When Darkness Falls, Book 3

by Ryan Casey

  She heard gunshots. She heard shouting. She heard all kinds of conflict.

  But all she could do was curl up by her husband’s side, squeeze her eyes tighter shut and hope—pray—that she survived; that her baby survived.

  It was a day later, after surviving that dramatic showdown and finding herself in the company of a new group, that she learned about what happened to pregnant women in this world.

  And it was a week after that she felt the sharp, burning pain right in the middle of her belly.

  A day after that, the pain was gone.

  And her baby was gone too.

  Like every other baby in this post-EMP world.

  Gone.

  A week after that, Kelly took her final breath, the rope wrapped tightly around her neck.

  Then, she jumped.

  Chapter Thirty

  I lay by Sarah’s side with my hand on her belly and tried not to think about the story that Hailey had told me.

  It was the middle of the night. A cool breeze swept across the field that we’d decided to stay in for the night. It was open, so we’d be able to see if anyone was coming. The hedges were noisy when they were brushed against and climbed through, so we’d surely be alerted of anyone that might be headed our way.

  But it wasn’t so much the spectre of Ian and his people looming large on the horizon that bothered me now.

  It was the fear of what might be coming.

  Or what might not be coming…

  I looked to my left. Everyone was lying in the grass, curled up, trying to sleep. A couple of Hailey’s people were sitting upright, clearly on guard, bows and arrows in hand. At least they seemed like good people. I had to be grateful for that. It wasn’t easy trusting anyone in this world. And I wasn’t exactly fully trusting them yet, of course. I had a long way to go before I could do that.

  But they seemed like good people. And they’d saved my life—as well as Suzy and Will’s lives—back in the town a few miles back.

  I had to be grateful for that. Because no doubt about it, I had stared death closer in the face than I ever had before.

  “Struggling sleeping?”

  When I heard Sarah’s voice, my stomach sank right away. I didn’t want to get into a conversation with her, mostly because I knew that getting into a conversation about what Hailey had told us about the miscarriages—about all the experiences they’d had with the miscarriages—made it all the more real.

  I shuffled around, closed my eyes, pretended I was fast asleep.

  Sarah sighed. “I know you’re awake, Alex. I’ve been married to you for years. Don’t think I can’t tell when you’re faking it.”

  I felt my stomach sink. I knew there was no hiding from Sarah. I was a fool to think I could.

  I opened my eyes and looked at her.

  And in the light of the moon, against all odds, I thought I saw something remarkable.

  She was smiling.

  I narrowed my eyes. “What… why are you smiling?”

  Sarah looked up at the moonlight. Her eyes sparkled in the glow. “I’m just thinking how beautiful it is. This moment. Lying in a field in the middle of the night. Kind of like the camping trips we used to take really, isn’t it?” She turned and smiled back at me.

  I felt unease creep through my body. “Sarah… this isn’t a time to be happy. After what Hailey said—”

  “You know, I’ve spent so many hours of my life wondering about what might happen. I’ve spent my life looking back at the past and what might’ve been if I’d done things differently. But… but I haven’t spent enough in the present moment. And in the present moment, there’s me, and there’s you, and there’s our little baby inside of me. And nobody can take that away from us, not right now. Nobody.”

  I felt dread building in my body. Dread that reminded me of the way Sarah had been speaking when we’d lost our first child. I moved myself closer to her. Wrapped my arms around her. Looked into her eyes. “I’m going to find a way to get us to this extraction point, okay?”

  “You can’t make promises like that.”

  “No, I can. I can. I’m going to get us there and they’re going to find a way to look after us. They’re going to find a way to look after our baby. I promise. I promise.”

  Sarah’s smile widened then. And I saw tears building in her eyes. “Oh, Alex,” she said. “Always making promises you aren’t sure you’re going to be able to keep.”

  When she said those words, I felt like I’d been stabbed. I felt totally inadequate. Totally weak. I loosened my grip on Sarah, lay back and looked up at the stars. “I try.”

  “And that’s why I love you.” She shuffled closer to me, took my hand in hers. “But sometimes you’ve just got to take things as they come. Sometimes… sometimes you’ve got to accept that things aren’t going to be easy. That you might not get what you want at all. That you can’t make promises that you can’t keep. But you can try. You are trying. We both are. I know that. And I love you for it.”

  I looked over at Sarah. Then I leaned over to her and kissed her again.

  “I know you don’t like me making promises I can’t keep,” I said. “But I am promising one thing, and I am sticking to it. We are going to get to this extraction point. We are going to give ourselves the best shot of survival. And we are going to survive, all three of us, one way or another.”

  She looked back at me. Her mouth opened, like she was going to say something, going to protest.

  But in the end she closed her mouth and sighed.

  “Sleep well, love.”

  “And you too.”

  I lay back and stared up at the stars, my hand in Sarah’s, resting on her belly.

  But I wasn’t going to get any sleep.

  I didn’t want to miss another moment of my unborn child’s life.

  And I didn’t want to be absent when they passed.

  Not again.

  So I took a deep breath and kept my hand resting on Sarah’s belly.

  She was right.

  I was going to try.

  I just couldn’t shake the whispers tormenting me, telling me I was going to fail…

  Chapter Thirty-One

  As soon as the sun rose, I was ready.

  We were walking through the fields. Hailey had told us that this was the direction of the extraction point. She didn’t want to come all the way with us, mostly because she still had a strange attachment to this world and this way of life. But she fully understood us wanting to get there, and some of her people wanting to join us.

  That’s what set Hailey aside from a lot of the “leaders” I’d encountered. They didn’t attempt to control what their people wanted as individuals. This wasn’t a hive mind. Everyone was entitled to decide the course of their own future.

  And I’d decided. Sarah had decided. Ellie, Suzy, Ibrahim, Will and Kaileigh had decided.

  We were making our way to this extraction point.

  We were getting away before Ian had a chance to stop us—or before he had a chance to do anything to the extraction point.

  And we were going to forge a new life for ourselves in whatever was left of the world beyond.

  Sarah, me and our child.

  I waded through the tall grass, Sarah by my side, the bulk of Hailey’s people behind us. I felt nauseous, mostly through lack of sleep. We’d managed to trap ourselves some breakfast—rabbit—but it hadn’t done a lot for my energy levels.

  That didn’t matter, though. I could sleep for a lifetime when I got to this extraction point. Getting there was the priority.

  I looked ahead and I saw Hailey at the front of the group. She was walking alone, half-smile on her face, bow and arrow in hand. I felt like I wanted to understand more about this woman; to know more about what drove her, and why she was so adamant about helping us.

  So I walked over to her, stepped by her side.

  “Still can’t convince you to join us in the new world?” I asked.

  Hailey looked at me, her smile
widening. Her blonde hair glowed in the brightness of the sun. “Trust me,” she said. “I’ve thought about my answer to that question more times than you’d believe. And the answer’s always the same. Not while I’ve nothing to go back to.”

  I felt sadness for Hailey then, as I continued to walk alongside her. “It must be difficult,” I said. “Knowing that you’re just going to stay here. Not knowing whether anything’s ever going to change.”

  Hailey shrugged. “As far as I see it, that’s the way we’ve been living for the last God-knows-how-long. We haven’t known whether there’s a way out or anything like that. All we’ve known is that we have to try and find our ways to survive. I don’t see how anything has to be different just because we know now about this extraction point.”

  I shook my head. “But just knowing about it. Knowing there’s a whole world out there. Surely that changes things, right? Surely that makes a difference?”

  Hailey looked into my eyes and she smiled. “Life is complicated,” she said. “Life is awkward. And if there’s one thing I have learned, it’s that life is never, ever clear-cut. So don’t make assumptions, Alex. You have your ways and I have mine. Stick to them. Or don’t, and see what happens.”

  She walked on a little quicker then. And in the distance, as I walked alone, I could see a bridge. A bridge that we were going to have to make our way over.

  I felt someone pat me on the back. I turned around. It was Ellie.

  She smiled at me. Cigarette in mouth. “Keep moving, slow coach.”

  I pointed to her cigarette. “Thought you’d given those up?”

  “Temporarily,” she said. “Besides. It’s a bloody nice day. If I can’t have a ciggie on a nice day then what’s the point to any of this?”

  I shrugged as I continued walking. “Never smoked so I wouldn’t know.”

  Ellie’s eyes widened. “You’ve never smoked?”

  “Never felt the need to. Hate the smell for one.”

  She pulled the cigarette from her lips, held it towards me. “Go on. Just a puff.”

  I shook my head. “No thanks.”

  “Come on, man. Live a little. You don’t know how long you’ve got left. None of us do. Might as well be a bit… Ah, man. I’m sorry.”

  None of us do.

  Those words.

  A reminder that my child might not make it. That it could die inside Sarah at any time. They were too raw. Too real.

  “Listen,” Ellie said. “I didn’t mean it like that.”

  I took in a sharp breath, forced a conciliatory smile. “It’s okay. I know you didn’t mean it.”

  She nodded, taking another draw of the cigarette. “I’m just saying. What’s the point of life if we aren’t chasing new experiences anymore?”

  I stopped. Narrowed my eyes. “Ellie, we’re living in a post-apocalyptic world. We’re about to discover an extraction point leading us to some crazy new existence. I can’t think of many more new experiences than that.”

  She tilted her head, then took another smoke. “Fair point.”

  “Hold up.”

  The voice came from up ahead. I went totally still when I heard it, so too did Ellie, as did the others.

  When I looked at where it came from, I saw it was Hailey.

  She was standing by the edge of the bridge. She was looking ahead at something, keeping very still.

  “Everything okay?” I asked.

  She turned around. Looked at me. Then at the people behind me. “Something tells me this isn’t gonna be as easy a journey as I first thought.”

  I didn’t realise what she was talking about. Not at first.

  Then I looked ahead at the bridge and my stomach sank.

  The bridge—which was still filled with cars—was falling apart.

  There were holes in it. Some of them looked like they’d been formed through holding too much weight for too long. It didn’t look accessible. It didn’t look safe.

  Hailey raised her eyebrows. “Hope you’re all good at balancing,” she said. “Looks like we’ve got a challenge on our hands.”

  Chapter Thirty-Two

  I looked at the rickety bridge ahead of me and I knew damn well that attempting to cross it might just be the last thing I ever did.

  The sun shone down brightly from just above, creating an unsettling glare that didn’t do a thing to help with our circumstances. The bridge ahead was in ruin, in all truth. It looked like the concrete had caved in somewhere near the middle, and that had led to a massive gaping hole that vehicles had tumbled down. There was a small area around the side of it that I knew if I balanced on, I could make it over. But who was to say that area was stable enough to hold all of us at all? What was stopping that section of the bridge from just caving in, too?

  “What do you think?” Hailey asked.

  I felt a weight build on my shoulders as the baton of responsibility was handed to me. I craned my neck, tried to see if there was a better way of us getting around this bridge. But below, it didn’t look much better. There was a massive body of water; a reservoir that looked like it’d long ago burst its banks. The water was moving rather freely. “Going underneath it looks risky. But… but I guess if we have the time to construct a boat or something, we might be in with a shot.”

  “And you’re a pro at constructing boats, are you?”

  I thought back to the makeshift raft I’d constructed on an activity course a few years ago, how proud I’d been when I got it floating.

  Of course, the raft hadn’t been perfect. I hadn’t tied the pieces of wood tight enough together. But with a little work, it could float. It could get us across this water. It really could.

  “Right now I don’t think we’ve got much of a choice other than to try another route. It’s going to take us more time. It’s going to hold us back. But I’m not comfortable crossing this bridge. None of us should be. We need to…”

  I turned around and I saw something.

  It was in the distance, behind us. Right down the way we’d come from.

  “Are those…” Suzy started.

  She didn’t need to finish.

  She knew damn well what they were.

  All of us knew damn well what they were.

  Or rather who they were.

  “Ian’s people,” Ellie said.

  There was a group of people heading in our direction. A convoy of vehicles. Seven of them in total.

  And they were racing towards us. Fast.

  Nerves crept up my skin, took over my body. I stepped back, over towards the bridge. “We don’t have a choice anymore,” I said.

  Ibrahim frowned. He looked at me, eyes narrowed. “What’re you saying, mate?”

  “I’m saying we have to get across this bridge. Or we have to at least try. It gives us something between Ian and his people. And not only that but I… I have a feeling that if Ian gets to our position, he isn’t going to be as forgiving as he was last time. Someone else is going to pay. Someone else is going to lose their lives. And that can’t happen.”

  Suzy shook her head. “That bridge. It… I’m not sure we can make it across there.”

  Fear gripping hold of me, I looked back at the bridge and saw the gaping, unstable hole right in the middle of it. “Me neither,” I said. “But we have to try.”

  Ian’s trucks were getting nearer and nearer. So close that I could hear their engines now. I didn’t know how long we had left to deal with, only that we had to act. Fast.

  Hailey looked at me and frowned. “My people. There’s… there’s fifteen of us.”

  “We can make it.”

  “No,” Hailey said. “We can’t make it. Not all of us.”

  She lowered her head, looked at the ground, then over at her people.

  “You have a choice,” she said. “A choice to leave. But you have to be quick. And there’s no guarantee you’ll make it. But there’s another choice. And that’s to get the hell away from here before Ian’s people get here. Right this second.”


  I saw Hailey’s people looking at one another like they were weighing up the situation.

  “Guys, we need a decision—”

  “Sarah needs to get across this bridge,” a voice said. A man called Mike, one of Hailey’s people. “The kids need to get across this bridge. If there’s anything we can do to help hold Ian’s people off, to slow them down… that’s what we should do.”

  I saw the look on Hailey’s face sink. “But his artillery. His weapons.”

  “We’ve faced worse monsters,” another woman called Miri said. “Besides. What’s the point of life if we aren’t fighting for the causes we believe in?”

  Hailey turned and looked at me, defeat on her face. “I guess it looks like we’re staying put,” she said.

  There was so much I wanted to say to Hailey. So much I wanted to tell her. I wanted to tell her to go. To get away from here as quickly as possible.

  But in the end, all I could do—as I got close to choking up—was shake my head. “Thank you. Thank you.”

  Then I turned around and looked at my people as Hailey’s people got down on their knees, bows and arrows lifted, bracing themselves.

  “Come on,” I said. “We have to try this. We have to move.”

  Ellie went first. She pushed herself right up to the bars at the side of the bridge. I heard the ground creaking beneath her feet. Every shift of her weight, my heart skipped a beat, and I couldn’t stop imagining her slipping, tumbling to her death.

  She made it halfway.

  Then she made it a little further.

  Then…

  A little of the concrete came loose beneath her feet.

  My heart leaped into my throat.

  And then…

  She got her balance and she made her way to the other side.

  She rubbed a hand against her head, immediately took out a cigarette and started puffing on it before she’d even lit it. “It’s not impossible,” she said. “But it is fucking scary. Excuse my French.”

  I looked back. Ian’s vehicles seemed to be getting closer at a more rapid rate. Hailey’s people were still braced. “Who next?” I said.