Ken McClure: The Lazarus Strain

Giles knocked on the door but predictably there was no response. He turned the handle and looked inside. The room was empty and appeared to be undamaged although untidy with masses of files and papers arranged in piles on the desk and floor.

‘Looks like the Prof had already left when these bastards appeared on the scene,’ said Smith.

‘I hope so for his sake,’ said Giles. ‘It wouldn’t have been much fun watching your lab being smashed up before your eyes.’

‘This’ll break his heart,’ said Smith.

The sound of wheels on gravel heralded the arrival of two police patrol cars, followed a few moments later by a Fire Brigade biohazard team. Giles filled them in on the situation and suggested that everyone wait for Cleary who could apprise them of any likely danger. They didn’t have long to wait. Giles was explaining the situation to Smith when a green Land Rover Discovery swung in through the gates and a tall, fair-haired man in his thirties got out.

‘I’m Nick Cleary. What a bloody mess!’

‘Well, they haven’t been too shy about stating their views, I’ll give you that,’ said Giles as he watched Cleary turn his head this way and that to read the daubing on the walls. ‘Mr Smith thought there might be an element of danger about going inside although we have checked out Professor Devon’s room just in case he was still here.’

Cleary looked surprised so Giles added, ‘The professor told Mr Smith he was coming in to work this morning.’

‘Ah,’ said Cleary. ‘Not too surprising I suppose. He seems to work all the hours there are these days.’

‘About the danger…’ began Giles.

‘We do work with pathogenic microbes,’ said Cleary. ‘Several. The viruses are kept in a locked deep freeze in bio-lab 3. The lab itself is locked and the doors are air-tight. Pathogenic bacteria are kept in freeze-dried vials in a safe in the same lab.’

‘Windows?’

‘No windows in the bio-lab. It’s an inside room with a filtered air supply under negative pressure,’ replied Cleary.

‘Then we should check out the integrity of that room first,’ said Giles. ‘Perhaps you could brief the bio-hazard team on its location in the building?’

‘I’ll go in with them if you like,’ said Cleary.

‘You should talk to the Fire Chief.’

‘I’ll do that.’

‘Before you do, what bugs are we talking about here, sir?’ asked Giles.

‘Maybe we can leave off worrying about that until we see if there’s a problem?’ said Cleary.

Giles nodded his understanding. ‘But if you find security of either of the microbial stores has been breached…’

‘The public will have a right to know. You’re quite right. But if that’s the case I suspect the matter will be taken out of both our hands.’

‘A comfort,’ said Giles. ‘There’s another problem: we had reports earlier today about monkeys being on the loose in this part of the country…’

‘Jesus,’ said Cleary. ‘They let the monkeys out?’

‘Liberated them is how they would see it. Perhaps you could advise us of the risk involved?’

‘I don’t use primates myself; that was Tim Devon’s province and the room was always kept locked. But I don’t think he had any animal experiments running. Chances are they are perfectly healthy monkeys although that’s not to say they can’t be dangerous. You can get a very nasty bite.’

‘Someone already did,’ said Giles. ‘But you don’t think there would be any other hazard involved?’

‘I can’t be absolutely sure; you’d really have to ask Tim that. Have you managed to contact him yet?’

‘Not yet. Sergeant Morley is still trying.’

Cleary went off to talk to the Fire chief and Giles found Morley. ‘Any luck?’ he asked.

‘Still no answer,’ said Morley.

‘Shit,’ muttered Giles. ‘I’m beginning to think we should hit the panic button on this one.’

‘Why?’

‘To guard our arses. I’m beginning to see “Police Delay Puts Public at Risk.” headlines.

‘You think the monkeys were infected with something?’

‘The trouble is we don’t know for sure and Devon seems to be the only one who can tell us.’

‘I’ll keep trying.’

‘I’m going to give him until they’ve examined the microbial stocks. Even if the stores are intact, if we still haven’t made contact with Devon I’m going to blow the whistle.’

Giles and Morley returned to the car to wait.

‘What happens if they do find the virus store has been breached?’ asked Morley. They were watching the bio-hazard team make last minute adjustments to each other’s suits before trooping in single file into the institute. Giles noted that Cleary was with them.

‘Depends on what bugs they’ve been storing there,’ said Giles, ‘and what their characteristics are. Some viruses are highly infectious, others not. Some are stable in air, others are not. Some diseases are contracted by breathing in the virus, others you have to ingest them. All these things have to be taken in to consideration. At least that’s what they said on the course… Personally, I’m a run-for-the-hills man.’

‘Surely a place like this wouldn’t be working with anything really bad. I mean, smallpox or plague or anthrax, anything like that?’

‘There’s not much point in designing vaccines against harmless things,’ countered Giles.

‘But surely if they were working with dangerous bugs they’d have better security, wouldn’t they? Fences… guards on the gates.’

‘Let’s not take that for granted.’

‘So this could turn into a real nightmare?’

‘Let’s just say our best chance of avoiding such a nightmare lies in the microbe stores being intact and everything in them being present and correct.’

‘Looks like we’re just about to find out,’ said Morley as the first of the bio-hazard team appeared in the doorway. Both men got out of the car.

He saw cause for optimism when one of the team waved away the men responsible for operating the mobile shower and decontamination facility. ‘It’s looking good.’

It was obvious that the bio-hazard team were relaxed when they removed their helmets; they were laughing and joking with each other.

Giles approached Nick Cleary who grinned and said, ‘They didn’t get through the door to BL3. Everything was secure. Mind you they’ve made an appalling mess of the rest of the place. It’s going to take months to get back to normal. Any word from Prof Devon yet?’

‘Still nothing. Did you check the animals?’

‘No, I thought we’d better come straight back and tell you folks about the microbe situation.’

Giles nodded. ‘Maybe we could take a look at the animal house now? See what’s missing.’

Still wearing his bio-hazard suit but without the helmet and visor Cleary led the way along the corridor and down some stairs into the experimental animal facility. As they came to the first door Cleary said, ‘This is the mouse house.’ He looked in through the glass window set in the door and cursed under his breath.

Giles looked in to see chaos. Several stacked columns of mouse boxes had been pushed over on to their sides, spilling their occupants out on to the floor. Mice were clambering over everything, investigating everything and nothing, their fur matted with wet sawdust and blood from cuts sustained from the glass water feeding bottles that had been smashed on the floor. ‘Will this cause big set-backs?’ he asked.

‘All the experiments running will be ruined,’ replied Cleary. ‘We can’t possibly tell which mouse came from which box.’

They moved on to the next room. ‘Same mess here,’ said Cleary. ‘Guinea pigs all out of their cages.’

Giles counted some thirty guinea pigs on a floor littered with animal feed and sawdust: many of their wire cages had been deformed by being smashed against the wall and jumped on, judging by a number that had been flattened. ‘But they didn’t release anything into the wild,’ he said.