Blood Roots: Are the roots strong enough to save the pandemic survivors? (8 page)

From the safety of
AWOL
’s companionway Mark looked nervously in both directions. Once satisfied no one was in sight he scrambled into the cockpit, pulled the yacht against the harbour wall with the stern-line and clambered onto the walkway.

Keen to direct attention away from the harbour area he headed inland towards Balboa Park. As he ran he realised that in his haste to leave
AWOL
he had forgotten his rifle. He dared not go back. He cursed San Diego’s grid system of long, straight, wide streets and found himself constantly glancing over his shoulder.

He heard his pursuers long before he saw them. In the absence of the drone of traffic the sound of hooves clattering on roadways echoed off empty buildings. He picked up his pace and turned alternately left and right at each intersection in a desperate attempt to stay out of sight.

Reaching the undergrowth at the edge of Balboa Park he paused to catch his breath. Through the bushes he spotted Hank and Brad.
They had halted their horses about four hundred yards away. Brad had earphones on and held an aerial above his head.

A few hundred yards into the park, running along a shallow gully, he noticed a drain grille. He stooped to drop the anklets through but, hearing running water below, he grabbed a nearby branch and after several attempts finally managed to lever off the cover. Then he slipped the anklets over the branch and dropped it into the water.

As the branch was swept from view he caught a brief glimpse of the riders through the undergrowth.

‘They’re very close,’ Brad shouted as he carefully swung the aerial backwards and forwards. Hank, holding his weapon at the ready, brought his horse to rest beside Brad’s. Mark cursed the time he had spent struggling to lever off the drain grille. They were now so close he dared not stand and run away, so he crawled nervously through the undergrowth.

‘This equipment’s telling me they’re directly underneath me,’ Brad said a few seconds later. He was angry at the apparent malfunction and gave the receiving set a thump with his closed fist. ‘They’ve got to be close by. Let’s circle around and find them.’

Brad’s horse began heading directly towards Mark’s hiding place. He had readied himself to stand and raise his hands above his head when Hank’s voice called, ‘I bet they’re hiding down this drain.’

Brad swung his horse around and Mark watched, relieved, as both horsemen dismounted. He crept further up the gully only to find the undergrowth petered out. He was trapped.

‘Crafty bitches,’ he heard Hank mutter.

Brad wasn’t amused. He poked his head into the drain and yelled. ‘Right, up you come.’

Nothing happened.

Brad lowered his head again and yelled angrily, ‘Are you coming up or am I coming down to get you?’ When still there was no reply, he shrieked, ‘If you don’t get up here right away you’ll regret it.’

He withdrew his head and said to Hank, ‘We’ll give them a damn good thrashing when we get them out.’

Hank laughed. ‘We’ll give them a damned good something else.’

‘We’ll give them that and
then
give them a damned good thrashing.’

Impatient for the sport that lay ahead, Hank lowered himself into the drain and disappeared from view. A minute later his voice echoed through the entrance. ‘It’s frigging dark down here.’

Eventually he re-emerged. ‘God knows where they are. The drain slopes downhill and the water level rises to the roof. I couldn’t get any further along.’

Brad walked over to his horse, picked up his antenna and began to move slowly backwards and forwards through the undergrowth. Finally, after much toing and froing he announced, ‘The bitches are holed up directly below.’

‘What now?’ Hank demanded.

Brad glanced at his watch. ‘I need to get back to Date Street. There’ll be two clients arriving shortly, and I’ll have to pacify the guys coming in for the next two sessions. I’ll come back with shovels as soon as I’ve taken care of that, and we’ll dig the bitches out.’

‘How do I know you won’t double-cross me?’

‘I’m hardly going to double-cross you, am I? I need them back as much as you do.’ Brad twiddled the knobs on his receiver. ‘I’ve set the equipment to sound an alarm if they move more than five yards,’ he explained. He walked a few yards and the alarm sounded, gaining in volume the further he went. As soon as he retraced his steps the alarm stopped. He put the equipment on the ground. ‘That’s where they are,’ he said, pointing. ‘Just sit tight and wait till I get back. If the alarm sounds, just move the equipment around till the noise stops. That way you’ll be able to follow them if they move.’

Mark watched, relieved, as Brad rode off. But there was still no opportunity for him to escape. Twice he thought Hank had fallen asleep, but each time as he prepared to creep away, the man stirred.

It was almost dark by the time Brad arrived back. He was carrying torches, shovels and dynamite. He picked up the receiver and moved it a few yards. The alarm sounded again. Satisfied, he returned the equipment and handed Hank the second shovel. As they commenced digging, Mark crawled away on his belly.

It was dark by the time he arrived back at
AWOL
. There was a good offshore breeze and he was both surprised and relieved to find Fergus had not obeyed his order to sail as soon as it was dark.

As he jumped down into
AWOL
’s cockpit with a thump, Fergus stuck his head through the companionway hatch and began removing the washboards. ‘Thank God,’ he said, the relief evident in his voice. ‘We thought you’d been captured.’

‘Then what are you still doing here? This breeze is perfect and there’s cloud cover. Let’s get going.’

‘Julie and the other women are refusing to leave.’

In a state of great agitation, Mark hurried down the companionway. Fergus replaced the washboards and turned on the red night lights, which illuminated the cabin and cast eerie shadows on the bulkhead. Mark noticed that all the hatches and windows had cardboard taped over the insides.
AWOL
seemed extremely crowded.

Jane sat at one end of the saloon table with Zach, Nicole and Audrey. On the other side of the table were crammed Jessica and the other children. The three San Diego women, Julie, Anne and Louise, were sitting on the couch opposite. With all seating taken, Fergus stood leaning against the bulkhead.

Mark stood at the foot of the companionway ladder, confronting them. ‘What the hell do you mean you won’t go?’ he asked. ‘Have you any idea what Hank and Brad have in store for you?’

‘I won’t go without my partner,’ Julie said.

‘Your what?’

‘Her partner,’ Fergus explained ‘Rick Hoff. Turns out Brad’s group are the crew of a nuclear sub. They’ve got the sub tied up alongside the old aircraft carrier
Midway
. They’re using the sub as a power source and the carrier as accommodation. It’s like a floating city apparently.’

Mark turned to Julie. ‘And your partner Rick’s on the
Midway?
’

‘Yes, he’s the captain’s steward.’

‘What time’s he off watch?’

‘He’s never off watch. He’s on call twenty-four hours a day.’

Fergus interrupted. ‘It gets worse. He’s not a member of the crew
at all. He’s a prisoner, a Chatfield, another one of our relatives. They lock him in the brig every night.’

‘And you expect us to try to rescue him from a locked brig!’

‘Of course she expects you to try to rescue him,’ Jane said. ‘Would you leave without Mum — or Allison?’

‘We’re going to have to try and snatch him,’ Fergus agreed.

‘Or we’re going to have to leave Julie behind,’ Mark retorted angrily.

‘We’re not leaving her or any other Chatfields behind,’ Jessica said defiantly. A chorus of agreement swept through the cabin. The tables had turned. Now Mark wanted to get out of San Diego and the others were insisting on staying.

He turned to Julie. ‘How the hell do you expect us to get him out of the brig?’

‘I know my way around the
Midway
. And I know how to get aboard without being seen. Brad takes me in to see the captain every Sunday night. He takes me a secret way, so the rest of the crew don’t know I’m there.’

‘Why?’

‘The hypocritical bastard captain’s a so-called Christian,’ she spat. ‘Holier than thou as far as his crew is concerned. Truth is, he’s worse than they are.’

‘So how does Brad get you aboard without the crew knowing?’

‘We go up the old visitor exit gantry rather than through the visitor entrance the rest of the crew uses. There’s a padlock at the top of the gantry which Brad has a key to.’

‘And I suppose the brig is locked too?’ Mark said, stroking his chin as he grappled with the problem.

She bowed her head. ‘Yes, Brad has a key to the padlock to the cell. He lets me have a few minutes alone with Rick in return for special favours later.’

Fergus ducked into the forepeak. ‘These will do the trick,’ he said as he returned, holding up the bolt cutters. ‘I’m sure I’ll be able to get the padlocks off.’

‘I’ll be getting the padlocks off myself,’ Mark said grumpily. ‘The
policy is the same. I’m prepared to risk myself — and Julie will have to take her chances with me — but if anything goes wrong the rest of you have to get the hell out of here. The more I hear, and the more I see, the less happy I am with the children being at risk. I want
AWOL
away from San Diego tonight, with or without Julie, me and Rick.’ There was finality in his voice. He turned his attention to Julie. ‘What time will it be safe to go aboard
Midway?
’

‘There’s some form of sporting event on the hangar deck most nights. Then there’s the bar. But there’s never anyone about when Brad takes me aboard at one in the morning.’

‘What about security?’

‘There’s an armed guard at the top of the crew gangway and security cameras on the wharf but I know how to get to the exit gantry without being seen.’

Mark pondered the situation for a few seconds.

‘Right, Julie and I will make our way towards the
Midway
at midnight and get in position. Fergus, I want
AWOL
out of here by three a.m. at the latest, whether we’re back or not. Brad’s probably found the tags by now. Come tomorrow this place will be on high alert. We can’t risk the women and children. Do you understand?’

Fergus nodded.

Confident
AWOL
’s crew accepted the gravity of the situation, Mark turned to face Julie, Anne and Louise. ‘Now, while we all have something to eat, you can tell me what the hell’s been going on in San Diego since the pandemic broke.’

Over the meal, Julie, Louise and Anne recounted their story.

The course of the pandemic on the western coast of America had followed a similar pattern to that experienced elsewhere. But the Americans’ right to bear arms led to the wholesale slaughter of its citizens as the population fought over precious supplies of food and medicine. Julie lost her husband and two teenage sons in the violence and Anne’s husband was shot in cold blood for a tin of meatballs. Louise alone lost her partner to super-SARS itself. As the remainder of the population died, the Chatfield relatives drifted together.

‘It was some time before we realised we had a common ancestor in William Chatfield,’ Anne explained.

Julie added, ‘Rick came to the conclusion that our family alone had something in its genes that gave us immunity to the disease. You can imagine our surprise when, almost a year later, we saw a nuclear submarine coming up the harbour.’

Louise stopped eating and looked up. ‘In the end we wished it hadn’t.’

‘How come they came to San Diego?’ Fergus asked.

‘It was their home base.’

‘And it took them a year to get here?’

‘Apparently,’ Julie explained. ‘A week before super-SARS broke out the submarine commenced a mission which entailed remaining submerged and maintaining radio silence for four months. When, at the end of their mission, they attempted to enter the port of Gibraltar an underwater explosion — they assume a mine — damaged the propellers. They made it back to their home port at reduced speed, relying on secret caches of stores the US Navy had laid down.’

Mark was perplexed. ‘So having got back to San Diego, why didn’t they berth at the naval base? Why use the
Midway?
’

‘Apparently,’ explained Louise, ‘according to Roger — the sub’s doctor — there was a minor radioactive leak on another submarine docked at the base.’

‘The
Midway
made sense anyway,’ Julie added. ‘She’s effectively a self-contained floating city: workshops, sickbay, cafeteria, hotel, water-making plant, all rolled into one. And having been one of San Diego’s top tourist attractions before the pandemic she was in good shape. They simply recommissioned her and hooked up the submarine’s nuclear power supply. Given that none of the crew fell ill, we were obviously no longer carrying the super-SARS virus. It must have died out when the last of San Diego’s population perished.’

Anne had finished eating and described how the crew had then set about establishing gardens, a farm and a fish processing plant.

‘It sounds the perfect set-up,’ Mark speculated.

‘That’s what we thought. It was a lot better than the accommodation we had arranged for ourselves on the old paddle steamer
Berkley
. We were only too happy when we were invited to live aboard the
Midway
too. There was only one problem.’

‘And that was?’

‘Us, we were the problem,’ Julie replied ruefully. ‘One hundred and fifty-seven men and three women. Two women in reality — I was
already hooked up with Rick.’

‘And I didn’t help matters,’ Louise added. ‘I got involved with a junior officer called Frank. A couple of weeks later he mysteriously disappeared. I’m sure he was murdered.’

Julie nodded. ‘It got really scary. Anne wandered into the crew’s quarters and …’ She noticed Zach and Nicole listening and shrugged her shoulders. ‘You can guess what happened. Next thing I knew a couple of officers were suggesting I ditch Rick for them. They got really nasty and moody when I said no. We all agreed we had to get away. But in the middle of the night, two hours before we planned to escape, our cabins were raided, Rick was tied up and gagged and we were whisked away.’

‘By whom?’ Jessica asked.

‘Eighteen ratings. We were force-marched up the coastal road towards Los Angeles.’

Louise interrupted. ‘We marched when we weren’t being …’ She also saw Zach and Nicole sitting open-mouthed and didn’t complete the sentence.

‘So what happened next?’ Fergus asked.

‘World War Three, that’s what happened,’ Julie breathed.

‘The rest of the crew caught up with us about a hundred miles up the coast,’ Anne explained. ‘There was a huge gun fight. Fifty-nine officers and ratings got killed.’

‘And you ended up back at San Diego?’

Julie’s voice was soft and sad. ‘The captain ordered the sub’s doctor to sterilise us. He refused, but had to agree to ensure we took contraceptives.’

‘So the captain wasn’t interested in the future of mankind,’ Mark muttered.

‘He was only interested in keeping his crew under control. He put us on a rota to service them. Not all the crew, of course — a few formed gay relationships, and a fair number had strong moral values and left us alone. But there were still a lot to … to service. Being a good Christian, the captain gave us Sundays off — except me.’ Her voice had become bitter. ‘At first we remained on the
Midway
, but
despite the rota, crew fights and the occasional …’ She shrugged her shoulders again. ‘Eventually he ordered us moved to La Pensione Hotel under the protection of Brad.’

‘Some protection,’ Louise scorned. ‘He used to sell extra favours to the crew. That’s why the captain put an armed guard at the top of the gantry.’

‘So what’s the story with the astronauts?’ Mark asked.

‘When the pandemic broke,’ Julie explained, ‘three astronauts were aboard the International Space Station and a Russian Soyuz spacecraft was on the pad ready to deliver three more crew. The crew were placed in isolation and the launch held back. When it was realised the pandemic was unstoppable, the decision was taken to send the Soyuz up and supply the station with every Progress cargo ship they could launch. They also managed to launch and position a second Soyuz close to the station.

‘As a result, five men and one woman were marooned in space for almost a year. Somehow the engineers aboard managed to keep the station functioning and to prepare the two Soyuz for the return to earth.’

‘That would have been some feat,’ Fergus mused.

‘It was. So was the two pilots both managing to land their craft close to Edwards Air Force Base, without any ground-support systems.’

‘Why Edwards, why not Russia — given the Soyuz?’ Mark quizzed.

Julie shrugged. ‘It wasn’t called the International Space Station for nothing. Only the two pilots were Russian. The six took a vote and chose America.’

‘So why didn’t the astronauts simply link up with the submarine crew?’

Julie shrugged. ‘Neither group knew of the other’s existence. Hank and Brad stumbled across one another on the airwaves, and kept the fact that two groups had survived to themselves.’

‘But why?’

‘Hank discovered Brad was running a brothel. There were five men at Edwards Air Force Base and only one woman — and she had paired up with the commander, and …’

‘And Hank had drugs?’ Mark interrupted, recalling the intercepted radio transmissions.

‘Exactly. It ended up as a profitable black-market business for the two of them. The commander at Edwards Air Force Base and the captain of the sub never found out. Only a few ratings in San Diego and the four single men at Edwards were in the know — and they had the sense to keep their mouths shut. They knew if they let on, they’d lose either their drugs or their women.’

Anne attempted to complete the story. ‘Every so often Hank would collect one of us from Date Street and take us to Los Angeles for a few days to …’ The memory brought her close to tears and her words petered out.

‘And Brad warned us that if we ever let the astronauts know where we lived, Rick would be killed,’ Julie concluded.