Vivisepulture (17 page)

     Duthie was curious.  ‘And?’

     ‘Here we go again.’

They didn’t use the siren on their way to the next job.  Officially, it was more or less routine.  But it had the potential to be dangerous.

     ‘You’re lucky,’ Anders said.

     ‘Am I?’

     ‘Yeah.  We’re gonna be dealing with a restricted essence.’  

     ‘Which one?’

     ‘Submission.’

     ‘Wow.  That’s what the police and army use, right?’  

     ‘Sometimes.’

     ‘So where we going?’

     ‘Prison.’

     ‘Prison?’

     ‘HMP Forest Grange.’

     ‘What’s happening there?’

     ‘The Governor thinks there might be a leak.’

     ‘Major?’

     ‘He’s not even sure there is one.  But some of the inmates have been acting a bit docile.’

     ‘That’s a
problem
?’

     Forest Grange stood in what was once an outer suburb, now encircled by the city.  Anders and Duthie expected a bleak nineteenth century pile.  What they found was certainly grim, but it had all the hallmarks of the nineteen seventies.  

     They drove past high red brick walls topped with barbed wire, until they reached a pair of towering, grey metal gates.  

     Once in, having shown their credentials several times, they were escorted to the governor’s office by a flint-faced warden.  They crunched along a cinder path, edged with white paint, that cut through skinhead-short grass.  The prison itself looked like an East European office block, except somebody had installed windows that were far too small, and barred. 

     The governor’s office was tidy to the point of anal.  The governor was less 

particular about his own appearance.  The elbows and knees of his suit were shiny.  He had hair growing out of his ears, as opposed to on his head, which was almost completely bald, and his blotchy skin was bathed in a perpetual flush.  Anders thought he looked like a raspberry wearing steel-rimmed glasses.

     ‘Frank Rotherton,’ the governor announced brusquely by way of introduction.  

     ‘What exactly’s your problem, Mister Rotherton?’ Anders asked.

     ‘We think there might be an escape of Submission.’

     ‘You’re not certain?’

     ‘Felons are devious.  They’re quite capable of putting on a front to get better treatment or a chance of parole.’

     ‘How do you know that isn’t what’s happening now?’

     ‘I don’t.  Except too many of them are behaving too … reasonably.’

     ‘How long has this been going on?’

     ‘A few days.’

     ‘But you didn’t call us before?’

     ‘We weren’t sure.  Still aren’t.’

     Anders nodded and checked his PDA.  ‘I see that you’ve got Submission piped to just one part of the prison.’

     ‘Yes, the high security wing.  It’s one of our contingencies in the event of an emergency, like riot gear and high-pressure hoses.’

     ‘And you’ve not had to activate it recently?’

     ‘Not for months.’

     ‘Have you evacuated that wing?’

     ‘Do you have any idea how overcrowded this prison is?  How clogged they
all
are?

Besides, that wing houses some of the worst offenders in the penal system and it’s never been so quiet.’

     ‘Legally, you’re supposed to evacuate any area where there’s a suspected leak.’

     ‘You tell me where to put them.’

     ‘Well, I’m required to report it to my superiors.’  Anders started tapping on his PDA’s keyboard.

     ‘Be my guest,’ the governor told him.  ‘And good luck with the Home Office.’

     ‘Can we inspect the wing now?’ Anders said.

     ‘To do that I’d have to pull out nearly sixty of the hardest, most callous offenders you could imagine, with nowhere near as secure to put them.  My staff don’t relish the prospect.’

     ‘What do you expect me to do?  We’ve come to test for a leak.  If you won’t let 

us - ’

     ‘I’m not saying that.  If I have to evacuate them, that’s what I’ll do.  But I want to be sure first.’

     ‘The best way to do that is to let us get in there and check.’

     ‘I think there might be another way.  Suppose I have one of the inmates brought out so you can say whether he’s been exposed?’

     ‘I’m a technician, Mister Rotherton, not a doctor.’

     ‘But you’ve seen plenty of people affected by essences, haven’t you?  Surely you could tell.’

     ‘Pipes, pumps, circuitry, yes.  Those I understand.  But - ’

     ‘Your supervisor, Miss … ’ 

     ‘Mason,’ Anders prompted.  ‘Francine Mason.  What about her?’

     ‘She tells me you’re quite capable of making the assessment.’

     ‘Haven’t you got medics here, or - ’

     ‘No one with your experience.  And Miss Mason did say that British Distillate would be happy to cooperate, given the circumstances.’

     Anders sighed.  ‘All right, I’ll take a look.’  He added, ‘Is it safe?’

     ‘Perfectly,’ the governor assured him.  ‘The man I have in mind will be heavily guarded.  He always is.’

     ‘But if I think there’s any chance he might have been affected - ’

     ‘Then I’ll evacuate the block for you.’

     Duthie cleared his throat, reminding the other two of his presence.  

     ‘Yes, Bob?’ Anders said.

     ‘How does this man normally act?  I mean, how can you assess him if you don’t know how he usually is?’

     ‘Good question.  Governor?’

     ‘You’re assuming the man in question consistently behaves in what you’d call a normal way.’

     ‘Doesn’t he?’

     ‘I’m not alone in thinking he should be in a secure institution for the criminally insane.’

     ‘This just gets better and better.  Why
him
?  Why not show me one of the others from that wing?  Or are they all nuts?’

     ‘Because he happens to be out of the wing at the moment, in the sickbay, and that’s next door.  I need this resolved quickly.’

     ‘How long has he been out of the high security wing?’

     ‘Not much longer than you’ve been here.  The effects would still show after that short a time, wouldn’t they?’

     Anders nodded.  

     ‘And he’s in the infirmary because he’s giving blood,’ Rotherton went on.  ‘So nothing to worry about there.’  

     ‘Giving blood?  That doesn’t sound like the man you’re describing.’

     ‘All the inmates with clean blood are given the opportunity to donate.  I never thought he’d be one to agree.  Come on, let’s go.  You can leave that here.’  He gestured at the holdall containing their protective gear that Duthie had carried from the van.

     They had to leave the building to get to the adjacent infirmary.  

     As they walked, Anders said, ‘Do your warders have protective equipment?  To deal with an essence leak, that is.’

     ‘They use the masks they wear if we have to deploy teargas.’

     ‘Hmm.  Not ideal, but it should do for short periods.’

     ‘It won’t matter after today, will it?  One way or the other.’  He nodded at the robust door they were approaching.  ‘Here we are.’  

     They were taken to a small ward housing half a dozen beds, all empty.  Three people were waiting for them; two guards and their prisoner.  

     Anders and Duthie didn’t know what to expect.  But the individual they were confronted with in no way matched any mental picture they might have had.  He was short and slightly built.  His nondescript features were mild and his hair was silvering.  He looked feeble.  If his grey prison dungarees had been swapped for an off-the-peg suit he could have passed for a middle-aged accountant with the Salvation Army.

     When they entered, he tried to stand up.  Not in an aggressive or threatening way, but rather in what seemed to be a show of politeness.  

     ‘Stay seated, Norman,’ the governor told him.

     The man complied meekly as the guards pushed him back into his chair.  

     ‘How are you today?’ Rotherton asked.

     ‘All the better for seeing you, sir.’

     ‘Would you mind if these two gentlemen were present for a few minutes?’

     ‘No, governor.  Whatever you say, sir.’  He gave Anders and Duthie a subservient glance.

     They looked on as Rotherton asked a series of questions and his prisoner replied 

unctuously.

     Before long they were back in the governor’s office.

     ‘I’m surprised neither of you seemed to recognise him,’ he said.  ‘Still, it was a long time ago.’

     ‘What was?’ Anders wondered.

     ‘He killed seven that they knew of.  The media had a feeding frenzy.  Must have injured as many warders over the years, several seriously.’  

     Anders and Duthie exchanged a look.  

     ‘Yeah, well, I’m glad I don’t remember.’

     ‘So what’s your verdict, Mister Anders?’

     Anders jabbed a thumb in the direction of the infirmary.  ‘That’s as clear a case of Submission exposure as I’ve ever seen.’

     ‘Ah.  So you’re definitely confirming it.’

     ‘On the basis of the man we’ve just seen, yes.  Now we need to get into that wing and find the fault.  Then we can have a crew come down to fix it.’

     ‘There’s no other way?’

     ‘What do you mean?’

     ‘As I said, things have never been calmer on that wing.  So … ’

     ‘Yes?’

     ‘Couldn’t we keep the leak going?  Just for the time being?’

     Anders stiffened.  ‘I’ll pretend you didn’t say that, Mister Rotherton.  Prisons are one of the few places we pipe submission, and its release is strictly controlled and monitored.  You’re asking me to break the law.’

     ‘Not so much
break
it as … turn a blind eye.  Just temporarily, to give us a breathing space.’  He sighed, something he obviously did a lot.  ‘I can see from your expression that you’re not keen.’

     ‘You could put it that way.  Now let’s talk about the evacuation.’

It was growing dark before Anders and Duthie got away.  The high security wing had been emptied, not without incident, and the fracture located.  They left the repair crew mending it.

     ‘Governor wasn’t too happy, was he?’ Duthie remarked.

     ‘No.’

     ‘But you can see his point of view, can’t you?’

     ‘Sure, and I feel for the poor bastard.  But rules are rules.  He should know that, of all people.’

     They passed a multiplex.  Crowds were queuing to buy tickets and inhale from facemasks in the lobby.  The array of dispensers were labelled with signs denoting ROMANCE, HORROR, ACTION, COMEDY, SCIENCE FICTION and several other genres.  The masks pumped out doses of Receptivity, each tailored to a particular film category.  But they didn’t cloud people’s critical faculties.  They enabled the viewer to see the intentions and artistry behind even the poorest efforts, so that comedy was funnier, adventure more intense, romance truly tear-jerking.  Cine purists hated receptivity essences as much as they loathed 3-D.

     ‘Doing anything special tonight, Bob?’ Anders asked.

     His assistant shrugged.  ‘Dunno.’

     Traffic was heavier as they got near the centre of town.  They slowed in a jam and crawled past a bar.  Early drinkers were exiting.  At the door a couple of bouncers 

manned cylinders of Sobriety, offering whiffs to the obviously inebriated as a lone policeman looked on.  That was to make sure they were offering only Sobriety and not an intoxicating essence, which was available illicitly whatever the law said.  A handful of customers hung back at the end of the line, prolonging their drunkenness for a few minutes longer.  

     ‘I think I know where I’ll be going after we knock off,’ Duthie amended.

He turned up bright and early for work next morning.  Either he hadn’t drunk to excess or the essence had purged it.  It made no odds.  Sobriety, like abstinence itself, didn’t leave a hangover.  

     Their day started routinely.  They were dispatched to a housing estate in one of the edgier neighbourhoods, in which certain distillates had been installed by court order.  The Obedience, Sociability, Cooperation and Fellowship essences had gone some way to lifting the estate’s reputation, but every so often somebody tried to cut off the supply.  Anders and Duthie were there to check on reports of tampering.

     By arrangement, a police van was parked in the estate’s central courtyard, where 

the odd blade of grass struggled through compacted mud and discarded crisp packets.  The pair of officers leaning against the side of the van, supposedly ready to help if needed, looked alternately bored and impatient.  One of them toyed with his Pacification spray.

     Anders and Duthie discovered that crude attempts had been made to interfere with the flow.  They marked them, did the paperwork and booked a maintenance crew.  Then Anders got a call and they moved on.  

     Their next job was at a shopping mall in a more salubrious part of town.  A department store within the mall had Civility on tap in its staff areas, which the employees had agreed to, as required by legislation, although they did it reluctantly.  Now the management wanted to pipe in Honesty, an even more contentious move.  Anders’ task was to assess the existing system to see whether new ducts could be incorporated, whatever he and Duthie thought about it.  For a couple of hours they 

suffered hostile looks from the workers.

     They were relieved when their next assignment came in.

     ‘Though it could be tricky,’ Anders reckoned, driving them out of the mall’s car park.

     ‘Tell me more,’ Duthie said.

     ‘We’re going to a bank.’

     ‘They’ve got a leak?’

     ‘It’s a bit more sensitive than that.’  

     ‘Meaning?’

     ‘You know about bootleg distillates.’

     ‘Course.  Never come across any though.’

     ‘How do you know?  Haven’t you ever wondered why a meal in a restaurant tasted so good?  Or how great the music sounded at a concert?  Didn’t it ever occur to you that one of the unlicensed essences might have been involved?’