by David Moody
“It’s the exact same thing. Believe me, Matthew, I know all too well what these people are capable of.”
“And you’re still here?”
“I don’t have any choice. If you ask me, I think we’ve reached a pivotal moment in human history.”
“Easy on the hyperbole.”
“I’m serious. This is a conflict that’ll define all of our futures. To me, this feels like the last world war. The final war, if you like. We can’t not act.”
The Hater on the bed stirs. Joseph is between Matt and the door, and though Matt instinctively tries to slip past him and get out, Joseph stops him. He smiles and puts a finger to his lips, then pushes Matt back deeper into the cell. “We need to be going the other way if she’s about to explode,” Matt warns.
“Calm down, man. Just observe, okay? Stay back and out of her line of sight and you’ll be fine.”
The woman on the bed stinks, and her stench is enough to make Matt gag. Her head’s restrained so she can’t easily look anywhere but up, and the tattered clothes she’s wearing are soiled and sweat-stained. She strains and squirms, writhing in her own filth. Hater or not, the conditions she’s being held in are appalling. Inhuman. Matt thinks she’d be better off dead, but it doesn’t appear to faze Joseph in the slightest. “Good morning to you, Diane,” he says, his resonant voice filled with what Matt hopes is artificial warmth and familiarity. “How are you feeling today?”
He leans closer to the Hater. She’s in some kind of stupor, driven out of her mind, Matt presumes, through a combination of being held captive, being pumped full of tranquilizers, and being subjected to Joseph’s bullshit. It takes her several seconds to come around fully and to focus. When she realizes there’s an Unchanged man standing in front of her, her reaction is violent in the extreme. She arcs her back wildly as if she’s being electrocuted and screams with frustrated fury, the hatred clearly audible in spite of the gag in her mouth. She crashes back down onto the stained mattress then tries to lunge again. Matt sees that there are savage-looking welts and lesions on her ankles and wrists where she’s repeatedly strained against them, desperate to escape and attack. Her right ankle looks particularly fierce. It’s raw and infected, and he can smell the poison in her blood from where he’s standing. Unable to reach her leg because of her binds, she instead constantly moves it. The nonstop rubbing is agitating the weeping wound.
The Hater is exhausted. She soon stops fighting and starts to drift in and out of consciousness, panting hard but doing little else, her leg jerking involuntarily, the mother of all sleep-twitches. Joseph waits for her to finish like she’s giving a well-rehearsed performance for his benefit, then edges a little closer when it’s safe. “We all done now, Diane? That leg giving you some trouble?” The Hater’s eyes flicker again and she groans. “You want to scratch it? Want me to bathe it? It’s looking pretty sore, if you ask me.”
Both Matt and Joseph jump with shock when she lunges again. And then, again, Joseph waits for her to stop.
“Having all these tantrums and sweating like a pig … I’m starting to think that leg’s never going to heal. I give you a few more days before the infection takes hold. Strikes me I’ll come into this room one morning and find you dead. Pretty miserable way to see out your time, if you ask me.”
He waits for a response which doesn’t come.
“Maybe I could clean it up for you? Put a dressing on it to stop it getting worse? Imagine how much better you’d feel. No more pain. No more irritation.”
She reacts by kicking out again, and Matt notices that she recoils whenever the open ankle wound touches anything.
“How long do we have to play this game for, Diane?” Joseph asks.
Nothing.
“Okay, you have it your way. We’ll try again tomorrow. I’m in no rush. I’ve got all the time in the world.”
He checks her binds are tight, exaggerating his movements to demonstrate his control, then goes to leave.
The Hater speaks. Is it a word or just a moan? It’s hard to tell. Her leg is in spasm now. Joseph doesn’t show any emotion. He stands completely still with his back to her, eye contact now made with Matt.
He waits longer. The seconds tick by. It’s half a minute maximum, but it feels like forever.
Finally the Hater makes another noise, and this time it’s clearly a choked word. Joseph closes his eyes and composes himself. Matt can tell from the self-satisfied expression on his face that this a breakthrough. He turns back to his prisoner and removes her gag. She swallows, mouth dry, then speaks again. “Please…” she croaks.
Joseph pours a little water over her wounded ankle, pats it down with a soft rag he takes from his pocket, then rubs antiseptic cream into the infected area. For the first time since he and Matt entered the cell, she keeps completely still and doesn’t fight. He gives her a mouthful of water, then replaces her gag. “That’ll do for now,” he says, his tone borderline patronizing. “I’m very pleased with you. You’re making real progress, Diane. I’ll come back and see you again later.”
Joseph ushers Matt out of the room. As the two of them leave, the Hater is overcome by her anger and frustration at being left again. She knows she’s not going anywhere, that it won’t make any difference, but she strains and thrashes and moans as much as she can in the confines of her binds. This time Joseph simply leaves the room and locks the door behind him.
“And that’s it?” Matt says.
Joseph ushers him farther down the corridor before replying. “You might think I’m crazy, Matthew, but I happen to believe in what I’m doing here.”
“I never said you were crazy. Misguided, maybe, suicidal … I think what you’re doing’s impressive to a degree, and it takes some balls to get so close to those animals, but I’m struggling to work out why you’re bothering. Muzzling a handful of Haters is never going to change the world.”
“Perhaps, but we have to start somewhere, don’t we? As I see it, the biggest problem is the gulf that’s suddenly opened up between us and them. Bridging that gap has to be the first step toward ending the fighting.”
“I get that, but it’s a hell of a gap that needs bridging. It’s going to take more than you and me and a bunch of tame Haters.”
“They’re not tame. Don’t ever make that mistake. Even those who’ve made the most progress here have the propensity to regress.”
Matt stops walking. “You see, that’s another issue I have. You use the word regress like they’ve gone backward. If you asked a Hater, I’m sure they’d tell you they’d advanced and we were the backward ones.”
“I have talked to them, don’t forget. This all boils down to perspective. I guess we’re all looking down our noses at each other.”
“Okay, but what good is any of this really going to do? No offense, but it sounds like whatever hoops you get them jumping through while they’re chained up in here, they’ll have forgotten about as soon as they leave.”
“That might be so. Only time will tell.”
“And do any of us have that time?”
“I get the impression you’re just being difficult for the sake of it.”
Joseph’s clearly had enough of Matt’s questions. He continues downstairs into the bowels of the convent, leaving Matt alone on the landing where he stops and listens to the echoes of the old, decrepit building around him. The muffled groans and stifled roars of imprisoned Haters. Whispered conversations between the few remaining CDF soldiers left guarding the place. Joseph’s bizarrely cheerful whistling fading into the nothing. But the convent itself sounds weary today, as if it’s struggling to stay standing under the weight of the madness inside and around it.
He looks out of the nearest window, down onto the courtyard below. Franklin and Jayce are out there talking. Is Jayce about to “regress,” as Joseph put it? Matt doesn’t know which of them he trusts least. Logic says it should be Jayce because of what she is, but how sure is he that Franklin’s not a Hater, too? Or Joseph, maybe? Is this whole
place just an elaborate ruse? He’s been assuming all along that the Haters are in the minority here, but what if he’s the one being played and he’s actually the only remaining Unchanged? He consoles himself with the thought that as futile as Joseph’s plan to retrain lone Haters sounds, a Hater plan to ensnare lone Unchanged would be even more pointless. Particularly here, where there are thousands and thousands of people like Matt literally just a stone’s throw away.
He wanders down to the courtyard. Franklin’s on him the moment he steps out into the open. “I’ve been looking for you.”
“I was helping Joseph. Keeping him sweet like you told me to.”
“Whatever. I’m not interested. What are you doing now?”
“Nothing. I don’t know where he went.”
“Good. You’re coming with us.”
32
They’re walking this time, and though the area through which they’re now moving is familiar, Matt’s never been this far from the center of the city-camp on foot. The military transport they used last time, the battered Transit van, a stolen jeep … hell, even a pushbike would be preferable to being exposed and unprotected like this. It should help having Jayce with them, but somehow the presence of the Hater makes Matt feel worse. It was easier when he didn’t know what she is. Since speaking to Joseph he’s been watching her like a hawk. He followed her through the crowds, wondering if she was about to lose her grip and start lashing out. He thinks he would if he was in her position. He actually thinks he might.
KFC.
The front of the branch of Kentucky Fried Chicken they’re now approaching has been hit by a pickup truck. The dust and rust indicates that the collision happened some time ago, yet the vehicle’s never moved and remains sticking out of what’s left of the restaurant’s frontage. Colonel Sanders’s stylized face looks down disapprovingly from a plastic sign which, although still in one piece, is hanging at a perilous angle, suspended by vein-like wires. “Is this safe?” Matt asks when he realizes they’re going inside.
“Is anything safe these days?” Jayce says, answering without answering.
They enter through a broken window, their unannounced arrival causing a flurry of frantic rodent activity nearby. From the noise and chaotic scrabbling movement, Matt thinks they’ve disturbed a nest. He hates rats, but he has bigger things to worry about right now. “What the hell are we doing in here?” he asks, increasingly uneasy.
“Just passing through,” Franklin tells him as they march through what’s left of the seating area. There are plastic tables and chairs and the detritus of the last meals cooked and half-eaten here. They then continue down a short corridor and through a door marked “Staff Only.” The PIN code entry pad which kept it secure has been prised off.
The deeper they go into the building, the worse the stench. Past the dried-up toilets, through the kitchen and stores full of rotten food and rancid fat, then out into a small enclosed yard out back with overflowing wheelie bins. “You never react, do you?” Jayce says unexpectedly. As keenly as Matt’s been watching her, she’s been watching him. He’s several steps ahead, sandwiched between her and Franklin.
“What?”
“We could be taking you anywhere.”
“If you’d wanted to kill me, you’d have done it by now,” Matt answers, matter-of-fact. “Anyway, I’m busy soaking up the view.”
Just ahead of him, Franklin grunts but doesn’t look back. “So what do you see?”
“Fuck all, so I’m asking myself why we’re here, not where are we. The front of KFC looked impassable from outside. I’d probably not even have tried to get in, and I’m assuming that’s why you use it, to cover your tracks. And if we’re thinking along the same wavelength, I think you’re probably showing me a way of getting out into No Man’s Land on foot without putting our heads above the parapet. Am I right?”
Neither Franklin nor Jayce answer, and that’s all the confirmation he needs. There’s a hole in a wire-mesh fence which leads to a well-worn path through a patch of dense, overgrown, rubbish-strewn vegetation which, in turn, finishes right on the border of the endless dereliction of No Man’s Land, among the ruins of a collection of fancy-looking houses. Matt can tell they were decent because of the size of their footprints. There’s a collapsed house with just the garage door left standing, and it’s wider than the whole damn house he and Jen live in. How the other half lives, he thinks. Lived.
“So, if I’ve got this right, you’re taking me to meet the group who are going to be moving into the des-res you showed me underneath the printing house yesterday. Am I correct?”
“Keep your damn voice down,” Franklin mutters. Again, Matt takes that as confirmation that he’s right.
In the midst of what must have been almost a hundred homes, a single structure stands relatively unscathed. It’s a chapel. “What was this place?” Matt asks, looking around.
“Used to be a mental hospital, by all accounts,” Franklin tells him. “They knocked it down and built these houses here a few years back, but never did anything with the chapel. It was a protected building. Would have cost a fortune to do anything with it. As it happens, the houses around it seem to have shielded it from the worst of the shelling.”
“Divine intervention?” Matt asks, clearly taking the piss.
“No, just luck,” Franklin replies without a trace of humor. “That and the fact the church was built of bigger bricks than anywhere else nearby.”
The chapel door is boarded up, but the boards are easily moved. Light streams in through high, grille-covered windows, illuminating faded traces of the building’s former glory. There was a fire here at some point, but the dereliction is such that it’s impossible to tell if it was a month ago or a decade. Jayce and Franklin walk through the debris, then disappear down a staircase behind an altar-less space. “What is it with you pair and underground hideouts?” Matt asks, but his pointless comment goes unanswered.
Belowground, there’s nothing. Just a dark, musty-smelling space. The longer they’re down here, the more Matt’s eyes become accustomed to the lack of light. He sees faint traces of yellow spilling across the ground, and soon he’s able to make out the outline of a door.
Franklin goes first. He bangs his fist on the door. There’s an overlong pause, then muffled scraping sounds as it opens. He waits a moment longer, then goes through. A second later and he’s back, having prepared those on the other side for their arrival. Matt’s ushered in, and all he can see is a mass of people crammed into a small cellar with a curved ceiling. All ages, all waiting, all eyes on him. “Bloody hell,” he mutters under his breath. The room was previously filled with a low buzz of conversation. Matt’s only aware of this now because it’s been abruptly silenced.
“Bloody hell indeed,” a willowy man with a patchy beard says. He stoops as he approaches and extends his hand. “You come to join our little exodus?”
“No, this is the one I was telling you about, Darren,” Franklin says, talking about Matt as if he isn’t there. “He might not look much, but he’s proved himself pretty good at staying alive and keeping out of trouble.”
Matt disagrees. Keeping out of trouble? Christ, he feels like a trouble magnet right now.
“Good to meet you,” Darren says. “How are things looking up top?”
“Shite,” Matt answers, to the point.
“No change there, then.”
“A lot more shite, actually,” Jayce says. “His name’s Matt, by the way.”
“And how much have you told Matt?” Darren asks, looking directly at Franklin for an answer.
“Enough for now. We’ve shown him where we’re going.”
“You mean there’s more you haven’t told me?” Matt says, confused and concerned in equal measure. “So when were you going to let me in on the rest, Franklin? When we’re out there with a thousand Haters on our back?”
“It’s not like that…”
“Then what is it like? I think I deserve to know.”
�
��We’re giving you and yours a ticket out of here, don’t push your luck.”
Darren seems less antagonistic than either Franklin or Matt. “How much do you know?”
“What you’re doing and where you’re going,” Matt replies.
“But not why?”
“That’s pretty self-evident, isn’t it? You want to stay alive.”
“Yes, but there’s more to it than that. This is more than just a mercy mission, Matt. This is bigger than you or me or any one individual in this room. This is about ensuring the survival of the human race.”
Matt can’t help but laugh at the unexpected grandiosity of the man’s statement. “Sorry. I thought this kind of bullshit was that guy Joseph’s bag.”
Darren smiles briefly. “It’s not bullshit. Think of it as us going into hibernation and not coming out again until it’s safe. We won’t win against the Haters, that much is already clear, but in time they’ll burn themselves out. It’s inevitable. And we’re going to be ready to reclaim whatever’s left.”
“That’s if there’s anything left to reclaim.”
“There will be. I’m certain of that.”
Matt doesn’t think he’s ever been less certain of anything.
Darren continues. “The way I’ve started to think about it is to talk about this group being a time capsule, buried in the ground until the human race is ready to restart again. And yes, before you say anything, I’m well aware of how pretentious that sounds. I know it’s going to be hard and I know it’s going to take a hell of a long time, but we have to believe it’ll work. One day we’ll be able to walk out there in the open air without fear again and feel the wind in our hair and the sun on our faces. It might be months away, it might be years, but we have to believe it’ll happen because if we don’t, then what’s the point of any of us trying to stay alive at all?”
Darren’s distracted by one of the other people down here. The crowd have regained their collective confidence again and are starting to go about their business, not that there’s much business to be had. Franklin seizes the opportunity to corner Matt. “Listen, before you say anything, I know what you’re thinking. For the record, you’re right, Darren’s full of crap. It suits us to have him providing the focus down here and keeping this lot calm and in check.”
