Burning Angels

Jaeger didn’t say a word. The world seemed to stop revolving, time itself standing still. Then, slowly, he squeezed Narov’s hand and raised himself to his feet. On legs that felt like jelly, he stumbled towards the cockpit. He spoke to the pilot, his words sounding cold and alien through the FM54’s voice-projection unit.

‘Raise me Miles on the Airlander.’

The pilot did as asked and handed over the radio handset.

‘It’s Jaeger. We’re inbound.’ His voice was steel. ‘We’re bringing in two stretcher cases — both infected. Kammler’s shipped his primates off the island. It’s via the monkeys that he’s spreading the virus. Get the Rat on to it. Trace the flights, find the monkey houses and nuke them.’

‘Understood,’ Miles replied. ‘I’m on it. Leave it with me.’

Jaeger turned to the Wildcat pilot. ‘We’ve got urgent casualties to deliver to the Airlander — so why not show me how fast this thing can go.’

The pilot pushed his throttles forward. As the Wildcat soared towards the heights, Jaeger felt a stirring in his spirits. Go down fighting.

They would fight this battle, and maybe they would lose, but as his scoutmaster used to say to him when he was a kid, quoting Baden-Powell, the scouting founder: ‘Never say die until you’re dead.’

They had a matter of weeks in which to save his family, and all of humankind.

85

Figures dashed hither and thither across the Airlander’s floodlit hold. Voices echoed, shouted orders reverberating off the smooth lines of the Taranis drones. Above it all, the harsh whine of the Wildcat’s rotors was quieting as the pilot prepared for turbine shutdown.

A medical team had taken over, and even now they were manoeuvring Ruth towards an Isovac 2004CN-PUR8C — a portable patient isolation unit. It consisted of a transparent plastic cylinder, with five hooped ribs inserted inside, the whole thing sitting on a wheeled stretcher.

Its purpose was to isolate patients who were infected with a Level 4 pathogen, while still allowing them to be cared for — and right now, Ruth and Luke were in urgent need of all the treatment they could get.

Tough rubber surgical gloves were built into the sides of the unit, so the medics could insert their hands and deal with the patient without any risk of contamination. It also came complete with an airlock, to allow medicines to be administered. Plus there was an ‘umbilical connection’ that enabled IV drips and oxygen to be fed to the patient.

Luke was already zipped tight into his unit, and hooked up to its umbilical, and Ruth was being lifted out of the Wildcat’s hold in preparation for her own entombment.

For Jaeger, this was the worst moment yet of what had been his darkest day. He felt as if he were losing his wife and child all over again, having only just found them.

He couldn’t get the terrible association out of his head — that for him, the PIUs were Ruth and Luke’s body bags. It was as if they had already been declared dead; or at least, beyond saving.

As he exited the chopper with the team carrying his wife’s semi-conscious form, he felt as if he were being sucked into a dark and swirling void.

He watched as Ruth was slid feet-first into the unit — like a bullet being slotted into a shotgun’s breech. Sooner or later, he would have to let go of her hand. Her unresponsive hand.

He held on until the last moment, his fingers twined around hers. And then, just as he was about to relinquish his grip, he sensed something. Had he imagined it, or was there a spasm of life — of consciousness — in his wife’s outstretched fingers?

Suddenly her eyes flickered open. Jaeger gazed into them, an impossible spark of hope kindling in his heart. The near-zombie look was gone, and for an instant, his wife was back. He could read as much in her wild, sea-green eyes, which were once again flecked with their signature specks of gold.

Jaeger saw her gaze dart hither-and-thither, taking everything in. Understanding everything. Her lips moved. Jaeger moved nearer, so he could hear.

‘Come closer, my darling,’ she whispered.

He bent further, until his head was kissing-distance close to hers.

‘Find Kammler. Find his chosen,’ she murmured. There was a blaze of fire in her eyes. ‘Find those like himself that he inoculated…’

With that, the brief moment of lucidity seemed to be gone. Jaeger felt her fingers relax their grip, as her eyes fluttered shut again. He glanced at the medics and nodded, allowing them to slide her the rest of the way into the unit.

He stepped back as they zipped the coffin closed. At least for a moment there — a wonderful, precious moment — she had known him.

Jaeger’s mind was racing. Find Kammler and those he inoculated. Fucking genius, Ruth. He felt his heart start to race. Maybe — just maybe — here was the elusive spark of hope.

With a last look at his loved ones, Jaeger allowed them to be wheeled off towards the Airlander’s sickbay. Then he called together his team, and hurried towards the front of the airship.