Throwback

by Guy N Smith

  A jumble of motor vehicles, a dozen or more minor crashes except for the one in the middle of the road where a lorry had shot the lights and gone over a Mini. The lights were still working, eerily, pointlessly; red, amber, green, but nobody was going anywhere.

  A body lay on the tarmac, stark naked. Man or woman, it was hard to tell because it was mangled and bloody, probably thrown from the crushed car. Jackie thought she might spew again but that feeling of nausea was stopped instantly by an animal-like roar that had her forgetting the carnage.

  A man was coming round the back of a bumped Ford pick-up, shouting hoarsely, pointing at Jackie. In one fleeting second she saw and understood. He was big and muscular, blotched skin like everybody else, and naked from the waist downwards. He wanted her, all right, and for one reason only!

  She broke into a run, her carrier bags bumping and jogging against her, fast strides that scarcely affected her rate of breathing. Weaving her way through the line of cars, aware of his padding bare footsteps. Louder, closer, he would catch her soon, it was inevitable. Her heartbeats speeded up in time with her pounding head.

  And then she heard a scream, half-checked and turned her head back to look. Her pursuer had altered his course, spied a woman propped up in a newsagent's doorway. A couple of bounds and he had her, threw her roughly down on the concrete. She struggled, screamed again but it was futile. So deliberate, so fast, a stag taking his hind by force on the rutting stand. A forced mating, any female was fair game.

  Jackie fled, veered to the other side of the road because she spied a bunch of youths and wanted to avoid passing close to them. They did not appear to notice her. More than her life was at stake.

  With relief she saw and recognised the Monkmoor lights. A phone box; an idea that hurt like a migraine stab almost blanked her out again. She would ring Jon, he would come and rescue her. Whatever had been between them in the past was a strong enough link. He would not desert her in her terrible hour of need.

  Jackie Quinn glanced around, furtively, guiltily. A youth on the opposite side of the road was watching her, yet his expression was not one of lust like the man who had chased her, rather vacant as though he saw but did not understand; almost hypnotised.

  She dragged the heavy glass door open, went inside and let it bang shut behind her, a vibration which jarred her nerves, speeded up the thumping in her head. Jon would come, he did not have to drive through the blocked town. Down the A49; she could even walk down and meet him there. Another thought, perhaps he would not believe her, think that it was some ruse on her part or else she had gone mad. Everything up in the hills would be perfectly normal, nothing untoward ever happened up there. You've got to believe me, Jon. Something's happened, everybody's come out in ghastly rashes and nobody knows what they're doing. Except me and I might go on the blink at any second. It's the Russians! I know it is because ... a man told me it was. Oh God, it sounded lame, a kid's fantasy. You've got to believe me, please. Her head was vibrating as though there were steam pistons in her brain. A robot, controlled by ... Oh Christ Alive, her vision was tunnelling again, like looking down a telescope from the wrong end, seeing just a circle with a tiny grey telephone ringed in it. Start dialling now before it's too late!

  Her forefinger was almost too thick to go in the hole. Fumbling, missing and having to start again. Pushing with all her psychological strength, a tremendous effort.

  0... 5. ..8. ..8. ..4. ..It was going to take hours. The dialling tone started up another vibration in her brain, a minute pneumatic drill boring into her so that the tunnel was becoming even narrower. She could barely make out the numbers now. 8 ... 4 ... One slip and you'll have to start all over again. 5 ... 5 ...

  And then everything went black and red and the receiver was swinging on its flex like a pendulum gone berserk, banging against the pay-box.

  It took Jackie Quinn some time to work out exactly where she was. A wide main road, totally deserted, not even an abandoned vehicle. The river below, a deep muddy current, the grass on either side brown and sun-scorched; dying.

  Just walking, aimlessly, because there was nothing else to do, accepting what she saw with numbed apathy. The fear, the pain were gone. There was nothing left.

  She still carried the plastic bags filled with mushed food because it never occurred to her to discard them, a mindless living thing in a dead world.

  Scattered trees that appeared to have gone into their annual leaf-fall, but if you looked close you saw that the foliage was shrivelled and blackened instead of a golden brown tint. Heat scorched. But Jackie Quinn was not aware of this nor anything else.

  The thumping in her head began again, more persistent and painful than before, bringing with it a glimmering of fear, the beginnings of realisation again. Stopping, holding on to a low branch of a withered tree. Waiting.

  The pain came back, brought everything else with it. Oh God, she hadn't managed to phone Jon, hadn't made it in time. A sensation of helplessness, hopelessness, seeing the scorched countryside and knowing that it was not just a month of hot June weather that had done this. It was . . . she didn't know what it was, only that suddenly the whole world had changed.

  She would go on to Pauline's mother's house. There was a phone there and she would try again. The blackouts were becoming more frequent; she had to hurry.

  Almost running when she saw the traffic island. Miraculously she had continued in the right direction; not far now.

  The pub, its doors closed, an atmosphere of finality about it. The housing estates beyond, people standing about, flesh-scarred caricatures of their former selves, not understanding, not caring. Just living, but for how long? Death was surely the next stage, Jackie prayed that it was because to go on living like this was too awful to contemplate.

  There had been a pile-up on the island, a car and a van meeting head-on, an articulated lorry ploughing the wreckage up on to the concrete, flattening it, a body in the road. No help had arrived and it certainly would not be coming now. Even if it did it was too late.

  She broke into a run, felt her vision beginning to channel before it actually did, forced into the road again where the kerb had been built up in Sundorne Road, not a footpath, just a meaningless raised stretch of tarmac, dangerous because one could so easily fall back into the road; but it didn't matter anymore. There would not be any traffic again, ever.

  Turning left into First Terrace, sensing her power of reasoning beginning to fade. Number One, she knew it so well. Almost derelict, broken slates on the roof, a square hole dug out by the front door where the surveyors had attempted to investigate the subsidence cracking. The grass lawn a foot high, withered as though it had been sprayed with paraquat, the flowering bushes in an advanced state of macabre autumnal change. There had been no rain for months.

  She saw the front gates framed in a tiny circle, dilapidated woodwork that hung heavy on the concrete, her hands closing over them even though they seemed a hundred yards away. Pushing, dragging, almost falling headlong as they yielded to her efforts, a tinkling of metal as a rusted hinge snapped and clinked on the ground.

  The throbbing was fading, that tiny circle magnifying, knowing only too well now what was happening to her. The feeling came and went, her logic an early-morning mist evaporating in the warmth of sunlight. So much stronger again, the waistband of her jeans straining as her body filled with unnatural physical strength.

  Another couple of strides and then everything was gone. She stood there on the short weed-covered drive not knowing where she was nor why she was here, not questioning, still holding on to the carrier bags because there was no reason to jettison them.

  She breathed deeply then found a new rhythm, one that flared her nostrils into wide squat cavities, her lips pulled back to expose strong white teeth, realising that her body cried out for something but not knowing what. Then her stomach rumbled and she knew that she needed food. The bags dropped from her hands, spilling out their contents, but they were ignored; reaching up, pulling at foli
age, sniffing it but it was brown and bitter, unpalatable. She grunted with rage, tore at more branches, cast them aside. And overhead a wheeling crow cawed its own anger and frustration. It, too, was having difficulty in finding food in this burned-up land.

  CHAPTER TWO

  'Jesus CHRIST, what wouldn't I give for some proper food.' Sylvia Atkinson wrinkled her freckled features in disapproval as she chewed on a handful of freshly pulled bean sprouts. 'Being a health food freak isn't my idea of eating, Jon.'

  'It's the difference between surviving or dying.' Jon Quinn regarded her steadily, furrowed his brow and wondered how long it would be before she went over the top, ran up that flight of steps and out into the remnants of the world they had once known. 'At the moment we have two advantages over the rest of the population of Great Britain, maybe even over the western world. We have a seed-sprouter and an almost unlimited supply of fresh food, and, as far as we can tell, we're more or less all right, just like we used to be. God knows how everybody else will finish up, how much longer they'll last. All we can do is stop down here and wait.'

  They ate in silence, everything that had to be said had been said during the last few days. Now they were starting to get on each other's nerves, which was inevitable. He studied her carefully, let his gaze run over the small slim figure clad in a soiled cheese-cloth dress, sandalled feet and purple toenails, ran his eyes all the way back up her again. Her short dark hair was tangled and needed combing but she wasn't in the mood, her complexion so much paler without make-up. Dark eyes that no longer shone, were pouched and baggy underneath. A permanent expression of hopelessness, she was fast giving in, becoming a problem that he could well do without. Jackie had more resilience, would have come up with a few constructive ideas by now. And, that constant nagging thought, where was Jackie?

  Shrewsbury, no doubt. Alive or dead? It was anybody's guess who was alive or dead out there.

  He found himself studying the interior of the cellar again even though every square inch of it was indelibly imprinted on his mind. Boring, but it was the sole reason they were still alive.

  The idea of converting this underground ten-by-ten cubicle into a nuclear fall-out shelter had seemed a crazy whim five years ago but, as he had pointed out to Jackie, it could serve a dual purpose; food storage in case it was ever needed, an ideal place for seed-sprouting and a few mushroom buckets. A potato store, too. That way Jackie had not been so cynical about it, only begrudging the money spent on filters and other items of equipment needed to combat radiation in the atmosphere. All the same, he had constructed the shelter subversively under this ploy, got his own way by cunning. There was no incentive to build something which you hoped you would never have to use but if it had an alternative purpose it wasn't so bad. The ironic part was that Jackie wasn't here so that he could say, 'I told you so.'

  Shelving on two walls, mostly stacked with durable foodstuffs from the health food shop in Knighton. Coffee (decaffeinated), a selection of herb teas, muesli bars, a variety of nuts, tubs of seeds for sprouting, dried vegetables. Eating, for Jon, wasn't any different now from what it had been for years. Jackie wouldn't have minded but Sylvia was yearning for a return to convention. That might never happen, probably wouldn't, but he could not tell her that because it would destroy that last tiny flicker of hope that kept her going.

  Eight years ago he had been just an ordinary clerk working in a Birmingham office, nine to five, Mondays to Fridays, on a take-home of eighty a week. He wasn't well, nothing that you could put your finger on, probably a combination of junk food and boredom that inspired him to vegetate. It was Jackie who had been the driving force behind him, had dragged him out of the rut. Earlier in her life, before their marriage, she had been a vegetarian and she had realised the necessity to find an avenue of escape from their conventional existence. Reading and fantasising about 'the good life' was one thing; having the courage to put it into practice was another.

  The following spring she had persuaded him to dig up the upper-tier lawn of their small semi-detached garden and plant it with vegetables. 'It's a positive start,' she had said. 'Grass is no good unless you've got a goat or a cow, and as local bye-laws prevent us from having either we must use the ground constructively. Mowing lawns is just unconstructive work!'

  The next spring the lower-tier lawn went the same way and Jon's enthusiasm grew. Little by little she had 'enlightened' him; wholewheat bread instead of white sliced, textured vegetable protein replacing the Sunday joint and just as tasty. His health, his whole outlook, improved. The big step was looming up but again he had needed her to give him a shove.

  'We'll sell up, buy a smallholding and take our chance,' she told him one evening.

  'We don't have the money.' His resistance, his townie caution was only to be expected.

  'We will have,' she smiled, 'when we sell this place. Residential houses fetch money and there's a property boom on at the moment. We'll get twenty grand for this house even if it is a semi. That kind of money will buy us a small spread up in those Shropshire hills where land and cottages are relatively cheap. We don't have a lot of mortgage left anyway and it'll be more of a swap . . . this house and your job for a smallholding, and after that it will be up to us.'

  He'd been scared, scared so that he lay in bed each night telling himself what a bloody fool he was but he didn't care because this sort of artificial existence was no more than ticking the years off, waiting for retirement. And when you were retired all you had left was another period of waiting . . . waiting to die.

  It had worked out. The house had been sold and they had found a seven-acre spread and a tumbledown cottage in the hills and had even had a thousand left over after the mortgage was cleared. But without Jackie he wouldn't have made it even then; she had her own ideas about farming, ideas which made them 'cranks' in the eyes of the sparse local community.

  'Look at it this way,' she told him one night after he had spent the day propping up the sagging roof timbers in the old stone cottage. 'If we go in for conventional stock farming we'll be lucky to make a thousand a year with a few cattle and sheep, and that's providing we don't have any mishaps which we probably will have because we're only amateurs, after all.'

  Jon closed his eyes, waited for it. But, after all, she had been right about digging up those lawns.

  'We'll start up an organic farm,' she smiled. 'It'll be hard work but there's a genuine need for the produce. Carrots for cancer sufferers; under alternative treatment they have to drink three pints of organic carrot juice a day, plus goats' milk yoghurt, so we'll keep goats. And garlic, there's a big demand for garlic but most of it is imported. There's lots of other lines we can experiment with too. We won't make a fortune but we'll make a living and most important of all we'll have our freedom.'

  As usual Jackie had been right. It had been hard work, very hard work, and still was but they had made it. Contrary to popular local expectations, they had succeeded in growing their crops on a windswept slope 1,000 feet above sea-ievel, they had built up their own goat herd and even had a billy for stud. They still had the old Citroen Dyane but had managed to buy a battered old canvas-topped Land Rover for farm work as well. That part of it had worked out, but somewhere along the way things had gone wrong for Jon and Jackie; they found themselves drifting apart. These last few days Jon had tried to put his finger on the cause but it had eluded him. In a way he felt guilty about having Sylvia in here with him, occupying Jackie's rightful place in a tiny haven of safety. It was as though he had traded his wife's life for that of his mistress. If Sylvia took it into her head to walk out of here and go on up there, get herself all burned up or whatever, then that was her lookout. No, it wasn't, he'd do his utmost to stop her because if she went then he would be left alone and he could not stand that.

  'How much longer do we have to stay down here?' She broke the long silence, asked a question which he had been asking himself these last couple of days and had not had the courage to take responsibility for the answer.<
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  'Another few days, I guess.' He stared down at the bare concrete floor and wished that he had saved that old piece of coconut matting out of the kitchen instead of burning it. Jackie's motto was that you never got rid of anything. 'That freak gale and rainstorm last night will have helped to disperse whatever was in the atmosphere.'

  'God!' Sylvia covered her face with her hands and for a moment he thought that she was on the verge of hysteria. That's all I bloody need! But when she looked up again that expression of panic had passed. 'It is a nuclear attack.* She spoke calmly. 'It's got to be, hasn't it?'

  'No.' He pursed his lips, shook his head slowly, a physics master aware that he was going to have difficulty getting a new theory over to an intelligent and questioning class. 'It's not a nuclear attack. That much was made plain in the early radio bulletins before they cut out/

  Try the radio again.'

  'I have. Nothing at all. Plus the fact the batteries are beginning to run low. I should've stocked some spares. Next time I will.' He laughed at his own joke, made it sound more unfunny than it was.

  Then what do you think's happened, Jon?'

  'It can only be one thing.' He watched her steadily, wondered if he should put it into words, decided that there really wasn't any point in keeping anything back. 'I reckon it can only be one thing. Germ warfare^

  He saw her pale; it had to be a trick of the uncertain oil lighting because she had been deathly white for days.

  'How do you know?' She asked the question because she felt she was expected to say something.

  'I don't, I'm only guessing. The early reports hinted at a radioactive fall-out but they didn't know where it was coming from. There hadn't been any fireball, any direct attack, nothing picked up on the detection devices. All that was happening was that people were coming out in terrible skin rashes and their minds were going blank. It spread faster than the plague and I guess that when the newsmen caught it that was the end of all means of communication. We're OK because a shelter like this has a far better chance against micro-organisms than it does against radiation.'