by Hall, Andrew
18
Tabitha raced down the motorway south. The car was running on fumes, but at least the rain had stopped and she could see where she was driving. She looked back at Laika every so often, making sure she was alright.
‘You’re ok aren’t you, dog face?’ she said doubtfully. Laika was licking her side where the man had knifed her. It was more of a cut than a stab wound, when she’d pushed Laika’s fur back to see it. There wasn’t much blood; Laika seemed calm enough. Taking it with typical canine resilience.
‘I’m sorry,’ Tabitha told her, watching her in the rear-view mirror. Laika’s ear moved at the sound of her voice, but she lay still. ‘I just seem to get us into trouble, every time. I’m bad luck.’ She looked back at the road, still rolling on forever beneath the car.
‘Unless it’s you that’s bad luck,’ she added, smiling. She caught a glimpse of herself in the mirror.
‘And what the hell’s going on with my eyes?’ she said, staring at her reflection. They’d grown such a light shade of green lately that they looked almost yellow in the daylight. ‘Maybe we should just get on a boat, what do you think?’ she asked Laika. ‘We could fill it up with food and water and just sail off. Nothing could get us out there.’ It was a nice idea, the more she thought about it. And the more she thought about it, the faster she talked herself out of it. There’d be a storm. They’d run out of food and not catch any fish. They’d run out of water and have to drink from the sea, and then they’d be sunburned and crazy and end up eating each other. And to cap it all off, those giant black squids would find them and eat them. She’d forgotten about them. It was a terrible idea, when she really thought about it.
The motorway followed a wide river south, the water burning orange in the fading sunlight. Tabitha watched the grassy sandbanks and the endless sea give way to green fields. The sun was setting on yet another worst day of her life. She ran her tongue over the grainy film on her teeth, thinking. She clenched her jaw, tense. Gripped the steering wheel hard until it creaked.
‘I don’t know where to go, Laika,’ she said, defeated. The dog’s ears pricked up at hearing her name, but she hardly looked up. ‘I don’t know what to do,’ Tabitha admitted. Hiding away in the back of beyond had been a bad idea, then. It was either die in a town, or die in the country. That was all the choice they had. The needle on the fuel gauge was hanging just over empty.
‘I thought people could survive out in the sticks,’ she said, easing her foot off the accelerator. The engine roar died down. ‘I mean, that’s why we set out in the first place. To find somewhere safe, out of the towns. Then when we get there...’ she was shaking her head in disbelief. How long had it been since the invasion? Ten days, like the man said? Ten days and the country had turned into a wild pit. Then there was that group of men, back at the petrol station. The ones she’d tried to blot from her mind. They might have raped her, if they’d caught her. She would’ve murdered them if they’d tried, looking back now. Facing the village mob had broken her fear. Maybe that was just humanity now; possible rapists and potential cannibals, scratching around for food at the end of the world. This stuff only happened in the movies, she told herself. It didn’t have any place in reality. No one was ever supposed to go through this.
‘I mean, all that stuff takes months to happen, surely,’ she told Laika, shaking her head. ‘Nobody thinks about turning cannibal in a fortnight.’ Apparently people would, though. And all it would take was for one starving psycho to make it ok. So… this was humanity minus law and order. Minus farms, supermarkets and the national grid. Screwed. The countryside whipped by a little slower as Tabitha left her foot off the pedal. A motorway junction drew closer. Maybe it was just better to find a place where there weren’t any people at all. At least there they could live out their last few days in peace together, before the spiders found them.
Tabitha pulled up at a big roundabout in the middle of nowhere. Yanked the handbrake up. Switched off the engine. Pine trees covered the hills on her left, a gloomy mass in the twilight. There was a road sign on her right for a village with a strange name, eleven miles away. Another huge patch of the back of beyond. Silent as the grave, just like everywhere else. Tabitha stared ahead for a little while behind the steering wheel, blank and despondent. Pushed the locks down on the doors with a grey finger. She climbed into the back with Laika, and buried herself under the blankets on a nest of pillows. Once Laika had stopped sniffing and fussing over her, Tabitha brought the rifle closer in the footwell beside her. The blankets smelled like dog, safe and musty. Tabitha’s breaths sharpened, shortened, and the sobs came jumping out of her. She thought about gangs coming to rape her. She thought about a village of hungry people trying to kill her. Wild dogs, and weirdos with guns. And spiders. And her mum and friends too, like a black hole twisting in her chest. Laika lay down on top of her then, warm and graceless, and stretched up to lick the tears on her cheeks. Startled, Tabitha smiled through her sobs. Her dog looked up at her, resting on her chest. She ran her thumbs along Laika’s cheeks; scratched her behind the ears. Checking the fur on Laika’s shoulder, the knife wound had already clotted and dried. The glued skin on her other side had knitted and scabbed. She couldn’t smell any infection, at least.
‘You’re not as skinny as when I found you,’ she said, stroking the black fur on Laika’s head. ‘So at least I’m doing something right.’ She felt her dog’s warm weight against her stomach where she lay. Her soft furry head resting across her chest. Her smelly breath. She watched Laika peacefully in the last light, eyes closing a little more with every stroke on her head.
‘Me and you against the world,’ Tabitha said softly, looking out at the fading light.
Tabitha gasped and woke up, terrified. Laika lifted her head suddenly, staring at her in shock. Tabitha looked around. It was light outside. She was in the back seat of the car. The rifle lay beside her, just down there in the footwell. It’d been a bad dream, nothing more.
‘Morning,’ she said sleepily, rubbing her eyes. It hurt. Her fingers felt like sandpaper. Laika hauled herself up off her as Tabitha moved to sit up.
‘Stop looking at me,’ Tabitha told Laika, squatting down beside the car. They were high on the moors, miles from anywhere. ‘I can’t go when you’re looking at me.’ Laika didn’t have the same reservations, though. Her dog stared at her while they both peed. Laika’s crazy mismatched eyes didn’t help either.
‘Are you done?’ she asked her dog, still squatting by the car. Laika wandered off. Tabitha sighed, and commenced a satisfying post-sleep piss. It was strange how much better the world looked sometimes, after a few hours’ sleep. A cold wind hissed through the blonde dead grass that covered the moors, lumped and dry as tinder. A bird warbled somewhere out there, past the broken-down ruins of an old stone house. Strange, but the bird didn’t sound like it belonged here. It was the kind of sound she’d only expected to hear in some far-flung rainforest. The sound died down again, and Tabitha was alone in the wild pressing silence. She pulled her torn jeans up and stretched in the sunlight, and cursed when she remembered how low the petrol was.
It didn’t take long to leave the high moors behind, and the strong winds eased off as they drove on south towards green fields. Tabitha parked them up for a little while, just to stretch her legs again. She was taking breaks more often now. The novelty of driving had long since worn off, and she was glad just to be standing around and walking for a little while. That, and she was desperately trying to come up with a plan before she ran out of petrol.
Tabitha rubbed Laika’s tennis ball down her forearm, unable to feel it in her palm. She felt the cold wet dew on it from the grass where Laika had fetched it. Felt the chill of the breeze where it blew against her wet arm. Passing the ball between her hands though, she felt nothing. Only the weight of it, the shape, but not the touch. Like she had gloves on. This was alien skin, spider skin. It made sense that they were unfeeling creatures. Did that make her an unfeeling creature then, at least in
part? Laika barked, and snapped her out of her thoughts.
‘Sorry,’ Tabitha replied, throwing the ball. ‘Human problems.’ Laika raced after the ball across the dewy grass. She chased it down, snatched it up, and ran back to drop it at Tabitha’s feet. Staring into Laika’s eyes, Tabitha saw total dependence. Canine devotion. Laika seemed to smile as she panted, waiting to play. Tabitha lifted the ball, drew her arm back to throw. Laika jumped into her stance, ready to run. Watching the ball. Hooked on the thrill of the chase. Tabitha launched the tennis ball high into the air, and watched Laika pelt after it. Tabitha thought about how much the dog had fought to protect her, like nothing else mattered. Laika only made room for one thought at a time, she supposed. Threw herself into each new thing, and only that. Eating, dumping, chasing, protecting. There was no room for uncertainty in her head, no room for doubt. There was only the urgency of whatever came next. Hunting and fighting. And the thrill of the chase. Maybe that was the secret of happiness. If Laika managed to stay happy at the end of the world, maybe she could too.
They raced on down the motorway under a clear summer sky. The next services they passed was a burned ruin; the petrol station nothing but ash and scorched metal. Two burnt-out cars lay dead on the forecourt. Tabitha’s petrol gauge read empty, and there wasn’t another services for miles. They’d be stranded out here soon, and then it’d be back to wandering the roads. Unless they passed a stray car or braved a town centre, and Tabitha didn’t fancy her chances with either. Time to pick a nice quiet place in the hills around here, and pray that the spiders never found them. Tabitha looked back at the hills again, eyes drawn to something. So she hadn’t just imagined it. There was a tiny black wisp there ahead of them, reaching up into the blue. As Tabitha drove closer, it was clearly smoke from a fire. A couple of minutes later, as the motorway cleared the nearest hills from view, Tabitha’s eyes fixed on a tiny dark square on a distant peak. A castle. The lazy smoke trail she’d followed was curling up from the roof, reaching into the hazy summer sky.
19
The town that surrounded the castle was deserted. Tabitha parked up on the high street. She patted the hunting knife on her belt, and hoisted the rifle around her shoulder. It was quiet here. There were cars around too; plenty to scrounge some petrol out of. But she wanted to check the town over first. Better to take any residents head-on, she decided, than let them take her by surprise.
‘Come on, you,’ she told Laika, letting her out of the back seat. ‘And keep quiet.’ They passed through a stone arch, into the old heart of the town. The castle overlooked everything from a tall hill on her left. The rising smoke trail had disappeared. The town was small but built-up; everything crammed together on old narrow streets. Every house and shop was tilted and warped, like they’d been built for a fairy tale. Over the rooftops she could make out the crooked spire of a church. There were no tall offices though. No blocks of flats, and no factories. It seemed like a place cut out of history. Laika sniffed at the rank gutters, and followed her nose away up the street.
‘Laika, stay close,’ said Tabitha. She looked up at the uneven rooftops, and around at the glass panes of old shop windows that distorted their looted interiors. Laika padded back up the street, and nuzzled Tabitha’s hand. It was a shame to loot beautiful old shops like these, Tabitha thought. She imagined what the town would look like with a good covering of snow, street lamps lit, like a scene in a children’s story. Even despite all the broken doors hanging off their hinges.
At least the toy shop had been left alone; Tabitha was glad. Teddy bears and wooden figurines still crowded the window. There were rattles and trains in there; toy soldiers and dolls. She didn’t think anyone made those old toys any more. Then she saw it. The door was intact; still shut. It had been barred with two thin shiny chains, nailed to the corners of the doorframe like a giant X. Fixed around the chain links were little padlocks; memorials. Tiny locks on fragile chains. So easy to break, but still intact. Locks on a shared memory through that old shop door; protecting a bright warm thought from the world. Tabitha saw a note taped to the inside of the window, written in a shaky but elegant script.
Take the furniture for fire wood, if you must. But please, don’t burn the toys. Take them for your children, if you are still blessed with them.
These are dark days, and innocence is one of the few lights we have left.
Tabitha stepped back from the shop’s warped little window and the old toys inside. She felt a lump in her throat.
‘Come on, Laika,’ she said, her voice faltering. She moved away from the shop. She didn’t want to be so close to something so fragile, as if just being near it might break it. Laika started growling.
‘Hey!’ came a voice down the road. A young woman stood down at the end of the narrow street, aiming a shotgun at her. She was tanned and dark-haired; big brown eyes staring nervously. ‘What do you w-want?’ the woman called over.
‘Petrol, for my car,’ Tabitha replied. A cool breeze tousled her hair. ‘Are you living up in that castle?’ the woman stood there, said nothing. Tabitha grabbed Laika’s collar to keep her close. With her other hand she pulled her hunting rifle around and pressed the stock into her shoulder, aiming at the woman down the scope.
‘I’ll shoot you,’ the woman warned her. She had an Irish accent.
‘I’ll shoot you,’ Tabitha called back. ‘Who’s going to do the most damage, at this distance?’ the woman stared, hesitated. She jumped at a scuttling noise behind her, and checked over her shoulders nervously.
‘So, are you n-normal?’ the woman stuttered, still aiming the shotgun.
‘What?’ Tabitha called back.
‘Are you normal?’ the woman repeated, adjusting the shotgun against her shoulder.
‘Yeah,’ Tabitha replied, for the sake of argument. She’d never liked the word normal. When it came to people, there was no such thing. Especially now. Anyway, she was probably as far from normal as it was possible to get. Exhausted, Tabitha waited for the woman to respond. But she was just standing there, sizing her up, aiming her shotgun.
‘Look, if you’re going to shoot me, just do it,’ Tabitha called up the street. ‘I’m tired of this shit.’ She heard falling roof tiles behind her, slipping and cracking on the road. Laika started barking. It was a spider, clambering across a rooftop above them. Stalking them. The woman studied Tabitha carefully, and lowered her shotgun.
‘It’s not s-s-safe out here,’ the woman stuttered. ‘There’s a few of us living here, inside the c-castle. Come on.’
‘I’m Liv, by the way,’ said the woman, as they made their way quickly through the narrow streets. The sun above them was a pale staring eye.
‘Tabitha,’ she replied. ‘This is Laika.’
‘Well, I’m glad to meet you T-Tabitha,’ Liv replied. ‘And Laika,’ she added. She was turning her head constantly as they crossed town, checking this way and that. Looking from the road to the rooftops for any sign of spiders. Tabitha was running through everything in her head. Everything that might happen once they reached the castle. Mugging, raping, murdering. Imprisonment. Experiments. They might take her car and eat her dog. Eat her too, maybe. The woman didn’t seem that bad, though. Yet.
‘Do you do this a lot?’ Liv asked her, as they crossed the main road through the town centre.
‘Sorry?’ said Tabitha, dazed.
‘Zone out, I mean,’ said Liv. ‘You l-look exhausted.’
‘Well, I feel it,’ Tabitha admitted, dropping her guard a little. She checked for oncoming cars as they crossed the road. She caught herself doing it and looked at Liv, and felt like an idiot.
‘One good th-thing about the apocalypse,’ Liv observed, smiling. ‘No traffic.’ Tabitha’s glum tired face softened into a smile. ‘It’s not far now,’ said Liv. ‘And Jim’s around this c-corner here. He’ll watch our backs while we get to the castle.’
‘How many of you are there?’ said Tabitha, stooping to reassure Laika while they walked.
; ‘Four.’
‘Four?’ Tabitha repeated, shocked. She’d expected more survivors than that.
‘It’s weird; we’ve all lived around here for years, and never met before now,’ said Liv, pushing her hair back in the breeze.
‘How did you survive?’ said Tabitha. They crossed another road, skirting around the high street. Tabitha realised why when she glimpsed the silver shapes, hiding along the shop fronts.
‘We’d seen smoke coming from the c-castle,’ said Liv. ‘There were five of us out here in town, living from house to house. We’d seen a fella up there on the castle wall, waving and sh-shouting one day. So, we made a run for it. Up to the castle. They k-killed two of us on the way, though.’
‘I’m sorry,’ Tabitha said gently.
‘Well, we’ve both lost people, I’m sure,’ Liv replied grimly. ‘But th-thanks. All we can do now is hole up in the castle, and wait for the army to come.’
‘The army’s on its way?’ said Tabitha, looking at her.
‘Will thinks they will be. One day.’ Liv replied. ‘But you should probably ask him about that yourself. I’m n-not very good at optimism. Not like he is. Look, there’s home,’ she said, nodding at the castle. It loomed large on the hill around the next street corner, separated from town by a small field. Suddenly someone stepped out from a doorway beside them; a man in his sixties. His grizzly expression creased up into a smile.
‘A new face!’ he said brightly, with a smoker’s voice. ‘Thank god for that. Liv was getting really depressing to talk to.’ He grinned like a schoolboy, and put his guard up. Liv laid into him with a few punches on the arm.