I opened the year with an end-of-the world story, and this continues the subject of earth-shattering occurrences . Like the previous story, this one was started early last year, and had to wait until the end of the year, when my muse came back from where-ever it had disappeared to.
Marianne.
Part 1
“Say cheese!” Those two words summed up a lot of my young days. My father, Allan, was an avid photographer, while my mother, Wanda, had been a model. They told me that when they met, it was a marriage made in heaven.
Before I came along, they had worked almost constantly on advertising. Fashion, underwear, homewares, you name it, they had done it. Whenever I looked through their scrapbook it was almost like living their lives all over again. Sometimes, when we went on holiday, we saw old posters still up with my mother looking beautiful.
We seemed to have a lot of holidays. Whenever there was a break in work, Dad would load us into the car and we would head for quiet, remote spots with good scenery, mainly as a background for his scenic collection that he sold on-line. Mum and I would often feature in them. Often, on shoots for clients, she would brush my hair out, dress me in something feminine, and we would do ‘Mother and daughter’ shots. Other times I would have my hair in a cap, and we would then do ‘Mother and son’ shots. Sometimes, but it wasn’t often, Dad would let Mum get behind the camera and we would do ‘Father and son’ pictures.
We had a lot of weekends away, in the hills, by the beach, on every bit of moorland and forest we could find. By the time I went to High School I was a seasoned camper. Our house was on the edge of a village and was a wonderful place to run free in the open air. When it was time for me to go to the High School, we had a family conference.
“Brien, your father, and I have decided that we will sell this place and get somewhere closer to a town with a good school for you. The house is on the market.”
“Don’t I get a say in this, Mum? I love it here. Do I have to go to into town to study?”
“Yes, you do,” my dad insisted. “We have looked around and there’s a reasonable place within walking distance of a good High School. We want you to have the best chance at a future and it's your earnings that will enable us to make the shift. What you don’t know is that you have been getting income from pictures you’ve been in. We’ve been putting it aside for you.”
So, as a family, we could afford a place. We moved to the outskirts of a large town, in a reasonably sized house with a nice garden and a big shed to take all our camping gear. I went off to my first term and that’s when the problems began.
Me, Brien Weyland, became a regular visitor to the first aid room in that first term. I was all right at home on weekends, and perfectly good when we went off to the open air on weekends. No-one could figure out what was wrong, the occurrences were not regular, nor were they life-threatening. It was mainly a sudden onset of breathing problems, a bit like bronchitis. There was a supply of inhalers in the first-aid room, just for me. They helped me through my studies, and I was lucky not to miss much.
There were a few visits to the first aid room which had nothing to do with my breathing problems. As I have said, earlier, I was not a big boy. I looked a bit effeminate, and was the subject of some bullying, so gaining some cuts and scratches and more than my fair share of bruises.
I was in my third year when the pandemic changed our world. The school went into lock-down and we all had to study from home. Dad was able to make a reasonable living from on-line sales of his pictures, the scenic shots being very much sought after into the second year of being stuck at home. I guess everyone wanted a picture they could get lost in.
Unable to get out and about, Mum decided that, as an experiment, I was to be her daughter for three days out of seven, just for fun. She had saved up her older clothes. She had bought shoes in my size and collected a range of underwear and sleepwear. I didn’t make much of an argument when I was informed of this, it wouldn’t have done any good if I had. It was just clothes and I had been in and out of feminine attire most of my life. Living some of the week in skirts and dresses was different, though, as I was now expected to live as a girl.
One of the things that was good for me during the pandemic was that I had more than two years without a single occurrence of my breathing problems. We had a good computer that Dad used for his photographic sales, as well as a laptop when I needed to write essays, so it was easy to keep up with my studies. I found that, as Brienna, I could concentrate better. When restrictions were lifted, Mum cited my earlier breathing problem, and I was allowed to continue home studies. I graduated without going back to face the bullies or spending time in the first aid room. By that time, Brienna was often my normal personality.
The paperwork was delivered by post and Mum showed a remarkable skill in forgery so that Brien Aubrey Weyland was now Brienna Audrey Weyland, with her school certificate. My marks weren’t good enough to consider university, so it didn’t matter, I looked like a girl, I spoke like a girl, I dressed like a girl and my paperwork showed that I was a girl when I left school. I didn’t have to go looking for work, straight away, as I was now modelling for Dad with a new burst of advertising pictures. I had taken over Mums’ place on the hoardings.
When things started to get back to normal, we would go out to locations for a photo session. As I looked like an outdoors girl we were in high demand for camping and holiday posters. As part of Dads’ on-line sales, we had spent a whole weekend at Windsor Castle, creating a file of imposing photos. This came in handy when the Queen died, as they flew off the shelves, so to speak. When the new King came to the throne, things slowly changed in the advertising world. There was more of a demand for ‘male oriented’ advertising, reflecting the new King and a line-up of male heirs to follow.
By the time I reached nineteen, I had a decent bank balance and a very good closet full of outfits. My contracts we in the name of B.A, Weyland so it didn’t matter whether I was on set as a girl or a boy. I hadn’t taken any drugs to aid my femininity and could slip from one gender to another in ten minutes. As the need for Brien to be the subject increased, I had all the work I could ever need. That was mainly down to my aquiline face that looked upper class.
My wardrobe full of dresses and skirts was put to one side and more manly outfits took their place. I say ‘manly’ with my tongue firmly in the cheek. There wasn’t a lot of ‘butch’ about them, but my features allowed me to carry them off. If anything, my work increased as advertisers wanted to make it look as if the toffs used their products. The only set-back was the onset of my breathing problems, especially when we had a set near the city center.
One day we were contracted to do a series of shots with me standing next to large trucks. My lack of height made it look as if they were bigger than they really were. That’s when things went wrong.
The first part of the day was normal. The trucks were lined up and I was photographed standing alongside them, in front of them, leaning out the cabin, all the normal things. Then they decided to concentrate on their latest release, so the others needed to be driven away to leave this one to be seen on its own. I stood to one side as the engines were started and I could feel my throat constricting. One drove by me and it had a side-exhaust that pointed directly at me. That’s when I found that I couldn’t breathe and blacked out.
When I came around, I had a breathing pipe in my throat, and I was in hospital. Over the next few days, we found out what my problems had been all my life. I was allergic to the chemicals in diesel exhaust. When my parents looked back to when I had reported sick in school, they found out that it usually happened on those days the bins were emptied by a big truck.
I spent two weeks in hospital and had medication to alleviate the massive reaction I had suffered. When I could breathe normally, the tube was removed, and the gap stitched up. I was told that I was one of about a hundred known cases in the country. I was, however, listed as a high-risk patient and had to attend some meetings with the doctors and my parents before I was allowed to leave.
I was told that I had been lucky, one of the truck drivers had paramedic training and had worked on my throat with a penknife, and a tube from a biro. I was told that I was just seconds from being dead. That being the case, the doctors didn’t want to let me back into the real world as it would leave them liable to litigation.
The problem had become more frequent as the country came out of the pandemic and the business had come back to life. We were told that there had been a few high-powered meetings in the National Health and a solution had been put into place.
The solution, until a way to rid me of my problem was discovered, was in the form of purpose-built clinics, with internally pressurised living accommodation, where people like me could live without any fear of diesel smoke. These, we were told, went under the banner of the Allington Refuge Project, so named because the first three had been created, all near villages called Allington, well away from busy roads or industrial centers.
There were two in Wiltshire, one near Chippenham and the other near Devizes, both converted private houses that were big enough to house up to a dozen patients. Another was in Lincolnshire, also in a converted stately home. There were plans for others across the country, but the rate of building new ones was quite slow.
The place near Chippenham was for boys and the one near Devizes was for girls and my parents were assured that I would be well looked after while I was a guest. They even used the term ‘Guest’ in the paperwork I had to sign, saying that I was happy to be a guineapig for new drugs. I would be able to go out for trips, if I made sure I had oxygen handy. I was told that the clinic had high-speed internet so I could do gaming if I wanted, or even take on-line courses. It sounded all right and they assured me that there could be a vaccine or drugs soon that would allow me, and my fellow sufferers, to live a normal life. My parents were all for it and I didn’t want to die, so it was agreed that I would be transported to the Chippenham Allington as soon as transport could be arranged.
The transport showed the amount of thought that had gone into the project. It was an electric ambulance, fitted with a sealed cabin, with air being thoroughly filtered and an outlet to the rear, the inside being slightly more pressurised than the outside. It was a nice ride, my folks following behind, and I arrived at the Refuge in mid-afternoon.
Now, as you may have gathered from my account, so far, I was not used to a lot of contact with other people. My world had revolved around my parents, camera crews, and a few doctors since the pandemic. Being in hospital was the most people I had spoken to in some years. What with doctors, nurses, aides, and a few other patients, I had been almost giddy with all the different faces that looked in on me. The Refuge was, I thought, going to be a bit of a rest from that.
I couldn’t have been more mistaken. The place was, as I had been told, a converted country home. The grounds were substantial, the property was isolated, and the house would have been magnificent to live in, if you had the money for the upkeep.
When we arrived, we were shown the main house by a lady who was wearing a plain blue dress with her name badge that told us she was Sister McDonald. She said that the staff didn’t dress in full nurse outfits as we, the guests, weren’t sick while we were kept safe. The ground floor was set up as a general living area, dining room and a kitchen good enough for a hotel. The upper floor was, we were told, staff quarters and a small ward, big enough for two, with full oxygen and treatment facilities. That’s where I would be if I was trialling a new drug.
There was a covered walkway to the guest accommodation, entered by an airlock at each end. The building where I would live had once been garaging and a stable but was now a rectangular building with big windows. When we got inside, it had a communal lounging and games area, its own kitchen and dining and downstairs toilets. All the windows were triple-glazed and didn’t open.
Upstairs, we were told, was twelve, self-contained, suites, with ensuite bathrooms and big beds. I was shown into mine and Dad set the two bags he had been carrying on the bed. Mum had a smaller hold-all which she told me to look in when I was alone. We all went back to the main house where I hugged and kissed my parents and they left.
I asked Sister MacDonald if I was the only one here and she told me that the others were out, on an excursion, into Chippenham for some shopping, and would be back soon. We had use of a pressurised coach that had oxygen on board. Excursions would happen at days where there was enough breeze to ensure clear air. Other days, she told me, we could go out but had to carry a lightweight oxygen kit with nose breathers.
I went off to my room to unpack and have a shower. It was a little finnicky getting through the two airlocks, but I was sure it would all become easy with use. In my room, I looked out of the window at the rear garden and orchard. There was a big shed up near the back fence, which I thought may be the workshop. I unpacked my cases and put my clothes away. It was mostly Brien’s’ outfits, but Mum had sneaked in a few skirts and tops. In the hold-all I found everything I would need to be Brienna, underwear, sleepwear, cosmetics and even a packet of condoms. That one surprised me as I had never had a romantic attachment to a girl, or boy, since puberty, not that puberty did much for me.
After my shower, I dressed casually and lay on my bed until I heard some commotion from outside my door and went out into the corridor to see what was happening. It was then that the full impact of my life to be came home to me. I walked into a crowd of smiling, chattering guys who obviously were not upset at being here.
“Hello,” said one, “we’ve got a new boy.”
I nodded and said, “Hello, I’m Brien.”
One guy, who looked about the same age as me, smiled. “Hello, Brien, I’m Adam. I’m in the room next to you.”
As he spoke, I looked into his eyes and a jolt ran through my body. It wasn’t like anything I had felt before. At that moment I knew that I would follow him anywhere. It was a new, and frightening, feeling. What if he turned out to be horrible to me. I wouldn’t be able to resist him. I suddenly wondered if I had fallen in love.
He suddenly looked surprised, himself, but then gathered his wits together and introduced me to the rest of the crowd. The oldest was Jim, a mechanic who, at the ripe old age of thirty, had been found under a truck he had been working on and had been here since. Peter and Alf were in their late twenties and had both been working in London before their own narrow escape from death. I was informed that I had better have an open mind as they had become a couple since they met, here, and slept together.
Frank, Neville, and George were all in their mid-twenties. Frank had been an electrician; Neville had worked in radio and George had been a driver of light trucks. The last two were Norman and Ralph, both looked as if they could crush you just by looking at you. Both had been in the military and both resented being here but, like every good soldier, knew that there were things out there that could kill you, so keeping safe was the only option.
We all went down and into the main house to the dining area. The meal was good, certainly not the standard NHS fare. We were waited on by the two live-in nurses, Jane, and Penny, who joined us at the table once we all had our meals in front of us. Sister ate, so I was told, in her own quarters, along with her husband, who looked after the gardens. The talk was lively, and I found myself warming to the company. The only embarrassing moment, for me, was when Peter suddenly sat up and looked closely at me.
“You look like a toff and I’m sure I’ve seen your picture on an advert somewhere.”
I nodded and then Jim looked up.
“You used to be a girl in some adverts. I used to have some on the wall of the garage. Now I’m embarrassed to say that I lusted over you, especially in those perfume shots. The resemblance is uncanny.”
I couldn’t hide it. I nodded again.
“Yes, when I was younger, I was a girl in a lot of shots, then there started to be a demand for more guys and my appearance got me work as Brien, rather than Brienna.”
Adam looked straight into my eyes and said, quietly, “Brienna, I like that. Will you introduce her to us, some day?”
I smiled. “Maybe, but I’ll have to get to know you all a lot better before that happens.”
That evening we watched a bit of television and then went off to our rooms. That’s when I found out that the two nurses were sleeping with the two soldiers, June going in with Norman and Penny with Ralph. At the door of my room, Adam reached out and gave my arm a squeeze.
“Goodnight, Bri, I think you’ll fit in well. This is more like a hotel than a clinic. If you have any hobbies, you’ll have the chance to follow them. Sweet dreams.”
In my room I stripped off and opened the drawer where I had put my Brienna items. Having showered earlier, I brushed my teeth, splashed my face, and went into the bedroom to put on one of my nighties. That night I slept well but had some very interesting dreams that included Adam and activities I had never thought about before.
The next day, after breakfast, Adam and Neville showed me the rest of the complex. The shed that I had seen on the fence-line was an emergency generator, petrol driven, of course. There was another long building to one side of the house. These were workshops for carpentry, car mechanics, steel fabrication and one, Nevilles’ hide-away, set up as a ham radio station. Norman and Ralph had a track around the property, where they ran every day. I decided that I would join them if they’d have me tagging along.
Over the next couple of weeks, I settled in. I took up running to keep fit, Adam also joining me, and we let the others catch up with us, often twice a session. We were determined that we would keep up with them, one day.
As we ran, we talked a lot. Adam had been brought up in a sheltered household, like me, and he, was also finding it difficult to become sociable. We became sociable, together. Talking about being sociable, we would go into Chippenham every two weeks for the local dance. It was held in a hall, quite a long way from any main road, and we all were able to enjoy ourselves, knowing that the coach outside had all the equipment needed should we have an attack.
Adam and I were quite popular with the local girls, and I learned a lot about ‘sociability’ in relation to the correct activity expected of a guy when dancing with a girl – and afterwards, before we all went back to the Refuge. The locals were all on board with our situation and a lot of care was taken to not put us into any bad situation.
We went out on excursions, to local tourist spots, parking well away from the tour busses. We also visited the girls at the Refuge near Devizes. That was interesting. The more we went there, the closer we all became. Adam was smitten with a girl called Hayley. One, Cathy, nearly swooned when she saw me for the first time. The other girls escorted me to her room to look at the advertising posters on her walls. All were of me, in both Brien and Brienna mode. Cathy was determined to have me for her own and it wasn’t long before she and I were walking, hand in hand, in the garden, stopping out of sight of everybody to kiss for the first time.
While I found all this bonding with a girl a wonderful experience, I had my reaction to Adam in the back of my mind. I stayed in Brien mode and that helped me to maintain my distance from him. The desire to kiss him never went away but remained firmly in my thoughts.
I started studying again, taking a computer course in Modern History. It was interesting to have an interest to keep my mind active. As time went on, we became two, melding, groups. We would go down to visit the girls and they would come up to visit us. We would stay overnight at their Refuge, having several spare rooms. Cathy and I slept together on several occasions. Adam would go in with Hayley. Jim, and an older girl called Shirley, became a couple. Like our refuge, there was one same-sex couple, Gemma with Fiona. Neville, Frank, and George were friendly with Anne, Gloria, and Maureen, but were not in sleeping relationships.
Life passed, we stayed fit, me getting fitter, had our regular visits, went out, did a lot of dancing. I don’t know where any new patients were sent to, as we didn’t add any more to both places. Maybe they were now being sent to new refuges.
We had regular visits from family and friends. I went out, at times, with my parents, in the electric transport vehicle, with George driving. These were often to secluded areas where advertising photo sessions were waiting for me to be in front of the camera. If we went past Devizes, we would pick up Cathy. She was in seventh heaven to be on set and got on well with my folks. I’m sure that marriage was discussed when I was otherwise engaged.
Odd things started in my third year in the refuge. There were several sightings of strange lights in the sky from places all over the world. The television news was showing them almost every night. This carried on for almost three months and then they stopped in the early winter.
Late, one evening, after a normal spring day, a fog came in from the sea. The news was that this fog was being reported over the whole world. It was white and damp, from the reports, and smelt like disinfectant. We were sent off to bed with the pressure turned up just in case it could influence us. Sister McDonald told us that all the refuges were following emergency procedures.
Next morning, I was awoken by a terrible scream. As I dived out of bed and flung on a dressing gown, I looked out the window to see a lovely, sunny, day. It didn’t give me any indication of the horrors that were to follow.
Marianne Gregory © 2023
Say Cheese Part 2
I opened my door to find a blubbering June being comforted by Norman. He looked over her shoulder and told us it would be best if we all got dressed. We all took the hint and, ten minutes later, gathered in the corridor. June was in Normans’ room while he dressed and was quiet, but still teary.
This time, we all knew who was in charge. Both of our soldiers were in army uniform. Ralph had three stripes and Norman had two pips. It was Norman who told us to be quiet and that he would let us know what he suspected.
“The Sergeant and I have always been on the army list, as reservists since we got sick. That’s why we have kept in shape. We have also stayed in touch with our units. What happened last night was something we had war-gamed about. I think that it may have been a nerve agent. The odd thing is that it covered the entire world, so we must expect that it was an attack by something not of our corner of space.”
Neville chipped in, saying that he had been on the radio to a friend in Australia who had suddenly gone silent.
“Yes, if it started at that part of the world, they would have had only two hours’ notice, at most, when New Zealand was shrouded. I expect that there will be survivors, like us, in Western Australia as they are more than two hours behind. We can expect there to be more as you go east, I know that our military went into closed quarters as soon as the fog hit Europe.”
“Is it as final as that? Can you be so certain?” I asked.
“If it’s anything less, I’ll be very happy. Now, we must take precautions. Penny has found some disposable gloves. I want you all to put them on, if there are any damp spots when we leave here, do not touch them. Some agents stay lethal until they dry out completely.”
Ralph chipped in. “We must treat downstairs as if it’s a crime scene. If we’re wrong and the police are called, then we don’t want to trample all over the evidence.”
Norman then turned to June. “Tell them what you told me, sweetheart.”
June swallowed and then stood a bit straighter. “I got up early, dressed and went down to help cook with the breakfast, Penny and I do this week about. It was totally silent in the house. I investigated cooks’ room, and she was there, in bed, and looked like an old mummy. I went to tell Sister and found her and her husband looking the same. That’s when I lost it.”
“Before we head downstairs and get busy,” Norman said. “Ring your girlfriend and see how they are getting on there.”
I rang Cathy and she took her time answering.
“Hello, Bri,” she whispered in a shaky voice.
I asked her how she was and what was happening at the refuge. She whispered that everyone was scared. It was deathly quiet and that no-one had come upstairs to get them up. I told her to stay in the safe area and try to find some food. I told her that we would come over as soon as we could, possibly later in the day.
Norman then checked us all out and told Jim to put on stronger shoes. Then he led us downstairs and through the airlocks. The house looked totally normal, and, unlike most horror films, there was no music rising in crescendo. Penny led us up the stairs to the door to the cook’s room. Norman and Ralph looked in and the came out.
“June, can you please have a look and tell me what has changed?” Asked Norman.
She held his hand as she went into the room, slowly. I could hear her voice as she went towards the bedroom.
“It’s all as I saw it this morning. She is in bed and looks like a skeleton with skin on. No!! It can’t be. The body doesn’t do that!”
Norman came back out with her and told us all to go and have a look. When I got to the bedside, all I could see was a pile of ash-like dust on the pillow. Penny was still in the room, and we pulled the covers back, very carefully. What we saw was a cotton nightie, flat on the sheet, with the dust poking out the bottom, ending in a pair of bed socks.
We went to Sister’s quarters and the scene that greeted us was similar, except that there were two piles of dust in the bed, one in a nightie and one in pyjamas. We went back downstairs and gathered in the dining room. Norman asked the two girls to see if they could get some breakfast together while he investigated further. I offered to help the girls and we managed to find enough to feed us all. It was odd but the power and water all worked, and we had bottled gas here so that wasn’t a problem.
While we cooked, I rang Cathy and told her to take her group down and make their own breakfast but not to go into any of the staff bedrooms. I asked her to make sure that all the girls wore strong shoes, disposable gloves and not to touch anything that looked damp and sticky.
By the time Norman and the others got back, we were ready to serve. As we ate, Norman explained that everything around the house seemed normal, except for the fact that there was almost total silence except for the wind, and that every insect he saw was laying on the ground, dead.
Neville said that he had turned his ham radio on and could only talk to a couple of guys on the west coast of America. He had told them to go somewhere that the fog couldn’t reach them. It appeared that they were part of a circle of doomsday preppers and had bunkers ready to go. We had tried the radio and the television, but nothing was being broadcast.
When we had eaten, Norman said that we should go down to Devizes as the Refuge there could accommodate us all. He thought that, if those who had died were in the same state as the bodies here, all it would take was wrapping the remains in the old sheets and remaking the bed, should we need extra sleeping quarters.
We all went to pack. I took everything I had arrived with; plus some extra items I had bought. I put my laptop and charger in, just in case. We all met at the front doors. George had the electric coach, fully charged, and we loaded up our luggage. June and Penny had their own cars, petrol driven, and Jim had gone into Sister’s room and found the keys to her Range Rover. Neville had stripped his radio equipment from the room and loaded it into the electric ambulance.
In convoy, we left the Refuge and drove towards Chippenham. We got to the outskirts before we saw our first crash. It was a police car, off the road and in a ditch. I went with Ralph to check it out and saw two piles of clothes in the front seats. Ralph took the keys out of the ignition and opened the boot, using one of the keys to open a box. He pulled out a pair of pistols and a military looking rifle. Next was a shotgun and several boxes of ammunition, which we loaded into the coach. I asked why we were taking them and got the answer that it was possible that some wild animals may still be wandering the countryside. There was a smile on his face as he loaded the guns.
The next scene we came across was a bus, ploughed into the wall of a house. We didn’t stop to investigate but carried on to the town where we stopped at the supermarket. As it was a ‘we never close’ type of place, we just walked in and loaded the coach to its gills with boxes of canned and packaged food, bottles of water, toilet paper and anything else we thought we may need. We stepped around the small piles of clothes we encountered.
We then went to the big car dealership and swapped June and Penny’s small cars for new Volvo Estates, topping them up from the pumps out front that were still working. That led us to Ralph going with Penny to the big hardware store while we waited. They came back with a box of hand-operated pumps which we could use to suck fuel from any cars we came across and top up the ones we were using. Before we left town, we could see a few plumes of smoke. Possibly someone had been cooking before they died.
Then we left Chippenham behind and headed to Devizes, and then into the countryside to the Allington Girls Refuge. We got there just before midday and the girls were all very happy to see us arrive. They were all frightened and we comforted them and then told them what we knew. If anything, that frightened them even more. Their set-up was, as I said before, like ours, but on a larger scale. We sorted out our rooms, with Norman, Ralph and I claiming the three staff quarters to make everything easy.
I will skate over the procedure we took, wrapping the remains in a sheet in each bed and putting the bundles into a bin. June could point us to the right cupboards to remake the beds. In all, we removed the remains of the Sister, two nurses, a cook, and her husband. We kept the girls busy stocking the cupboards with our boxes of food. Then we cooked a lunch and sat down at the big table to eat and then discuss our situation.
There was now twenty of us, a group big enough to help us keep our spirits up. There was ten females and ten males, a good number if we were to restart humanity. It was silent for a while when this was mentioned, and Cathy snuggled up to me, whispering that we would need to start as soon as we could.
There was a small room in the house which we stripped of furniture and installed Neville’s radio equipment, stringing a wire from an upper window. There wasn’t anything that he could pick up, but Norman told him a frequency to find which had a slight hiss of static. He then took the microphone.
“Whiskey Delta Tango, Whiskey Delta Tango. Is there anyone there, Can I speak to Horace Bartlett?”
He did this a few times and then a voice replied.
“This is Bartlett, who is that?”
“It’s Norman Arnold, Horace. I was in a pressurised refuge last night with a group of other diesel sufferers. We are now just outside Devizes and there is now a group of twenty of us.”
“Oh! Arnold, what can you tell me about the outside? We are still locked in the vehicles.”
Norman then listed all the things we had seen and the speed that the bodies decomposed. “The fog may have been an agent that dehydrated the bodies to the point that they are totally desiccated. All we have seen are piles of clothes with dust in.”
Horace told him to report to Larkhill camp in four days. By that time, he said, they would have checked how many of the Regiment had survived.
When he signed off, Norman asked Ralph how many would have been able to isolate at Tidworth. Ralph then counted off the number of tanks and personnel carriers that could be closed-up for gas attacks and concluded that a couple of hundred would have survived. I raised an eyebrow at that, and he told us that he had been in the Royal Tank Regiment at Tidworth. Norman told us that Larkhill was mainly artillery regiments, but the self-propelled guns had quite spacious crew cabs. Alf, Peter, me, and the girls were being brought into a very different world, all macho and packing guns.
That afternoon we talked about the situation. It took a while for us all to come to grips with the fact that it was quite likely that our families, and every person we knew, were now small piles of dust. Cathy needed comforting and then she decided that we would share the room I had picked. We moved the best part of her things and put them in the wardrobe, after taking out all the nurse’s things. I had a quick check, and they didn’t fit me. Meanwhile, Norman and June, Ralph and Penny were doing the same. I expect that neither of the guys checked the dress sizes, though.
That done we took stock of the accommodation. There had been sixteen patient quarters in the addition, now with Adam and Hayley in one, Jim and Shirley in another, Gemma and Fiona were now openly sharing one room, as was Alf and Peter. Anne, Gloria, Maureen, Neville, Frank, and George all had one each and our two nurses were in with the soldier boys. That left six spares should we find any more survivors.
George wondered if we should go and explore the other houses in the village. Hayley said that there was at least a dozen, as well as a big farm. Norman put his foot down, saying that he didn’t want us wandering around on our own without communications. Neville remembered that there was a big electronics store in Swindon, so we made plans to visit the next day.
We then explored the Refuge more carefully. There was a charging station for the electric vehicles, but we didn’t know how much longer the power would stay on. I thought that the nuclear power stations would go for quite a while and hoped that they had automatic shut-down procedures in place. The refuge had a good generator, petrol-driven, and we would need to find a way to keep it running if the power did fail. Ralph suggested that, if we were going to Swindon for two-ways, we should go to a fuel depot and come back with a tanker to park next to the generator. He could drive the tanker if he had an oxygen supply should he feel sick.
We were all quiet that evening, after a reasonable meal. We used some of the meat in the freezer and Hayley found a couple of bottles of wine in the kitchen stores. The meal was a quiet celebration of us all being still alive. That night, Cathy and I made love and held each other close for a long time.
Next morning, the entire group wanted to go to Swindon. No-one wanted to be left alone. We fitted into the coach, now fully charged, and headed north to see what we could find. It was a very quiet group as we passed some crashed cars, had to take a detour around a jack-knifed truck, and, as we approached Swindon, saw a few houses still smouldering. We did stop at a couple of crashes, so the girls could see just what the remains of the occupants looked like. They took it in, and we carried on with more knowledge that we wouldn’t see blood and gore.
In Swindon, the electrical store was shut so we just commandeered a car, after sweeping out the drivers’ clothes, and just rammed it through the front window. Inside we went to the two-way section and picked up thirty sets and boxes of batteries. Neville and Norman set them up and issued us one each. They all had clips so we could carry them on our belts. That done we tested them and then split up.
We agreed to meet at the Railway Museum car park and Norman and Ralph took the car we had used and went off to find a tanker. We checked out the back of the store and found three electric delivery trucks, all on chargers. We loaded one with new freezers and a small electric forklift. George showed Gemma and Fiona how to drive the truck. Adam had a bit of driving experience and took one of the others, while Jim and Shirley took the other. The three trucks were driven around the front and the rest of us piled into the coach. Next stop was a big supermarket where we loaded one empty truck with canned and frozen food, and as much packaged goods as we could fit in. Next stop was the Great Western Hospital, where the last truck was loaded with medical supplies, bottles of oxygen and even a few hospital beds and a big load of bed linen.
It was here where we found some bodies that were not a result of the fog. June and Penny took us to the intensive care wards. There we found a few patients still alive but unconscious. June and Penny hugged each other and then proceeded to switch everything off. In one of other beds, the patient had died recently and was starting to smell.
It was in the hospital where we saw something we hadn’t seen before. In one ward, it was obvious that a patient was being given a bath when the fog crept in. There was a pile of nurse clothing in the doorway and the bath was filled with a solid grey mass. Penny thought that the body had dehydrated, like all the others, but had been rehydrated by the bathwater. We didn’t stay long there.
On the way back to the town centre we stopped at a big dealership and added three more Estate Cars to our fleet. Cathy and I took one and I drove us to a big camping store. There I added a couple of barbeques and a bunch of gas bottles, plus several crossbows and a load of arrows. I was starting to realise that the coming times were going to be survival of the fittest and I didn’t want to be left with nothing to defend myself with.
All the while, we had kept in contact using the radios and it was comforting to know that the others were in calling range. Norman cautioned us about chattering as he said we should learn to save the batteries. When we met up at the Rail Museum, it was now several vehicles. We still had the coach, along with the three trucks, three cars and now two fuel tankers. Both Norman and Ralph said they were all right driving them if they kept the windows closed.
Before we left Swindon, we left our vehicles and took the coach to the biggest department store in town. There, we broke in and proceeded to outfit everyone in sturdy clothing and shoes, suitable for living in this new world. We raided the travel section for cases and filled them from the racks. All the girls also picked nice party dresses and skirt outfits. I must admit that I did too.
It took some time to load up the coach bins and then we went back to the Museum, getting into the cars and heading back to the refuge. Norman and Ralph waited five minutes before they followed us, so keeping the diesel smoke apart from the convoy.
Back at the refuge we unloaded the trucks. June and Penny storing the medical supplies while us guys unloaded the freezers, unpacked them, and got them plugged in. Then we all unloaded the food truck and put the frozen goods in the freezers and the rest of the boxes into the kitchen storeroom.
When the tankers arrived, we all went inside while they were positioned beside the generator set. We had lunch and the afternoon was taken up with unloading our clothing and re-organizing the wardrobes. It was generally decided that we should have a dress-up dinner that night, to celebrate the successful scavenging foray.
The girls and I found some beef to roast and defrosted it in the big microwave. It then went into the ovens while we prepared some vegetables. As things progressed, we went, a few at a time, to get ready for the dinner. Cathy insisted that she wanted to see Brienna, so I got shaved, all over, and dressed in some of the things my mother had left with me, finishing off with a LBD. Cathy had a red dress that made her look stunning.
By the time we served up, all the guys were well dressed, and all the girls looked stunning. We opened a few bottles of wine that had been gathered at a bottle shop in Swindon and tucked in. Dessert was strawberries and ice cream, followed by coffee and more wine. Someone put a CD into the player and opened the doors to the patio. That night we danced, and we got gloriously drunk.
At one stage I was dancing with Adam, and I could feel his excitement against my thigh. Another time I was dancing with Gemma, and she asked me to remember her should Cathy move on. Neville and Anne danced together most of the night, as did Frank and Gloria and George and Maureen. When it was dark, couples began to leave and it was down to Cathy and me to turn off the CD player and the lights, close the doors and make our own way to bed. That night we both wore nighties and made love, first as two women and then as man and wife.
The next day there was a flurry of movement in the attached building, and we ended up with three more spare rooms. It took a while for everyone to come down for breakfast, but, eventually, we were ready to explore. As there were ten couples, we started out by walking along the village lane, with a couple going into houses as we passed. That way, we checked out the first ten houses that morning, reporting our findings by radio as we progressed.
The good thing about this was that we were able to make sure that none of the houses were about to catch alight, and that all lights were turned off. In every house we bundled up the dusty remains in the bedsheets and disposed of them in the rubbish bins. It was sad, as many of the houses had children and we had to put their remains out as well.
We all had notebooks and made an inventory of what each house contained by way of food and drink. We discussed them over lunch and then went out, in the afternoon, to check the rest of the village. Adam and Hayley joined Cathy and me in checking the big farm to the south end of the village. The main farmhouse held eight remains, which we put into the bins. There were also three dogs, two cats and a cage of budgies. All were dead and desiccated but the animal fur and the bird feathers were still intact. These needed to be put into bags before getting binned.
The cows were another matter altogether. Hides and horns were still there but just flat on the ground with nothing left inside them. These we left in the field to dry out. Perhaps, one day, we may be able to tan them and make leather clothing. In the pigsty there was no sign of any animal, just a ring on the ground in front of one pen. The exploration showed us one thing. The fog killed everything, human, bird, animal, insect – nothing was spared. Insects with hard shells looked normal until you peered closely and saw that the shell was empty. We were alone and there would be no more meat, once the frozen had gone.
That evening, we dressed up again but didn’t get drunk. We were matter of fact as we discussed the available stores in the other houses. Norman had been in touch with the army at Larkhill and they wanted to see us all on the next day. We now had five Estate Cars so would go in those with four in each. That way we would save the electrics, all now neatly parked behind the house. As a final, and telling, thing, Norman issued each pair with a weapon. He and Ralph had the pistols, Jim got the rifle and George had the shotgun. I had spare crossbows for Alf, Neville, and Frank. We got a short lecture on making sure we would take care of our weapons and each other just in case there was anything out there that we hadn’t met.
Marianne Gregory © 2023
Say Cheese Part 3
The next morning, we assembled for breakfast at dawn and, after we had tidied up and got ourselves ready, we left the Refuge in the five Volvos, all fully fuelled from one of the tankers.
It was a pleasant drive south, skirting the upper parts of Salisbury Plain, and it was just over an hour when we arrived at the gates of the Larkhill Army Camp. Ralph had explained, for those who may not know, that the large, and mainly empty, Salisbury Plain is one big training ground. Larkhill was where the Artillery was based. Bulford, not far away, was the base for the Signals, and Tidworth, a few miles to the east, was the home to several Regiments. These included Hussars, Tank, Medical and Close support groups.
The gates were open but there were guards on duty, who directed us to a group of buildings where we met Horace, the most senior officer still alive. All thought of saluting was now forgotten, but a sense of rank remained. We were all introduced to Horace and then he gave us a quick tour. We saw a lot of men and a few women, all busy making sure the equipment was properly cleaned. On the way, Horace explained that they had stayed closed-up for two days, just in case, and that over sixty soldiers survived.
He said that the first day out had been taken up with gathering up all the remains and giving them a proper burial. Then it was time to discuss what was needed and to try and establish contact with other bases. He said that Tidworth had around a hundred survivors but only a few made it at Bulford. The suggestion was that everyone should gather at Tidworth, as it had more accommodation. It would take a while to get things ready, with the guns and equipment needing to be moved.
Norman explained that we were mainly diesel intolerant so couldn’t be quartered with the army trucks. We would have to move closer, but there wasn’t a rush, yet. One thing we were offered was our choice of portable generators, some running on petrol, should we find somewhere suitable. Horace told us that he would loan us a few of his personnel if we needed things moved.
Neville asked whether we could have a mobile radio unit so that we could keep in touch. Horace called up Bulford and spoke at some length. When he put the phone down, he turned to us.
“There were only four that survived at Bulford. All are signalmen and were in a drill when the fog came in. The rest of the camp was at a social and nobody survived. The four were in a command unit that was closed-up for the drill. I have told them that you are on your way and to make ready to move. They can stay with you and give you armed support, should you need it. Now get going and let me get this army on the road.”
It only took less than fifteen minutes to get to Bulford, where the gates were wide open. As we drove in, Ralph led us to the Signals headquarters. There, we found the four soldiers waiting for us. All were women. We explained where we lived and for them to bring plenty of civilian clothing. Once they had packed, one drove Neville’s Volvo while he rode in the command unit with the other three, being taught how to use the radio equipment. When we arrived back at the Refuge, he was like a kid with a new toy and babbled a bit.
The four girls were shown the rooms they would have and unloaded their luggage. We got together for a late lunch, and everyone was introduced. They had a little trouble, all being privates, calling the sergeant Ralph and the officer Norman, but soon, Barbie, Alex, Wanda, and Casey were part of the group. They all had cooking skills and helped get the lunch together.
The command unit was parked at the back of the house and hooked up to the mains with a long lead. That afternoon, Ralph and I sat in the plush seats and worked with Neville, Barbie, and Alex to find out how many survivors there were. As to be expected, the majority were military. A lot of the bases around the country reported in, giving us the numbers. We even managed to contact some navy ships, all new ones, that had been built with chemical warfare in mind.
Neville tried his call list and there were several in America that reported, as well as a few in Australia. Barbie got onto the NATO frequencies and came up with about thirty bases, spread over Europe, that gave us numbers. We were not able to contact any of the U.S. military, perhaps they were careful and thought we were the enemy. In the end, we had a list of about four thousand known survivors. This we reported to Horace, who had got his own signallers to set up a command unit of his own. He told us that Tidworth survivors were mainly tank crews and infantry who had sheltered in their vehicles for a couple of days but were now making the camp ready for the influx from Larkhill.
Our new girls had been advised that, until the good food ran out, we would dress for dinner, and it was allowed that we could get a bit intoxicated. Norman insisted that the radio would be manned around the clock so the four girls, plus Ralph, Neville, Frank, and me, were rostered on three-hour shifts in the unit. That evening we had roast lamb and I stayed sober as I was on watch from nine. Barbie had started the roster at six and Wanda was my replacement. We recruited Alf and Peter to keep the records and make the lists of contacts.
We kept on our toes for the next few weeks and developed a group dynamic. As the weather warmed, we set up the barbeques I had brought back and had cook-ups with chops and sausages. During that period, Horace set up a radio conference for all the military commanders which Norman sat in on. During this they discussed what actions should be taken. Horace was given the overall command and we were tasked with keeping in the loop with civilian survivors. The US was obviously listening in, and we had some new voices on the air, now they were sure we were friendly.
One of the good things during that discussion was that any base near a nuclear power station was given the task to visit the site and make sure that there would be no meltdowns soon. That would ensure that we would maintain power in the grid. Everyone, though, was making sure that they had back-up generators in place. With mains power, we were still able to use the internet in the areas that power was still on and started to get contacts with individuals and small groups that had survived.
A few of those contacts were in remote sites where the fog had not reached, and some even had farm animals that still lived. It was promising, we now had the possibility to continue humanity, along with a future that would contain sources of meat and dairy products. That, we knew, may not be in our lifetime but was something we could work towards.
One thing I liked about the situation was the fact that the night sky, without city lights, was magnificent. I would spend much of my nine to twelve shifts, sitting on the step of the command unit, one ear on the radio chatter while looking up at the stars.
By summer, Horace had moved everyone from the close camps to Tidworth, where he created a ‘Humanity Central’ command post. That meant that we would need to move closer if were to have any part in the recovery phase. Wanda mentioned that, as a keen gardener, she had visited a big garden in the grounds of Chisenbury Priory. It was, she told is, in Enford, just south of the Tidworth and Larkhill junction.
Over the next few days, Norman, June, Wanda, and I took a Volvo to the place and explored the area. It looked perfect for our needs. The Priory was a much later building, with several extensions and was now a private house with a lot of bedrooms. The parking was easily big enough for our vehicles and there was plenty of space on the back to put our generators. Nearby was a pub, the Red Lion, as well as several large houses, one of which being set up as a Guest House.
Over the next few weeks, we slowly moved our things to the Priory. The four army girls were taken into Larkhill by Ralph. When they got back to the Refuge, they reported that we now had two petrol-driven generators in place. The next day they drove our two tankers down. That evening, Norman told us that he had been asked to go to Tidworth, with Ralph, June, and Penny, to oversee the Medical Complex in the camp. It would keep him away from any diesel but keep him close to the action. Hayley, who had previously had experience in dispensary work, was going with them as well.
Now I knew why Adam had been a little quiet these last few days. He was now put in charge of the move to the Priory, along with Cathy and me. We were to spread ourselves around the area. Barbie and Wanda would be staying with us in the big house, while Alex and Casey wanted to live in the Red Lion. After the others had left for Tidworth, the rest of us took the coach down to Enford to sort things out. There were several houses along the lane and, one by one, we cleaned them of remains or signs of not being lived in.
Alf and Peter opted to live at the pub with the two girls, saying that they would do the cleaning and other chores. Shirley and Jim teamed up with George and Maureen to live in the previous Guest house. Frank and Gloria claimed one of the private houses on the other side of the road, Gemma and Fiona claimed another and Neville would take one near the Priory Garden that had room for the command unit. Tidworth had taken over the radio net by now and it was his to use as his ham link. In front of the house that he had picked was a gate that led into the Priory Garden and the associated maintenance buildings and a tearoom.
It took us another week to empty the freezers and take them south, sharing them out between the buildings. After they were all running, we took down the food to store, before clearing the medical supplies, linen and all the normal things you need in a house. In the end, it was just running a shuttle with clothing and personal items, and we were living in Enford. There were plenty of cars in the village to choose from, all the wardrobes were full of clothing and the girls all spent some days swapping with others to get the right sizes. We settled into living a normal sort of existence.
In the Priory, we had set up with care not to damage the beautiful rooms. Cathy and I had a large bedroom with ensuite, and Adam had a similar room which may have been the master. He became friends with both Barbie and Wanda, and I think he may have taken both to bed, but not at the same time. He and I were talking, in the gardens, one day and he admitted that it was just sex, not as intense as it had been with Hayley. He also told me that Hayley had formed a bond with one of the soldiers at Tidworth so was unlikely to come back to him. I felt sorry for him as my life with Cathy was so full, especially as she had told me, that morning, that she was getting morning sickness. At least we had the hospital at Tidworth when the time came.
All the time, as we established a routine, we discussed the strange lights that had been seen the previous year. I knew that there were places where surviving scientists were trying to find out just what it was in the fog. A big help was that several bodies had been found like the one we saw in the hospital, the reconstituted sludge giving up a few secrets.
Several of the girls were now pregnant and we looked like we may be setting up a new dynamic. We discussed how we would cope, how we would teach the children. At least they wouldn’t need to know much in the way of history. Cathy, had a normal birthing in the hospital at Tidworth, being looked after by the three girls she knew well. She was the first of a mini baby-boom.
Horace could see the routine changing and called everyone at Tidworth together on the parade ground. He thanked everyone for their dedication and work ethic. He then dropped his bombshell.
“I know that we have been a bit lax in military procedure, recently. I am now going to tell you that I have decided that anyone who wants to live outside the camp can do so. We already have a very well set up group at Enford. There are several houses there crying out for someone to look after them. I know there are some among us who want to live openly as same-sex couples and Brienna has shown us how well she is coping as a father while living as a woman. The choice is yours. Anyone who wants to move out, let me know by the end of the week. Those who stay will follow our loose military routines. We do need to be prepared if the aliens come back. They wouldn’t have tried to disinfect the planet unless they had something on their tiny minds.”
Over the next few months, we had more of the village houses filled with army types of every hue. There were two sets of same-sex couples of both genders. They set up in a group of houses to the east of the pub. We spent a lot of time, with the electric trucks, finding freezers and the food to put in them, as well as setting up back-up generators for everyone. The army types also had a ball raiding the shops. Our weekly meals at the Red Lion became quite raucous and everyone started to be flamboyantly dressed for the occasion.
One of the side effects of all this activity was the beautification of Enford, in stark contrast to the slow advance of nature elsewhere. Wanda took it on herself to keep the Priory Gardens up to scratch and she had several helpers. It was a lovely area to have a picnic and pretend that the world outside was as it always had been. There were many nice areas around, with Cathy, me and our baby having private picnics next to the small stream that ran past the village.
I suppose it was too much to ask for, all this peace and tranquillity. After three years of recovery and setting up a new civilisation, the lights in the night sky appeared again. For us, where we were, they were easy to see, being concentrated a little south-west of us. Other groups reported lights near ancient stones and neolithic hill fortresses. I wondered if the science fiction writers may have got it right and we were here because of aliens.
While we didn’t bother them, they didn’t bother with us. I expect that they would wipe us all out if we got in their way. One of the groups, in France, reported that they had observed the aliens, in daylight. They were, they said, about a metre and a bit tall, green, and with insect-like heads. They had four upper limbs, and the funny thing was that, when they were observed, they looked as if they were vacuuming up the body dust wherever they found it. Perhaps they liked rehydrated human spread on their sandwiches between the stars.
On a lovely sunny day, I was having a picnic with my family, several hundred yards away from the Gardens, alongside the stream. We were sitting beside the spread blanket as our baby toddled about, nattering to herself. Suddenly, out from a small stand of big bushes, came two aliens.
I didn’t know which of us was more surprised. They were, however, very fast on their legs and were on us in a flash. One held back, looking around, but the other grew an enormous phallus and leapt on Cathy, who was screaming. Everything seemed to happen in slow motion – as the phallus touched Cathy it looked as if it was just merging into her body.
I looked back at the other one and it was holding a device. It was recording this! I grabbed the first thing I could, a butter knife, and tried to stab the one on top of a now-quiet Cathy. I found that the surface of the alien could not be pierced and was almost ready to face my death.
That’s when the alien tried to scratch it’s back, rearing up and giving out a keening sound. In a flash, I reached for my loaded crossbow, dipped the tip of the arrow in the butter and brought it up in the nick of time. As the other alien got close, I shot it in the neck. It keened and fell on its back, all six legs waving around. I looked back at the first one, now slowly dissolving over the body of an obviously dead Cathy. When I looked at the alien I had shot, it, too, was liquifying.
I went and picked up my baby and then sat on the ground, holding her to me, for several minutes. I then got on the radio and called Adam to come and help me. When he arrived, the two aliens were puddles of liquid with insect legs sticking out of the pools. I was blubbering and he helped me stand and held the two of us close for a long time.
I told him what had happened and how I had killed two aliens. He led me back to the big house and helped me put my baby in her cot for an afternoon nap. He insisted that I should have a shower and go to bed, to recover. Before he left me, he held me close again and he kissed me.
“I’m so glad you survived,” he whispered, “I don’t know how I could have gone on if I had lost you.”
There was a flurry of activity over the next few days. Horace came up, with a few army boffins, and I had to explain the whole story again, breaking down when I described how the phallus looked as if it had melted into Cathy. I found out a couple of weeks later, that this is exactly what had happened. One of the boffins told me that it looked like the member exuded an acid-like substance which just ate away everything and that Cathy had been penetrated, almost to her heart. It was that which killed her and killed her quickly. The army cremated her, and we buried the urn among the roses in the big garden, the whole village turning out for her.
A search of the surrounding area had found the vehicle that the aliens had been using. It was taken off to the camp to find out how it worked. All the survivors, around the world, were told that the aliens could be killed with dairy product, should they start getting to be a problem.
That’s when the tide turned. Horace utilised old nerve agent shells that were designed to spread the agent, without destroying it in the detonation. They were filled with grated cheese or old curds and were set to deploy their contents from above. A big plan was made to see what we could do with the aliens on Salisbury Plain, now camped around Stonehenge, now not looking like the Stonehenge we always knew, and more like it may have been in its day. Artillery was moved into range and tanks were shifted at night. When it started, I was with Adam, sitting in a command vehicle, looking at pictures from drones.
That day, Operation Beetlejuice was a fantastic success. As the shells exploded over the gathered aliens, they ran around like mad things, before slowly dissolving. We found that their spacecraft, if sprinkled, started dissolving as well. After a three-hour barrage, we all went and inspected the alien camp, now just a soggy meadow around Stonehenge.
As we stood, in awe, Horace came over to where Adam stood, his arm around my shoulder, while I held my baby, now more certain of a future. He pulled out a small camera and told us to cuddle up in front of the stones.
Before he pressed the button, he laughed.
“Say Cheese!”
Marianne Gregory © 2023