Behind them, coming from some way down the end of the avenue and round a corner, Sal heard the echoing rattle of gunshots and the high-pitched death rattle of something brought down. A eugenic from one of the other packs, she guessed.
They’re close!
They scrambled together along the avenue until they came to an intersection. In front of them Sal saw a grand old redbrick building with marble columns supporting a large entrance portico. A clock tower stretched proudly from its roof. She guessed it might once have been a courthouse, or a library, or some building with a public purpose. Before it, decorative gardens had gone truly wild and native … gardens fronted by a low stone wall that still boasted patches of blistering and peeling white paint. On it she saw a faded street sign on a rusted plaque:
ROBERT E. LEE UNIVERSITY
Samuel was frantically waving his spindly arms to the left. ‘Thish way!’ he screamed. ‘Thish way! Hurry!’
From side streets and spilling out of the open doorways of abandoned homes other packs emerged to join them.
They were on a much wider avenue now, but it was cluttered with abandoned carts and old automobiles. Panic had swept through this city long ago, streets and avenues congested with civilians desperate to leave. Carts laden with suitcases, valuable heirlooms and gilt-framed family portraits had been left to rot, weather and fade out in the open.
NORTH CHARLES STREET. Now a graveyard of vehicles, and, yes … here and there she could see bleached bones, the dark leather of desiccated skin and tufts of hair in among the iron spokes of cartwheels and rusting chassis.
They’d just begun to pick their way through the jam of long-dead vehicles, when they heard the rattle of gunfire again. It sounded closer than last time. Sal wrenched her hand free of the ape that had been clasping it.
‘NO!’ she shouted. ‘Please! Just let us go!’
The ape grappled with her, hoisted her up and held her under one arm.
Samuel led the way through the barricade of vehicles and finally stopped. The clutter was slowing them down too much. He took a turning off the broad avenue into a smaller alleyway. The others followed him. He stopped and slumped against a brick wall, gasping and wheezing, exhausted from the last few minutes of running. Such a small body, with lungs and a heart not designed for this kind of exertion. The other eugenics crowded round his panting form, waiting for him to recover, waiting for further instructions.
‘GO!’ he gasped. ‘GO! There’sh no time to wait for me. Go! GO!’
‘But which way, Sam?’ asked one of them.
‘Go north!’
‘Which way izzat north?’ asked one of the salamanders.
‘North!’ He pointed up at the strip of sky above the alleyway. ‘Keep the shun, the shun up there! In the shky … keep it on your right!’ he said, slapping his right shoulder for those in his group that didn’t know their lefts from their rights. ‘Keep the shun … on that shide of you!’ he gasped. ‘Now GO!’
Several of the eugenics did as they were told and shambled off reluctantly down the alleyway towards a smaller intersection at the far end, looking over their shoulders unhappily … hoping Samuel was following close behind.
The ape holding Sal and dragging Lincoln by the arm, hesitated to leave Samuel as some of the others waivered uncertainly, shuffling from one foot to the other.
‘Sam? You come too?’
Samuel flapped his hands. ‘Go … all of you … jusht go!’
Sal wriggled. ‘Let me go! Please!’
The ape’s voice growled. ‘Sam … you come too?’
‘I … can’t … keep … up … any more.’
Coming from further down North Charles Street, they heard more gunshots and the screams of eugenics brought down. It seemed the whole city was beginning to stir to life with creatures emerging from their bolt-holes in blind panic, like rats leaving a sinking ship. Sal suspected the city had been home to far more than the hundred and fifty or so they’d seen at the theatre meeting.
The gunshots seemed to be echoing from different ends of the avenue. The soldiers were coming from all directions, tightening a noose round them.
Sal looked up at the ape’s face. ‘Put me down! Let us go, and pick Sam up instead!’
The ape nodded, loosening his hold on Sal. ‘I carry you!’
The small eugenic shook his oversized head. ‘No … but … do ash she shaid. Let ’em both go.’
The ape placed Sal down and released Lincoln’s wrist. Lincoln snarled with relief and rubbed his arm where the brute’s hand had been wrapped round it.
Sam sighed. ‘You go to thoshe sholdiersh if you want.’
Sal remained where she was. She knelt down in front of Sam. ‘Sam, you’ve got to run now!’ she said. ‘Me and Abraham, we’ll stop them, stall them somehow. Buy you some time! But you’ve got to leave now!’
His brow creased. Confused. ‘You want me to eshcape?’ he wheezed.
‘Yes!’ She looked at Lincoln. ‘Yes, we do, don’t we?’
He nodded. ‘Odd creature as you are, I see in you –’ he looked for the right words – ‘I see in you admirable qualities, sir. A good soul.’ He knelt down beside Sal. ‘Better than quite a few I’ve met.’
Sam looked up at him, wide-eyed. ‘Never been called shir before.’
They heard gunfire and shrieking from the far end of the alley. Sal turned to see the eugenics who’d headed down that way doubling back to rejoin them. Beyond their shambling forms at the far intersection she saw a row of four-legged creatures, like hunting dogs, but no … not quite. Behind them, a row of uniformed men with guns. The far end of the alley was blocked off.
‘Shadd-yah!’ She shared a glance with Lincoln.
What do we do?
The alleyway – it was little more than a rat-run – lay in the dark shadow between two old brick-built tenement blocks. Most of the windows and doors were boarded up, but some of the boards had worked loose and fallen away. The creatures could lose themselves inside those buildings, hide in the gloomy labyrinth of rooms and hallways, but only for a while. They’d be trapped in there.
She heard noises from North Charles Street: soldiers pulling the jam of vehicles roughly aside. The splintering crack of old cartwheel spokes, the groan of stressed rusting metal being dragged to the kerbside. They were busy clearing a way through the traffic jam.
And then she felt it … a cold tickle on her cheek. She felt it again. Moisture.
I’m not crying, am I?
She felt a cold tingle on the back of her hand and looked at Lincoln. A snowflake was fluttering lazily between them, seesawing down.
‘Snowing?’ grunted Lincoln.
It was. More dancing flakes of snow descended around them. She looked up at the narrow strip of daylight above and saw nothing but blue sky. For a moment her mind instinctively queried why, how, it could snow on a sunny September morning … then a dark form obscured the sky. The alleyway dimmed as the blue vanished to be replaced with the smooth dark copper hull of some gigantic vessel.
‘They here now,’ said the ape, looking up, his small eyes wide as pennies.
CHAPTER 58
2001, Dead City
Captain McManus nodded at the message coming in over his earpad. ‘Right you are, we’re on our way over.’
He turned to Liam. ‘Good news, Mr O’Connor. We’ve got a report of a handful of the runaways boxed up in a small alleyway … couple of guests along with them. One girl; one man, quite tall. Sound like your two?’
Liam exhaled a sigh of relief. ‘Are they all right?’
‘Apparently. They’ve both been seen on their feet. That’s obviously a good sign.’ McManus opened up a map of the city. ‘Just nearby the old university on North Charles Street.’ He looked up from his map to the streets around them, taking a moment to get his bearings.
‘Ah … yes, very close indeed.’ He pointed up at the carrier hovering over the city a block away. ‘Just over there, in fact. Right underneath her.’ He tapped
a switch on his mouthpiece. ‘All units in the vicinity of the carrier … this is Captain McManus. We have a group of eugenics and their human prisoners bottled up in an alleyway. Nobody is to engage them. Repeat … no firing. Just hold your positions, chaps, until further orders.’
He tapped the switch on the mouthpiece to turn it off. ‘Well, now, gents … shall we?’
A wretched look of belated relief stretched across Liam’s face. ‘Aye.’
‘We go hide,’ said the ape anxiously, pointing up at the fire escapes and the dark open windows of the tenement blocks.
‘No!’ said Sal. ‘No … if you run from them, if you hide in those buildings, they’ll come after you! They’ll kill you all!’
A mewling whimper of fear rippled through the creatures huddled around Samuel.
‘What we do, Sam?’ asked one of them. ‘What we do?’
Sal craned her neck to look out of the alleyway into the wide avenue. She could see dozens of red tunics now hunkered down with guns trained on them. The soldiers had dragged several vehicles and carts aside to create a narrow access way up and down North Charles Street. She turned to look down the far end of their alley. The soldiers and their dogs were settled there, patiently waiting. Above, the sky was still blocked by the air vessel, a searchlight occasionally blinking on and combing up and down the alley.
‘I’ll go out there,’ she said, pointing to the soldiers. ‘Let me talk to them! Let me explain you’re not dangerous … that you’ve not hurt anyone. That you’ll come out peacefully.’
‘They kill us!’ one of them gasped.
‘You have to trust me!’ she said. ‘I think they must’ve come to rescue me and Abraham. If we go out and show them we’re not hurt, they’ll –’
‘Sodjers kill others. Me saw it!’ said a eugenic from another group. ‘Wuz all hands up … and they does the bangs bangs!’
‘If you try to run, I’m sure they’ll shoot you down!’ snapped Sal. She turned to Samuel. ‘Please, Sam … let me go out and talk to them!’
He scratched his chin, his fingers trembling. His eyes darted from one end of the alley to the other nervously. ‘You think sho? You can make it shafe?’
‘You’re not monsters … you’re not dangerous. I can tell them that.’
He pressed his ragged lips together. ‘You … tell ’em, then. Tell ’em we’re not bad. We didn’t hurt no one.’
She nodded. ‘I will.’
Samuel smiled. ‘I trust.’
‘OK,’ Sal smiled. She got to her feet.
‘A moment, young lady!’ said Lincoln. He tore the bottom half of the sleeve off his dirty shirt. ‘A white flag … well, truth be, it’s brown, but they shall understand it as a flag of truce,’ he said, tying it round a strip of wood. He got up and walked cautiously to the mouth of the avenue. ‘Allow me.’
‘COMING OUT!’ he bellowed loudly. ‘PLEASE DO NOT SHOOT YOUR GUNS!’ He waved his makeshift flag in the open … up and down several times to be sure it was seen.
‘I AM STEPPING OUT!’ Lincoln’s voice boomed again, and then slowly he emerged into the morning sunlight streaming down the broad avenue, both arms raised. ‘I am Abraham Lincoln! I bear no arms!’
‘Step out into the road, if you don’t mind, sir … so we can see you nice and clear!’
‘I have a girl with me! She wishes to parley!’
There was no response to that. Lincoln turned slowly and nodded at Sal to step out beside him. She emerged into the sun, shading her eyes with her raised hands. ‘Please! Don’t shoot!’ she called out.
‘Stand beside the gentleman,’ a voice replied. ‘There’s a good girl!’
She did as she was told. ‘There are some eugenic creatures with us … down the alley! They also want to come out and join us peacefully!’
There was no answer. The morning was still and silent save for the soft hum of idling motors up in the sky. From far away the stillness was broken by an echoing crack of gunfire.
‘Sal? … Is that you?’
CHAPTER 59
2001, Dead City
The voice came from further up the avenue. She couldn’t see anything with the glare of the sun in her eyes, but she recognized the voice. ‘Liam?’
‘Aye! Jay-zus!’ His voice echoed back down the avenue. She heard the slap of his feet on hard tarmac and finally he emerged in front of the soldiers and stood before her. ‘Well, look at you …’ He checked her over. ‘Look a state, so you do.’
She felt a rush of relief so intense her legs felt unsteady beneath her. She noted the bandage on his head. ‘You got hurt?’
‘Knocked out, Sal. Stupid, I should’ve ducked. That’s why I –’
‘So, this is your sister, is it?’ called out another voice, crisp and commanding.
Sister? She glanced up at him. He nodded slightly. She realized Liam must have told them that for a reason. Out of the bloom of sunlight, she saw a tall wide shape emerging. Unmistakably Bob. Beside him another man, slim, wearing a white pith helmet.
‘This fella here,’ said Liam as they approached, ‘is Captain McManus. It’s really all thanks to him we found you, so.’
Beneath the helmet’s peak she saw the taut face of a young army officer. ‘Sister?’ He frowned. Confused. ‘But you’re white and she’s …’
‘My step sister, so she is,’ cut in Liam. ‘Closest family I got, so help me.’
McManus cocked his head and shrugged. ‘Well, then –’ he extended a white-gloved hand – ‘Really rather pleased we found you in one piece, young lady.’
She reached out and shook it lightly. ‘Thank you.’
‘And you, sir?’
Lincoln shook his hand. ‘Abraham Lincoln.’
‘Jolly good to have retrieved you unharmed, Mr Lincoln.’ McManus nodded politely. ‘Now … we’ve got a few of these runaways back in the alley, have we?’
Sal nodded. ‘Look … please don’t hurt them!’
He frowned at her. ‘Don’t hurt them?’
‘Please! They’re harmless!’
He tapped his finger pensively against his chin. ‘How many of them down in that side street there?’
She shrugged. ‘Couple of dozen, I think.’
‘These creatures, Captain … they did not kill any people. It was other creatures. Nor have they hurt us,’ said Lincoln.
‘They treated us really well,’ added Sal. ‘Gave us food and water. They didn’t hurt us.’
‘Really?’ McManus looked bemused. ‘That’s rather untypical behaviour of these things. They’re feral animals. You can’t predict how they’ll behave from one moment to the next.’
‘You sure they didn’t hurt you?’ said Liam. ‘I mean they were … well, they seemed pretty ferocious back in that farmhouse.’
‘They were scared, Liam! They’re like frightened children.’
‘Frightened, perhaps, but they are still exceedingly dangerous. They need to be apprehended. And then we can decide what’s to be done with them. I can’t promise clemency if we discover any of them were directly involved in the recent killings – you understand that?’
Sal nodded. ‘Honestly, it wasn’t any of them.’
He glanced over her shoulder at the deserted brick tenement building. ‘Do we need to flush them out of there as well?’
She shook her head. ‘No … I told them not to go inside and hide. That it would just make things worse.’
‘Very sensible advice.’
‘They’re all just waiting back in the alley. They just want to come out … like we did. Just come out with their hands up.’
He shrugged. ‘Good.’ He cupped his hands round his mouth. ‘YOU RUNAWAYS HIDING IN THE ALLEY … BEST YOU COME OUT NOW!’
Nothing emerged from the alleyway. For a moment Sal had a sinking feeling that fear had got the better of them and they had quietly slipped away into the tenement buildings on either side. But then they heard a soft frightened whimper emerge from the gloom.
Too frightened to budge.
/>
‘Let me try,’ she said to McManus.
‘If you wish.’
‘SAMUEL!’ she called out. ‘It’s OK! They’re not going to hurt any of you! Do as he said … all of you! Just like I did … slowly, with your hands nice and high!’
Silence. Not a murmur. She was about to cup her mouth and try again, but then the first pale figure slowly emerged, blinking, into the sunlight.
Samuel. He was doing as she’d instructed: his thin, child’s arms raised above his oversized head. Twenty yards away, she could see he was trembling. The ape emerged behind, towering above him, huge muscular arms raised.
‘No shoot!’ it cried in a deep voice.
Sal nodded encouragement. ‘That’s right! No one’s going to shoot you. Come on!’
The others began to emerge one by one. ‘That’s it … come on. It’s OK!’
Captain McManus studied the creatures as they stepped into the daylight. ‘By the shape of the heads I’d say these are mostly Watson-Rutherford Class Eugenics. Manufactured fifteen … some of them twenty years ago,’ he mused. ‘Hmmm, all old stock, very poor condition looking at them, largely malnourished.’
He ordered some of his men over to herd the group together.
Liam stepped beside Sal. He put an arm round her shoulders and hugged her. ‘It’s a relief to see you again,’ he whispered, squeezing her tight. ‘I let you down, Sal. God, I’m so sorry! When I came round … I was … you were already gone –’
She put a hand to his mouth. ‘I’m OK. Honest.’
‘But if –’
‘We’re both fine, Liam,’ she smiled. ‘Hungry … very hungry, but fine.’
‘Closer together, Corporal!’ barked McManus. ‘Don’t want any of these devils sneaking off!’
‘Mr Lincoln? You’re not hurt?’ asked Liam.