The Moon Stealers Box Set. Books 1-4 (Fantasy Dystopian Books for Teenagers)

by Tim Flanagan

  Princes Street to see if anyone had followed them but the roads remained empty. Tracker knocked again as hard as he could without hurting his knuckles.

  From behind the door there was a heavy thud as something was being moved, followed by a metallic sliding sound and a click. The left-hand side of the door opened slightly and the round metal barrel of a handgun emerged from the darkness beyond.

  'We heard the radio broadcast,' said Tracker rapidly. They raised their hands in the air to show that they were not hostile. An eye peered out at them from above the barrel of the gun. It was red rimmed from lack of sleep, with lots of age lines in the corner and deep black bags hanging beneath it. For a while, the owner of the eye only seemed to examine Tracker, squinting as if to double-check who it was that he was actually looking at. An overly long-haired eyebrow lifted slightly and the eye flicked over everyone else.

  'Where are you from?' asked a gravely voice with a strong cockney accent.

  'We've made our way from Yorkshire,' replied Tracker.

  'What's wrong with the boy?' The gun didn’t lower but stayed level, pointing at Tracker, who was nearest to the door.

  'He's sick,' replied Trent.

  'Then he can't come in this entrance. We have to separate the sick from the healthy. Did you come with supplies?'

  'Yes,' said Tracker, speaking for the group. 'We have two cars full of food, water, clothing and medicine, as well as a snow-plough.'

  'I don't see much snow at the moment,' scoffed the voice behind the door. 'What weapons do you have?'

  Tracker, Steven and Georgia lifted up the shotguns they carried. The rest they had left locked in the cars.

  'I need to take them before you can enter.' An aged and lined hand reached through the gap. The nails were bitten ragged, as low as they could go, whilst the back of the hand was dotted with brown speckles, betraying the age of the man hiding behind the door.

  Reluctantly they passed their guns to the man, hoping they were not leaving themselves vulnerable.

  'Take the boy down to the end of this road and wait there. Someone from the Health Section will open another door for you. The rest of you can come in here.'

  The door slowly opened wider, but not fully, and all that could be seen beyond was what looked like a dark narrow corridor. Tracker was the first to take a step inside. Georgia looked at Trent as he nervously began walking along

  Princes Street towards the back of the building. 'Don't worry,' she said to his retreating back. 'We'll come and find you. Stay with Joel.'

  Trent nodded and watched the rest of them step into the massive building. There was a hollow thud as the door closed behind them. Each step Trent took seemed to take more and more effort as he made his way towards the end of the street. He hoped his sick son was not being cast aside or rejected by the survivors inside the bank. The exhaustion of their journey was finally beginning to catch up with him; Joel was heavier in his arms than the day before. At the end of the road, the long featureless side to the Bank of England changed into an archway that formed a tunnel that cut through the corner of the building. As he walked wearily through the tunnel, the sound of his shoes echoed off the stone walls. His feet seemed to drag along the road more than usual. As he emerged from the tunnel, he could see the back of the building stretching along the street, featureless except for a statue that was recessed into the wall. Further on he could see what looked like a small door. When he reached it, he sat down on the pavement with his back against the cold stone of the Bank of England and gently lay Joel next to him, cradling his head in his arm so that it rested against his chest.

  He waited and hoped that he had not been abandoned.

  17. Bank Community

  Inside the Bank of England, the old man that had opened the door was talking through the rules and regulations of the community. They were standing inside a long corridor that smelt old and dusty, and once the door had been closed it became very dark. At one end of the corridor was a small table with a pad of paper and a thick church candle. The light flickered orange on the wood panelled walls and cast shadows deep into the furthest corners. Next to the table was a chair; a pillow was wedged into the back which showed an indentation where the old man had been leaning against it. Tracker noticed a pile of guns propped up against one wall which had now been joined by their own. The man shuffled across to the table. He was about seventy, had trousers pulled up until they almost covered his stomach and a jacket with greasy stains. His head was bent forward in an awkward way, but it didn’t prevent him cautiously watching every move the new visitors made. The man continued to point the hand-gun in their direction. His shaky hand was making Tracker nervous, fearing the trigger might go off accidentally. The deep growling from Mason's throat, also demonstrated the dog's mistrust of the old man too. Annie placed a reassuring hand on his head and scratched behind his ears.

  'Everyone who joins us needs to be logged into this book. You will be assigned a job according to your skills and knowledge.'

  'Who's in charge?' Steven asked.

  'For now, me. Patrols are out searching for supplies everyday. Organisation and planning are being controlled from the American Embassy. Our community leader will return before sundown. Fill this in.' The old man tapped the pad of paper on the table with his index finger.

  Dylan, Shirley and Annie followed the man's instructions without question.

  'Will our friend and his son be alright?' Georgia asked.

  'We have an allocated section of the building in semi-isolation from the rest that contains all of the sick people. The community has the skills of a doctor, as well as several nurses. We've already built a stock of medical supplies and equipment that have been salvaged from local hospitals and clinics. The hand generators provide limited electricity to power only the essential. We have four generators wired up to different areas of the bank. Generally, power is not used for lighting, or heat, and only sparingly for cooking. The health section has two generators, whilst the food section has the other two.'

  'How many survivors are there?' asked Steven.

  Georgia began completing the form on the paper. The old man stood next to Georgia and ran his finger down the list of numbers in one of the columns.

  'At the moment, we have seventy-four healthy members. Although that figure changes every day. Some members don’t come back from patrols, others die whilst defending our groups from other rogue groups or people with disease. Every day the number of healthy members goes down, but the numbers of sick members goes up.'

  'How many sick are there?'

  'I don’t know the exact number, but yesterday it was over one hundred.'

  'Are they all ill from attacks from the creatures?' Steven asked.

  'Only a very small proportion. The rest are all sick and not a pretty sight. The nurses say they develop flu like symptoms followed by complete organ failure. We've even lost a couple of nurses to it.'

  'Do they know what's causing it?'

  'No.'

  Steven exchanged a glance with Georgia, both of them knew that the sick were probably becoming ill from contact with the bacteria. Tracker was now at the table filling in his details.

  'We may be able to help them,' Steven told the old man. 'The sick boy you sent round to the back of the building was suffering from similar symptoms yesterday. I gave him some of these tablets.' Steven held up a box that was now nearly empty. The old man squinted in the gloom at the box. 'Today, he's getting better.'

  'What are they?'

  'Specially developed antibiotics. They are specific to the bacteria that the creatures carry.'

  'How could you possibly know that?' the old man asked suspiciously. 'The creatures only appeared three nights ago. There's no way a medicine could have been developed in such a short space of time, especially with all facilities and scientists out of action.'

  'I was in Yorkshire checking water quality. Some of the animals around there had been getting ill before the creatures appeared. A bacteria had been
identified so the antibiotic was fast-tracked for use in case it should cross over to infect humans.'

  'Why does no one else know about this?' said the old man.

  'There should be stockpiles of it in local clinics across the country. Every member of the community needs to take it, we have all been exposed to the bacteria; everything we touch is probably infected. Without it, every community will slowly die.'

  'I think the American will want to speak to you,' said the old man, rubbing the grey stubble around his chin.

  'Is he the voice we hear on the radio?' Tracker asked.

  Steven stepped up to the table and began filling in his details. It was a straight-forward form with various boxes to fill in. The first was a running total of all records, followed by a column for the first and second names, date of birth and sex. The next space was for job title followed by an empty column. Some of the recorded entrants at the top of the page had dates marked in this final column which Steven presumed were the dates they died.

  'The American immediately took charge of the first group of survivors the morning after the creatures attacked. I've never met him myself, but Wanda, the Bank Community leader, says he is the most organised and prepared person she has ever met. She says he understands how the creatures work.'

  For some reason, Steven decided to write in the occupation column that he was an environmental researcher rather than an MI6 operative. He noticed that Georgia had also done the same, entering research assistant for herself. As Steven finished writing in the record, he glanced to the entry above him, noticing that Tracker had entered himself in as James Tracker. Thinking back to when they had left Butterwick Hall, Steven recalled the parcel that had been delivered, it had been addressed to James Hallington. It seemed likely that Hallington was Trackers real name.

  'The American stays in the embassy,' continued the old man. 'You can always rely on the Americans to be prepared for anything! Apparently a huge supply of food, water and weapons had arrived at the embassy only days before the creatures attacked. He communicates with each community via a network of radios.' The old man seemed to be in awe of the efficiency of their American leader.

  The old man put his handgun inside his trouser pocket, picked up the candle and began walking down the corridor.

  'Follow me,' he said as he pushed his shoulder against one side of the corridor wall. A concealed door swung out into another corridor. The candle gave off very little light so they stayed close together to be able to see where they were going. They followed the candle down a mahogany panelled corridor which smelt old and stale. At intervals the light flickered and danced off the surface of a brass door handle, but the old man didn’t waste time showing them what was behind those doors. He took them through a labyrinth of corridors until they entered a more modern part of the building and turned right.

  'If you followed the corridor behind us, it would take you to the health section,' informed the old man. 'You will find your friend and his son in there, but I would advise you to keep away from the health sector as much as possible - even with your magic tablets.'

  There were some windows along this corridor that looked out into an open courtyard nestled within the bank complex. Daylight came into the corridor from above the courtyard, making them squint slightly after spending the last few minutes in the dark. They rounded the corner until the courtyard was on their left.

  'This is the

  Bullion Court; it's where the bank's gold would have been brought in. Below us are the vaults which hold the gold reserves of the UK, as well as other countries. We found the keys to the vault but steel grills still block the way so we can't reach the gold yet. We have teams of metalworkers down there right now, working to get us in.' 'What good will gold do?' said Georgia.

  'There's over £150 billion worth of gold down there,' the old man licked his lips. 'Can you imagine having that amount of money!'

  'But we should be concentrating on surviving, not getting rich. The creatures don’t care whether you have a pair of shoes with holes in or the latest sports-car, all they're interested in is feeding, and we're the main course!' replied Georgia with disbelief.

  The old man screwed his face up as if Georgia had said something that had offended his nose. 'When the creatures have gone, the world will still need money and those with the most will hold the key to the future. I, for one, want to be part of that.'

  'How do you intend to get rid of the creatures?' asked Steven.

  'The American has a plan. I don't know what it is, but Wanda, the Bank Community leader, says the American thinks there may be a way to rid the creatures from this planet. It was he who personally ordered us to break into the vault and acquire as much of the gold as possible, as well as the reinforced vehicles to transport it. Take it from me, when we move from London, as much of that gold is coming with us as we can carry.'

  'What's in here?' asked Tracker, looking at a pair of large doors that faced the windows to the

  Bullion Court. 'Our vehicles access the bank from Lothbury, the road at the back, and unload their supplies into the Pay Hall.' The old man pushed open one of the doors. 'Every day, the supplies are sorted and catalogued before being distributed to the right section.' The old man walked into a huge rectangular room. Boxes were arranged in organised rows with small gaps between them that were just wide enough to walk between.

  Walking around the side of the Pay Hall, they left the room through another door into a circular room. Around this room were many other doors, but along the side they had just come through were barbeques and camping stoves lined up, together with gas cylinders. Tucked away in one corner were the two generators, humming continuously then vibrating in pulses as the metal casing rattled and rocked from the motion of the engine inside. A thick cable ran from each generator to a group of three cookers that stood side by side, whilst another joined onto a flood light that looked like something from a football stadium. Tracker had no idea where the patrols were getting their supplies from, but he was impressed with their resourcefulness.

  'This was the bank's Dividend Office. We use it as the kitchen. It has doors to all of the surrounding dormitories. Men, women, children and families.' The old man swept a hand around the room indicating the separate sleeping quarters. 'The heat generated by the cooking seeps into each of the sleep sections.'

  The Dividend Office had long continuous rows of tables and chairs pushed together. At one of the tables, four women sat opening tins and chopping potatoes.

  'Why don’t they talk?' Georgia whispered to Steven. She felt guilty breaking the silence in the room, and, by contrast, her whisper sounded like she was shouting.

  The old man heard Georgia.

  'Everyone here has lost something, usually someone they loved. They have all seen death, been hunted by creatures they can't begin to imagine, haven't slept for days and live in fear every night, worried whether the creatures will break in or not. It's no wonder they don't speak - they have nothing left to say.'

  18. Health Sector

  Trent sat on the pavement with his back against the stone wall of the Bank of England, his son's head resting against his chest. Closing his eyes was effortless and had the instant effect of making his head feel heavy until it slumped forward so that his chin rested on his chest. He jerked his head back up and pulled his eyes open but it didn’t take long for the sleepy feeling to overcome him once again. It felt so good when his eyelids slipped down and immersed him within the dark world inside his head. He knew there was no one else around, so he didn’t feel self-conscious or threatened. Even the hard stone against his back seemed as comfortable as a soft pillow. His body tingled with exhaustion. Just a couple of minutes, he told himself. Trent noticed his breathing seemed to coincide with his son's, but the more he concentrated on it, the fuzzier the blackness inside his head became, until he finally fell asleep.

  What felt like only fractions of a second later Trent jerked his head up and opened his eyes. Momentarily, he was confused by his surroun
dings before remembering where he was. He then realised what had woken him. He was staring into a pair of pale blue eyes that were sandwiched between a white surgical hair net above and a green face mask below. The mask was tied behind the ears by white bits of string that stuck out at unusual angles. Trent thought he was dreaming; he still felt drunk from his nap. He quickly realised that he was looking at a young woman dressed in a nurse's uniform who, unusually, was also wearing thick rubber wellies on her feet, and gently shaking his arm. He then looked down and saw that Joel was missing and began to panic.

  'It's ok,' reassured the nurse, 'we've just taken your son inside.'

  The door he had sat next to was open and a man in surgical greens, together with matching wellies, stood with a gun in both hands cautiously watching up and down the road.

  'Can you stand?' asked the nurse.

  Trent stood up and followed the nurse into the bank. The door went into a short stone lined tunnel. Behind them, the man with the gun pushed the door shut with a loud thud that echoed off the walls. It went momentarily dark until the nurse opened the next door at the end of the tunnel. This led into a small room where tall fabric curtains hanging from metal mobile frames shielded the walls. Trent took a step forward.

  'Wait there,' said the nurse as she reached the next door.

  The man with the gun closed the curtains around Trent until he was shielded on all sides by the waxy fabric as if he was in a shower cubical. 'Please remove your clothing and put them inside the bag. We need to disinfect you to prevent you bringing any germs into the Bank Community health section.'

  Trent did as he was told. He took off his clothing and placed them into a yellow incineration bag that was hanging on a hook at the side of one of the curtain frames. With a rustle, a hand appeared through the curtain and pulled the bag off the hook.