Don't Fear The Reaper

by Lex Sinclair

  ‘You’re not the only one whose faith is wavering,’ the Rector said without preamble. They didn’t have time for greetings and cordial chat.

  ‘My sister is due any time now,’ Rev Perkins said, not acknowledging the Rector’s brusque comment to start their conversation. ‘She’s without a husband and needs all the support she can get.’

  The bishop didn’t conceal his agitation.

  ‘I’m gonna go and be with her in the next week or so,’ Anthony went on, unperturbed by the Rector’s noisy exhalation. ‘But I just wanted you to know I’ll be here for you every day till then.’

  John Hayes removed his thick-lensed spectacles and knuckled his sore eyes. ‘I thought you’d be running for the door by now, cursing God and all of Christianity.’

  ‘My faith in God may be on the rocks,’ Anthony said, ‘but my faith in people like you will never fail.’

  The bishop offered a smile. ‘Very nice. Poetic even.’

  Rev Perkins turned away, disgusted by the sarcastic remark.

  ‘No, I mean it.’

  Perkins tilted his head back and regarded the rafters overhead, seeing the daylight illuminate the colourful translucent depictions on the gothic-style windows. ‘What’s happening to us?’ he asked no one in particular. ‘No one comes to church anymore these days, except the elderly; afraid ’cause they’re standing on death’s door. But what about the others? Maybe this isn’t about anything else than bad luck or punishment of being too concerned with ourselves and secular desires. The Pope spoke to the public yesterday about how we needed to have faith… no one listened. Other ministers preaching around the world aren’t truly speaking on behalf of God. Have you heard them? They stand there giving an oration, speaking of good and evil and love and hate colliding. And yet, if one looks close enough you can see the pride and the joy surfacing on their faces, overwhelmed by how many parishioners and media attention they’re getting. All they care about is their fifteen minutes, and if you believe in God then the meteor will leave you unscathed. Pardon my language – but that’s complete horseshit!’

  The Rector couldn’t protest Perkins’ outburst, as it was all true. He’d seen ministers in the U.K.; the Archbishop of Canterbury, and ministers the world over, raising their voices so they were almost shouting over the masses of followers about the End of Days. He had to admit the religious freaks were as bad as the terrorists, murderers and other people who cherished nothing sacred but their materialistic gifts… as if they would make a difference.

  Already bunkers, caves, bomb shelters were being constructed by average folk. The Royal family; the rich and famous and other highly regarded, important, skilled members of the public were being called out to be offered this temporary sanctuary.

  In their county of Neath and Swansea the oceans would rise and towns, villages would fall asunder and be washed away. There was another asteroid heading to them four miles wide. The nations not close to the oceans would rapidly become an inferno rolling across the land, peeling the Earth like that of the skin of an orange.

  The panic roiling inside the rector’s innards was a shark, prowling the sea, waiting to burst from the depths and unleash its fury. The realisation of what was pending was too surreal to contemplate with any rationality. He assumed his experience and faith would give him strength. Yet here he was wiping the sleeve of his jacket over his damp brow. As cold as it was outside and in the high-ceilinged mausoleum sweat continued inexorably to run down his brow and into his eyes.

  ‘I still remember everything you said some six months ago, like it was yesterday,’ he said in almost a whisper. ‘You remember? It was the sixth day of the sixth year of the new millennium, and I told you what had been foretold. Well, this is it.’

  Rev Perkins sat back down, weary not from physical exhaustion but from constant worry. ‘Yeah, I remember.’

  ‘Then you shall also remember that at the end of the same year another baby would be born unto this world. The child of God. The child and this child alone, that would set us free. You remember this, yes?’

  Perkins nodded.

  ‘Last night I had a dream. A dream so real I still believe that it was a vision. A way to communicate through me so I could help protect the child – our saviour – from being hurt and worse from those who fear the reaper.’

  This time it was the young reverend that knitted his eyebrows together, alarmed and yet intrigued by what the Rector was saying. ‘Like the visions – dreams, whatever – I told you about?’

  John Hayes concurred. Then he said, ‘In this dream, I saw the birth of our saviour, not literally, I should add. It wasn’t quite that explicit. But I saw the newly born baby lying on its back in its crib. Something bad had happened. I don’t know what or how I knew, but I sensed it. Then a nurse gently picked up the baby and handed him over to a man with brown hair of average height, who appeared to be enduring great shock. At first I thought it was because this man had just found out that he was the father of this baby, but that couldn’t be it, for there was no smile, no mirth or any sense of fulfilment and gratitude in appreciation of this little miracle.

  ‘The man had his back to me and was cradling the baby close to him. The doctors, midwife and nurses looked on forlornly. They didn’t say anything. Apparently there was nothing they could say to make things better or to console this man and infant. Then the man holding the infant turned around… and I saw you.’

  *

  There wasn’t much to say thereafter. Bishop John Hayes’ vision could not be substantiated or unproven, for it was merely a vision. And had there been no apocalypse looming over their very planet, steadily heading into their atmosphere, both the Rector and the reverend could dismiss it the moment it’d been spoken.

  Perkins was compelled to inquire further as to what this meant. However, his tongue had glued itself to the roof of his mouth. The vision he’d had of the world burning to ash was an accurate account of what would befall some parts of the world. Therefore, the Rector’s vision had to be believed or taken into consideration.

  Instead of sitting still, waiting for the Rector to break the silence, Perkins rose and paced the red-carpeted aisle. His shoes thudded the thin carpet and hardwood underfoot; the sound reverberating in the high ceiling and stone walls.

  ‘I don’t think any of it matters, anyway, does it?’

  John Hayes cocked his head. ‘What doesn’t matter?’

  ‘What you saw in your dream or vision. It’s totally irrelevant. I mean we’re all gonna either be smashed away by a thousand foot high tidal wave or be the meat on the barbecue.’

  The Rector also stood. Rev Perkins thought he’d offended him, but wasn’t about to apologise.

  ‘I want to show you something for when the time comes,’ he said, vapour pouring from his mouth. It was so cold.

  With that said Rev Perkins watched as the Rector sidled down a row of pews towards the pulpit and kept going past the chanters and disappeared under the Anglo-Saxon arches into the sacristy.

  Dutifully following, Perkins wondered what was so damn important after everything else that was happening worldwide and the possible premonition the Rector informed him of.

  He found John in the vestry not much bigger than an alcove. The bishop grimaced as he withdrew the bolts and heaved the rickety ancient timber door open, emitting a squeak on its rusted hinges to the rear side of the environing cemetery grounds. Then he beckoned Perkins to follow as he stepped outside.

  Emerging into the overcast day gloomier still in the shade of the church, Perkins was not only perplexed but now intrigued; no longer indulging the Rector’s delights.

  ‘Look down there,’ John Hayes said, pointing to the cobbled stairway that disappeared into the depths of the earth.

  It took a minute for Perkins’ brain to register what he was seeing. Amazed at the sight that he’d only seen partially beneath the kindling and assumed was an old well, Perkins couldn’t stop staring. ‘What is it… exactly?’

  ‘Salvation
,’ John said, grinning.

  Perkins let out a nervous laugh. ‘It’s a well though, isn’t it?’

  ‘It’s an old bunker. During World War One and Two, women, disabled and other members of the parish took shelter here when the bombs started dropping. When you went up to be with your sister earlier in the year, I saw that some of the kindling was rotting with damp and going to waste. I started gathering it up and put in the new log cabin.’ The log cabin was no bigger than a timber-slatted shed used to store the lawnmower and hedge-trimmer. Also, as the church no longer needed logs for an authentic hearth in the advent of radiators there wasn’t any use for them, lest there be a power cut.

  The bishop produced a long steel key from his coat pocket. It wasn’t anything like a modern key. On the contrary, this key was big and hefty, probably weighing a kilo or two.

  Somewhat dazed, Perkins followed on legs as light as feathers down the cobbled steps. The rough stone ensconced the curved stairway to a hardwood chamber door. The wide keyhole accommodated the hefty key and after a series of turns the lock clacked open and reverberated in the niche.

  Bishop John Hayes drove his shoulder into the sturdy door, which scraped and yielded only a few inches. He repeated this four more times until the door finally opened and allowed them to sidle into the Stygian interior. Perkins remained where he was, his eyes fruitlessly trying to see through the impenetrable darkness. The bishop entered and disappeared somewhere behind the door approximately four feet wide. Perkins felt the snakes writhing around his innards momentarily. Then the bishop poked his head around the frame and held up the torch. ‘It’s not much light and we’ll need to light the wall sconces, but with the door open we can go in and see enough.’

  Perkins shifted from one foot to the other, slightly bemused in the revealing of the Rector’s survival ingenuity he’d kept secret until now; it was as though Perkins had been introduced to another person altogether.

  He followed tentatively, reaching out with his fingertips to touch the wall so he didn’t become totally disorientated and kept his wide-eyed gaze on the yellow beam. The passage they walked down widened and resisted the claustrophobia had it been the same width as the cobbled stairway.

  John halted. He craned his head over his shoulder to look back at Perkins. ‘It goes for a few hundred yards to another door, which is unlocked but closed – easier to open than that door,’ he said, indicating the first door. ‘Then there’s this big bunker with stone pillars. It’s about the size of two tennis courts with concrete pillars and niches. Beyond that is another door.’

  Mesmerised by the information being absorbed by his overactive brain, Perkins said, ‘What’s behind that door?’

  The Rector smiled again. The broad, contentedness of the smile was unfamiliar as Perkins couldn’t recall the last time he’d seen the Rector this happy.

  ‘I worked it out and followed the gravel road leading back down the hill, but before you get there a footpath intersects across towards the other side of the cemetery. That path as you know leads to the rear of a single-storey stone-walled vicarage.’

  Perkins didn’t feel, never mind register, that his mouth had fallen open and rested on the hinges of his jaw. ‘My house!’ he gasped.

  *

  The reverend and the bishop spent the rest of the day cutting the grass in Perkins’ back yard and raking away turf, finally revealing beneath the layers of soil and dust a storm door. The rusted handles on each folding door were secured by two plastic ties.

  Perkins returned from his home with a scissors and severed the ties. Then, together with the bishop, they heaved the heavy, recalcitrant storm doors open where they slammed the back yard and coughed up two separate plumes of dust. When the dust cleared and Perkins removed his hand covering his nose and mouth the chasm below offered them access into another identical stone passage, presumably leading to the bunker. Seeing it from above with daylight conquering the darkness made it appear much more promising, Perkins thought.

  Breathing hard from exertion, both men exchanged glances and gave each other a wry smile.

  ‘Hope lives, my friend,’ John Hayes said. ‘Hope lives!’

  *

  As the sun went down and darkness invaded the sky the two men sat in Perkins’ kitchenette by the patio doors and faced the back yard, nursing cans of Coke. Both were now feeling the effects of their hard labour, but nonetheless satisfied with their achievement.

  ‘What’ll we do now?’ Perkins wanted to know.

  The Rector put down his Coke. ‘We can’t tell too many people about our sanctuary otherwise before we know it we’ll be the ones pushed out. It’ll just be me and my wife, Natalie, and her friend Sue. We’re gonna need provisions and plenty of clothing and bedding. We now have entrances and exits in case of emergency. We’ll also need to get more torches and batteries, as there’s no electric down there. I don’t have any idea how bad this part of the world is gonna be affected. We might still be wiped out if the asteroids don’t break-up upon entering the atmosphere. Whatever the case, we’ve got a chance of survival. Whether there’ll be anything left to live for is another thing altogether.’

  Perkins drained the last of his Coke, crushed it and launched it into the black rubbish bag where he kept all his other recyclable leftovers. ‘I just want to bring my sister and her baby. I just hope to God she gives birth before…’ he trailed off.

  John Hayes rested a reassuring hand on the reverend’s shoulder. ‘I know…,’ he said.

  Perkins blinked back the hot tears brimming in his eyes. The tranquillity beyond the patio glass doors revealing the back yard and cemetery beyond appeared so creepy and tranquil; at the same time it would be perfect for a director to shoot a horror film. The leaves whispered in the sycamores and oaks casting deep shadows across the straight and crooked headstones.

  ‘If I give you some money for food and water will you be all right if I went to stay with my sister for the birth?’

  The bishop patted Perkins’ shoulder tenderly. ‘Of course.’

  ‘I might not make it back,’ Perkins said, realising the peril he was putting himself in and not caring.

  ‘Don’t talk like that!’ The Rector stared at him with steely eyes. ‘PMA: positive mental attitude. You go and be by your sister’s side and then bring her and the little one here. You’re a survivor, Anthony. God knows you’ve survived more than most and could’ve easily ended up a bitter, sinister criminal taking his vengeance out on the world – but you didn’t. Remember that. You chose the righteous path.’

  Perkins nodded. However, he also remembered it wasn’t quite as easy as the Rector made out. For a short while, prior to being saved or finding Jesus, Perkins had resided in a crappy council flat in a tower block, smoking crack and drowning his sorrows with as much alcohol as he could afford. Then one day as he was on his way back to his apartment, drunk and staggering across the road, he spotted a young boy no older than twelve cycling down the steep hill alongside the traffic when a car in its haste trying to overtake misjudged and struck the rear tyre of the boy’s mountain bike. The youngster had fought fruitlessly although courageously to right himself and inadvertently steered into the three-lane road. Another car in the right-hand lane collided with the mountain bike and the boy was tossed through the air. Perkins blinked purposely when he saw a boy seemingly flying overhead and marvelled at the miracle. Then in his drunken stupor condition he understood that the boy wasn’t flying but falling. The boy hit the road in an unforgiving fashion; skull cracked concrete and concrete was unsurprisingly victorious. The traffic was travelling at too great a speed to stop. The car trailing the one that had knocked the boy from his saddle was racing down the steep road bearing down on the half-conscious boy who raised his head and saw how his life would end. That was when a force had seized him by the collar of his T-shirt and hurled him onto the grassy bank. A sickening thud that ought to have been the boy’s body being crumpled caused traffic to screech to a halt.

  Perkins recalle
d lying on the road, looking up at the clear night sky wondering how many beautiful stars winked at him. He felt no pain even when drivers and onlookers arrived at the crash site and gawked. They remarked at the bruising and swelling around his face and the two broken legs. Then he saw the youngster whose head was bleeding and scratched around the temple. The boy gently pushed past the phalanx of nosey-parkers and knelt down and took his numb hand and brought it to his cheek damp from the tears he’d shed and whispered a heartfelt “thank you”.

  Perkins had been carted into an ambulance and rushed off to Morriston Hospital shortly after. He never saw the boy whose life he saved. That was something he desired because it wasn’t just the boy’s life he saved that day but his own.

  ‘I’ll do my best,’ he choked.

  John Hayes sat in silence. He dreaded the visionary dream he’d had, knowing it was something more. A premonition, perhaps? And hoped it wasn’t an accurate account of events to befall his friend and colleague. If it was he didn’t know if Rev Perkins would find any courage left to survive. Most of all, John Hayes was afraid Anthony Perkins wouldn’t want to.

  12.

  NUMBER 2 AND NUMBER 3 kept in touch with Number 1 via brief phone calls. Number 1 was currently renting a single-bed room in a hotel not far from Nadine Moretz.

  In Central London as was the case in every city around the U.K. names of residents who were deemed in the higher classes, royalty or imperative for services required during the aftermath were being selected by the government.

  Number 3 sat in a light-blue KA across the street from the Benullo home and observed a black unmarked sedan roll to a halt alongside the kerb outside the house and a man dressed in a black suit slot two letters through the box.

  The night before last – 20 December 2006 – the men known as The Three had the same dream.