Outside - a post-apocalyptic novel

by Shalini Boland

  ‘If you know something, please tell us. I like you two kids, but you better not be upsetting my Jessie for nothing.’

  ‘I’m sorry,’ says Luc. ‘We’re sorry. We shouldn’t have said anything. I don’t want to raise your hopes by guessing. It’s just, what happened to your children happens quite a lot in this area and my father has some theories about who’s behind the abductions.’

  ‘Spit it out, lad.’ Fred speaks more gently this time and guides Jessie back to her chair. He sits down next to her and holds her hands in his.

  I feel uncomfortable that I blurted out Grey’s name without thinking first. But it’s too late and anyway Luc looks like he’s gearing up to tell them about James Grey, Salisbury and the rumours.

  Chapter Nineteen

  Eleanor

  *

  With thousands of people either dead or missing, we gave thanks, hourly that our loved ones were still beside us. My emotions fluctuated between a blissful euphoria that Connor and I were so consumed with each other, and the growing worry that world events were about to catch us up.

  The centre to everybody’s lives had shifted. Priorities changed. The tainted summer air held a mixture of urgency and recklessness. Samuel decided to join up. The military had issued a public announcement for more people to defend our besieged country and the TV advert gave a list of recruitment offices where you could just turn up to enlist.

  Samuel was sold on it, and Abi was all at once, proud and distraught. She’d taken to calling him, My Samuel. They accepted him on the spot, pending his security checks and, all being well, he would go through fast-track basic training and then start serving.

  He took to his new career like a cockerel to a five-barred gate, crowing loudly to Abi and me about his new responsibilities. I suppose at the time, I thought he was basically a loyal, good-hearted bloke - just not a very bright one. And he was easily seduced by power and beauty. He wanted to be at the heart of the action, the first to know everything and he craved the status and power newly up for grabs. It became harder for me to like him, however, as he openly hated Connor.

  One afternoon, Connor and I were walking back from the corner shop to my parents’ house. It was quite chilly and we were looking forward to getting in out of the gusting wind. He had his arm around me and I leant into his body, revelling in our closeness.

  ‘Still in your civvies, Connor. Not gonna help out your country then?’

  We both turned around and saw Samuel with a couple of his army buddies. Connor ignored him and we carried on walking. A thousand and one retorts hovered on my tongue, but I couldn’t spit any of them out.

  ‘Talking to you, mate,’ Samuel called out. I heard him say something to his buddies and they all laughed.

  I prayed Samuel would leave it alone. We carried on walking, but I felt Connor’s stride slow down. We could hear them close behind. The road was quiet and I had a stomach-lurching feeling this wouldn’t end well.

  ‘Connor! Mate! Is it because you’re a coward? Is that it?’

  Connor looked at me and gave me a reassuring smile. He didn’t appear at all worried. He seemed calm and unbothered.

  ‘I said. Is it because you’re a coward?’ This time, Samuel’s voice was right behind us.

  ‘Ellie,’ Connor spoke to me quietly. ‘You go on home. I’ll be there in a bit.’

  ‘No way,’ I replied and turned around to face the three soldiers. The wind whipped my hair around my face and I pushed it behind my ears. ‘Samuel Bletchley, you’re being a twat. Why don’t you just shut your ignorant mouth.’

  This provoked laughter and jeers from him and his mates.

  ‘Hey, Connor! Guess that proves it then. You really are a coward. Gotta get your woman to fight your battles.’

  ‘Is that what this is then?’ Connor asked. ‘A battle?’ He dropped his arm from around my shoulders, stood in the middle of the pavement facing the three of them and took a long swig from his can of lemonade.

  Samuel and his mates didn’t reply, they just smiled and nudged each other like the immature idiots they were.

  ‘So. You think I’m a coward, yeah? That’s what this is about?’

  ‘Pretty much,’ Samuel replied.

  ‘That’s an easy issue to sort out, Sam.’

  ‘Only my mates call me Sam.’

  ‘And what are your two mates called?’ Connor asked.

  Samuel looked confused for a second. ‘Them?’ He gestured to his mates.

  Connor nodded.

  ‘Mark and Rich. What’s that gotta do with anything?’

  ‘Mark, Rich,’ Connor looked at the beefy soldiers. ‘Why don’t you two do one so I can prove to Samuel I’m not the coward he thinks I am. But if all three of you stay, I think that would prove you are the cowards. We can settle this one on one or you can all three start laying into me and we’ll know for a fact I’m right.’ Connor stared hard at Samuel, not breaking eye contact for a second.

  Samuel looked away first. He smiled and shook his head.

  ‘You wanna fight me, Connor? Nah, you don’t wanna do that mate. You might get hurt.’

  He patted Connor on the shoulder and then all three of them barged past us and carried on down the road.

  I looked at Connor and saw a brief flicker of cold hate in his eyes, but then he instantly softened and winked at me. He draped his arm back around my shoulders.

  I was still really unnerved though. I knew Samuel still thought Johnny had been wronged and Connor was to blame. He wouldn’t accept it had been my decision to end the relationship, and Johnny was too dignified to pursue the matter. As a loyal friend to Johnny, Sam still wanted his revenge and, as we were soon to find out, his new career put him in the perfect position to exact it. Samuel just couldn’t help himself.

  Chapter Twenty

  Riley

  *

  Luc and I heard the history of James Grey’s rise to power from Luc's Uncle Rufus, who’s one of the few people outside Salisbury to have met the man. Salisbury Cathedral is the focal point for many devout Christians across the country. The reason it’s such an important building, is that it’s now the very last cathedral left in Britain. Because of this, after the main terror attacks, Salisbury attracted many pilgrims who travelled through the unpredictable countryside to reach its endangered walls and help preserve it against looters and vandals.

  We all knew the rumours surrounding one of these pilgrims - Mr James Grey. Luc’s uncle once had the misfortune to dine with him a few years ago, as a guest in his grand but austere house in the Cathedral Close.

  Luc's Uncle Rufus is based at our Perimeter, but only ever comes home about once a year, as he’s heavily involved in the family business. He spends his time managing perimeter security around the country, but also in his more secretive occupation of weapons production.

  Rufus was hand-delivered a request to dinner, by one of James Grey‘s personal messengers. Rufus assumed he wanted to discuss perimeter business and so he accepted his invitation. He arrived on time at the heavily guarded Cathedral Close.

  They passed an interesting evening where Grey told Rufus his story or, as he liked to call it, his ‘epiphany.’

  ‘I was called to save the people,’ he said.

  But Rufus told us there was something manic about Grey. He got the feeling he was more than slightly unhinged, that it was obvious to see the fearful respect everybody paid him.

  It turned out it wasn’t security Grey was after from Luc’s Uncle, but information on weapons production. Rufus was shocked that Grey knew anything about it, as it wasn't supposed to be common knowledge.

  Grey suggested it would be mutually beneficial if Rufus were to set up a munitions factory within Salisbury's walls. Grey said he knew it wasn’t a very Christian business but it was a necessary evil needed for protection. Rufus lied, politely denying all knowledge of the weapons industry and beat a hasty retreat. But he left behind a very angry man.

  Rufus now has strong opinions on Grey:

/>   ‘He’s a man who is wholly sure of himself, an evil dictator disguised as the saviour of mankind. He’s the worst kind of charlatan, but unfortunately he’s got that place sewn up tight with his priestly warriors, disciples and slaves running around doing his bidding. It‘s a closed society and it’s fuelled by fear.’

  Under no circumstances will Luc’s Uncle arm this madman with weapons and we’re all praying that no one else will help him, for who knows how powerful he might become?

  Thankfully, four years after his meeting with Rufus, Grey isn’t yet crusading against the rest of Britain in a holy war. So we can only hope his weapons production never got off the ground.

  According to Rufus, James Grey, a one-time hospital worker, came down to Salisbury from his hometown, the City of Durham, where the Cathedral and many churches had been taken over and, in Grey’s words, ‘desecrated by the masses.’ They were being used either as places of shelter, as fortresses, or they had been targeted by terrorists, demolished or dismantled.

  ‘… But nowhere, nowhere I tell you, were they being respected as Houses of God. Blasphemy everywhere I looked!’ Luc’s Uncle had pounded the table with his fist to add weight to his impression of Grey.

  Grey was both furious and upset with this blatant disrespect to his God, but he received word from his sister, who lived outside Salisbury, that their ancient Cathedral was still intact. She could still see its four hundred and four foot spire from her little house. Rumour spread that it was being protected against terrorists and other ignorant heathens, by people such as himself, who were flocking to its aid to ‘preserve Christianity in these barbaric times.’

  After he received this message from his sister, Grey felt something he had never felt in all his thirty nine years - hope, in the form of a spiritual calling. He packed up his sparse belongings and trailed his frightened wife and four children more than halfway across the inhospitable country until they reached the little village on the outskirts of the City where his sister lived.

  His sister was missing and her house had been demolished, so they assumed the worst. They hiked the five extra miles to the Cathedral Close to find it bolted shut from the inside against the outside world. No amount of begging, cajoling or shouting gained him entrance from the guards. He and his family were forced to make camp outside the walls, along with the hundreds of other homeless families and pilgrims, many of whom were injured, mortally ill or clinically insane.

  He made sure he and his family camped well away from the others, wary of attracting the wrong sort of attention or catching some vile disease. Occasionally, one of the gates would open to allow somebody out, or back in, but he could never catch a glimpse of the person, as they would always be surrounded by a heavily armed security force. Grey traded some of their precious food for a map of the Close.

  He prayed night and day for God to admit him to His place of worship and one day, seven months later, his prayers were answered. The inhabitants of the eighty acre Cathedral Close were struck down by an unknown illness.

  One morning, the gates opened wide and a robed man staggered out calling for a doctor. Weak, crying and sweating profusely, he had hideous, swollen lumps on his neck and black bruises on his face. He suddenly broke down into a coughing fit, which had him bent double and clutching his chest in agony. As soon as Grey saw the distraught man he knew what he was looking at - the Plague.

  He went straight to find his wife, children and meagre possessions and they left the area. They slept rough for several weeks and avoided all contact with other people. One day they stumbled across a deserted, mouldering two-bedroom mobile home hidden by trees in the corner of a field. They cleaned it up and moved in. Grey waited patiently, planning his next move.

  Three months later, he was confident Salisbury Cathedral would be his to restore to the good Christian people of Britain. He told his family to remain in the mobile home for their own protection. He said he would return for them within a year. If he did not come back within the allotted time, they were to ‘make a life for themselves.’ (He never saw them again. When he finally did send someone to find them, the messenger returned saying the mobile home was empty with no sign of recent habitation. Grey assumed they must all be dead, kidnapped or fled).

  When he returned to the Cathedral Close, the area outside the walls was as he had expected it to be - deserted. The stench of rotting bodies overpowered him, and Grey was repeatedly sick every time he tried to approach the St Anne Gate. However, he persevered and, when he reached it, he found it unlocked.

  And so, after months of waiting, he had finally made it into the Close. At the entrance, a shallow pit had been dug, now overflowing with partially burnt, decaying bodies. He jogged quickly past with his face averted, but he knew he would soon have to deal with it.

  He saw deserted buildings - Bishop Wordsworth’s School, The Sub-Deanery, Sarum College; he knew the buildings and the layout by heart, from the worn and crumpled map he kept in his pocket. He went straight into the cavernous cathedral and dropped to his knees to give thanks to God for entrusting him with this holy task to undertake.

  Over the next few days, he began the unforgiving and near impossible task of burning the corpses. He slept each night in the North Canonry and scavenged food from the empty buildings and gardens. One day, he hit the jackpot and found huge rooms in The Bishop’s Palace piled high to the ceiling with bottled water, tins of fruit and vegetables and all manner of supplies that would have taken an army several months to get through.

  But then, during that first week, he contracted strong flu-like symptoms. He knew this was inevitable and had expected it to happen. A couple of years previously, after the initial terror attacks, he’d had the foresight to steal an array of medicines from his place of work. He prayed for forgiveness every night, but saw the theft as a minor transgression, needed in case he or his family should need treatment in the future.

  So, sweating and in fear, he prepared a syringe and gave himself his first shot of antibiotic, straight into his thigh. He had enough for two shots over a ten day course and prayed this would be enough to protect him from the disease.

  He sweated it out, not having anticipated feeling so dreadful. He thought he would die, but the plague didn’t manage to take hold of him. He was ill for two weeks, with dizzy spells and a strange deafness and light-headedness that disorientated him. But he attributed this to the pitiful amount of food he had consumed. The food was abundant, he just hadn’t the energy to eat it.

  At the end of his second week, he had a visitor - a middle-aged man who turned out to be one of the Cathedral Close gardeners by the name of Dickinson. He had survived the plague without the help of antibiotics. But, unlike the other survivors who had fled, he remained, not sure what else to do. When he found Grey on the brink of death, he took on the task of nursing him back to health.

  Soon, Grey’s mind cleared enough to focus upon the huge task ahead of him. Although he was impatient to start, he knew that he would have to get fit and healthy before the real work could begin. Dickinson offered to help him. It took months.

  First they daubed the exterior walls will the words ’PLAGUE, KEEP AWAY’. Next, they dug pits and burnt the dead. It was exhausting, stomach-churning work, but they kept at it until every last corpse was just a charred remain. Thankfully, there can’t have been that many people within the walls in the first place, but even so, it was almost six months before Grey decided to remove the warning graffiti and open the gates.

  During that time he amassed a small group of some twenty five or so followers. They had each ignored the warnings and entered the Close by cunning or brute force; either because they had already survived the plague, or because they felt it worth the risk. Either way, they were greeted warily by Grey, who interrogated each of them at gunpoint while deciding whether or not to let them remain. They all ended up more-than willing to do Grey’s bidding. How or why? Who knows? Were they brainwashed, bribed or threatened?

  These first inhabitants
became his core disciples and Grey considered them to have been chosen by God for him, as they had made it into the Close without fear of the Plague.

  He had some weaponry left over from the deceased security forces and so they all took up arms and prepared to receive their first influx of residents. Each visitor was grilled thoroughly on arrival and, if they were worthy, they were housed within the walls and given a role to fill, be it gardener, farmer, cook, child carer or tradesman.

  The one common factor required was the willingness to embrace Grey’s new religion. Few people refused to stay, as his way of life promised an easier existence than the one they faced outside the walls. He planned to disregard all previous incarnations of Christianity and devise a new, all-encompassing faith, to unite every denomination. And in true Grey style, he named it ‘Grey’s Church of the Epiphany’.

  His Church grew quickly and soon the eighty acre Close became overcrowded. So Grey expanded his new empire. Before five years had elapsed, his walls enclosed almost the whole of Salisbury and beyond.

  He’s as strict about letting people out, as he is about letting them in. The army lets him get on with it, as long as he doesn’t cut off their transport routes and he often pays them to turn a blind eye.

  This is the gospel according to Rufus. But he still knows very little about what actually goes on behind the Close walls. Maybe it’s all peace and harmony. But Luc’s uncle is a good judge of character and he thinks we haven’t heard the last of James Grey, not by a long way. He’s a man out for glory and he’ll get it by any means necessary.

  Chapter Twenty One

  Riley

  *

  Luc has just finished telling Fred and Jessie about Salisbury’s recent history. He left out the bit about his Uncle Rufus’ weapons production, just giving them the bare facts about James Grey and Salisbury. I see him pause as he thinks about how to tell them the next bit.