The Deadly Game(52)

Jake smiled at him.

‘Maybe Ronnie’s right, maybe you’ve been hanging around them Hare Krishna people too much,’ he said with a smile.

‘Peace and love and looking after people who need help,’ said Jez. ‘It ain’t no bad thing.’ He looked towards Michelle, who had opened the door of her car and was waiting. ‘Better go and do the last move, Jake.’

‘Yes.’ Jake reached out his hand, and shook Jez’s. ‘I’ll pay you back someday, I promise,’ he said.

‘Sure you will.’ Jez smiled. ‘I know that.’

Then Jez slipped the bike into gear, and raced away. Jake watched him go then he walked to Michelle’s car.

‘You got it?’ she asked.

‘I got it.’ Jake nodded.

‘OK,’ said Michelle, her eyes brightening with excitement. ‘Let’s get to the lab!’





Chapter 30




The lab was in a building that looked impressively high-tech from the outside. Michelle parked in the enclosed car park. Inside the building, once they’d passed through security, there were rows of corridors that appeared to house many labs, all with red lights on outside the doors, and signs outside each warning: ‘No entry’. Jake followed Michelle to the lift, which they caught to the third floor. There seemed to be very few people about, and those that were wore white lab coats and hurried past them unsmiling and not making eye contact.

‘This is our lab,’ said Michelle, pointing to the number 23 by one of the doors. She took out a plastic card and ran it through the security decoder beside the door. There was a buzzing sound, then the door swung open. A young female lab technician in a white coat was waiting for them in a small entrance lobby.

‘Ms Faure?’ she asked.

Michelle nodded. ‘And this is Jake Wells,’ she said, gesturing at Jake.

Jake gave the young woman a smile, but it wasn’t returned.

‘Lucy Waning,’ said the young woman. She held out her hand. ‘You have the item?’

Jake took out the plastic bag and handed it to her.

‘Be careful,’ he warned her. ‘The last time one of these was opened, there were spores inside it which infected the person who opened it.’

‘That’s why we are using a bio-hazard case,’ said Waning. ‘If there are any contaminents inside here, they’ll be detected.’ She indicated a side door marked ‘Gallery’. ‘If you go in there you’ll be in the observation gallery, and you can watch what’s happening.’

‘Do we need to wear hazard suits, or whatever you call them?’ asked Jake.

Waning shook her head.

‘Not at this stage,’ she said. ‘And, hopefully, not at all. Inside the observation gallery you’ll find monitors, so you’ll be able to follow everything that I do as there are high-definition CCTV cameras aimed at the bio-hazard case from different angles which pick up everything. If you have any questions, or I want to ask you something during the procedure, the speakers and microphones inside the gallery will be switched on the whole time. Do you have any questions?’

Jake and Michelle exchanged questioning glances, then both shook their heads.

‘No,’ said Michelle. ‘Everything seems to be covered.’

‘Then I’ll go and prepare and we can begin,’ said Waning.

With that, she left the small lobby through a door marked ‘Strictly no entry’. Jake followed Michelle through the door marked ‘Gallery’.

As Waning had said, they were faced with banks of monitors, speakers built into the walls, and there were three microphones dangling down from the ceiling. The observation gallery was dimly lit. As well as being able to see everything via the monitors, one wall was completely glass and looked down on to a laboratory. They watched as Lucy Waning came into the laboratory. Now, she was wearing a hazard suit, complete with a large helmet with a visor at the front, with tubes and wires dangling from the front of the suit and the helmet. Jake thought she looked like an astronaut prepared for a space walk. In her hand she carried the plastic bag with the book in.

She went to a large glass case in the centre of the lab, lifted the lid, and placed the package inside. She shut the lid, and then clicked various switches to make sure it was sealed shut. Lights came on around the glass case.

‘Those lights confirm the case is now sealed and airtight,’ came Waning’s voice over the speakers.

Waning then connected the ends of the different tubes and wires dangling from her suit and helmet to points at the base of the glass case.

‘I am now connected to the unit,’ said Waning. ‘Everything I do will be recorded. If any hazard of any sort is detected, the units on the display above me will show the kind of hazard present, and the action the unit takes to neutralise it. Can you see the displays?’