Simon stuck his hands in the air.
'You've already caught me,' he said.
The woman hesitated, frowning.
'You've already got me,' he repeated. 'With this fly thing.'
'What fly thing?' she said, her accent eastern European.
As she spoke, the fly shot past Simon, buzzing furiously, straight towards her. The woman flinched, waving her hand at it, but it evaded her easily.
'Don't hit it!' Simon said. 'It explodes!'
The woman froze, her gaze locked on the fly hovering before her. 'Really? That's interesting.'
'Not the choice of words I would use,' Simon told her. 'So I'm guessing you don't have one of the phone creatures in your head either?'
She turned to him. 'No. I don't. And do you really expect me to believe that you aren't one of them?'
Simon shrugged. 'That's why the fly is guarding me. The only reason it didn't blow my head off is because I didn't have a weapon and I, uh, begged for my life.'
The woman set down the metal bar and narrowed her eyes as she withdrew her hand. The fly backed off towards Simon, then flew at her again, causing her to flinch, and then back again, zooming back and forth as if it were on a piece of elastic. 'Well,' she said. 'I guess your friend the fly is guarding us both now. I expect it won't be long before someone comes to infect us too. Should I thank you for giving me away to the enemy?'
'Hey, I didn't know you were in here. I was just trying to get out of the sun,' Simon protested.
'No. You're here for another reason,' she said. 'But what? Maybe you're supposed to bring more infected employees. So I can set a trap for them, maybe?' She reached for the metal bar again, but the fly buzzed angrily toward her until she took her hand back. 'Or maybe not,' she said. 'Hmm. Why exploding flies?'
Simon took a step forward to see what she was making.
'What's your name?' she asked him suddenly.
'Simon,' he said, unable to identify the object, and realising that in a place like this he wouldn't know most of the equipment anyway.
'I'm Anna. Now, why would I bring you here, Simon? Are you with the army? Are you here to rescue me? I'm not ready to be rescued yet.'
'Uh, not exactly,' Simon said, growing increasingly confused by her questions and commentary. 'I was brought here by UNAXI.'
'UNAXI? The UN?'
'Yeah. Some highly improbable department set up for the eventuality of alien invasion or other high-tech scenarios. Or so I gather. I was the one who discovered the phone creatures. We're calling them Mophospalifos.'
'Sounds Norwegian. You should name it something Latin. Anyway, I discovered the one in my phone myself.' She frowned at the fly for a moment. 'Things are changing,' she said, glancing down at the object she was making on the desk. 'I'm sure there aren't supposed to be exploding flies. Unless they're here to capture you, to bring you here, so we can, you know,' she giggled, 'before I finish all this.'
'What are you talking about?' Simon asked her.
Anna rounded the desk and walked towards him, looking him up and down. 'Hmm,' she said. 'You're a bit thin, but not bad looking.'
'What?'
'Are you going to kiss me?'
'What?'
'Okay, just shut up, and kiss me.'
Simon retreated until his back hit the wall. 'Listen, I think you've got the wrong idea...' he began.
'I thought I told you to shut up?' she said, closing the distance so the fly had to move from between them to hover overhead.
'Anna, wait,' he stammered.
She laughed.
'No,' he said more firmly. 'At least, not until you tell me what's going on.'
Anna shrugged. 'An evil and unknowable menace threatens the world. Who will stop it? Who can stop it? Only one woman, a woman of hidden talents and resourcefulness, a wily, courageous, sexual...'
'Whoa,' Simon said. 'That's not quite what I meant.'
Anna sighed. 'Fine. I guess I was bored. We fought long and hard to get this project running. There were many fears: of blowing a crater in the desert, irradiating half of Asia, creating strange matter capable of consuming the planet, causing a vacuum transition that would destroy the universe. Silly fears, really. But we fought hard, and three years ago, GASP finally came online. But now? Now that it's here?' She sighed again. 'I mean, it's all very well living on a scientific and technological frontier, but when the day-to-day reality is stacks of paperwork – and I mean stacks, because we aren't a hundred percent digital here – and repetitive results with long-winded analyses, excessive number-crunching and watching of screens, waiting for an alarm to go off which might mean something has finally happened – only for you to discover that the implications of the results won't make any difference to the world for years and years, and that you'll have to spend all the meantime riding back and forth in automated cars through an alternately freezing and boiling wasteland, where the only forms of entertainment are getting blind drunk or scrabbling around in the dirt for largely unidentifiable parts of long-dead creatures – when the weather permits – while longingly waiting for the one or two trips to wherever you'd rather be that you can scrape together from your meagre holiday allowance, then - as I'm sure you can imagine - a few days of fighting zombies, blowing things up, and saving the world starts to sound quite appealing. To be honest, I'm surprised I didn't think of it earlier.'
Simon stared at her.
'So that's what I'm going to do,' she added, gesturing at the thing she was making on the desk. 'Save the world.'
Simon opened and closed his mouth a couple of times, then decided to ignore everything she'd just said, and asked her what the device was instead.
'I can't tell you,' she said, nodding up at the fly hovering above them.
'I see,' Simon said, failing to understand at all.
'So. Are you going to kiss me now?'
'What?'
'You're really starting to bore me, you know.'
'Anna...'
'No more questions, okay? You're confusing me, and that tongue could be used for other things...'
Simon held up his hands. 'Okay. No more questions,' he said quickly. 'But will you just tell me how all this started? Just your side of the story?'
'There'll be plenty of time for all that afterward.'
'Afterward? After what?'
'After I've saved the day.'
'What if you can't?' Simon asked her. 'What if you die? Somebody should know what happened here.'
Anna laughed loudly. 'I'm not going to die.'
'You might. There are hordes of Infected out there, holding off the entire Mongolian army. There are exploding flies, microwave weapons...'
'Don't be silly. I'm not going to die. Why would I die? Why would I want that?'
Simon paused. 'Well, you wouldn't.'
'Exactly.'
'What?' Simon shook his head. 'Listen, Anna, I'd like to hear your side of the story. Please.'
She sighed. 'Fine. But you'd better have it made into a virrie, or a movie, or something.'
'Yes,' Simon agreed slowly. 'That's... exactly why I need to know...'
'Well, it all started when the unexplained equipment arrived,' she began. 'I asked Li about it and he said it was for a new experiment, funded by the Chinese, and that they were going to give us all new phones. He said I would get a bonus too, because I'm a Project Coordinator, and obviously they appreciate the importance of what I do. I guess he was lying, because today we were given the phones and then everyone started disappearing. Roy, Khongi, all my staff. I went looking for them and discovered they had been infected by the creatures hiding in the phones, and that they were turning the reactor into a missile...'
'Wait, a missile?'
'Yes. A very big one. And since all the phones were down, there was no way to alert the world. So I blew up the fuel tanker to let people know there was something funny going on. When I woke up I realised that help wouldn't arrive in time, and it was up to me to save the planet. So,' she waved her hand at the item on the table with an upwards nod at the fly, 'that's what I'm going to do.'
'Right,' Simon said, trying to piece things together in his head.
'And, presumably, you're here to be my love interest. Although, to be honest, I've been romanced more effectively by hadron colliders. So no more talking, okay?' She closed her eyes and leaned towards him.
'Hang on,' Simon blurted, and she let out an irritated snap of breath. 'I didn't, technically, come here to be the love interest,' he told her. Not that he would mind that role, he thought, noticing again the skin visible under the torn fabric of her clothes, while simultaneously trying to look like he hadn't noticed lest he encourage any more craziness.
But she just smiled. 'Of course you don't think you did. But why else would you be here? Here I am, trapped in the desert, surrounded by the enemy and about to embark on a very dangerous mission that will save the world, when you suddenly turn up. Isn't it obvious? You're the love interest. You're here because I need a little hot sex and wild romance as well as all the action and adventure.'
Simon opened and closed his mouth, wondering why he always seemed to get the crazy ones. He gestured at her shredded and bloodied blouse. 'Did this happen when the fuel tanker blew up?' he asked.
'This? Yeah,' she said, plucking at the material, and then, disconcertingly, unfastened the top button.
'You were caught in the explosion?'
She laughed. 'Very nearly. It was extremely well-timed, you know. Probably my favourite part so far. I was in the toilets, being chased by two zombies, but the walls of all the cubicles were between me and the outside wall, and they shielded me from the blast.'
'But you were knocked out?'
'Only for an hour or two,' she shrugged.
'Anna, why am I here?' Simon asked, finally understanding.
'I'm not sure I know any more,' she snapped. 'At first I thought you were a zombie for me to fight, then I thought you were here because I was horny, but now I'm not sure, because all you seem to do is ask annoying questions.'
'I'm not here for any of those reasons,' he told her gently. 'I think you were injured in the tanker explosion. You seem to have developed some kind of... solipsism syndrome.'
Anna stared at him. 'Solipsism syndrome?' Then she laughed. 'That's funny,' she said. 'That's really funny.'
'Why is that funny?'
'Because... Because it is.'
'Because you're the star of all this?' Simon suggested, gesturing around him. 'Because you were bored, and wanted a chance to fight some zombies and save the world?'
'What are you saying? That I'm imagining all this?'
'No, believe me, it's all really happening, but not because you want, or wanted, it.'
'I'm bored with you now,' she stated, folding her arms across her chest.
'Then make me go away,' he challenged her.
'Why should I? You must be here for a reason,' she said. 'I obviously need you for something important.'
'Like, for pointing out that you're crazy?'
'I'm not crazy. And why would I point that out to myself anyway? That doesn't make sense.'
'Unless I'm part of your subconscious,' Simon told her, getting a little mixed up in it himself, 'that's aware that you're crazy and is trying to tell you.'
'That's the poorest logic I've ever heard,' she sniffed, turning on her heel and stalking back to the desk.
'Anna,' Simon said. 'You've obviously been through a lot. You're alone out here, in the desert, with a war going on, and forces none of us can comprehend looming around you. I can't blame you for being a little traumatised by all of this. This kind of thing only ever happens in virries. I'm not surprised your mind is equating such circumstances with something you've chosen to have a role in.'
'Will you shut up now?' Anna snapped. 'There's nothing wrong with my mind.'
'That isn't what I'm saying,' Simon said hurriedly. 'I know you must be pretty smart to have survived this far. Were you really a Project Coordinator here?'
She wordlessly showed him the ID card that hung around her neck.
Simon nodded. 'And you really think you can stop whatever is going on here?'
Anna glanced at the fly zooming between them. On its way back to Simon, while it was facing the other way, she shrugged and pointed at the object on the desk. On the fly's next run she mouthed, 'Sabotage the missile,' but then kicked at a chair and glared at him. 'The problem is that some idiot seems to have brought along an explosive fly to guard us.'
Simon took a deep breath, hoping he wasn't about to place all his faith in someone completely delusional, and that solipsism was the full extent of Anna's issues. But one thing was certain: she had survived this far, uninfected, on her own. Maybe she really could do what she claimed, and if whatever intelligence was behind all this really was building a missile, then she was right – it had to be stopped.
'What if I could lead the fly away from us?' he asked. 'There's only one of it, but two of us.'
'How can you be sure it will follow you and not me?'
'There's some dead Mongolian soldiers not far away,' he told her. 'I'll bet if I grab a gun and some of their grenades and try to storm the reactor, the fly will destroy itself stopping me. Then you can escape.'
Anna raised an eyebrow. 'You'd sacrifice yourself to let me escape?'
Simon shrugged, figuring it probably wouldn't have to come to that, and not at all certain whether he would be able to go through with it if it did. All he really wanted was to get Anna out of the room so they could close the door behind them and trap the fly inside – but just in case it was listening, he didn't want to say that aloud.
'Hmm. Maybe you're here to add some heroic tragedy,' Anna mused.
'Maybe,' Simon agreed slowly, resisting the urge to roll his eyes.
'Let's go then,' she said briskly, clapping her hands together.
'What? Now?'
'No time to lose.'
'But...' Simon swallowed and stared at the fly; fast, manoeuvrable, and probably far too smart to fall for a plan like this.
'What's the problem? Now you want to kiss me? It's about time!'
'Uh...'
'Make your mind up,' she told him. 'We can't waste all day.'
'Right. No, we can't,' he agreed, casting his gaze over her again. With her shredded blouse that revealed more than it hid, her makeshift bandanna and deluded-yet-dignified demeanour, he found her strangely attractive – in a cheesy, archetypal, battle-scarred heroine-scientist kind of way. 'Maybe I should kiss you,' he said. 'I mean, I'm about to get myself killed in a plan more insane than you could ever be...'
'Love interest. See? What did I tell you? The girl is supposed to get laid before she saves the world.'
'I only said I'd kiss you,' Simon said.
'Don't be ridiculous. This is the last chance you ever get,' she told him, and popped open another couple of buttons on her blouse.
Simon nodded gravely, staring at her breasts. He supposed she was probably right about that.
He stepped toward her, and she to him, forcing the fly to elevate itself over their heads once more, but as their lips met, a noise in the doorway made them turn.
Two infected GASP employees walked in, holding gleaming phones. As Simon and Anna stared, the phones both began to ring.
'Crap,' Simon said.