Darkshines Seven by Russell Mardell

Author:Russell Mardell [Mardell, Russell]
Language: eng
Format: epub
ISBN: 9781784626440
Publisher: Matador
Published: 2019-06-08T06:00:00+00:00

2

The man who had tried to offer Albie food was now distributing metal trays to those sat around the campfire, the same unidentifiable mush in each. Tommy dipped a finger into his and then sniffed it. Hector poked at the bread and flicked at a fly on the crust.

‘So, how long have you been here?’ Tommy asked Jarrow, as he wiped the brown mush from his finger onto the ground.

‘More or less since the start. We were greater in number back then, a proper community. I was a resident doctor at Our Lady of the Fallen Morality…’

‘Huh?’

‘Just a little joke. I worked in the hospital in City 17…’ Jarrow scooped a fingerful of the brown substance from his tray into his mouth, grimacing as he swallowed it, ‘now that is the real joke! City 17! How soulless and how typical of The Party. We are just numbers now. Statistical irrelevances. Those people have no heart. No emotion.’ He scooped up another bit of the food. ‘They started ransacking the hospital from day one. Antibiotics mainly, at first, that was before The Wash, before that lunatic thought he could cure us all, well, once he had sold The Party on that craziness, they started to clear us out of anything and everything he thought he might need for his brutality. Party Plod came and took it all. That was when I realised that enough was enough.’

‘What do you know about The Wash?’ Hector asked. ‘I’ve heard stories about what they were doing up there at Bleeker Hill. Some guy called Schaeffer?’

‘Ellis Schaeffer was the greatest doctor I ever met. I trained with him. He was a good man. Really, he was. I don’t know when that changed. I don’t know when he convinced The Party that he had the answers to stopping the madness. Maybe it was just self-preservation, maybe he just sold them a lie to buy himself some time. At the start. Either way he convinced them that he could wipe people’s minds. Remove the aggression and the rage. Reboot them, if you like. Wash them clean.’

‘They experimented on prisoners. I knew people who had done some time. I heard people talk about it,’ Hector said. ‘Guinea pigs.’

‘Then I guess they ran out of prisoners. You’ve seen the posters everywhere?’

‘Of course.’

‘They are selling the notion of sanctuary. But all they are doing at Bleeker Hill is culling. The Wash never stopped. They will keep on until they get what they want. Subservience. Empty shells that they can control and manipulate. Sometimes I see them carting people off, and I see the hopeful looks in their faces and I want to shout and scream at them and tell them that it is all a lie. But what good would any of that do?’

‘How do you know that is what they are doing at Bleeker Hill? How can you know?’ Tommy asked, nibbling away at his chunk of rock hard bread.

‘Information can be quite easy to come by, if you really want it.

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