Forecast (30 page)

“Keep going,” he encouraged. “We have to outrun them.”

A bullet lashed by and struck the bark of a dead tree. Matthews glanced back, the men were descending the hill, stopping only to make shots and to track them with a pair of binoculars. The bullets continued. One whipped off Matthews’ helmet, leaving a scar but not a hole. God, the men were shooting off rounds like nothing on Earth, going through some heavy supply of ammunition. One struck the drum in its middle and water leaked out.

“Shit!”

“If they follow us to the White Room, it’ll be compromised and we’ll never be safe,” said Faraday.

The White Room! Matthews had neglected to consider that. By revealing their secret hideout, they would jeopardise all that they had. Furthermore, the distance between them and the White Room was far, seven or eight miles, and Matthews hadn’t factored in the distance when he’d taken the drum. With the men gaining on them, he realised it could be their final demise. More alarmingly, where was the White Room? He couldn’t remember which way they had come. Then Gable pointed to a faint white line painted in the ground smudged and diluted by the rain. “My line,” he shouted.

Matthews lifted his visor a fraction. “Your what?”

Gable was panting, his words muffled by the filter in the gas- mask. “This trail leads…to the White Room. I made it…using paint so I wouldn’t…get lost.”

“It worked well,” Matthews replied sarcastically, shutting his visor.

Following the line was dangerous, Matthews thought, because if the men detected the trail they would have a route all the way to the White Room. He surmised that they’d traversed two miles from the bunker, that they were all exhausted and out of breath and that outrunning the men would take the stamina of an athlete, leaving him with little choice but to ditch the radio and water drum. While he weighed up the options, he listened to his legs and kept on the move. It struck him that the men would only stop once they had hunted and killed. The water continued to spew out of the drum, shedding weight.

“We need to deviate from the line,” Matthews suggested to Faraday.

“I can’t go on,” said Gable.

He stopped running, put his hands on his thighs and bent over, holding down vomit. The glass on his gasmask had steamed up and he could barely see the way. Plus his leg wound, his breathlessness, his shock and just about everything.

Matthews lifted his visor. “Then stay here and get eaten, I don’t give a shit!”

Gable stood up straight, ran a few more steps, then collapsed and could go no further. It occurred to him that he would die of a heart attack before his pursuers got to him.

Faraday knelt beside him and lifted her visor. “Stand up, Trev. It’s not far. You can make it.”

“I can’t, I can’t.”

“If you can’t run, we’ll have to leave you and they’ll get you.”

“Don’t leave me.”

Matthews leaned over him. “You either come with us or you stay here alone. We won’t die for you.”

A bullet erupted at the back of Faraday’s boot.

“Trev!”

“I can’t.”

Faraday turned to Matthews. “I can’t leave him.”

“Screw him. I won’t let you die because of this fool.”

“Simon, I can’t.”

Matthews was caught up in two minds, whether to run or not, when one prevailed over the other and he put down the drum and radio. “I’ll come back for you, I promise.”

“Stop there!” shouted a voice.

Matthews turned to see the men were still closing a large gap between them, walking now, but their weapons claimed all the authority. Instinct persuaded him that attack was the best form of defence. Anyhow, they couldn’t go on and he could fight back or get killed, although he didn’t fancy their chances. He could try small talk or blackmail, that might work. Impossible. He had killed one of their family, had stolen their water and radio and had rousted their abundant supply of food.

Gable wobbled to his feet. He could hardly see through his fogged
-
up mask, but he didn’t need to see to know that the outlaws were standing right in front of them with guns. One of the men stepped forward. He was the father of the boys, dressed in rumpled, dirty clothes and a gasmask, aiming his rifle forward. He snatched back the water drum and radio.

“On your knees, all of you. Close your eyes,” he ordered.

Matthews realised that only the father had a deadly weapon, a hunting rifle. The two young sons were holding batons and metal pipes. One of the boys was so small he looked as though he would have trouble swinging a cricket bat.

“Fuck you!” Matthews bellowed.

Faraday saw the wisdom in doing as she was told, but it didn’t look as though her cousin would see the same wisdom. Thinking about Sutcliffe and Hennessey as she fell to her knees for execution, a blazing fear came over her and now her body was shaking so violently she thought she might die of panic. Urine filled her diaper. Next to her, Gable was sobbing. Matthews, defiantly refusing to kneel, was asking for trouble. One of the sons casually walked up to Matthews tapping the baton on his thigh and whacked him across the knee, forcing him down.

“Helmet off,” the father ordered.

Matthews held out his palms and shrugged. “If you’re gonna shoot me, just shoot me.”

The man rotated the rifle towards Faraday, keeping his eyes on Matthews. “Take it off and she’ll live.”

Matthews shot a desperate look at his cousin, surrendering to the fact that either both of them got it or just him and neither alternative kept him alive. His minutes were numbered, but if he couldn’t save his own life, he could do the noble thing and save the life of Faraday. Then again, he couldn’t trust them to be true to their word.

The man clicked a bullet into position and positioned his finger on the trigger. A range of thoughts raced through Faraday’s mind. She wondered if a bullet to the brain would hurt. She wondered what would become of her body after she was dead. What would Sutcliffe and Hennessey say about it? Would they even find out?

Matthews disobediently stood up. He was in a testy mood. The rifle swung back at him.

“Hey, let’s just talk,” Matthews said. “We’ve got plenty of food and drink. Maybe we can share it.”

Faraday closed her eyes in despair. She couldn’t believe her cousin had just given up their only supply of food, endangering the White Room and the lives of Sutcliffe and Hennessey. Then she heard three successive gunshots and heard his body crash to the floor, and the stark reality that her cousin was dead immediately struck home.

Pacing the room, Hennessey was going out of her mind. She wanted to go out looking for Sutcliffe, but knew she couldn’t leave Burch by himself. What was taking him so long anyway? There were dangers outside. She had said it, over and over. Sutcliffe had told her that he was taking the amputated foot away to dispose of it and that he would be straight back. That had been over two hours ago. A worrying thought entered her head. Amputating Burch’s foot had clearly affected his mental state, now that she gave it thought, and he had acted strange thereafter. Despondent and distant. Before he had left the room, he had kissed her head and pulled her into his arms. “You’ll be fine, stay strong,” he’d said. Now she worried his words secretly meant
goodbye
.

In the time that Sutcliffe been gone, Burch’s condition had deteriorated. His breathing was shallow and she thought he was going into shock. It taught her just how quick a human condition could go from being stable to the door of death. Life was seeping out of him by the hour and his face was alabaster white.

Simultaneously sweating and shivering, Burch was deeply aware that his fear of heights and his indecision on the balloon had brought him to his current condition, and it would bring him to a miserable end. He let out a soft moan.

Hennessey felt his forehead and offered him a weak smile. “What is it, Keith?”

“My foot, it’s itchy.”

“I’ll scratch it for you.”

She peeled off his sock and ran her long fingernails over the crest of his foot. The skin around his toes was crumpled with burn scars and she avoided touching it.

“Just tell me where exactly.”

“Not that foot.”

The comment puzzled her. “You mean your left foot, the one we amputated, remember?”

“Yeah, it’s itchy.”

“No, Keith, that’s impossible.”

“Scratch it. Please.”

Hennessey didn’t know what to do. Where was everybody?

Faraday could not understand what had just happened. She’d heard the body collapse to the ground, knowing that Matthews had just taken three bullets to the head. Seconds later, when she opened her eyes, she saw before her the father face down on the ground, his leg shuddering with spasms and a dark hole in his temple. Standing either side of him were his two sons. One had a bullet hole in the eye of his blood-smattered gasmask. She watched him slowly topple to the floor. The other man dropped to his knees and was clutching his throat where he had a dark hole in his neck with blood spilling through his fingers. Someone had shot them all. Who? Faraday turned to see Sutcliffe holding the pistol that had put all three men down. “Brad!” Faraday flew to her feet and ran to him, flinging her arms around his shoulders. She had never been so pleased to see someone. She drew back. “Thank God you came.”

Gable was in a terrible state. His leg was bleeding from a bullet wound and he could hardly stand. He was sobbing quietly to himself.

Matthews said nothing. He just stood dumbfounded, unsure how to feel or what to think.

Sutcliffe opened his visor. “Who are these people?”

Faraday, almost in tears, raised her visor, understanding that Sutcliffe’s communication system wasn’t working properly. “I’ll tell you about it when we get back.”

Matthews reclaimed the precious radio and water drum and lagged behind as Sutcliffe and Faraday supported Gable along the way.

Nightfall approached. Another day was drawing to a close.

It had been thirty five hours since Hennessey had last seen Gable. Seeing him now gave her a shock. His eyes were bloodshot red, his face drained of colour, the bags under his eyes swollen and dark. He had a bullet wound in his thigh, though on closer inspection she determined that it wasn’t life
-
threatening, just a flesh graze. She was beginning to feel like a nurse as she dressed his bloody wound, her second of the day.

Faraday explained that Gable had been under enormous stress, what with being lost and then being held prisoner. And he hadn’t eaten for days.

“Get him some food and water,” Hennessey said.

Faraday nipped out to the elevator, grabbed a tin of vegetable soup from the top of the pile and picked out a bottle of water. Using the tin opener, she cut the metal lid off the tin and opened the water for him. Gable waded through the soup and drank the water and colour came back to his face almost immediately.

“So, the survivors are still out there?” asked Sutcliffe.

“Not for much longer,” Matthews commented.

He gave them a rundown about the bunker and the cannibals. Although the prisoners were free, they had no food or shelter and they would soon die because their lungs had been fully exposed to the radiation. Faraday elaborated on what she had observed while Hennessey put Gable to bed. Sutcliffe joined in and explained to Hennessey how he had stumbled upon Gable’s paint trail on the cliff top and had followed it for a good five or six miles, sharing details about how he had arrived to find Gable, Matthews and Faraday in a vulnerable, very frightening position after escaping from the bunker – Matthews cut in and laid the blame on Gable for that – and Sutcliffe had prevented their execution by shooting the men with the pistol he had with him. Hennessey had nothing but sympathy for Sutcliffe because she knew how difficult it must have been for him to amputate Burch’s foot, but killing three men must have been equally as hard.

Matthews watched in absolute disgust when Hennessey put her arms around Sutcliffe, so he went out to the elevator to retrieve some food and escape the room. He didn’t notice Faraday following him out.

“Thanks for…you know.” She leaned forward and kissed him on the cheek, commending him for his single
-
handed rescue at the bunker. The moment was awkward, because the inappropriate feelings that Matthews had earlier discarded were back and stronger than before.

Back inside the White Room, Matthews crouched beside Burch who was mumbling some words and shaking unendingly beneath the insulation blankets. “What’s wrong with him now?”

Sutcliffe motioned with a finger for Matthews to follow him to the other side of the room. “Please try and show a little respect. I had to amputate his foot a few hours ago because of gangrene. He might die.”

“Well, with ‘respect’ Brad,” Matthews said, “Perhaps his death will be a blessing to us all.”

Sutcliffe had swallowed more than enough of his partner’s blustering comments. He had endured several of his conversations twisted and discarded by cheap mind
-
playing language and was sick of his constant expletive
-
ridden tirades. For the first time, he realised the only thing they shared in common was that blood ran through their veins.