The Bitter End (15 page)

Indistinct voices came through the wooden walls. He tried to detect malice or threat but couldn't. Even so he realised he was gripping the handle of his gun too tightly.

The others stood still, looking at the door at the other end of the cabin. Then everything seemed to go quiet. The voices stopped. He braced himself for the sound of gunfire.

Across the room Sol moved towards the window. He was silent, almost eerily so. Ben wanted to warn him not to move but he couldn't bring himself to speak.

The boy leaned over the sink and looked up. The boat beside them was a big one. Painted deep brown and glossy it towered over their little vessel.

Above he heard footsteps and he flicked the safety off his gun. He looked up and followed the steps over his head.

On the other side of the room Sandra had her arm around Kris who appeared to be shaking. Anthony was looking out of the front windows.

He never knew who fired first. No one owned up to it. What he did know was that someone had climbed onto the front of the boat. Two figures dressed in dark clothes holding heavy looking machine guns. The windows were broken by gunfire and therein lay his only clue as to who started the fire fight: when it was all over they found no glass on the inside of the boat.

A bullet tore through the air close to his head. He heard it go through the wooden wall behind him. Somebody screamed, he thought later that it was probably Kris. One of the dark figures on the back of the boat flew backwards, a trail of blood exploding out of his chest like a boats wake. He seemed to hang in the air for an age and when he hit the water he seemed to float there for a moment before sinking like a rock beneath the surface.

Time froze.

He could hear the air pulsing inside his ears as he stood alert for movement. He swallowed sticky saliva and almost choked. Killing a human was not the same as killing a vamp, he knew that. He had never done it before and he wasn't sure he would be able to, even now.
 

Gunfire tore through the air. He watched Anthony dive to the floor and thought for a moment he had been hit. Then he started to crawl towards him.

"Get down," he shouted but Ben could only see his mouth move over the sound of guns firing and wood exploding. The air was filled with smoke and splinters and the sound of rapid fire machine guns.

He threw himself on the floor next to Anthony just in time. The door at the end of the boat exploded open and the sheet of metal flew across the room and shattered another window.

Two men came through the smoke firing their machine guns indiscriminately around the boat. There was more screaming, blood joined the smoke and sawdust in the air and someone fell down but Ben couldn't see who it was.

Anthony fired and Ben found that he could shoot at a human. He aimed at the figures approaching and squeezed off two quick shots. The gun recoiled like an angry dog in his hands. The first shot went wide and hit his target in the shoulder. The second found its mark and the head shot dropped him.

He shook as if he was the one who had been shot. Beside him Anthony fired and took out the other man. Two more followed and they fell as well.

Ben tried to get up. A sudden and overwhelming need to get away had come over him. He needed to be somewhere else. A hand on his back kept him down and he turned to see Anthony scowling at him. He wanted to punch Anthony but he couldn't move.

"Keep your fucking head," he shouted and Ben heard that loud and clear. They weren't safe yet.

Another figure appeared at the door but they didn't come in. He threw something down the stairs. It hit the floor and rolled to the middle of the boat.

Anthony looked over the chair that they were hiding behind to see what it was. "Oh fuck!" he said.

Ben was hauled to his feet. He didn't understand what was happening but gladly deferred to Anthony. They ran towards the front of the boat and other people were running too.

Seconds passed like minutes. All of a sudden the air was gone and Ben felt his feet leave the floor. He flew through the air without grace or control and all of a sudden the river, rather than the boat, was below him.

Up and up he went. He could feel heat like a fire behind him and thought that he was being cooked alive.

Then he started to fall and time snapped back at double-speed. The water coming towards him too quickly, he put his hands up to shield his face.

The oily green river engulfed him and turned black. He sunk towards the bottom and couldn't slow his momentum. He forced his eyes to open but could see nothing through the murk. He hit the ground with a thump that shook his skull and surprised him so that he opened his mouth to cry out and swallowed water.

A hand waved around in front of him. He didn't care whose it was. He grabbed hold of it and felt himself dragged along the river, slowly upwards and away.

Heavy objects landed all around him, imbedding themselves in the bottom of the river and very nearly taking off his head. He stayed below the surface, even when his lungs began to burn and he wanted nothing more than to swim up for air.

When he broke the surface the noise hit him like a second explosion. People were shouting, guns were being fired, someone was crying. He looked up and saw Anthony ahead, scrambling up the mud slick bank. He collapsed on the grass and Ben followed him.

"Anthony!" he shouted but he could barely hear his own voice above all the noise. He grabbed his shoulder but Anthony didn't move.

He looked around. Kris was crying but managing to lead Sol out of the river. He was clutching his blood soaked shoulder, his face caught in a grimace. Ben couldn't see Aaron or Daniel but gunfire still came from both sides of the fight.

Ben ran down to the bank and gave his hand to pull Kris and Sol out of the water. He pulled them along the bank and Sol collapsed on the floor next to Anthony. Ben felt a ridiculous sense of guilt that he hadn't been shot. It was the only thing he could later blame for what he did next.

Wired with adrenalin that allowed him to ignore the aches and pains, he didn't feel like he could just stand there doing nothing. Kris had started to cry again and at first he thought it was just shock. He tried to comfort her, put an arm around her and told her everything would be alright.

She pushed him away. "She's dead," she said and he didn't need to ask who she meant.

He looked back at the two boats. An undamaged hulk towered over the remains of their little narrow boat. Men in dark clothes stood on the deck firing their guns, the return fire came from behind the trees on the opposite bank.

Ben made his decision. "Wait with them," he said.

Kris looked at him blankly but he decided she wasn't going anywhere. He would have taken her gun but he didn't want to leave her unarmed. After a final look over them he started to run back towards the boats, ignoring the pain in his ankles.

He could almost feel the adrenalin coursing through his veins and a part of him was aware that he would pay for it later. But that didn't seem to matter now. This was exciting, thrilling even. He gripped the gun tightly and came to rest just short of the hulk on the opposite side of the river to Aaron and Daniel.

He closed his eyes and focused on his breathing. He tried to forget that he was shooting at humans rather than vamps. What they wanted didn't matter: they were trying to kill him and his people and that was enough.

When he opened his eyes he extended his arm and aimed at the boat. He could see three figures standing on top, facing away from him towards where Aaron and Daniel stood. Ben aimed for the head and waited. His heart continued to hammer in his chest and he squeezed the trigger.

The man crumbled and suddenly there were more people on the roof of the hulk and some of them started firing in his direction. Bullets scorched the ground a few feet in front of him and he rolled calmly behind a convenient tree. Pieces of bark flew off but he was safe for now.

When he had calmed down enough to believe that he could shoot accurately he looked around the far side of the tree, aimed his gun and fired off six quick shots. Two more people fell down. Across the other side of the river Aaron and Daniel were moving towards the boat but he stayed where he was; they could take cover behind broken pieces of their own ship but if he stepped away from the tree there was nothing for him to hide behind.

An engine started. It crunched and grated. Ben risked looking out from behind the tree and saw the hulk had started to move. It turned in the water, grinding the debris of their long boat beneath it. He wondered how many people were left aboard. He saw Aaron fire off a couple of final shots as the vessel retreated but, if they hit, they had little effect.

He watched with relief as the hulk disappeared around the corner and the adrenalin that had kept him upright so far started to leave his system. Suddenly he was aware of his left ankle that felt like it had been shattered into a million pieces, of his back which felt burned to a crisp and of his arm which burned with a fiery anger. When he turned and looked at the places where it hurt he saw that his shirt had been torn away and a piece of his skin was missing. It was just a flesh wound but he had been shot.

"You alright?" said Daniel as he emerged from the water. Aaron was further downstream, going to make sure his brother and Sol were okay.

He nodded. "I'll live."

"Come on then."

He followed Daniel back to the others. Anthony and Scott were sitting up now, using pieces of cloth to dress their wounds. Kris stood a few feet away, looking back at the wreckage. No one needed to ask what had happened.

"We need to get these two some proper help," said Aaron.

Ben nodded, he was exhausted and he didn't know how far any of them could walk but if they could find somewhere safe to spend the night they might make it back to Sanctuary by the middle of tomorrow. He helped Sol to stand. He had been shot through the shoulder and a couple of bullets had skimmed his legs. Anthony was supported by Aaron and Daniel.

He started to walk back towards home, exhausted and disappointed but also, somewhat, relieved.

"Where are you going?" said Daniel.

He stopped. With an effort he turned around and saw that they were all ready to go but facing in the wrong direction. "Sanctuary is this way," he said.

"I know," said Daniel. "We can't go to Sanctuary."

There was no more than five metres separating him from the others but with Sol hanging from his shoulder and crushing his lungs, he felt as if he needed to shout. "Why not? What else can we do?"

"Who do you think just tried to kill us?" said Daniel.

He understood what Daniel was saying but it wouldn't sink in. He shook his head. There was no way that had happened. He shook his head.

Daniel shrugged. "Go back if you want, see what kind of welcome you get."

"Where are you going?" he said.

"We'll find somewhere. Are you with us?"

He looked back along the river towards where he knew the village to be. It seemed like a long way to go by himself and what if Daniel was right? He remembered Aaron saying that he didn't trust Nicholas and he wondered if he had reason for that.

Ben hesitated but in the end he decided to go with the others. If it turned out Daniel was wrong they could always turn back tomorrow. So they walked on, the six of them. One less than they started the journey with, two badly injured and one emotionally crippled. They walked on into a world he didn't know.

8

Away from the river Ben felt uncomfortable. It wasn't anything he could properly define, a general sense of unease that came from being too far away from the water.

They walked for most of the day, taking short but frequent breaks for the injured and those carrying them. Nobody felt much like talking, it seemed.
 

They trudged through mile after mile of anonymous fields. Daniel led the way and insisted that, once, there had been a path here that would lead them where they wanted to go.

Where Ben wanted to go was Sanctuary, back to Mary and the twins, but he tried not to think about that. He tried not to think about the hulk being sent by his own people; it was much easier to believe they had been pirates. The trouble was that, as far as he could see, the only reason not to think about them being from Sanctuary was that a part of him knew there was a very good chance they had been. Which also meant that the three men he had killed were most likely people he had seen before, possibly even people he knew well.

Fog settled over the fields as they walked and Ben found that without being able to feel the current of the river he could not tell that he was walking in a straight line. Sol was getting heavy on his shoulder, he had fallen into a fitful sleep and woke with a start every few minutes. The trees in the distance had disappeared behind a white screen. He could just about see the others ahead.

"We need to rest," he called ahead. He was worried that Sol was slipping away. They had been walking for hours and he knew that if they had gone in the other direction they would be just as in the middle of nowhere as they were now, but they would be closer to home. Someone could have gone on ahead to get help.
 

They stopped where they were. The ground beneath them was hard and brittle. It snapped and cracked as they settled down. The fog acted as a kind of wall around them, they couldn't see out and, hopefully, no one could see in. The only way he could tell it was still daylight was that the fog seemed to glow. He wondered if vamps could come out in the fog but decided he would rather not know.