Bats Out of Hell (11 page)

It was only as he walked up Corporation Street that Baxterdale found the courage to admit to himself the real reason why he had locked the clerks in the Credit House with the bat. Had he attempted to release them, that crazed creature might have flown at
him
. The captain of the ship had battened down the hatches and deserted the sinking vessel with the crew locked in the hold.

He walked slowly, thoughtfully. Of course, they might not die. There was every chance that the bat had not been carrying the virus, that its erratic flight had been caused by panic. It was his only consolation.

His car was parked in Shadwell Street, a lengthy daily walk to and from the Treasury, but that was compensated by easy access to the Expressway. From there it was about forty minutes by car to his home at Shenstone.

Something caused him to glance upwards as he crossed Colmore Row and made his way across the front of the derelict Snow Hill station. At dusk hundreds of starlings could be seen in and around the buildings, chattering noisily as they went up to roost. Scavengers, but the city accepted them in the same way that it put up with the feral pigeons which fouled the buildings and cost the ratepayers a fortune annually in cleaning bills.

But today something was wrong. The starlings did not come back to roost until dusk, and that was almost three hours away. He looked again; The eaves were crowded, some of the occupants flying, settling, flying again. And there was something decidedly odd about the way they flew. Starlings maintained a straight course, in short, jerky flights. These were soaring and diving faster than the eye could follow, crashing crazily into the stonework. Swifts? Swallows? Baxterdale did not know much about ornithology, and he was not particularly interested. He almost turned away, and then, suddenly, he understood.

Bats!

The papers had said they might head for urban areas. He quickened his step, hurrying down the underpass. The radio had said, "report all sightings of bats". To hell with that! Bats had caused him enough trouble for one day. Let somebody else do the shouting,

Baxterdale was breathless by the time he reached his car. His fat fingers fumbled with the door key, and it dropped from his grasp and bounced under the car.

"Sod it!" he swore, and dropped to his hands and knees.

It was then that he saw the rat. It was crouching motionless under the car, and it was a big brown creature, its red eyes regarding him balefully. Baxterdale drew back his hand. The key was nearer to the rat than it was to himself, and the rodent made no move to flee. It was not frightened of him.

Of course, it wasn't surprising to see a rat in the car park. He'd come across them before. The canal was only a matter of fifty yards away. That's where it had come from.

"Shoo!" he muttered. "Scram!"

The rat did not move. Baxterdale pursed his lips and a little shiver of revulsion ran up his spine. He had to have that key. And the sooner he was away from Birmingham the better. Tomorrow he would go sick. He'd made up his mind. He'd never done it before, but there was a limit to that which any man could stand.

He began to stretch out his hand nervously. The key lay about a foot away from the rat. Easy does, it, then a quick snatch . . . He moved quickly, grabbing for the fallen object, but even as his hand closed over it the rodent leaped forward.

Baxterdale yelled as sharp teeth dug into his palm, claws raking his knuckles. The creature was clinging to him, biting, scratching. He struck at it with his other hand, once, twice. Its grip slackened, and with a sob of relief he saw it fall, hit the ground, roll over, and dart towards a dense bed of nettles and weeds which bordered some adjacent waste ground.

Baxterdale retrieved his key, unlocked the door and then examined the wound on his hand. The bite was a deep one, bleeding freely. It was painful, too, There might be poison in it. He'd read somewhere once that people bitten by snakes sucked the venom out and often saved their lives by so doing.

His eyes shut, his thick lips closed over the bite, he sucked, sensed an unpleasant taste on his palate, and vomited on to the ground. For some moments he stood there retching, and then, with deliberate effort be climbed into his car, bound The wound with his handkerchief and drove off.

Baxterdale was feeling ill by the time he reached Spaghetti Junction and filtered on to the A38. His vision was impaired for some strange reason, as though he was driving through a red fog, with visibility down to only twenty yards or so and gradually reducing. His back ached, the pain increasing and travelling upwards until it reached his neck. He could not turn his head at all, and even the effort required to manipulate the controls was considerable. Logic told him to pull off the road and attempt to attract attention. Instinct urged him to try and make it home, a wounded fox crawling back to its lair to die.

He passed through Sutton Coldfield, and had it not been quiet, with virtually no traffic about, his frequent swerves would doubtlessly have involved him in a head-on collision.

Then, at last, every nerve seemed to freeze in his body. His brain was confused. He did not know where he was, or where he was heading. An island loomed up ahead of him. His foot was jammed securely on the accelerator, and there was no way in which he could free it even had he realized the danger. Rigid hands clutched the wheel. Eyes stared sightlessly ahead.

The car, a Viva, hit the roundabout and overturned, sliding on its roof with a screech of tortured metal, and finished upside down on the forecourt of the Midland Bank branch at Four Oaks.

The wheels spun. People gathered, staring, curious, horrified. Baxterdale watched them from his inverted position, unharmed by the accident, but slowly dying from the paralytic plague. He stayed there for almost an hour, and only when a fire engine could be spared from the scene of burning devastation in Sutton Park was the Treasury Chief cut free and rushed to hospital.

Haynes' expression was grave. His bloodshot eyes were proof that he had not slept for days. Once again a meeting was being held in his small office, but this time, apart from Rickers, Newman and Susan Wylie, there were two leading bacteriologists from London, and a well-built, grey-haired Ministry of Defence official.

Sir John Stirchley was tall and thin, wore rimless glasses that seemed to have the effect of making his eyes larger than they really were, and this, combined with bushy eyebrows and a military-type moustache gave him an appearance of severity. His work was acknowledged by biologists throughout the world.

Professor Talbot, on the other hand, was clean-shaven, said little, and was virtually unknown outside his London laboratory. Yet Sir John Stirchley had the greatest admiration for him, and had singled him out from a host of top bacteriologists as the man most suited to help in the crisis which was now building up to a peak.

All eyes were on Newman, the bandages around his waist and beneath his clothing giving him a more mature stature, but every time he moved the stiff jerky motions reminded one of a screen cartoon character. He had certainly been fortunate not to have received more severe injuries at the hands of the mob.

"Gentlemen," Haynes began, sounding tired and lifeless, "we are now faced with a situation which, up until a few days ago, we had considered not impossible but certainly improbable. The bats have moved into Birmingham, and, as far as we know, they have not infiltrated beyond the city center. It was thought at first that a single bat had somehow penetrated the Bank Treasury. It was later discovered that several more of the creatures were hiding out in a rather antiquated ventilation shaft. Seven bank clerks who came into contact with the bat died at intervals during the course of the following week. This was only to be expected, but the most alarming features of all were to spread from there."

He paused, fumbled a cigarette out of a packet on the desk, and lit it with fingers that shook.

"First, this man Baxterdale," he continued. "As far as anybody knew he had had no contact with the bat. He was later discovered, on the same day, trapped in his car which had overturned. There was no doubt that he had somehow contracted this mutated meningitis virus, but even if he had done so then he should have survived another two or three days. He died within hours! There was a wound on his hand, a small but nasty bite which was later found to have been inflicted by
a rat
. Baxterdale had contracted the disease via a rodent. Now, perhaps Professor Newman would be kind enough to give us a summary of his recent experiments with rats."

"I injected twenty rats with the same virus which is causing widespread death amongst the bats," Brian Newman said. "Only one rat died. The others appeared to be immune. I thought that possibly they had become carriers in the same way that many bats are. Further tests proved that they were not. The virus had died without apparently harming them in any way. One rat in twenty, gentlemen.

Five per cent. But a thousand times more deadly than a bat."

"And what about mice?" Sir John Stirchley asked.

"Totally erratic," Newman replied. "Some followed the same course as the bats. About fifty per-cent fatalities. Definitely not as receptive as bats, but more so than rats. But, overall, there is no pattern. There is only one common denominator, and that is that the disease is deadly and it can be carried by almost any living being, including humans! Seven Treasury clerks died as a result of coming into contact with an infected bat. Within a week three hospital staff and one doctor caught the disease. Yet none of those who attended to earlier victims caught it. Why?" He shrugged his shoulders. "Maybe we shall never find the answer to that one. It could be that some people are immune for some reason. One thing seems fairly certain, though. The virus is only passed on while the sufferer lives. Once the victim dies, so does the virus. Whilst we are faced with a situation akin to outbreaks of bubonic plague in the Middle Ages, we have the small consolation of knowing that corpses can be handled with impunity."

"And your experiments to find an antidote?" Sir John Stirchley asked.

"Negative. At the moment I have nothing to report. I am still hopeful, though."

Haynes took off his glasses and sighed. "So much for the biological side of this business." He turned to the. Ministry of Defence official. "Now, Mr. Littler, we have brought you up to date on our side of things, so perhaps you would be kind enough to fill us in on the details of what is happening in the Midlands? One is always dubious of relying solely upon newspaper, radio and television reports."

"Quite so," the other spoke in a flat, expressionless voice. "Well, as you know a large number of bats have infiltrated the center of Birmingham. The first reported sighting was in the old Snow Hill Station. The pest authorities were called in; the building was sealed off and pumped full of cymag gas. Later it was discovered that forty-two bats had been killed. All males."

"All males!" Newman gasped. "Then—"

"Precisely. The point I am just about to make," Littler continued, "is that it is reasonable to assume that the females are breeding elsewhere. In the city, or in rural areas? It is impossible to say. According to reliable information which I have, the female bats should have given birth to their young already, and so, by the middle of September when these young bats are able to fend for themselves, their numbers could have increased by twenty-five percent. As one infected bat alone is capable of killing an innumerable number of people before it dies, then we have some idea of what we are up against."

"But apart from Snow Hill Station." Haynes broke in, "there must be dozens of other such places harbouring bats."

"Of course," Littler replied. "They have been sighted in scores of derelict slum areas, but it seems that once they are disturbed they leave and seek refuge elsewhere. We had one report of a large flock seen entering a derelict house in Moseley. We followed the same procedure as with Snow Hill Station, but afterwards, when it was safe to enter, we found not one single dead bat. They had obviously flown before our arrival."

"It's like the mythical burial ground of the elephants in Africa," Rickers groaned. "Somewhere that's never found. We have to find the bats' breeding places if we're to check their spread, and that's only half way towards solving the problem."

"And what about the public?" Sir John Stirchley lowered his voice. "The scenes on television and the accounts in the newspapers are pretty awful. Is it really as bad as all that?"

"Worse," Littler said with a grimace. "So far twenty-three people have died as a direct result of this virus. Doctors are working night and day, and surgeries and hospitals are besieged by terrified people who claim to have been in contact with bats. The Prime Minister is speaking to the country tonight. The Midlands is to be declared a disease zone, a circle incorporating Stoke-on-Trent, Leicester, Kidderminster and Wellington. All roads will be closed to and from the Midlands in an attempt to keep everybody and everything in."

"Impossible!" Sir John snapped. "We have neither the police nor the armed forces with which to implement this. Just closing the roads and railways won't be sufficient. People will travel on foot."

"We shall not be relying solely upon the police or armed forces as we know them," Littler spoke uncertainly, as though he should not be disclosing the information. "There can be . . . shall we say, the formation of an additional force."

"Like vigilantes?"

"Oh, no, the vigilantes are already making their presence felt. This will be a body of men. Armed. Well, I'll say no more, but it is the only way."

"A police state," Stirchley muttered.

"Only temporarily. While the bats continue to spread the disease."

"All the armies in the world couldn't contain a colony of bats."

"It isn't just the bats, sir. It's the people. If they begin fleeing the infected area then they are capable of carrying the virus to other parts, the same as the bats do. Likewise, we can't have a breakdown of law and order in the Midlands. Imagine the looting which would take place if everyone left."