react before it got out of hand. Eric was a quick and positive pupil, and Simon enjoyed giving him the guidance he knew would help keep his son safe from harm. He told his son on many occasions the same words, “Never start a fight, always try to stay out of a fight, but if you can’t, make sure you end it, and do so quickly.” From the very first time Simon Peterson had instructed his son, he gave him the simple mantra of “Location, threat, retreat, and finally fight.”
Those words echoed in Eric’s mind as he peered into the deep gloom of the storeroom under the stage at his high school. “Location, threat, retreat, and finally fight.”
Games.
The light from Eric’s mobile wasn’t as good as a full torch, but it was enough to see around the storeroom. He remembered the first part of his father’s mantra, Location. The room seemed to be reasonably empty, as he realised that some of the props were out on the stage above his head, or had been placed outside the store room, moved out of the way to get to the required bar scene items.
He shone his mobile around the room. Neatly stacked to the left of the door were wooden benches. The opposite side had huge wire-mesh, securely locked cages; the one nearest to him contained various pieces of sports equipment, from basketballs to storage bins full of beanbags, hoops and small cones. The assembly hall was occasionally used as a second sports hall, and thus it was easier to leave a selection of basic equipment locked up in here, rather than carry it back and forth to the gym. The next cage was full of mops, buckets, bushes and an industrial floor scrubber. Eric could clearly see that this was the cleaner’s store cage, and he wondered when they would come into the school, as he never saw anyone during the day.
He carefully made his way over to the solid door, made from huge, thick steel plates with angled steel pieces welded along each edge and across the centre. He placed his hand on the cool metal surface and gave it a gentle push. He wasn’t surprised to see that it didn’t budge a great deal, but there was a tiny amount of movement. Shining the light from his mobile around the door, he could see that there was no handle on the inside. Eric stopped and tried to remember what it looked like outside, and his heart sank when he mind’s eye saw that it was a draw bolt and padlock system of security, same as his father had on the garden shed at home. The only way to be fully trapped inside was for the bolt to be slid across and slotted into the hole. He rattled the door gently once more, at the lock side, and his heart sank when the door didn’t move that much. A moment’s anger came over and he took a deep breath before slamming his shoulder into the door, giving it harder push. He knew that this was also to no avail, but his anger forced him to at least give it a try. “Damn” he exclaimed to the darkness that enveloped him as his phone cut off, and he thumped his fist against the metal in frustration, making it boom quite loudly within the store.
This gave him an idea.
“HELLO?” He shouted and banged his fist against the door a couple of times. “IS ANYONE OUT THERE?” He held his breath as he waited, straining to hear the slightest noise. He’d heard whoever had set the trap for him, as he’d passed by, so was hopeful that the same could be done for him. He banged even harder on the door with the base of his fist and yelled out “HELP, HELP!”
Once again he listened carefully, his body straining to hold his breath in, the sound of his heart beating in his ears as he wanted to pick out a noise that would give him any slight chance of hope. He was met with silence. Eric sighed as he knew that everyone would be in class by now, and very few people would be wandering the corridors, let alone be going past the entrance to the Assembly Hall at that moment.
Nevertheless, he was always optimistic, so he continued his calls and banging.
After a short period of calling and banging, Eric decided it wasn’t worth tiring himself out too much, and stopped. Whoever had done this was probably going to return at some time, or so he hoped. He used his phone again to illuminate his path back to the benches at the side of the storeroom, and took one off the top so he could sit down. As he got about halfway across the room, his mobile phone’s battery gave up, and he was plunged into darkness.
His plan to text Tom to come and get him out had just died along with the phone’s battery, and he sat down dejectedly and decided to await his fate.
Time passed by very slowly, and so, to keep himself occupied he played one of his favourite games; how to spend a lottery win. He’d played this many times over the past 2 years after his father’s death, normally during the very early hours when he found that he couldn’t sleep. The therapist he’d seen on many occasions during that time had explained that he shouldn’t count sheep, as that was so lame. Instead he should wonder what to do if his Mum won the lottery and he was given a million pounds to spend. As the therapist explained the game, he said that he should save at least half, and he would hope to get around 4% interest on that investment in a long term savings account. This would give Eric one set of calculations to perform, calculating the amount of money he’d earn from the interest he’d get. He could then split that into months, and only use half of it to spend, and half to put back into the investment, so that it grew. The next step was to repeat that calculation year by year, as the half a million grew, but increasing his allowance by 3% annually.
The other half a million was his to do as he pleased. He could buy anything he wanted, within reason, and definitely within the restricted budget. Eric had answered quickly that he’d initially get an Aston Martin Vantage, easy peasy. He then turned his attention to a decent iPod, a top specification ipad, and so it continued. The therapist stopped him, and asked that he kept a running total of what he’d purchased.
The therapist had explained to Emma Peterson, Eric’s mum, it was a simple distraction to get away from the thoughts of his father’s death. It would also use both sides of the brain. The creative side would dream up the items to purchase, and the intellect would calculate the total spends, and how much was left. By doing this, he would quickly tire both sides out, and hopefully drift off to sleep.
Eric sat on the wooden bench, not using this to get some rest, but to simply pass the time, and not dwell on the anger he was feeling towards whoever had done this to him. He used mental arithmetic to work out how much interest per day he’d be earning, to help lengthen the game. The spend became more intense, as his sights lowered to a new bicycle, including all ancillary kit of pumps, bags, water bottles etc. These may have only cost pounds, but it also helped pass the time during his incarceration.
There was the sound of a bell ringing, which made Eric jump, as he’d been so engrossed in his calculations and dreams of items. It took a moment for him to realise that it was only the bell which heralded the start of the afternoon break. He sighed, but stopped as a thought struck him. Eric leapt up and ran over to the door where he resumed his thunderous banging on the door and shouts for help.
It didn’t take long for him to realise that he had no chance of being heard, as the din of 700 kids all moving around the corridors at the same time was more than enough competition to his miniscule banging and shouting against a metal door at the far end and underneath the stage in the Assembly hall. Dejected, he went back and sat down again. Eric heard bell ring again at 3:30pm, and he could hear his peers leaving the school at the end of the academic day. He was starting to wonder if his assailants had forgotten about him.
Tests.
Harrap and his colleagues ran tests on the remainder of the 43 subjects that they had in storage over the next 3 weeks. They documented every process, every stage of the virus taking hold. They checked body temperatures, heart rates and blood pressure levels on an hourly basis for each test subject they were using. They took repeated scans to see how the brain and various organs tried to defend themselves from their attacker, making copious notes if something deviated from the norm.
He smile appeared after 25 had been tested to their fatal end, and it broadened, bit by tiny bit as each one result
ed in the same fate. His serum worked, and so far it had been 100% effective. Two of his team were responsible for mapping the longevity of the test subject. When all had been completed, they noted in their report that the majority had died within two weeks, some a little quicker, and one held on long enough to just make it to day 15, but still died. He wasn’t too worried about that one, as statistically he’d plotted the average time to death as 9.2 days.
Harrap sat at his computer. His team slept peacefully in their bunks at the far end of the laboratory, in a living area which was screened off by a blue curtain. Harrap couldn’t sleep. He didn’t know if it was from the excitement due to the success of the virus at this stage, or the impending live trial that was to take place. So far they’d only been able to take a small sample of creatures and test them in isolation of each other. He couldn’t yet tell how and even if the virus could be transmitted from person to person. They had collected and tested mucus and spittle samples from each subject, during each phase of the virus’s attack, and that looked promising as each contained the virus in vast quantities during the latter stages.