Divine Madness (35 page)

Georgie shot up as soon as the Tannoy cut out. She flicked on the lights and stepped towards the kids.

‘You heard our new leader,’ Georgie shouted. ‘The dark time is upon us. I’m heading up to the school to make sure that the staff up there know what to do. You three wake up the others. Grab the little ones, put them in strollers and take them up to the church.’

Georgie slung her M16 over her shoulder and headed off, leaving the door open behind her. James, Lauren and Rat rolled off the cushions and on to their feet.

‘Don’t know about you two, but I don’t fancy getting myself barricaded underneath the church,’ James said, as he stuck his head through the door to see what was occurring in the corridor outside.

There was nobody around, but he was shocked to see electrical wire running along the floor, linked up to sticks of explosive spaced out every ten metres.

‘That’s
 
not
 
good,’ James gasped. ‘Once that circuit is activated, any TAG units trying to come down here will get blown to bits.’

‘The rest of the tunnels are probably the same,’ Lauren said. ‘The turrets and gates as well I’d bet.’

‘So,’ Rat said, ‘are we good little kids heading for the church, or do we risk making a dash and try escaping through the sewage tank?’

A little voice came up behind them. ‘Are we going?’

James looked back at Joseph. ‘Sure, wake Ed up and get dressed quickly.’

‘You’d better decide fast,’ Rat said, as Joseph took great delight in waking Ed up by twisting his ear. ‘Georgie doesn’t trust us. She’s not gonna leave us down here on our own for long.’

James nodded. ‘OK, we’ll vote. I don’t fancy getting locked behind a blastproof door until the food runs out or Special Forces storm in, so I vote sewer.’

Lauren waved her hand uncertainly. ‘I wish there was another choice, but you’re right.’

Rat had already been outvoted, but his smile made it clear things had gone the way he wanted. ‘I’ve spent my whole life trying to get out of here. Let’s go.’

‘Hang on,’ Lauren said. ‘What about the little dudes?’

‘Eh?’ James frowned.

Rat shook his head, as Lauren scowled at the two boys. ‘You’re prepared to abandon them down here? If something happened I’d never forgive myself.’

‘Come off it Lauren,’ James said. ‘They’ll slow us right down, it’s not practical.’

Lauren stepped backwards and waved the boys away. ‘Fine, you two go. But I’m staying here. I’ll do what I can to help them.’

James shook his head firmly. ‘I’m senior, Lauren. I’m
 
ordering
you to come with me.’

‘I’m not stopping
 
you
,’ Lauren said, ‘just go.’

James knew his sister was as stubborn as hell and he didn’t want to leave without her. ‘Get the buggies out,’ he sighed. ‘We’ll take ’em.’

The two oldest kids, six-year-old Joseph and seven-year-old Ed, were nearly dressed. Lauren scooped Annabel and Martin from the cushions and popped them into a double buggy unfolded by Rat. The fifth kid was a three-year-old called Joel, who’d been asleep since they arrived. James picked him off a small mattress and gently lowered him into a single buggy.

‘Great, you’ve got them all ready,’ Georgie said, breaking into a rare smile as she stepped through the doorway.

James thought fast and gave his sister a shove. ‘Wait for me outside.’

Lauren didn’t know what her brother was up to, but didn’t argue. After everyone was out of the nursery and as Georgie reached to shut the metal door, James spun around in the doorway and dashed back towards the bathroom.

‘Just a sec.’

‘For crying out loud,’ Georgie said irritably. ‘Can’t you hold it in for five minutes? I want to lock up and get moving.’

‘I’m really busting,’ James said as he ran into the bathroom.

James looked around for a weapon. The porcelain lid over the toilet cistern looked ideal. It was up near the ceiling, so that little hands couldn’t fiddle with it. James balanced on the toilet seat as he slid it off, making a grating sound that sent a chill down his back.

‘Come on,’ Georgie shouted after a minute. ‘What are you playing at in there?’

‘Can’t you stop being such a moody cow for once?’ James shouted back. ‘You’re so damned ugly; I bet you’ve never had a man near you.’

A brighter person might have seen through James’ ruse, but Georgie was a hothead who had very little going on in the brains department.

‘You’d better watch that tongue, young man,’ Georgie yelled as she bowled into the bathroom.

James stepped out from behind the open door. The cistern lid weighed a ton and it strained James’ biceps as it smashed into the back of Georgie’s head. It didn’t knock her out, but she lost her footing and toppled like a great tree, so stunned that she didn’t even put out her arms to save herself. As Georgie moaned, James grabbed the gun off her shoulder. He couldn’t help grinning as he stepped over her legs and slammed the bathroom door: Georgie took such delight in being mean to kids that he reckoned she totally deserved a taste of her own medicine.

He ran into the corridor, pulled shut the reinforced metal door and turned the key in the lock. Lauren, Rat and the little kids were waiting.

‘What happened to Georgie?’ Joseph asked, as they turned the buggies around and set off briskly towards the sewer. ‘Why have you got her gun?’

The two little lads were old enough to understand some of the Survivors’ beliefs. James knew they’d start going nuts if they realised they weren’t really heading for the church, but he couldn’t think up a good excuse.

Fortunately Rat butted in. ‘We discovered that Georgie’s a devil,’ he explained. ‘James had to deal with her.’

Joseph and Ed broke into big smiles. ‘She’s always
 
so
 
mean to us,’ Joseph said.

Rat nodded. ‘Exactly. Someone that horrible couldn’t really be an angel.’

This explanation proved very satisfactory to the two small boys, who’d been terrorised by Georgie their whole lives. The three toddlers, one pushed by Rat and two by Lauren, were asleep. As the buggies clattered rapidly over the tunnel floor, James dropped behind, so that Joseph and Ed didn’t overhear his attempts to radio Chloe.

‘No signal,’ James said, looking at Lauren when he caught up.

While James had fallen behind, Ed had started asking questions about why they were going the wrong way. He was only seven, but he’d lived in the Ark his whole life and he knew the way to the Holy Church.

As ever, Rat proved the master of excuses as he turned his buggy off the main underground walkway and into a gloomy tunnel that had a mass of explosive sticks wired up in its entrance.

‘The soldiers are really close, Ed,’ Rat said. ‘They’ve taken over some of the Ark, so we’ve got to take a really long way around. Don’t worry though, I know these tunnels. Once we get under the church you’ll be safe.’

The corridor ended at the base of a spiral staircase. James gave Lauren a filthy look as he picked Annabel and Martin out of the double buggy. It was a huge palaver, taking the toddlers out of the buggies, folding them up, carrying them up the stairs, unfolding the buggies again and then putting the three toddlers back in their seats and doing the whole thing gently so as not to wake them up.

Unfortunately, Rat misjudged a step and stumbled as he carried Joel. The blond-haired kid woke with a start and realised that he was in a strange place in the arms of a strange person. It was all the excuse he needed for a good scream up.

As they set off again, Joseph pushed the empty single buggy and Rat struggled to hold Joel in his arms as the toddler wriggled and kicked for all he was worth.

‘Where’s everyone else?’ Ed asked. ‘Are you sure we’re not lost?’

Lauren was losing her patience with the kids and she’d realised that their racket was echoing for hundreds of metres, giving away their position. She turned sharply and practically bit Ed’s head off. ‘Shut up,’ she said fiercely.

‘Who are
 
you
?’ Ed said. ‘You can’t boss me. You’re not even a grown-up.’

Rat stole one of Georgie’s favourite lines. ‘Shut up the pair of you, or I’ll knock your bloody heads together.’

A couple of minutes after the staircase, they turned into a maintenance corridor with bare bulbs instead of fluorescent tubes. It had bunches of pipes and electrical cables running along the walls and a damp stone floor. Fifty metres along, Rat dumped a slightly calmer Joel back into his buggy and scowled at Joseph.

‘Don’t let him run off,’ Rat said firmly, before taking a few steps forwards and pointing at a metal hatch in the floor.

‘There it is,’ Rat said. ‘Sewage tank’s right under our feet.’

James squeezed past the buggies as Rat pushed his fingers under the hatch and tugged it open. James felt himself heave as he caught a blast of warm air and the most intense stench he’d ever encountered.

‘Oh my
 
god
.’

Rat managed a grin. ‘So that’s what three hundred people’s crap smells like.’

‘Is there anywhere near here where we might get a torch or something?’ James asked. ‘It’s pitch black down there.’

‘There might be something in one of the storage cupboards, but they’re all kept locked,’ Rat said. ‘You’ll have to climb down the ladder and feel your way around the walls. Keep walking straight until you get to the other end.

There’s probably another ladder and the exit hatch should be right above your head.’

‘I suppose,’ James said, before something occurred to him. ‘Hang on,’ he said angrily. ‘Who said I had to be the first one to go down there?’

‘You’re senior,’ Lauren said.

James shook his head. ‘You ignore me all day, but
 
now
 
my rank counts for something.’

‘What’s down there?’ Joseph asked, sounding scared. ‘I don’t want to go down that hole.’

Lauren tousled his hair. ‘Don’t worry, we’ll carry you.’

‘I
 
don’t
 
want to,’ he repeated firmly. ‘It stinks.’

‘You want to get to the church, don’t you?’ Lauren said. ‘This is the only way. It’s probably not that bad once you’re used to it.’

James slid the gun off his shoulder and handed it to Lauren. ‘Safety’s on. Do you know how to use that if the devils come after us?’

‘Course,’ Lauren nodded.

James took a deep breath and stood with one foot on either side of the hatch. As he stepped down on to the first rung of a metal ladder, he tried not to think too deeply about where he was about to put his feet.

James couldn’t see how many steps down, or how deep the sewage was. Hopefully it was only a few centimetres, then it wouldn’t even run inside his shoe. At least the fumes got better as he stepped down, though he was still fighting back puke every time he took a breath.

His trainer touched a layer of bubbles. All the Survivors’ contaminated water ended up here, whether it was from a toilet, or the soapy discharge from a dishwasher or washing machine. The next rung brought a trickle over the top of his trainer and in a couple of seconds he could feel the cold liquid squelching under his sock.

He had a horrible thought:
 
What if this is so deep I have to swim through it? What’s it gonna be like if it runs in my ears and gets in my mouth
?

He felt relieved as his sole touched concrete. It had a worrying coating of slime on it, but at least it wasn’t that deep, barely reaching over his ankle.

He felt blindly along the wall behind the ladder until he reached the corner. He turned away and took a step forwards, but his foot didn’t touch anything. By the time James realised he’d stepped off a ledge, it was too late to pull back. He felt his body topple forwards and gain momentum. His trainer finally hit the floor, half a metre below where he’d started and he felt it glide through something slippery. He swung his back leg forwards and put out his arms to save himself as he felt the sewage swill up his legs and soak into the bottom of his shorts.

Lauren heard the splash and yelled out anxiously, ‘You OK?’

Somehow, James managed to stop himself from falling on his face, but the putrid water had splashed up his arms and there were even a few trickles running down his cheeks.

‘This is it,’ James shouted furiously. ‘I quit. If we get out of this alive, I’m
 
never
 
going on another mission.’

He heard Joseph sobbing up above, ‘I’m not going down there.’

Then another voice, belonging to an adult. As the metal ceiling hatch clanged shut, James realised Lauren and Rat were in trouble. He thought about climbing back up the ladder, but they had the gun. There wasn’t much he could do to help.

*

‘What the hell are you kids doing down there?’ Ernie shouted, pointing his gun at Lauren and Rat as he looked in the corridor entrance.

Lauren was startled and let go of the hatch so fast that she almost caught Rat’s fingers as it slammed shut.