by Ryan Casey
You can trust me.
Those four words just made me doubt this man even more.
“Nice dog you’ve got there. What’re they called?”
I didn’t say anything in response. The man didn’t seem to mind.
“Look, my name’s Alex. And you?”
Again, I didn’t respond.
He chuckled a little, then pulled his rucksack off his back and rested it down beneath him. He sat on it, wincing like he had some kind of back problem. “It’s a nice lake. Imagine there’ll be plenty of fish around here. Just a pity I’m so shitty at catching them. You don’t look like you’ve had any problems there, though, huh?”
I looked at the fish in my hand. It had gone totally still. I was going to have to get to work on it soon.
“Maybe you could teach me how to—”
“That’s not going to happen.”
Alex whistled. “Wow. Okay. That’s how we’re doing things. Mightily frosty. And they say we’re all supposed to be banding together nowadays, too. Trading skills. Helping each other. That kind of thing. There a reason you’re so… well, how else can I put it? Unfriendly?”
“I’m unfriendly because I’ve seen what this world can turn people into.”
Alex stared rather intently at me then. “Yeah. You’re right about that. Dead right.”
There was a longer, more extended moment of silence.
Then Alex stood, lifted his rucksack and started making his way towards me again.
I lifted the knife. I didn’t want to get into any kind of scrape. But at the same time, I didn’t want anything threatening me or getting in the way of my goals.
“How about we catch another fish? We can take it back to my place. We’ve got a decent cooking setup. Just short of stuff to put on it, these days. Could do with someone like you to give us a hand. You look like you know what you’re doing.”
“Stay back.”
Alex slowed his walk. But he didn’t stop moving towards me. “I know it’s hard to let someone else in. Believe me; I’ve lost just like you have.”
“You don’t know a thing about what I’ve lost.”
“Then tell me. Let me in. Let someone else in before you end up all alone with no one else to look out for.”
I knew it wasn’t a threat. At least, I thought it wasn’t. I didn’t know. God, what did I know anymore?
I just knew one thing.
This man wasn’t stepping closer to me.
He wasn’t taking this fish from me.
“I’m going to spell this out clearly,” I said, not liking what I was saying, but knowing that I had no room to mince my words right now. “If you try to take this fish from me, I’ll kill you. If you come a step closer towards me, I’ll kill you. If you don’t get away from this lake, I’ll kill you.”
Alex narrowed his eyes, then. He looked at me in a way he hadn’t looked at me before—like I was something other than human. “That’s quite a way to introduce yourself.”
I took a step towards Alex, the knife tight in my grip. “I’m not kidding. Get the hell away from here.”
Alex sighed. He didn’t seem afraid or threatened. He just seemed… well. Disappointed. “I’ll long believe that if we’re to survive and prosper, we have to pull together. All of us. But I dunno. Maybe some of us really are too far over the edge already.”
I thought he was going to step towards me again.
Instead, he shook his head and turned around. “Maybe I’ll come back here some other time.”
As he walked away, I kept my knife raised and watched his every move.
He stopped. Looked back at me. “This’ll come back to haunt you, my friend. It always does. Karma has a funny way of rearing its head in this world.”
“I’ll take my chances,” I said.
Alex smiled. “Me too. Goodbye. And good luck.”
I watched him disappear over the hill. I waited for a while, my knife still raised, just in case he came back.
He didn’t come back.
I looked at the fish then. I took a deep breath and began to cut it apart.
Karma has a funny way of rearing its head in this world.
If only I’d realised how much truth Alex was speaking right then.
Chapter Fifteen
I had to admit the trout I’d caught didn’t taste so nice after I’d shot Alex down to get it. Not literally, fortunately for him.
The day was heading fast towards darkness, and I knew I’d have to utilise the last of the sunlight as much as I could. It was getting cold, too. As well wrapped up in a parka as I was, the tips of my fingers and the tops of my ears were biting cold. I’d always been teased a little for my biggish ears when I was a kid. Nothing nasty, and nothing I couldn’t handle, but they were certainly my most distinctive facial feature. Of course, as I’d got older, my face had filled out and made them less noticeable. But that still didn’t stop them being one of the first places I felt the cold in times like this.
I looked around at the hills ahead of me. I knew I couldn’t be ridiculously far from York. Sure, the whole trip was destined to take a few days. I’d already done a pretty solid day of travelling, and the journey to the Pilchard Industrial Estate itself was pretty straightforward.
I’d had a few run-ins, which didn’t totally surprise me. I could do with some decent food—the fish had a funny taste to it. Maybe it was a taste of guilt.
Yet despite all that, things were rolling along surprisingly smoothly. Bouncer seemed well enough.
I stroked his head, ruffling his fur. “Good lad.”
He tucked his head further under my arm when I did that.
The thing that was bothering me most, as I stood and continued my journey, was Olivia, believe it or not. I’d tried training myself not to be too reactive to thoughts and feelings because what was the point in getting bogged down by intangible things that couldn’t really do you any harm?
But still, the knowledge that she was back there at the barracks while I was out here—me and Bouncer—wracked me with guilt. I trusted Kesha with her, absolutely. But what if something hypothetical happened to her? What if her walking took a turn for the worse, or if she broke her neck falling down some steps? Olivia would be on her own, then.
And sure, Kesha tried to convince me there were good people at the barracks; people who would look out for me if I looked out for them.
But I didn’t believe her. I couldn’t believe her.
It was all too much to take in.
So, shit. I had to do my damnedest to make sure I didn’t let her down.
I remembered the way Olivia had looked at me and told me that I needed to let Kerry go. I remembered how hard it felt to hear those words, from mine and Kerry’s very own daughter.
My daughter, all eight years of her, was worried about me going out there and finding her mother.
If that didn’t say a lot, I didn’t know what would.
I stopped after another couple of miles and rested the map down in front of me. It was crinkled, but I’d marked everywhere I needed to go. It wasn’t easy using a road A-Z to find my way when I was generally staying off the roads. Hell, using an A-Z wasn’t easy after we’d got used to a world of sat-nav and TomToms, full stop.
But I’d planned a route that ran alongside several major roads. Not so major that there might be life there, but major enough to keep track of.
I checked where I was going to make my next turn. I didn’t want to end up on the A1 (M). Motorways were a no-go for several reasons. In the early days, everyone was there, which wasn’t a good thing. They were the first places that would fall under gang control.
But more recently, there was another reason those motorways were a bad thing. Most people, when they realised the world had changed for good, spent a long while wandering around no doubt, trying to figure out what to do. In the end, though, they’d just gone back to their cars. The crisis would resolve itself they’d thought. Everything would be back to normal soon. They just had t
o sit in their cars and wait for things to change.
A lot of those people hadn’t ever left their cars again. They’d died in there.
Death meant disease.
Disease and illness were rife in this new world, and it was more deadly than ever. Illnesses that were previously curable with a round of antibiotics were suddenly fatal, especially now the bulk of the drugs were generally in the hands of some not so nice people.
Sure, there were ways to bargain with those people. But in a world with no money, there were still prices to be paid.
And those people often didn’t take non-payment lightly.
I squinted closer at the map. If I kept on heading straight, I’d eventually reach a bridge that took me over the motorway and into another set of fields, before hitting some woodlands to the side of a rather well built up suburban area. I had to avoid that too, for the reasons I was avoiding everywhere with potential people to run into.
I’d have to be careful crossing the bridge. There could be people tolling it, or…
I saw a speck of rain hit my map.
A second after that, another.
Then another.
Then before I knew it, the rain was pouring.
I looked at Bouncer, who seemed just as bewildered as me.
Then I looked up at the sky. It’d turned a nasty, dark shade of grey.
Somewhere in the distance, I heard rumbling thunder.
“Come on,” I said, standing up and pulling the hood of my parka up. “We’d better get to shelter.”
It was just a bit of rain.
It would soon pass.
At least I thought.
Chapter Sixteen
Kerry ran as fast as she could. She knew she wasn’t going to find a better moment to get away from the hell she’d been living in.
Now was her time.
It was pitch black, and the ground was frozen rock solid. She couldn’t see directly ahead of her but knew that she didn’t need to. Direction wasn’t important. What mattered was just getting away from the situation she’d been in.
She could feel her teeth rattling together and smell the perspiration coming from her body. She felt so nauseous, so sick like she could throw up right now. The pain in her stomach was intense. She felt like she’d been punched. Maybe she had been punched. She couldn’t remember anymore. It was easy to lose track.
She took as many deep breaths as she could as she waded barefoot across the rough, slippery forest floor. She’d never known ice like this before. The ground itself was slippery, like an ice rink, even though she wasn’t on a pavement or anything like that.
The moon was behind the clouds, which was a good thing. She needed the cover of the clouds to keep her hidden for just a little longer.
She heard voices behind her then, but they were muffled and over-stretched, the pitches of them all contorted and wrong. She saw eyes peeking through the trees and heard whispers. She couldn’t focus on them. She just had to keep running. Had to keep going.
She ran even quicker, getting even further away from that hellhole when suddenly she was forced to stop.
There was a cliff edge right ahead of her. The cliff was massive, ten times the height of the white cliffs of Dover. At her feet, some of the rocks fell away.
She couldn’t go this way. She had to turn back. She had to—
When she turned, she saw them standing there.
The dark figures.
All of them hooded.
All of their eyes popping out.
All of their sharp, jagged teeth rattling as they got closer to her.
She backed away, right to the edge of the cliff. It seemed to be stretching even further down. More of these people were surrounding her. She could smell blood in the air and hear screams.
“Please,” she said. “Please don’t.”
“Kerry, it’s okay,” a voice said. She didn’t know where it came from. In a way, it felt like it came from the collective mouth of all of these people. “You’re just… It’s okay…”
The words were getting more surreal, more contorted.
As these people got closer, Kerry knew there was only one thing she could do.
She looked down over the edge of the cliff. It was impossible. Certain death.
But anything was better than death at the hands of these monsters.
“Screw you,” she said, tears streaming down her face. “Screw you.”
She held her breath and thought of her daughter, Olivia, wherever she was.
Then she took a step back.
She expected to go falling over the edge of the cliff.
When she looked down, she realised there wasn’t a cliff there at all.
She was still on solid ground.
Sheer dread filled her body. She couldn’t move a muscle anymore. She couldn’t even speak.
Her eyes raised, though, and when they did, she looked into the eyes of the monsters ahead of her.
They all flew at her.
She screamed, and—
“Kerry!”
She raised her head up from the bed. She was covered in sweat, and her breathing was short and manic. Her heart pounded like mad.
“It’s okay. You’re okay. You were just dreaming. I’ve got you.”
Kerry felt his arms wrap around her, and she felt safe. It was just a dream. Just another of those nasty recurring dreams she’d been having since she’d escaped the clutches of the cannibals.
“What time is it?” she asked.
The man tightened his warm, intense grip around her, and then kissed her cheek. “It’s breakfast. I’ve made some eggs. You want them up here?”
Kerry smiled and shook her head. “It’s fine. I’ll be down in a second.”
“You sure?”
“Positive.”
He climbed off the side of the bed, but he didn’t seem too convinced by Kerry’s assurances that she was fine. “Well, you know where I am if you need me. If any of those nightmare monsters come to get you again.”
He smiled, but Kerry didn’t find it all that amusing. The dreams frightened the life out of her. They were so real.
“Sorry,” he said. “I shouldn’t joke.”
“It’s fine,” Kerry said. “It’s just me. I’m being too sensitive.”
“You’re bound to be, with some of the things you’ve been through.”
“We’ve all been through hell,” she said. “One way or another.”
He smiled at her and at that moment, he looked so handsome. “You don’t have to worry anymore, love. We’re in heaven now.”
He walked out of the room and left Kerry on her own. She could smell the fumes from the eggs downstairs. Light peeked in from behind the curtains. She didn’t know what time it was, but she could only assume she’d slept in late again.
She got some clothes on and dragged herself down the stairs, as much as she wanted to just laze around in bed all day. When she got there, she saw her eggs and toast were sitting on her side of the table. The view outside of the sun and the grounds of their home was nice. The best view in the entire industrial unit, in fact.
He held out his hand and gestured to the food. “Bon appetit,” he said.
Kerry smiled. She didn’t feel hungry, but she appreciated the gesture. He was always full of gestures like this. “Thank you.”
She ate her eggs silently. She knew he didn’t like it when she was too quiet. He got kind of paranoid that he was doing something wrong, which was cute, in a way.
As she was halfway through her eggs, though, she had a sudden memory of something that’d happened just before she’d drifted off to sleep last night. “I heard a gunshot last night,” she said. “Everything okay out there? I was worried about you.”
He looked back at her, and for a moment, the colour disappeared from his face.
Then he smiled like he’d washed away her concerns in the space of a second. “Oh, yeah, everything’s fine. It was just a deer.”
“Did you hit it?”
He puffed out his lips. “You know how hopeless I am at catching deer.”
She smiled a little, and in a moment of spontaneity, he leaned over the table and kissed her.
“Ugh,” she said, turning away. “You don’t want any of my eggy breath.”
“Oh, I love your eggy breath. It’s probably my favourite thing about you.”
She widened her eyes. “Wow. Thank you. Compliments all round.”
He leaned back in his chair; arms outstretched, big grin on his face. “You know what I mean. I love you, Kerry. I love every damned thing about you.”
Kerry wanted to say “I love you” back, mostly just to keep the peace. He was nice, but he could be weird when she didn’t act the way he wanted her to act. Not in obvious, hurtful ways. He didn’t ever hurt her, physically or emotionally. He just… made her feel like she hadn’t been grateful enough for everything he’d done for her.
So even though she could only do one thing when she said the words—think of her ex, Will—she said them anyway, just to keep the peace.
“I love you too, Stu.”
Stu smiled and took a sip of his freshly pressed apple juice.
All was fine with the world today at the Pilchard Industrial Estate.
Chapter Seventeen
It was pitch black, and I was absolutely drenched.
The rain hadn’t let up one bit since it started a good five hours ago. It hadn’t even eased a little. It’d been completely lashing down, non-stop. My parka, supposedly waterproof, was absolutely drenched. Bouncer smelled like wet dog, bless him. And it was cold, too. Even colder with the fact that I was totally soaked in cold water, that wasn’t going to dry as long as I was out here in the cold. It was really awful.
I’d tried finding a good form of shelter, but there’d been nothing safe at all. I’d seen a farm in the distance at one stage, and my hopes had been raised. But then I’d seen firelight outside it, and I knew I couldn’t go there. I had no idea who those people were, or what they might do to me. I had to find my own way.
It wasn’t going to be easy. But at some stage tonight, I was going to have to find some kind of shelter, then try and light a fire outside—if that was even possible after how heavily the rain had been pouring. I had to warm up, and I had to dry my clothes. My teeth were chattering badly enough as it was. I couldn’t let things get to any worse a state.
