On Deadly Ground

  I didn’t like the man. I certainly didn’t trust him. I knew one day I’d end up in a confrontation with him, but, damnit, I had to acknowledge he had feelings, too. He still grieved for the girl.

  A moment later, Cowboy pulled the cord to start the motor of the outboard. It puttered, but didn’t start first time. He gripped the cord, ready to tug again.

  ‘Wait!’ Kate shouted.

  ‘What’s wrong?’

  ‘Shhh.’

  ‘Kate—’

  ‘Shh, don’t you hear it?’

  We listened. I heard the smack-suck of water. The mournful note of the wind. Nothing else.

  ‘There. It happened again.’

  ‘What?’

  Kate looked round, eyes wide. ‘Someone’s shouting for help.’

  I listened. This time I heard it, too. Faint. But you could hear the sheer desperation shooting through the voice. It sounded as if someone was fighting for their life.

  ‘It’s coming from over there,’ Cowboy pointed along the flooded street.

  ‘Hurry up,’ Kate pleaded. ‘Someone’s in trouble.’

  Cowboy started the motor. The propeller scrambled the water into bubbles. Then the boat surged forward in the direction of the cries for help.

  Chapter 82

  ‘Can you see anyone?’ Kate asked.

  ‘No,’ Tesco called back above the snarl of the outboard motor as it powered the boat along the flooded street, the wake curling away in a cream-coloured V. ‘But it sounded like it came from this direction.’

  Freak Boy clambered to the front of the boat where he leaned out over the prow, looking like some strange tattooed gorilla, the slip stream blowing back the strips of orange silk that were tied to his arms, legs and head.

  Cowboy sang out, ‘See anything, Freakie Boy?’

  Kate turned back to me, the breeze blowing her hair across her face. ‘You heard it? Someone screaming for help?’

  ‘I heard it all right,’ I said, ‘But what if it came from one of the buildings? ‘I looked up at the windows. ‘There’s hundreds of them.’

  Stephen shouted back to Cowboy. ‘Kill the motor. We’ll listen again.’

  ‘We can’t.’

  ‘Kill it, for Godsake.’

  ‘No way.’

  ‘Why?’

  ‘Look,’ he pointed to a ruined building. There was a sign bearing the familiar logo of the Underground, the red circle bisected by a blue bar. It had been crumpled as if it had been punched by a gigantic fist. ‘That’s Leicester Square station.’

  ‘So?’

  ‘The Tube tunnels act like gigantic plugholes. If there’s a shift in water levels it’ll create a whirlpool; we’ll be sucked right down.’

  ‘The water looks calm enough—kill the motor.’

  Throwing up his hands angrily, Cowboy shrugged his shoulders, indicating clearly enough: OK, on your head be it.

  He switched off the outboard.

  ‘There—did you hear it?’

  Kate scanned the waters. ‘It’s a girl’s voice.’

  ‘But where the hell is she?’

  Freak Boy suddenly pounded the gunwale of the boat so violently I thought it would tip us into the water. ‘Girl!’ he yelled, pointing. ‘Girl! Girl! Girl!’

  ‘Oh, Christ,’ Kate grabbed my arm. ‘Rick! Do you see them?’

  ‘Where?’

  Stephen pointed. ‘There, on the ledge. No, not at water level; up on the second floor. Girl and a man. Do you see them?’

  I looked up. It was such a bizarre sight that I stared with my mouth open.

  In front of me and opposite the remains of Leicester Square station was an eight-storey building. Clinging to a ledge that couldn’t have been more than fifteen centimetres wide, yet was a good ten metres above the flood waters, was a man of about fifty with bushy grey hair, and a girl of about twenty. She had short dark hair and was dressed in the type of skirt and jacket a female business executive would once have worn. They were shouting, waving.

  Cowboy fired up the motor and nudged the boat through the floating debris to the building.

  ‘Weird thing to do,’ Kate said. ‘What made them climb up the front of the building?’

  Cowboy called out, ‘Stephen, I don’t like the look of this.’

  ‘You think it might be some kind of trap?’

  ‘Might be. See anyone else?’

  ‘No, just the girl and the man. But have you noticed something?’

  ‘What?’

  ‘We’ve had no rain, but the front of the buildings are streaming with water.’

  ‘Shit.’

  Tesco turned pale.

  ‘What is it?’

  ‘You’ll see soon enough if we don’t get out of here,’ Cowboy said.

  ‘What’s wrong?’ Kate demanded. ‘Why are the buildings wet?’

  Cowboy twisted the hand throttle. The boat surged forward, the prow lifting up beneath the bow wave.

  Stephen said, ‘What are you doing?’

  ‘I’m getting us out of here.’

  ‘You can’t, you’ve got to go back.’

  ‘No!’

  There’s two people back there,’ I shouted. ‘Are you going to leave them to die?’

  ‘If we stay here we’re going to be dead, too!’

  Stephen climbed over me and worked his way along the boat on all fours toward Cowboy. ‘Stop!’

  ‘No!’

  ‘Tell me why you’re running away! What’s wrong?’

  ‘Because the whole fucking street’s going to erupt any fucking second.’

  ‘Erupt?’

  ‘Yeah, erupt! Do you want to wait and see it happen?’

  ‘Hey, just slow down. You’re going to wreck the boat.’

  The man eased off the throttle but still steered a line along the flooded Charing Cross Road; the wake from the boat broke against the front of buildings in a splash of spray.

  ‘Listen to me.’ Stephen spoke in a level voice. He wasn’t going to shout; he was going to negotiate. ‘Do you really want to leave those people to die?’

  Cowboy shrugged. ‘They’re strangers. Want to risk your life for strangers?’

  ‘But if it was one of your group you’d risk it?’

  Holding onto the brim of his hat, he nodded. ‘But they don’t belong to our group.’

  ‘Oh, but they do belong to our group.’

  ‘Oh no, they don’t, Kennedy.’

  ‘You’ve heard of the human race, Cowboy?’

  ‘Shit.’

  ‘Well, that’s our group, isn’t it?’

  ‘So what?’

  ‘So show some loyalty to our kind.’

  Tesco chipped in, I thought he was going to side with Cowboy. I thought wrong. ‘Cowboy. It looks quiet enough at the moment.’

  ‘We’d be killing ourselves,’ Cowboy said.

  Tesco shook his head. ‘We can do it. Just take the boat in close. We can be out of there in one minute flat.’

  Cowboy shot us a fierce glare, then he looked at the man squatting in the prow of the boat like a huge ape. ‘Freak Boy, what do you say?’

  ‘Go back…get ’em.’

  Cowboy rubbed his stubbled jaw, thinking hard. Then he repositioned his Stetson hat on his head. ‘You’re all fucking crazy.’

  Then he leaned on the outboard motor steering arm so it turned the boat as near as damnit on its own axis. Five seconds later he was powering the boat back to where the people stood on the ledge.

  ‘We’re going to have to move fast,’ he shouted.

  ‘OK.’

  ‘Any sign of eruptions and we’re out of here, whether we’ve got those folk or not.’

  He brought the boat up to the face of the building. Above us the man and the girl waved their arms, shouted. But the outboard motor drowned any individual words.

  ‘Why on Earth did they climb up there?’ Kate shook her head.

  I looked up. ‘There’s no way into the building. The windows are barred.’

  ‘Seems
to me,’ Cowboy said, ‘these folks were passing through in a boat when they got hit by the last eruption. The boat sank. They swam for it. See the drainpipe? They climbed up that to the ledge, hoping to get into the building through one of the windows. But, as you said, the windows are barred.’

  ‘How best to get them down?’ I asked.

  Tell them to jump.’

  ‘Into that?’ I said, looking down into the water. It was covered with a near-solid-looking mat of wooden crates, timber, rotting carcasses.

  Kate shouted up at the two people on the ledge. ‘Climb down…we’ll bring the boat into the wall for you. Hurry…please!’

  They nodded. The man gave a thumbs-up sign to show he understood. Then both moved along the ledge—slowly, slowly, their backs to the wall, arms out, palms flat to the brickwork. You could actually see their legs shaking. Those people were terrified.

  They made it to a drainpipe. The girl went first. She was barefoot. She turned round gingerly so she faced the drainpipe, then gripped her hands around it. Her left foot found the first pipe bracket below the ledge. Then she started the descent.

  Cowboy hissed through his teeth. ‘She’s going too slow.’

  ‘Hurry yourself!’ Freak Boy bellowed.

  ‘Don’t rush her.’ Kate glared at them. ‘She’ll slip.’

  ‘We can’t hang around,’ Tesco warned. ‘Do you see what’s happening over at the station?’

  ‘Here come the bubbles! Here come the bubbles!’ Freak Boy yelled, pounding the sides of the boat with his huge fists. ‘The big one’s coming!’

  ‘Big what?’ Stephen asked.

  ‘The geyser.’ Cowboy nudged the boat through the floating crap. ‘The ground under London’s baking hot. We don’t see much sign on the surface because it’s flooded.’

  ‘But down there in the Tube tunnels it’s getting pretty hot,’ Tesco added. ‘The water boils, then every so often—whoosh.’

  ‘Whoosh!’ yelled Freak Boy in echo.

  ‘The steam pushes a way out through the tunnels, right up into the station. It comes out in one helluva rush. That’s why the walls are wet. Any second now you’re going to get a column of water erupting higher than any fucking building round here; then back down comes the water. Tons of it. Carrying a couple of tons of masonry, too.’

  I watched the girl’s progress. The descent was so slow, it was painful to watch.

  ‘Hurry up!’ Freak Boy bellowed. ‘We’re all gonna be boiled alive!’

  ‘Cool it,’ Stephen said in a surprisingly calm voice. ‘She’ll make it.’

  Cowboy clucked his tongue. ‘Why doesn’t the guy start down the pipe?’

  ‘The pipe won’t take the weight of both of them.’

  ‘I’ll give ’em sixty seconds, then I’m powering this boat out of here.’

  ‘No,’ Stephen said. ‘You’ll do as I say. Take the boat closer to the building.’

  ‘I’m not going in yet.’

  ‘Why not?’

  ‘If there’s a surge we could be sucked right in through the windows. It’ll smash the boat to buggery.’

  ‘Get in closer.’

  ‘Oh-ho,’ sang Freak Boy. ‘Trouble at mill.’

  ‘What’s wrong?’

  Tesco looked down into the water. ‘Oh Christ, here it comes.’

  Chapter 83

  Tesco stared down into the water, eyes bulging in horror.

  The water had actually begun to fizz, like beer poured too quickly from a can. A scummy brown froth began to form on the surface. ‘Christ, things are really starting to cook down there.’

  ‘I’m going,’ Cowboy yelled. ‘We tried our best to save them, but we can’t stay here.’

  ‘We’re staying,’ I said. ‘They just need another five minutes, then they’ll be in the boat.’

  Cowboy snorted. ‘In five minutes we’ll be plastered all over this fucking city.’

  Come on, come on.

  I looked up at the girl. She was half-climbing, half-sliding down the drainpipe; her skirt had rucked up almost to her waist, exposing her underwear. Freak Boy stared up at her, a massive leer all over his sweaty face. His eyes bulged halfway out of his head; the muscles in his throat seemed to inflate so the veins stood out from his skin.

  ‘Hell…what are they?’

  I looked back to see Kate pointing into the water.

  I stared. Now this was weird. Damned weird.

  All around the boat, the surface of the water was being broken by what looked like smooth-backed whales. Five, six, seven…eight of them I counted.

  ‘What are they?’ Kate asked.

  ‘Cars. They were stuck in the mud down there.’ Tesco explained. ‘If they sank with people inside the people rot, give off gas; slowly the cars fill with gas, then, when the mud’s disturbed, they’re shaken free and—whoosh—up they pop.’

  ‘Pop!’ Freak Boy echoed, still leering up at the girl.

  She’d reached the first floor now. If I could have been sure of the stability of the boat I’d have stood up and lifted her down.

  But the water seethed like it was alive, creaming thickly with scum; here and there cars broke the surface, their windows green with slime.

  Once a car rose as far as the door handles it would roll over. Then, in a flurry of bubbles, it would sink again.

  ‘Jump into the boat,’ Cowboy yelled at the woman.

  She hung on to the drainpipe, panting, her face pressed against the brickwork.

  ‘Jump into the boat,’ Cowboy yelled.

  ‘She can’t,’ Tesco shouted, ‘she’ll go right through the fucking bottom.’

  ‘Come on!’ Kate encouraged. ‘You can do it!’

  ‘It’s building.’ Cowboy was forced to grip the outboard motor’s steering bar in both hands. The current’s pushing the boat.’

  ‘She’s nearly there.’

  Bang!

  I looked behind me. The building across the street was moving; the entire frontage slipped downwards into the water with a roar, sending up a spray of water. The flood waters must have eaten into the foundations so much that even the slightest vibration would topple these buildings.

  ‘Bring the boat in closer!’ Stephen ordered. ‘Come on. Closer. Rick…hold my legs.’ Standing, he reached up, grabbing the girl by the waist as she worked her way down the drainpipe.

  ‘Let go of the pipe,’ he shouted.

  For a second she clung there grimly. ‘I’m still too high up,’ she screamed. ‘I’ll fall into the water.’

  ‘You won’t…let go!’

  Closing her eyes, she released her grip on the pipe. Stephen tumbled backwards into the boat still holding her.

  One down, one to go.

  I looked up as the man began his descent of the drainpipe. He moved faster than the girl. He looked as if he might once have been a builder and clambering down scaffolding was second nature to him.

  I heard a rattle. The windows were shaking in the building. You could sense the pressure building somewhere thirty metres or so beneath where the roadway would be. I could picture the water deep in the Underground rail system beginning to boil, then the steam trying to force its way outwards. The whole thing was like a huge pressure cooker. I could sense the brute force of the thing building and building.

  Its safety valve was the station across the road. Bubbles frothed around its ruined walls; now I could see steam pouring outwards across the flood waters.

  ‘Any second now…’ Cowboy said in a low voice.

  Tesco shouted up at the man. ‘Faster, come on…hurry!’

  The glass rattled harder in the windows. Tiles slipped off the roof to splash into the water beside us.

  More cars surfaced, then rolled over, belching gas that stank of rot and death.

  I looked down at Stephen. He’d got himself into a sitting position. The girl lay panting in the bottom of the boat.

  ‘Hurry up!’ Tesco yelled up at the man climbing down the drainpipe.

  More tiles fell from the roof
to splash into the water.

  ‘I can’t hold the boat still here,’ Cowboy panted. ‘I’m going to have to ride her out…then back in again.’ He twisted the throttle. The boat surged out over the bubbling water; he leaned against the steering bar, swung the boat round, then powered the craft back in towards the building once more.

  That’s when the man decided to jump.

  He hit the water. He didn’t so much splash as disappear into the scum. Seconds later he was swimming towards us.

  He’d meet the boat halfway.

  We shouted encouragement.

  Suddenly there came a series of cracking sounds like gunshots. Then a roar. The building the couple had been standing on toppled forward into the water.

  One second the man had been striking out in a powerful crawl stroke. The next he was gone beneath an avalanche of masonry.

  The girl screamed.

  I knew it was too late to do anything. He’d been hit by tons of brickwork and timber. He’d have been killed instantly.

  Cowboy didn’t hang around.

  Even before the wave created by the falling building hit us, he twisted the throttle. The boat surged forward, ricocheting against one of the floating cars that had become nothing more than their dead owners’ coffins.

  He didn’t stop. He kept the boat blasting along the flooded street, weaving desperately from side to side to avoid the cars as they floated to the surface, belched out their gas, then sank once more.

  I looked back at the wake sweeping outward in an ever-widening V of foam.

  Then, at last, the pressure that had been building deep in the flooded Northern line forced its way up from the tunnel, through the submerged platforms, up the drowned escalators, bursting with God Almighty fury out into the ticket halls, then…

  I saw it. A column of water, forced explosively upward by the superheated steam.

  It stood there, as white as a bone, shining in the daylight, twice as high as the surrounding six-storey buildings.

  Then, with a thunderous rumble, the water fell back to hit the surrounding buildings, toppling row upon row into the new Lake of London.

  I looked down at the girl. She shivered, still panting in her business suit. Dazed, she gripped Kate’s hand as if it was the only thing keeping her between life and death.