by Ryan Casey
When Darkness Falls
Book Two
Ryan Casey
Higher Bank Books
Contents
Bonus Content
When Darkness Falls
Prologue
Chapter 1
Chapter 2
Chapter 3
Chapter 4
Chapter 5
Chapter 6
Chapter 7
Chapter 8
Chapter 9
Chapter 10
Chapter 11
Chapter 12
Chapter 13
Chapter 14
Chapter 15
Chapter 16
Chapter 17
Chapter 18
Chapter 19
Chapter 20
Chapter 21
Chapter 22
Chapter 23
Chapter 24
Chapter 25
Chapter 26
Chapter 27
Chapter 28
Chapter 29
Chapter 30
Chapter 31
Chapter 32
Chapter 33
Chapter 34
Chapter 35
Chapter 36
Chapter 37
Chapter 38
Chapter 39
Chapter 40
Chapter 41
Chapter 42
Chapter 43
Chapter 44
Chapter 45
Chapter 46
Chapter 47
Chapter 48
Chapter 49
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When Darkness Falls
Book Two
Prologue
Brian Wood didn’t know how long he’d gone without food, only that if he forced himself to go much longer, he wasn’t sure he was going to make it at all.
The air was cold and frosty. Not as bad as it had been in the thick of winter, but that bitterness to every breath was still very much there. Winter had been hell. He’d been lucky to be with another group during that period or he honestly didn’t know how he’d have managed to survive.
But now he was alone, and he was hungry. And although it wasn’t the thick of winter anymore, that didn’t mean it was easy.
Survival was never easy. Not in a world where everyone was out for themselves. Where every motive should be questioned. And where every single supply was worth its weight in gold.
And worth its weight in life.
He looked around at his surroundings and he felt his stomach sink. Trees, everywhere. Some of them had lost their leaves through winter and the shoots of their replacements were just beginning to show, signifying an early spring. The others were thick, evergreen, staring down at him like he was nothing but a mere mortal; like they were the ones who ran this world now, not humans.
He wasn’t sure what month it was, exactly. March, perhaps. Or maybe even February still. What did it matter, anyway?
He didn’t even know where he was either. All he knew was that he was cold, tired, and desperate. His feet were covered in sores and blisters, the pain agonising. He knew he was probably rife with infection in all different corners of his body, but he didn’t have the time to care about things like that right now. He wouldn’t know where to begin.
He’d always had someone there to care for him, right the way through his life. First, it was his mum. She used to spoil him with toys and ice creams and all kinds of treats that made the other kids jealous—and made his dad pretty pissy. “You’re training him to be weak,” he’d say, looking down at Brian with his big, mean eyes.
And although Brian had detested him for his point of view at the time, looking back, he knew his old dad probably had a point. Maybe if he hadn’t been such a spoiled brat, he might’ve learned how to fend for himself in life.
It didn’t help that his girlfriend, Shelly, had a mothering nature herself. She’d cook for him. She’d book the holidays. She’d be the one to sort out the couple’s finances. And it wasn’t that Brian delegated to her, per se. She genuinely enjoyed doing all that pro-active stuff. So who was he to stand in her way?
Things changed though. First, when his mum died. That sudden bolt of lightning in his life; that reminder that he wasn’t immortal—in fact, no one was immortal—so eventually he was going to have to fend for himself. Everyone was eternally alone.
And then there was the day the power went out.
He remembered it clearly. He was sitting in front of the television watching the news. Well, not really watching it. Just taking in the images, enough of a pretty, colourful distraction to get him by. Shelly was in the kitchen, listening to the radio, humming along like she always did. The pair of them had a day off work. It was supposed to be a day they went out and did something—went for a walk, drove up to the Lake District, something like that. But it was mid-morning already and they hadn’t left the house. Some old routines died hard, that was for sure.
As he listened to Shelly’s humming, Brian felt a mixture of emotions. Partly happiness to hear her so content, so pleased. But also annoyance. She wound him up. Sometimes he wished she’d just go away, leave him alone. But then he knew what being alone meant, too—all those responsibilities, all of them falling on his shoulders.
So he rooted for her to stick around. Just about.
But then something had happened.
He wasn’t sure what he’d noticed first: the fact that the television went out with a violent burst, or his wife’s scream, and the chilling thud that followed.
He felt guilty even to this day as he paced down the road between the trees, heart racing, thinking back to that moment. Because he could remember. Of course he could. He tried to repress it, but he could remember exactly the first thought he’d had.
Never mind your screaming, Shelly. The telly’s frigging bust.
He remembered coming to his senses, then. Standing up. Heading over to the kitchen, partly fuming that the telly had practically exploded in front of him, partly curious as to what his wife had been so alarmed about.
He remembered stepping into the kitchen, ready to pull Shelly up for her melodrama, when he saw her lying across the floor.
She was bleeding from her head. Her body was totally still. And weirdly enough, the radio had gone off, too.
There was such a silence to the kitchen that Brian knew right then what had happened. He understood right away.
Shelly was gone.
Something had happened and Shelly was gone.
He took a deep breath and snapped himself back to reality, the tears beginning to roll down his cheeks as he replayed the memory. He’d ended up with another group not long after that. They were good people. Harsh but good. They knew how to gather supplies. They knew how to survive.
But Brian had gone and pushed himself a step too far. He’d stolen from them. Taken from their rations.
And even though he’d pleaded his innocence, even though he’d begged for forgiveness, he knew how it always ended for people like him.
He was banished.
That was several days ago.
He hadn’t eaten since.
He stopped, then. Put his hands on his knees. He took a few sharp inhalations. Part of him wanted to just give up. Listen to the voice in his head. He was worthless. He wasn’t going to make it. There was a reason people like him didn’t survive in this world—they weren’t cut out for it. He was barely even cut out for the
old world, so God knows how he expected to get by in this one.
He thought about the best ways to do it, end his life. Perhaps he could find a nice tree to sit under and listen to his stomach rumble as his body consumed itself. Or maybe he could just climb up that tree, tie a rope to it, jump off it. The thought of it was tempting, no doubt about that. But at the same, he was too afraid to do that. He was too afraid to do anything.
He had to keep on pushing.
He had to keep…
It was then that he heard something up ahead.
He wasn’t sure whether he’d heard correctly, not at first. After all, it couldn’t be possible. It couldn’t be real. In such an awful world as this had become, what he heard wasn’t something that happened anymore.
He lifted his head and squinted down the long country road. He looked through the mass of trees to his left. He held his breath. Listened some more.
Then he heard it again.
Children.
Children laughing.
His heart picked up pace. He forced himself upright, narrowed his eyes, staggered in the direction of the laughing. He knew what he’d heard. And there was no doubting it, not now.
Somewhere in or beyond these woods, there were children. And they were happy enough that they were actually laughing about something.
He moved quicker as he made his way through the trees. His feet hurt and his heart felt like it was going to explode out of his chest, but he didn’t care, not anymore.
He just had to see that these laughs were real.
He had to see where they were coming from.
He just had to see for himself.
He saw an opening behind the trees, then. A light, where the woods came to an end and whatever was beyond the woods reared its head.
He held his breath as he approached it, slowly now. Tensed his fists together.
Then, he looked.
When he saw what was beyond the trees, at the bottom of a hill, he couldn’t stop a smile from breaking across his face.
It was a homestead. A farm. Animals were in the fields. Cows and sheep. There were patches of land where crops would be planted—some early potatoes, no doubt. As well as carrots, cauliflower, cabbage, turnips, all things like that. This place looked tended to. Cared for.
And there were two children—two boys—playing in the garden in front of the farmhouse.
Brian sat there for a while and watched them, smile on his face, as the sun began to set and the sky took on an orange shade. He just stayed there and watched, not moving, even though his hunger and thirst were reaching dangerous levels. Because to see these children just playing with one another… it sparked hope inside him. Hope that things really could be okay again. That in spite of all the horrors of this world, things could get back to normal. That everyone, himself included, could be happy again.
He watched as a woman stepped out of the farmhouse and waved at the kids. She said something to them, called them over, clearly eager to get them inside.
And as he watched the kids and the woman go inside the farmhouse, he knew right then that he should reach out to these people. All he had to do was tell them that he was desperate for food and water. He wouldn’t even expect to be allowed to stay here… but he could hope. He could try.
But there was another opposing voice in his head. And this voice was telling him something very different. This voice was telling him that nobody could be trusted. That nothing was quite what it seemed.
It was telling him to steal from these people. To take what he could from them while he had the chance.
He swallowed a lump in his throat and looked at the animals. He could go down there. Take a cow for himself. Then he could use that cow to trade with someone else. Or he could… he could find a way to kill it and cook it. Or maybe he could work his way inside that farm and then intercept it from within. All of them were perfectly viable options. It wasn’t going to be easy for him, but he had to start somewhere. Everyone had to start somewhere. Right?
He remembered the laughter of the children, still echoing in his ears, and he wished everything could be good and happy. But the reality was that laughter was an illusion. Those kids would grow up and realise the world was a dangerous place. It wasn’t a happy place. Far from it. And if they didn’t wisen up soon, they’d fall victim to this world, just like so many others before them.
He took a deep breath into his shaking body and swallowed a niggling lump in his throat. He thought about what Shelly would say to him if she knew what he was contemplating right now. Don’t you dare, Brian. We pull together. We have to.
But Brian had seen too much—done too much—to know that pulling together was nothing more than a naive fantasy.
So he tensed his fists.
He stood upright.
And he started walking down the side of the hill.
He hadn’t made it far before he heard the shuffling behind him.
And at that point, he knew he was too late already.
He stood totally still. He didn’t want to look around. If he didn’t look around, he wouldn’t see who was behind him, and he could deny the reality of his situation for a little while longer.
But he did turn around.
And when he saw the person behind him, he knew he was in trouble.
It was a man. He was tall and slim with dark hair and blue eyes. He was wearing a white T-shirt, ill-fitting and baggy.
And he was holding a knife.
I looked at the scared little creep—the one that’d been lurking around our homestead, watching my son Bobby, scouting it out—and I had to use all the restraint in my body to stop myself killing him on the spot.
“You’re going to stop right there. And you’re going to tell me what you’re doing lurking around my home. Right this second.”
Chapter One
I looked at the man on the other side of the cold outhouse and I tried to find it inside myself to feel pity for him.
It was dark in this outhouse. Always was. The room itself was cramped and damp. The roof wasn’t completely covered over, so whenever it rained, the water always flooded inside. It wasn’t ideal. I mean, I could try fixing it, putting a new roof on it, something like that. But I figured I’d found another purpose for it.
It made a good holding cell.
Especially for people who were trying to steal from my farm.
I crouched opposite the man and looked into his eyes. He was quite a bulky guy, which made me think he came from somewhere that had food. The power had gone out around six months ago, so really anyone alive at this stage had found a way to get water and food. Anyone plump… well. They were certainly doing alright for themselves.
And that was part of what had made me so uneasy about this guy lurking around our homestead.
Where did he come from?
Who was he with?
What was he trying to take from us, and what was he hiding?
I took a deep breath of the muggy air. I felt a slight pain in my right when I did. Although around six months had passed since I’d been hit by a bullet, I still had reminders of it every now and then. Fortunately, my wound hadn’t been too bad. I dreaded to think what it might’ve been like if it’d hit me in a more dangerous position.
When I inhaled, I could smell urine. Didn’t surprise me. I’d had this guy tied up for a good few hours now. He was gagged and blindfolded. And I got the sense that he didn’t even realise I was right there, opposite him.
I wanted to stay there just a little while longer, totally silent, trying to figure out what to do with him, how to progress.
But I knew I couldn’t just sit back. I had to be proactive.
I lifted the man’s blindfold.
Immediately he tried to shuffle away, flinching and kicking out as his fearful eyes settled on me, his breathing intensifying.
“Keep still,” I said.
I went to reach for his gag and he kicked out again.
“Hey,” I said, looking right at
him now. “Keep still or I’ll not take this gag off at all. I’m trying to do you a favour here. Because I’m guessing you’ll want to tell your side of the story. If you don’t tell your side of the story… well, that’s not a good thing for you. Believe me.”
The man studied me for a while, like he was trying to weigh up whether I was tricking him or not. Was I tricking him? I thought my motivations were pretty clear in all truth. He was an outsider. He’d been behaving weirdly. He was a potential threat to my family, to my friends.
Wasn’t I just reacting totally normally in the face of what could be a real threat?
He went still, then, and nodded. Like he was signalling that I was okay to remove the gag.
I reached for his mouth with my knife and cut it away.
I saw that look in his eyes, just momentarily. An urge to scream. To try his luck and do the only thing he could to try and escape this place.
But then he looked at the knife and that expression faded. I had him. My terms.
“What’s your name?” I asked.
“Please,” the man said, his throat raspy and dry. “I—”
“Your name.”
He looked down at the floor then back up at me. “Brian.”
“Brian. Good. That’s a start.”
