Apocalypse Cow (23 page)

Why didn’t we get those last night instead of tennis racquets?
Lesley thought.

‘Anything to report, soldier?’ she asked.

Terry shrugged. ‘Some scratching, scrabbling. A few big thumps and grunts. I decided it was best not to look.’

Terry unfolded his legs, which were still clad in the nasty purple trousers. Not that she was in a position to criticize. She had been forced to raid Fanny’s wardrobe for night clothes
and
was wearing a purple T-shirt and a pair of voluminous orange cotton trousers with dragons curling mystically up each leg. While Lesley would normally never be seen dead in new-age trousers, never mind a dead woman’s new-age trousers, they were the only piece of clothing suitable for sleeping that did not bear the ghostly imprint of Fanny’s camel toe – a reminder of sartorial inelegance from beyond the grave that Lesley could live without.

‘I take it from the fact you didn’t come staggering downstairs pouring blood from multiple bite wounds that James didn’t catch the virus,’ Terry remarked.

Lesley didn’t get the chance to tell Terry there were far worse things that could happen to a woman.

‘Of course he didn’t catch it,’ a weak voice said. ‘It isn’t designed to pass to humans.’

Lesley whirled round. Constance’s eyes were open and she was trying to raise herself onto an elbow. Terry rushed over and helped her, prompting body-racking groans.

‘How you feeling?’ Terry asked.

Constance smoothed down her hair and squinted at Terry. ‘Terrible. You’re an awful doctor. But if you were to bring me a glass of water, I could forgive you.’

Terry filled a glass from the tap and handed it over to Constance. She took a few big gulps, and then let loose a hacking cough. Flecks of blood dotted the glass. Terry and Lesley exchanged looks.

The professor examined the glass and smiled sadly. ‘My own fault, I suppose.’ She beckoned Lesley closer. ‘I have something for you.’ She pointed to her leather satchel, which had been stuffed into Fanny’s bookcase. ‘Fetch me my bag, if you wouldn’t mind.’

Lesley stared at the satchel and mentally kicked herself. She had forgotten all about it. Colin would have emptied it out days ago and picked through every item, looking for evidence. Not only that, there might be more fags in it: she had smoked the last of the stolen packet days ago and had been sucking on charred matchsticks to ward off her cravings. She brought the bag over to Constance, who rummaged inside.

‘I had planned to get this out by myself. That’s not going to happen now.’ Constance held up a tiny 64GB USB flash drive in one frail, shaking hand. The stubby neon-pink device was shockingly bright in comparison with Constance’s skin, which was a deathly grey.

‘All the essential project data are on here,’ Constance continued. ‘Technical data, minutes, emails from government officials, everything you need.’

Lesley took the drive, turning it over in her hand. She didn’t believe in God, or fate, or karma, yet here, in a device no bigger than her finger, was everything she needed to turn her into a famous journalist. She was suddenly seized with the certainty she was meant to get the story out. She had buggered up royally, proved again and again she was the worst kind of hack, yet here she was being handed another chance. Lesley, driven by the lack of any pockets in the trousers, tucked the drive into her bra, next to her suddenly racing heart.

‘So what exactly is this project then?’ Terry asked.

‘Biological warfare,’ Constance said. ‘We were just one of dozens of research teams working on weapons. Our task was to engineer a virus that would attack the food chain.’

‘Why the food chain?’ he asked.

‘Lots of reasons: economic damage, political destabilization,
destroying
another country’s cattle herd so they would be forced to buy British beef.’

‘If it’s aimed at the food chain, why do they attack people?’ Lesley asked.

Constance perked up a little, and answered with another question. ‘Tell me, what is our greatest driving force?’

‘Getting to the top of the property ladder?’ Terry suggested.

‘Very droll, but no. Procreation. Passing on our genes. Ensuring the survival of our species. Let me ask you another question. Why do people sneeze when they have a cold? What purpose does the sneeze serve for the virus?’

Lesley bit her lower lip and looked at Constance, who rolled her hand in encouragement.

‘To pass itself on, survive,’ Lesley ventured.

‘Exactly! The animals may look and act angry, but they are simply tools for this virus to multiply. Once that is achieved, and we supercharged the virus so it happens quickly, the host no longer has an interest in attacking. So, one infected animal won’t attack another, unless it is for food. People can’t be infected, so the animal will attack until there is nothing left but scraps.’

‘That doesn’t explain why they want to shag you as well,’ Terry said.

Constance looked down. When she spoke, her voice was hoarse. ‘We were playing with multiple transmission methods: airborne, bodily fluids and so on. We put them all in to start with: they have sores to help the virus get out, they sneeze, they try to get it directly into the bloodstream by attacking. And yes, the males can try to pass it on through intercourse.’

‘That’s pervy,’ Terry said.

‘I told you: it was still experimental.’

‘More like just mental,’ Terry muttered.

‘Well, it wasn’t my idea,’ Constance retorted, briefly recovering a little fire. ‘My colleagues – all male, might I add – thought it was funny.’

‘Are you sure it can’t infect humans?’ Lesley asked.

‘It wasn’t designed to transfer to people, or birds for that matter. They’re too mobile. The government wanted a virus that could be released into an enemy country and stay there.’

‘There’s no way it could mutate?’ Terry asked.

Constance sipped her water, prompting another bout of coughing and more blood. ‘We hadn’t tested it in the field. To be honest, none of us ever expected it to be used. We were treating it as an academic exercise.’

‘So my mates are dead because of an academic exercise?’ Terry asked.

He leaned closer to Constance, and Lesley tensed. He looked as though he was going to finish the old biddy off himself. Instead, he simply took the glass, now empty, and placed it on the floor.

‘I’m sorry,’ Constance said. ‘Nobody wanted this to happen.’

They sat in grim silence until Lesley, who had relaxed and returned to her cross-legged position on the floor, said, ‘Will the virus kill the animals, or can it just go away on its own, like the flu?’

‘It won’t go away, but it won’t necessarily kill them either. There are many viruses people live with their whole lives – herpes for example.’

‘Are you saying the animals that have it won’t die?’ Terry asked.

‘No. The virus doesn’t make them invulnerable. It just jazzes up the nervous system, makes them ignore pain in much the same way that PCP does.’

‘PCP?’

‘Angel dust, I believe, was the street name. You must remember the stories about addicts in the US punching through car windows to steal handbags. They were able to do so because their pain receptors were suppressed. It’s the same with the animals. They can be killed. It just takes longer for them to understand they are dead.’

‘Like the cow in the abattoir,’ Terry said, his face grim.

‘So why hasn’t the army cleaned up yet?’ Lesley asked.

‘I would expect they are trying,’ Constance replied. ‘You would have to firebomb every square inch of the country, including the sewers, to eradicate every infected animal. Don’t believe for a minute that won’t happen here either.’

‘What? You mean we could be fried?’

Constance shrugged then winced in quick succession. ‘I don’t doubt the option is on the table. If you’re concerned about possible mutation, then you can be sure people with access to heavy weaponry are too.’

‘Great. Murderous animals and trigger-happy generals. Anything else we should be worried about?’ Lesley asked.

‘I have a vague recollection of hitting Brown with my car. I don’t suppose it killed him?’

Terry shook his head.

There was a long silence as Constance, whose breathing had grown shallower, seemed to muster the strength to speak.

‘Then you have a bigger problem,’ she said. She peered around the living room. ‘Where are we? I hope you weren’t foolish enough to go home.’

‘We’re staying with my cousin’s friend,’ Terry replied.

‘Then Brown will find you.’

‘He’s not a real cousin.’

‘That should buy you some time, but he will come. How long have we been here?’

‘Four days.’

Talking was clearly now a major effort for Constance, blood-flecked lips barely moving as she spoke.

‘Then I suggest you get moving. He won’t stop until you’re all dead, do you understand? Your only chance is to get the evidence out of the country and go public. Then they can’t touch you.’

Constance reached out a shaking hand to Lesley, who moved closer, only for the hand to grasp her T-shirt and yank her forward with surprising strength. ‘Promise me you’ll get the evidence out. We deserve to suffer for what we did.’

‘I promise,’ Lesley said.

Constance released her grip and fell back. Either she was satisfied with the answer or she was about to pop her clogs. She let out a wet, hacking cough. Blood, thick and dark, oozed over her bottom lip. Her hand fell limp onto her chest.

‘Is she dead?’ Terry asked.

Lesley bent over to listen to Constance’s chest. ‘I think so, poor old biddy.’

‘I heard that,’ Constance said weakly, then died properly.

The remaining adults, at least those who weren’t lying in a coma with drool on their chin, as James had been when Lesley checked on him mid-morning, sat around the kitchen table at lunch, spooning kidney beans and rice into their
mouths
. The children had elected to eat their makeshift meal upstairs, away from the corpse.

Through the kitchen door, Lesley could see Constance’s feet sticking out of the sheet Terry had covered her with. Her big toe, painted the same shade of pink her lips had been before they were stained with blood, protruded from a hole in her tights. Lesley’s mother had always warned her against wearing ancient underwear or hosiery with holes in it, just in case she got knocked down by a bus and then had to suffer the embarrassment of presenting her scabby gusset to the mortuary attendant. Constance had seemed so proper, just like her mum. Lesley was sure lying dead in a room full of strangers with an exposed toe would upset her, so she got up and pulled the sheet down. This made her feel slightly less guilty about raking through the satchel half an hour after Constance had died and appropriating the packet of cigarettes she found in there. She came back into the kitchen in time to see David throw down his spoon. It bounced off the table and clattered to the floor.

‘This is disgusting,’ he barked. He pushed back his chair and crossed to the window to peer into the garden, where the bodies of the squirrels were still strewn across the grass. ‘What do you think fried squirrel would taste like?’

At first Lesley thought he was joking, but his voice was soft and serious, as though he were talking to himself.

‘Probably chicken,’ he mumbled. ‘Everything tastes like chicken. Even hamster.’

‘They were infected, remember?’ Lesley told him.

David didn’t reply.

‘We need to talk about what we’re going to do,’ Terry said. ‘I agree with David that we can’t keep living on tinned beans.’

Smart
, Lesley thought.
Make it seem like someone else’s idea
.

Terry and Lesley had already conducted a quiet discussion in the toilet earlier and decided to leave – although where to, they had no clear idea. Even without the threat of Brown, there seemed little point staying put and hoping the cavalry would arrive with a bottle of wine, five roast chickens and tiramisu for dessert. Lesley touched her bra, reassuring herself the flash drive was still there. She had wanted to pack and leave immediately. Terry had refused to go without at least inviting the others. His selflessness was admirable, although not so admirable that Lesley shared it. She was hoping the others would elect to stay. A smaller group could move faster.

‘Not to mention we also have a dead body to deal with,’ Terry continued. ‘That’s a hygiene problem right there.’

He paused, waiting for somebody else to speak. Mary just kept munching her rice and beans and David kept staring out of the window.

Ah well
, Lesley thought.
So much for diplomacy
.

‘We should make a run for it,’ she declared.

‘Make a run for it?’ David responded, without turning. ‘To where, exactly? And how? Our trip to the supermarket wasn’t exactly a glorious fucking success.’

Lesley opened her mouth. Terry nudged her under the table with his foot.

‘Let’s think this through,’ he said. ‘Our first problem is what to do with the professor. We can’t just leave her there.’

‘We can put her in the garden,’ Mary suggested.