by Stevens, GJ
“What the fuck?” were the words I barely heard from Toby's mouth, words I knew weren't meant for anyone.
“Why the fuck?” My words came without command, my feet unbidden the same. One in front of the other, slowly at first, building, building until I was flat out.
My gaze jerked this way and that, searching out for new information. Searching for the end of the line as I swerved left and right around cars which became three across as each one tried and failed, despite the brush of metal on metal, to squeeze past. Shoes and bags, luggage and holdalls littered the remaining gaps, slowing me to more of a hurdle as I raced to the head of whatever this could be. I swerved right at the bumper of a van, having smashed the wall before bogging down on the grass. Its doors were wide. A glance of a hand imprinted red to the white paint of the bonnet.
I turned away, my progress doubling as I ran unimpeded along the grass. Slowly, the density of cars seemed to increase, leaving no air either side, but it had done them no good. Each car had wedged with their windows smashed.
A vision flashed of people hauling themselves out, biceps tight, clawing to climb from the crush of metal. I turned back ahead, knowing my day-mare was still only a patch on reality. My breath caught as I saw the queue abruptly stop, the road blocked with three cubes of concrete stacked at the junction. I stopped just as quickly.
Shaking my head with my hand reaching for my chest, the drum of my heart reassured me I was awake. As my breath slowed I took a tentative step, renewed guilt washing over me when I realised I hadn’t thought of the shadow hitting the windscreen as I ran.
With a deep breath I climbed the wall, stones crumbing to the ground as I leapt to the roof of a stocky sports car. Easing my way forward, the journey unhindered by space between each car as I moved to the next. Ahead I could see the concrete blocks were like those used to put across disused carparks, like those used to protect the unwanted colonisation by families armed only with their homes towed behind them.
Beyond the concrete there was nothing. Nothing at least when I took my first look. An absence of traffic, cars, vans, the spray of glass, but as my eyes blinked with a fevered ferocity, I realised there was plenty else to see. Bags, clothes and suitcases littered the T-junction cutting left to right, its third way blocked by the concrete. But it was the blood, more numerous than anything else, which forced my hand to cover my mouth.
Glancing back at the sound of panting breath, I saw Toby and Andrew hurrying forward on the grass. Their eyes were not as wide as mine, stretched only to the abandoned cars. Soon they would be as wide as they could be on seeing the despicable scene spread out in front.
The moment was clear when they fell on the three piles of clothes, each looking out of place, seeming larger than all others surrounding. Both climbed on the car as I stood without words. Both took steps with me, jumping over windscreens, landing to the clear tarmac.
Soundless, we headed on. Our gazes latched to the blood, our feet stepping sideways. Our glances meeting for the first time as my foot knocked something we all recognised, the spent cartridge like a tiny bell as it rattled across the floor.
Soon the sound came again, this time in chorus like a miniature orchestra. Our feet swept the path left and right, clearing the way to avoid the slip and fall while together we took our unspoken journey to the closest of the dark bundles. Definition grew, its shades of greens, browns and black recognisable on the arched back.
We arrived and I watched my hand reach out. I watched as, pulling at the shoulder, I wheeled back, the body of a young woman, a lieutenant according to her lapels, rolled under her own weight.
My stomach reacted first, gripping vice-like, but it was already empty. My gasp of air was enough to control my alarm at the crushed side of her face, a muddy footprint to the other. The same could not be said for my friends.
As the body came to rest on her back, I spotted the handgun lain underneath. I turned left and right to the pair standing bent over with their hands to their mouths in unison, their gazes fixed on what I’d seen.
Toby nodded. Andrew gave no reply. The gun was still warm, but it nearly fell from my fingers as an almighty rumble ran deep in my chest, ripping through the silence and lighting the horizon.
5
Lunging for air, I turned toward the cloud. Breath rasped as I watched the smoke build, waiting, desperate for its form to become clear.
Panting, I read its shape in vain, lids blinking in anticipation. Could it be a mushroom? There was no bright flash. No wind battering across me, knocking me off my feet.
My breath slowed and I turned to Andrew and Toby either side, shaking my head. Solemn nods came back in reply as Toby seemed to get energy from somewhere. He bounded around to the other two bodies, skirting their forms, staring for a moment at each but never closing in.
Without words we turned back along the row of cars. Our pace was steady as we started the return journey. Their faces were grey and I imagined mine was the same.
“What do we say?” I heard Andrew's words low as we walked along the endless string of cars.
“Tell them everything,” Toby said, his voice quick and coarse.
“No,” I said, shaking my head, gaze fixed on my feet. “They’ll panic.”
“I’m panicking,” Toby replied.
I looked up and slowed the breath I hadn’t realise had been racing and took a moment to feel the energy building in my chest.
“We tell them what they need to know. Tell them we found a roadblock…” The words caught in my throat and I took a deep swallow. “We tell them we found chaos the other end. We tell them everyone has gone, evacuated.”
“Not everyone,” Andrew said.
I waited a moment to answer, knowing the full extent of what our words could do to our friends.
“We tell them about the panic. We tell them people didn't make it,” I said, picking up my pace with the gun heavy in my jacket pocket.
Their reply was silent. I hoped if I turned I would see them nodding. To say anything else wouldn't make sense.
“Then what?” Toby said, breaking the silence, his words soon crumbling under their weight.
“We find another way out.” My gaze fell on the procession of cars stretching to the horizon. “All this in just a few hours?” I said, not targeting my words anywhere in particular.
No one replied, but Andrew slowed. I turned, watching as he cut across to the wall, his hands testing the stone before climbing. I joined him high at his side, mirroring him as he took in the view.
All around us were fields rolling gently up and down, with only the occasional wind-battered tree pointing skyward to punctuate the horizon. The long-packed road at our front was the only sign of anyone having ever set foot on the earth.
Our gazes carried to the left; we were about a third of the way back to the cars and our friends. Breath stole from my lungs, my stomach a cavern as I thought of Zoe and the others back at the car. I thought of their fear for us, their fear for the unknown. They would have heard the explosion but weren't in the same head space as us and had yet to see what we had.
“What the hell is going on?” came Toby’s voice at our backs.
I climbed down and offered my hand, helping him up as we jumped down the other side. I was about to open my mouth, about to speak, about to tell him I had no idea, when our heads turned skyward, our gazes darting this way and that, trying to spot the low rumble building on the horizon.
Breath came fast, my look swapping between my two friends. Their eyes were as wide as mine.
We moved quickly, soon building to a run, winding our way through the metal and jumping the haphazard belongings clogging the road.
The roar grew, rising too quick to a crescendo as a grey fighter jet ripped through the air high above.
“Invasion,” I shouted, my instant reaction. “It's World War Three...” the words tailing off as I ran faster than I dared.
6
Breathless, I spotted the missing car at the back
of our own short convoy before I saw Zoe stood next to Toby's young wife.
Lily waved her arms high above her head and, in unison with Zoe, their faces lit with relief. Lily ran towards us as we grew closer, rushing past me to clutch her husband. I turned away when no one came running in my direction.
Slowing my pace and with Andrew at my side, we watched Naomi climb from our car, followed soon by Matt and Chloe pulling out of Toby's silver Mercedes.
“What is it?” Zoe asked, her hands at her mouth, dread covering her face. “The explosion,” she said, turning towards Naomi who eyed me with a squint of interest.
“It's a roadblock,” I said, not ready to give the details. “Where's Leo and the others?”
Zoe and Naomi exchanged looks. Matt stepped forward, glancing to Chloe before he spoke.
“They didn't want to sit around waiting. They were pissed off you upped and legged it.”
“I was coming back,” I said, my voice high and defensive. “Of course, I was always going to come back.”
Matt shrugged, his gaze flitting to the distance.
“So where did they go?” I said, catching the gaze of each of the five. Matt spoke again.
“They're going to find another way around.” Zoe shook her head, a look of distaste on her face.
“Leo said some scary shit,” Matt continued. “Dan thinks we're being invaded. World War Three or something.”
Zoe looked at me the entire time, not hiding her interest in my reaction. “Max reckons they blew up the rest of the power station to stop a build-up of heat, but that must be bullshit,” Zoe added, fixed on my eyes, her own wide for an answer.
“Well, what is it?” she said, her voice rising.
I didn’t reply straight away, the pressure of the question weighing down heavy.
“I don't know,” I replied, shaking my head, speaking my true feelings. “It's not an invasion,” I said, pausing, adding more words than I needed to. “I don't think. I did before, but it makes little sense now.”
I watched Zoe's eyes widen and Naomi's contract. “If the Russians or the Chinese have invaded then why the evacuation? The skies would be teaming with fighters,” I said, shaking my head.
“But the explosion?” Zoe replied, noticing the rest had gathered around, their faces intent on our discussion.
“I don't know.”
The only reply was silence. Each of my friends looked on, waiting for me to come up with some idea, some plan, some theory they could latch on to. I read the disappointment on their faces when my lips didn’t move.
I couldn't remain silent for long. “All I know is there was supposed to be an evacuation. Everyone should be gone, but we missed the bus. Quite literally,” I said, turning to Andrew for reassurance I’d said the right thing.
He gave a shallow nod and silence followed, but I knew what came next. It was Zoe who spoke first.
“Evacuated from what?” As her words came out a tear rolled down her cheek.
“I don't know,” I replied, stepping forward with open arms, dropping them to my side as she instead turned and sunk into Naomi's embrace.
Drawing a deep breath and pushing down the rising emotion, I broke from the group to circle my car and closed the passenger doors as I did. Taking the driver's seat, I pushed down the locks as the engine started.
With emotional faces staring back, I turned the car, rolling it to the side of the road. Seven heads followed my every action as I killed the engine and walked to the last abandoned car in the long queue, a Freelander.
Leaning through the open driver's door, I turned the key one notch and watched the fuel indicator spring to the right.
They soon got the idea as I pulled open the boot and lugged suitcases to the side of the road. Each lent a hand, pulling our bags from my car with the wrecked screen.
Without words we started the convoy once more, pleased for every mile I put between us and the reminder of the worst day of my life, although the heaviness in my chest wouldn’t let me completely forget.
We drove for hours, following the map on Andrew's lap, Toby’s Mercedes never leaving my mirrors. Taking turn after turn, each time we found a queue of abandoned traffic, sometimes longer, sometimes shorter than the one we’d left.
At the first few we checked the head of the queue, gaining hope when there had been no repeat of the conflict; no cold bodies left behind. Until we came to a short queue of upwards of fifty cars.
Zoe was the first to see the bodies lying in pools of blood. We checked no more road blocks after, instead turning the car away each time we came across the beginning of the snaking line.
The skies had darkened, the air chilling. It must have been the tenth or so road north we'd found blocked. This latest queue was right back to the trunk road, but to its right we found the dry-stone wall smashed through.
The first car to knock the barrier down had been abandoned to the side, the windscreen smashed, the bumper discarded at the gap. Great welts scouring into the earth told us many more had followed.
I looked towards Andrew and he gave the nod as I turned the wheel through the gap.
The going was chaotic and the Freelander loved the terrain. At first I thought it was a farmer’s field, but instead it turned out to be wasteland potted with rocks hidden below the waist-high wild grass swinging in the winter breeze.
The same could not be said for the Mercedes in the rear-view mirror. With no surprise, smoke soon billowed from under the bonnet. Circling around, we watched our friends pile out.
7
With the blue sky only a memory and our luggage discarded to the long grass, Chloe squeezed up against Zoe, sliding Naomi to the door. Without complaint, Toby, Lily and Matt were left to fold themselves into the rear compartment. Holdalls bursting with our snatched precious things rested in every other space.
No one was keen to hang around in the dark, knowing death was close by and the eerie, distant orange lights helped to urge us on. Towering black smoke told of its source burning on the horizon.
Despite the cramped conditions, I felt the relief in the car as we moved away with a slow, considered pace, knowing each bump rushing through the axles amplified tenfold for those tight together in the back.
With the main beam lights dancing across my view, another ten minutes past before I was relieved to see the remains of a stone wall smashed through in too many places to count, the many cars which just hadn't been able discarded at its foot.
Swinging the four by four in an arc, I swept the headlights across the barrier and spotted the largest of the breaches near to the head of the silent queue of traffic. We rolled, our movement slow and considered.
I glanced to Andrew in the passenger seat, watching his shallow nod in reply.
The going was easy, the gap more than ample. Relief rushed through my body, a palpable excitement we were through the roadblocks. At my back, excited whispers joined my thoughts.
Through the gap and lit by our main beam, we saw the pickup truck which I guessed had cleared the way as we travelled through. Its mass was pointed high, angled to the horizon, the front wheels resting on a stone wall bounding the opposite side. Its doors were wide open.
Turning the wheel, the headlights caught on a view we'd seen so many times before. Bags, holdalls and luggage scattered around, but this time we weren't so naïve to the sight of the larger shapes surrounded in dark shadows.
A difference caught my eye and with only a little surprise, the others too, if the sharp intakes of breath were anything to go by. We'd seen the face of a man, his body encased in an oversized orange hazmat suit. His eyes reflected through the wide transparent window punctured by bullet holes.
Still turning, trying to find a route to navigate around the biggest of the debris, I pushed hard on the brakes and all looked forward as I saw something I knew to be a trick of light. Or so I thought, until Andrew jumped forward in his seat.
Leaning against the windscreen, he stretched his neck to get a better look. He, t
oo, had seen the body in the headlights move as the beam bathed our view.
I looked left, expecting to see Andrew's hand pulling the handle, but he was still staring forward with his mouth open.
It was Chloe's form which lunged into the light before I felt the chill of air coming from her open door and heard the chorus of voices calling her back. She wouldn't be turned as I joined in with the frantic calls, her nursing instinct hard-wired.
Drawing a deep breath, I followed her into the night. The darkness brought fog to my breath.
Glancing, I watched Chloe kneel at the body's side. With her head bent down, she listened to the gentle moan of death.
I forced myself to breathe through my mouth, the powerful stench of blood and ripe, overflowing toilets sticking in my throat. I couldn't look at the scene for very long as I drew closer, instead surveying the wider view, despite knowing I should avoid it for the sake of my dreams.
This was by far the worst we’d come across; the highest body count. Double figures ticked off, despite my desperation to avoid the detail. This roadblock was also unique because on this side of the concrete blocks were cars. Some hadn’t got away. Bullet holes strafed their sides, shell casings glinting in the powerful light.
I was grateful to arrive at Chloe's side, despite the growing stench giving me an excuse to look away. With a stolen glance I saw the desperate view I couldn't turn from and watched the last moments of a woman Chloe's age; mid-twenties, hair once blonde, streaked with scarlet. Half her face was blown off, her lips missing from one side of her mouth. The one intact eye remained closed. Still, she was moving, cradled in Chloe's arms.
Chloe made no attempt to halt her death. Even I could tell there was nothing to be done, other than to give the ultimate gift of not letting her be alone when the final moment came.
The moment came too soon. Came as Andrew arrived at our side. Came as both of us rested our hands on Chloe's shoulders.
