Fighting Darkness: A Post-Apocalyptic EMP Thriller (Fighting to Survive Book 2)

by Alex Knightly

  A group of three men appeared in the yard. Josh blinked. He hadn’t seen the door open. He frowned. He didn’t know any of them. They left the yard and disappeared across the fields.

  Focus, he thought. Now.

  He had a long day ahead. The fear and discomfort would all have been for nothing if he faltered now.

  He shifted as much as he dared, trying to stretch his aching muscles while moving as little as possible. He had to be ready when his opportunity came.

  He wondered again if he had messed up. What if they never go anywhere alone?

  He waited. Another two men left the building. One of them was Miles. Josh held his breath and watched the man. It had taken him a moment or two to recognise him. Back in London, he’d always worn his hair slicked back and Josh had never seen him wearing anything besides one of his tailored suits. Now his hair was a mess and he was dressed in dirty chinos. He looked more like one of Harry Harman’s men than a wealthy banker.

  Even thinking about Harry Harman made Josh feel queasy.

  This isn’t hard. This is nothing compared to what we’ve already been through.

  There was no way he was ever going to reinvent radio, like Harry had wanted. Not with the resources he’d had available to him, anyway.

  This was a different story. He just needed to be patient, that was all.

  Focus, Josh. That’s five out of the house.

  He waited. Things went quiet. He wondered what they were doing. He wondered what Pete and the others were doing at the next house along. Had they finally relaxed and got on with everyday farming? He hoped so. Or, as seemed more likely, they were fussing and fretting about whether he’d pull this off.

  Josh flushed. Of course he’d pull this off.

  He had to.

  An hour or so passed and nobody emerged from the house. There wasn’t a sound from that direction. Josh began to think of alternatives. What if instead of waiting for Nigel, he went in there when everyone was out. He soon began to pick holes in that plan. For one thing, there might be people sleeping in there. And even if there weren’t, how the hell was he going to explain his presence when the others came back?

  He was so lost in this internal debate that he didn’t notice the door opening. Which it must have, because Nigel appeared in the yard.

  Josh’s heart hammered and his vision went all blurry. This was it. He waited, holding his breath; terrified he was going to jump the gun and mess this up.

  Nobody else came out.

  Josh reached for one of the stones he’d placed in front of him. To his dismay, it took him a few tries to lift it. His fingers were numb from the cold. That wasn’t good. That was something he hadn’t even thought of that could mess the plan up completely.

  He blinked. He had to clear his mind. That was what had gotten him to uni, gotten him a first, and made him incredibly good at his job: his focus. His ability to block everything else out.

  He flung the stone, aiming for the fence just in front of Nigel. He was facing in the right direction at least.

  Nigel looked up, startled.

  Josh plastered a goofy smile on his face and stepped out of the bushes.

  Nigel’s face was a picture. “What the hell are you doing here?” It had obviously taken him a moment or two to recognise Josh. Understandable, since he was covered in mud.

  Josh made sure he kept smiling, but inside he was panicking. Nigel was over on the other side of the fence shouting at him. If anyone else heard, this could all be ruined.

  “You’ll never guess what I found,” Josh said. He gestured for Nigel to come over, moving behind the little stand of trees as he did. It felt far more open back there than it had the previous evening.

  He shivered.

  When he glanced back, Nigel was over the fence and approaching him with an alarmed look on his face.

  “This better be good. What the hell are you doing here?”

  Josh shook his head. “Don’t ask. It’s been one hell of a journey.”

  Nigel tilted his head to one side, assessing this.

  He was a small man. Well, he was short. Unlike Harry Harman, though, he was bulky. Josh was pretty sure it was mostly fat and not muscle. He’d never seen Nigel in the company gym and he knew he lived close to a tube station that brought him almost directly to the office door. Added to that an endless appetite for pints and buffalo wings and he wasn’t in the best shape of his life.

  “What are you doing here?”

  Josh smiled. This was it. The gamble that couldn’t be avoided. “Brandon told me about it. Well, he gave me rough directions. It’s been a bloody nightmare finding this place from the motorway. How the hell was I to know which farmhouse on this stretch of road was the right one?”

  Nigel smiled and clapped him on the back. “Joshua, you daft git. It’s the seventeenth house on the left once you turn onto this road. I always suspected you couldn’t count.”

  Josh pretended to be embarrassed. “Is that what he told you? Or did you come up here with him?”

  “Nah,” Nigel said. “We followed. I’m surprised he told you to be honest. I thought it was VP and above.”

  Josh shrugged. “Maybe Miles told you lot not to say. Brandon let the cat out of the bag. Do you think Miles will be pissed off at him for telling me to come? To be honest, he just told me the nearest motorway exit, he didn’t offer me a lift or anything.”

  “Doubt he had room. The Land Rover we came up in was jammed. Cars are in short supply now.”

  “I know. I had to walk.”

  “Jesus, Josh. Alone? It must be crazy out there now. We left the morning after. Some client of Miles’s. Lives on the next street over.” Nigel rolled his eyes. “Well, he did before all this happened. Anyway, he told Miles this was something serious—far more than just a power cut. They came up with a plan. Miles had this place. Thankfully a whole lot of us had been round at his place in Belgravia for a party the night before when the power went and we’d stayed the night when we couldn’t call taxis. He said we might as well come along.”

  Josh’s mind raced to take this in. Was he screwed? If they’d all left together, there’d have been no opportunity for one of the others to have told him about this place.

  He needed to know more.

  But he couldn’t let on. “I’d say that living room didn’t smell pretty the next morning.”

  Nigel brayed with laughter. “You’re a funny fucker, Freeman. Underneath the surface. Don’t they have guest rooms where you’re from?”

  Josh thought he’d blown it, but Nigel’s face grew thoughtful. “I’ve always thought you were cutthroat, Josh, like you’d do anything to get ahead. Maybe now that’s going to stand to you even more.”

  “What do you mean?”

  “Have you had your head under a rock? All this. The power. Miles’s client told him it’s an EMP strike. A large scale attack, Freeman. You should have seen what Belgravia was like the morning after it happened. It was chaos.”

  Josh smiled. He was losing patience. He didn’t have time to stand here and listen to things he already knew. “Yeah, right. That’s what Brandon said.”

  Nigel frowned. “How’d he find you anyway? Miles gave us an hour to get home and get our shit together. Anyone who lived more than half an hour’s walk away was out of luck.” His expression grew serious. “Or they just came as they were. You live miles out, don’t you?”

  Josh shrugged. He’d always been vague and changed the subject whenever anyone asked where exactly he lived. Living at his mother’s house was only meant to be temporary until he got the money together to buy them someplace decent.

  He stared at Nigel, thinking hard. Where was it Brandon lived again? He couldn’t remember. No, wait. It was South Kensington. Definitely. “I was staying at a friend’s in South Ken. Bumped into him.”

  “Ah,” Nigel said frowning. “That’s lucky for you.”

  “I know,” Josh said. “Lucky.”

  Nigel stared at him. It was like they’d run ou
t of things to talk about. Before, they could always count on work: that was all any of them ever really wanted to talk about anyway.

  That didn’t matter. Josh knew everything he needed to know now. They had all left Miles’s house in Belgravia and separated before meeting up again. It was quite plausible that he’d met one of them that morning.

  Josh smiled. The plan was a good one after all.

  “Wait a minute,” Nigel said, backing away. “Brandon didn’t go home that morning. He was too hungover. There was no way I was ever going to get all the way back to St. John’s Wood in time, so he made a deal: I could take some of his things if I walked over to his flat and picked up enough for him as well.”

  Shit, Josh thought.

  “Yes, that’s right. I was livid because I thought they’d leave without me. I ran all the way back carrying two bags.” His eyes widened and he glared at Josh as if he’d just tried to mug him.

  Josh lunged at him, winding him with a knee to the stomach before Nigel even knew what hit him. He lunged for a rock he’d spotted earlier and slammed it as hard as he could onto Nigel’s head.

  “Sorry,” he whispered quietly.

  He meant it too. Nigel was okay for a banker, but he’d sensed something was wrong and Josh couldn’t risk him telling the truth or holding it over him.

  Dan

  Wednesday

  Three Days Later

  Dan was starting to lose hope. He’d been up on that hill for so many hours over the past few days. He’d seen people moving around but none of them had been Josh. Even worse, it looked as though they were headed for the river now. He could only imagine the mess they’d made down there: he hadn’t been down there since they smashed up his rods. He couldn’t bring himself to go there.

  “Well?” Max called from the shed as Dan passed by on his way back to the house.

  Dan shook his head. “Nothing.”

  The big man shrugged. “It’s still early days yet. Don’t fret.”

  “We just need some indication that he’s okay. That they didn’t hear Linda and immediately suspect him.”

  Max’s smile faltered. “Bad timing that.” He jerked his head towards the house. “I don’t mean to be unkind, but that woman has issues. I hope they’ve thought of a plan in case we don’t hear from him. They can’t just keep feeding her pills.”

  Dan sighed. “I don’t know what else we can do. We can’t risk her trying to go over there again. And we can’t lock her up like a prisoner.”

  Not that it hadn’t crossed his mind before.

  “We’ll think of something. With a bit of luck, Josh will come through and we’ll get word soon.”

  Dan sighed. “What are you working on now?”

  Max winked. “Top secret.”

  “Oh go on, tell me.” Dan stared at the bits of metal and piping. It was all stuff they’d used in the renovation that he’d shoved in the back of the shed and forgotten about. “It looks like…” he was going to say a mess, but held off.

  “You can say it,” Max said with a grin. “I’m not precious. Si worked for me for two years and she’s never been one to mince words.”

  Dan nodded.

  “You don’t much like her, do you?”

  “It’s not that.”

  “What she did. Running off.”

  “Yes,” Dan said quietly. “Dragging my wife off after her. I’m glad they found you and brought you back, but it was a big risk.”

  “I know. Well, look. That’s understandable. But just so you know, she’s a good kid.”

  Before Dan could think of a response, there was a commotion behind them. He turned around to see Pete racing down the hill with Si following closely behind him.

  Dan darted forward instinctively, afraid something had happened. Judging from the sound of metal falling on concrete behind him, Max had done the same.

  He reached the fence at the same time as Pete. “What is it? What happened?”

  It was only then that he realised Pete was smiling. “It’s him. We saw him.”

  “You did?” Dan said, shocked. “Where? Is he okay?”

  “Looked like it. He seemed free to walk around. He was walking outside with another bloke.”

  “Oh. Right. So we don’t know for sure.”

  “We will soon,” Pete said with a smile that was filled with pride. “He was hanging around one of the trees.”

  “We think he left a note,” Si said.

  The wait was excruciating. Si and Pete were of the opinion that they should go over there immediately.

  “It’s your land,” she said for what must have been the fiftieth time since they ran down the hill an hour earlier.

  “I want to wait until dark. I told you. Just in case someone’s watching from that house and puts two and two together.”

  They were all sitting around the kitchen table. Dan wasn’t going to make the same mistake again and allow someone to run off and possibly ruin everything. Everyone was staying together until dark.

  “But they won’t. Josh isn’t going to risk being caught with a note. He’ll have made sure it was safe. Why else would he wait so long?”

  “Maybe that’s true. I’d rather wait.”

  “What about the gunshots in the night,” Pete said. “It’s going to seem weirder if you creep around in the dark and risk getting shot than if you just walk past that tree in the daylight. It’s your land.”

  “So you’ve both said a hundred times.” He looked around the table, beyond exasperated. “What do the rest of you think?”

  Annie shrugged. “I’d rather just find out. The wait is killing me.”

  “Me too,” Terry said.

  Dan looked at Linda, but she just stared absently into space.

  “She’s still sedated,” Olivia said softly.

  “I know what we can do,” Annie said, sounding excited. “We can make it look like we’re collecting sap from the trees. I’ve been meaning to do that anyway. We need as varied a diet as possible.”

  Si’s lip curled in disgust. “What?”

  “It’s like slightly sweet water. Packed full of nutrients. Anyway.” She waved her hand. “I’ll go set up tubs at some other trees first and then go to the one where he may have left the note. One of you needs to come with me to show me which tree.”

  “I’ll go,” Pete said immediately.

  Dan stared at him, suddenly filled with apprehension. Pete was the one who’d told them about the possible note and now Pete was going with Annie? Something didn’t seem right about that. “I’ll come too,” he muttered.

  “No, it’s best to have as few of us as possible,” Annie said. “It’s going to look weird to them if we’re all out boring into trees. This way, I can burrow the hole and Pete can secure the tub around the tree to catch the sap.”

  Dan tried to swallow his misgivings. After all, airing them might do more harm than good. He obviously didn’t do a good job of it, though, because when he looked up Pete was watching him through narrowed eyes.

  “You think I’m trying to screw you over, don’t you?”

  “No… I…”

  “It’s obvious. I’m not an idiot.”

  Dan sighed. “Well you were the one who said you’d seen Josh leave a note. Then you volunteered to go with my wife to get it.”

  “Yeah,” Pete snapped. “Because Josh is my brother and I’m worried about him.”

  The table fell silent. Dan looked away, wishing he’d thought of that far more reasonable explanation before he’d allowed his paranoia to get the better of him. “I’m sorry,” he said. “I’m just struggling to get my head around all of this.”

  “I think we all are,” Annie said. “Come on, Pete. Let’s go grab what we’ll need and find out if he left anything.”

  Dan paced the house. He’d resisted the urge to go up the hill and watch them through binoculars. That would only make him crazy. He knew Annie. She was thorough enough to actually set up all the tubs before she came back, even if they did find someth
ing in the tree Josh was at. It was safer that way and he wasn’t complaining, but still, it felt like a long wait.

  “I wish they’d hurry up,” Si muttered. “No, I wish I’d gone with Annie before Pete piped up, because I could really do with getting out of this house.”

  “Let’s all just wait here until we know,” Clive said. “Everything hinges on this.”

  “Is pacing helping you?” Max asked, looking amused. “Because it’s stressing me out just watching you.”

  Dan shrugged. He didn’t know anymore. All he knew was he wanted Annie back. Soon. Before he went out of his mind worrying.

  More time passed. He didn’t know how much.

  It was getting dark now and he hoped they’d be able to find their way back without stepping in a hole and twisting an ankle.

  “I’ll make some tea,” Max said.

  Dan tried to force a smile but he didn’t want tea. He wanted to know if there was a note.

  And then—finally—when it felt like he was going to go mad, the door opened.

  “You’re back,” he hissed. “Thank goodness.”

  Annie smiled. “Of course. We just made sure to do lots of the trees just in case anyone was watching.”

  “And?”

  She held up a little square of paper.

  “Have you read it yet? What does it say?”

  “No, of course not,” she said, sitting down at the table. “I’m not going to open it up and read it within sight of that house, am I? Let’s look at it now.”