by Ryan Casey
Aiden looked at Dom standing right beside him, and he wanted to do it. He wanted to lift his gun and shoot him. He knew it would spell the end for him. He knew there would be no coming back.
And he understood why Richard’s people were doing what they were doing. Creating hope was an important part of sustaining a community. The schools, the education, things like that, they were all just a ruse, so people could work to maintain this place.
If they thought it meant they were going somewhere at the end of it… then they were more likely to contribute a little early on.
Before they were tossed away, gradually replaced by a new breed of worker ants.
“Anyway,” Dom said. “We should crack on. Don’t want anyone finding this mess, do we?”
Aiden looked back down at Lana’s body. He wanted to apologise to her. He wanted to tell her he hadn’t intended for Dom to kill her. That he’d wanted to reason with her. He wanted to give her a chance to run away.
But mostly he wanted to tell her that he was sorry for knowing what he knew and allowing her to get onto that helicopter anyway.
For allowing so many people to be discarded by this place.
But then he took a deep breath. Because he knew Dom was right. Emotional attachment was a problem in this place. It might not seem fair, but it was a part of the cruel reality. He just had to go along with it. Ride along its waves.
And if he didn’t like it, then… well. He could find somewhere else to live.
He didn’t fancy his chances.
“Come on,” Dom said. There was more humility to his voice now. “Let’s get her moved and buried or something. I know it’s shit, mate. I know it’s really damned shit sometimes. But… well, we warned them, didn’t we? We told them not to come back here. Right?”
Aiden looked into Dom’s eyes, and for a moment, he felt it closing in. He felt himself getting close to telling him what he really thought of him. To telling him to stuff it—stuff the lot.
But then he sighed, and he nodded.
He went to pick Lana’s body up.
That’s when he saw them.
The footsteps.
The little footsteps in the mud right by her side.
“What’s up?” Dom asked.
Aiden frowned. Looked around. Looked all over. “Something… something’s not right.”
Dom sighed. “What do you mean something’s not right? Hurry up here or people’ll start…”
He didn’t hear the rest of what Dom had to say.
He saw it.
It was only a glimmer. Just a glimmer in the moonlight.
But in the distance, over by the trees, he saw someone.
Someone running.
Someone running away from this place.
“Shit,” Aiden said.
He started to move in the direction of the woods, rifle in hand.
“Hey!” Dom shouted. “What the hell do you think you’re—”
“Someone saw us,” Aiden said.
Dom frowned. “What? What’re you on about?”
“They’re out there. Someone saw what we did. Someone… someone from…”
He looked around.
Saw the little boot print again.
And Aiden’s stomach sank.
“One of our own,” he said.
Dom looked at him with fear. With confusion. Like all of a sudden, the onus and the responsibility had been passed on to Aiden.
“What’re we supposed to do?” he asked.
Aiden looked down at Lana’s body.
Then at the little footprint.
And then thought he knew exactly who it was.
Then, he looked over at the woods, and at that little figure disappearing into the distance.
“We need to find her,” he said. “And we need to stop her. Before it’s too late.”
Chapter Fourteen
When the sun rose, Mike and Nina’s journey began.
It was early. The weather was fresh and crisp. Quite a cool day considering it was summer. Felt like one of those early autumn days, the dew on the ground, breath frosting in front of your face. Mike never used to be a fan of those autumn mornings. Too much of a winter-hater to have any kind of affinity with the season of glorified leaf death, basically.
But today felt different. Today felt fresh.
Today felt like the beginning of something.
Especially because he was in a car.
He looked outside the windows. Looked at the road ahead. It was lucky they were on a long, country lane. After all, driving was pretty much an impossibility in any inhabited location—and pretty difficult even in the locations where there weren’t many people. Cars that had broken down when the first EMP struck didn’t just disappear, after all.
It meant that every now and then, Nina would have to bring the car to a halt and manoeuvre her way around a tight squeeze. And it was those moments of slowness that made the tension build up inside Mike. Because he knew there would be people around. There would be pockets of survivors camping out in the woods. It kind of reminded him of the very early days when people were scrambling for the last of the supplies. Where you kind of felt like you were in a capture the flag video game simply for being in possession of something valuable.
And even in a world where travelling by foot was probably way more feasible… a working car was sure to attract plenty of attention.
“Don’t look so worried,” Nina said. She seemed remarkably calm and laid back for someone who had been on a helicopter to extraction only to be dumped in the wilderness. “I make this run all the time. There’s a big industrial facility out here. Bit of an untouched gem filled with lorries. And where there’s lorries, there’s petrol.”
Mike sighed. “I just… it’s hard not to think about my people out there. Or heading towards this extraction point. How long did you say this was going to take again?”
“It’ll take three hours by car, probably an hour back before the roads were clogged up, but we work with what we’ve got, right? Then I’ll drop you off a few miles from the extraction point and you can… well. At that point, you can do whatever the hell you bloody want. I just hope you realise what a shitter you’re on the verge of getting yourself into.”
Mike stared out of the window, stared out at the road ahead. “I know it might seem mad. But it’s just something I have to do. Kelsie. I can’t… I can’t let her get caught up in that place. I can’t let her think there’s hope and then lose it just like you did.”
“Kelsie your daughter or something?”
Mike thought about what Nina was asking. He wanted to say yes. It’d make things easier, make them less awkward to explain.
But in the end, he just took a deep breath and told the truth. “No. But it’s… complicated.”
“I know how it is,” Nina said. “The bonds you make with people in this world. They’re strong. The friendships you make. They were good in the old world. I mean, really good. You’d make friends with people who made you laugh and made you feel good about yourself. And there’s nothing wrong with that. But this… this is different. In this world, you make friends with people who can be straight with you. Who can look you in the eye and tell you when they think you’re making a shitty decision, because they know what’s good for you on a whole. And I have to tell you, Mike. Going to this extraction point is a shitty decision. Because once you’re in there, you aren’t getting out. Not without causing trouble.”
Mike sighed as he looked out of the window. “If I get caught up there with my people then fine. If we get put onto that helicopter… then fine, I guess. We can start again elsewhere. It’s what we’ve done before. We’ll do it again if we have to.”
Nina raised her eyebrows. “You’re making a big assumption there.”
“What’s that supposed to mean?”
“Well. Not to break my frigging ardent adherence to feminism, but men are better workers, physically. The stronger men, they’re the ones they keep around. And before you k
now it, you’re in their military gear, and then you’re working there as a guard, and then you’re in on the secret. Meanwhile… to maintain the image, it’s the women who are taken away. It’s the children who are taken away. Just a few. Just a select few. The ones who contribute the least. The weakest. Because that’s what this world is, at the end of the day.”
“Survival of the fittest,” Mike said.
“Like it’s always been.”
They drove further. And as they progressed down this long and sprawling road, Mike started to wonder whether he was making the right call. Just those natural doubts you get before any venture, really. Because what they had at the hospital was good. It was workable. It was a community built around shared values. And that was what they needed to strive towards. That was the kind of future of hope that should be championed. Not some pie in the sky fantasy about a “safe haven” behind the clouds.
It might be tough to accept that staying put was the best option. But it was the most realistic option. And realism kept people alive.
But then he thought about Ian, Gina, Arya, Alison, Kelsie… and he knew he only had one option.
“I’ll find them,” Mike said. “One way or another, I’ll find them. And then I’ll find a way. We all will.”
Nina half-smiled. “Well, Mike. It’s just a pity all guys aren’t like you. Most of them just run away with their dicks between their legs at the first sign of—”
She stopped.
Stopped right away.
Because there was a crash.
A crash out of nowhere.
And then…
The car stopped.
“Shit,” Nina said.
She tried to start up the car, but it was smoking. The engine wasn’t having any of it.
“Shit, shit, shit,” Nina said.
They sat there, sat together, alone on the road, car totally screwed.
“Well,” Nina said, opening the car door. “You really are a bad luck charm and a half. Looks like we’ll be getting our 10,000 steps for the day after all. Ready for a walk?”
Chapter Fifteen
When Alison woke up, she knew something was wrong.
She got up. Walked across the cool floor of the portacabin, over towards the door. She looked outside the blinds first. Looked out through the windows.
The extraction point was already bubbling with life. There were people everywhere. People looked like they were doing things—whether they were tending to crops or working away at construction, it was clear there was an order to this place. It was clear that everyone here was pulling in the same direction.
But something just didn’t feel right.
Alison went to the bathroom, took a cool shower, which was a weird thing in itself. It felt amazing, feeling fresh in a way that she hadn’t felt in a long time. But it still felt like the grime would take forever to wash away; that it would take more than just one shower to get the handprints this world had pressed against her away from her body.
She got out. Got dressed into clothes that she’d worn yesterday, which felt like they dirtied her right away. Then she finally walked over to the door, took a few deep breaths, steadied herself.
It was time to go out there. It was time to face the world.
She opened the door and stepped outside.
The fresh air hit her right away. Somewhere in the distance, the smell of meat cooking, which sent her taste buds into overdrive. It was easy to get caught up in the sensory attack of this place. Easy to get hypnotised by the many delights and distractions it offered.
But Alison wanted to know something, for certain.
Gina.
Kelsie.
Arya.
She wanted to be certain they were all okay.
So she took a deep breath and stepped out onto the walkway between the portacabins, towards where Gina was staying.
She knocked on Gina’s door. A few seconds of hesitation, a few seconds of pause. And then Gina emerged.
Her hair was scuffed up. Her eyes were bloodshot. She looked… distant.
“You okay?” Alison asked.
Gina yawned. “Didn’t sleep. Weird, isn’t it? Most comfortable bed I’ve laid on for a year and the worst night’s sleeps I’ve got in even longer.”
Alison nodded. She hadn’t had any issues getting to sleep herself, but she could see how the sudden change of surroundings and circumstances could make it hard to settle. “There’ll be plenty of time to catch up on sleep,” she said.
“How about you?” Gina asked.
Alison looked around. Looked down at Kelsie’s door. “Just making sure everyone’s okay.”
“Still not sure about this place?”
Alison turned around to Gina. Her question had caught her off guard. “What?”
Gina smiled. “Come on. It’d be madness if we just blindly trusted this place right from the off. And anyway. As good as this place feels… we have to keep our guard up. Never know when we might need it.”
Alison nodded. “Mmhm.”
But she was staring. Staring off into the distance somewhere. Looking at the guards. The armed guards.
One of them was looking right at her.
Uncertainty on his face.
And then the moment he clocked her looking back at him, he turned and walked away.
“It’ll take time to adjust,” Gina said. “Especially after what my mum said. The rumour she spread about this place. But we have to go off what we can see. And from what I can see… this place doesn’t seem like the kind of place that’s sending women off to be baby farms.”
Alison nodded. But she was miles away. Thinking about the weapons those guards carried. Thinking about the guns.
And she thought about it. Why did they need guns? Why did they carry them? Because it surely wasn’t the people in here they needed to worry about. It was the people outside. Right?
“Anyway,” Gina said. “Check on Kelsie. Can’t have her skiving school on her first day.”
Alison began to walk towards Kelsie’s room. And those thoughts spiralled around her mind again. Those uncertainties. But wasn’t Gina right? Uncertainty was bound to be natural. The main thing was that they were here. Things seemed good. The people seemed friendly. It seemed like they had the best interests of everyone at heart.
And surely Kelsie had a better chance of surviving here. Especially when it seemed like they had a decent stock of meds.
What was the alternative?
Try to survive out there, only to fall into disarray all over again?
That wasn’t an option. Not now they were here. Not now they’d sampled this life.
She reached Kelsie’s door and knocked.
The first bit of worry started to rise when Kelsie didn’t emerge. She had to dismiss it, though. Just sleepiness. That’s all it was.
But then when she knocked again, and Kelsie didn’t emerge, she knew something was wrong.
She tried the door, but it was locked. And then suddenly, tension built up. Her diabetes. She’d had some kind of attack. Fallen unconscious. Something terrible had happened.
She banged against the window. “Kelsie?”
Gina came running up, curious. “What’s happening?”
“She’s not answering. Kelsie!”
“I’m sure she’s just… wait, what the hell are you—”
Alison wasn’t in a mood for hesitating.
She’d already grabbed a brick from the side of the portacabin and slung it at the window.
It cracked. Smashed into pieces. And for a moment she worried. She worried about if she’d hit Kelsie. If she was just paranoid, and this was only making things worse.
But when she pulled away the loose shards of glass and lifted the blinds to one side, her fears were justified.
Kelsie wasn’t in bed.
She reached through the window. Unlocked the door from the inside. Then she rushed in. A few more people were here now, too. Wondering what the hell was going on. Some of them rolling
their eyes, no doubt growing concerned about their new neighbour.
But Alison didn’t care.
She searched the bedroom.
Then she searched the bathroom.
She searched the wardrobes, and then under the bed, and then the whole thing all over again.
And when she was sure, she walked back to the door, heart racing, tears building in her eyes.
“Alison?” Gina said.
“She’s gone,” Alison said. “Kelsie… Kelsie’s gone.”
Chapter Sixteen
Mike walked out of the woods and towards the residential area, and he couldn’t help smirking at the fact that things hadn’t gone totally to plan.
Well. That things hadn’t gone to plan at all.
It was afternoon. Time seemed to be speeding by rapidly. They’d been walking a good few hours already. The air had heated up, more warmth to things now.
Since stepping out of the woods, Mike couldn’t help feeling a little… well. On edge. His wound was being managed with painkillers. It was well covered up and bandaged. It was bad apparently, but the few days off his feet had done him a world of good.
He knew he wasn’t exactly in tip-top condition, but he was on his feet, and he was moving, which was something. But it was mostly that edginess that was getting to him. Because he was used to being surrounded by the countryside. He was used to being protected by the arms of the trees reaching over. He wasn’t used to being in this sort of environment. So open. So vulnerable.
Somewhere that was previously so populated.
The roads were filled with stranded cars. Some of the windows in the detached, new build houses were boarded up. Other houses looked as if they hadn’t been occupied in a long time. And in a way, Mike knew they hadn’t. The bulk of people who had lived in these houses would be gone by now, for sure.
He walked past a little children’s tricycle lying on its side in a garden, which had overgrown and was filled with weeds.