Gary Briggs, 47, divorced, was the first to find it. Working with his partner, Szymon Wójcik, on a medium pressure gas leak in Shaw, Briggs was digging further up the road to cut off the gas before the rest of the team arrived to begin repairs. Medium pressure pipes contain enough potential energy to level a block of houses, and then some, so Briggs was being especially careful and digging wide of the valve. Perhaps overzealous, he chipped into some previously undisturbed rock and only paused when he felt the jackhammer meet resistance. Fearing he’d hit an adjacent pipe, Briggs stopped the hammer and was surprised to see it covered in a viscous, semi-translucent, pinkish substance. From where he’d dug, a dull red light glowed with an ebbing pulse and there, rippling between the layers of sandstone and gravel, thin veins of scarlet, crystal-like rock had been pierced by the edge of the jackhammer. Briggs thought he’d stumbled upon a vein of gems, something like ruby, and was later heard speaking of his great fortune and subsequent anxiety that his imminent wealth would be stolen from him, before he could enjoy its pleasures, by some corporate entity or the government itself. Six months later, Gary Briggs would die from complications associated with pancreatic cancer.
To say the redvein is an epidemic is an understatement. It appears to leech into other minerals, replacing their chemical composition with its own. Ultraviolet light, oxygen, and nitrogen all appear to catalyse this process, hence the exponential growth across much of the surface of the northwest. We can assume that the subterranean presence of redvein spreads slower and may be the reason it was not encountered until now. Water and a few select materials, like metals and tar, appear to resist the replacement process. Organics are not conduits for its growth but are affected by its proximity, namely by the aggressive mutation of cells, typically resulting in cancers such as the one that killed Mr. Briggs. The internal nature of this change made the true scope of the problem hard to identify at first. It was only eight months after the initial contact with redvein that a definitive correlation was made between the discovery and the uptick in hospital admissions. Now, a year later, hospitals across mainland Britain are critically beyond capacity and are at breaking point. International aid is hesitant for fears of further spreading.
Some offer religious or anecdotal explanations for this fast and devastating apparition. One god or another smiting sinners for their long-overdue penitence. Others say it is like the earth’s immune system, activating after the human infection has persisted too long. I doubt either is true. It is simply something that has been uncontacted by terrestrial life, until now, and thus adaptations to its strange elements have yet to be developed. I will admit, however, it is easy to have doubts when you press a gloved hand to its veins and feel the warmth through the nylon and the consistent, low pulse, that could be the thrum of a great, unseen heart.
Paddy Dobson
24th August 2020