by Ryan Casey
“I love you,” she said. “If this—if this doesn’t work out. I love you.”
Martin nodded back at her. A lump swelling in his throat. “I love you too, Ella bear.”
He held her hand tighter. Looked down at Bruce, who he knew—or at least hoped—would follow.
And then he climbed onto the edge of the balcony.
“On three. Okay?”
Ella nodded. “Okay.”
He took a deep breath of that cool air.
Looked down into the abyss below.
“One. Two. Th—”
And then he heard a crack, and the balcony went tumbling from beneath his feet, and he went falling into the darkness.
Chapter Fourteen
Harriet rushed over and covered Oscar’s mouth before his screams got any louder.
She stood there in Peter’s kitchen. As much as she wanted to get out of this room, as much as she wanted to get away from the horrors of what was staring back at her, she just couldn’t turn herself away.
Peter lying there on the white-tiled kitchen floor.
Blood spurting out of his neck.
Every now and then, a twitch of his body, and then stillness.
Oscar cried underneath her grip. And she felt so bad for him. He didn’t understand this. He wouldn’t understand this level of violence, why she’d done what she’d had to do.
He wouldn’t even understand how deeply Peter deserved it, because he was just a kid, and a trusting, compassionate, loving kid at that.
And he was sensitive, too. He’d once walked in on Harriet watching a horror movie and cried for weeks at night after seeing nothing more than a bit of blood.
This would scar him.
But shit. At least they were still here. At least they were still alive.
And at least they had a chance to make things right.
“It’s okay,” Harriet whispered, her voice shaky. “He—he was a bad man. But we’re going to be okay. I swear to you.”
She moved her hand away from Oscar’s mouth just slightly as his cries quietened. At that moment, she saw the potential advantage of a cry. At least whoever was outside would think that Peter was the cause of the cry. They were right, just not in the way they perhaps expected.
“But why, Mummy? Why?”
She held him close, and she wanted to answer him. Staring at that bloody mess on the floor. The smell of it in the air. The taste of copper on her lips.
But all she could do was try her best to reassure him.
“Remember what Mummy told you about the dragon? About—about the monsters? About how the king wasn’t who he said he was?”
Oscar’s little face twitched. “So—so Peter was the dragon? But he—he was nice to me. He gave me Mars bars.”
“I know, sweetie. I’m sorry. I’m so sorry. We’re going to be okay, love. I promise.”
She stared at Peter’s body, and she found herself caught in a fork in the road then. On the one hand, she wanted to try and explain her way out of this. Or use this to her advantage. She wanted to stay here and live in a community where the people didn’t fear Peter anymore.
But on the other hand, she knew she was through a trapdoor there was no turning back on. Peter had allies. There were others like him. Owen, in particular. She wasn’t going to have much luck explaining herself to him.
She’d dug this hole for herself and Oscar. Whether it was the right thing or not, it was what it was.
There was no turning back.
There was only one way to go now.
As scary a thought as it was.
As harrowing a reality as it was.
She knew exactly what needed to be done.
“We’re going to go away from here for a little while,” she said.
Oscar looked up at her, confusion in his eyes. “But—but you said it was dangerous out there. That there were monsters, and they’d get us.”
Harriet sighed. She had told Oscar that much, mostly just to deter him ever trying to leave her sight. She could see how it could backfire now. But she’d never envisaged having to leave this place. Maybe that was short-term thinking, she wasn’t sure.
It was just one of the hurdles she’d have to face up to, going forward.
“I know I said there were monsters out there. And—and there are bad people out there. And that’s why you’ll have to stay close to me. Very close to me. Never leave my sight. But fighting them will make us stronger. Like the story, remember? We’ll be okay, you and me. Mummy and you are always okay, aren’t we? Because what are we?”
Oscar tried to turn around to look at Peter’s twitching body again, but Harriet stopped him.
“Hey. What are we?”
He looked up into her eyes, tears streaming down his cheeks, and he smiled up at her. “Superheroes.”
“Yes. We’re superheroes.”
She glanced back at Peter’s body one final time. Tasted vomit, burning its way towards her mouth.
She closed her eyes. Breathed deeply, right into her belly.
You’ve got this. You’ve got it under control.
And then she opened her eyes and shifted herself right back into the moment.
“Come on. We’ve got to get out of here.”
She walked towards the kitchen door, first. But then she stopped. She could hear voices out there. Commotion in the street. It was too risky, going that way. It’d draw too much attention towards her—especially covered in blood.
There had to be something else.
She looked back into the kitchen, over the pool of blood, over Peter’s body, and she saw the rear door.
She didn’t know what was behind there. A yard like the other terraced houses down here. A dirt track behind it leading towards woodland and a golf course, as far as she remembered. But not one that was particularly well-manned or anything. Kids sometimes played down there. Every now and then, one of the old officers would go down there, make sure nothing was going down.
And it never was.
Because that’s the sort of place this used to be.
She knew it was a risk. She knew it was a gamble. And the idea of climbing back over Peter’s body filled her with nausea and fear.
But at the end of the day, it was the only choice she had.
“Come on, superhero. Close your eyes. Keep them tight shut. See if you can use... use your sense of smell and hearing or whatever to get you across the lava pit.”
She tried to make it sound like a game. That was one way of helping Oscar through this.
And he had to get through this. She knew he’d struggle with nightmares. She knew he’d struggle with tantrums. She knew they’d both struggle on the road.
But they had to take this step by step. One step at a time.
She tightened her grip around Oscar’s hand and eased him across the kitchen. The closer she got to Peter’s body, the more her heart pounded. She had visions of him sparking back to life. Reaching out his hand and grabbing her ankle, blood trickling from the corners of his mouth as he stared up at her with those hateful eyes.
But she kept her composure. Just kept walking. Step by step.
She kept on going until she was right beside him. The squelching of the blood on her shoes. The kitchen door getting so close. So close to reaching that handle. So close to getting out of this place.
She passed by Peter’s body. The kitchen door handle so close now. Her heart raced. Her stomach lurched. She wanted air. Needed air. She felt like she was drowning here. Like she was suffocating, slowly, painfully.
She reached that kitchen handle with a final burst of energy. Grabbed the handle. Went to twist it, lower it, open that door. Freedom so close. An escape, so close.
She almost allowed a smile to creep against the corners of her mouth as she stood there, so close to escape.
But then she heard something.
Something that filled her with fear.
The front door opened.
“Peter? Where you at?”
Someone stepped inside.
Someone was in here.
Chapter Fifteen
Martin plummeted towards the ground and braced himself for impact.
He squeezed his eyes shut. Felt the flames nicking his back. He heard barking. Shouting. Screaming.
But all the way down this fall, he held on to Ella’s hand.
Squeezed it so tight.
He never wanted to let her go.
He never wanted to lose his grip on her.
He braced himself for the collision with the ground when he felt a smack.
His body crashed against the ground. He tasted blood, his teeth sinking into his bottom lip. He coughed up smoke and dusty debris, which wedged into his eyes, and his ears rang, unable to hear a thing at all.
But he noticed something, as he lay there on the ground, in the rubble.
He was alive.
He wasn’t burning.
He was still here.
His attention immediately turned to Ella. He couldn’t hear her coughing, but then he couldn’t hear anything, so he couldn’t let that affect him too much.
He turned onto his side, a little sore, but considering he’d just fallen with a crumbling building, he could’ve felt worse.
He saw Ella by his side.
She was on her knees. Bleeding from her forehead. Coughing up thick, yellow phlegm.
“Ella,” he muttered, his ears ringing, his sense of hearing only just about returning.
He put a hand on her back. Patted it. Helped her cough up whatever was in her lungs.
He scanned her for serious wounds right away. Burns. Breaks. That sort of thing.
But she seemed okay.
Battered. Bruised. Coughing her guts up. But okay.
And then he turned to his side, and he saw something else.
Or rather, something missing.
Bruce.
Bruce was nowhere to be seen.
He looked around, through the smoke, the ash, the dust. Saw the flames crawling across the remains of the log cabin. All those memories. All those happy memories. All of them reduced to dust.
He stumbled back towards the cabin. “Bruce!”
But there was nothing of Bruce.
He walked over to the remains of the cabin. Heard glass crack underfoot. Glass from the old television. He saw books Sarah had read, crisp at the pages. All of these memories. All of them right before him. All of them, gone.
And then there was Bruce.
He’d been sceptical of Bruce at first. Never thought he was all that good with animals. But Bruce had become one of the family.
Ella loved him, and he loved Ella. He was good for both of them.
The lack of him here right now worried Martin. A lot.
He looked back at Ella. Saw her coughing on her knees. He dreaded having to break the news to her. Dreaded having to tell her Bruce was gone. That it was just the pair of them again. The pair of them, and the road ahead.
Because there was a journey ahead of them now. There was a journey to find somewhere new. Somewhere safer.
And after this place had fallen apart, all their supplies inside, even his damned rifle... a journey to find methods of surviving, all over again.
It was a new start.
A terrifying new start, but one they were being forced into.
He walked over to Ella’s side. Lump in his throat. Looked down at her. Put a hand on her shoulder. Prepared to break the news.
“Ella,” he said.
She looked up at him. Looked up with bloodshot eyes like she knew what he was going to say already.
Then somewhere in the distance, somewhere just out of the comfort of his hearing, he heard a barking.
He looked up. Into the smoke.
Bruce came running through the smoke, barking. Wagging his tail.
Alive.
“Bruce!”
Martin staggered over towards him. Ella jumped up, too, like just seeing him sparked her out of her struggle.
They both reached Bruce’s side. Fussed him. Martin checked him for burns. For injuries. All this seemed too good to be true. Part of him wondered whether he was dreaming.
But no. This was real. This was very real.
And he had to be grateful.
In all the chaos, in all the destruction, he had to feel some gratitude.
He stood there by Ella’s side. By Bruce’s side. He heard Ella crying, but he knew it was just adrenaline. He knew it was just relief.
And as much as the future scared him—terrified him, even—he had to appreciate this moment.
His family was still here. They were still alive.
He had a second chance.
He looked back at the cabin. Looked at the flames. He looked at his Land Rover parked in front of it. Looked at the trees beyond it, hard to see in that smoke.
He looked at it all, and as much as he tried to fight it, as much as he tried to resist it, he knew he had to accept it. Face it.
He had to find new shelter.
He had to find a new home.
He had to go out into this dangerous world and face whatever it threw at him, Ella and Bruce by his side.
After a while of sitting there, warmed by the heat of the flames but shaking with adrenaline, Ella came over to him. Sat beside him. Rested her head on his shoulder.
She was quiet for a while.
And then she said the words he’d been waiting for.
“What do we do now?”
He looked back at her.
Put an arm around her.
Felt the warmth of her body shaking beside his, as Bruce settled at their feet.
“We start surviving. All over again.”
Chapter Sixteen
Ally looked back at the burning remains of the cabin in the distance and felt a knot in his stomach.
It was dark. The middle of the night. The raid of the cabin had gone wrong. Very damned wrong.
And Chris just kept on reminding him about it.
Kept on going on about it.
Again. And again. And again.
And it was growing frustrating.
It was winding Ally right up.
To the point he felt like he was close to losing his grip entirely...
“Trev didn’t have to die in there,” Chris kept saying. “It didn’t have to happen like that.”
Ally rolled his eyes, rubbed a hand against his face. He was tired of arguing with Chris. Tired of telling him that it was an accident. It was a mistake.
“Just leave it out, Chris,” Paul said. Paul was a decent guy. One of Ally’s most trusted allies. He was one of the few who actually spoke up for him. Franco kept himself to himself. And it was always hard to figure out where Sajid and Mark stood.
But Ally could always rely on Paul to have his back. To cover him. To believe in him.
That’s what friends were for.
“No,” Chris said, shaking his head. “I won’t leave it out. We went rushing in there when we shouldn’t have. We ended up getting caught up in something we weren’t prepared to deal with. And you want me to just leave it out?”
“Trev died defending our people.”
“Trev didn’t have to die at all,” Chris barked.
Ally stood there. Looked Chris in the eye. And not for the first time, he found himself wondering whether he could do something awful to him. Wondering whether he had it in him to take Chris out. To put him in his place.
But then he thought how that would look to his people, and he knew he needed a change of tactic.
“There’s only one person who killed Trev. That’s that over-protective scumbag from the cabin. But we’ve dealt with him now.”
Chris shook his head. “That’s beyond the point, Ally. The point is... we went there because we wanted supplies. We wanted shelter. We left with neither. And we left a man down. How much longer is this gonna go on, mate? How much longer can we keep dancing around from place to place and hope for things to somehow change when we keep doi
ng the same thing ourselves?”
Silence hung in the night air. Chris stared back at Ally. And Ally stared at him. Hunting rifle in hand.
And he thought about just lifting that gun. Just shutting Chris up, once and for all.
Because he was trouble.
He was problematic.
But he had to keep his composure.
He had to keep his cool.
“We’ll find a home. We’ll find somewhere good. Somewhere we can all survive. But until we do... we’ll have to do whatever we have to do. And I’m not afraid to admit that. I’m not afraid to accept that. Because it’s doing the difficult things that’s going to keep us going.”
He looked at Chris, then. Looked right into his eyes.
“We’ll find somewhere, Chris. And all the sacrifice will be worth it in the end. But until we do... we know what we have to do. We know what we have to keep on doing. And I won’t be ashamed of that. I won’t hide from that.”
Chris opened his mouth. He went to say something.
But then he closed it. Shook his head.
“I just hope you’re right,” he said.
They sat there together in the darkness. Ally looked over at those burning remains of the cabin in the distance. Thought about the man trapped in there. That barking dog. And that shouting girl.
He’d made them pay.
And he’d make anyone who stepped in his way pay.
No matter what it took.
“Now come on,” he said. “We’d better get moving. We’ve got a long road ahead.”
He saw Chris looking at him from the corner of his eye.
For a moment, he swore he saw hate. He swore he saw venom.
But he kept his rifle lowered.
He’d deal with Chris if he had to.
Just like he’d deal with everybody.
He took a deep breath and walked away from the sight of the flames.
He didn’t see the movement around those flames, in the rubble of the cabin, in the darkness of the night.
Chapter Seventeen
Harriet heard the footsteps creeping through the living room, and she knew she needed to get out of this house. Fast.