The Offset

by Calder Szewczak

  “Come with you?” repeats Alix blankly. “To Soho?”

  “Unless you have other plans?”

  A look of pain crosses Alix’s face. It occurs to Miri that her mothers will have long since planned how to spend their last day together – that Alix is only here now because Jac thoughtlessly absented herself. As usual.

  Miri wonders what they were planning. Perhaps they were going to have dinner and spend the evening looking at old photographs before the memories they preserved were cracked through with grief. Perhaps they were going to act out the ancient parting ritual of sharing salt and honey. Certainly something in the privacy of their own home, not striding out into Soho.

  Miri is about to rescind her offer when Alix unexpectedly says, “OK. I’ll come.”

  It takes them the best part of an hour to cross the city. By then, the air has begun to cool, enough that Alix has pulled her crumpled blouse back on over her camisole. Miri can tell that she is starting to get nervous.

  “Are they… these people we’re going to meet. Are they anti-natalists?”

  “What? No. Well, some of them must be, I suppose. But not all.”

  “Oh. I thought–”

  “What, that I was taking you to some sort of rally?”

  Alix gives her a sheepish look. “Well, I don’t know. They’d probably eat me alive, wouldn’t they?”

  Miri stifles a grin.

  “But that’s what you’ve been doing these last two years, isn’t it?” Alix continues. “Agitating for the anti-natalist cause?”

  “Not exactly, no.”

  “So, you really meant it when you said you were on your own? You haven’t been indoctrinated into some sort of cult?”

  Miri gives a wan smile. “No, Mum. No cults. I’ve got some anti-natalist friends, but…”

  “But what?”

  “I’m not really interested in doing what they do. Campaigning and everything.”

  “What have you been doing, then?”

  Miri shrugs. She doesn’t know how to explain that being alone was the entire point, the only thing she really wanted, the only thing that seemed honest.

  As they cross the abandoned wastes of Oxford Street, Alix hums lightly to herself and keeps smoothing her hair with her hands, like she’s trying to make herself less conspicuous. Miri knows, of course, that it won’t be lack of neatness that causes Alix to stand out, but the expensive cut of her blouse and skirt. It doesn’t matter how crumpled they have become, there’s no mistaking the quality. She doesn’t mention this, however, but takes her mother by the arm and steers her firmly down Wardour Street, where they hook a right onto D’Arblay and then take the next left. Berwick Street.

  On either side of the narrow road, squalid towers of apartment blocks loom above them. No two buildings match in dimension, style or material; tall brick structures stand next to brutalist concrete facades and squat shelters cobbled together from corrugated iron and plasterboard. The reflective whitewash on every surface has been allowed to fade and peel away. In most places it is completely invisible beneath a thick layer of soot. Hard metal studs have been fixed to the pavement and every alcove and windowsill in sight sports wire spikes or shards of broken glass that cut upwards. The purpose is to make it impossible for anyone to loiter or sit idly out in the street – or at least, this is the excuse. The real point is to make sure that the inhabitants of the Soho tenements keep to their homes, for that is where they can be more easily controlled.

  The people who live here are not London-born. That much is evident from the tattered flags and pennants that hang sadly from the grimy windows. Some have come from as far afield as Alba, but most are from various parts of the Federated Counties.

  “Look, Miri,” says Alix, pointing with surprise at one limp flag, a black-gold split cut through by a diagonal white band pitted with black markings. “Is that–”

  “The flag of Norfolk,” finishes Miri. “There are people from Cambridgeshire here, too.”

  Alix stares open-mouthed. “It can’t be. The fens were lost to flooding decades back, long before you were born. I remember watching the news coverage of the relief efforts… after the banks of the Wash broke. There was no one to rescue. Only bodies to bury.”

  “Some people must have survived.”

  “It’s not possible.”

  Miri shrugs. She’s heard otherwise. She’s heard that there are even a few inhabited islands, but she’s not going to push the point. The people she has met claiming to be from the fens are much the same as others she’s met from across the Federated Counties: hungry and desperately trying to carve out a living.

  Everyone in the Soho tenements has come here to work. They make up the best part of the contingent of skilled foreign workers on which London heavily relies. Because it is nearly impossible to get a visa that covers family members, the majority of them have come alone. Their existence is precarious. They are paid at half-rates and most of that goes on rent and the associated costs. What little they have left, they often try to send back to their families, though it’s getting harder and harder to send money safely across the Counties. Most are on visas that mean they will be denied re-entry if they ever stray beyond the city’s limits. Although all are encouraged to apply for permanent residency – an application for which there is, of course, an exorbitant fee – it is rarely ever granted. The people who live here are trapped, completely and utterly. Unable to leave but not welcome to stay.

  Miri doesn’t know how much of this Alix is aware of. Her expression certainly grows more grim as they follow Berwick Street south and Miri spots her shooting nervous glances at the numerous pigsuits they pass. There are far more here in Soho than she will be used to seeing at home or in the areas around St Pancras. Here, a pigsuit stands at nearly every street corner. Not only are they in better condition than many Miri has seen, but their central casings have also been blacked out, making it impossible to see through to the empty pit within.

  As one turns to follow their progress down the road, Miri has the unerring feeling of being watched. For the first time, she finds herself wondering if there are real human eyes staring out at them behind the tinted acrylic. A shiver runs down the length of her spine.

  There aren’t many locals out in the street, but the few they pass seem to take a keen interest in Alix. Miri notices more than one thin face pressed up against a window, pointing out Alix’s pink blouse and wild hair, eyes following her as she passes. Miri isn’t entirely sure whether it’s because they recognise her as the wife of the famous Jac Boltanski or because she so obviously looks like she doesn’t belong here. Miri’s not overly worried though – either way, Alix will be perfectly safe, particularly if they stay together. Her only concern is that her mother will realise the attention she is attracting and panic. But so far, she seems to be holding herself together.

  They turn onto Peter Street, which quickly becomes a dead end, culminating in an old three-storey building; the bricks are black with soot, the glass in the windows warped and discoloured. At road level, there is a wide steel shutter, blue paint all but eaten away by rust. There are no pigsuits here and the street is completely deserted. Even so, Miri is careful to scan around and make doubly sure they are alone. Then, with a sudden thrill of realisation that she is closer than ever to the Celt, she stoops down, grabs the handle and heaves the shutter open.

  26

  The Archivist has been subdued ever since their discovery. Jac isn’t foolish enough to believe that his feelings towards her have changed, but she’s grateful at least that he has decided to set them to one side while they deal with the matter at hand. He’s as troubled as she is by the project’s failure and, like it or not, they’re in this together. With his assistance, Jac puts together a list of all the things she’ll need for her expedition. A torch. An empty capsule and a trowel. A test kit to check the atmospheric carbon. And, just for good measure, a core extractor and a pair of microcalipers.

  “Alright,” says Jac to the Archivist. �
��Help me out. Where are we going to get hold of all of this? The microcalipers are easy enough,” she adds, brandishing the last pair they used to measure growth rings.

  “There are empty capsules here in the annexe as well,” says the Archivist, glancing back over the list. “Everything else we should be able to find in the main part of the facility. Do you want me to go?”

  Jac shakes her head. “There isn’t time. We would have to scrub down first.”

  The Archivist nods. The NAX command centre is buried deep within the nuclear annexe – as only befitting given the radioactive nature of the cargo shipped over from Greenland. If they’re to go through with this plan, they’ll both have to keep their hazmat suits on. Not to mention the fact that it will be her only protection from the radiation once she gets to Greenland.

  After a moment, the Archivist suggests radioing up to the Facility Manager. “She’s already sent a lab book through the airlock. Let’s see what else she can do. Should I tell her about the plan?”

  “No,” says Jac at once. Although she wields the authority of the Director, there is no escaping the fact that riding the NAX will count as a gross breach of regulations. She hardly expects to be allowed to go ahead with her plan if she is found out.

  At her instruction, the Archivist radios the Facility Manager on a frequency they can both use and tells her what they need. When he finishes, there is a brief silence on the other end of the line. Then she asks why the items are required.

  “I’ve been told that information is restricted,” says the Archivist.

  Another silence. “I see. Is the Director there?”

  “Speaking,” says Jac into her mic.

  “Professor Boltanski–”

  “I need those items,” says Jac, not allowing her to finish. “Consider this my official authorisation.”

  “But what are they–”

  “It’s better that you don’t know. Please, I need you to trust me on this.”

  “Doesn’t your train leave in less than an hour?”

  “I’m afraid it will be leaving without me,” says Jac.

  A loud sigh makes the line crackle. “Very well. I’ll have those things sent down now.”

  “No,” says Jac.

  “No?”

  “No, don’t have them sent down. Bring them yourself,” she says. Now she thinks of it, the fewer people involved, the better. “And I caution you to be discreet.”

  “I don’t see why I should–”

  “Do this for me and I’ll see that my report to the Board of Oversight about the incident that happened here on your watch is favourable. If they do threaten suspension, I’ll vouch for you.” She glances at the Archivist as she speaks, who doesn’t so much as raise a brow at the baldness of the bribe, perhaps more out of respect for their temporary truce than anything else. Jac doesn’t care. It works. After a moment, the Facility Manager agrees to do exactly as she asks.

  Jac thinks fleetingly of her bag on the other side of the airlock. Her golden wedding ring is tucked away in the inside pocket. It will be safe there, she knows, uncomfortable as she feels without it. I’ll just have to make sure I come back for it. Though what state she’ll be in, she doesn’t like to think. No human has set foot inside the entire ARZ since the Kvanefjeld disaster. As much as Jac would like to believe she won’t be in Greenland long enough to receive a fatal dose of radiation, she knows better than to hope. If there is any silver lining, it is simply knowing that it will be days before the exposure kills her. Presuming nothing else goes wrong, she’ll have time enough to come home, to share her evidence of the project’s failure, to say goodbye to her wife and child.

  The thing she most wants to do now is call Alix, but Jac’s phone is in her bag along with her wedding ring. Even if she asked the Facility Manager to send it through with the rest of the items, Jac wouldn’t be able to use it while encased in her hazmat suit. For one thing, it would be difficult to hear anything Alix said without the phone being connected to her in-suit radio. For another, even if she placed the call and screamed a message at the top of her lungs, the sound would get no further than the visor of her hood.

  Something inside Jac caves at the thought of not being able to speak to Alix. She needs to apologise, to say sorry for failing to make the world safe for their daughter like she promised, for not coming home when she said she would, for leaving in the first place when the Offset is so soon. What if she doesn’t make it back in time for the ceremony? No, it’s no good worrying about that now. It’s bad enough that she’s six hundred miles away when she should be at home, when she should be at Alix’s side. For years she’s lived with the knowledge that she and her wife would have to part forever when Miri turned eighteen. This is not the way she planned to say goodbye, not the way she planned to face her death.

  Her only consolation is that if there’s anyone who can understand what she’s doing and why, it’s Alix. She’s never once questioned Jac’s commitment to her work or the importance of it. How could she? In some ways, her work at Great Ormond Street had been just the same – consuming and absolutely critical. In the course of her time there, Alix had done a thousand times over what Jac is trying to do on the macroscale: save lives. It’s a great honour to take on that work, but a burden too. Alix alone knows exactly how that crushing weight feels. Jac’s not going to let her down now. She’s not going to give up, no matter how much she wishes she could.

  27

  The building at the end of Peter Street is more spacious than it first appears. Once a multi-storey car park, it has stood empty for long years, ever since the Bogotá Accord placed a global ban on the private ownership of motorised vehicles. Now, though, it operates as a ReproViolence Clinic for the residents of the Soho tenements and anyone else who cannot afford the fees of a fully licensed hospital. It is run by a small contingent of volunteers who are always overstretched and have to scramble to get hold of even the most basic medical supplies.

  After Miri secures the steel shutter behind them, she leads Alix through to one of the clinic’s makeshift wards. In each parking bay marked out on the concrete floor is a patient. Mostly, they lie on thin foam mattresses, but there are not quite enough of these to go around, so some beds have instead been made up out of old cushions and scrap fabric stuffed with polystyrene packing chips. Around one or two of the bays are rigid dividers of corrugated cardboard, concertinaed out like a standing screen. It’s all that can be done to afford the patient within a little privacy while intimate medical procedures are conducted. Sometimes, though, the dividers are set up to protect the other patients from the sight of a dead body. With so few resources, deaths are common and it’s not always possible for the volunteers to collect the corpses right away.

  Although the volunteers do what they can to keep the place clean and disinfected, the thick odour of faeces and vomit is unmistakable beneath the acrid top notes of bleach. It is a cloying stench of decay that pools beneath the tongue, then suppurates and trickles down the throat. Above everything rises an unceasing chorus of groans, coughs and splutters that is only amplified by the echoes of the hard, concrete surfaces.

  Briefly, Miri’s mind wanders upwards to the floor above, where there’s a second, quieter ward. It is there that the Celt is waiting for her. Miri is struck by a sudden urge to go and find her – now, immediately – but she resists. The Celt is not expecting her until seven.

  No matter. There is plenty to do in the meantime.

  As they cross the clinic’s lower ward, Alix glances around eagerly. There’s a spark in her eyes that Miri doesn’t think she’s seen once since she came back. It doesn’t take them long to hunt down the on-duty volunteer, an ex-medic with acid-bright hair.

  When Miri introduces Alix, taking care to mention her professional credentials, the Medic’s face lights up.

  “If you have some time spare, we could really use the help,” xe says, holding up a list of patients who require urgent attention. Alix doesn’t need to be asked twice. Lifting her
dangling glasses onto her nose, she takes the list and examines it methodically.

  “I’ve got time,” she says.

  With a grin, the Medic points out places where she can clean her hands and find supplies. Then xe turns xyr attention to the white rat sitting astride Miri’s shoulder. “You can’t have that in here.”

  “I’ll make sure it doesn’t get loose. It’s well behaved.”

  “I don’t care. We might not be state of the art, but there’s absolutely no way I’m allowing a rat to stay on the premises. It’s not hygienic.”

  “What am I going to do with it then?”

  The Medic shrugs. “Your call. Put it outside?”

  “You want me to abandon it?”

  “What I want is for you to have thought about this before deciding to bring a rat into our clinic, Miri. It can’t stay. If you won’t get rid of it, I’m going to have to ask you to leave.”

  “That’s not fair. And I have an appointment–”

  “I don’t have time for this. Lose the rat. I don’t care how. Snap its neck, take it home, whatever. And make sure you wash your hands when you come back.”

  “A clinic is really no place for a rat, Miri,” Alix adds quietly.

  “Too right,” says the Medic. “And I don’t think the Celt will be pleased when she finds out you brought one in here either.”

  That settles it. Now Miri has no choice but to track back through the lower ward. She peers through a gap in the rusted shutter to check that the coast is clear and then heaves it up, stepping out into the silence of Peter Street. There isn’t enough time before she’s due to meet the Celt to take the rat back to the Warren. In her head, she runs through a catalogue of all the places she has stayed in the last two years that might be safe enough to leave the rat. None of them are close enough.