This is an alternate history story about an extended Cold War and bio-terrorism. It isn't finished yet...I can't decide on an ending! Any feedback will be very much appreciated. This is only a first draft, so it still needs polishing. Thanks!
PROLOGUE
“Manolo, are you there? ¬---- Manolo?” whispered Adrian, a hint of fear and desperation breaking his voice as it travelled across the dim, damp room. A flicker of candlelight licked the walls to his right, and he was sure he could see the silhouette of a tall, lean man brandishing a handgun. He held his breath, trying not to draw attention to his own presence in the small room. A large wooden crate was all that protected him from an imminent attack. He started to wish he hadn’t put himself up for this. The candlelight disappeared and the room was plunged into total darkness. Adrian could hear the shuffle of feet coming from where he had seen the silhouette. The sound rounded on him and he could feel a presence behind him. He crouched even lower and pressed himself up against the crate. He could feel heat just inches from his face. What he thought was a waving hand was trying to confirm his existence in the dark room. He didn’t breath. He didn’t move. All he could do was hope. He could hear the distinct sound of a match striking against the rough surface of a matchbox. He closed his eyes, knowing now that his cover was blown. He could see the flickering of light through his eyelids. He waited, expecting to be shot by his attacker, expecting to feel the pain of the penetration of a bullet through his fragile flesh. Nothing. He didn’t dare to open his eyes. He didn’t want to see death.
ADRIAN
Adrian recalled the feeling, an acute wave of strength and will empowering every muscle in his body, of seeing her lying, lifeless, on the side of the road. Her mangled body, limbs fallen in a muddled heap, left there to rot. He had poised himself to exercise his doctor’s compassion whilst confirming the reality of her passing. He’d approached the body with its chestnut hair matted with sweat across its delicate face, and reached out a trembling hand to confirm the absence of a pulse. He was shocked to find that, beneath the cold, almost translucent skin was a fragile heart pulsing weakly. For the first time in his career as a registered doctor, he had been motionless, breathless, senseless, until he heard the grinding of a van door sliding closed somewhere in the distance. He had pulled out his cell phone and called for an ambulance before attending to his patient, breathing life back into her. He had then gone with her in the ambulance to the hospital. She still hadn’t regained consciousness. Her pulse was weak. She was dying. He’d noticed a phone number scrawled hurriedly across her palm. It read:
(642) 225-2100 begin_of_the_skype_highlighting (642) 225-2100 end_of_the_skype_highlighting begin_of_the_skype_highlighting (642) 225-2100 end_of_the_skype_highlighting
With the benefit of hindsight, he now identified this moment as a crossroads in his life; one of those moments in the movies where, had the character not taken one course of action a whole different story would’ve unravelled before the viewers’ eyes. What if he hadn’t walked down that cold, dark street? What if Tom was able to give him a lift to work like he always did? What if he hadn’t been robbed and was able to buy the car he had been saving for? What if that van had arrived 10 minutes later? What if that creep had a conscience and didn’t leave her there to freeze to death? ...What if? The eternal existential question, the notion behind alternate realities, the pinnacle of the human condition. Nonetheless, he had walked down that cold, dark street, and so he had stumbled upon her almost lifeless body in the gutter and he had called the number scrawled across her palm. He wished he hadn’t.
A few hours after he had left with the girl in the ambulance, Juanita Gonzalez had arrived at the Sierra Vista Regional Health Centre. To this day he doesn’t know how she got there from Cuba so quickly, or how she got there at all. All that mattered to both of them was her daughter – 18 year old Maria Gonzalez. He had made it his duty to comfort Mrs. Gonzalez whilst her daughter struggled against the vice-like grip of the doctors desperately trying to avoid any further damage. She had been in so much pain. Her lifeless body had been ripped from the jaws of death only to be thrust back into the tumultuous cycle of life. Adrian couldn’t quite understand Maria’s mother’s reaction to seeing her daughter like that. She had seemed dejected, guilty, responsible. The doctors had been contemplating surgically removing the capsule from Maria’s stomach right then and there because they feared that it might explode with her violent thrashing, but it seemed that the risks outweighed the benefits. They prepared her, instead, for emergency surgery and whisked her away to theatre. Why did he have to be on duty that day? If he hadn’t, he wouldn’t be where he is now. All to protect this woman.
Adrian was brought back to his grim reality by a sharp slap across his face. He found it difficult to work in these conditions. It was hot and the fumes were making him sick. Not to mention the stench of the man sent to oversee his work. Arduous was the only word he could find to describe his daily life since that day. Six months it had been since he found her, lying in the street, more dead than alive. He still remembered vividly the moment he recognised what was making her so sick, a tiny pill covered in a brown rubber seal with a minute tear, seeping cyanide into her stomach, slowly killing her. Of course, that wasn’t the idea of a cyanide pill. He remembered learning about cyanide pills in 2002. They, at the Centre for Disease Control and Prevention, had been warned of an increase in the number of terrorists committing suicide by ingesting cyanide pills after a major terrorist cell, Al Qaeda, was cracked. The idea of the cyanide pill is that it kills fast so a suspected terrorist or spy could avoid interrogation and torture, but the rubber seal around Maria’s pill remained almost completely intact except for a slight tear, slowing the process of death. That’s what enabled them to save her. Adrian decided to confront Maria himself before he contacted authorities to ask her why she had used a cyanide pill. By this time her brother, Manolo, had arrived and was by her side. Adrian had asked them straight away to explain themselves. Manolo and Maria told him everything. About how they were forced into espionage by the Soviet-Cuban Alliance, one of the original Cold War alliances, because of huge debts that the family owed. The Cold War had started in 1947 and was still continuing today, 70 years later, except that now there were no longer proxy wars. War was raging in the East, the idea of mutually assured destruction seemingly forgotten. Fear was already a part of the American psyche. And Adrian now knew that that fear was warranted, all because of his work.
MANOLO
Manolo sat near the man that had saved his sister and noticed that his small frame seemed frail and weak in the dim light of the dungeon. He was reminded of the time that he had turned his back on a world that had once cared. He remembered that wretched morning, sliding the doors of the van shut and staggering into the passenger seat. He had stared into the rear vision mirror and noticed a young man slowly approaching the body he had just heaved into the gutter. He hadn’t known how he managed to do it; it went against everything he had been taught, everything that he valued, everything that he believed. He’d known why he did it – to protect her, to protect them – but he didn’t know how he could have possibly gone through with it. Mamá had told him to take care of his little sister, to make sure that nothing happened. Maria was frightened; she was just 18, too young to be dealing with this. So he sedated her and pushed one of the capsules down her throat. Then at least she wouldn’t have to deal with this life anymore. He couldn’t bear to see her suffer, but this was the only way to ensure that she didn’t endure a lifetime of suffering. He had to make sure she went with as little pain as possible. He had taken her out there in the still of the early morning, snow lightly flaking from the sky, her naked sedated body hanging limp from his arms, and placed her to rest in the gutter. He had quickly written a note on her hand, hoping that someone would find her:
(642) 225-2100
Mamá deserved to know when it had happened.
Manolo felt a single bead of sweat slide slowly down his face, landing in a puddle that had been accumulating on the stone floor beneath his feet. He closed his eyes and tried to ignore the pain that he was feeling. He was being used as a guinea pig for Adrian’s trials of a virus. He was only giving him very small, diluted samples, not enough to kill him, or for the effects to last, but enough to make him wish it would kill him. This time, he hoped that Adrian had finally gotten it right. This was the fifth time he had been subjected to the virus, the needles each time leaving a track of holes around the veins on the inside of his elbow. Each time had a different effect on him. They’d all started with profuse but controlled sweating, as if each drop of sweat purposely waited for the one before to slip down his cheek before taking its own turn. One of them induced vomiting that lasted for 2 days; another, intense itching that caused his skin to bleed from being scratched too much. He didn’t know what the virus was; all he knew was that, in its concentrated form, it would be potent. Manolo and Adrian were not permitted to speak to each other at all. Adrian’s eyes said a lot, though, and Manolo could tell that he was exceedingly sorry. Adrian had been offered an ultimatum by Alvaro; either Maria dies, or he offers them his services. Alvaro had overheard Adrian confronting Maria and Manolo about the cyanide pill and decided that he knew too much. He had arranged for both Adrian and Manolo to be kidnapped. They were taken to a small shack squeezed between two apartment blocks down a backstreet in the middle of Arizona where Alvaro had planned to kill Manolo and coerce Adrian into being his own ‘evil scientist’. However, Adrian had refused to work for Alvaro unless both Maria and Manolo were spared. Instead of killing him, Manolo was to be used as a test dummy for Adrian’s work. And that’s where he found himself now, strapped to a chair and gagged, being injected with a deadly virus.
MARIA
The month of August had started off like any other. Sure, there was the war raging in the East, but that had become a fact of life rather than a work of fiction. War bred famine and hardship in only the war-ravaged countries, or so Maria thought. Granted, they had to deal with unrest on what was labelled the ‘home front’, but that didn’t compare to the incessant fear on the battlefront, the eternal trademark of a war. The battle of the ideologies, the lifeblood of conflict, had reached 212 °F. Maria found it cruelly ironic that this was called the ‘Cold’ War. She could think of an endless list of reasons why this was anything but ‘cold’. Nonetheless, August had started off like any other month, but now that had all changed. Maria had found herself implicated in a war of subtext. Her family had owed money, they couldn’t repay it, so they were conscripted as spies for the joint Soviet-Cuban Alliance. Simple. But things became more complicated 6 months ago. She remembered waking up in a hospital bed feeling absolutely exhausted and seeing her brother sitting in the shadows by the door. She recalled how strange it seemed in the room, the mellow atmosphere usually felt around family replaced with tension. Her brother had noticed that she’d awaken and slowly risen from his chair, approaching the bed with caution. His cheeks were streaked with red, like he had been clawing at his face in agony, or anxiety? He had reached out his hand and placed it over her heart, as if with disbelief that she was alive. She had felt confused and looked at him with a puzzled expression. He had smiled back at her reassuringly. They didn’t say anything. A moment later Adrian had walked into the room and demanded to know why she had swallowed a cyanide tablet. They had no choice but to explain everything to Adrian. The next day Maria had discovered that Manolo and Adrian had been kidnapped by Alvaro, one of the leaders of the Soviet-Cuban Alliance. That was 6 months ago and she still hadn’t heard from them.
ADRIAN
Adrian filled the vial with the deadly virus and moved towards Manolo, trying to reassure him with his slow, steady movements. Manolo’s eyes were filled with tears and he was cowering away from the needle. Adrian glanced around the room at Alvaro’s men, before gently injecting the clear fluid into Manolo’s arm. He knew that Manolo would not be able to stand another dose. He prayed that this one was finally right. He sat back down on his chair and observed his patient, making notes and measurements based on the readings on various machines hooked up around Manolo. Manolo started writhing in pain and convulsing. Adrian knew that it was working. Before he could do anything, two of Alvaro’s men had Adrian by the arms and were pulling him out of the dungeon. He took one last fleeting glance at Manolo before being carried out into the artificial light of a narrow passageway. He struggled against the powerful grip of the two henchmen, but they managed to keep him under control. He was marched up two flights of stairs to another room, this time engulfed by darkness, except for the vivid orange hue of a burning cigarette somewhere near the rear. He was held in the doorway until the man with the cigarette called him forward, the henchmen pushing him inside and closing the door. Within an instant the lights in the room were switched on and Adrian was left momentarily dazed. Eventually the black spots that had clouded his vision subsided to reveal a short plump figure clad in what appeared to be a very expensive black suit. Adrian had not spoken in 6 months. He attempted to clear his throat, but the man with the cigarette spoke first, revealing his identity.
“Welcome, Adrian, to my humble abode. My name is Señor Alvaro. I am the leader of the Soviet-Cuban Alliance”
Adrian sneered, unable to will a sound to emerge from his tender throat.
“I gather from your presence before me that you have completed your experimentation?” Alvaro enquired rhetorically, pronouncing his Rs with a distinct trill.
“Yes” Adrian managed to squeak, the sound scratching his throat.
“I have one more thing that I need from you, Adrian”
Adrian scoffed.
“I need you to tell me where the stockpiles of the vaccine are hidden throughout the country.”
“No!” Adrian replied, defiantly, he wasn’t going to let this happen.
Instinctively, it seemed, the door behind Adrian opened and the two burly men that had brought him in entered.
“I will ask you again, Adrian. Where are the secret stockpiles of the vaccine?”
Adrian did not reply. Alvaro nodded. The men grabbed his arm and injected him with the virus. The sweating started almost immediately. The men dropped him into a heap on the floor. Alvaro asked again. Adrian refused.
MANOLO
Manolo sat hopelessly curled up on the cold stone floor. The room was silent and as sinister and minacious as the infinite nothingness of space. It had been hours since Adrian was removed from the room, taking with him the entire guard of Alvaro’s men, leaving Manolo by himself. But, then again, he couldn’t really be sure that no eyes were watching him. The air in the dungeon was thick and stuffy, rendering it difficult for Manolo to breathe. He had almost overcome all of the symptoms of the virus injected by Adrian. He couldn’t tell whether the sweating now was a result of the virus or the heat that had seemed to intensify since the lights were turned off. He didn’t know what to do. He slowly crawled, as quietly as possible, over to what he remembered to be the closest wall. He had to pause for a break once he reached the wall as dehydration was causing him to feel exhausted and disoriented. He began to see colours obstruct his view of the nothingness spread out before him. He then made the decision to track along the wall, looking for an opening of some kind. He wasn’t the smartest of people, but he had undertaken specialised military training after the September 11 bombing attacks that gave him the skills, both physical and mental, to handle a situation like this. Military training had been made compulsory after 2001 for all males aged above 15. Manolo had been eager to begin specialist training as it meant he could leave school early. It also gave the Soviet-Cuban alliance a reason to pursue his services.
MARIA
Maria paced the room, the sound of the television blaring in the background muffled by her frenzied footsteps across the old linoleum floor. She paused momentarily to watch the montage of images floating across the TV screen, images of the war in the East. Entire towns flattened by bombs of epic proportions, eclipsing the destruction seen in Hiroshima and Nagasaki. Still the threat of thermonuclear war was apparent, though it had been for over half a century, and thankfully one had never eventuated. Now the threat seemed to be more of biochemical warfare, with countries advertising their immense supplies of exclusive, non-treatable viruses, including those the world thought had vanished. Nothing could have prepared the world of science and technology for this, almost inevitable destruction from breakthroughs that were supposed to bring peace and an end to suffering, not this. Maria thought of all of the things she had learnt through her spy missions, of all of the black ops being run by US military personnel. She thought of all of the information she had translated to the Soviet-Cuban Alliance, and how destructive it all would be. But she reassured herself. She had had no choice.
Maria’s father finally arrived home shortly after to find Maria still pacing across the room. Immediately she sprang over towards him and greeted them with a longing embrace. They joined Maria’s mother, Juanita, seated at a table in the middle of the room.
“I made a deal with Alvaro” announced Hugo solemnly, avoiding eye contact with his wife and daughter. Maria began to sob.
“Where is Manolo?” she asked, wiping her tears away with a tissue offered to her by her mother.
“Alvaro didn’t say, but I heard rumours that they have him locked up in an apartment somewhere in Arizona”
“Dios mio” whimpered Juanita.
“What’s the deal?” enquired Maria tentatively, able to control herself now.
“We have to trade – we have to find information about secret stockpiles of vaccines throughout the US, and in return they will free Manolo”
“And how are we going to do that?” probed Maria.
“I have a plan” admitted Hugo, a hint of doubt dampening his defiant tone.
ADRIAN
Adrian woke up to find himself under a spotlight in the centre of a small enclosure. His hands were bound behind his back, his feet to the chair he was sitting on. A clock was on the wall behind him, the ticking penetrating the silence. He lifted his head to look around the room and noticed a mirror covering the wall in front of him. This was the first glimpse he had had of himself in six months. His shirt was covered in blood that was still seeping from cuts etched across his face, like the Chinese symbols he learnt about at school. His blood-shot brown eyes struggled to open through the huge swelling and bruising that disfigured most of his face. His hair was tousled like a lion’s mane, held together in a dishevelled mess by his sticky blood and rank sweat. Scraps of food were tangled in the scruffy beard growing from his face. He now resembled more of a criminal after a prison riot than a respectable doctor. Suddenly the light turned off and he felt a sharp jab into his side, accompanied by a loud crack from within his chest. He yelped. As quickly as they were turned off, the lights were turned back on again, this time revealing to him a different image in the mirror. Adrian was confused. He saw a shadowy figure reflecting back at him. He looked around the room. There was no one there. He looked back into the mirror as the shadowy figure began to feel its way across the wall, dragging its hands enquiringly over the surface. He called out to the figure only a few meters away, but received no reply. He was perplexed. The figure continued across the mirror before disappearing beyond the edge of the wall. Again the room was plunged into darkness.
Time passed by and Adrian was still being drowned by the darkness. The clock kept ticking. Time, he thought to himself, controllable in theory, but not in practise. What we have come to know as time can be changed; we can, effectively, travel across time by means of changing our own perception of what ‘time’ is. That is, time is simply a definition. The entity itself cannot be changed, only our definition. Daylight savings, for example, allows us to change our definition of time. In theory, it would be one time, but in practise it would be another. Adrian thought of the unforeseeable ramifications of time. If time went backwards instead of forwards, problems would be resolved before they started. If time stood still rather than in constant motion, problems might occur but never manifest into something more. Time for him now, however, was a force working against him. He didn’t know how long it would be before Alvaro and his men found and destroyed the secret stockpiles of the vaccine. He didn’t know when they were going to release the deadly virus that he’d developed. He didn’t know what time was going to do to him. His fate rested in the hands of time, and the clock kept ticking away.
MARIA
Maria relished the moment she got to let her body fall onto the bed and into the tranquillity of sleep. She looked up at the shabby roof and contemplated the iniquity of a man like Alvaro, relentlessly and mercilessly forcing people and families like her own into espionage to further the Soviet-Cuban Alliance, poor, helpless people and families like her own that had no other choice. She wondered where Manolo was and what he was doing. She couldn’t help but imagine all of the horrible things he had been through over the past 6 months. She felt guilty. She wouldn’t be there if it weren’t for her. He was just trying to protect her, and now he is the one that needs protecting. As she let the thoughts swirl aimlessly around in her head, she slowly succumbed to the muffled summoning of the dark serenity.
The next day Maria woke up, rejuvenated by one of her first unbroken sleeps since that dreadful day six months ago. Time had gone so fast, yet it still seemed like her brother had been gone forever. She missed him, and the brief moment of hope she had had when her father told them that Manolo was okay had begun to fade since the news that they’d have to do something for Alvaro if he was to be returned. Again they all assembled around the table, a family broken but still being held together by the unrelenting bond forged between them wouldn’t allow them to give up on each other, despite an almost hopeless situation. Juanita, Maria’s mother, sat balancing a coffee cup clumsily in her hands. Hugo reached over to steady the cup, gently prising it from her grip and placing it safely on the table. Juanita looked terrible. Her usually delicate brown eyes looked hazy and disengaged, as if she was sitting there next to Manolo watching him suffer. Hugo began by reminding them of the situation at hand. In order to get Manolo back they had to inform Alvaro’s men of the locations of the stockpiles of the vaccines. Alvaro already knew of three locations, there were still another five to find. Alvaro had not set a deadline, but, knowing him, they didn’t have long. Maria knew that her father had contacts in the Centre for Disease Control and Prevention, so scouting out locations should not be too much of a problem. What Maria envisaged as being the biggest hurdle was the need for her and her family to abandon their morals and values for Alvaro again. They had to get Manolo, they had no choice, but she had a feeling that giving the locations of these secret stockpiles could do a lot of damage in the long term. What do you do in a situation like this? A situation where, sacrificing tow lives could lead to the salvation of millions of others? But, who’s to say that Alvaro just wouldn’t find someone else to do the job for him, and then Manolo and Adrian would have died in vain. Maria knew they had no choice but to opt to save them, but at what cost?
ADRIAN
Again Adrian saw the shadowy figure slowly creep across the mirror, this time realising that what was in front of him no longer was a mirror but a window into the next room, one of those reversible ones you always see in cop shows. He also recognised the man that was feeling his way across the window – it was Manolo. He screamed out to him – “Manolo. Can you hear me?” – and at first Manolo seemed to pause as if he could hear him, but then continued to sneak along the window before again disappearing beyond the edge of the wall. Adrian struggled against the ropes that bound his hands behind his back, but to no avail. He bowed his head in despair. He then noticed Manolo creep back across the window and called out again. Manolo stopped right in front of him and looked into the window as if staring right at him. Adrian yelled out again to him, but Manolo walked away from the window into the middle of the room where Adrian lost sight of him in the obscurity of darkness.
Darkness gave way to light again in his little room and he noticed before him a mug of water. Great, he thought to himself, and how am I supposed to drink that? Unexpectedly the door into the room creaked open to reveal a man, slight in build, sporting a comical moustache, and through his delirium Adrian managed to laugh. The slight man moved inside and picked up the mug of water, approaching Adrian with it in his outstretched arms. Adrian’s natural instinct was to lean closer to the water, like a plant does to the sun. As he did so the man continued to reach out the mug, holding it just short of his mouth, before retracting it and slowly pouring the water all over the floor in front of him, a brash smile forming across his face as he did so. Adrian cried out with dejection and the man laughed. Adrian had not noticed, but the slight man was followed into the room by a duo of burly men. They too had approached Adrian and were waiting behind him. The slight man gave them a cryptic sign, which Adrian eventually understood to mean ‘Get him out of here, boys’ as they grabbed him violently by the arms and pushed him out the door. They took him along a corridor, up one flight of stairs and into the same office he had found himself in earlier. This time the lights were on. The man who had identified himself as Alvaro was sitting at an extravagant mahogany desk featuring a comparatively modest desk lamp and a small stack of envelopes neatly stacked in a pile near the edge. A strong smell of whisky and rum greeted Adrian’s sensitive nostrils, and cigarette smell filled his struggling lungs.
“We have made a deal with Hugo. In exchange for your safe return, Hugo and his daughter Maria will help me to identify the locations of the stockpiles of the vaccine, as you have refused to do so yourself” Hugo announced with a grin. “Meanwhile, you and Manolo will remain here in the refuge of my home”
Adrian did not get to say anything in response. Within an instant the two strapping men had him in their grasp. He collapsed. When he woke up he again found himself in a room immersed in the eerie silence of a pool of shadows, illuminated only by a lonely candle in the corner.
MARIA
Maria and her father left Juanita in the care of a close cousin whilst they went about discovering the locations of the vaccine. Hugo had spoken to his friend, Liam, who worked for the Centre for Disease Control and Prevention. Liam was a fellow spy, but Alvaro had strange ways of doing his work. In order to distance himself from his crimes if a criminal investigation happened to occur in the future, he found ways of instructing operations and coercing people to do things without incriminating himself. He never went directly to the source, but instead through pressure caused other people to go there for him. Alvaro could have easily gotten the locations of the stockpiles straight from Liam, but instead he chose a different route of obtaining information, using other assets that would confuse authorities and absolve him from blame. Liam had only known the location of six out of the eight locations Alvaro had requested in exchange for the safe return of Manolo. Maria and Hugo now had to scour through hundreds of articles and exclusive documents, hopefully alluding to the locations of the other two stockpiles. As they sat there, leafing through the thousands of pieces of paper and searching the endless databases Hugo had gained access to through his job at the US Department of Defence, Maria again couldn’t help but think of her brother. Was she doing the right thing? Would Alvaro relinquish Manolo even if they did give him the information he desired? Her father looked like a mindless madman sifting through the paper that had formed a ring around him on the floor of their lounge room. He frantically glanced at everything, giving each piece only enough of his attention to identify something useful. He, too, look lost in thought. Maria wondered if he was having the same moral dilemma as he was. They had hardly spoken to each other for the past 4 hours, each lost in the task at hand. Just as Maria was about to get up to stretch her legs and have a short break, her first of the day, her father’s face lit up with hope and alerted her to the news that he had found one of the locations. They now had seven of the locations – Texas, Illinois, New York, California, Ohio, Florida and Pennsylvania. As Maria wrote down the names of the states they had identified as having a stockpile of the vaccine, she started to recognise a pattern. In geography class at school they had had to rank the states of the US from highest to lowest in terms of population size. These seven states, she noticed, were in the top 8. The only state left was Michigan. They had found all eight locations. Now they had to find Manolo and Adrian.
MANOLO
Manolo stumbled back into the centre of the room, spooked by the echoes that kept bouncing from the walls. He thought he could hear a muffled call from behind the wall but came to the conclusion that it was just his hopeful imagination willing him to believe. He didn’t believe anymore. He was tired and hurt, abandoned in the darkness by his loyalty to his sister. Suddenly he crashed into a large wooden crate supporting what felt like a mug of water and a box of matches. The mug of water had spilled with the clumsiness of his collision, and the box of matches crashed to the ground with a very light thud, which, despite the sound’s brevity and lack of depth, reverberated around the room like the hum of a lonely bee seeking salvation. Manolo desperately snatched up the mug of water and slopped it down his throat, the cool stream soothing his parched throat. He then lowered himself onto his knees and felt around for the pocket-sized box, but was surprised when he felt the cold metal surface of what seemed to be a key. He kept searching with his hands for the match box but could not seem to find it. He began to wonder whether it was the box he felt or the key, which would explain the ringing sound that resulted from dropping it. He slowly rose to his feet, the water giving him an unfathomable boost of energy, and stumbled again towards the wall, hoping this time to find a lock of some kind hidden on the wall within his grasp. As he staggered towards the wall a candle sprang to life, spreading a blanket of delicate gold light over the room. Shadows leapt from the walls like figures dancing along the sands of a perfect beach. Rapidly, however, the momentary serenity of the enlivened room collapsed in a heap as a door once hidden by the enigma of gloom creaked ajar. Manolo crouched as low as he could, not wanting to be taken again by his captors. The door closed. There was silence.
ADRIAN
“Manolo, are you there? ¬---- Manolo?” whispered Adrian, a hint of fear and desperation breaking his voice as it travelled across the dim, damp room. A flicker of candlelight licked the walls to his right, and he was sure he could see the silhouette of a tall, lean man brandishing a handgun. He held his breath, trying not to draw attention to his own presence in the small room. A large wooden crate was all that protected him from an imminent attack. He started to wish he hadn’t put himself up for this. The candlelight disappeared and the room was plunged into complete blackness. Adrian could hear the shuffle of feet coming from where he had seen the silhouette. The sound rounded on him and he could feel a presence behind him. He crouched even lower and pressed himself up against the crate. He could feel heat just inches from his face. What he thought was a waving hand was trying to confirm his existence in the dark room. He didn’t breath. He didn’t move. All he could do was hope. He could hear the distinct sound of a match striking against the rough surface of a matchbox. He closed his eyes and could see the flickering of light through his eyelids. He waited, expecting to be shot by his attacker, expecting to feel the pain of the penetration of a bullet through his fragile flesh. Nothing. He didn’t dare to open his eyes. He didn’t want to see death.
MANOLO
“Adrian?” whispered Manolo, relieved but not allowing himself to believe that his ordeal might finally be over. “Is that you?” There was no reply. The unearthly silence continued. Manolo remained still. The door screeched open again, this time revealing what appeared to be a woman. She was relatively short, with long hair glimmering under an aura of light.
“Manolo?” the woman asked. “Are you okay?”
Manolo slowly craned his neck as the woman moved further into the room. As she did so, her delicate features gradually came into view under the light of the candle, and Manolo recognised her beauty immediately.
“Maria!” he rejoiced, pulling himself off the floor and throwing himself into her arms.
“Where’s Adrian?” she enquired in between sobs.
“I don’t know. They took him away” replied Manolo, refusing to let go of his sister.
Maria helped Manolo out into the corridor where he collapsed onto the floor. She offered him a drink of water and a sandwich, which he gladly accepted, not before ensuring that there was enough for Adrian when they found him. Maria reassured him that he was now safe and that Hugo was on his way here. Manolo wrapped his arms around his sister. He now believed.
HUGO
Hugo stared into the darkness and could feel the heat radiating off the body cowering in front of the crate. He bent down so that he was level with the man opposite him and struck a match against the matchbox.
“Thank you” he whispered, “but I’m sorry”
As the words fell out of his mouth, Hugo pulled the trigger on the gun.
“Why?” Hugo managed to hear Adrian whimper after the loud crack inhibited his hearing, his nostrils acquainting themselves with the smoky smell of burning sulphur. Why? he thought to himself. Now all he could hear were the silent moans of a man who had sacrificed himself for someone he didn’t even know. They would haunt him for the rest of his life.
MANOLO
Manolo finally felt energised enough to stand up and leave the building with the support of his sister. As they proceeded down the hallway his father ran towards them and grabbed Manolo’s other arm, the family finally reunited after six long months.
“Did you do it?” demanded Maria.
“Yes” responded Hugo, regretfully.
“And Alvaro?”
“He’s impressed with our service and will reward us with safe passage across the border with the rest of the Alliance” uttered Hugo.
Manolo was confused. Do what? he though.
“So when is it going to happen?” Maria asked.
“Next week, on Labour Day”
Manolo was still confused. “What are you talking about?”
“We made a deal with Alvaro. He would free you in return for us discovering the locations of secret stockpiles of a vaccine for the Smallpox virus.”
“So where’s Adrian?” Manolo enquired despondently.
“Adrian was part of Alvaro’s plan. He could not survive. It was either him or us. He was going to be used by Alvaro and then disposed of. You were supposed to be too, but I made the deal with Alvaro. I had to kill Adrian because Alvaro doesn’t do those things himself.”
Manolo sat in the car and said nothing. He couldn’t believe it. They drove to the house. They all shared a meal. They all slept. One week later they left. It wasn’t fair.
MARIA
Maria stared out of the car window and saw, sprawled out for miles, what could only be described as the rotting corpse of America, the prelude to the demise of Western democracy. She never took any notice of the concocted images of the imminent apocalypse that film directors and authors had created; she passed them off as nothing more than a work of fiction, a nightmare. But now, these images took on a life of their own. Terrified countenances, black with blood pooling beneath the surface of the skin, flashed past the bus window, screaming out for help. She felt guilty, but the lucky ones couldn’t afford to be selfless. They were the only ones who could create the perfect society as envisaged by the Alliance.
ALTERNATE ENDING (NOT COMPLETE)
HUGO
Hugo stared into the darkness and could feel the heat radiating off the body cowering in front of the crate. He bent down so that he was level with the man opposite him and struck a match against the matchbox. He saw in the frightened face of Adrian with his eyes tightly shut, trying not to breathe.
“Adrian” he said, “It’s me, Hugo”
Adrian slowly lifted his eye lids, the muscles in his face relaxing and a slight smile developing across his face. Hugo helped him to his feet and had to steady him because he could not support his own weight. He took him outside into the hallway and down a flight of stairs where they spotted Manolo cradling Maria in his arms.
MANOLO
Manolo finally felt energised enough to stand up and leave the building with the support of his sister. Both he and Adrian were in terrible shape, more so for poor Adrian, he thought, who appeared to have been beaten up since he last saw him. No one said anything as they made their way towards the car. Manolo was surprised by the ease with which they were allowed to leave the building. There was no opposition from Alvaro or any of his men. Uncanny, he thought. As they drove through the streets of Arizona, the doctor attended to her patient. This time it was Maria saving the almost dead Adrian, and not the other way around. She administered the vaccine, only effective against the Ebola-pox virus if given within the first 3 days, and handed out more food and water to both of them. After a while, Manolo decided it was time for some answers.
“Could someone explain to me what has happened over the past 6 months?”
“Well, after you were kidnapped we didn’t hear from you or about you for months, until one of Dad’s friends heard a rumour that you were being kept in an apartment block somewhere in Arizona. Dad approached Alvaro and made a deal with him – we had to tell him the locations of secret stockpiles of the vaccine in exchange for your safe return. We reluctantly agreed and found the locations and informed Alvaro. Alvaro, for once, stayed true to his word and allowed us in to free you two.
I was a little worried about constantly changing perspectives, so I will work on that. I agree, the story loses its fluidity and becomes disjointed when I keep changing characters. This is a major work for school that is worth almost 100% of my final mark, so I have to get it right!
Gender:
Points: 300
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