The building itself reached twelve stories at its highest point and looked far more like a swanky office block than a hospital. The lower part of the building was brick with ultra-modern, geometric paneling covering the outside of the ground floor wall. The automatic, glass double doors to A&E were locked shut.
Ben ordered us all to stand aside before getting back into the pick-up truck, reversing it as far as he could down the lane, and then ramming it into the doors that cracked and shattered without any resistance. Instantly, a massive dust cloud mushroomed up and billowed out in all directions, bringing with it a sickening, sulfur-like odor. The smell of my freshly laundered t-shirt was just about enough to stop me gagging once I’d pulled it up over my nose.
Ben got back out of the truck and knocked down any remaining glass shards with a hammer and then gestured for us to go inside.
“Not my first rodeo,” he mumbled to Nate and me as we passed him. Clearly, it was Ben who’d been responsible for all the smashed, looted shops we’d seen after arriving in London. By the smug look on his face, the destruction appealed to him.
As the dust cleared, the death and decay became visible. It was everywhere.
Bodies lined the corridors and filled every seat in the waiting area of the A&E department. They were on the floor, sprawled out in the positions they’d died in, and some were even still standing against the walls or leaning against the snack machines. The smell was much worse, the closer we got.
We followed the corridor down until we ended up in the main lobby of the hospital. There were bodies in here too, but only on the leather chairs that made up the coffee shop seating. A barista in a green apron was slumped over the service counter, his bony index finger still wrapped around the handle of a coffee mug, a brown stain on the linoleum floor below it.
Why anyone would still go to work in the midst of a pandemic, to one of the most likely places to catch it, was beyond me. The doctors and nurses, I could understand, given they had a duty to take care of sick people, but a coffee shop worker?
“They sure are running a skeleton staff today,” Ben mumbled as he passed by the ex-barista, swiping a cereal bar from the display in front of the till. “Hey, Tobias. What did the zombie do after he dumped his girlfriend?”
“No idea.”
“He wiped his arse!”
Tobias snickered. “You’re a sick man, and you need help.”
“Ben, if you don’t shut up, I’m going to kick your arse,” Eve snapped as she looked over a huge map of the hospital stuck up on the lobby wall. Nate perused it too and then pulled a piece of paper from his jeans pocket. He tore off a section of it and handed it to Eve.
“The medical archives are on the fourth floor, next to the consultant’s offices. This is a list of the books and journals I want. Find as many as you can and then wait for us outside.” He turned to me with an austere expression. “Go with Eve, Halley.”
It was an instruction that left no room for argument.
Eve and I headed to the main stairwell and began our ascent. After two minutes of stair-climbing, the stench of the dead burned my nostrils so vehemently that nothing could block it out. It took everything I had not to spew my breakfast over the linoleum.
“Go back to the car, Halley.”
My teeth ground together in an effort to stop gagging, and with a quick shake of my head, I quickly carried on up the stairs.
Fortunately, the fourth floor was corpse-free and far less pungent than the ground level and stairwell. Some kind soul had left a window open, and a fresh breeze blew through the corridor, providing enough ventilation for me to breathe without retching.
The archive was basically a library; a large room with shelf after shelf of books and a few computers on desks against the far wall.
There were five books on Nate’s list—one of which was authored by Kara Strahovski and entitled ‘Factors of reproduction.’ I wasn’t sure whether to look under S for Strahovski or ‘F’ for the book title.
Eventually, we located it in a section dedicated to fertility research.
Kara’s book was a thick hardback, and judging by the state of the outer sleeve, very well-read. The back cover included her bio and a small photograph. She was a pretty blond in her early forties with black-rimmed spectacles and thin lips. She didn’t look at all like a mad scientist.
I tucked the book under my arm and began looking for another of the titles on Nate’s list. Eve made faster progress than me and had the other three titles in hand before I’d even located the section with ‘The evolutionary history of vertebrate RNA.’
She came to lean casually against one of the shelves next to the section I’d begun to rummage in. “Why haven’t you told Nate yet?”
I ran my index finger down the spines of a row of medical encyclopedias. “I told you I needed time.”
She sighed. “Time for what? Doesn’t he want children? Are you afraid of what he’ll say?”
“Yes, he wants children.” My reply was abrupt. “But it’s early still, right? Something could go wrong.”
“So, what? You’d rather he didn’t know?”
“Yes. If something bad happened, I’d rather he never found out about it.”
A look of shock registered on her face. “But—”
I cut her off. “He’s seen so much death, Eve. He’s lost so much. I’d rather save him the heartache.”
She simply glared at me, huffed and shook her head crossly. “You have no right to keep this from him. What are you afraid of?”
Ignoring her, I sidestepped over to another shelf of books. The huge tome I’d been searching for was here, nestled amongst other gigantic works. As it slowly wiggled out of its slot, she appeared beside me and slapped her hand across the book to stop me from pulling it out any further.
“You’re afraid if you lose the baby, he’ll do something stupid.”
With an indignant glare aimed directly at her, I batted her hand away and dug my fingernails into the book’s spine to get a better grip on it. “I will not let him go back to the dark place he was in when I found him.”
Suddenly, she became incensed. “Are you bloody kidding me?” She grabbed my wrist. “I’ve seen the way he looks at you. Nate would never do that to you. No matter what happens. You’re an idiot if you think otherwise. He loves you.”
“Sometimes, love isn’t enough!” I recoiled and yanked my wrist from her grasp. The book, along with a few other volumes, dropped to the floor in a series of heavy thuds that echoed throughout the room.
“Priya mentioned your mother.” Eve’s stare was penetrating, but not so condemnatory. “Did something happen to her?”
“Yes!” I snapped, not thinking.
Did I really want to talk about this now? With Eve?
My mother’s suicide had gnawed at me for the last ten years. A long time to hold onto the belief that I’d not been enough to keep my mother from killing herself. From slitting her wrists in the bathtub and leaving me with Andrew. Hadn’t I loved her and behaved like a good girl? Or was there something more I could’ve done?
Exhaling, I let my body slump back against the bookshelf. “She left me, Eve,” I muttered. “She took a bath, slit her wrists…and she left me.”
****
Before…
The night before my planned departure, I snuck my backpack into the garage and dropped it down next to the bicycle, ready to go.
After wolfing down breakfast, I informed Rebecca that I’d be going out for a while.
“Don’t be too long,” she said.
Not wanting to leave her with a lie on my lips, I simply nodded. As far as she was concerned, I was only going to cycle around the village.
With the backpack on my shoulders and my fingers wrapped tightly around the handlebars, I pushed the bike out of the garage and down the path. As soon as the ground leveled, I hopped onto the seat and began to ride.
In no time at all, the highway loomed into view, and once the bike was traveling along the
hard shoulder, it coasted easily without me having to pedal. It felt good to have the breeze in my hair and the pre-summer sun on my skin.
Half an hour later, a roadside sign informed me it was twenty kilometers to Saltash. From there, the coast was only a short distance away, and my expedition could properly begin.
Thirsty, I stopped to take a swig of water from the bottle clipped to the bicycle frame and wiped the sweat from my forehead with a cloth I’d stowed away in the front basket.
Looking around at the acres of overgrown farmland, my attention was caught by some movement in a field off in the distance. Cows. Only a dozen, grazing idly on the long grass, where large herds used to roam.
The cows had mostly starved or died from illness. The remaining ones moved constantly from pasture to pasture in groups, mainly to deter foxes from attacking the weaker members of the herd. As they munched and meandered, my gaze followed them until they disappeared from sight.
Survival was easier in groups; that was a fact.
And yet, here I was, all alone in the outside world. It didn’t frighten me, although perhaps it should have. My worry was for Rebecca.
Without me, she’d be vulnerable, especially in the state she was in. I hadn’t even told her I was leaving.
“Fuck!” My frustrated scream echoed across the silent landscape.
A few moments later, I steered the bike around and cycled back to the cottage.
Chapter Twenty-One
After…
Speaking about my mother’s death had lifted a weight from my shoulders, although it was strange to have finally shared it with Eve, of all people. She’d sympathized with my fears but made it abundantly clear she disapproved of my decision to keep the pregnancy a secret—for the sake of my sanity.
She also pointed out that Nate was far more impervious to death now than before he evolved, but I wasn’t reassured—if someone really wanted to find a way to end their life, they would. Eve’s last comment on the matter was to tell me I was more screwed up than she thought, but she would continue to keep my secret for the time being.
Outside the hospital, Tobias and Ben had just finished loading a big, expensive-looking piece of equipment into the back of the pick-up when we returned. Ben secured it with a strap, alongside a heavy-duty microscope, and then covered it all with a dust sheet.
Unable to hold it in any longer, I vomited onto the rear wheel of an abandoned police car. Eve rushed to my aid, holding back my hair and giving my back a gentle rub as my violent retching reached its peak. After swilling out my mouth and downing a bottle of water, I started to go back inside the hospital to help Nate, but Tobias stopped me.
“Don’t!” he warned. “Just stay here, we won’t be much longer.”
Ben jumped down from the back of the pick-up. “Yeh, it ain’t pretty in the basement.”
From the map, I’d gleaned that the laboratories—where Nate had gone to get the equipment from—were on the lower levels, next to the mortuary.
I grimaced, not wanting to think about it.
Eve turned to me. “We’ll wait in the car.”
Despite my reluctance to abandon Nate to the horrors of the hospital basement, I knew that if I went back in there again, the puking would recommence, and I’d be no help at all.
With a sigh, I climbed back into the Range Rover and shut the door, pulling the neck of my t-shirt up over my nose again, and rested my forehead against the cool glass of the passenger door window. I closed my eyes, picturing one of my favorite old movies in my mind to distract me from the putrid smell outside. Finally, the ache in my stomach muscles eased enough for me to relax.
In no time at all, the fatigue in my body pulled me down into a deep sleep, only rousing for a few seconds to acknowledge Nate when I heard the car door open. I felt his hand brush gently against my cheek as he shifted me into a more comfortable sleeping position, with my head on his lap.
“She’s been kinda tired recently.”
“Oh?”
“She has nightmares.”
The voices sounded a million miles away. The rest of their conversation was lost to me as I sank into a deeper slumber.
Once again, I find myself in the red desert. It looks more like the images beamed to Earth by the Mars rover than any place on my own planet.
I sit beside the lake, leaning back, with my feet dangling in the water as though I’m basking in the sunlight of a hot summer’s day. The reflection in the water is of a blue sky again, although the sky above me here is the same dismal gray it always is.
Someone is swimming in the lake, and as he floats closer, I recognize Nate. He smiles at me, then walks out of the water as if there are invisible steps I cannot see. We both bask on the shore, soaking in rays from an absent sun.
After a while, he turns to me and gently kisses my lips. “I know it’s going to hurt, but you must remember what I told you the first time we met.”
I frown. “When you were lying on the sofa in the cabin?”
Nate shakes his head. “No, before that.”
Before I can reply, lightning flashes and blinds me. When I’m finally able to see again, Nate is gone, as is the lake.
There is nothing here now but endless dunes of dry, red sand, as far as the eye can see.
I am alone.
****
It took me a while to get my bearings, but I eventually managed to sit up straight and focus.
The car had stopped at an awkward angle, and a thin trail of smoke was wafting out of the dashboard, above the steering wheel. It stunk of burnt plastic and quickly filled the car in a thick gray fog.
My lungs burned as I pressed my palm to my mouth and stifled a cough. “What happened?”
Nate unbuckled my seatbelt quickly and pulled on the door handle. He then gave it a hard kick with his foot, and it swung open with a defiant squeal. “Halley, get out!”
I quickly slid off the seat and stepped out onto the pavement.
We weren’t far from the school, but somehow the Range Rover had mounted the curb and plowed into some railings, trapping Nate and Eve on the passenger side. As Nate jumped out onto the street, Eve clambered over the center console and onto the back seat. She wasted no time exiting the vehicle.
“Christ,” Tobias swore from behind me. He was already out, jumping up and down, shaking and flexing his hands.
“What happened?” I asked again.
A few orange flames began to lick at the edges of the bonnet, charring and bubbling the paintwork as it spread downwards toward the grill.
Eve stared at me. “You were having some kind of nightmare and then—” She stopped and threw both hands into the air.
Nate cut in. “The engine cut out, then Tobias lost control.”
Eve took hold of my shoulders and looked me up and down. “Are you okay?”
We couldn’t have been traveling very fast, especially given the state of the roads. Still, the panic rocketed in my chest when my thoughts turned to the baby.
Nate answered for me. “She’s fine. She slept through the whole thing.” He put his arm around me and moved me a little further away from the car, gesturing for the others to do the same.
Tobias huffed. “I’m not fine! I got electrocuted!”
Eve rolled her eyes at him. “Don’t be so dramatic. You’ll heal.” She turned back to me. “Has this ever happened to you before?”
I shot her a confused look. “What do you mean?”
“There was…a surge. It came from you!” Eve’s eyes were unblinking and wild. “Halley. I think you did this.”
“What?” I couldn’t help but laugh.
Sure, there’d been the incident with the light bulb that one time, but this couldn’t possibly be anything to do with me. Could it?
Nate pulled me aside. “There was static, Halley. It was all over you, I could feel it,” he muttered, under his breath.
“How? How could I have done this?”
My mind spun. Someone could’ve gotten seriously hur
t. Because of me. And because of something I couldn’t control.
Eve pulled out her walkie talkie. “Daniel…?” She paused abruptly when she realized the radio wasn’t making the crackling noise it usually did. She fiddled with the controls and bashed it, but it was dead. Tobias tutted and unclipped his radio from his belt. “Dead,” he said, after a few attempts of trying to contact the school.
They both looked at me curiously. It felt as though I were an exhibit in a freak show, the star attraction, scrutinized by onlookers captivated by my abnormalities.
An irate growl left my throat, and with a shake of my head, I stomped away toward the school. I was in no mood to stand around ruminating—there was only one person who might be able to help me understand this. Claire.
If this was my fault, I needed to get it under control.
“Halley—” Nate caught up with my swift stride. I looked back to see Tobias rescuing the books from the boot of the Range Rover, while Eve followed us, although she kept a good few meters behind.
Nate took hold of my hand rather forcefully. “Don’t shut me out!”
His eyes filled with apprehension. Was he worried about me? Or was he scared of what I might blow up next?
We stopped under the dilapidated canopy of an old pawn shop where I leaned against the metal security shuttering with my arms crossed.
“I’m not,” I snapped, and then sighed.
Wearily, I stepped forward, taking his hand in mine, giving it a firm squeeze as I kissed his cheek. This wasn’t his fault. “I need to speak to Claire.”
“You think she can ask them what’s going on?” Nate asked.
“Maybe.”
Nate held the back of my hand up to his lips and kissed it. “Fine. Just don’t keep things from me. Whatever’s going on with you, I want to know.”
I glanced up at him, feeling instantly guilty. “What if I’m not ready to tell you?”
Nate shrugged. “Then I’ll wait.”
****
When we arrived back at the school, Daniel was at the gate with Ben, pacing.
“Where have you been?” Daniel shot an icy glare in our direction, before putting an arm around Eve. “I knew I should’ve come with you.”
As the World Falls Down Page 25