‘The original formula?’ Richard’s brow furrowed. ‘No. Well, a drop, perhaps. But we copied it exactly. You don’t think . . .’
‘I don’t think anything,’ Derek said. ‘It was just a question.’
‘Yes,’ Richard said, his mind racing. ‘But a good question. An important question. You think that it’s the copying that’s the problem? You think that the copies of copies are no longer as powerful as the original?’
Derek shrugged lightly. ‘I wouldn’t know about science, sir – that’s your domain. But photocopies – they’re not originals, are they?’
‘No, no they’re not,’ Richard said, beginning to pace. ‘But we don’t have the formula. We never found it. All we have is copies. It’s all we’ve ever had.’
‘We never found it back then, but that doesn’t mean it isn’t out there somewhere,’ Derek said as he attended to the body, wrapping it up as though it were simply an animal carcass going to market. ‘He’ll have written it down somewhere. Must have done.’
‘We’ve searched,’ Richard said uncertainly. ‘We’ve searched everywhere.’
‘We searched a bit,’ Derek conceded, ‘but you had the stuff itself. Your scientists copied it OK, didn’t they? We didn’t think we needed the formula. We stopped looking.’
‘We stopped looking.’ Richard nodded, his eyes lighting up.
‘So now we start again,’ Derek said, standing up and inspecting the floor, which was now spotless.
Richard breathed out, his shoulders relaxing slightly. They would find the formula. The formula would solve everything. No mutated virus. No pandemic. No end to everything he had spent his life building up. Everything would be back to normal. Everything would be restored.
‘Thank you, Derek. I knew I could depend on you.’ Richard allowed himself to exhale, then he looked at Derek meaningfully and left the room, making his way briskly back to his office, away from the bowels of Pincent Pharma to the light, airy spaces above.
.
Chapter Two
Anna sat bolt upright, her heart thudding in her chest, sweat pouring from her forehead. It was pitch black, but without hesitation she jumped out of bed and ran towards Molly’s room. Quietly she inched open the door, then dropped to her knees at the foot of her daughter’s makeshift cot. Allowing her breathing to return to normal, Anna watched her beautiful baby sleep. Just four months old, her little hands were curled into fists, her chest gently rising and falling with each breath, her lips pursed, her eyebrows furrowed as though concentrating as hard as she possibly could on sleeping. Molly was fine. Of course she was fine. It was just a dream, a nightmare. Just like all the others.
Every so often Molly would sigh and reach for some non-existent object. Her thumb would find her mouth, she would roll over and then, as sleep embraced her once more, the thumb would drop out again. Anna knew this little routine better than anything else in the world. Every night for weeks she had watched it, reassured that her worst fears were only that and no one was stealing her baby, not in the real world.
From the day she was born, Molly had represented so much to Anna. It was as though her own happiness and peace of mind were to be found within that tiny body. Molly was more precious to her than she’d been prepared for – she would have slept on the floor by the cot every night if Peter had let her. He’d told her she had to move on, told her that she was safe now, that Molly was safe, that she didn’t need to fear any more, that she should sleep contentedly.
But it was sleep itself that awoke all Anna’s fears. The dreams that filled her mind as soon as she drifted into semi-consciousness were filled with Catchers trying to snatch Molly and Ben, Anna’s three-year-old brother, away from her. Their innocence of the world they had been born into, their lack of awareness of just how precious their lives were, made Anna as protective as a lioness. Like her own mother, she would die for them – she understood why now.
Anna hadn’t known much innocence in her life. Taken by the Catchers to Grange Hall when she was very little, she’d grown up under the wrath of Mrs Pincent. Only when Peter had arrived two years before had she learnt that she wasn’t evil, wasn’t a Burden on Mother Nature, that it was wrong to make her work tirelessly to pay for the sins of her parents. Now she was Legal, but even that didn’t offer much protection, not when her very existence was such a threat to the Authorities, not when Richard Pincent wanted her and Peter dead, out of the picture.
But the Underground were keeping them safe. She knew that. During the day, she reminded herself regularly, there was nothing to worry about. As Peter said all the time, they were going to be fine. The Underground had found them somewhere to live, somewhere no one could find them. They were self-sufficient, more or less; they were protected. Everything was fine. At last, everything in Anna’s life was OK.
Quietly, Anna padded over to the chest of drawers where a pile of Molly’s ironed clothes lay. She picked them up and, one by one, put them away. Order reassured her – she’d spent most of her life trying to achieve it.
But at night the demons came – the terrible monsters who wanted to steal her children away, wanted to imprison them as she had been imprisoned, wanted them to hate her, wanted them to know a life without love, without laughter, without her.
Anna had spent her childhood in Grange Hall. A Surplus Hall, it was a prison for children born illegally to parents who had signed the Declaration – a piece of paper that most signed too young to understand that in return for eternal life they would never bear children. Peter had been a Surplus too, but he hadn’t been discovered by the Catchers; instead he had been passed around Underground supporters for most of his life, hidden in attics, never knowing whether he’d be in the same place the next day or whether he’d be moved again. It was only when he was taken in by Anna’s real parents that he’d seen what family was all about and it was their love that had driven him to hand himself in to the Catchers and get himself sent to Grange Hall so that he could help her to escape.
And now he knew no fear. Anna loved that and feared it in equal measure; loved his strength, his courage, his ability to laugh when she expressed her worries to him in a way that didn’t belittle them but made them obsolete.
I am here
, he would say to her.
No one will ever hurt you again
. But she even saw his fearlessness as a threat; she worried about his restlessness, his need to be fighting someone, something. Feared that the strength within him would eventually take him from her. From the children.
The clothes folded away, Anna sat down next to the cot and listened to Molly’s rhythmic breathing. All was quiet. Her loved ones were near her, were sleeping, were going nowhere.
‘Anna?’ She looked up with a start to see Peter standing in the doorway, looking at her quizzically. ‘What are you doing?’
She blushed. ‘Nothing.’
‘You’re watching her sleep again, aren’t you?’
Anna bit her lip. ‘I just . . .’ She sighed. ‘I had another nightmare.’
‘Don’t tell me,’ Peter whispered. ‘Catchers?’
She met his eyes – they were twinkling kindly.
‘Not Catchers this time,’ she said, slowly standing up and moving towards him. ‘I dreamt about Sheila.’
‘Sheila?’ Peter frowned. ‘What did you dream?’
Anna closed her eyes for a moment. Sheila, her friend from Grange Hall. Was friend the right word? Sheila had been her shadow. Younger than Anna, she had turned to her for protection which Anna had reluctantly given. Sheila wasn’t strong like Anna; she had got into trouble with the other girls, with the House Matron Mrs Pincent, with everyone. Like a ghost with her pale, translucent skin and pale orange hair, Sheila had been so fragile, and yet there had been a steely quality to her, a refusal to accept her Surplus status, a determination that her parents had wanted her, that she didn’t belong in Grange Hall. And it had turned out that she was right. They’d only found that out later, after Anna had escaped with Peter, leaving Sheila behind. After Sheila had been taken to Pincent Pharma, experimented on, used . . .
Anna shuddered at the memory. ‘I dreamt . . .’ She exhaled slowly, her breath visible in the cold night air. ‘I dreamt that she was angry with me. Because I hadn’t believed her. Because I’d told her she was a Surplus. I dreamt that she took Molly away to serve me right, to show me what it was like.’ Tears started to stream down her cheeks and Peter pulled her into him, out into the corridor. Then he closed Molly’s door behind them.
‘Sheila wouldn’t do that,’ he said gently, stroking Anna’s hair.
‘It was my fault she ended up at Pincent Pharma,’ Anna said, her voice hoarse. ‘She asked me to take her with me. I didn’t. I left her behind.’
‘You had to,’ Peter said sternly. ‘And she’s fine now anyway. She’s with Pip and Jude in London. There’s nothing to feel guilty about. Nothing.’
‘I looked after her. In Grange Hall,’ Anna whispered. ‘When I left . . .’
‘When you left you were brave and strong and courageous. You saved my life. Stop this, Anna. Stop finding problems where there aren’t any.’ Peter’s voice was sterner now. ‘No one’s going to take Molly away. Not Sheila, not the Catchers, no one.’
‘I know,’ Anna said, wiping her eyes and shaking herself. She looked up at Peter earnestly. ‘I know that. I don’t know why I keep having these horrible dreams . . .’
‘Because you’re not working hard enough during the day,’ Peter said, a mischievous glint suddenly appearing in his eye – the glint he employed whenever Anna worked herself up. ‘I dug up all those potatoes yesterday and you just sat and watched.’
‘I didn’t!’ Anna protested earnestly, even though she knew he wasn’t entirely serious. ‘I dug up carrots. And scrubbed the potatoes. And –’
‘I’m teasing,’ Peter grinned. ‘Look, the dreams will stop eventually. But no more creeping around at night. You need your sleep and so do I. OK?’
‘You think she’s OK? Sheila, I mean. You think she’s happy in London?’
‘I think she’s very happy. I also think she’s her own person now. She’s not your responsibility. Not any more.’
‘You’re right.’ Anna nodded.
‘Of course I am.’ Peter grinned. He took her hand and Anna squeezed it, allowing him to lead her back to their bedroom. And if she had a sense of foreboding, a feeling that something terrible was going to happen soon, very soon, she suppressed it. Peter was right – she had to learn to trust, she told herself. She had to learn to be hopeful.
Jude’s hand was shaking. It wasn’t nerves – at least he told himself it wasn’t. It was his cramped position which was causing his muscles to spasm, to rebel, to quiver indignantly. He took a deep breath and returned to the wires in front of him, painstakingly making connections, checking and double-checking. He was ready to upload the film, ready to show the world what he’d just seen. He looked at his watch – 4 a.m. Looking around him one more time to make certain that he hadn’t been followed, that the dark shadows beneath him were just that and not a gathering army of Pincent guards ready to pounce, he held his breath and pressed the blue button on his hand-held computer. Upload. He heard a familiar whirring, the comforting sound of the device flicking into action. And then, for the first time in three hours, he allowed himself to relax slightly.
It had been his idea, filming the raids on Pincent Pharma. After all, they had been going on for years and nothing had ever happened – a few batches of Longevity had been destroyed but Pincent Pharma had just made more. In the battle of David and Goliath, Jude had pointed out to Pip, Goliath wasn’t just winning, he was triumphant, arrogant. They were barely making a dent. But Jude knew technology – knew how to harness it, how to make it work for him. And so he’d persuaded Pip to let him help. Initially they’d just tracked the raids through the Authorities’ network of CCTV cameras so that Pip, Jude or anyone else who wanted to, could watch the Underground soldiers bring the Pincent lorries to a halt and destroy the Longevity drugs within them. It had made everyone feel better, made them feel part of it, more entrenched in the rebellion. And then Jude realised that if more people saw the attacks, they too would feel part of the rebellion or, if not, at least they’d know it was happening. At least the Authorities and Pincent Pharma couldn’t deny it any more.
He pulled himself up and shook out his aching muscles, trying not to wince. He hated being reminded of his physical weaknesses, of his slim frame, his pale skin. He was nearly seventeen but still looked like a boy, not a man. Every time he glanced in the mirror he cringed at his reflection. He wanted to be strong, powerful, but instead felt like the runt of the litter, the also-ran. Peter, his half-brother, was the action hero who’d broken into a Surplus Hall to save Anna. Jude . . . Jude was just a techie.
He heard something, a noise, and ducked down again, his heart beating rapidly. Someone was here. Who? Had he been followed? Still, silent, he crouched and waited. Then, hearing nothing more, he relaxed slightly. He’d probably imagined it. After all, he was always careful. Peter was the brave, impetuous one; Jude was the planner, the organiser. In short, the boring one, he thought wryly.
He’d never thought of himself as boring before he’d met his brother; before he’d met Pip and joined the Underground, the resistance movement that had been set up to fight Pincent Pharma, Longevity and all it meant for humanity. He’d been a White Knight in his previous life on the Outside – a computer whiz who worked for good, identifying weaknesses in companies’ networks and offering to fix them. He did it for a price, of course, but there were others who simply took advantage of weaknesses to steal, to spy, to cause havoc. Jude had always seen himself as a benevolent protector; he’d liked that image, liked the kick he’d got every time he contacted a major corporation to let them know that he’d just hacked into their network and could, if he wanted to, empty their bank account. In return for his work he demanded a fee big enough to keep him going for a few weeks, sometimes a few months. And then he’d reward himself by going on to MyWorld. It might only have existed on his computer, but it often felt more real than the world outside. In the real world there were no young people, but MyWorld was full of them. And in MyWorld Jude was a genuine hero, popular with everyone.
The truth was, life without it had taken some getting used to.
‘Come on, come on,’ he muttered under his breath as the digital film slowly uploaded. It frustrated Jude that connectivity had, in recent months, got slower not faster. Like everything these days, things were getting worse all the time. Falling energy supply, falling water supply – he’d heard that in the south-west people had been forced to start queuing for water at the municipal well. Drought had meant that food was being rationed too, and not even under the pretext of identicard choices either. But at least they could queue up openly. At least they weren’t like him, hiding in a grungy, barely habitable building where sometimes food didn’t materialise for days at a time.