you need. I'll arrange for your personal account to be transferred over.'
'OK.' Kester took the Book from Gerald. He held the fingerplate and flicked the Book left then right like he had seen people do in the adverts. Two wings slid out from the sides, tripling the size of the display. 'Cool. Thank you.'
'Now, if you'll excuse me, I've got some things to finish up in the screening department. I'll be back up in an hour or so. I'll beep you before I come.' Gerald smiled, then his mouth popped open and he raised a finger. 'Just a few housekeeping things – I always forget! Fire escapes are through the corridors at the back two corners of the room – they lead up to the roof. There are escape slides to the back of the building – why escape the building when you can escape the whole City? The facilities are back out in the hall, and the exchange booths are round the central hub. They exit back into the decon room so don't get them confused with the exit – you might get more than you bargained for!'
> With that, Gerald smiled his Hollywood smile, turned on his heel and headed swiftly to the decon room.
Once he was sure Gerald had left, Kester took in an enormous breath.
'Yes!' he shouted, then whooped. He leapt up from his stool and ran to the front window to take in the view. His lab was about halfway up the building and the square below was smaller than the palm of his hand. In the buildings that flanked the square he could see tiny people trundling about their business.
This whole space was his. He couldn't believe it. Swinging to face the centre of the room, he opened up his labcoat and ran, holding it out like a cape, up and down between the benches. Suddenly, he worried that someone was watching and stopped, but kept laughing to himself. His colleagues from the Institute – if only they could see it.
Sitting back down at his desk, Kester selected the workstation option on his Book and rested his hands in front of him. An outline keyboard appeared on the surface at his fingertips and quickly recalibrated to his hand size. A wafer-thin monitor swooped down from the ceiling. There was something distinctly dental about the whole setup.
On the monitor the 'housekeeping' information that Gerald had just shared with him was laid out on a 3D rendering of the lab. Exchange booths; so it was true. His curiosity got the better of him. He should at least know what they look like – what to expect, and if not now when there was nobody around…? He laughed, then got up and walked cautiously towards the central hub. 'Welcome…Doctor Lowe,' said the doors to the decon room. He walked on, but caught a glimpse of the room. As the doors were closing, he swore he saw a figure in there. Coats hanging, he thought to himself. He was always spooky, seeing figures in coats and curtains. 'Welcome…Doctor Lowe.' The doors of the first exchange booth parted.
Kester hovered in the entrance. Inside, the booth was lit in a cool pink light. By the door was a panel of coloured buttons, the pink one glowing. Kester touched the green switch and the light faded to green. The booth was small, the size of a double bed. The walls were made of a velvet-finish rubber. The only things in the room that he could see were a ledge at the back with various dips, what looked like stylised rounded hand-grips on the walls, and a sleek oval dispensing machine with glowing buttons advertising Durex Pop-it lube capsules, Dryvul pessaries and a type of V-branded painkiller Kester had never come across before. There was a half-moon black bulb on the ceiling, presumably something to do with the super-heating. Kester stared up at it, his mind wandering – how did it work? There was the smell of perfume again, but this time he ignored it, fascinated by the half-sphere. Then he started to feel dizzy – no – not dizzy; the light was fading from green to amber.
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