Igor's Secret Laboratory, New Milton Keynes, 16:30, Thursday the 11th of March, 2055.
Yuki injects herself with her new concoction and we all wait to see what happens. After a couple of minutes she's neither died nor had her arm drop off and it's a bit of an anti-climax so far.
Sykes goes over to the lab's dataterm and downloads a screamsheet to find out what's happening in the outside world. Imagine our joy when we find that Shen's story has made the front page! At least neither me or Yuki are mentioned, nor are our pictures included in the article.
I wonder where Shen is. Did he go to ground like I suggested? What will the others do to him when they catch up with him? Will the government or Biotechnica people get to him first? I'm sure Biotechnica at least will want to silence him.
Yuki takes a sample of her blood and compares it to a sample from before she injected herself. She tells us it looks like the nanites have become less active. As Roland seems to be deteriorating the fastest she offers to inject him, although obviously there is still a great deal of risk involved.
He decides to take the offered injection, and for the first time in quite a while, not that I'm complaining, we here from Crash as he pipes up with a "Me too".
Sykes makes a few calls to his contacts in an attempt to find out if anyone has connected him to the news story as, although he's not named, his picture is included. Despite the fact a number of his contacts have seen the story and recognised him, it's not yet common knowledge.
The hours seem to fly by as we try to decide where we go from here and Yuki continues to monitor herself, Roland and Crash to see if her serum is working against the nanites. Before we know it, it's gone 20:00, but Yuki says her serum has stopped the nanites causing any further damage.
Although she doesn't yet know how to repair the cellular damage caused by the nanites, at least she's bought us some more time.
Igor appears to see what we're up to. Yuki explains what she's found out about the nanite infection and her serum. Igor says he can help spread the serum through his network of ripperdocs, saying I'm sure they wouldn't charge too much.
Yuki is horrified at he thought of all the starving peasants dying from the nanite infection because they can't afford the treatment, and she tells him that he absolutely cannot charge anyone to give them it. He then says that he'll have to charge for her use of the lab then. After some negotiation, she agrees that he can charge up to 10eb for each injection, but no more.
Sykes meanwhile has made a call to Jake, to offer him Yuki's treatment. Unsurprisingly, Sykes isn't Jake's favourite person at the moment. A strange combination of fear and loathing, on Jake's part, means he's not really willing to listen to anything Sykes has to say and I suspect that it'll take a while for Sykes to regain his trust, if he ever does.
I have to admit to being uncertain of what to do next. As I think about it, I recall a quote that I've read somewhere;
I can see no other escape from this dilemma than that some of us should venture to embark on a synthesis of facts and theories, albeit with second-hand and incomplete knowledge of some of them -- and at the risk of making fools of ourselves.Maybe it's because I was a cop, I don't know, but I decide that the only course of action I can see is to go to the government with Yuki's serum. We know the government is involved somehow because of the speed with which the military acted, and the Prime Minister's connection to Biotechnica via his wife, Diana.
Yuki has a bag full of syringes primed with her serum and we head off to the central government office. We stop across the street because a sizeable crowd is demonstrating outside the front of the building, with a police cordon trying to hold them back. Obviously we aren't going to be able to just walk in...
I try to call Morgan to see if he can put in a word for us and get us through the cordon. I figure he's likely to be at the precinct still as there's always plenty of overtime available at a time like this, and with police salaries as low as they are, if there's overtime available it gets worked.
I was right, he is there. I explain the situation to him as best as I can, without giving too much away. He asks me to hang on while he tries to sort something out. After about 5 minutes he comes back with good news. He contacted the sergeant in charge of the cordon and if we can get to him he'll try and get us through. Morgan tells us where to find the sergeant, I thank him and leaving Yuki's bike securely parked, we cross the street to the government office.
We find the sergeant and he does indeed get us through the crowd and cordon and into the building. Once inside we're met and taken deep into building and eventually we're led to what looks like a study. We're asked to wait here and someone will be with us soon. We're offered refreshments, but we both decline them.
After about 10 minutes, three people enter the room. Two men and one woman, all wearing business suits. They introduce themselves as Matt Hayes, aide to the Prime Minister, Diana Rigg, from the Department of Health and Gordon Norton, a representative of Biotechnica.
We all shake hands, though I'm mindful to shake hands before Yuki does, as although she's stopped the nanites in her blood from doing any more damage, who knows if she's still infectious.
We begin explaining that Yuki has developed a serum that prevents someone infected with the nanites from suffering any more cell damage. However, it doesn't take her long to say three little words that render anything else we say completely meaningless... "I am infected."
After their initial shock, the suits recover and immediately brand us as terrorists trying to bring down the government by deliberately infecting them all with nanites. I hadn't warned Yuki not to say she was infected because I thought it was obvious. Obviously it wasn't obvious enough!
The suit's conversation is now mainly aimed at filling time and from all the sounds of activity in the corridor, they're not gonna have to fill for long. Shortly, Matt Hayes announces it's time to go. The door to the corridor is opened and in walk several people in full biohazard suits.
We're led down the corridor that has been lined with heavy plastic sheeting. You've got admire the speed with which the government can act when they think they're personally at risk! Eventually we find ourselves led into little isolation tents where we're ordered to remove all our possessions and dress in the 'paper' clothing that's been placed inside for us.
I hear Yuki protesting, but I know it'll do no good. At the moment co-operation is all we can give. Cause too much trouble and we'll be classified an even greater danger to the city and be disposed of. Yuki's damned us with those three little words of hers...
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This page © Greg Aldridge, 21 June 2003
