Coldbrook

2

‘Still want to slit my throat?’

Marc jumped a little, then sighed and rested back in the chair. ‘It’s not over yet. I said I won’t kill you until it’s over.’

‘Define “over”.’

‘Yeah.’ Marc stood and stretched, his joints creaking. The desk he’d requisitioned in Secondary was piled with printouts, the laptop stood open, and the satphone was plugged in to recharge.

‘So when will you be ready to begin?’ Vic asked.

‘I have begun.’ Marc pointed at the printed sheets. ‘I understand about thirty per cent of that.’

Vic flicked through papers, read lines here and there, saw formulae, tables, and some words he had never heard of — some of the phrases were in English and yet alien to him. He touched the laptop’s pad and the screen lit up, revealing a dozen unread emails. He saw that they’d come in over the past few minutes.

‘All these people are trying to help?’ Vic said.

‘It’s going to take for ever,’ Marc said. ‘It’s daunting. It’s scary how much I don’t know. I told Holly, and she didn’t seem to accept that very well. And there’s one thing I haven’t told anyone. About Jayne and Mannan.’

‘What’s that?’ Vic asked.

‘I think they need to mate. Conceive. I think it’s their child that might provide the cure.’

‘But that’s. .’ Vic said, aghast.

‘I know. Maybe years.’

‘I wasn’t even thinking timescale.’

‘You see my problem,’ Marc said.

‘Coldbrook won’t last,’ Vic said. ‘They’ll get in somehow. We’re taking a breather, but everyone in the garage is twitchy, listening to those things in the duct. Soon we’ll have to move again, and from then there’s only one way to go.’

‘I know that, too.’

Vic turned and looked at the blank screens, seeing himself and Marc reflected there. ‘Tomorrow,’ he said. ‘We’ll tell them all tomorrow.’

‘Yeah,’ Marc said. ‘Everyone deserves a day of hope.’