It was grim. All the senior members of staff were dead or missing. Eight others seriously wounded, but all should recover. Another seven were walking wounded and would be released tomorrow, in time for the meeting. He had enough staff and supplies to cope. For the time being.
That was a relief. If necessary, I would have sent Peterson back to my St Mary’s for medical aid, but I was unwilling to do so. Firstly, I didn’t want to leave my unit short should any of the Boss’s fears about a counter-attack at St Mary’s materialise. Secondly, I wanted them to stand on their own feet as soon as possible. However, I could hear the ‘but’ …
‘But …?’
‘But, Max, unless this is carefully handled, there’s a very real possibility they’ll be bolting out the door right after breakfast. Do you have a plan?’
‘Yes,’ I said. ‘Nothing fancy. I’m going to feed them, pay them, keep them safe, make them laugh, and work them to death. Not necessarily in that order.’
He smiled tiredly. ‘That should do it.’
I said, ‘I have one concern.’
‘Yes?’
‘How is this to be explained away to outside authorities?’
He shifted in his seat. ‘Things have changed since your day. Our link with Thirsk is almost severed. We are no longer answerable to them for our funding. We are pretty much stand-alone these days, which you must have guessed since we’ve been inoperative for over a fortnight and no one seems to have noticed. But where the money is to come from while we recover …’ He pulled himself up. ‘We usually hold a small service of remembrance. If you could appear at that as Director and speak, I think it would be greatly appreciated.’
Thirteen people dead. We were about to bury thirteen members of St Mary’s. It was unprecedented. That bastard Ronan …
I said, with a viciousness that surprised me, ‘I hate these fucking people.’
‘So do I,’ he said. ‘So do I.’
I have to say I was curious to meet their Chief Technical Officer. From what everyone had been telling me, she was the person who had held it all together in the basement, despite repeated and often brutal punishment. Stubborn as a mule, they said and as soon as I clapped eyes on her, I could see what they meant. Even lying in bed, bandaged, bruised, and woozy, she radiated pugnacious belligerence, arguing with the staff and refusing her medication until someone – anyone – would tell her what the fu … what was going on. I liked her immediately.
She glared at me with the one eye that was working properly.
‘Who the f …?’
‘It’s OK,’ I said to the nurse. ‘Can you give us just a minute, please?’
I thought it best not to give her the chance to get going again.
‘Good morning, Chief. I’m Max. Caretaker Director, for my sins. Here’s what’s happening. St Mary’s is secure. Tomorrow – no – later today, we start putting things back together again. My aim is to have the unit ready for you to get the pods back as soon as possible. I want you on your feet and functioning, so I’ll do you a deal. You take your meds and do as you’re told, and when you say you’re fit, I’ll authorise your discharge. You don’t need me to tell you how stupid it would be to discharge yourself before you’re ready, so I’m quite happy to leave this in your hands. Yours will be the decision.’
She stared at me suspiciously. ‘Who the hell are you?’
I threw caution and protocol out the window. I needed her on my side.
‘I’m Maxwell.’
‘You’re the one they wanted.’
‘Yeah. They should have been more careful what they wished for.’
‘How did you know what was happening?’
‘We didn’t. We came looking for our Chief and stumbled on all this.’
‘Who’s we?’
‘Me and two others.’
‘Just the three of you?’
She slumped back again. I knew what she was thinking. Just the three of us had achieved what her entire unit could not.
I shook my head. ‘We were expecting trouble. We had the element of surprise. And if your people hadn’t held out for so long then our efforts would have been useless. Don’t sell yourself short and don’t sell your unit short, either.’
She blinked in surprise, then nodded and took her meds like a battle-weary angel.
‘Our missing Director. Did you find him?’
‘No. No sign.’
From what I could see of her under all the bruising, she had a square face, with sandy hair worn in a long, thick braid over one shoulder, eyebrows to match, and a jaw on which you could crack nuts. I would have said she was as immoveable as the Great Pyramid. I could see why Ronan had tried to use others to induce her to part with the information. She hadn’t budged an inch, and now all those people were dead. I knew it. She knew it. I could see it in the shadows in her eyes.
I sat down on the bed, said nothing, and waited.
Eventually, she said, ‘Thirteen dead?’
I nodded.
She exhaled a long sigh. ‘Oh my God.’
‘Yes,’ I said. ‘Only thirteen.’