Jay had taken only a couple of steps in Ellen's direction when Bob let out a long shriek. Jay wanted to keep moving but he couldn't help turning. Bob had dragged its legs free of the windscreen and in so doing had lost shoe, sock and most of the skin from its foot. Blood spilled onto the bonnet, running down to the floor. Still shrieking, Bob leapt from the van, lurched toward Jay, then dropped to its knees. It tried to get back to its feet but only managed to rise halfway before falling again. It looked back at its wounded leg, drawing Jay's eye to what looked like a stub of gristly cable protruding just above the heel. It had severed its Achilles tendon, Jay realised. Unable to walk, its shrieking dropping to a low, steady moan, it began crawling toward him.
Jay was about to give thanks to Whoever for this nugget of good fortune when he noticed the collective silhouette of the hyenas filling the main exit and growing as they moved toward him. He couldn't follow Ellen; even if he could make it to the ramp before they caught up with him, they'd follow him up the stairs and, once they were on the roof, where would they go? They'd be trapped. He looked around for another exit but there was nothing, not even a window. He raised the rifle, ready to begin firing, knowing he'd run out of ammunition long before all the hyenas had fallen, and even if he did have enough bullets, how long before more hyenas came, attracted by the sound of gunfire?
Then he registered the Meriva for the second time, a shoe on its roof and one door open.
The mini people-carrier was equidistant between Jay and the hyenas. But they were advancing and he had yet to take a step toward the vehicle. If there were keys, he could get the Meriva moving, plough through the hyenas. If not, it wouldn't take long for them to break the windows; Christ, Bob had done it without even trying. But what other choices were there?
Without even realising he'd consciously made the decision, he sprinted toward the Meriva. As one, the hyenas surged in his direction, there cacophony filling the car park, sounding like a riot.
Halfway to the Meriva, his heel skidded on a patch of diesel. He managed to stay on his feet but the assault rifle flew from his hand. It hit the ground ahead of him, bouncing on its stock. He continued toward the car, stooping for the rifle at the same time. He grabbed it by the strap, but in so doing overbalanced and spilled to the floor, rolling the last few feet toward the Meriva. He succeeded, just, in keeping hold of the gun. The hyenas shrieked with something like joy as they saw their prey go down. It was all over in their eyes.
Jay reached up and grabbed the inner handle of the open door and dragged himself up and into the vehicle. There was a thud as a hyena slammed into the other side of the car. Then another. Another. And another, this one from the roof. Jay dragged the door closed as a dirt-encrusted hand swiped down from above. Filthy fingers were momentarily caught then dragged away with a shriek.
The vehicle began to rock and, in a second, a collage of hyena hands and faces had filled every available inch of window.
Jay was in the passenger seat. He squirmed out of his backpack and over to the driver's side, slapped a hand against the ignition, thinking, please, please, please let there be keys.
He felt nothing but the cold, metal slot.
Chapter 22
“Fuck!”
Jay slammed the heels of his hands against the steering wheel. “Fuck! Fuck! Fuck!”
Ahead of him, kneeling on the bonnet, a hyena that had cultivated an elaborate Mohawk pre-Jolt, wilted now, appeared to be mimicking him, slamming its own hands into the windscreen. It grinned as it beat its palms against the glass, revealing toothless, bleeding gums.
Jay sat back in his seat and wiped the sweat from his face. He looked down at the gun, his heartbeat thrumming down into his stomach, churning its contents, and thought... He wasn't sure what he was thinking. Try and shoot his way out, even though he knew that was hopeless? Or put the barrel of the gun under his chin and pull the trigger, quick and painless?
For a few seconds, the Meriva rocking and booming, he considered the latter option. It would be over in an instant. He wouldn't even feel it. The last sensation he would have would be the trigger passing the point of no return, then a slow-motion awareness of the rifle's mechanism taking over, unstoppable, as he seceded power to the gun. It sounded so easy. The easy way out. The coward’s way out. But he knew it was neither of these things. It would require an act of near-superhuman will and he knew he just didn't have it in him.
So. Option one. Start shooting. Keep shooting until the rifle runs dry. He tried to raise the gun, to point it at Mohawk, who was still grinning, still pounding against the windscreen, but he was too close to the steering wheel. He reached under the seat, groped around until he found the metal bar, lifted it up then pushed the chair back.
There was a handbag in the foot well, black with mother-of-pearl sequins.
Jay propped the gun up next to his backpack and snatched the bag.
Amidst all the howling and banging, Jay thought he heard the click-creak of glass beginning to give. Mohawk was licking the windscreen, slathering it with blood-threaded saliva.
Jay began scooping out the bag's contents and dropping them on his lap. A mobile phone, a packet of tissues, a purse, lipstick, compact, a packet of Airwaves and — last, of course last — a bunch of keys. There were eight or nine keys on the Mama Mia key ring but Jay knew immediately that not one of them would start the car. They were house keys; Jay could tell at a glance. Still, he worked his way through the bunch because there was nothing else to do.
Another click-creak of glass under strain, and still the car rocked from side to side like an amusement park ride. Jay threw the bag back into the foot well and was about to sweep the bag's contents from his lap when he realised he'd seen something on the floor an instant before the bag had landed.
He kicked the bag aside.
A key. A car key.
As he reached down for it, there was another click-creak but this time the creak was more protracted. He glanced up as his fingertips found the key, flipping it into his palm, and saw that the windscreen was beginning to sag as the seals started to give way. As if sensing this slight shift, Mohawk stopped his licking and hammered against the glass with renewed enthusiasm.
Jay tried to slot the key into the ignition but succeeded only in jabbing the steering column. He tipped his head to get a better look, then grabbed the tip of the key with the fingertips of his other hand and guided it toward the slot, like a drunk suddenly unequal to the task of getting back into his own house. The drawn-out creak of the sagging windscreen was abruptly smothered by a significant increase in the volume of the hyena's din, and Jay saw that the seal had given up completely on the passenger side of the windscreen and a finger-width gap had appeared.
The key slid into the ignition. He tried to turn it, but it wouldn't move. For a moment, he thought, It's the wrong fucking key! He couldn't help but laugh at the absurdity of it. Then he realised he hadn't inserted it far enough. He pushed it in the remaining few millimetres. This time it turned.
The car growled at the hyenas and, as one, they retreated a couple of feet, Mohawk slithering from the bonnet. At the same moment, Al Green recommenced singing L.O.V.E. from halfway through the first verse: that's what the world is made of, so give me more L-O-V-E, love. Jay punched down the handbrake, stamped on the clutch, dragged the gearstick into reverse and stepped hard on the accelerator. He took the Meriva in an arcing trajectory to the back of the car park, until he was pointing at the ramp he'd seen Ellen go up.
The hyenas, their initial surprise evaporating, raced toward the car. Jay put it into first, but mistimed the clutch; the engine grumbled, chugged, then cut out. Al told Jay that L.O.V.E is strange to me and then fell silent. As Jay turned the key back then forward and the engine fired up again, the first of the hyenas slammed into the front passenger-side door and the window shattered, showering Jay's backpack with fragments of glass. Al started singing again as the hyena thrust its arm into the car, immediately filling the interior with its stink.
Jay stamped on the accelerator and the Meriva sped, tires screeching, toward the ramp. The hyena was dragged along for a couple of seconds before it dropped to the tarmac, to be trampled by the rest of the pack.
Jay realised too late that he was driving too fast to negotiate the tight, upward-sweeping 'u' of the ramp's trajectory. The front passenger-side wing was wrenched off and the car juddered so hard Jay almost lost his grip on the steering wheel, but he managed to keep it moving. A glance in the rear-view mirror showed nothing but hyenas.
Numerous signs recommended a maximum speed of five miles per hour, but Jay was doing closer to thirty when he came off the ramp and had to slam on the brakes to stop himself from ploughing into a concrete pillar that already bore the cracks, chips and scrapes of carelessness.
As Al told him to stop and look at the big wheel roll, Jay looked around for any sign of Ellen. Nothing. She must have kept moving up. He tried to bring the car back round on itself to take it up the next ramp but went wide and had to reverse and adjust his approach, during which time the hyenas had reached the top of the ramp he'd just exited and were spilling across to the next, blocking his way.
He put the car into first, gritted his teeth and drove into the pack. Of the four hyenas in the Meriva's immediate path, two were knocked aside, both pirouetting, and one went under the wheels. The fourth was scooped up and hit the centre of the windscreen face first, creating a bloody cataract, before rolling off and joining its pack-mate beneath the wheels. To the left, the hyenas caught between the car and the wall of the narrow ramp were dragged against the concrete. One reached in, succeeded in snatching at Jay's shoulder before being rotated back along the car, shrieking. Jay had left more space on the right, and here a growing rank of hyenas kept pace with the car. The lead hyena, sporting a ragged, once lipstick-pink tracksuit, tore off the wing mirror and began using it to hammer against the driver's window. There was a series of thuds and scuffles above him as hyenas clambered onto the roof. Jay plunged down the accelerator as he came out of the turn.
A pillar that appeared, scrape for scrape, to be a replica of the one on the first floor reared up. Jay hit the brakes and yanked the steering wheel hard right. He succeeded in saving the wing from further ruin, but the car slid into the pillar side-on, the front passenger door taking the brunt of it. Jay felt the impact in his bones, in his teeth, and this time his hands lost their grip on the wheel and his feet were bounced from the pedals. The engine died, cutting short Al Green’s backing band just as they were really beginning to enjoy themselves.
Out of the corner of his eye, he could see the top of the ramp filling with hyenas. He turned the key back then forward. The engine grumbled to life, stuttered and died.
“Fuck!”
He gave the key another turn. The engine grumbled again. Then stuttered and died again.
The hyenas were at the door now. A hand so filthy it looked scorched punched through the glass and into Jay's cheekbone. The car filled with a smell like ripe cheese and sewage. Almost blinded by the blow and the stench, Jay turned the key backwards, then forwards. The hyena that had punched him drew back its fist to repeat the offence. The engine grumbled again. Before it could cut out, Jay stomped on the accelerator and Al’s backing band surged back to life. As the Meriva lurched away from the concrete pillar, the crushed front passenger door popped open, whatever mechanism had been keeping it locked and shut, wrecked.
In his eagerness to get away from the hyenas, he'd overshot the entrance to the ramp by a good twenty feet. He put the car into reverse and ploughed into the advancing pack until the nose of the car was in the right position to turn onto the ramp.
A hyena in a denim jacket and with a face so swollen and seeping with infection that Jay couldn't place its pre-Jolt age, gender or ethnicity, threw itself onto the bonnet of the car, sliding up and onto the windscreen. The glass began to warp inward under its weight.
Jay took the car up the ramp, knowing that the steep incline would increase the hyena's weight against the windscreen but, with the flapping passenger door and his own window broken, he knew he couldn't hang around. He stayed as far right as he could as he followed the ramp's curve, trying to prevent further damage to the offside wing but only succeeding in destroying the other wing in a shower of sparks.
The hyena tried to rear back, presumably to begin beating the windscreen, but the momentum of the car pulled it down again. The seal on the passenger side gave up entirely and half the windscreen fell in, draping over the dashboard.
The Meriva emerged on the third floor and Jay surprised himself by taking the car up onto the final ramp with barely a scrape. He would have felt quite pleased with himself if it wasn’t for the fact the windscreen was peeling inwards at an alarming rate. But there was nothing he could do about that, except hope.
Once he was out of the bend, Jay floored the accelerator and the Meriva flew out onto the roof. The hyena scuttled across the bonnet so it was directly in front of Jay, blocking his view. It tried to rear back again but Jay kept his foot down, pinning it in place. Then he stamped on the brake pedal.
But the car didn't stop. It carried on racing forward, fishtailing. He'd forgotten about the snow. Jay leaned left, to see past the hyena. He was almost at the edge of the roof, a low wall the only thing between the Meriva and a four storey plunge. All over the roof, gulls and pigeons took flight. Jay jerked the wheel left then right but the Meriva's trajectory was set, the most he could do was exaggerate the fishtailing. He braced himself for impact, pushing himself back into the chair and scrunching his eyes shut. Al was singing something about love being as bright as the morning sun and then the noise as the car hit the wall was deafening. Despite his best efforts to remain rigid, Jay was thrown forward, his forehead hitting the steering wheel. The blow forced open his eyes and, thinking so much for the fucking airbag, he saw the hyena and windscreen fly beyond the crumpled bonnet of the car. Then he was thrown back into his seat so hard the air was forced from his lungs. The hyena and the windscreen dropped from view. Jay was fully expecting to follow them down to the street below, tensing his entire body in readiness, when he realised the car had stopped.
He looked in the rear-view mirror. The pack had arrived at the top of the ramp. Ears ringing and trying to ignore the various injuries that were starting fires throughout his body, Jay put the Meriva into reverse and trod down on the accelerator. Nothing happened. And then Jay realised, no Al Green, no L.O.V.E love. The engine had cut out. Jay worked the key back and forth. Nothing. Not even a cough. He tried again. Nothing. The hyenas had halved the distance, trudging through the thick snow, stalking toward the Meriva as if it was a wounded animal, exhausted and unable to escape.
Before
“They're a sort of artsy-fartsy community theatre group, going round schools doing plays about 'issues'. You'd hate them.”
Jay's dad smiled, shook his head.
“I'm sure I wouldn't,” he said and gulped a mouthful of Cain's bitter.
“Anyway, they're big on promoting literacy. So, I come on and just, you know, 'be myself'. I tell these kids what it's like trying to get through life without being able to read and write, and how, unlike me, they've got a choice. And I actually get paid for this. It's all government funded. We'll be going all over the North West.”
“Sounds really good,” said Jay's dad.
“The money's not much but I can pay you a bit of housekeeping now.”
“You don't have to do that, son.”
“No, I want to. I want to pay my way. I'm eighteen, now.”
Jay drained the remainder of his lager.
“Fair enough. But it's up to you. I won't be chasing you for it.”
“You won't have to. I'll leave it under the phone, every Friday after I've been paid.”
“If you do, you do. If you don't, you don't. So, when's your first 'gig'?”
“Thursday. Holt Comprehensive, by the Fiveways.”
“Nervous?”
“A bit, yeah. Wel
l, a lot. But I've got to do it and I've got to get it right because,” there's this girl in the group, Lucy, and she's gorgeous and she keeps smiling at me for no reason, “I don't think I'm going to get another chance like this.”
Behind them, over by the bar, a couple of old regulars shouted abuse at the horses on a wall-mounted television.
“Fucking donkey!” one of them shouted, throwing his betting slip to the floor.
Jay's dad finished his pint then pointed at the empties.
“Another round?” he said.
Jay nodded.
“You must be excited,” said Jay's dad as he returned with the drinks, a fug of cigarette smoke parting as he approached.
“Yeah, but you know me. I can't help thinking something's going to go horribly wrong. It usually does.”
“Well, it’d be a pretty dull life if nothing ever went wrong. Great things are done when men and mountains meet. Blake.”
“But all I ever seem to meet is fucking mountains.”
Chapter 23
Jay grabbed his pack and the rifle and fell out of the car, sprawling in the snow. Back on his feet, he looked around for a fire escape, an exit. But there was nothing. There were only two other vehicles on the roof, parked next to each other about twenty feet away, a Transit van and a Punto, both inflated with snow, neither with an open door. He put his backpack on and raised the rifle, sighting the nearest hyena. There were at least twenty on the roof now and still more spilling from the ramp. As his finger tightened on the trigger, he wondered where the hell Ellen was. Perhaps she was on the floor he’d bypassed, or maybe she had doubled back somehow, made her way down to the ground floor and got out. He hoped so and he was glad he'd told her where the boat was moored. It suddenly mattered to him that she thought well of him.
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