Humanity: After It Happened Book 2 (5 page)

WE MUST RETAIN OUR HUMANITY

Dan was out for most of the morning.  When he did come round, he could not move his head.  This resulted in him fountaining acidic bile into the air for it to fall in his face.  He would have choked had Kate not run over to him and tipped his entire immobile body over for the sick to go with gravity.  She cleaned him up and began an in depth top to toe survey where she tested his feeling all over.

No obvious spinal damage.  She turned him the other way and felt down every single segment of his vertebrae asking each time if he had pain or numbness.  He didn’t.  She checked his skull thoroughly, looking for signs of fractures.  After checking his pupil response for the fiftieth time, she finally allowed him to remove the head blocks and move around.  Kate was still unhappy.

“I’m only guessing you realise?” she asked testily “You should have a full spinal x-ray or a CT preferably”

Dan tried to reassure her that he was fine, and that she was doing a great job without modern machinery.  He could barely get the words out from the swollen right side of his jaw.

“Council members” he mumbled “Please”

He was soon looking up at the concerned faces of Penny, Andrew, Neil, Jimmy, Cara and Chris.  Kate was still flitting around him, but had sent Lizzie to take a break.

Dan had told a version of events which left out some embarrassingly key details.  Where his consciousness ended, so Chris’ story began.  He learned how the cowardly bastard Kyle had run into the woods rather than face the consequences.

Kate reported that Dan was lucky, that one of the blows could easily have paralysed or killed him.  Neil reported that Steve, Joe and Lexi had gone after Kyle, but as Ash was too wound up over him being down to go with them, they lost track of him after a mile.

He wanted to get his dog and his gun and hunt the bastard down.  He said as much to the council but even he had to agree he was in no state to move anywhere for a while.  He left out the more creative ideas of what he could do when he caught him.

Kyle’s actions had brought about the difficult question of punishment.  The only one internal problem they had ever encountered had resulted in the public humiliation and ejection of Callum some months ago.  That was different; that was a fight as such and not a deliberate action by the leaders of a group of people.  It wasn’t society punishing a crime.

Was Kyle to be banished?  That held inherent dangers in that he knew where they were and what capabilities they had.  He could return with others and be a serious threat to them.

Someone suggested execution which Dan thought was a good idea at first, but the more he thought of it, the more he knew it was the wrong way to go; killing someone was one thing, executing them for a crime was different.  Even if it was the attempted murder of himself.

Neil pointed out that it was irrelevant as Kyle was in the wind anyway, and was unlikely to live long without shelter and equipment.  From what Chris said he ran with just the clothes on his back so would probably die of exposure before the New Year.

Penny suggested that if he returned or was captured then he should stand trial.  Dan wanted to protest that he was seen by three people doing it and then ran away.  No mitigation he could offer could excuse his actions, especially as he fled after.  He held his tongue though; as anarchical as he felt he still believed in justice.  Although his beliefs were in a deeper and purer justice than the world had known before it happened.

The subject was ended under the cloud of crossing bridges when they came to them, and he was left to sleep by the others.  He wasn’t sure how badly hurt he was, as the hangover symptoms seemed worse than the head injuries.  Sera brought Ash to him later that day, and the huge dog hurt him again by climbing onto the hospital bed as he had a matter of weeks before.  He refused to leave and growled at Kate when she told him to get down, prompting Dan to reprimand him and send him out with Sera. 

He would’ve preferred to go back to his own bed but Kate insisted on twenty-four hours’ observation, especially the way he ‘liked to collect concussions’ she added.

He was released by lunchtime the next day and walked stiffly to the front door.  He let Ash out on the way past, and leaned against his truck to smoke.  Steve joined him, told him of the brief hunt for Kyle but without a dog they were too far behind to find him. 

“Pete tried with his girls, but they just put pheasants up instead” he laughed.

“Ash would’ve caught him and tore the little fucker to pieces” Dan growled, looking at the dog.  Sensing he was being discussed he cocked his head over and stared at Dan with his ears up, waiting for food or praise or both.  He fussed his head.

“I don’t fancy his chances though” said Steve “I’ve seen people die in better conditions, and he has no tradecraft at all from what I hear” he reassured Dan.  Steve’s eyes glazed over, deep in memory.

“Where have you gone, mate?” Dan asked, kindly.

“The cockpit of a Merlin.  Kosovo” he replied quietly.

He put a hand on the pilot’s shoulder as he passed.  They all had their history, and post-traumatic stress was probably the only single common denominator for them all.

Dan had his own skeletons too, just not of the frozen wasteland mass genocide type.

Steve felt instantly guilty for the lie. 

True, he had seen some awful atrocities during his service in the Balkans and elsewhere but nothing compared to the soldiers actually on the ground.  He had really gone back to Snowdon years ago.  A sudden storm had hit them when walking and he had to lead his wife and kids down before the weather became a danger to them.

Dan limped back into Ops, where Leah fixed him with a smile of relief.  The mangy cat hissed at Ash from its perch; a Sainsbury’s shopping basket with a prison blanket inside on top of a five-foot-tall stack of 5.56 bullets in boxes.

Ash responded with a whine of fear and frustration as he backed away from the evil thing.

Lexi blushed and looked at the floor.  He wasn’t in the mood, but he had to deal with this soon.  Steve walked back in and went straight past Ops, deep in thought.  Dan made a show of producing his packet of cigarettes, announcing clearly without words that he was going back outside.  As he had hoped, Lexi followed him.

He lit two cigarettes at once, and handed her one in silence.  He walked with some difficulty to the place where Kyle had attacked him. 

He laughed mirthlessly; that was probably the only conceivable circumstances in which Kyle could ever have beaten him. 

But he had, and it was very nearly final.

“I’ll kill the bastard if I find him” she started.

“You won’t, because if he’s not already dead I doubt he will last more than a couple of days” he replied tiredly “Any idea what set him off?” he asked, subtly raising the subject.

“We didn’t do anything” She blurted out, turning crimson “I just…”

“You just what?” he asked carefully.

“I just didn’t want to spend Christmas on my own” she said to the floor “I was drunk and I just got in your bed, that’s it”

He sighed “Lex, we’ve been through this.”

“I know” she said “Kyle tried it on with me last night and I was” she hesitated, searching for the right word “unkind to him.  Cruel actually.  Then he probably saw me go to your room.  It’s my fault”

“No, it isn’t” said Dan “It’s Kyle’s for being a fucking jealous prick and mine for letting the rat get the drop on me.  You know I roughed him up the other day and Ash saw him off?”

Lexi’s eyebrows raised “Yeah” said Dan “He demanded to be a Ranger.  Again.”

Lexi laughed “I bet he shit a brick when you gave Leah a Glock!”

Dan wasn’t in the mood to laugh at Kyle’s wounded pride; his injuries were still too sore.  He started to walk back to the house.

“So, we good now?” Lexi asked after him.

“Yes” he said, not entirely convincing himself, as he recalled her bare chest in his bed covered in scars she received for doing the job he gave her.

CABIN FEVER

After the excitement of Christmas and Kyle being branded an outlaw, New Year came and went without the grand celebration of previous times.  Perhaps people were more pensive about the passing of time and making resolutions without sharing them with the loved ones they had last time around.

The mood became low, then tempers started to fray.  Suggestions were made for scavenging runs, mostly for people to get out.  Neil insisted Dan take him out for petrol as the generators had used almost all of his stores up.  Dan knew he still had over three hundred litres of petrol, but humoured him anyway.  Six people volunteered to come.  In the end they went on their own, travelling further afield just for the hell of it.

One of the main reasons for Dan putting a stop to the trips during winter was that the roads, without proper maintenance and gritting, were degrading fast and were treacherous in places.  He had to go slowly, avoiding potholes and even subsidence at one point.  They had ten jerry cans to fill and two hand pumps to do it with.

Neil removed the reservoir locks as he had done before, and suggested a race to fill the first can.  Dan smiled, and asked what the stakes were.

“Name your price, Monsieur” Neil replied in a sleazy French accent.

“I win, you do my washing up this week” he said

“Likewise” Neil said, offering his hand.  As Dan took his own hand from the pump to shake Neil’s, he shouted “GO” and began to pump furiously, making Dan curse and rush to try and catch up.

They couldn’t call a clear winner, and sat panting and laughing together as Ash gave them both a questioning look.  They finished the other cans at a more sensible pace and went to set off home.  They drove for a few minutes before Neil stared ahead, leaning towards the windscreen.

He held up a pointed finger in silence, making Dan look to his right where a pillar of black smoke was rising behind a copse of trees in the distance.

They exchanged a look, and Dan turned the Discovery towards the possibility of people.  They struggled to find the source of the smoke; when they got close to where they thought it was, they found a golf course blocking their path.  They had to drive a long detour with Neil keeping an eye on the Ordnance Survey map of the area.  Eventually they found a long, looping road which had housing estates branched off at intervals to the right, and industrial areas to their left. 

The source of the smoke was the bonnet of a crashed Ford Transit minibus, the unfortunate driver having taken advantage of the relaxed seatbelt laws of late.  His shattered and twisted frame was sprawled though the broken windscreen where his upper body was starting to cook from the heat of the small fire which hadn’t yet erupted to engulf the entire vehicle.  Dan had seen enough in his life to know that the driver was killed on impact, and that the whole lot would be afire soon.  Bags were strewn about in the back and on the ground next to the open sliding door.

“Someone survived” he said, pointing to the uneven tracks in the wet grass leading to the overgrown bushes separating the road from an industrial area.

Neil had not come armed, so Dan handed him his Sig as he retrieved the M4 from the cab.  He whistled Ash to his heel and locked the Land Rover before setting off after the survivors of the crash.  The tracks were a mess, like whoever had left them was dragging something in a hurry.

The more Dan looked at the tracks, the more concerned he grew.  There were gouge marks intermittently, like whatever they were dragging was fighting back.  He hadn’t survived this long by being careless, so he sank to a crouch and readied his weapon as he whispered his suspicions to Neil. 

The older man switched on immediately and his happy demeanour melted away to reveal his darker, more serious side. Dan made eye contact with Ash before giving him a hand signal; Ash understood and sank into a stalk as he moved silently alongside his master.

Moving carefully meant moving very slowly.  It was close to five minutes before they were rewarded with a low grumble from Ash’s patented early warning system.  They slowly circled a building before finding a vantage point where Dan could see what was inside.  It was a warehouse and looked similar to their own stores, but not organised by any standard.  Crates of bottles and tins were ripped open in no particular order.  He heard a male voice speaking, and what sounded like a female voice responding angrily. 

He scanned the room and saw movement off to his right.  He assessed what he saw and considered his options before deciding to play this one dumb.  He stripped off his body armour and swapped weapons with Neil.  He tucked the Sig in the back of his trousers before creeping alongside the building to where the shutter door was rolled up.  He sat Ash flush to the building, so a person would have to be outside before they saw him.  He made him stay with eye contact and hand signals before walking away to come to the building from the direction of the road.

He put his hands in his pockets and scuffed his feet as he walked, trying to demonstrate no threat in his body language.

“Hello?” he called as he approached the door.

The man who had been talking visibly jumped in fright, and wheeled on Dan holding a gun.  He recognised it easily as a Glock, and thought that this weapon had probably been sourced in the same way he had his own in the beginning.

The man held it sideways, like he was in a film.  Dan felt a surge of disappointment at the low standards of this newest adversary, suspecting that he was going to have to converse with a mouth breather; ever the post-apocalyptic snob.

“What the fuck do you want?” he asked, scared and edgy.  He walked away from the woman and Dan saw her clearly for the first time.  Her blonde hair was a mess, and her big eyes pleaded with him for help but burned with a mockery that said she would never lower herself to actually beg for his assistance.  He made no response to her look, but focused on the man with the gun.

He advanced on Dan, still holding the gun sideways and evidently scared by the intrusion.  He thought that if he was going to walk up to him and hold the gun to his head then this was going to be easier than he suspected.  He stopped short of the threshold, about ten feet from where Dan stood with his hands up. 

Dan willed him to close the gap between them and make it easier to remove him from the equation.  A glance at Ash showed that he wasn’t in play yet; their new enemy needed to walk forward a few more feet for the dog to surprise him.

“I said, what do you want?” said the man testily.  His aggression failed to mask the panic evidently rising in him.  He forced himself to sound in control, only managing to cover his fear with an excess of hostility.

“Who is it?” came another voice from inside.  It wasn’t the woman, as she sat and stared at Dan with almost a sense of amusement at the turn of events.

That complicated things; there was at least one other in there and had no clue yet if they were armed as well.

“Whoa mate!” said Dan, intentionally attempting to mimic a local accent in an attempt to dumb down.

“Was that you that had a crash back there?” he said, stalling for time.

“No, someone else. We helped them” he said, uneasily.

“They ran us off the road and dragged me here” the woman started to shout indignantly before another man stepped into view and slapped her hard across the head, messing her hair up further and receiving a murderous look in response.  Dan involuntarily stepped forward but the man with the gun pointed it in his face.

“Not one more step, she’s ours.  Get lost.” he said nervously, waving the end of the barrel at Dan.  He could barely keep the gun still.  Dan now had to take out two in quick succession before the woman got hurt.  Simply leaving was not an option for him now.  He stepped backwards and stared at the man.

“What are you going to do?  I bet you don’t know, do you?  Look at you, you’re a joke” he said softly as he walked backwards, goading him.

The man reacted as he was supposed to, with his manhood affronted he stepped forwards to close the gap with Dan and threaten him again; to be close enough to see his fear. 

As the hand holding the gun came into view he just saw Ash tilt his head to marvel at the new toy he was being presented with.  A second later he launched, took the arm and the body attached to it.  The force of the impact and the momentum of the dog was sufficient to yank the man’s neck painfully as he was taken to the ground.  Dan stepped to the side, simultaneously drawing the Sig from behind his back. 

He walked past Ash ripping at the man without taking his eyes off the second target; he had to trust the dog to do his job as speed was paramount.  Untrained people take triple the time to react, and he capitalised on that.

As the second man saw what was happening he reached out and grabbed the woman, reacting far quicker than Dan expected. 

Too late for Dan to strike, he held a knife to her throat and looking terrified and desperate.  He had the same twitchiness as the man now screaming in Ash’s teeth.

“Get your dog off him!” he bellowed in fear, pressing the knife into the flesh above the woman’s collar bone.

“No.  Let her go and I’ll call my dog back” Dan said in a low monotone.  Give the appearance of calm, and their panic will rise.

“NO!” he snapped in retort over the noise of snarling and painful screams, trembling.  Dan thought that this man was likely to cut her deeply by pure accident in his state of panic.  He glanced at the woman, still pointing the Sig at the man holding her.

“What’s your name?” he asked her in the same low voice.

“Marie” she said through gritted teeth “Lovely to meet you, but please get this fucking arsehole off me” sarcasm in the face of adversity.  She got more attractive by the second.

“Marie, I’m very sorry” he said.  The look of confusion on her face was replaced by open-mouthed, horrified shock when he fired a single round.

The desperate man’s biggest mistake was that he had let Dan get to within ten feet as he spoke; so close that he could not miss.  The bullet entered his face just under the nose, tearing a ragged hole through his top lip, shattering the teeth behind before blowing the brainstem out.  The hand holding the knife had no chance to cut her accidentally, as it was instantly lifeless without the possibility of any nerve receiving a signal from the brain.

Marie stood still with her mouth open and blood splattered on her face as her captor fell to the floor, utterly lifeless.  Dan heard the percussive cough of a suppressed weapon firing outside, and ran to find Neil had fired at, and killed, a ragged-haired woman running at Ash with an axe.  He thanked him, and called Ash away from the dead man he still tore at. 

“Good boy, leave it” he said.  Ash trotted to his side without reluctance, happy with the praise. His muzzle, face and chest were soaked red with the man’s blood.  He walked back inside where he found Marie wiping the gore from her face in horror.  Dan went to speak to her, but was met with a snarl “In my hair?  Thanks!” she said, then took a breath and steadied herself.

“No, seriously.  Thanks” she said, and raised herself on tiptoes to kiss his cheek, transferring a small amount of brain matter to his face.

She walked to a door and opened it, revealing another woman and a man who was groggy with a lump on his head.  The woman was much shorter and heavier than Marie, she was Asian, had long dark hair and an almond shaped face.  She saw the spreading puddle of dark red blood on the ground and looked instantly unwell, hugging Marie tightly.  In contrast, Marie seemed to be unfazed by their ordeal.

The man was barely conscious and couldn’t quite understand what was happening.  Dan checked him out and hoped it would pass as he could detect no serious trauma.  With help, he laid him on a heavy plastic sheet as a makeshift stretcher.

He retrieved the Glock and found no other weapons of use.  They left the bodies where they were and spirited the women outside where he took back his kit from Neil.  He used a bottle of water from inside to wash the blood from Ash’s face – fearing that it painted him in a less than ideal light.

Marie and Selina told them that they were in a minibus with their friend, Anthony, when something big hit the windscreen and they crashed.  They were brought here by the now deceased occupants of the warehouse and told they were staying with them now.  They disagreed on that point, whereby Selina was locked in a cupboard with the man injured in the crash. 

“Then you showed up with your wolf and shot the nice man I was talking to” said Marie. 

Dan couldn’t get a bead on her at all; she looked delicate and if forced to guess he would have said she was the ‘hide in a corner and cry’ type as opposed to the ‘make jokes about seeing someone shot in the face twelve inches away’ type.  She fixed him with a smile to show she was joking, and he felt himself colouring up.  He liked her.  She disarmed him completely and made him feel like an awkward boy.

“I assume you two live somewhere near here?” Selina asked, changing the subject.

“We have our own manor house and grounds” said Neil pompously.  He pronounced grounds as ‘grinds’, making Dan smile.  He’d used the very same impression when they first met.

“And there are almost forty of us” Dan added.  That got a response form the two, who exchanged a look.  Selina asked “All immune?”

“I assume so, none of us got sick when it happened” he said, then changed the subject again as they walked to the Land Rover.