Jaspre Bark - Dawn Over Doomsday

The whole place felt like a morgue or a hospice to Cortez. It wasn't anything specific he could put his finger on. It just felt like somewhere that people came to die.

They followed Greaves around a corner and walked straight into a wall. No doors, just a dead end. Greaves looked confused. He put his hands on the wall to see if it was real, then he looked back round the corner to check where they were. "This can't be right," he said. "This should lead to a flight of stairs. I memorised the whole map. I've got a photographic memory and perfect recall."

Anna turned and walked back down the corridor. "It's this way," she said. She was as confident and nonchalant as Greaves was flustered and confused.

"Wait," Greaves said. "Where are you going? You'll get us caught. You can't possibly know where we are."

Anna spoke in a calm voice. "I know exactly where to go. It's calling me. You might not understand this Mister Greaves, but every molecule in my body is alive with the sound of its need."

"Err, well… yes. Of course I understand. I've just never heard you talk this way before. We have to wait for this camera to go off then you better lead the way."

Cortez smiled. Greaves was not used to someone knowing more than him. Knowledge was how he kept control of things. Now they were in Anna's hands. They followed her back along the corridors and down two flights of stairs.

As they rounded a corner they heard footsteps coming towards them. Anna, Greaves and Cortez froze. Greaves glanced at his watch and then at the camera mounted just above them. He signaled that they had ten seconds until the camera came on.

The footsteps moved away and Cortez realised he had been holding his breath. Anna led them to a set of double doors. They looked impregnable. Beside them was a keypad.

Greaves inspected the keypad and nodded. "They never change," he said, smiling. "Doesn't matter what happens to the world, they use the same old security tricks. The code is a basic algorithm, with two variables determined by the number of the floor and the department. Now let's see…" Greaves started to tap away. He looked happier than Cortez had seen him in a while.

The double doors clicked then opened with a pneumatic hiss. Anna strode through them as if she was being pulled by some invisible force. Greaves was still tapping at the keypad which was now making a high pitched whining noise. Cortez was not certain if he should stay and look after Greaves or go and accompany Anna.

Greaves waved him on. "It's okay. You go after Anna. I just have to override and re-set all the codes. It's just a precaution. I won't be long." Cortez left him and hurried after Anna. She was marching past cages of rabbits, rats and mice.

The doors hissed shut behind him. Cortez hoped Greaves wouldn't need pulling out of the shit anytime soon. Right now he had to look out for Anna.

Greaves was going to do a number on their internal coding. They'd always underestimated him. That's how he'd gotten away and stayed one step ahead of them.

Using the keypad to access the whole complex's CPU, Greaves sent a counter command worming its way back through the system, changing the codes for every electronic lock in the place. It would take them three or four hours to isolate and countermand the code he'd set up, once they'd noticed. Until that time he was in control of every security door in the complex. That would hopefully give them the edge they needed to get out of the place with the virus.

Greaves punched in the new code and the doors hissed open once again. The code would change every two minutes, based on a cunning variation of the geometric theta progression. At the moment only Greaves knew what the code would be at any one time.

As Greaves stepped into the lab, he remembered a novel from a summer school he had attended in American Literature when he was thirteen. He was home from MIT and had no-one to play with. He didn't have any friends his own age and his fellow students were college kids, at best they thought him cute, at worst a victim for pranks. So his parents sent him on courses at the Massachusetts College of Liberal Arts during the vacation.

The novel was by Thomas Wolfe, its title was You Can't Go Home Again, which always had a special significance for Greaves, it seemed to sum up his own life. Up until this moment, when standing in the lab Greaves found suddenly he was 'home again'.

It all came flooding back to him. It was the sterile smells that did it, evoking a host of memories. His heart beat faster as he remembered the thrill of discovery. The methodical application of process and the intuitive teasing of a theorem from a growing set of results. Oh God he'd missed it.

For a second he thought he'd give anything to be back there. Making things happen, proving his theories, all of them. Proving to his father that he was more intelligent and he did have more ambition.

But that life was gone now. They'd stolen it from him, stolen his last chance to live out that dream. Now he was going to steal their prize discovery in return. Steal it and use it properly. This was his real destiny.

He hadn't realised it when he first joined their project. He was just glad to be back in research. But from the moment they employed him he was fated to take the virus and rebuild humanity.

Greaves was impressed by how well equipped the new labs were. Beyond the room with the caged creatures there were many fascinating bits of apparatus and technology. He was sorely tempted to take a quick tour of the whole facility but he didn't have time.

Anna would have gone straight to the virus. The biological imperative that now impelled her would override everything else in her brain. He had to find her and Cortez. They would need to be told how to remove the virus from containment and how to transport it out of the complex.

To his left Greaves saw a sign for a virology farm. There had been talk of creating such a facility when he had worked at the previous lab. An artificial environment in which the natural evolution of viral strains could be hot-housed and accelerated. Greaves couldn't resist taking a look, after all, it was on one of three routes to where the Doomsday Virus was contained.

He tapped the entrance code into a keypad and the door slid open. The temperature was much lower inside and there was a thin vapour of condensation in the air. Greaves peered through the mist and tried to make out the contents of the lab. Then, out of the corner of his eye, he saw a movement.

Greaves peered over to the other side of the room and was shocked to see a figure wearing a bio-hazard suit. He didn't realise he was at risk of infection. He hadn't expected the labs to be manned at this hour.

"What the hell are you doing here?" the figure demanded. "How did you get clearance? What's your command sector?" Greaves had been so confident the place would be empty that he didn't know how to respond. "Tell me your rank and centre number. Who sent you here?"

Greaves suddenly recognised the voice. It was Joe Black Feather, the Native American virologist. He'd never worked directly with the man, but he'd seen his work. He'd been through the man's results several times on audio file. Greaves just had to hold Joe where he was long enough to get through the other exit, then he could lock him in. The man didn't have the new codes to get out, so he could be contained.

"It's just a routine check," said Greaves. "Sinnot was surprised to see you working late and sent me to check if you were taking the customary precautions." Sinnot had been project leader when Greaves last worked for them. He dropped the name, hoping that would be enough to keep Joe quiet.

"Sinnot detailed me to this shift," said Joe. "Why would he be surprised to see me working late? Who are you and why would he send you? You're not even properly suited up. Don't you know there are live specimens in this room?"