“I’m lucky then.”
“Yeah, I guess you is. I’m glad we friends, little man.”
“Me too, Vamps. I hope I can help you kill lots of demons.” With that, the kid finished peeing up the wall and trotted off to re-join his mother.
Vamps sighed as his own stream began. “That kid is gunna be some badass.”
From the other side of the petrol station, Mass yelled at the top of his lungs, making Vamps spill piss down his jeans. “Green Pot Noodle, baby! Oh, hell yes! You the man, Vamps!”
Vamps smiled and put his dick away.
Richard Honeywell
Richard stared out the window at the setting sun. From the high elevation of the Slough Echo's upper floor, he studied the city's ghosts. The nearby office blocks and car parks resembled scenes from a dull painting, grey and lifeless. Nothing moved.
But that didn’t mean nothing lived.
Skullface.
The abomination that butchered Richard’s wife—and Dillon’s mother—was still out there somewhere in the ruins. Maybe it was watching them right now—waiting, biding its time—preparing to finish what it started.
Along with Portsmouth, the Slough Echo was the only haven in the South. A detachment of soldiers arrived a week ago, with more on the way thanks to General Wickstaff. Everyone at the office had a rifle or gun, and the soldiers possessed grenades and tools for building defences. Barbed wire and sandbags cluttered the lower floors and stairwells. Soldiers kept watch day and night. Wickstaff wanted the Echo to continue the intelligence gathering started in the early days of the invasion.
Except that intelligence gathering had stopped now.
Three days ago, the newspaper’s emergency generator packed up. The main grid had been up and down for weeks, but gave up the ghost permanently a few days ago. Several power stations, such as Coryton in Essex, caught fire or exploded early on, but ironically, none of the nation's nuclear plants caused harm—they merely wound down quietly. This, and more, Richard knew because he had been a part of the news team for three weeks now. A part of a family he neither loved nor wanted, yet the family who kept him safe—kept Dillon safe.
But was this a life worth living?
No.
David appeared at Richard’s side with a cup of tea. His melted face glistened with tender healing flesh. He battled infection for a while, but finally seemed to be recuperating. A thin-lipped smile stretched his face as he passed over a second steaming mug. “Freshly heated by a military engineer’s blow torch. Drink up.”
Richard took it. “Thank you, David.”
“You're welcome. Anything out there tonight?”
“No, all’s quiet, as usual. They’re out there though. I can feel it.”
David swigged his tea. “Doesn’t make sense they would just forget about us. I’m not sure if they want to wipe out every last one of us, or if a few stragglers are insignificant enough to ignore.”
“What did you learn from Andras? Any idea what the demons want?”
“The key to winning this war is closing the gates. The demons, the angels, they all rely on them staying open. Corporal Martin thinks we should change our objective.”
Richard frowned. “To what?”
“Establishing a battle line. Most of the enemy has moved south through London towards the coast—most likely heading for Portsmouth. Martin thinks we can gain ourselves some breathing room if we fortify a wider area. He has men looking for iron scrap. It’s the only thing that keeps the buggers at bay.”
Richard turned his head and watched his son, Dillon. He played beside Alice at one of the computers. With the power off, they only pretended by tapping away at the keys, playing some imaginary videogame. Would there ever be places for a child to play again? There had to be more than this.
“I don’t think we have any chance,” said Richard, sipping his tea and allowing it to burn his mouth. “We're finished.”
David sighed. His ruined face made it impossible to decode his expression accurately. “You’ve been through a lot, Richard—losing your wife the way you did and having to care for your boy. I’ve witnessed you fading into yourself ever since you arrived here. You've forgotten how hard you fought to stay alive. If everyone did what you did, the demons wouldn't have a chance. Weeks ago, you said you had a plan. You said you were going to—”
Both men frowned as a high-pitched trilling filled the office behind them.
Richard wasn't sure, but he thought he heard banging too.
Corporal Martin leapt up from a desk and hurried across the room. “Sat phone. Must be Portsmouth.”
“Well answer it then, lad,” urged Carol, still the de facto leader of the group. She stood beside Aaron, the young lad who proved his bravery helping Richard during the early days of the invasion.
The soldiers in the room stood to attention as if whoever was calling might see them.
“Hopefully it’s good news,” said David to Richard. “Wouldn’t that be nice? The war is over chaps, come on down for fish supper.”
Richard grunted. He used to have a sense of humour, but hadn't smiled since he saw his wife's head reduced to pulp. There were no more reasons to laugh.
“So anyway,” said David, realising his joke had gone down like a lead helicopter. “That plan of yours?”
“I have no plan. My plan was to throw myself through the nearest gate, but then someone did it for me.”
“There’s a gate in South Downs, I hear. Directly between Portsmouth and us. If you would be so kind as to toss yourself through that one, we could all mosey on down to the coast in relative safety.”
Richard blinked. For a moment, he thought he sensed something—a vibration. More banging, perhaps. “What was that?”
“That was a joke, Richard. How would you ever reach the gate, anyway?”
“I’d wrap myself in iron.”
David chuckled, distorting his burnt face. “I suppose you could cover yourself in old pots and pans or something. It just might work.”
“It’s a stupid idea, but all the good ideas have failed us. We’re just existing here, David. All we’re doing is praying Portsmouth somehow obliterates an army ten times its size. There’s no point in us being here.”
“Where else would we go?”
“North. Some place secluded where we might eek out a few years of peace. I can’t stay here anymore with no hope, no… anything.”
There was a commotion at the back of the room.
Corporal Martin was gathering Alice to his side and thrusting the sat phone at her. What was going on? Who at Portsmouth would want to speak to Alice?
Richard sensed movement in the corner of his eye. Dillon smiled at him. “Alice is talking to her daddy.”
“What?”
“Alice’s daddy has come all the way from… um… her house.”
“Her daddy’s come from America?”
Dillon nodded.
“It’s true,” said Carol rushing over. She had aged five years in the last three weeks, but her wide grin now made her look like a giddy child. “Our little Alice still has a daddy.”
David chimed in. “How wonderful. Could it really be? Alice’s father made it all the way across the Atlantic to get to her? Oh, how I wish there were still news to report. This would make a wonderful human-interest piece.” He turned to Richard and put a hand on his shoulder. “There’s your hope, Richard. There’s your hope.”
Richard swallowed a lump in his throat as he watched Alice explode with excitement. Was it true? Had a Coast Guard Captain sailed the Atlantic to reach his daughter? Were people still walking through fire to protect their loved ones?
I have. I’ve faced monsters to keep Dillon alive.
If Alice’s father had survived such a journey, then perhaps David was right. Maybe there was hope.
Maybe it was still worth surviving.
The office windows shattered.
Richard gathered Dillon into his arms and shielded him. He turned and glanced at where
the windowpanes had been.
Andras stared back at him.
Now in his natural form, the angel rose three-stories. A squad of demons scurried behind him.
Skullface was there, staring up at the building like a dark sentinel.
Despite the obscene threat, Richard couldn’t help but glare right back at the beast.
The monster that took Jen from him.
One second later, all hell broke loose.
Guy Granger
“I need to get to her!” Guy screamed in Wickstaff’s face. To her credit, she didn’t blink. She did, however, look mortified.
“If the Slough Echo has been attacked,” she said. “We will just have to pray they pull through. I sent them a detachment weeks ago, and another is on its way. We can’t help them any more.”
“My daughter is with them. She’s in danger!”
Skip and Tosco hurried into the room attracted by the commotion. Skip asked what was wrong.
“Alice is alive,” said Guy, waving his hands madly and clenching his fists. “I spoke to her.”
“That’s wonderful,” said Tosco. “A miracle actually.”
Guy paced the room, a caged bear at the zoo. He wanted to claw at something. “She’s in danger, Lieutenant. The people she’s with were just attacked, right while I was talking to her. The line went dead.”
Tosco looked at Wickstaff. “Can we patch back through?”
“I tried. There’s no response.”
“Oh hell,” said Skip, and took Guy into his arms. Guy surprised himself by allowing the gesture. Madness still beckoned, but his breathing at least began to return to normal.
“I’ll keep trying to make contact,” said Wickstaff, folding her arms, but what Guy read in her tone scared him. This was not the only time the general had lost contact with a group of survivors. She thought Alice and the others were dead.
Like my son. Is Kyle really dead? It doesn't feel real?
If Alice is gone too, what is left?
“I need to know what happened,” said Guy, pulling away from Skip and pleading with Wickstaff. “Help me find out.”
Wickstaff perched on the edge of her desk and pinched the bridge of her nose. “I’m afraid I can’t. The enemy is amassing outside Portsmouth, and I intend to meet them on the battlefield in one massive assault designed to wipe them out en masse. I cannot afford to spare a single man. Do you understand? This might be our one and only chance of victory, and that must be my sole focus. I mourn for your daughter, Captain, and for the others at the Slough Echo—they are amongst the bravest people I know—but I mourn more for the future of the eighteen thousand people under my care here. I mourn that this time last year, Britain’s population numbered in the tens of millions, but now barely exists. The best you can do, Captain, is remain here and fight for humanity’s future.”
“You can’t win,” said Guy, hating himself for saying it. “You would need three times as many soldiers to have half-a-chance.”
Tosco wrinkled his nose at Guy and turned away in disgust. Skip seemed disappointed too.
Wickstaff, again to her credit, did not waver. She stared hard at Guy, waiting until he shifted awkwardly. “We lack manpower, certainly, but our forces have teeth, I assure you. There are over a hundred warships in that harbour, with enough firepower to flatten Hell itself. I have heavily armed choppers, two Tornado attack jets, and six Eurofighters launching from a French carrier. You might also have noticed a German submarine docked. It has eight warheads onboard that can decimate a square mile if deployed. Trust me, Captain, if the enemy continue grouping together the way they are, we will annihilate them.”
Guy couldn't deny it was impressive. The general might have enough hardware at her disposal to wage war, yet… “We’ve had firepower since the beginning, General—a hundred armies all over the globe wasn’t enough to stop the invasion.”
“It wasn’t an invasion. It was an ambush. Now humanity fights a guerrilla war, and guerrilla wars invariably go to the incumbent forces. But forget all that, because it’s mere window dressing. The reason I will win the battles ahead is that I have a secret weapon.”
Guy turned his back. “If you’re talking about nukes then—”
“I’m not talking about nuclear missiles, Guy!” The use of his first name made him turn back. Was it a lack of respect, or an attempt to be more intimate? Before he could figure out which, she went on. “What’s the point of winning if you spoil the prize? No, I will not launch a nuclear assault. My secret weapon will do no harm except to the enemy. It will allow us to close the gates.”
“You need to find someone dumb enough to jump through.”
Wickstaff rolled her eyes. “You can do it that way, yes, but getting close enough is a tough task. I have something that can close gates from five hundred yards away.”
Guy frowned. Skip and Tosco were paying close attention too.
Wickstaff moved from the corner of her desk. “Want me to show you?”
All three men said yes.
The general led them out of her office. Guy grew confused when she headed towards the barracks. Whatever weapon she had at her disposal, he'd not expected to find it housed in a place where people slept. Indeed, once inside the building, Guy saw families and civilians. No soldiers—or weapons—in sight.
“I house as many as I can in the barracks,” Wickstaff explained, “but the rest have to make do in the nearby townhouses. I pushed our defensive perimeter out as far as I could without spreading ourselves thin.”
“What are we doing in here, General? I don’t understand.”
Wickstaff had been forging ahead, but now she slowed so Guy could catch up. “Look, Captain, I would not usually be so accommodating to a Coast Guard with a relatively useless vessel.”
“The Hatchet is not useless,” muttered Skip at the back.
“But,” Wickstaff continued, “you all showed great bravery getting across the Atlantic, and it would be useful to have an American here with some authority. I have a few groups of your people scattered here and there, including a detachment of Marines who were over here on a training exercise. You could be most useful in taking charge of them.”
“I’m only interested in finding my daughter.”
“We shall see. Come this way.” She opened a door on her right and stepped aside so that the men could enter. Guy exchanged glances with Tosco and Skip, but decided there was nothing to fear, so he stepped inside. He found himself inside a dormitory with six beds separated via concrete dwarf-walls. Most of the beds looked in use, but the people inside huddled around only one of the berths.
A paunch-bellied stranger with a modest bald patch spotted them standing there and narrowed his eyes. Guy felt like an intruder, so he waved a hand and nodded. “Hello.”
The man grunted. “Who might you be?”
“This is Captain Guy Granger from the United States Coast Guard,” said Wickstaff. “He is here to speak with Rick.”
Guy frowned. Rick? Who the hell is Rick?
The man blocking their way shrugged. “You best come in then.”
The room's inhabitants were playing cards on top of a crisply made bed at the back. Two women sat side-by-side, one a decade older than the other who looked barely past her teens. The older woman had short brown hair, the younger long and blonde. There was another man here too. He stood to greet them, and when he smiled at Guy he looked familiar.
He also looked ill.
“Hi, I’m Rick. You wanted to speak with me?”
Guy looked at Wickstaff and raised an eyebrow. “I don't know. Do I?”
Wickstaff shook Rick's hand. “I was hoping you could give the Captain a demonstration. He needs a little convincing that we have a chance of winning here.”
“We have more than a chance,” said the irritable balding man. “Those bastards won’t know what’s hit them.”
“Look,” said Guy, tapping his foot. “What am I here for? In fact, screw it, just point me toward Slough. I will get
to my daughter on my own.”
Rick frowned. The corners of his eyes were cracked and peeling. “What is he talking about, General?”
“His daughter is at the Slough Echo. They were just attacked.”
“Then God help them,” said the balding man.
Rick nodded to Guy. “I’m not a military man, so may I call you Guy?”
Guy nodded.
“Thank you. I’m Rick, and this is my brother Keith. These gorgeous girls are Maddy and Diane. We are survivors of the original gate in Crapstone.”
Guy shrugged. “Not heard of it, sorry. I came from New York. My children were here on school vacation. My daughter might still be alive. I’m going to find her.”
“I’ll help you,” said Rick.
“You only just met me.”
“Yes,” said Wickstaff. “Rick, you’re needed here.”
Rick wiped at his nose, and Guy saw a hint of blood on the back of his hand. “I’m needed to help win this war, General. I’m not doing that playing cards. My place is out there. I can do some good by going north with Guy.”
Guy was tapping his foot faster. “What are you talking about? How can you help me find my daughter?”
Rick gave Guy a warm smile, then placed a hand on his shoulder.
Guy gasped, and reeled backwards, pawing at his eyes.
Tosco whipped out a gun and pointed it at Rick. “The fuck did you do to him?”
“Put that away, Lieutenant,” warned Wickstaff, “Before I make you eat it.”
Guy slumped forward, putting a hand out and clutching Tosco’s arm. “It’s okay, it’s... okay. Put the gun away.”
Tosco slipped the gun back inside its holster, but he remained tense and ready to pull it back out.
“What are you?” Guy aimed the question at Rick. What had he experienced? His entire body fizzed. “You... you're what?”
“I showed you Hell,” said Rick flatly. “I'm connected to it. Whatever higher power the angels draw upon, I have the same hook up.”
Skip backed towards the wall, his eyes wide. The old man looked frail. “You’re one of them?”
Hell on Earth Trilogy: The Complete Apocalyptic Saga Page 63
