by Ian D. Moore
“You’re telling me?” Evie replied. With a seductive raise of her right eyebrow, she added, “Is it just me or is it very warm in here?” She kissed him once more and stepped out into the cooler air of the room, the moment amicably paused for another time perhaps.
***
Nathan stood, watching her dry down as the water flowed over his body, taking the bubbles of remaining soap and driving them in crazy circles, before they disappeared down the drain. Every so often, she’d flick her hair back to see him through the cubicle; late thirties maybe early forties was her guess with defined abdominal muscles and barely a shred of excess fat. This told her that he was either lucky to be born with a high metabolism or he’d kept himself in good shape to this point; either way, she found him extremely attractive. He seemed confident in whom he was; what made him that way?
She wondered as she glanced at Nathan again, watching him as he moved his hands over his own body, washing away the suds. She motioned to him through the steamed up cubicle, placing her flat palms in a letter “T” shape, and then opening the door to the hallway. He nodded, just holding her gaze as she left, wondering about this woman. In the chaos of the last few hours, it occurred to him that he knew little and only what he’d found out at the conference and the impromptu pub meeting afterwards.
Nathan hoped she hadn’t found him presumptuous. She had effectively saved his life, and had it not been for her, that deadhead would surely have killed, or at the very least, infected him. He exited the cubicle, drying quickly and walking naked to the bedroom, finding clean jeans and grabbing a couple of T-shirts, socks, shorts, and a baggy sweater. He descended the stairs, sidling up behind Evie to nuzzle her neck. She’d made hot tea and gestured to the sugar pot, not knowing how he took it.
“One minute. I’ll go shut the generator down. Time to hit the cellar,” he said.
Nathan had fitted a kill switch inside the main house, which would shut down the jenny, although not instantly. Once the main power board had been turned off, the jenny would revert to tick over for about ten minutes before shutting itself down. He threw the switch, placing the house in darkness and then cursed under his breath, having forgotten to get the torch first. Now, fumbling his way back towards the cellar, he saw the flickering gas lamplights that Evie had illuminated.
She’s a smart girl.
He pulled the cellar door closed behind him, double-locking it with the Yale and steel bolt before descending. On the small table stood two mugs of steaming tea, along with the camping gas stove, atop of which was the pan of soup, gently heating while Evie stirred it.
“Got you a clean shirt and there might be some jeans that should fit in there,” he said, pointing to the wardrobe. Evie nodded her thanks.
“I figured we should eat something; might be worth taking another look at those plans and files for a while. I’ll put the radio on, see if there are any broadcasts,” she said, pouring out the soup into each bowl and handing one to Nathan.
Static was the only sound from most of the local stations, the eerie hiss of an electric serpent, while the radio automatically scanned for a signal as it flicked through the channels. Evie clicked a button, changing the band to FM and set the search to “Worldwide Services,” watching as the radio swept through the frequencies again. With a sigh, opening the wardrobe, she selected a pair of dark blue stretch jeans that had once been a favourite pair of Katelyn’s, though she didn’t know that, of course.
“This is great!” Nathan said, tasting the soup.
He noticed the look of dismay across her face at the absence of any broadcasts. They spread the plans and data sheets they’d retrieved out over the duvet on the bed and worked their way towards the middle from the outside.
“So how come you found yourself living in Salby?” Nathan said, casually.
Evie sat back on the bed, resting on the headboard and pulling up her knees, wrapping her arms around them as she spoke.
“I was one of the first residents of Salby; bought the first house they completed there, must be ten years ago now. I’d been working in the pharmaceutical industry since leaving school, much to my father’s dismay. He’d wanted me to go into the management side of things in some city hospital. He passed away two years ago and had been a top neurosurgeon, a pioneer in his day. They were hard shoes to fill at the best of times.”
“Indeed. I’m sorry,” he said, with genuine empathy for her loss.
“I moved here from Manchester to be closer to him; took a position with a major pharmaceutical manufacturer and set about finding my own place in the world. I never married. Came close once, but I guess it wasn’t to be.”
Evie stood and took off her blouse, pulling on the oversized T-shirt, content in just her lower underwear for now. She enjoyed the liberation of not being fully dressed; she returned to the bed before continuing.
“When the opportunity to buy at Salby came, I jumped at it. The bustle of the city had once been something I craved, but I guess I just got older. The company made it easy for me to move, allowed me time to study other fields of medicine, and there’s also the intimacy of living in a small village. When the SGFC set its sights on us, I became an involuntary leader in the fight against it. Being an only child, growing up alone, it gave me a sense of connection that I’d never really known, which helped to make it feel like home,” she said, finishing in a melancholy tone.
The radio hummed, crackled, hissed, and finally burst out, “All people are ordered under martial law to report to the nearest military base: Army, Air force or Navy. Bases have facilities for your care. Take only what you need for the journey as any excess belongings will be destroyed.”
The message was being transmitted on a constant open channel closely followed by a crackle, hum, and hiss, all spewing from the small speaker, as the radio reception was lost once more. Evie moved from the bed to extend the aerial, taking the small radio nearer to the vent chute in the hope that it would improve the signal. It nearly worked, as the next sound was Tougher than the Rest by Bruce Springsteen, a track picked up from the world service station.
The Boss belting out the sound was soothing in the confines of the small cellar. Nathan stood, extending his hand.
“Would you care to dance, my dear?”
His voice in that instant reminded her of her father. How could she refuse?
She giggled like a dizzy schoolgirl on a first date, and as she took his hand, Nathan pulled her close into him, feeling the warmth of her body. His powerful hands were now gently at her hips as they swayed. Evie’s head was on his chest, and she kissed at his neck, pulling off his T-shirt for the second time that night, but this time, she meant business.
Her hands ran down his body, touching and teasing at his shoulders and neck, fingers alternately stroking then lightly scratching down his back to the rhythm of the song. Nathan could hear his own heartbeat thumping. He found her mouth with his and then, brushing lightly against soft lips as he took time to kiss each side of her mouth, he played with the sensations. Finally, open-mouthed and probing her own with his tongue, his fingers slowly closed at the hem, lifting the cotton top she wore up and over her head.
He played with her body, sending tingles through it with each stroke, while his mouth and tongue teased her bare skin. Aware that his actions had altered the once calm pattern of her breathing, creating short intakes and faint but audible murmurs, it gave him immense satisfaction and the confidence to continue further. Placing his hands beneath her bottom, Nathan lifted her so that her legs could wrap around him. Kissing their way to the bed and briefly pausing to shove the various papers and plans to the floor, he placed her gently down.
From the corner of his eye, he could just make out the jeans of his beloved wife. He gazed into Evie’s eyes and despite what his eyes told her, what he said surprised her.
“Evie, you know I want to. You’ve been driving me crazy all day, and Lord knows, I want you in every way a man can but …” The sentence hung in the air before Evie interrupted.
“I’m so sorry. I should have thought, your wife, I mean, Katelyn, I mean oh …” she attempted.
“It’s not that. Well, not entirely all that, it’s just … we have a big and probably dangerous day tomorrow, and we’ll need to head out early. I need a clear head and so do you. You’re the first woman to come here since my wife passed, and yes, it’s still painful.”
As he spoke, he could feel his gaze resting upon the floor, the feeling of having broken the spell between them immense.
He’s hurting still, yet his affirmation of his feelings changes everything.
“Nathan, stop. Please, you’re right. I know you’re right, and I understand completely. Let’s eat and then we’ll go through the documents and plans, see what else we can find, eh?”
Evie purposefully changed the subject, steering them away from the awkwardness of the situation. She sat up on the bed, scooting on her bottom to the edge as Nathan knelt in front of her. Taking his face in her hands, she kissed him tenderly.
“Hey, come ‘ere, it’s okay,” she whispered.
It would be several hours before sleep finally claimed them. When it did, they snuggled close, each taking comfort from the other.
*******
Momentum
In a secret location, a couple of hours drive north of Salby and buried deep underground, the dawn of a new day would only be known by the changing of the shift. The night research teams began making their way to the surface as the day teams took over to continue the round the clock research.
A couple of hours later, at around 10:00am, his phone received a text message that put the fear of God into him. He read it several times–just to be sure it was real. It was an emergency tag-coded message, sent to everyone on a secure, five-digit, quick-dial number that had, since its creation ten years ago, never been used. It meant certain trouble on an immense scale; he knew what he had to do next.
Lieutenant Colonel Dr. Charles Fitzgerald was the senior consultant virologist at a secret underground military base in the north of England. His mandate included the creation and destruction of some extremely dangerous and highly classified military-grade bio-chemical weaponry. His remit included all of the labs in England.
He was a traditional gentleman, wearing a plaid tweed suit with perfect trouser creases and a self-tied bowtie. Highly polished brown brogue shoes accompanied the suit. His near-white hair and silver-rimmed, round spectacles permanently fixed to the end of his nose gave him a distinguished look; he wasn’t a man to trifle with. Here was a man accustomed to position, a man who demanded precision in everything he did.
He made a call to the Defence Minister, who in turn scrambled armed units in full nuclear and biological chemical warfare kit, NBC kits for short, to the wellhead site on the outskirts of Salby. The site was soon in lock-down with a ten-mile perimeter, including the town and surrounding areas. A massive joint forces military operation had been started after the discovery of three infected corpses in the main yard. Subsequently, bodies had been found at the wellhead pipeline entrance too.
Teams of scientists, reporting directly to the upper echelons of government, had flown in to determine the cause and nature of the infection. Everyone was confident that Dr. Fitzgerald and at least four of his associates would know what the problem was, and its scale, immediately. What they wouldn’t know, was how far the problem would reach and how quickly the infection would spread.
Having spent the better part of an hour on the telephone to Whitehall, Dr. Fitzgerald assembled his research team, ready to travel to the shale gas wellhead site at Salby. Renowned for being meticulous, Charles ensured information was released on a need-to-know basis, not wishing to create unnecessary alarm to those remaining at the lab. His team was briefed and equipment was loaded for the trip. Dr. Fitzgerald knew that all necessary precautions were taken, as per his orders.
***
The team awaited the arrival of the military helicopter that would provide safe passage to the area. It seemed that chaos was spreading rapidly. The government had implemented a state of emergency, including martial law, and had seized control of radio and TV stations across the country. Borders had been closed, and all outbound and inbound flights and shipping had been stopped. Rail services had been terminated and major arterial motorways blockaded in an attempt to limit the spread of the as-yet unconfirmed virus that had become so destructive in a short space of time.
After boarding the helicopter for the hour-long flight, Charles looked over his assembled team. There was Kate Simmons, a bright biochemist, fresh-faced and young-looking despite her being in her late thirties. She was rising through the ranks; a clever woman who had come to the facility highly recommended by her peers and specialising in molecular sciences.
To her right sat Hans Goerdricht, a huge Austrian physicist with Aryan looks, short-cropped blond hair and chiselled jawline. He would have been more at home on the set of a film than here in this team. He had a brilliant mind, with a flair for solving the seemingly unsolvable and a very hands-on approach to his work. He had been involved in designing the pinpoint-accurate radio-controlled missiles used in the Iraq war.
Finally, there was Moses “Mo” Sighal, originally from Uganda: tall and quite thin, with black-rimmed glasses and jet-black hair. He specialised in anatomy, neurological sciences, and cardio-vascular surgery and was at the very top of his field.
Waiting for the helicopter to become airborne, Charles gestured for his colleagues to adorn headphones; he briefed them on the situation.
“As you may already be aware,” he began, and the deep commanding tone of his voice exaggerated his natural authority, “we have been tasked to go to a recent industrial accident location with a possible, no probable, bio-chemical and viral element to it. I do not need to stress the risk factors here nor should I need to remind you not to take any chances. Our role is to determine the source of the outbreak, its nature, and, if possible, take samples, with a view to the manufacture of an antidote of some kind in multi-release format. The outbreak has spread outwards from the initial site with high casualty figures. These are expected to double at the very least, so it is imperative that we focus on our work.”
He noticed the twitching arm of Kate Simmons, eager to ask a question it seemed.
“Please humour me for a minute, Kate, there will be time for questions shortly,” he instructed, before continuing with his briefing.
”The location is a small purpose-built town called Salby, in West Yorkshire; it is one of the most heavily guarded government projects in the country. Below it lays a five-square-mile testing facility, not dissimilar to our own base. This information stays within the confines of this aircraft. No one, and I mean no one, is to be told of the existence of this facility. There are eight storage tanks, approximately one mile below ground situated towards the west end of the town. They hold different generations of the Saliva Activated, Live Blood type Y virus, a highly dangerous prototype. Now, we have limited data available for this virus, but as yet, we don’t know which strain could have been released.” The radio headsets crackled briefly before the pilot cut in.
“Excuse me, Sir, just to inform you that we are twenty minutes to destination.”
“Thank you, Captain, duly noted” he replied, returning to the briefing once more.
“The underground lab will have gone into automatic lock-down if any of the security measures have been breached, and they certainly look like they have been. We’ve tried to contact our colleagues, but there’s been no response. Distressing as that is, I urge you to focus on what we’re up against, remembering that some of the greatest minds in the world manufactured this virus, and we have to find a way to stop it, at least until we can gain access to the facility. Any questions?” he asked finally.
Questions were quick to come from such honed minds, and the headphones erupted as soon as Charles had finished his deliberations. With the limited information at his disposal, Charles did his utmost to explain the situation durin
g the remaining flight time.
As they passed nearer to the town, the horror that was to come became clearly evident. Road accidents had left mangled vehicles littering the highway, with smoke rising in plumes from the resulting fires. Bodies, hundreds of them, some with missing limbs, others mutilated beyond recognition, were spotted. The nature of the virus and its effect upon infected people closer to the major city of Leeds was starkly real.
Military blockades had been formed at many locations as countless people tried to make their way to the relative safety of the forces’ bases, the nearest being RAF Leeming, just off the great north road, the A1. Lines of traffic blocked the road as people abandoned their vehicles, trying to make it on foot. Some clutched suitcases or pulled belongings behind them; it was distressing to see. RAF helicopters and fighter jets made several passes, providing air support, and the sporadic crack of automatic weapons discharging sounded over the low thwut, thwut, thwut of the helicopter’s rotors. The initial infected victims had seemingly scattered, but it was clear that just one infected person could, and probably did, infect as many as forty or more before being overcome, killed, or more worryingly, simply moving on.
***
After coming in to land in a field a few hundred yards from the wellhead, troops on the ground provided a ring of cover around the helicopter, with green-swathed bodies milling about like ants at a nest entrance. Intermingled with white-suited technicians, the forensic and chemical clean-up teams, a host of support staff had gathered. The officer striding towards the aircraft lowered his head as a precaution, under the rapidly rotating blades, to greet the newly arrived scientific team, unaware of their true purpose.
“Captain Shaun Tate, Royal Logistics Corps,” he said curtly, extending his hand to Charles.
“I am Lieutenant Colonel Dr. Charles Fitzgerald, and this is my team, Doctors Simmons, Sighal and Goerdricht. A pleasure,” Charles said, taking the Captain’s hand and matching his firm grip.