Philip Hemplow: Sarcophagus

Osterberg blew through his lips. “There is no time for fireproofing. I have told them to spray the structural supports with fibre plaster in the low-risk areas, but it will do little. We have dismantled our equipment from the roof, and the winches are in position—but they still have no power. I have sent the helicopter to collect heavy power cable. We did not have enough to join them to the supply.”

That, at least, sounded promising. Once the giant winches had power, they would ease the Carapace down the railway tracks to dock with the reactor. The 200 metre journey would take five hours, with Wolfgang watching the winch gauges like a hawk for any sign of torque.

“Where’s Swan?” It suddenly occurred to Victoria that the American was conspicuous by his absence. She would have expected him to be busily interfering, countermanding Osterberg’s instructions and generally being obnoxious.

“He is sleeping,” replied Osterberg, with a grim smile.

“Thank God for that. I think he was cracking up.”

“I gave him four milligrams of lorazepam. That will keep him asleep for a few hours, then he should sleep naturally until morning.”

“I’m amazed he took them,” admitted Victoria. “He wasn’t being very agreeable last time I saw him.”

“He didn’t have much choice. I got two of the men to hold him down, and injected it into his buttock.” Osterberg lit a cigarette, challenging her with his eyes.

“You medicated him against his will?” Victoria was incredulous. “Can you even do that?”

“Of course. I am a doctor and he needed it. And he was a problem: he was upsetting the men. Babbling about pyramids and demons and legends. When he wakes up, the helicopter must fly him to Kiev so he can be treated properly. And you must go with him.”

“I’ll go to Kiev once the Carapace is in position and the Geiger counters are in the green, Wolfgang. It’s my job to be here.”

“Victoria, please.” Osterberg clamped a hand on her shoulder. “This is not a place to be making decisions. Give yourself a choice. Look after yourself. Go back to London, then decide what to do.”

“You’re talking about me being pregnant, right?” Victoria could feel her anger rising again. “Wolfgang, it’s got nothing to do with you. Okay, I might keep it. I probably won’t. I might have lost it already, it’s far too early to say. I might give it up for adoption. Or maybe I’ll give up all this crap, and move to a pretty little market town in the country, and be a single mother, and join the PTA and the WI, and spend all day watching television and making jam—but none of those things are going to happen before this place is secure, and I can walk away with a clean conscience.”

“And if we can’t move it in time? If the storm hits, and the roof collapses, and we have a big cloud of radioactive schmutz everywhere? What then, Victoria? What if the uranium flashes to critical?”

“Then it will still be my job to be here. Let’s just make sure it doesn’t come to that, right? All right?”

Osterberg was quiet for a moment, his expression unreadable, then he laughed ruefully. “You are a stubborn bloody woman, Dr Cox,” he informed her. “It is your best attribute, and very irritating. Yosyp has some coffee in the server room. It seems the kettle is the only thing in there that still works, shall we—"

He was interrupted by a squall of shouts from the workmen high above. They looked up, and Victoria’s hand flew to her mouth.

One of the men had torn off his safety harness and was wrapping it around his neck, screaming, as the others scrambled towards him along the narrow roof beams. Victoria felt her stomach flip as he tugged it tight and then, before the others could get to him, rolled off into space.

A sickening crack echoed around the gigantic vault as his cervical vertebrae snapped. There were shocked shouts from the other workers. The hanged man was not struggling, his limbs splayed and rigid as he swayed hideously beneath the girder.

Victoria felt suddenly weak and hypoglycaemic—had to fight to stop her knees from buckling. She would have liked to sink to the ground and perhaps weep, but a glance at Osterberg told her that she was going to have to be stronger than that. Someone was going to have to take charge, and the German was in no state to do it. Ashen-faced, his mouth moved silently as he tried to blink away the sight of the swinging body above. His hands clenched and unclenched hopelessly, and when he turned to Victoria his eyes expressed nothing but defeat.

He mumbled something, but she didn’t catch it. Holding his arm, she leaned closer.

“Still alive” he repeated. “He’s—still alive.”

Victoria did her best to supervise the workers as they retrieved the hanged man and hauled him back to the comparative safety of the scaffold, giving them directions by walkie-talkie. It took nearly two hours to safely convey him back to ground level and into the back of a VV troop carrier. Osterberg was right, he was still alive, but only barely. A perfunctory pinprick test suggested that he would never move voluntarily again.

Once the APC had roared off into the night, presumably taking him to a hospital, she went to find Osterberg. She had sent him to the server room to stay warm. The attempted suicide of another worker had seemingly been one tragedy too many—had been enough to break him. In all the years she had known him she had never seen that look of surrender on his face. It was already haunting her. Fighting her own despondency and exhaustion, she rode the scissor lift up to the little hut and let herself in.

Osterberg was staring at his reflection in a dead computer screen. Yosyp, the computer engineer, was there, too, playing a game on some kind of handheld console. Both of them were silent. Victoria could tell that Osterberg wasn’t going to respond to cajoling or pep-talks. She decided to round on Yosyp instead, as the easier target. Maybe that would elicit a reaction from Osterberg, something she could work with.

“Shouldn’t you be working on fixing these computers, rather than playing games?” she suggested, glaring down at the Ukrainian. He glanced at her, then went back to playing.

“They cannot be fixed. So, I play game.”

“Well, then, why didn’t you get new parts? New computers? I’m sure Dr Osterberg made clear how vital they are, so why are you just sitting on your damned arse?”

“Please, Victoria,” sighed Osterberg, closing his eyes.

Yosyp bridled, but carried on stubbornly pushing sticks and buttons on the handheld. “I did get all new parts. New parts break down, too. All the programming torn to shreds, turned into junk. I have told Dr Osterberg I think it is a specialist virus, like ones the Americans use on Iranian nuclear equipment.”

“I don’t know anything about that. You’re talking about sabotage?”

“I think someone does not want our computers to work, yes.”

“Well, that’s ridiculous. And it’s a lazy answer. You’ve got the rest of the night to try to get them working, so I suggest that you do whatever you can. And, if you’ve already tried everything—try it again! Dr Osterberg, I’d like to update you on the injured man’s condition. Can we please go downstairs? Wolfgang!” She stood, silently demanding a response until his head finally turned towards her. “Can we talk a walk, please?”

Osterberg nodded reluctantly and hauled himself to his feet. He suddenly looked so very old, so drained, that she had to stop herself from going to help him up. Maybe that was what happened. Maybe one day you just crossed a threshold and became old. Gave up, surrendered to entropy—and why not? Why not just damn all the distractions and all the sophistry, and face the darkness with a grin? Let the abyss take a good, long look. Stare past the mirror, and just erode away into the emptiness. No more stress. No more ticking clocks. No more worrying what any of it was for…