School's Out Forever (afterblight chronicles)

by Scott K. Andrews

  As Tariq watched the kids climb into the containers her felt a tug at his jacket and turned to find a familiar face looking up at him.

  “They won’t give me a gun,” pouted Jenni.

  Tariq smiled, glad to see she was still alive. “That’s because you’re still only thirteen.”

  “But you gave me a gun before and I managed not to accidentally shoot anybody with it,” she said. “Please, Tariq. Pretty please.”

  He reached into his kit bag and handed her a Browning. “Okay, but don’t tell the guy with the bow and arrow, all right?”

  The girl went up on tiptoes and kissed Tariq on the cheek. “You’re a sweetheart,” she said.

  The Iraqi was surprised to find himself blushing. Jenni secreted the gun inside her coat, but didn’t move to join the other kids in the lorry. She glanced around furtively, as if looking for someone, then pulled him down the side of the lorry, out of sight.

  “Listen,” she said. “There’s something you should know about John Keegan…”

  THE SURVIVING SNATCHER was installed behind the driver’s seat of the lead vehicle. He was in his mid-thirties, solid and capable looking, dressed in combats. Tariq thought that if he’d had to kill one of the captives, this was the one he’d have killed; the one Caroline stabbed had been snivelling and broken. This one was more composed. The Iraqi sat beside him, knife in his lap.

  “Here’s what you have to do,” he said. “You lead the convoy to Parliament. If we’re challenged when we arrive, you say Heathrow came under attack by unknown forces and you managed to escape. All we want to do is get inside the perimeter fence. Once we’re in, I swear you’ll be free to go. Understand?”

  The snatcher nodded and turned the ignition.

  They drove through the night, making slow progress down roads clogged with vehicles abandoned by the fleeing masses during The Culling Year.

  The snow came down in thick, solid looking flakes, reducing visibility and making the going harder as they progressed. For a while Tariq thought they wouldn’t make it, but as the day drew to a close they pulled up outside the tall black metal fence that ringed the Palace of Westminster. Big Ben loomed above them in the blizzard, marking the time as twenty past seven. They were actually a little early but that was okay.

  The light was pre-dawn murky and the air was thick with snow as the snatcher honked his horn.

  “Remember, once we’re in, you can go,” said Tariq, knife in hand. “Just don’t try anything.”

  A minute later there was a knock at the window. The driver wound it down.

  “What the fuck you doing here, Tel?” asked the guard, shivering despite the thick Puffa jacket he was wearing.

  “We had a bit of business, mate,” said the snatcher. “Someone attacked us at the airport. Had to evacuate. Let us in, will you? I’m bloody freezing.”

  “You and me both. All right, put them underground.” The guard stepped back and waved them forward.

  The gate swung open and the three lorries pulled into the courtyard. The snatcher swung the lorry round and drove down a concrete ramp into the underground car park. He pulled into a bay and switched off the engine. The other two lorries pulled up alongside.

  Tariq opened the door and stepped out. He gave the thumbs up to Wilkes, who sat in the cab of the adjacent lorry, looking unenthusiastic.

  But Tariq’s triumph was short-lived. There was a cacophony of boots as men streamed down the ramp and burst through the interior doors, machine guns in hand.

  Tariq stood frozen to the spot as the lorries were encircled by ten very well armed, very angry looking soldiers. The guard from the gate stepped forward and met the snatcher who had driven the lorry, by now out of the cab and running to meet his comrades. He took a gun from the guard and walked up to Tariq, smiling.

  “I didn’t give the password, dipshit,” said the snatcher. “What, you think we’re amateurs? We’re SAS, pal. And you are really going to regret fucking with us.”

  CHAPTER TWENTY-THREE

  I CAN HEAR Big Ben chiming midnight as I lie in bed, unable to sleep.

  I’ve been given a room in the Speaker’s Cottage. It’s luxurious, furnished with lovely antiques that have been polished to a fine lustre, and the flock wallpaper feels expensive. The bed is huge and comfy, the eiderdown deep and warm. The window looks out over the river and catches the rising sun in the morning. It’s a very nice room indeed.

  But it’s a gilded cage. Cooper sleeps next door in an even more opulent chamber, and when he escorts me to bed in the evening he locks my door so I cannot sneak out and kill him as he sleeps.

  I lie awake listening to the creaks and echoes of this old building as the night cold grips its bones. I can hear Cooper pacing the floor. He’s not exactly walking up and down outside — he ranges wider than that — but every few minutes his soft footfalls pass by my room and I hold my breath, listening for the key in the lock. So far he’s always kept walking, but this time around he’s stopped outside my door.

  Silence falls as I lie there, holding my breath, waiting for him to enter or leave. He’s been there for five minutes now. What is he doing? Listening at the door? Wrestling with his conscience? Plucking up the courage to come in? The silence lasts so long that I begin to doubt what I heard. Maybe I just didn’t hear him leave. He can’t have been standing out there, motionless, for so long, can he? That’s paranoid.

  Yet I feel that just by listening for him I’ve been drawn into a deadly game of cat and mouse. I consider getting out of bed, creeping to the door and peering out the keyhole. But if he hears me moving around that may catalyse a decision, lead directly to him entering.

  So I lie here, listening to the sound that is no sound — the sound of a man trying to decide my fate.

  I was surprised when I found the women in the Lords. Not because I didn’t realise such a place probably existed — armed men who run internment camps have always kept women for their use, from the comfort women to the women kept alive for ‘special duties’ in the concentration camps. No, what really surprises me is that Cooper visits them himself. He had been so insistent that he never had any of the women or girls that he trafficked before The Cull. I believe him, too. Now, it seems he no longer feels the need for such restraint. He even has a favourite. I wonder what insight Jools might be able to give me into the real man.

  I resolve to go and talk to her again in the morning. My movements around the Palace are not restricted, but I am closely watched and another visit to the Lords risks arousing Cooper’s suspicion. Still, I need allies, and those women are the best I can hope for right now.

  I hear a sound outside my window, like a sharp crack. The air is thick with snow and all sound is muffled, so I have no idea where it came from or what it was. A drifting boat bumping against the embankment, perhaps?

  There are no more sounds and I realise that it distracted me. Has Cooper crept away while I wasn’t paying attention?

  The silent waiting resumes. Another five minutes pass and I can feel my eyelids starting to droop in spite of myself. Sod this, I think. I’m going to sleep. I turn over, pull the eiderdown up to my cheek, and close my eyes.

  The instant I do this I hear a loud banging on the door of the cottage. My eyes snap open. I hear Cooper turn and walk away from my door — so he was still there! — and go to answer. I have a feeling that whatever has occurred may provide an opportunity, so after a second’s consideration I jump out of bed and pull on my jeans, jumper and shoes.

  I tiptoe to the door, grabbing a glass from the dressing table as I do so, placing it against the thick wood, trying to hear what’s going on. It’s hopeless, though; all I can hear is the muffled drone of their conversation.

  Then there are hurrying footsteps coming my way. I leap backwards as the key is thrust into the lock. I stand in the middle of the floor, fully dressed, no point trying to pretend I was asleep. The door opens and Cooper stands framed there for a moment, surprised to find me up and about. His surprise soon pass
es.

  “Kate, I need your help,” he says. “Come with me, please.”

  Over his shoulder I can see one of his goons standing expectantly in the hallway, machine gun at the ready.

  “Help with what?” I ask, not moving.

  He pulls a handgun from his waistband. “You’ll see,” he says. He steps forward, grabs my wrist and pulls me after him.

  “Hey!” I protest, but he spins and snarls at me with such menace that I’m momentarily silenced. Even when he slapped me he seemed in control, but in this brief instant I catch a glimpse of a different Cooper — furious, savage and ruthless, almost feral.

  ‘Ah-ha,’ I think. ‘There you are!’

  He drags me down a small winding back staircase to the ground floor, through a series of carpeted corridors — green carpet, meaning we’re in the Commons — then into the corridor that joins Commons to Lords, through the central lobby and up to the closed doors of the Lords itself.

  There are six or seven of his soldiers gathered at various vantage points, all with their guns trained on the doors. The air smells of cordite. Unconcerned by the fact that his men are staying in cover, Cooper walks right up to the doors, still pulling me behind him. He stands in front of the doors for a moment then kicks them open and strides into the ornate, high-ceiling chamber.

  The women are gathered in a line on the back bench to my left. They’re all sitting bolt upright with their hands upon their heads, eyes wide and fearful. In the middle of the room, on the big red cushion they call the woolsack, stands a man in a hoodie with a bow and arrow. The string is taut, the shaft of the arrow aimed straight at Cooper’s heart. My mind races. This is one of Hood’s Rangers. Have they decided to take Cooper down? Is this the beginning of an assault? I feel a momentary rush of hope but then damp it down. There’s no firing from anywhere in the building, no sounds of combat or attack. No, this is one man. Here to deliver a message, maybe?

  It occurs to me that it might actually be Hood himself.

  Cooper pulls me to his side, wrapping his left arm around my throat and holding his gun to my temple.

  “Drop it or she dies,” he yells.

  The hooded man stands there, unmoved. He doesn’t say a word.

  Cooper lifts the gun an inch and fires a round just over my head, deafening me and making me yelp in surprise. I inwardly curse myself for being such a wuss. This is the point where I should bite his wrist or stamp on his foot, distract him for a moment and run for it. But there’s a small army behind me and only one man ahead.

  “I dunno who you think I am, but I have no idea who that woman is. Why should I care if she lives or dies?” The Ranger has a thick Irish accent. Not Hood, then. He’s a bit shit, too, ’cause I’ve never met him before in my life but already I can tell he’s bluffing.

  Cooper drops the gun so it’s pointing at the floor. For a moment I think he’s backing down but then, the instant before he fires, I realise what he’s about to do.

  “No,” I shout, but my cry is drowned out by the percussive blast that sends a small lump of lead into my right foot.

  I scream in agony and go limp, unable to stand. Cooper’s arm is tight around my neck, holding me upright. I begin to choke. As the blood pounds in my ears and my vision blurs I hear a voice shouting:

  “All right, all right! We surrender!”

  Lee?

  CHAPTER TWENTY-FOUR

  “I’M SORRY ABOUT that, Kate,” said the man I assumed was Spider as he handed Jane the syringe.

  She took it without making eye contact and stuck it into her ankle, depressing the plunger. A few moments later her shoulders relaxed as the morphine did its work.

  I knelt on the hard tiled floor of the central lobby with my hands on my head, fingers interlaced. The muzzle of a rifle rested gently on the nape of my neck, ready to end me if Spider gave the order. Ferguson was on his knees next to me in the same predicament. I’d counted seven soldiers in the lobby with us, mostly dressed in black or combats, all heavily armed. I could tell they were proper soldiers, not followers who’d joined after The Cull; something about their bearing and expressions told me they were professionals.

  Corridors ran off the circular lobby in four directions, and white statues stood against the walls, regarding us coldly.

  Spider was physically unprepossessing. Of slightly less than average height, he had blond hair and blue eyes but lacked Brad Pitt’s good looks. He didn’t have that quality of madness about him that Mac or David had possessed, nor the world weary doggedness of Blythe. He seemed kind of ordinary.

  I didn’t doubt he’d have killed Jane, though.

  Ordinary, then, but dangerous.

  “Do you have a surgeon?” asked Jane through gritted teeth. She sat on a chair against the far wall, white as a sheet.

  “I’m afraid not,” he replied, seeming genuinely apologetic. “We make do and mend.”

  Kate grimaced. “Fine,” she said. “How about antibiotics?”

  “Yes, we have those.”

  “Good. I want to get over to St Thomas’, I can patch myself up there, assuming any of the equipment still works.”

  “I’ll detail one of my men to take you there now.” The boss nodded to a soldier to his left, who stepped forward and helped Jane to stand.

  She hopped away but just before she left the lobby she turned and said: “Oh, and Cooper?”

  Spider, who had been staring at me intently with a nasty smile on his face, looked away.

  “Yes, Kate?”

  “If you hurt either of them. At all. I will kill you.”

  He laughed. “Oh, Kate, please. You didn’t manage to exact revenge last time. What makes you think you’ll manage it this time?” He paused for effect, then said: “Don’t worry. They’ll still be here when you get back. Probably.”

  She limped around the corner and Spider turned to us again. He knelt in front of me.

  “Five years I’ve been running things here,” he said. “Five years. I have a team of highly trained, heavily armed special forces at my disposal and an army of daft religious nutters out there who think I’m the representative of the Messiah. In all that time I’ve had plenty of people try to break out of here, but no-one’s ever been stupid enough to break in before. Why on God’s Earth would you do such a stupid thing?”

  “Good question,” I answered.

  “It wasn’t rhetorical,” he said, allowing an edge of menace to creep into his voice.

  “Should I call you Spider or Cooper?” I asked.

  He appeared to consider this seriously. “You can call me Cooper,” he said at length.

  “Well, Coop, I guess you could say I have a compulsion.”

  “What would that be, then?”

  “I feel compelled to hunt down murderous bastards and wipe them out.”

  He narrowed his eyes and pursed his lips, considering my admittedly weak bravado.

  “And how’s that worked out for you?”

  “Well, three years ago me and my friends managed to wipe out a cannibal cult that was terrorising the countryside. Not as well armed as you guys, but they were all naked and bathed in fresh human blood, so they were a little scarier, I think.”

  “Good for you.”

  “And then, of course, there was the Americans.”

  “Excuse me?”

  “The Americans army invaded a couple of years back. You may have missed the memo.”

  “No, no, believe me, I got that one.”

  “They didn’t last long.”

  Cooper barked a sudden laugh and clapped his hands.

  “Are you trying to tell me,” he said, “that you single-handedly fought off the US Army?”

  “Not single-handedly, no. I had an eleven-year-old boy helping me. But essentially, yeah.”

  “And how did you do that, exactly?”

  “We nuked the fuckers.”

  “You nuked the fuckers.”

  “Yup.”

  He stared deep into my eyes. I stared back an
d smiled.

  “You know,” he said. “I almost believe you. And this is how you go about killing bad guys, is it? You wander into their bases with some stupid plan and get yourself captured?”

  The soldiers standing around us sniggered.

  “Um, actually yeah, it kind of is.”

  And then what do you? Manufacture some miraculous escape? Call in the cavalry? Light the Bat-signal?”

  More laughs.

  “No, I just wait.”

  “For?”

  “A mistake.”

  He leaned in close ’til I could feel his hot breath on my face. “I don’t make mistakes, kid.”

  He held my gaze for a moment then asked: “So how do you know Kate? No, wait, let me guess. You’re one of the boys from St Mark’s, yes?”

  I nodded.

  “I used to go to school there,” he said. Which teachers survived The Cull?”

  “Bates and Chambers.”

  “Didn’t know Bates. Liked Chambers, though. Maybe I’ll have him over for dinner once I’ve taken the school.”

  I shook my head. “Nah, he died a while back.”

  “Pity. Where is the school now, by the way? I sent a team there last year and it was just a burnt out wreck.”

  “We’re somewhere you’ll never find us.”

  “I could torture you. You’d tell us eventually.”

  “I was waterboarded in Iraq, pal. Bring it on.”

  Again he laughs. “Iraq, now? I can’t decide if you’re a superhero or a fantasist or both. You’re certainly entertaining, I’ll give you that. Final question: how long have you and Kate been together?”

  “If you mean Jane, she’s my Matron and that’s all.”

  “She may be Jane when she’s at school, but here she’s Kate. Trust me on that. And you’re lying, but I don’t hold it against you. I should probably keep you alive, use the threat of killing you to make her tell me where the school is. But something tells me that you’re more dangerous than you seem. So, firing squad at dawn, I reckon.”

  I just smiled at him. Our part of the plan might have failed, but if Tariq and the others kept to their schedule, they’d be here before dawn. I looked sideways and saw the snow falling through a far off window and bit my lip.