Into the Dark (Book 8): The Next World

by Casey, Ryan

  And then there were the fields of cows. The felled trees that had been cleared and were used for logs. The barns that they had built with those trees.

  And the wall around the hospital itself.

  Protecting them from the outside world. But something they didn’t have to think about all that much anymore. Because nobody who came here was a threat. The people who came here—provided they didn’t attempt to kill you—were usually won over by the place. They bought into it.

  And when they bought into it… they became a part of the wider system.

  The hospital itself was made of several smaller buildings. Some of them were there already, a part of the original design of this place. Others were smaller places they’d constructed over time.

  It gave the place a feel of a community—of a little village—rather than a hospital.

  It felt homely.

  Mike took a deep breath of that cool autumn air. In the distance, he could see the orange leaves at the tops of the trees. He thought about the world beyond it. The people out there. There were other groups. Some of them they worked with, too, exchanging food for other supplies. Helping each other out. United.

  Even the extraction point that Richard had been running two years ago had a very different purpose, now. It was by the coast, and there was a fishing boat. Fish were in abundance, so they were a part of the trade.

  All part of the system.

  All part of the ecosystem.

  The hydroelectricity was a life-changer. It wasn’t leaned on. But it meant they could heat water for hot showers, and other things that just added to the comfort, to the luxury.

  And make no mistake about it—one hot shower and you found it very hard to fall back into the routine of cold water washes all over again.

  He looked out into the distance, and he felt a smile stretch across his face. Because everything he cared about was here. Everything he worked for was here.

  He just wished Holly were here to enjoy it, too.

  To see the kind of beauty that could be born in a world of such chaos.

  A door opened behind him. When he looked around, Mike saw Alison appear. Arya was by her side, wagging her tail, then bumping her nose into Mike’s leg to be petted.

  Mike fussed Arya, ruffled her long, smooth fur. Then he smiled at Alison. Her cheeks glowing. Her eyes glistening. Still limping, just a little, from the deep wound she’d taken at Richard’s place two years ago.

  But she was still alive.

  She’d made it.

  “Staring off into the sunset like a walking cliché again?” she asked.

  Mike smirked and nodded. “You know me. A bundle of soppy stereotypes all rolled up into one.”

  She stopped right before him. Then she put her hands around his waist. “Come here, you.”

  She leaned in and kissed him. And as they kissed… it was awkward, initially, in the early days. Because he couldn’t find enough distance in intimacy not to get flashbacks to Caitlin. To the relationship they’d had. To the love he’d had for her.

  For how much he felt like he was betraying her with that sole kiss.

  Even if their relationship was hardly in a good place during Caitlin’s final days.

  But things had got better. A distance formed. And in time, he was allowed to fall for her. He was allowed to love her.

  And he did.

  He loved her.

  And he loved Kelsie.

  He loved Gina.

  He loved Arya.

  He loved his family.

  She pulled away, frowned. “What’re you smirking at?”

  Mike shook his head. “Just thinking how lucky I am.”

  “Oh yeah? Sure you’re not still just tittering to yourself about what happened to Harrison earlier?”

  Mike’s smile widened. “Okay. Maybe a little bit. But mostly luck.”

  She kissed him again. And as they stood there, Mike found himself looking off into the distance again.

  “How’re you feeling about tomorrow, anyway?”

  Mike frowned. “Oh. Well, that’s private. An election is a private matter, after all.”

  Alison tutted. “I mean there’s only one candidate really, isn’t there?”

  Mike thought about the work Vincent had done for this place. He’d got it on its feet. Led by example with humility and patience. Allowed people to come in here, to share what they had.

  And they’d had moments of difficulty. Moments they’d worked through. But nobody had contested Vincent when they’d decided this place would be a democracy just a couple of months after Mike’s arrival.

  The second year, there were a few competitors. And in a sense, Vincent wanted it. He allowed it. Encouraged it, even. He was so humble that he felt like he should have some kind of competition to keep him on his toes.

  He’d won by an absolute landslide.

  But that hadn’t stopped one candidate stepping up against him again this year.

  “I dunno,” Mike said. “Graham can be pretty convincing when he gets going.”

  “He’s a typical bitter old man,” Alison said.

  “Rumour has it he’s not even that old.”

  “He’s grey. So he’s old. Technically.”

  Mike rubbed his head. “Good job I’m still blessed with my dark locks of eternal youth, huh?”

  Alison carried on. “He likes what he’s got here, but he’s paranoid. Paranoid about the new people coming in. He doesn’t want expansion. He doesn’t want change. He just wants us to have what we’ve got right now. Typical little Englander.”

  “Or little hospital-er,” Mike said.

  “Doesn’t have quite the same ring, does it?”

  “Whatever the case,” Alison said. “He doesn’t stand a chance. Even if he does have a few old boys behind him.”

  Mike nodded. He didn’t even know why Alison was so concerned about it. Vincent was the only real candidate. There was no reason for them to even have an election beyond the maintenance of democracy.

  He was a leader for life. And the vast, vast majority were more than okay with that.

  “What would we do if we lost it all?” Alison said.

  Mike turned around. Looked at her. He wasn’t expecting that. “Where did that come from?”

  “Do you think we’d be able to make it? After we’ve got so used to this world? So used to its comforts?”

  Mike swallowed a lump in his throat. He didn’t like to think about the possibility of collapse all that often. But it was something they had to be in touch with. Something they had to be aware of.

  He wanted to tell Alison that he wasn’t sure he’d be able to make it if they lost it all. Because that was the truth.

  He wasn’t ready to lead again.

  And he certainly wasn’t ready to lose again. Not after everything he’d lost already.

  So he pushed the idea from his mind and squeezed Alison closer.

  “We’re not going to lose it all,” Mike said. “We’re not going to lose any of it. This is our home. This is where we live now. And nobody’s going to take it away from us. Nothing is going to take it away from us.”

  Mike didn’t hear the rumble of thunder in the distance or see the flash of lightning from afar.

  Chapter Four

  Kelsie stared at the clock ticking away above where her teacher was standing and didn’t even think about how lucky she was that she was looking at a clock at all.

  The day was dragging on, and she couldn’t wait to get home. She hated school. It was more interesting than school used to be, but it was still something she got bored by after a few hours.

  It wasn’t like the old school. Everything had more of a meaning. The things they learned were skills that they could use in the world they lived in now. They were learning how to build the new world so that they could teach their children how to expand this place when they were gone, and on and on like that.

  And sure. Kelsie and everyone else knew the truth about women over a certain age and how th
ey couldn’t have children anymore.

  But there was no pressure on them, like Calvin’s group had forced all that time ago. They could just do their own thing. No forcing it. No pressure. Just a normal life.

  Living in the present but being mindful about tomorrow.

  That’s what they learned. That’s what they were building towards.

  And that was true for Kelsie more than anyone. She had Type 1 diabetes, which was being managed at the hospital. But she knew supplies weren’t going to last forever. She knew that eventually, they were going to run out, and she just had to hope something had changed by the time that day came.

  But she couldn’t dwell on it. She could only take each day as it came.

  Live in the present.

  Mindful about tomorrow.

  Kelsie felt something hit her arm. When she looked around, she saw that a piece of paper had been thrown at her.

  In the distance, she could see Tom sitting there, with a few of the other cooler kids by his side.

  She unrolled the paper. Squinted at it, tried to get her head around it.

  Then she made the words out, and her stomach sank.

  WILL YOU GO OUT WITH ME? T

  She heard a snigger from the back of the class. When she looked up, she saw Tom looking right over at her.

  And she felt a little bit sick. Because as much as she liked him as a friend… she didn’t see him in that way.

  She found herself looking at Lucy, instead.

  Looking at the gap between her teeth. How perfect she was with her dark skin, her gorgeous brown eyes.

  And she found herself feeling things she couldn’t even understand.

  “Something bothering you, Kelsie?”

  She turned around. Mrs Dalglish was looking right at her.

  Looking right at the paper in her hands.

  “No,” she said, scrunching the paper back up. As she did, she looked back at Tom, too. “No. I don’t…”

  “Anyway,” Mrs Dalglish said, interrupting her. “Seeing as the bulk of you are glazing over, I’d say we’ll call it a day on maths for now, huh?”

  It didn’t take much for the kids to jump up at that. And Kelsie jumped up, too. Because she didn’t want to get caught up with Tom. She didn’t want to have to explain herself. Not again.

  She stood up and made a break for the door.

  She hadn’t made it far when Tom appeared by her side.

  “Where you running off to?”

  Kelsie felt awkward around Tom right away. He was her friend, but he was getting too extreme with this whole fancying her thing. And it didn’t leave her feeling good. It left her feeling uncomfortable. “I just want some time alone.”

  “Me and the boys are going out tonight. Smoking shelter. Found some old tobacco in one of the teacher’s desks. You can come with us if you want?”

  Kelsie wanted to say yes. She wanted to say that she’d do that. That she was capable of doing normal kid things.

  But at the same time… she felt something else pulling her back.

  A rival pull telling her she couldn’t. That she wasn’t capable.

  Because it was just too much of a lie.

  “I’m okay,” she said. “Really.”

  Tom sighed. “Sure. That’s… I guess that’s okay. But I wish we hung out like we used to. Is it something I’ve done?”

  Kelsie didn’t want to lie to Tom. But at the same time, the way he’d said those words gave her an opportunity. An excuse. “I’m just not interested in you in that way,” she said.

  Tom blushed, then. His red face and his ginger hair were bright and alarming.

  He cleared his throat, then looked away. “Oh. Well that’s… that’s okay. I mean, we can still just be friends. Right?”

  She looked at him, and she wanted to tell him how sorry she was. How it wasn’t anything he’d done or said at all. It was just the way she was. Just the way she felt.

  But then she heard a cough right in front of her and saw someone standing there.

  When she looked around, she saw it was Graham.

  Graham was tall, slim, with grey hair and piercing green eyes. He always smelled a bit like old people, but according to Gina he wasn’t as old as he looked.

  He smiled at Kelsie with those yellow teeth. “Hello, kids. I wondered if you’d let me speak to you a moment about the changes I’d make to education here if I’m elected leader tomorrow?”

  Kelsie didn’t want to hear it. She knew Graham was just a troublemaker. He had no chance of winning the election.

  But she’d always been told to act polite. So she smiled and walked past him. “I’m sorry but I really have to—”

  He put a hand on her shoulder, then. Quite heavy. Quite forcefully. And she could see the look on his face. That smile was faltering. A new look about him.

  A meanness.

  “The least you can do is just listen to me.”

  She felt herself falling into survival mode, then. Flashing back to the time she’d been out on the road. The times she’d been cornered. Surrounded.

  She found herself flashing back, and despite all her re-education, despite all her conditioning… she punched Graham.

  In the balls.

  Hard.

  He winced. Gasped. A few people around did the same, looking at Kelsie like she’d just committed some kind of mortal sin.

  She looked back up at Graham, blushing, trying to keep her cool, keep her composure. People around her were sniggering.

  And he just looked at her with hateful eyes.

  The kind of eyes that scared her.

  “Big mistake, kid,” he said. “Big, big mistake.” And then he took a few breaths, forced that smile on his face. “This says all that needs to be said about the current level of discipline in these walls.”

  He ruffled her hair as he walked past; hair that was shorter now, in honour of Holly.

  “Have an excellent day,” he said before walking off.

  He scuttled off into the distance. And Kelsie still felt like she was lost. Still felt like she was in a trance.

  It was only when she heard Tom’s voice that she zoned back into the present moment.

  “Shit,” he said.

  She looked around.

  And when she looked, she saw he was smiling.

  “That was awesome,” he said. “You really showed him!”

  Kelsie looked back. Saw Graham disappearing through the crowd.

  And she wondered for just a second… what if? What if he won? What if he was elected? What would he do to punish her for that moment?

  She shook her head, forced a smile.

  That was never going to happen.

  He was never going to be elected.

  She had nothing to worry about.

  Right?

  Chapter Five

  Later that night, Mike sat in the local bar with those closest to him and tried to forget everything about that looming election on the horizon.

  It was dark and chilly outside. A breeze was blowing right through the thin walls of this place, which had been constructed rather hastily compared to a lot of the other locations here. There had been some arguments to have a “recreation area” within the hospital, but it was a good idea to separate these things. A place to come to at the end of the day and chill out.

  It helped that they had a shitload of booze.

  The beer was home-brew stuff. They’d managed to cultivate the right kind of grains that were required over time and go back to a proper way of doing things, an authentic way.

  And sure. It wasn’t exactly as smooth as a nice Wainwrights on a winter’s day. It wasn’t as refreshing as an icy cider in the summer heat. It could even be argued that it was a waste of resources.

  But hell, recreation was important. And besides. It was surprisingly good.

  Most of the time.

  Mike sipped back on his beer as he sat at the little wooden table. Alison was by his side. Also on their table, Gina, Harrison, and Sarah, the
woman who Nina had insisted on Mike saving a couple of years back. Sarah was an interesting character. Long blonde hair, clumsy as anything. Somewhat… well. Cold, in a sense. Distant. Never really revealed her true colours.

  Sometimes Mike wondered about her. It was a surprise on the surface that she’d made it this far, as ditzy blonde as the cliché—as much as he loathed to resort to stereotypes.

  But when it came to it, she was tough. Really tough.

  She’d done a lot of work helping this place get to where it was.

  She had all of Mike’s respect.

  By her side was Romesh. He’d been here long before all of them. He was a former surgeon at this place, fresh out of medical school. He had a long black beard, a slight hair lip. He was as chilled as they came. Always seeking the peace whenever a conflict erupted. Always keen to avoid arguments from spiralling out of control, even if they were just in jest.

  Him and Sarah, as “unofficial” as they were, had been sharing a room together for the past year and a half.

  Probably about time they made things official.

  Mike couldn’t pretend to understand where the fireworks had sparked between them. He didn’t really see it himself.

  But each to their own.

  Everyone had their own ways, at the end of the day.

  “So you’re saying it actually full on bit you?” Gina said.

  Harrison’s cheeks flushed as he glared over at Mike, clearly grateful to be reminded of his incident earlier. “Yeah. Thanks for bringing that up again. It really wasn’t as dramatic as he makes out.”

  Mike smiled as he swigged back some beer. “Not as dramatic? No. Sure. I mean, the scream you made—”

  “I didn’t scream.”

  Laughter all round.

  “No. Sure. That wasn’t a scream. It was the horse that made that noise, right?”

  “I told you already,” Harrison said, clearly getting wound up at all this banter at his expense. “I have an—an irrational fear of horses.”

  “And you don’t stutter when you’re nervous. Not at all.”

  “I d—d—don’t!”

  Everyone laughed, then. Even Harrison joined in. The beauty was, nights like this weren’t rare. They’d been pretty regular for the last two years.