Carrion Virus (Book 2): The Athena Protocol (10 page)

“We can wait here until they’re finished,” suggested George.

Dylan shot George a wrathful glare. “Every moment we’re exposed like this is another chance for infected to discover us. We need to scare them off.”

As if fated was tempted, a milling group of shambling infected entered the street. They were two-hundred metres from Gemma, and not much less from the looters. Gemma touched at her camera, but thought twice. The clicking sound would give away their location.

The new swarm of infected, several scores in strength, make their halting progress down the street. The looters had not yet noticed the approaching danger. The baseball bat one had been carrying was now propped up against the side of the vehicle.

Gemma turned to her two companions. “We have to go back. Those looters see us and they’ll make enough noise to bring the infected down on top of us.”

“We can’t go back. We need to keep moving forward.”

George tugged on Gemma’s shoulder. “For God sakes, let’s go back. What are we doing out here? It’s crazy.”

Dylan grabbed hold of George’s chin and made sure those terror-filled eyes focused nowhere but his face. “You’re here and we move forward. You make enough noise and I’ll silence you. Understand?”

Whether the words were designed to scare George into compliance or whether they held darker grains of truth, Gemma was not sure, but she was frightened enough to intervene.

“That’s enough, Dylan.”

His blazing eyes turned on her. “And you’ll do better if you take the same advice.”

Dylan let go of George’s face. Tears ran south along the frightened man’s cheeks. Gemma could have cried, too. In the hotel at their first encounter, the handsome Dylan had been so gentle, so calm, so warm and caring, despite his uniform, despite the weapons strapped to his body, despite the horrors of the city. It now seemed things were taking their toll. Inevitable she supposed, but she had hoped it wouldn’t happen to this soldier.

The snow lessened for a moment, the veil of white becoming more permeable. Dylan reached into his vest, and pulled a flare free.

“What are you doing?”

“Surviving.”

“Dylan, no.”

He struck it alight, launched the illumination over the street, his aim good. It landed amongst the looters, and alerted the infected. A charge erupted and those beasts fell upon looters with familiar efficiency. Gemma filmed it all.

“Move,” ordered Dylan.

The three ran through the snow drifts, up the street in the direction the infected came. Screams and cries haunted their flight, but no pursuit came. Gemma did not look back, instead willed herself forward. She pushed her burning legs harder, drawing level with Dylan. George was a short way behind, his heavy footfalls crunching through the snow.

Dylan had little sense of Aberdeen, where Gemma knew the city well. They entered Union Street, the arterial passage that ran through the heart of Aberdeen. It was a dark, ghost-land filled with snow.

“This way,” she called out and set off again.

Vehicles had trampled the snow to slush. It made for easier going. The three of them ran up the middle of the road, past cars hidden in the white depth. They rounded a corner and finally Marishcal College came into sight. The gothic, granite-fronted building seemed a fortress. They wasted no time in dashing toward the protection it would offer.

“What were you thinking, Dyla
n
?
”

“Move, unless you want to stay out here and die.”

“But
you
let those people die.”

He did not halt his run. “I have my orders.”

“I thought you were in the business of saving people.”

“They were out robbing a bar. They broke curfew.”

“They didn’t have to die.”

“It was us or them.”

“What’s going on with you?”

He kept running.

“Hey! I’m talking to you.” Gemma grabbed his arm and hauled him to a stop. He turned on her, opened his mouth to speak. Before a word came out Dylan flew backwards, thrown off his feet by an invisible force. He landed five feet away, his chest ripped open, exposing broken ribs and pulped innards.

“Sniper! Get down.”

Hands encircled her waist and pulled her back. Where she stood a moment before, a huge spurt of snow erupted. George pulled her further away, to a low wall in the shadows of a building adjacent to Marischal College.

Gemma could not master herself and screams came, her eyes fixed on the wreckage of Dylan. She pushed her face into the snow, letting the ice numb her hot tears of anger. They had been so close, so close. Now they were about to be killed by a trigger-happy soldier.

George slunk down to his belly and snaked around the short wall. He stretched out and pulled the rifle free from Dylan’s body then wriggled back.

“What are you doing?”

“We need to let them know that we’re not infected. Look.” He indicated with a nod of his head toward the plaza before the entrance of the building. Breaking the blanket of snow, here and there, limbs protruded like broken gravestones fighting against the decay of time.

“They’re shooting first and asking questions later.”

George pulled open his jacket and slipped out of it. He pulled off the white vest he wore under his jumper, wrapping it on the end of the rifle. George held the weapon by the stock and waved it past the cover of the wall and into the open where the sniper was no doubt watching, waiting for a clean shot.

This is crazy, thought Gemma. Part of her wanted to run back the way she came. The rest demanded inaction and so she lay in the snow, watching the person she had become companion to through circumstance.

“Gemma, look.”

A five-man squad of soldiers, kitted out in winter camouflage moved toward them, weapons ready. George threw the weapon down and stood, with his hands raised overhead. She did the same, only speaking to confirm her name. Gemma offered no resistance as her hands were tied behind her back and a spit-guard placed over her head. She allowed herself to be taken. They had made it.

***

Work never ceased at the research facility. Staff and guards went about their business. As long as Jane moved with a perceived purpose nobody challenged her, not even the armed guards who watched everything with a predatory interest.

After leaving Holden the night before in his drunken despair, she spent the night formulating some barebones plan to get a message to the outside world. But who to call? Holden no doubt had connections but how many of them knew of the practices here. For many employees, the powers that be would have played with their desire to do good. Some would have been threatened. Some probably complicit in the establishment and maintenance of the facility.

It should have been a sanctuary, a place to share her medical expertise as trade for safety. Hyde, who she assumed was Holden’s unofficial minder, had access to a phone. He walked around clutching the thing to his body like it regulated his heartbeat. She needed to prise it from his grip, use it to contact somebody, anybody on the outside that could help.

Hyde’s personal office was before her, the blinds of the window drawn, the door probably locked.

“You there. Nancy?”

It took her a moment to realise the voice called to her.

Hyde strode up from behind, the satellite phone ever present. Jane attempted to look elsewhere and not at the prize.

“Jane,” she mumbled, pulling her eyes from the phone to his dour face.

“Where is Doctor Holden? He is overdue.”

“The doctor wasn’t feeling well this morning. I think he’s coming down with something.” She looked up to the humming vents. “Probably all the recycled air you’re pumping in here.”

Hyde waved a hand in a dismissive fashion. “He’s here to work, we can’t afford to not have him working. He’s got until the afternoon.”

Hyde breezed past. An overpowering richness of aftershave came like an aftershock. He grabbed a key from a cord on his belt and rattled it into the door lock.

“Well, I won’t keep you.” Jane did not move.

“Piss off,” he said in response. The door closed behind him.

Jane burned a hole in the door with her anger. One way or the other, she was going into that office and taking his phone. It had to be soon.

***

Ryan spent the night in The Owls’ Nest, his accommodation a room of unique opulence. Every piece of furniture no doubt had been chosen for its beauty. The bed, a four-poster, ornately carved frame, was as comfortable a bed as he’d ever slept in. Paintings on the wall, framed in gilded finery did not look like prints. A vase stood here and there, vases he dared not touch out of fear of breaking them. He suspected none to be reproductions.

He waited in his room, waiting to be summoned, showering in a marble bathroom well-suited for a Roman villa. He still felt majorly underdressed, wearing a creased white shirt and jeans. When he was summoned, it was without ceremony or speech. A knock at the door, and a wave followed when opened.

Hector Crispin, or Mr. Nippon, sat at a table crammed with breakfast foods. Large bay windows commandeered a postcard view over Tokyo.

“Beautiful isn’t it, Ryan? For a city with such a massive population it still retains an aesthetically pleasing facade. Sit. Join me. Please, eat.”

Ryan heaped a plate with toasted sourdough bread, poached eggs and slices of smoked salmon. Into a glass he poured equal portions of pineapple juice, orange juice, and apple juice. His eyes devoured the pile of pancakes and the jug of syrup, and thought it a little bold to start on that yet.

“Tokyo is one of the few examples of a city where the presence of people does not detract from the beauty. Of course, like any city, scratch a little below the surface and the rank underflow is revealed.”

Crispin kept his focus out to the city. His face twisted, as if he chewed on a sour grape. He leaned back, and sipped at a hot drink, probably coffee from the scent. He lapsed into silence, his eyes moving from point to point, pondering some great secret. His lips moved with unsaid words, and then, “The Owls’ Nest. Mister Nippon. The Athena Protocol. Grand names, theatrical in a way. I’m sure you’re wondering about them. You’ve heard the first two, of course. The Owls’ Nest, here, where we are enjoying a delicious breakfast. Mr. Nippon, well a code name of sorts. The Athena Protocol. One that you haven’t heard yet. You probably suspect a great deal, some will likely be astute guessing, the rest I shall reveal. A time of great strife is coming, Ryan. Many will not live to see the resolution. And you, my dear boy, have helped us sow our seeds.”

“I didn’t know what I was doing would be used in such a way.”

Crispin laughed a dry rattle. “Come now, don’t play innocent. You designed and built the pressurised storage and delivery system. You personally delivered the virus to a target of our choosing. You did all knowing it would not benefit anyone in the venue. The almighty dollar sign blinded you. Perhaps such a thing would have been inconceivable under different circumstances.”

A flush of heat burned its way from Ryan’s stomach and into his head, causing his vision to reel. All psychosomatic symptoms he was sure. He attempted to force out a few words in defence.

“Relax, Ryan.” Crispin now looked directly at him, a stare Ryan could not hold. “I’m not judging you. There will be no recriminations, no trace back to you. You provided us a service. Of all those in our employ, you are quite the most unique.”

“In what way?”

“Well,” said Crispin, turning back to the city. “You are the only one we’ve allowed to live after their task was completed.”

How did he allow himself to be there, in The Owls’ Nest? Hector Crispin was right, he was blinded by the money. All he saw was a way to make his life easier for a relatively small task. Ryan almost managed to convince himself that he was doing something harmless, even when he stepped off the plane in Aberdeen.

“What do you know of your father, Ryan?”

“My father?”

“Yes, your father. It’s important because I’m asking you, and you are here under my sufferance. You will answer.”

Ryan blew out his cheeks. “I never knew my father well. He always worked away from home, hardly saw us at all. I know he passed away some years ago. I don’t really remember the date.”

“A sad thing when a father is not mourned by his child.”

“Mr. Crispin, I don’t understand why we’re talking about these things.”

Crispin slammed his hand on the table, rattling crockery and spilling juice. “We are talking about such things because I’ve made it happen. Your survival is down to me, and me alone. Had you been anyone else other than your father’s son I would not have protected you. Your body would never have been found. You would have simply ceased to be. A stain on the annals of history removed without comment or consequence. You are here, talking about what I deem worthy to talk about because I saved your life. Do you understand?”

Ryan nodded, a robotic movement. A chunk of toasted crust sat on his back teeth. He dared not chew. He dared not say another word.