Nuclear Midnight (17 page)

‘Not nice, eh?’ Cliff agreed. ‘But there's no point in dwelling on the past, is there? You've always been one for that.’

‘Yes,’ Alex said distantly.

‘We can't dwell on the past, we have to look to the future,’ Cliff persisted as though trying to reinforce his point.

‘What future, Cliff?’ Alex suddenly blurted out. ‘Don't you see? I don't pity these skeletons, I envy them. They suffered for a few minutes, maybe a few hours or days, but then they were free. And us? We are still here, still struggling, and for what? A few more years of life scratched out of a wasteland until our own deaths?’

‘You always were a pessimist, Alex. I agree the world will never be the same, but the land will regenerate. The animals and plant life will slowly start to return.’

But Alex would have none of it. ‘No, no. We’ve destroyed the animal life forever. There will never be enough carnivores to keep down the insects or rats. The land will be ravaged forever by plagues.’

‘Wild dogs will keep the rats down,’ Cliff countered.

‘Then why aren't there thousands of packs of wild dogs roaming the countryside?’ Alex asked, feeling unreasonably annoyed. ‘They can't tolerate the radiation, don't you see? Every time they eat they concentrate radiation in their tissues. The ones that don't die are too sterile to breed.’

‘It won't always be like this,’ Cliff argued, determined not to be beaten. ‘The radiation levels will drop and the animals will start to multiply again.’

Alex took a deep breath, and then looked back at the sunset. As the sun approached the horizon, the huge dust burdens in the stratosphere magnified it to many times its normal size. Like some grotesque, flaming fireball, it stained the sky in rainbows of deep purples and crimsons, and the land in the colour of blood. The irony of that never failed to make him smile. ‘I don't know,’ he said finally. ‘Does fertility return just because the radiation level drops? Or is the damage permanent?’

Cliff knew without asking what was being referred to here. Over the past three years there had been just over twelve hundred births in the community, and over half of these had had to be terminated because of physical or mental defects. There would be precious few children to inherit this mess.

‘Even if most of the survivors remain sterile, their children won't,’ Cliff said.

‘How can you say that? It may take generations before the population becomes fertile again. Our children's children will still be eating contaminated food before some of the longer life isotopes have fully decayed.’

Cliff shook his head slowly. At times like these, there was little point in trying to reason with Alex. He would pick holes in any argument, however convincingly put. In truth, the root cause was not his physical or mental exhaustion, though these did play their part. Alex belonged to the former order; he was an antique of the old world, with none of the will to live of the more adaptable colonists. He had lost all that was most dear to him, and he dwelt on that, almost to the exclusion of hope.

The two friends parted, Alex to get something to eat, Cliff to return to work. Alex knew he had put a damper on Cliff's cheerfulness and that he seemed to be doing it constantly these days. But he could draw on experiences of which the little carpenter had no inkling. Cliff had not seen what lay beyond the frontiers of the community. He was buoyed up by his own driving optimism, like a swimmer in an enclosed pool who has never had to face the waves. The land wasn't regenerating; it was rotting under the blazing sun, ravaged by cycles of plague, growth and more plague. And Cliff couldn't see himself, how aged and physically how much weaker he had become in the brief month that Alex had been away. It would only be a matter of time before someone in authority noticed as well. He was slowing up, sinking visibly before the onset of disease. As long as his work didn't suffer and he wasn't contagious he would be ignored, but let some jumped up jack in office force him to attend a medical and the truth would be out. He would be placed on the short list of the sick, and one fine day he would be given his week's rations and told to leave, the payment for all the work he had done.

Alex strolled to the open air eating area, hugging these unhappy thoughts. All around him people were busy preparing the evening meal. Huge charred pots were gently simmering over log fires. The cooks were adding the final touches and the kitchen staff were preparing the necessary plates and cutlery for the three hundred odd residents of the mine. Now that the community had pushed its boundaries further eastward, the underground population had steeply declined, and only administration staff still lived there.

After a few minutes, he was joined at his fire by Terry Aldiss, the mine's chief motor mechanic, a very tall, ungainly looking fellow with skinny limbs and an expressionless face, which always gave the impression of boredom. He rested his elbows on his knees and studied Alex without speaking. Alex made no move to greet or acknowledge him in any way, but continued raising his cup of herbal tea to his mouth.

‘It's a good thing you can't see yourself in a mirror,’ Terry said, after he had finished his inspection. ‘You look like death warmed up.’

Alex ran his fingers through his hair, opened his mouth to speak and then decided it wasn't worth it. He went on sipping his tea.

Terry smiled briefly at this deliberate slight. ‘I can understand if you don't want to talk,’ he said. ‘I'm probably not your idea of a welcome home party.’

‘You're the last person I want to speak to,’ Alex said coldly.

This response drew a loud burst of laugher from Terry.

Fuming Alex rose to his feet, tossed the dregs into the fire and strode off without another word.

The next morning Alex reported formally to the full meeting of the committee in the main conference room. Eight men and four women faced him around a large, oval shaped table. Each member was responsible for a facet of community life, rather like the minister in the cabinet of the old government, except that here there was no election and no House of Representatives. Most of these eminent citizens had been with the community since its inception; only three were not from Wales.

A man with greying hair and dark, bristly eyebrows stood up and announced the topics for the day's discussion. Alex's trip was first on the agenda. Alex followed him and delivered his conclusions from the data he had recovered at length, including the high incidence of radiation in the cities which had been examined. The committee listened quietly, some frowning, others expressing surprise. When he finished he remained standing for questions.

‘This confirms our suspicions,’ Marcus summed up. ‘The eight largest cities in England and Wales still have areas of severe contamination.’

Everyone's eyes turned to a short, lean man in his mid-forties with a pair of reading glasses resting on the bridge of his nose. His name was Arthur Kenwell a Londoner who had formerly worked in a nuclear power plant near Bristol, and never allowed anyone to forget that fact. Arthur's imperious glance took in the circle of expectant faces before he wriggled into a more upright position in his chair and started talking.

‘Ah well,’ he clasped his hands together in front of him. ‘As you all know, before the war I was engaged in researching more efficient ways of deriving non-destructive forms of energy from nuclear power.’ He paused to clear his throat. ‘In retrospect it proved rather an inconsequential exercise. However, I did gain some expertise with radiation and a rough knowledge of the type of nuclear warheads in each superpower's arsenal. From what Alex has been telling us, the radiation is intense and localised. This can only mean the Russians used what are commonly termed ‘dirty bombs’ on all the major cities. These bombs are designed specifically to leave behind long life isotopes such as radium 226, strontium, 90 and caesium 137, which not only remain dangerous for years, but, also become incorporated in the tissues or the bones and cause cancers.’

‘But what would be the point of such bombs,’ a ginger-haired man asked. ‘Surely the immediate effects of their bombs, and the subsequent radiation would be enough to ensure almost total death in the cities.’

‘Why, my dear chap,’ said Arthur, taking off his glasses and setting them down neatly in front of him. ‘At first glance, I would agree, it may seem like an overkill situation. But if one thinks about it, it's not such a ridiculous idea, in fact it's rather ingenious. After all, the sooner a nation can reoccupy its industrial areas and start manufacturing goods; the sooner it will recover. By contaminating the cities for as long as possible, the aggressor can ensure that he gives himself a head start in the post war race for domination.’

‘But surely the radiation would be everywhere and not just localised?’ Alex asked.

‘I think what you have been seeing is drainage effects,’ he answered confidently. ‘Several years have now passed since the holocaust, during this time most of the radiation will have been washed into underground streams or reservoirs, or concentrated in gullies and minor depressions. This would give rise to discrete pockets of radiation all over the city. I’m sure if you had had more time and taken more readings, you would have discovered this effect yourself.’

Alex, who couldn't recall whether he had been walking over depressions or gullies when he registered these high counts, sank back in his chair and kept quiet.

‘Well as always, Arthur has given us all much food for thought,’ commented Marcus, falling into the now customary role of filling in the awkward moments when discussions had gone flat. ‘In your opinion, Arthur, when do you think the radiation will be sufficiently low enough to allow people to re-occupy the cities?’

The great man shrugged, then threw himself back in his chair in an exaggerated gesture. ‘It is too difficult to estimate,’ he said, rubbing his chin as though he was performing some complicated calculation in his head. ‘Unless a very exhaustive study of each city is taken, we will have no way of knowing what type of isotopes have been left behind.’

‘But the radiation levels Alex obtained were so high,’ another man interrupted. ‘Surely these long-life isotopes you're talking about won't be present in sufficient amounts to cause such high readings?’

Arthur met this new challenge head on. ‘You still don't understand, do you? Strontium has a half-life of twenty nine years, Cesium two years; both are specific decay products of fission bombs. If the Russians had wanted to, they could have designed bombs capable of producing long-life fission products which could contaminate a city for centuries.’

His persuasive manner and the depressing scenario plunged them into silence once again.

‘All right then, if we can't repopulate the cities in the foreseeable future, do you think scavenging parties could collect material from them without running a serious health risk?’ Marcus asked.

‘If the area was monitored beforehand and they had adequate protective clothing, I see no problem,’ Arthur replied.

‘We're running low on fuel and building materials,’ Marcus continued. ‘I suggest, therefore, that a party should be outfitted and sent to either Liverpool or possibly Birmingham as soon as possible.’

The motion was passed unanimously and the committee moved on to discuss the types of materials needed and the easiest city to reach. After some further debate, Liverpool was chosen and the size and date of the scavenging party was fixed.

Alex listened to the debate politely and offered his opinion when called upon to do so, but to his surprise he was not asked to participate in the expedition. He was just collecting his notes before leaving when Marcus motioned him to stay.

‘Mr. Rawling,’ Marcus cut through the general chatter that had broken out, ‘may I ask, have you intercepted any further radio messages from other countries?’

A short, squat man with a broad face and flat, ugly features looked up. ‘Yes, several in fact, from various parts of Europe; and, of course, from Ireland, which having received only a few bombs, has been broadcasting continuously. However, it's obvious they consider Britain beyond help. They refer to us as a nuclear wasteland, would you believe.’

‘What about the ones from Europe?’ Marcus urged, bringing him back to the point.

‘Rather weak signals on the whole. They seem to be attempts by the remaining factions of governments to calm the survivors. One mentioned that several cities are to be abandoned because of an epidemic carried by a rat plague. I suspect they may be in an even worse state than us.’

‘Nothing from further afield?’

‘None we could pick up with our receivers.’

‘I see.’ Marcus leaned forward on his elbows and began tapping with the base of his pen on the table top. ‘Ladies and gentlemen,’ he continued, ‘the world picture is naturally very hazy, but I think we have to assume international devastation, and possibly a world-wide nuclear winter causing massive crop failures. If every industrialised country has suffered equally like ourselves, it follows that our main priorities must be to increase our own strength and concentrate on finding any other sizeable communities which may be able to help us.’ He switched his attention to Alex. ‘You have not, I believe, encountered any signs of organised military force on any of your trips?’

‘Other than a few ragged bands of men dressed in military uniform, I've seen no evidence of any military activity for over two-and-a half years now,’ Alex replied.

‘Extraordinary,’ a well-spoken man beside Alex said. ‘Tell me, do you have any explanation as to where they could have gone?’