Plague World

by Alex Scarrow

  Grace was down on her knees, unclipping, then lifting the mask’s plate away from her face. She leaned forward until one side of her face was pressed against the ground.

  ‘Jesus . . . like the Pope kissing the—’

  ‘Shut up!’ barked the officer. The comms channel went quiet again.

  As Grace knelt with her cheek against the ground, her eyes settled on Rex. She smiled at him ‘You look totally terrified!’

  ‘I’m . . . uh, I’m doing fine, Grace. Can you tell me what you’re doing right now? Is this about making contact?’

  She closed her eyes. ‘I’m knocking on the front door.’

  They waited in silence for a minute, then finally she stirred. She slowly lifted her head from the ground, leaving a sticky, jelly-like strand dangling for a moment before it snapped back down.

  ‘They know we’re here. And They know why.’ She turned to look at him, revealing the side of her face that she’d held down. The flesh of her cheek was gone, exposing tendons and bone, gums and teeth. Her smile was a zombie-like sneer, a cheap movie-world prosthetic.

  ‘What will They do?’ asked Rex. ‘What’s going to happen?’

  ‘They’re coming,’ she replied. ‘Relax. All They want to do is show you.’

  ‘Show me?’ Show me what?’

  ‘What They have to offer.’

  ‘What does that mean, Grace? What can They “offer” us?’

  ‘Movement!’ one of the soldiers barked suddenly. ‘Three o’clock.’

  Rex turned to his right and scanned the marbled brown terrain. He could see a portion of the ground puffing up like a blister. Its colour lightened as it ballooned, stretched and thinned. The membrane popped softly, the skin rupturing and falling to the ground to reveal a ribbed orifice that descended into darkness.

  ‘Shit!’ gasped one of the soldiers.

  They waited and watched for another few seconds before spotting movement within the cavernous interior.

  ‘Grace? Talk to us. What’s happening?’

  ‘Shhh . . .’ she replied, smiling again. ‘It’s OK, Mr Williams . . . Just wait and see, OK?’

  Rex squinted to try and make sense of what was emerging out of the gloom. He could see the top of something pale, tall, slim.

  ‘What the hell is that?’ said Calloway.

  There were five of them, growing taller like calcium stalagmites in fast forward. Rex realized they weren’t growing, they were advancing up an ascending ramp into the open. He understood with that, that this structure was more ‘iceberg’ than ‘ship’, with an unknowable mass hidden below the water’s surface.

  How big is this thing?

  The pale objects emerged from the orifice into the sunlight and began to cautiously advance across the undulating ground towards them.

  ‘Steady, lads,’ said the officer. ‘Fingers off triggers.’

  Rex could hear a faint hissing, skittering sound above the gentle splash of the bow waves nearby. The tall objects, a little closer now, appeared to be pale columns, like tree trunks freshly stripped of bark, at their base a froth of pale movement that he began to recognize as a swarm of the small scuttling creatures.

  ‘Grace?’

  ‘Yes?’

  He pointed. ‘Those crab-things, they know who we are as well, right?’

  ‘Everyone knows who we are by now,’ she replied. ‘You’re among friends.’

  The five trunks and the surging carpet of pale creatures drifted closer, riding over the humps and dipping into the troughs.

  ‘You should lift your mask or remove a glove,’ said Grace, ‘so they can taste you.’

  Taste? This was starting to feel like a bad idea.

  Their welcoming party was now just five metres from them and had come to a halt. The carpet of scuttling creatures settled down, retracting their tiny legs and claws into their pale, pearl-like shells until they looked like thousands of glistening pebbles. The tree trunks, he could see now, were not solid but a woven rope of slender, glistening eel-like creatures, writhing and twisting around each other as they appeared to struggle upwards to the very top.

  ‘What now?’

  ‘Grace? May I go now?’ said Choi.

  She nodded. ‘Go on, Jing.’

  The Chinese officer removed his mask, his gloves, then unzipped his biohazard suit, shrugging it off his body and stepping out of it. He turned to look at everyone.

  ‘I am not afraid,’ he said. ‘This is what I am choosing. To pass into this other world.’

  ‘You’re not coming back, Lieutenant Choi?’

  He shook his head. ‘This is our future. Embrace it, Prime Minister.’

  ‘Christ. What’s it going to feel like?’

  ‘There is no pain. No discomfort. Only a sense of unity.’ Jing smiled. ‘You will see.’

  God help me.

  Choi turned to Grace. ‘I thank you for your friendship and your invitation.’

  ‘I’ll see you inside, Jing.’

  He stepped forward, crossing the small distance between them and the writhing trunks, removing his shirt, then his vest, and discarding them in his wake. He stepped on to the carpet of glistening pale pebbles and stopped before the nearest of the trunks, looking up at it like a pilgrim at the end of a long journey. He carefully removed his trousers and underwear and stood naked before them, his arms spread wide.

  The trunk advanced until it was pressed firmly against him, then the eel-like shapes suddenly ceased their endless, squirming race to the top, changed direction and swarmed over his body. Within seconds he was engulfed.

  Rex could hear one of the men cursing quietly, someone else’s breath hitching nervously.

  ‘Steady, men,’ said Rex. ‘Those things . . .’ He could hear his voice shaking. He was sure he sounded like a ten-year-old schoolboy, a figure of authority no more. ‘Those things didn’t attack him. We’re still good. We’re still good.’ He turned to Grace. ‘What happens now?’

  ‘Do you trust me, Mr Williams?’

  I don’t have much choice, do I? He was here now. If he turned and ran for the helicopter, he wasn’t sure what would happen. Would the crabs chase him down? Would running now undermine his role as the ambassador for what was left of humanity? Trigger an aggressive stance from the virus?

  He cracked an uncertain smile. ‘Yes.’

  She held out her hand to him. ‘Take my hand, and we’ll step in together.’

  ‘I’m not going to lie . . . I’m really very, very bloody scared.’

  She smiled, a scary Janus-like expression – on one side warmth, compassion, on the other a wraithlike sneer.

  CHAPTER 33

  ‘The truth is . . . we can cross the water to get to you. We have been able to do this for some time. You are not safe here any more,’ said Camille.

  Leon watched the young girl as her gaze swept across the people crammed into the fish-and-chip restaurant. She looked every bit as human as anyone else. Only, unlike everyone else, there was an odd serenity about her.

  ‘So, if I spray you –’ Leon was holding the hose in both hands – ‘you’re saying it won’t do you any damage?’

  ‘It will hurt me,’ she replied. ‘Please do not. You will kill many in my community. And I am only here to help you.’

  ‘Help us?’ Leon started forward.

  ‘Take it easy, Leon,’ said Lawrence. He took a step closer. Most of those in the small restaurant had stood up from their chairs and backed well away. Lawrence, however, had come forward. He looked at Leon, then at Jake, standing on the other side of the small narrow-framed girl, with a salt-water-filled fire extinguisher ready to use.

  ‘My name’s Lawrence. I suppose you could say I’m in charge here on the isle.’

  The girl studied him for a moment before answering. ‘I am Camille.’

  ‘So –’ the old man narrowed his eyes – ‘starting from the basics . . . you’re saying you’re one of Them.’

  ‘Do you need proof of that? I can disassemble if you want?’


  There were gasps at that. Leon turned to see heads shaking, eyes wide – Cora’s, Finley’s and Kim’s the widest; they knew how that looked when it happened.

  ‘You really don’t want that happening in here, Lawrence!’ called out Jake.

  ‘That’s what happened at Southampton?’

  He nodded. ‘They break down into crabs, hundreds of them. There’s no way to fight them.’

  ‘In that case we’ll take it for now, Camille, that you’re infected, then. Please . . . don’t disassemble!’

  ‘Don’t even move a muscle!’ added Leon.

  Camille shook her head sadly. ‘You are all so frightened. You do not have to be. They came to help us move on to the next stage of life, to absorb us. They are like librarians. Gatekeepers of information.’

  ‘You say your name is . . . was Camille?’ said Leon.

  ‘I am Camille. And I am human,’ she replied with a hint of indignation.

  ‘You’re not human,’ snapped Lawrence. ‘You’re a copy. A recreation, a—’

  ‘I am Camille Ramiu. I am a proud Hausa. I lived in Niger. I lost one parent to disease and one to militiamen. I always dreamed of going to school, but I had to care for my brother and sister or they would starve.’ She inspected her hands. ‘These are my hands, my fingers, and they are as much mine now as they once were before.’

  She turned to look at Leon. ‘Leon . . . You said that is your name?’

  He nodded.

  ‘Leon, yes, you can hurt me with the salt water. But it will not kill me. It will kill the flesh it touches. If enough of my colony structure is damaged, I would have no choice but to disassemble into smaller constructions. And these smaller creatures are not able to communicate with you in the same way I can. They are simple. They work on instinct.’

  ‘We don’t want that,’ said Leon. ‘We really don’t want that happening!’

  ‘Why did you come here?’ asked Lawrence.

  ‘I have a message, but it is very complicated, Lawrence.’

  ‘What’s the message?’

  ‘It is better, perhaps, if I can show you?’

  ‘NO!’ He shook his head quickly. ‘Don’t do anything! No one’s doing anything! Just tell us the message!’

  ‘As you wish.’ She locked her fingers together and raised both hands to beneath her chin, looking like a little shaman in prayer. ‘We are ninety-nine per cent of life on Earth. We are made up of all the humans, all the animals that existed here on this world. There are now only a few small groups like yours around the world.’

  ‘Where are they?’ asked Leon.

  ‘The ones who came to rescue you, they came from places called Cuba and New Zealand. There are a few others, but they are struggling, dying.’

  ‘How many of us left?’ asked Leon. ‘Do you know?’

  She shrugged. ‘I have no number, but most of them will not survive for much longer. Their food is dwindling. This world will continue to grow colder as the climate has been changed by our reach. They, and you, will die out in the next few winters.’

  ‘We’re doing just fine as we are!’ cut in Lawrence.

  She shook her head sadly. ‘It will get much harder for you to survive. Your food will run out . . .’

  ‘No, it won’t. We have an endless supply of fish, for God’s sake!’

  ‘Not for very much longer.’

  ‘Hang on! What do you mean by that?’ asked Leon.

  ‘The sea creatures will also be absorbed soon. We are learning ways to filter the salt from their chemistry. There is so much life in the sea for us to bring into our world.’

  ‘We can carry on foraging for supplies,’ said Lawrence. ‘Indefinitely.’

  ‘This is true. But those supplies will also run out one day.’ Camille looked over to the restaurant, then at the window, at more faces peering through the scuffed glass. ‘Your population will die out.’ She turned back to him. ‘Death is your enemy. Not me. Not us.’

  ‘Not our enemy?’ said Lawrence. ‘Your flippin’ virus wiped us out.’

  ‘No. We have not “wiped out” anything. We have preserved it.’

  Lawrence shook his head, exasperated and out of his depth.

  ‘Yes. Every form of life has been broken down, read and stored. Kept safe. If you want to know who has done more wiping out of life on Earth, it is humans.’

  Leon had heard enough of ‘They’. He wanted to know more about them than just that one mysterious word.

  ‘Camille? Who are They?’

  She turned to look at him. ‘Yes, that is a much more useful question to ask.’ She paused for a moment. It looked like she was listening to an unheard voice, seeking advice.

  ‘They . . . like to be seen as facilitators, that is all. Helpers.’

  ‘Yeah, but what are “They”?’ pressed Leon. ‘What? Not why are They here . . . What are They?’

  Camille shrugged. ‘Helpers. They have instructions that are stages that take Them to a final goal.’

  ‘So, what’s that?’ asked Leon. ‘What’s this “final goal”?’

  ‘To achieve on a different scale what cannot be achieved now.’

  ‘What the hell’s that supposed to mean?’

  ‘It is easier for me to show you than it is to explain it to you.’

  Lawrence raised his hands. ‘Don’t do anything! Just stay right there!’

  ‘I came here to invite one of your group to come with me.’

  ‘Now listen here! No one’s going to go anywhere!’

  Camille shook her head. ‘I will not force anyone. I am here only to ask for one of you to volunteer.’

  ‘When you say “come with” you,’ said Jake, ‘what does that mean exactly? What’s going to happen to them?’

  ‘They will be absorbed. They will have a chance to witness my world.’ Camille smiled. ‘Then they will be allowed to return and explain what they’ve seen.’

  ‘Great,’ said Leon. ‘You’re going to infect them, let us take them back in and then we’re all going to be sneakily infected!’ He turned to Lawrence. ‘This is bullshit!’

  ‘No. No infection. We do not wish to “sneak” in.’ She nodded at the window. ‘We do not need to trick you – we could sail across and land on this place quite easily. We could force you, overrun you, but we do not want to. We choose to ask you instead.’

  CHAPTER 34

  Tom Friedmann stared out through the dusty windscreen. A pallid grey light was threatening to steal back into the night sky. He had no idea what time it was now. His watch was back on the bedside table in the small room he’d been assigned in the diplomatic apartment block.

  He looked down at Freya curled into a foetal position on the seat beside him. Her dark hair was splayed across her face. She appeared to be utterly exhausted and fast asleep.

  He had been talking to this girl for several hours. But it hadn’t been Freya.

  He’d been talking to Grace.

  She’d been sitting right there, on that seat. His daughter. Not the Grace he last saw over three years ago, but a girl who was now a teenager. Her face had gradually grown out of Freya’s. Perhaps in full daylight, the transition from one face to another might have been horrifically disturbing, but by the wan light of the moon it seemed like a magical transformation. The bridge of Freya’s nose had thickened slightly, her jaw had become more oval and pointed. The skin around her eyes had shifted almost imperceptibly, one moment Freya’s, the next, unmistakeably, he was staring into Grace’s eyes. Freya’s hair, however, remained unchanged, as did her body. It had been an odd and unsettling experience for him to see his daughter’s face transplanted on to another person’s frame.

  As she spoke to him, he knew it was Grace; her voice had the slightest trace of her New York accent, the hard corners of it knocked away by the short time she’d been living in London.

  He sensed it could only be her – not a copy or an impersonation.

  Dammit. It was her.

  You look like crap, Dad. That was
the first thing she’d said.

  She told him about how the outbreak had happened in the UK, in London. That after their last phone call got disconnected, things went crazy on their train up to Norwich. How Mom did her best to keep them both alive, finally having a breakdown and Leon stepping up to look after them both.

  She told him about their months hiding out in a mothballed nuclear bunker from the Cold War, eating tins of food. Then eventually emerging into daylight, into a world transformed by the virus, stripped bare of everything that had once walked, flown, crawled, slithered.

  She shared with him how Mom had died in the service station, ambushed by spider-like creatures – Grace referred to them as ‘scouts’. How Jennifer had fought to ensure both her children escaped through a smashed window before being overrun by the creatures. Jennifer fought to save her kids. She didn’t get ‘preserved’. She was torn to pieces.

  Tom listened to his daughter try to persuade him that she was one of the lucky ones, not like her mother. That infection was the way ‘They’ preferred to invite their victims.

  . . . They’ve learned the best way to preserve humans. The pathways that need to be taken, the particular order in which a body is disassembled and broken down to ensure the valuable parts of the mind – what makes us, us – remain unharmed and perfectly encoded . . .

  She explained that the ‘scouts’ – the crablike creatures – were like dumb robots, simple, disconnected automatons. Constructed for scouting, foraging and, if necessary, killing. Running, resisting, fighting the virus was going to draw them like tiny, voraciously hungry assassins.

  Dad, you have to understand, the virus isn’t the enemy. Death is our enemy.

  She gave him a phrase that seemed to work well in summing it all up for him. There is an ‘afterlife’, you know? A heaven. But it’s not up in the sky – it’s deep down. It’s within us.

  A biochemical afterlife.