Coldbrook

5

In some ways, Marc reminded Vic of a younger Jonah, though he looked nothing like him — Jonah was thin and wiry, Marc was heavily built and strong. But there was a grace about him, an inner strength. Perhaps knowing more about the world than most people gave him a peace of mind that many others lacked.

Vic stood in Marc’s office doorway and looked inside, and he was amazed. The room was piled high with loose-leaf files, sample jars, DVDs, books, and magazines and newspapers yellowing around their edges. A desk was pressed against the rear wall, and there was a small sofa with a coffee table in front of it, both of which were also homes to boxes of files and papers. Marc was at his desk, working on a laptop. Vic saw the satphone beside him and wondered whether the phone networks were still down.

‘You lied about the rabbits,’ Vic said.

‘Your daughter hates me now?’

‘No. She just wanted rabbits.’

‘Right.’ Marc continued what he was doing, and it was half a minute before he spoke again. ‘Come on in.’ He still did not look up.

Vic entered and stood awkwardly in front of the loaded sofa, looking around the room and smelling the mustiness of time. ‘You work in here?’

‘Only when someone releases a plague that threatens the world.’

‘Doesn’t happen much, then.’

‘Threw it together myself — well, paid to have it done. This used to be an old water-pumping station and its offices. A grey concrete block, so no one’s interested in it. And, because it’s remote from the university, Jonah always called it my bunker.’

‘So what’s it for?’

‘Times when I need somewhere private to work. Lots of personal stuff stored here that I wouldn’t want the university to see. And it’s a retreat. I wanted to be prepared, just in case something like this ever happened.’

‘And it has a helipad on the roof?’

Marc smiled. ‘Personal reasons.’ He tapped away on his machine for another minute, leaving Vic standing. Then he glanced over his shoulder, nodded at the sofa, and said, ‘Just dump all that on the floor.’

Vic cleared the sofa and sat down.

‘Your family resting?’

‘Yeah.’ He’d left Lucy and Olivia in the small room that they’d been assigned. Olivia had fallen fast asleep, and Lucy had said she was going to take a shower and change. Maybe she’d rest, maybe not. Vic had told her that he didn’t know how long he was going to be. She hadn’t replied.

Marc stood and stretched, then pulled open a drawer in his desk and produced a bottle of Knob Creek and two glasses. Vic couldn’t help smiling. So very much like Jonah.

‘This is being prepared?’ Vic asked. He couldn’t hold the implied criticism from his voice — he might be guilty, but he had never been meek.

Marc actually looked hurt. ‘Did it using my own funds. It isn’t the fucking President’s White House bunker, but yeah, it’s being prepared. There’s water and food to last several weeks, a lab and a communications room in the basement — which can be isolated, if needs must. Very secure from the outside. Air conditioning, hermetically sealed doors. . lots of other stuff.’ He waved one hand. ‘Don’t want to bore you.’ He handed Vic a glass, sat beside him on the sofa, and poured.

Vic took a grateful drink and winced as the bourbon burned its way down.

‘So what is it you do, exactly?’

‘Lots,’ Marc said. ‘But what’s pertinent to our current fucked-up situation is my research into disease vectors.’

‘You think this is a bug?’

‘Don’t you?’

Vic shrugged.

‘Just because people are using the word zombie,’ Marc said, ‘don’t go getting all spooked on me. I’ve spoken with Jonah, and he’s seen them first-hand. Killed a few of them himself. The body shuts down. The infection takes over their brain. And once we work out what the infection is, we might have a chance at a cure. Or an inoculation, at least.’

‘Body shuts down. Dead.’

‘Well. .’ Marc said, and Vic saw the first glimmer of doubt.

‘So you produce an inoculation — what about those who are already infected?’

Marc raised his eyebrows. ‘Not our priority, sad to say.’

Vic rested his head back against the sofa, changing the subject. ‘So who does the chopper on the roof belong to?’

‘A friend of mine.’

‘You’re shitting me.’

‘No, really,’ Marc said. ‘I do have friends.’

‘I should tell Jonah I’m here,’ Vic said. ‘Update him. See what he’s doing down there. He said he was alone, the only survivor.’ And I worry for him, Vic wanted to say. But after everything he’d done, that sounded so trite.

‘Jonah’s a hard motherfucker,’ Marc said. ‘His father worked in a coal mine, he ever tell you that? Fifty-two years. And every day of Jonah’s childhood, his father said he was working down there so Jonah didn’t have to do the same thing. His sense of worth comes from that, and his honour, and a lot of his attitude. Then when poor Wendy died. .’ Marc shook his head and poured more bourbon. ‘Something on your mind?’ he asked.

Vic frowned and looked around the room, trying to grab hold of the thought that had been circling his consciousness for the last half an hour. Marc’s perception was sharp and, though they hadn’t exactly hit it off, it felt good to be around someone he couldn’t hide anything from. It meant that Marc was in control.

‘Something’s bugging me,’ Vic said, closing his eyes and rubbing them.

‘Your trip up here? Radio reports? Something you saw on the way?’

‘Jesus!’ Vic said. He closed his eyes and had it. So obvious! ‘They were completely still.’

‘Huh?’

Vic jumped up and pointed to the computer. ‘Those images, that military site. Bring them up again.’

‘You saw something I didn’t?’ Marc said. But he tapped at the computer and brought up the site, and Vic reached past him and clicked on a film clip taken from a low-flying helicopter. They both watched for a couple of minutes, neither of them commenting, and Vic was starting to think he’d been imagining things. Then he saw it.

He leaned across Marc and hit pause.

‘Here,’ he said, pointing at one of the zombies in the crowd of afflicted people. ‘A woman. She’s lost an arm and has abdominal wounds. Run over, maybe. But while all the others are running and doing whatever they can to reach. .’ He pointed below the screen, where a crashed camper van was out of shot. ‘She’s doing something different.’

He hit play again. The woman stood motionless. The only movement was her head, turning left and right as a dozen other zombies raged past her, running as fast as their injuries would allow towards the camper. Some of them fell as the occupants of the crashed vehicle fired, then she too crumpled.

‘Didn’t see a bullet hit her,’ Marc said.

‘That’s because she wasn’t shot. She was watching, that’s all. Observing.’

‘Why?’ Marc asked.

‘Don’t know. Pacifist zombie?’

‘Call Jonah,’ Marc said. ‘Tell him. I’ll patch in on my phone.’

As Vic dialled he thought, This has only just begun.