The Cure, стр. 38
Tallulah followed the woman, Rose, having to double step to keep up every now and again as she was led around the tunnels. ‘Through there,’ said Rose. ‘I can’t take you any further, but I’ll see you on the outside.’
‘The outside?’ said Tallulah.
‘Trust me,’ said Rose and she put her cap on Tallulah’s head and her jacket over her shoulders.
Tallulah opened the door and she was suddenly in familiar surroundings. To her left were the stores and she thought of Brad Junior and doubt crept into her mind once again. Past the stores were the laboratories and if her memory served her right the communications room was somewhere past that, though she had never been there before. She kept her head down as a man walked around the corner ‘Morning,’ he said, but she just kept walking. ‘Rude,’ she heard the man say as he walked away.
The stores were busy as always, but so busy no-one even looked up at her, more concerned about the food stocks than a girl in army fatigues it would seem. The laboratories were next, and the doors were all safely locked. She passed her father’s lab, but he was nowhere to be seen. Had he gone with the men to release the toxin? No, she didn’t think so. The communications room was empty as expected and the door had a keypad rather than a key card. She stood there frozen not knowing the number combination, one finger poised out in front of her. As she stood there, she heard a noise and man stood almost next to her looking down at her and an angry sneer on his face ‘1776,’ he said.
‘I’m sorry?’ she said.
‘1776. The code to get in,’ the man repeated.
‘Oh, thank you,’ she replied, ‘I’d forget my own head if it wasn’t screwed on.’
The man smiled and walked away.
Inside the room was a desk. The same desk she had seen on the television at the prison. She turned around and shut the door, locking it from the inside and went and sat at the chair behind the desk. ‘Now what?’ she wondered. She removed the rest of the toxin she had brought back with her and stared at it almost waiting for it to do something. ‘You’re the key, aren’t you?’ she spoke to the test tube.
Leaving it on the desk she moved over to the equipment and started switching buttons to ON. Before long the camera started whirring and she could see the desk on a monitor. She stood behind the desk.
Looking deep into the camera she started to speak.
***************
Back at the reservoir Danny had pinpointed the weak spot in the center of the main reservoir dam and was setting up the explosives. He couldn’t believe that he’d made it this far and was about to blow up one of the largest water filtration systems in the world, let alone America, but this is what it had come down to.
He knew that the army were on their way there with enough toxin to kill half the population and he knew that it was down to him to ensure that didn’t happen. He tied together two wires and flicked a switch on the bomb. ‘Time to rock and roll,’ he said to himself.
‘I wouldn’t be so sure about that,’ said McGregor, walking along the corridor towards him.
‘It had to be you didn’t it?’ said Danny.
‘Aye lad, only one man for the job I’m afraid.’
‘I thought you’d died back out there.’
‘So did I. It sure felt like it Danny boy.’
‘So, what happens next?’ said Danny.
‘It can go two ways son. The first way is that you can switch off that little button there, walk over to me and we can go back to the base and let the good soldiers do their job. You get told off by your daddy and we get to live to a ripe old age,’ said McGregor.
‘And the other way?’ said Danny, already knowing the answer.
McGregor drew his pistol ‘I can come over there and switch it off myself, but I leave here alone.’
‘But there is a third way,’ said Danny and he held the detonator out in front of him, his thumb pressed tightly down on the red button on the top ‘I’m guessing you know how this works.’
‘Yes son, but you and I both know that explosive has a denotation area of about a hundred feet. Am I wrong? You take your finger off that button and it’s not just the dam that goes Boom.’
‘You think one life given isn’t worth saving millions? I also get to take you with me McGregor.’ he smiled.
‘I don’t think you’ve got the guts boy,’ McGregor started walking forward again, gun drawn on Danny.
Then he stopped again. Monitors all-round the corridor of the reservation started to make white noise and black and white pixels started to become a desk. Both McGregor and Danny looked up at the monitor above McGregor’s head.
Tallulah came onto the screen.
‘Hello. If you are hearing this then I need to tell you that you are in grave danger. My name is Tallulah Wanikiy and I have been living on a government base for over ten years with the President and some of his closest aides and confidantes. We have lived well whilst you have suffered from starvation. Now the government have decided that the only way this life can continue is by taking away the lives of people so that the remainder of us can thrive. They intend to put a poison into the water system which will go out to most of the major cities and kill anyone who drinks it.’
Throughout the cities people watched Tallulah