I'm heading out of the city now. I look back over my shoulder and see that although there are still lights on in many buildings, there are also huge swathes of town which are bathed in darkness. The power must be down. It's inevitable, I suppose. This 'change' (whatever it is) might only be affecting a minority, but it's repercussions are being felt everywhere. It's tearing society apart as quickly as it destroyed my family.
I turn a corner and walk straight into another body coming the other way, the first person I've come across for some time. I immediately tense myself, ready for the kill. I push the dark figure back and clench my fists ready to strike. I stare through the darkness into the other person's face and… and it's okay. There is no anger, no hate and no threat. The mutual unspoken feeling of relief is immense. This person is like me and we both know that neither of us has anything to fear from the other.
'You okay?' I ask, keeping my voice low.
The other person nods and walks on.
***
I can hear engines in the distance. The military are still moving through the dark city behind me and they are closer now. There are more helicopters crawling through the sky too. I can see four of them hovering ominously, sweeping over the streets and occasionally illuminating the ground below them with impossibly bright spotlights. It's definitely time to get under cover.
I cross over a low stone bridge which spans a silent railway track. Ahead of me is the dark silhouette of a huge factory or warehouse and, on the other side of the road, a building site. As I get closer I see that it's the beginnings of a new housing estate. There are a few houses almost completed just off the main road and they are surrounded by the shells of other partially constructed buildings. The half-built walls and wooden frames jutting up into the air make it hard to tell whether the houses are going up or coming down. It's a silent and desolate place and it seems a sensible place to stop and shelter for a while.
The paving slabs and tarmac beneath my feet give way to gravel and dirt. I follow the muddy and uneven route deeper into the centre of the building site and find myself walking along a row of six homes of varying shapes, sizes and degrees of construction. The ground has been so badly churned by machinery here that it takes me a while to realise that I'm actually walking through the future back gardens of these buildings, not across the front. I wonder whether any of these houses will ever be finished now? The three furthest from me appear to be the most complete and I head towards them. Their windows and doors are covered with grey metal grilles. All except the middle one of the three. The grille which covered the space where its back door was intended to go has been prised off. It's lying on the ground in a puddle of mud, buckled and useless. I'm standing in front of the doorway now looking inside. Has someone been here? I realise that there could still be people inside but I need to stop. Should I go in? Is it safe? Sensing that no-where's safe anymore I climb the step and cautiously enter the building. If there is anyone in there and they're not like me I'll kill them.
Footsteps in the darkness. Sudden movement.
I try to move back but before I can react a figure is on top of me. My legs are kicked out from under me and I'm sent flying back across the hard concrete floor. I can't see anything. I try to kick and punch myself free and stand up but before I can move I'm knocked back down again. I can feel someone pressing down on my ankles and someone else has their hands on my shoulders, keeping me flat on the ground. There's a third person in here. I can see their shadow moving past the doorway.
'Think he's safe?' someone asks. They switch on a torch and the unexpected brightness burns my eyes.
'Turn it off,' I hear another one of them say in a loud, relieved whisper. 'He's all right.'
As quickly as the hands grabbed hold of me they now let go. I shuffle back across the floor, putting as much distance as I can between me and whoever else is in here. The light in the half-finished house is limited and I'm struggling to see anything. Someone's moving just ahead of me. I know there are at least three people in here but are there any more? The torch is switched on again.
'Take it easy, mate,' one of them says. 'We're not going to hurt you.'
I don't know if I believe him. I don't know if I believe anyone anymore.
The figure holding the torch shines the light into their own face. It's a man, perhaps mid-to-late twenties. I know instantly that he's like me and that I'm safe with him. And if this man is no threat then the people who are with him are no threat either.
'What's your name?' he asks.
'Danny,' I tell him, 'Danny McCoyne.'
'Been like this for long, love?' asks a woman's voice.
'What?' I mumble back.
'Been long since it happened?' she asks, rephrasing her question. I assume she's talking about what happened at home when I killed Harry and lost my family.
'Few hours,' I mumble, my throat dry. 'Not sure…'
'I'm Patrick,' the man holding the torch says, holding out his hand. I'm not sure whether he wants me to shake it or whether he's going to pull me up. I reach out and he helps me to stand. 'Happened to me three days ago,' he continues. 'Same for Nancy here. That's Craig,' he says, pointing the torch at the third person across the room. 'Yesterday afternoon, wasn't it, Craig?'
'Just after dinner,' Craig answers. Patrick shines the torch at him but it only illuminates a small part of a huge expanse of belly. Craig is immense.
'So what happened?' Nancy asks. 'Anyone close?'
'My partner's dad,' I explain, feeling some sadness but no remorse or guilt over what I've done. 'He just turned on me. Thought he was going to kill me so I…'
'Had to get him first?' she interrupts, finishing my sentence for me. My eyes are getting used to the darkness in the house now. I can see Nancy nodding and I immediately know that she completely understands what I had to do and why I had to do it, even if I'm still not sure myself. 'Everything will start to make more sense soon,' she tells me. 'I was just the same when it happened to me. Hated myself for doing it but I didn't have any choice. I'd been with John for almost thirty years and we'd hardly spent a day apart in all that time. It was just like someone had flicked a switch. I knew I had to do it.'
This is in danger of turning into a comedy of errors. Have they all killed? I ask the question without realising I'm speaking out loud.
'Suppose it just depends where you are when it happens,' Patrick says. 'Craig hasn't killed anyone yet, which is a surprise when you look at the size of the bugger!'
Nancy takes up Craig's story.
'Tried though, didn't you, love,' she sighs. In the circle of torchlight I see him nod. 'Bunch of them had you cornered at work, didn't they?'
'I was picking orders in the warehouse with four of them,' the giant of a man explains in a surprisingly soft voice. 'Didn't know what was happening. I started on one of them but there were too many. They shut me in one of the offices but I managed to get out of a window. All I could do was run.'
This conversation is bizarre and uncomfortably surreal. It only becomes believable again when I remember the fact that I've killed twice today. How could that be? Christ, until this morning I hadn't even hit anyone in temper, let alone killed them. Patrick passes me a bottle of water which I drink from thirstily.
'What about you?' I ask him.
'I killed,' he answers. 'Don't know who the guy was, I just had to do it like the rest of you. He was just stood there staring at me as I was getting into the car…'
'…and?''
'And I mowed him down. Started the engine, chased him down the street and I mowed him down. Pretty much wrote the car off too. Just kept driving along with him under the wheels. I didn't know what else to do. Tried to go back home but when I got there I saw that my girl was just like the rest of them and…'
'…and you know the rest of the story,' Craig grumbles. 'You just have to do it, don't you?'
'It feels like second nature,' Patrick says quietly. 'It's instinctive. It's animal instinct.'
The room falls silent.
'So what happens now?' I ask.
'Who knows,' Nancy answers. 'My guess is we'll just keep killing each other until either we're all gone or they are. Crazy, isn't it?'
It's hard to get my head round the fact that this woman (who looks like any other average wife / mother / daughter / sister / aunt) is talking so matter-of-factly about killing. In the days since she's changed she seems to have relinquished every aspect of her former life and is now prepared to kill to stay alive herself. At moments like this it all seems beyond belief. Nancy looks more likely to bake you a cake than kill you. I shake my head in bewilderment as Craig gets up and drags a wooden board across the open doorway, blocking out the last shards of light coming in from outside.
35
'So how much of it have you worked out then?' Patrick asks. We're both upstairs in what was probably destined to be the master bedroom of the half-finished house, sitting with our backs to the recently plastered wall. The sky has cleared now and the moon is providing limited but welcome illumination through the grille over the window. I'm tired and I don't want to talk but I can't avoid answering his question.
'Haven't got a bloody clue what's going on,' I answer honestly. 'This is as close as I've managed to get,' I say as I take the folded-up booklet from my bag and pass it to him. He scans the pages by the light of his torch and smiles wryly to himself.
'Good stuff, this!' he laughs sarcastically.
'Took it from a house I hid in,' I tell him. 'Doesn't say much.'
'When did you last get anything from the government that did?'
He shuts the booklet and throws it down onto the bare floorboards.
'It's not like there's anyone you can ask about it, is there?' I say. 'I still don't know if anyone really knows what's happening.'
'Someone knows,' he mutters, 'they must do. You can bet that from the second the first person changed, some government department somewhere has been analysing us and cutting up people like you and me and…'
'Cutting up people?'
'I'm exaggerating,' he continues, 'but you know what I'm saying, don't you? They'll have had a team of top scientists sitting in some lab somewhere working out what's happened to us. They'll be working on a cure.'
'You reckon?'
He shrugs his shoulders.
'Maybe. Whatever happens they'll be trying to find a way of stopping us doing what we do.'
I know he's right. We're a threat to them. Far more of a threat than any enemy they might have battled with previously.
'I don't want to be cured,' I say, surprising even myself with my admission. 'I want to stay like this. I don't want to go back to being one of them.'
Patrick nods and switches off his torch. In the darkness I find myself thinking about Ellis again. I know that it's only a matter of time before she changes if she hasn't already. I've tried to convince myself that she'll be all right but I know that as long as she's with the others she's in danger. The hardest thing to come to terms with today - harder even than everything I've lost - is the fact that Lizzie, the person who carried my little girl and who has provided her with more safety and security than anyone else, is now the one who poses the biggest threat to her. The pain I feel when I think about Ellis tonight is indescribable. Maybe I should try and get to her now. Poor little thing doesn't know what's going to happen. She hasn't got a clue…
'Don't say a lot, do you?' Patrick pushes. He's beginning to get on my nerves but I sense that he has a need to talk. He's as nervous, scared and confused as I am so I don't retaliate.
'Not much to say, is there?' I grunt back.
'So who are you thinking about?'
Very perceptive. I pause but then decide to answer him. Maybe it will help.
'My little girl. She's like us.'
'Why isn't she with you?'
'Because of her mother. I was in the house with the whole family when it happened. I knew that Ellis was like me and I tried to get her but…'
'But what?'