The Alpha Plague (6 page)

As Rhys stepped up to his building, he saw the queue in front of him and muttered, “Fuck it.” The line for the retina and fingerprint scanners stretched all the way out the doors.

About thirty people deep, the queue could have been worse. The security guards watched the people as they passed through, but no one had been pulled to one side. When they got on one of those kicks, the queue would be three times longer.

***

Despite how much he blew on his coffee, it still burned Rhys’ lips when he took the first sip. Larissa had often joked about him having an asbestos mouth. It didn’t feel very heat resistant at that moment.
 

Rhys swiped his security card through the reader on his desk and stared at his computer screen.

“Please make sure you’re at eye level,” the female voice prompted him.
 

The screen turned into a mirror with a red line that ran across the centre of it. A quick adjustment of his seat allowed Rhys to follow the machine’s orders.

“Now, please lean back in your seat so it fully supports your back. Remember how important it is to maintain good posture and take regular breaks.”

The regular breaks thing he could live with. The good posture thing, not so much. An entire day of sitting with a straight back was neither natural nor comfortable. But what could he do? Slouch and the posture alarm went off. The medical team had given him far too many warnings as it was. After he’d leaned back into his seat, Rhys waited.
 

“Thank you. Scanning retinas… Scanning retinas… Scanning retinas…”

Before the process could complete, Clive and Larissa’s voices entered the office. It pulled Rhys’ attention away from the screen.

“Please face the screen. Please face the screen.” The alarm-like voice rang out for everyone in the office to hear.

Panic turned Rhys clumsy as he snatched at his security card and ripped it from the slot. IT would send him a warning for that one. Every time an employee removed his or her security card, it was to be only after the computer was logged off. Better to receive the condescending letter than let his computer tell his ex-wife and her lover that they were being watched.

Not that it bothered him to see Larissa and Clive together. Well, okay, it did bother him; it tore at his heart every day, but she had a right to move on. Besides, it wasn’t like he could ever have a relationship with her again. Too much bad blood ran between them, and it wasn’t worth living a life of misery so he could wake up in the same house as Flynn each day. It wouldn’t be healthy for Flynn. With a tense stomach, he took another sip of his coffee as he watched the pair kiss. He looked away before they’d finished.

In his peripheral vision, he watched Clive head in the direction of his corner office, and Larissa came over to her pod. Rhys had met Larissa at work. They’d had adjoining pods for a year or so before they started to date one another. Since they’d split up, they’d remained at the same desks. What else could they do? The only way to change desks in this place was to be fired, die, or get promoted. Some people stayed in the same pod until they retired. A few died without ever moving desks. Old Ryan Bell died
at
his desk; the same one he’d had since the day he’d started.

With Larissa fucking the boss, there’s no way she was going to get a promotion; it just wouldn’t be fair. And they wouldn’t promote Rhys. If he got paid more money, he could get a better solicitor. But they couldn’t fire him either—that wouldn’t look good on Clive. Nope, Rhys was fucked. He was destined to die a slow death in his cubicle as he watched his ex-wife and his son’s new dad play the happy fucking family and grow old together.

When Larissa disappeared behind the temporary walls that made up her workstation, Rhys threw a timid, “How’s Flynn?” in her direction.

As he awaited a reply, he listened to her move things around on her desk. She crashed and banged on the other side of the partition.

“I said, how’s Flynn?”

Never one for a scene, Larissa kept her voice low. “Jesus, Rhys, I’ve not even turned my computer on yet.”

The caffeine had added rocket fuel to Rhys’ veins and his pulse raged. Despite this, he managed to keep his reply level. “All I’m asking you is how my boy’s doing. I’ve not seen him for over a week. It’s not unreasonable to ask.” In the past, they would have argued. Not now though. It didn’t serve any purpose and would only give her ammunition to take to their eventual court battle for custody of their boy. When Rhys drew a breath to speak again, Larissa cut him off.

“He’s fine. He’s doing great, in fact. He had a wonderful weekend.”

The weekends Flynn spent away from Rhys were always wonderful.

“Clive and I took him swimming,” Larissa continued. “He’s doing widths now without arm bands. Clive’s such a good teacher, and Flynn loves swimming with him.”

Sure, Clive was now with Flynn much more than Rhys could ever be, but that didn’t make him an arsehole. He was a middle management moron who spent a bit too much time with his head in an inspirational manual and not enough reading the reactions of his staff, but he had a good heart and he did genuinely care about Flynn. “I’m pleased Flynn’s happy. Thank you for telling me about the weekend; I’m glad you all enjoyed it.”

When Larissa didn’t reply again, Rhys picked up the photo of Flynn from his desk. Time had curled the corners of the image, but did nothing to diminish the depth of his boy’s brown eyes. People had told him they had the same eyes, not that Rhys saw it. Instead, he saw the warm smile of his boy. Everything else may have been a disaster in his life, but when he looked at Flynn’s smile, Rhys could overcome whatever came his way.

He placed his card back in the card reader on his desk and returned his attention to the mirrored screen.
 

The computer started its routine again, and the female voice said, “Please make sure you’re at eye level.”

Chapter Five

“We had to do it, Frank.”

Unable to move his sore eyes from the monitor, Frank still hadn’t blinked when he said to Artem, “We didn’t have to do anything.” He flinched as he watched John and Alice tear into the portly Wilfred. Alice, who seemed to have earned alpha status already, went for the neck, while John attacked one of Wilfred’s ample thighs.

After he’d cleared his throat with a wet cough, Frank added, “Wilfred didn’t deserve that.”

The only light in the room came from the monitors. Artem’s fingers danced over his keyboard. He remained focused on his screen when he said, “All of the other doors are fine. The locks are solid. They’re safely quarantined up there.”

Frank looked across to see Artem with his hand raised for a high five. A shake of his head, and Frank returned his attention to his own monitor. “There’s nothing to celebrate.”

Once the other two had finished with Wilfred, they left him limp on the floor. As Frank continued to watch, his mouth dried. The anticipation of what was to come sent a hot wave of nausea through him. Sweat lifted on the back of his neck.

First, Wilfred’s left arm twitched. Then his left leg jumped from the floor. His head thrashed from side to side. He snapped at the air, but his body didn’t seem to have worked out how to move yet. As Wilfred lay on the floor, he released a throaty, phlegmy growl. The sound turned Frank’s skin to gooseflesh.

Frank shook his head and said, “I know they’re in the penthouse, and we’re about as far away as we can possibly be in this building, but it still feels too close.”

When Artem laughed, Frank tensed and his shoulders lifted into his neck.

“You’re paranoid, Frank. We’re in control here. There’s no way this is–”

A loud pop rang out and Frank looked across to see Artem crash onto his keyboard. Blood covered the monitor in front of him. Before he could turn around, Frank felt the hot end of a gun barrel press into the soft patch just below his right ear. He tilted his head around as far as the gunman would allow. “What the–”

“Don’t look at me,” the man behind him said. He had a thick Chinese accent. “Keep your eyes on the fucking screen if you want to live.”

A surge of adrenaline pulled Frank’s stomach tight. He lifted his shaky hands in the air. “O… okay. Sorry.”

The man behind pushed so hard it felt like he was trying to drive the barrel of his gun through Frank’s skull.

“Ow!”

“Shut up, pussy.”

When Frank blinked, a tear fell onto his desk. “What do you want?”

The man pulled the gun away, and Frank relaxed. A sharp pain then exploded across the back of his head; the loud crack made his ears ring. Before he had time to shake the dizziness, the barrel of the gun returned to the soft patch below his ear.

“You don’t ask the fucking questions! Got that?”

Frank nodded.

The butt of the gun hit the back of Frank’s head again, and the loud crack made his world spin. “Yes,” Frank said as he rubbed the sting on the back of his head. “I’ve got it.”

“I just want you to know that your wife, Juliette, and your two boys are okay.”

Frank’s stomach lurched. “What have you done to them?”

Another blow and Frank blacked out for a second.

“Are you fucking deaf or something? You don’t ask the fucking questions! They’re fine. That’s all you need to know. If you do everything I ask of you, then that’s how it will stay. Fuck me over, and we’ll kill them. And I don’t just mean a bullet through the head.”

The man leant so close to Frank that he could smell cigarette smoke and his breath tickled his ear. “We’ll make rats eat through your boys’ stomachs. Your wife will be forced to watch it while my men take turns on her.”

Tears soaked Frank’s cheeks, and a shudder ran through him. “Anything,” he said as his lips trembled. “I’ll do anything you want.”

The man pointed his gun at the screen. It showed a family of four in one of the building’s lifts. “Take control of that lift. Stop it there.”

Clumsy with fear, Frank hit several wrong keys.

The gunman pushed the barrel of his gun hard into Frank’s head again. “Don’t fuck about. Hurry the fuck up!”

Frank shook like he had hypothermia and typed as quickly as he could. A quick check of the monitor showed him the family had gotten closer to their destination floor. Just before they arrived, he hit enter. The lift stopped.

Frank released a stuttered sigh and swallowed against his dry throat. He wiped the sweat from his brow. “There.”

The pressure beneath his ear eased off slightly. “Good. Now redirect it to the penthouse.”

“But they have children with them!”

The next blow made a wet pulse throb in Frank’s ears. The taste of his own blood filled his mouth and he gulped a huge swill of metallic saliva. A wet heave threw half of it back up his throat. He swallowed it back down, and the bitter taste made him shudder.

“Well?” the man demanded.

Frank slurred his words. “You’ve got to stop hitting me; once more and I’ll be done for.”

The barrel left the spot beneath his ear and Frank flinched as he waited for another blow.

It never came.

The man behind him calmed down. “So, I have you on side?”

Frank nodded.

“I swear your family are fucked if you mess this up. Eight of my boys are sitting in your front room right now with them.”

The man put his phone in front of Frank. It took a few seconds before Frank made sense of the image. Men surrounded his family with more weapons than a small nation. Another gulp of his own blood, and Frank said, “Okay. I’ll do whatever you need me to do.”

“Redirect them to the penthouse.”

The little girl, the youngest of the family, couldn’t have been any older than three. A doll hung limp from her hands and her jaw hung loose as she stared around the lift. Her brother played a game on a phone. More tears rolled down Frank’s face as he typed on the keyboard and pressed ‘enter’ again.

The lift came to life. The family inside visibly relaxed and the dad hugged his daughter.

When it passed what was clearly their floor, the dad pressed the button on the panel. At first, he pressed it hard. Then he jabbed it. Before long, he hammered it repeatedly.

Frank’s sweaty fingers flew over the keyboard and he managed to hit ‘enter’ before the dad pressed the emergency call button. When the dad pressed it, it did nothing.

As the family elevated, the man in the room with Frank said, “You know who we are?”

“I’m guessing you’re from The East.”

“Check you out, brainiac. The accent gave me away, huh?”

Frank shrugged.

“We found out about your little experiment going on today; about your plans to drop it on us.”

“I wouldn’t know anything about what they’d planned to do with it.”

“Bullshit! It doesn’t matter though. When we’re done, you’ll wish you were dead. You’ll probably wish your family were dead too.”

Frank’s entire body tensed. “Leave my family alone. You said you wouldn’t do anything to them if I did as you say.”

“And I won’t, Frankie-boy. I won’t.” His voice dropped to a low hiss. “You’ll wish I had though.”

***

The walk from Building Seventy-Two to the square only took five minutes. Despite the short distance, by the time Rhys had sat down on the wall that surrounded the water fountain, sweat had stuck his shirt to his back.
 

At least he had the comfort of his old trainers rather than his work loafers. He’d left his tie in his top drawer and shoes beneath his desk. They were items for the subservient. A necessity while in Building Seventy-Two, but no one could tell him what to do on his lunch break. At work, he would often remove his shoes and not put them back on until the end of the day. It was a ‘fuck you’ to the bosses… an act of rebellion that gave him a small sense of freedom. People may have given him strange looks when he walked around the building in his socks, but fuck what other people thought.