Finn raised an eyebrow. “Clive confronted the guy?”
His ma almost smiled, but the sadness was too quick and snuffed it out. “Aye, he did, bless him. He came back with more than a black eye. Took three months for his wrist to heal. Even now, I see it pains him. We didn’t see Marie for weeks after that. The brute kept her from us.”
“Who is he?” Finn growled. “I’ll wring his bloody neck.”
“I know you will, Finley. That’s why I’m telling you. We may have been parted by your father's hate, but you've been brought back by your mother's love. Never have I made you unwelcome here. You have always been free to call this your home. Now ye have, just in time. You're my boy and I love you. Being here now, at the end, is what counts. Taking care of your family now is what counts. You look just like him, you know? But your eyes are much softer.”
Finn knew he looked like his father—chestnut hair atop an ordinary face—but his blue eyes were his ma’s. He took a moment to think things through. His ma had always been so against violence. When his father had been murdered by a British paratrooper during a standoff at a burned-out factory, she had begged Finn not to take up his mantle, but at thirteen years old a boy needed his daddy. Having him taken away by a foreign invader filled Finn with a rage that had only grown with age. Yet, here Ma was now, seeking vengeance?
“Are you saying that Marie’s boyfriend did this? It was him who killed her?”
His ma shrugged her shoulders and folded her arms. For a moment, she was once again the strong, no-nonsense Catholic woman he remembered from his youth. “Don’t have no proof, but if one day you see a cat eyeing up a mouse and then the next day ye have a dead mouse, it don’t make much sense to blame the dog. You know I don’t like killing, Finley, but it doesn’t cost so much these days. I don’t want to meet my end knowing that monster is still out there.”
“His name?”
“Dominic Cassell.”
Finn leaned in and gave his mother a hug. He didn't let go for a long time. Perhaps his ma's embrace might have saved him from the hatred, if only he'd allowed it more often as a younger man. “I’ll take care of it, Ma. If I’m not back when…”
“I know,” she said, cutting him off. “I love you, Finley. I’ll see you in the next life.”
Finley ground his teeth, nodded, then left the kitchen in silence.
“Everything okay?” asked Clive when Finn re-entered the living room. He still rubbed at his wrist and was wincing.
“Sorry I hurt you, little brother. I never meant to.”
Clive nodded. He didn’t hold grudges—never had. They fought every Christmas about something or other, and sometimes a year would go by before they saw each other again. Nonetheless, Clive always welcomed Finn back with open arms.
“I wish I had been here more. I always thought there would be time. You were right, I should have made better decisions, but I can't change what I am.” Finn pulled his brother into an awkward hug and patted him on the back. Then he turned and knelt down beside Marie. Beneath the blanket, he knew her face was a beaten mess. Her skull looked as though a horse had trampled on it, and one eye socket was so badly crushed that her left eye popped out a full inch. Even with all he'd seen, Finn had been so horrified that he'd not looked beneath the blanket since the day they had covered her.
“I’m sorry I hurt you too, little sis. I wasn't here, but I am now. Your big brother is here to look after you.”
Finn stood up and left the house without saying another word.
Fuel
Finn didn’t know the streets, for he’d only arrived in London three days ago. When the tar reached the north-western coast of his native Northern Ireland, he had decided to extend his existence by travelling to see his family in the UK. Getting hold of a boat had been dirty business, but there was no other way to cross the sea, so he had taken a yacht from a rich couple and made the journey. He'd found London to be the exact same dirty mess that Belfast had been, and since the earth descended into panic, every street corner played host to the dead and dying—the mugged and murdered. Every alleyway was a death sentence to those who walked it. It was hell on earth.
Finn knew roughly where to find the Hobby Horse. It sat in an area that would have been labelled “rough” back when areas were still good and bad. He couldn’t believe his little sister had hung around such a place.
Do I really know anything about her at all?
Finn remembered Marie's laugh—remembered the way her cheeks blushed bright red whenever she giggled. Even last Christmas, as an adult, her laughter had still been childish and innocent. It was the thing he missed most every time he returned home. How could somebody hurt a sweet girl like Marie?
Only a monster could.
During Finn’s last Christmas visit, he had not been himself. The emotional bloodstains were obvious, clinging to every inch of his flesh. He’d been sullen and tormented. His ma, Clive, and Marie could only have been glad when he went home and took the dark, sucking cloud with him. It still hung over him now, but the dreary rain-cloud had filled with thunder and lightning. When he found Dominic Cassell, more blood would stain his soul, but this stain would not add to his burden, it would lighten it. It would be the first time in a long time he killed somebody deserving. Finn might be a lot of things, but he did not beat women to death.
Yet he was still a monster. He had created orphans beyond count. Did the fact the world was over absolve him? The lives he took had been unknowingly brief. The days he cut short were less.
But the grief he caused was no less severe.
Finn stepped over an elderly woman lying against the curb in her bloody nightdress. She trembled and shook while muttering to herself, but he could do nothing to help her, so he did not try. The suffering in the world would continue until the last gasps of humanity, and it was too pervasive to prevent. They would all get what they deserved.
Wherever Finn went next, he doubted he'd see Marie again.
When he and his sister had been children in Belfast, they would often go up into the nearby hills and enter the forest. There, they played in streams, discovered insects, and collected acorns. Sometimes they took jam sandwiches and sat on fallen logs to eat them. Other times, they would find a clearing and sunbathe with their shirts off. Finn couldn’t believe he'd once lived in a world where a boy could take his six-year-old sister to play without fear of monsters preying upon them. Now, monsters dwelled everywhere, feasting on those unlucky enough to be alive.
And all the while the grey tar got ever closer. Inch by creeping inch by creeping inch.
The shops Finn passed on his way to the Hobby Horse bore smashed windows and bent doors. Druggies and alkys pottered amongst the ruins looking for a fix, but the fixes had all dried up. No more drugs to push. No more vodka left in existence. The pleasures of the world had evaporated.
However, certain pleasures still remained. Like vengeance
Finn strolled towards an underpass beneath an empty highway. Mounds of black dust collected at the bottom where a couple of teenagers leaned up against the underpass's walls. They eyed Finn as he came near “How’s it going, mate?”
“Just fine,” said Finn, not bothering to make eye-contact.
“Got any smokes?”
Finn kept on walking.
“Oi, mate, I said, you got any smokes?”
Finn stopped walking. He turned and looked at the lad who had spoken—a weasel in a red woollen cap. “Now, let me consider your question,” Finn said in a low voice. “Several million people in this country were addicted to smoking before the world ended. Since the world is now utterly fucked, I imagine cigarettes are in dwindling supply. That would make a single smoke extremely valuable.”
The teenager pulled his hands out of his pockets. “Yeah, mate, what’s your point?”
“My point is,” said Finn, “that if I possessed something extremely valuable, why the hell would I give it to some ballsack who just asked for it?”
The teenager lea
ned forwards, putting his face closer to Finn’s. “Because I’m asking nicely, mate. Want to see me get upset?”
Finn smirked, which the teenager didn’t appreciate if the irritated look on his face was any indication. “You must be pretty tough to have survived this long, I'll grant you that, but do you really want to spend the time you have left getting battered in an underpass? You may have experienced a whole lot of shit in the last few months, kid, but I’ve been surviving in shit for the last twenty years. I killed my first man before you were even born, and I’m on my way to go kill another. You want to get in my way? You won’t be the first I’ve killed or the last, you’ll just be some dead dickhead I won’t remember beyond today.”
The teenager clenched his fists and locked his jaw. He looked ready to throw a punch, but before he was able to, his friend stepped forwards and put a hand on his shoulder. “It’s not worth it. He probably ain’t got no smokes anyway, so let’s just bounce.”
The angry teenager sucked at his teeth, but took a slow step backwards. He sneered at Finn. “You ain’t worth my time, blud. Hope that geezer you’re off to see takes you out.” He raised his hand like a gun, turned it sideways, and quietly mouthed the word “Blam.”
Finn smirked. “He’ll be dead before he even knows who I am. Same goes for you if you don't get out of my face.”
The teenager looked like he was going to get into it again, but his friend pulled him back once more. “Come on, Frankie.”
The two of them headed in the direction Finn had come from.
Finn shook his head. Fecking eejits.
He carried on through the underpass, attempting to ignore the rank odour of piss radiating from the walls. All manner of bodily fluids stained the dusty pavement, and he was fairly certain that at one point he stepped on an ear. Leaving the underpass didn’t ease the suffocating feeling though. The world outside swirled with black ash. The sky above was a grey sheet, lowering by the second. A few weeks ago, the sound of sirens had pierced the air at all hours of day and night. Now the world was silent. Doom had struck the words from people’s mouths.
Eventually, the Hobby Horse came into view. Like other buildings, its windows were shattered and its door hung loose. Wooden picnic tables sat outside on the pavement but had been reduced to kindling. Only one table survived intact, and it was currently occupied by two men.
Finn crossed the road, not bothering to look for traffic. Now and then, you would see a car travelling, but it had become increasingly rare. There was nowhere to drive to, and getting around the endless wrecks and abandoned vehicles was a nightmare.
The two men at the picnic table stood up and scrutinised Finn as he approached. “Help you mate?” asked the biggest of the two. The man wore a tight suit like a bouncer, and his shaven head and tattooed neck suggested he enjoyed being a cliche of an English thug. His colleague was more ordinary, with short black hair and a two-day layer of stubble. He also wore a suit.
Finn nodded hello and kept his arms by his side. He wanted information not aggro. “I’m looking for Dominic, you seen him?” He stated the question in a way that made it seem like he knew Dominic and they were friends.
But the skinhead-bouncer didn’t buy it. “What you want Dom for?”
“Just want to talk to him about something.”
“I don’t know you, mate, so I suggest you piss off.”
Finn raised his eyebrow and looked confused. “What’s the problem, fella? I just want to talk to him.”
The thug jutted out his chin. “Lotta people want to talk to Dom, mate. Don’t mean they get to.”
Finn took a step forwards, which prompted the skinhead’s colleague to move in front of him. “Where you think you’re going, mate?”
“I’m going in there to talk to Dom,” said Finn in a voice several shades harder than his prior tone. “Now, you can either tell me where he is or I’ll snap your friend’s elbow.”
The skinhead laughed, almost bellowed with amusement. Perhaps it was the fact he held half-a-foot of height over Finn and two stones in weight. Whatever it was he found so funny, he didn't laugh when Finn doubled him over with a jab to the throat and grabbed him in a hammer lock, shoving up on his wrist until his elbow snapped. The noise the big skinhead made reminded Finn of the wounded seven-year-old girl he’d dragged out of a post office in Belfast. Agony made frightened children of men.
The skinhead’s colleague pulled something from his inside pocket. From the glint alone, Finn knew it was a blade. “You’re going to want to think twice about that, buddy.”
The thug didn’t heed Finn’s warning and thrust the knife at his chest. Finn hopped back and the blade missed its target, leaving its wielder unbalanced. Taking advantage, Finn used the palm of his right fist to shatter his attacker’s nose, aiming the blow down onto the bridge rather than up against the septum—he didn’t want to kill the guy. Not unless he had to.
With both thugs on the floor weeping, Finn sauntered in through the pub’s open doorway. Hearing the commotion outside, the pub’s inhabitants were already looking his way as he entered.
Finn waved a hand. “Can a fella get a drink?”
“The fuck are you?” a stumpy guy behind the bar asked.
“The name’s Finn. I’m looking for Dominic. You fine gentlemen seen him?”
There were maybe nine people in the bar, but no one spoke or announced themselves as Dominic. Finn took the moment to survey his surroundings. The carpet beneath his feet was worn and tacky. Bloodstains melded with ancient chewing gum and mushed-up peanuts. The walls, too, were stained and the ancient wallpaper peeled in multiple places. The air smelled of piss and stale beer.
“Dom isn’t here,” said the guy behind the bar. “I suggest you bugger off before he sees what you just did to Gaz and Tommy.”
“Oh, them?” Finn looked back out at the pavement. “That was a misunderstanding.”
“Yeah, right,” the barman replied.
Finn cleared his throat and looked around the room again, making eye-contact with everybody present. He didn’t want to give the impression he was intimidated by any of them. In fact, he wanted them to be intimidated by him. After what he did to their two friends outside, he saw he had already achieved his goal with most of them.
“Could somebody tell me where Dominic is, please? I’d be much obliged.”
The barman picked up a dishcloth and started wiping down the bar. He pulled a face. “Can’t help you, mate.”
Finn took several steps and stood directly in the centre of the room. “Tell me where Dominic is, right now.”
“Or else what?” someone in the room asked.
Finn turned and met eyes with the person who had spoken—a dirty-looking kid in an Arsenal shirt. He gave the man an answer. “Or else I start asking questions you people won't like.”
“What questions?” the barman asked.
Finn took another step forward. A guy to his left with shaggy blonde hair and a scorpion tattoo under his left eye flinched at the proximity but didn’t retreat. Finn was near enough to strike the man if he wished, but for now he would stick with words. “I’ll start asking questions about my sister, Marie. Anybody know her? Somebody beat her to death. I got here one day after. You can probably imagine how I feel about that.”
The room went silent. Nobody spoke or even blinked. It was enough to tell Finn that these men had known Marie. The reason for why he stood there facing them down was a mystery no more. From the looks on their faces, they didn’t know whether to fear Finn more or less. Was he mad from grief, or a man looking for retribution?
“She was a good girl,” said Finn. “Would’ve given you the shirt off her back. Although, maybe some of you here tore it off her back. She was naked when someone dumped her on my doorstep. Not sure if that means she had a friend who cared enough to take her home, or a tormentor twisted enough to want her family to see what was left of her.”
The barman stopped polishing the bar and folded his arms across his chest.
“Don’t know any Marie, mate. Think you've got the wrong pub. Sorry for your loss, though.”
Finn nodded and turned towards the door. “Thanks anyway.”
“No problem.”
Finn felt the air deflate behind him as he headed for the door, but just when he was about to exit, he turned to the nearest table and dragged it across the open doorway. “Okay, last chance, fellas, because I’m losing patience. Don’t know if any of you have noticed, but time is pretty slim for us all, so I don’t intend on wasting any of it on you bunch of halfwits.”
“Careful,” said the barman with a scowl.
“No, you be careful,” said Finn, “because the next words out of your mouth will either be Dominic’s location or I’ll wipe that bar spotless with your ugly mug.”
The barman chuckled defiantly, but decided against speaking. That was good. It meant he was taking Finn seriously.
“Think you should leave, mate,” said the guy with shaggy blonde hair and the scorpion tattoo.
Finn allowed his hands to dangle by his sides as he moved to stand in front of the guy. “Did you get that tattoo before the world ended or after?”
The guy shrugged. “Before. So wha—”
“Then you’re a bigger bloody idiot than you look.”
Before the idiot had time to reply, Finn grabbed him by the wrist and twisted. He tossed the guy over his hip and brought him crashing down on top of a circular wooden table and left him lying, dazed, amongst the kindling.
The bar erupted.
Those unsure of what to make of Finn were distinctly informed. They came at him in waves. Finn caught the first attacker—the kid in the Arsenal shirt—with a swift kick to the knee, dropping him to the dirty carpet. He followed it up with a spinning backhand that shattered the jaw of a meathead who could have been Mike Tyson’s twin. Like ‘Iron Mike’, the guy had a glass jaw and was out for the count. Finn's next attacker managed to land a blow hard enough to make Finn see stars. He barely kept his balance enough to stay upright and dodged the next blow only by millimetres. The thug was small and wiry with a body more like an athletic girl than a man’s, but the snapped end of a pool cue he wielded evened up the odds.
Hell on Earth Trilogy: The Complete Apocalyptic Saga Page 84
