The tent’s opening swished aside and Mojito stepped in. “How’s the boy?” he asked.
Ana quietly shook her head. “Paul,” she asked, “can I get you some water? Or maybe you should–”
“I’m all right, Ana.” He looked her in the eyes. “I have to do something.”
Mojito bent over Ady, studying the wounds. Paul noticed some degree of interest, but very little sympathy in his eyes.
“Not looking good, is he?”
Paul felt like punching him in the face.
“There is one place you could take him…” Ana began, thoughtfully. When Paul turned to her, she waved her hands in the air, dismissing the thought. “No, no, that’s stupid.”
“Tell me, Ana. Please.”
She hesitated. “Well… Ady needs proper medical care… the only people who are likely to have it – and I mean likely, not for sure – are…”
Paul finished for her. “… the Warden’s men.”
She nodded. “In Bately. Yes.”
Mojito sniffed. “You’d have to get there fast, by the looks of it.”
Ana threw him a dirty look. Then, she brightened up. “We have a pick-up truck!” she said.
They turned towards her. “It’s the only one left,” she explained. “Very little fuel, but it should be enough to get you to Bately.”
Paul rose, ready to leave.
“Hang on a minute,” Mojito said. “If it’s the only vehicle left in the Pack, I can’t allow it.”
Ana’s jaw dropped. “You’re joking,” she said.
Paul gritted his teeth. “Listen here, you–”
“Sorry Paul,” the ’wraith said. “It’s not going to happen. We might need it to communicate with the Queen. She’s on her way here now. Might get here any minute, but until then, we need the truck.”
Ana sighed in frustration. “But you have the horses!”
“Aye, we do. But they’re knackered old bastards. Plus, it’s good to have options.”
“Options?” Paul cried. “This boy is dying right here, in case you haven’t noticed, you bastard!”
“Sorry Paul, bigger fish to fry, I’m afraid,” came Mojito’s unbearable reply.
Ana considered the young priest. He looked terrible. Head bandaged, to conceal his blind eye, skin covered in that condition of his (psoriasis, he’d called it), clothes in tatters. Mojito had told her Paul could easily be mistaken for a ’wraith. It was true. And yet, despite all that, Paul seemed determined to fight his way out of there and onto that truck, with the boy. Even if his opponent towered above him, younger, fitter, despite the Affliction.
If he tries to attack Mojito, they’ll kill him. No doubt about it.
“I’ll go with him,” Ana said, stepping between them.
“I’m afraid that’s not an option, either,” said Mojito, raising his hands in the air. “With those cunts in black out there, I don’t want any of the ’wraiths wandering off. Especially not the newly elected Alpha Wraith.”
This Alpha Wraith seems to have very little decision-making power, Ana thought.
“Mojito!” a voice called, from outside. “Sir, the scouts are here, ready to report back.”
“Coming,” he replied. Then, with mock-concern on his noseless face, he said, “Paul, why don’t you wait here with the poor lad for a bit? The Alpha Wraith and I have pressing business to deal with. Then, we’ll concentrate on the boy. All right?”
Paul was about to reply, when Ana squeezed his arm. Wait, her expression said. Calm down.
“I’ll be back soon,” she said. “You sit by his side. We’ll think of something.”
Paul nodded, unconvinced. She could tell his mind was elsewhere. Desperately trying to find a way to get Ady to Bately.
So was hers.
* * *
Paul sat alone for endless minutes, his mind too crowded to even think.
He held Ady’s hand in his, thumb pressing against the child’s wrist, to make sure his pulse was still beating. As long as it was, there was hope.
“Pssssst.”
He looked up, towards the tent’s entrance. No one there.
“Psssssst… Paul… out here.”
Slowly, Paul stood, and drew the worn fabric of the tent aside. Peering out, he spotted the man—the prisoner, the one the ’wraith vanguard had dragged along with it. Thick chains still fastened him to a pole in the ground.
“Do you need water?” asked Paul, reaching for his own canteen. The man hesitated, then nodded. There was something else.
“Yeah, cheers. Come close.”
When he was standing next to him, the man asked, “How’s the boy?” His concern was genuine.
Paul sighed. “Not too well.”
“I’m sorry mate, I really am. Sweet young kid.” Then, lowering his voice, “Listen… I overheard you, in the tent… talking about Bately.”
Paul nodded. “What about it?”
Again, the man looked about them, making sure no one was around. “That’s where I was headed. Before they caught me, that is.”
“Was it?” asked Paul. He wanted to get back into the tent.
“Yes. Well, sort of… somewhere close to Bately, along the coast…” he stopped to think.
“Listen,” said Paul, “I’m sorry, I can give you the water, but I really want to get back inside–”
“Wait,” the other man said, grasping his sleeve. “If you do get there, and say they actually somehow manage to cure the boy, what then?”
Paul shuffled his feet. This man was wasting his time. He had to find a way to leave.
“Look, I don’t know. I haven’t thought about it. For now, all I want is–”
“Then you leave, that’s what.”
Paul frowned. “Leave? Where to?”
“Three days from now. At midday. A boat—a gulet or something, will be there along the beach, south of Bately.” The man quickly described the spot. “It’s big, enough to fit ten, twelve people. Three people, good people, will be on board already, but they’ll have plenty of room to spare. Especially if it’s just the two of you.”
“Where will they go?”
“To the League. Down south. Dangerous journey, of course, but people say things are different there. Safe.” He looked at Paul intently. “I don’t think I’m going to make it, mate. But you’re a good man. You and that boy, you should go.”
The League—Paul had heard of it. Most people had. The south of Italy, some Greek islands. A happy place, a network of communities, where people had re-built. Like they had, in Bately. Only, the League had succeeded. It was, of course, the stuff of legend. Strands of information gleaned from Sean’s online sources, but little else. Wishful thinking, nothing more.
As if reading his thoughts, the man said, “It’s real. Believe me, Paul. It is, and you have to get there, if you want that kid to grow up in a place that’s half-decent.”
“O-okay,” Paul muttered, the prospect of finally finding a safe place for the children warming his heart. “Thank you.”
“Remember,” the prisoner said, before repeating the exact location the boat would be. “Midday. Make it sharp. They won’t wait for long. Be there, and leave.”
Suddenly, the man straightened his back and said, “Thanks for the water, mate.” His tone was different, wary. Paul turned and noticed Ana walking hurriedly towards them. She pointed her chin at the tent.
Before leaving, Paul shook the prisoner’s hand. “Thanks again. I mean it.”
Whether or not his story was true, and whether that even made any difference, the prisoner’s words had given him a glimmer of hope: something Paul was quickly running out of.
“He just wanted some water,” Paul said, as he reached Ana by the tent.
She ignored him, and pressed something into his palm. Something small and hard, like a blunt knife.
“It’s the keys to the truck,” she said. “Let’s get Ady on it now. Then, you leave, and make it quick.”
With his heart pounding, Paul
followed her into the tent.
* * *
A few minutes later, he was standing next to the truck. Ana had finished laying Ady on the back seat, covering him and strapping him in as best she could.
“Ana, I don’t know how to–”
“Forget all that. You gotta go, before they realise something’s up.”
“What about you?”
“I’ll tell them you must’ve stolen it. I’ll get Sixfingers to say she saw you.”
Paul opened the door to the driver’s seat. He hesitated. “Will you be safe?”
She sighed. “These are my people, Paul. They won’t harm me.” He wasn’t convinced. Not entirely. “Yes, I’ll be safe,” she added, pushing him inside the truck. “Now, get out of here.”
Paul sat at the wheel, and noticed the low fuel warning light was on. He held his breath, hoping it would be enough to get them to Bately.
With a long glance and no words spoken, he turned the key in the ignition, stepped on the accelerator, and left Ana and the Pack behind him.
Chapter 3
Sea of Sands
Atlantis was their destination, and this desert was the sea. A dead, rain-battered stretch of brown.
Sean peered out of the passenger window, his eyes drifting from one ripple in the sand to another. Spotting a rock, or a dune, or blurry specks of things he couldn’t recognise, as they flew by outside. Once, he’d seen bodies. Two of them, huddled close, their clothes in tatters. A ghostly wind danced in their hair, and Sean couldn’t look away. When the bodies were gone, swallowed by the road behind them, he turned to his fellow passengers. Neither Jeremy nor Checkmate had seen them. If they had, they said nothing. There were many long stretches of silence, during their journey.
Sean preferred the silence. The alternative was Jeremy’s vague, excited praise of them, the two young hackers, and the task that lay before them.
“You should be proud, lads. So proud,” he’d say, nodding gravely. It made Sean feel sick.
Beside him, Checkmate was writing code in a notebook. Pen and paper, to avoid wasting his laptop’s battery. Functions, classes, snippets of scripts that made Sean wonder just how insane the kid was. How could he sit there, quietly writing programs, while they were travelling to who-knew-where, with a smelly hippie psychopath as their guide?
He tried to relax. Jeremy had promised the greatest hacking feat in the history of humanity. There was little left to live for, after all, so he might as well enjoy the challenge.
Sean turned towards the empty seat beside Jeremy. Not quite empty, actually. The automatic weapon was there, its muzzle rocking gently along with the car.
Yes, he’d just try to focus on the hacking.
All things considered, he really had no choice.
* * *
Two days after leaving the insanity of the Colony, Sean, Jeremy and Checkmate saw Atlantis.
“Here we are,” Jeremy said. He sounded like a triumphant general.
Checkmate dropped his laptop and leaned forward. Beside him, Sean did the same.
There once had been a road here. A real one, not just an ever-shifting mass of sand. You could see it, beneath the dirt, peering out like raw meat through an open wound. And this broken road led straight ahead, to Atlantis.
It was surreal. A spectral group of modern buildings, rising from the sands. Sean saw three rings of barbed wire fences surrounding it. They were adorned with the occasional turret, now unmanned. It was as grand as it was decaying.
In the distance, just before the horizon, Sean spotted the profile of a small town. It looked like the ones you sometimes saw in American films, two rows of buildings along a sleepy Main Street. He imagined there’d be a diner, somewhere. Maybe the people from Atlantis would hang out there, sometimes, leaving the mysterious complex and heading out for a cup of coffee, and a chat with the intrigued locals.
Jeremy kept driving towards the military base, slowing down a little, to increase the dramatic effect. Above them, the sky was a whirl of thick greys and blacks.
There was a series of three gates ahead of them. Someone (perhaps fleeing the base) had driven some sort of vehicle through them. Steel bars and tangles of wires jutted outwards, towards the road, torn from the rest of the security fencing.
Jeremy drove the truck through each of the ragged openings, his eyes fixed beyond them, to Atlantis’s main entrance.
“Beautiful, isn’t it?” he asked, as he turned the key in the ignition, bringing the engine to a halt. They sat there for a while, eyeing the structure, and Sean thought there was nothing beautiful about it. Nothing at all.
Jeremy sighed, shaking his head, as if contemplating some great work of art. Then, he reached out for the rifle and opened the truck’s door. “Time to go, kids. Follow me,” he said cheerfully, as he hopped out.
Sean felt Checkmate’s eyes on him. He did that all the time, and it pissed Sean off. Rather than stare back, he hesitantly opened his own door and stepped out onto the muddy tarmac.
He noticed two things.
First the dead body. Then the cameras.
The corpse lay to their right. It was a woman, dressed in ragged clothes. She was covered in dirt and dry blood. There were flies, too. Lots of them. A thick black buzzing cloud, but not dense enough to conceal the wound in her head. A gunshot, maybe. Someone had killed her and dragged her out here. As a warning, perhaps.
Sean raised his gaze towards the CCTV cameras. They were moving—brief, robotic motions that eventually led all lenses to focus on them. The intruders.
“Don’t worry boys,” Jeremy said indifferently, as he threw a careless glance to both body and cameras. He paused, then added, “We’re meant to be here.”
“Y-yes,” muttered Checkmate, who was trying very hard not to look at the corpse.
They walked towards the main entrance. It wasn’t a simple door. Rather, some sort of hatch, with thick metal and glass to protect it. Beyond it was a vast empty space. Sean could see doors, lifts, a large reception area, and little else. Empty.
As they peered in, they heard a little buzzing sound. It was right there, above their heads, slightly to the right. Another camera.
Sean watched the lenses slip forward and the aperture behind them widen. Like a dark, inquisitive eye fixing its anger upon them.
He felt a shiver run down his spine.
Jeremy giggled. With a wide smile, he raised his hand and waved. “Hey there buddy!” he said to the camera. “They told you we’d be popping by, right?”
Something told Sean that whoever was inside that abandoned base, he or she most definitely wasn’t their buddy.
Jeremy pointed his index finger out, gun-like, cocked his thumb, and mimed a shot straight at the camera. He blew away the imaginary smoke from his fingertip.
“Relax, guys,” he said, turning to them. “Anyway, there’s no time to sit there and shiver like a couple of sissies.” He flicked something in the air, towards Sean. Instinctively, he held out his hand, as a small object fell into his open palm. It was a USB stick.
“Come on now, it’s time for a little warm-up exercise.” Jeremy nodded towards the memory stick. “Connect that to your computer.” Then, he simply sat down, the rifle spread across his legs.
Both boys imitated him, despite the absurdity of the situation. Sean flipped open his laptop (a strangely reassuring gesture, one he’d missed), and attached the USB stick to one of the ports.
“Plain text files,” Checkmate commented, over his shoulder.
“Open the Wi-Fi one,” said Jeremy, stretching his back.
Sean let the cursor hover to a file called ’wifi_passwds.txt,’ and clicked. Two columns appeared, one containing a list of twenty-two Wi-Fi network names. The other was a list of their respective passwords.
“They’re the base’s Wi-Fi networks,” said Checkmate, uselessly.
“Precisely,” said Jeremy, who appeared to have assumed some sort of yoga position. He spoke to them through closed eyes. “But some are
likely hidden, so you’ll have to search for them manually.”
Sean studied the list for a minute, then shook his head. “Surely whoever is in there will have changed all these by now, right?”
Before replying, Jeremy straightened his back and brought both hands in front of him, thumbs and index fingers closed in rings, palms upward. “Hopefully not,” he said.
“Hopefully not?!” Sean couldn’t believe it. “Is this your plan?! Break into this nightmare military base, hoping they haven’t changed their pass–”
This time, Jeremy did open his eyes. Just a crack, but it was enough for Sean to shut up.
“Watch your tone, young man,” Jeremy said, his voice low, cold and threatening. Then, cheering up again, he added, “Come on now, get to work. Even I could do this. And if you do end up having to hack into the network, I’m sure that’s pretty basic stuff for two pros like you, right?”
Sean swallowed. He fired up a terminal window and began typing.
As he did, his mind wandered to the CCTV camera above him. Who was studying them, at the other end of the video feed? Who were these mysterious people who shot women in the head and left them to rot outside? Who ruled this abandoned military base, now that the world had collapsed?
Whoever it was, they gave Sean the chills.
Chapter 4
Walscombe
James Walscombe, PhD, Senior Security Engineer and recently self-appointed King of Atlantis, sat slouched forward, eyes glued to the screens in front of him.
His knees were covered in crumbs from the crackers he’d idly been munching on. Before the vehicle had shown up, that is. After that, he’d somewhat lost his appetite.
The lights were low, in S&S, the small surveillance room that oversaw the camera feeds and controlled access to the blast hatches throughout the base. In front of him, on the control desk, was a cup of tasteless coffee, and a small vase plant that went by the name of Aubrey.
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