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Waiting for you, pal,' Fairbank answered.

'Move on to where? I've been beaten almost to a pulp, dragged through the ruins and nearly crushed to death.' Ellison spat dust from his mouth in disgust. 'How much more do you think I can take?'

'None of us can handle much more, that's pretty obvious,' Culver told him, 'so you just be your usual charming self and we'll see what we can figure out.'

He looked out over the hazy ruins and wished he could see the full extent of the damage. The mist was clearing, but it was still impossible to see the small hills surrounding the rubbled city. He wondered what lay beyond.

'All right,' he said finally. We can try to make it out of what's left of the city on foot, finding food and shelter as we go. It doesn't look as if we're going to get any help from official sources and I doubt we'll find any Red Cross soup kitchens set up along the way.'

'But where is the government help?' Ellison snarled. 'Just what the fuck are they doing about all this?'

The devastation has been beyond all expectation,' Dealey began to say. 'It was all underestimated. No one foresaw—'

'No jargon, Dealey, no bloody officialese excuses!' Ellison's hand hovered threateningly over a brick by his side.

Fairbank stirred. 'Cut it out, Ellison. You're getting too much to stomach.' His words were all the more ominous for their quietness. He turned to Culver. What about the main government headquarters, Steve?

Wouldn't we be better off there?'

That's what I was coming to next. Our friend from the Ministry here and I had a quiet chat yesterday, and he disclosed some interesting details about the place. It seems it's impregnable. Bomb-proof, radiation-proof, and famine-proof.'

Teali, but is it flood-proof?' Fairbank rumbled darkly.

'Each section can be sealed by air-tight doors,' Dealey said.

You can get us in?' Ellison asked eagerly.

'He knows the entrances,' said Culver. We'll worry about getting inside when the time comes.'

Then you think we should make for the shelter,' Kate said.

Yep. Literally go to ground. It's our best bet.'

'I agree.' Dealey looked at them all individually. 'It's what I've advocated all along. Wait until the radiation has passed, then link up with main base.'

Ellison now had second thoughts. 'How do we know it really is safe? There's been no communication from them.'

Dealey answered. The fault must have been from our end, or somewhere between. Remember, we've had no contact with any of the other shelters, either. I think it's not only in our own interest to report to government headquarters, but it's also my duty as a civil servant.'

Fairbank gave him a tired handclap.

'It's a feasible choice,' said Culver. 'Agreed?'

The others nodded.

'Jackson?' said Kate.

Culver held her arm. 'He's dead, you know that. He had no chance in there.'

'It seems so cruel, after all he'd...' She let the words trail off, aware that they all sensed the futility.

Without further words, Culver helped her up and they all began to clamber over the ruins. They concentrated their efforts on not stumbling over treacherous masonry and avoiding fragile-looking structures, steering well clear of any open pits and fissures. Not far away, and protruding through the low mist, were the supports of the elegant Jubilee Hall,

beneath which had been the trendy shops and stalls of Covent Garden. Its very bleakness forced Kate to look away, for she had always known it as a lively bustling square, a favourite haunt of both tourists and young Londoners. The Aldwych was gone, its semi-circular buildings flattened, as was the once magnificent Somerset House, much of it tumbled into the Thames which it had backed on to. Surprisingly, protruding from the rubble was the steeple of St Mary-le-Strand, only the tip broken off. It presented an odd and perhaps ironic sight amid the devastation, but Kate, following Culver's advice, did not let the thought linger.

Climbing, sliding, and brushing away swarms of oversized insects, they steadily made their way towards the river. A walk that would have taken no more than five or ten minutes in normal times took them the best part of an hour. They became almost immune to the unpleasant sights they came upon, their minds learning to regard the image of mutilated, swollen and rotted corpses as part of the debris and nothing to do with human life itself. Vehicles, overturned, burnt out, or simply askew in the roadway, had to be skirted around or climbed over, their ghoulish occupants ignored. Nowhere did they find walking, moving people; nowhere was there anyone like themselves. They wondered if it were possible for so many to have been destroyed, yet when they looked around at the damage to the inanimate, they understood that very few people could have lived through such destruction.

'How much further?' Ellison complained. He was panting and one hand was clutched tight against his side as though ribs had been damaged in the beating.

The bridge,' Culver said, his own chest heaving with the effort. His cheek was caked with darkish blood and he had realized earlier that a pellet from an intruder's air-rifle must have scythed a path across it. The wound throbbed, as did

the rat-bites in his ear and temple, but no longer stung. The pain in his ankle was sharper, but did not hinder him too much.

'If we can get to Waterloo Bridge there's a staircase leading down to the Embankment. We can get to one of the shelter's entrances from there.'

They journeyed on and were shocked when they reached Lancaster Place, the wide thoroughfare leading up to Waterloo Bridge itself. They should have expected it, but somehow hadn't. And one more defilement to their city should not really have surprised them. The bridge was gone, collapsed into the river.

They looked towards its broken structure with new bitterness. The open space from bank to bank looked insanely empty. On the other side, the National Theatre was a mound of rubble.

'Please, let's not stop now,' Dealey implored, fighting his own inexplicable sense of loss. The steps may still be intact. They're in a sheltered position.'

They walked forward and it was strange, so very strange, like walking a gangplank towards the edge of the universe. The great, wide bridge stretched out over the river as if yearning to fingertip-touch the similarly outstretched section on the other side. Vapour rose from the swollen river, thicker here, and hanging heavily.

They looked towards the west and saw the broken shaft of Cleopatra's Needle.

'Oh, no,' Dealey moaned, for he was examining the area beyond the snapped monument.

Culver's forehead sank onto the wide balustrade overlooking the Embankment road.

'Steve, what is it?' Kate clutched at his shoulder. He raised his head.

The railway bridge.' He pointed. 'Hungerford Bridge.'

They saw that it, too, had collapsed into the river. The metal struts had broken in several places and it hung as if by threads, dangling into the river like a sleeping man's fishing rod, still loosely connected to the section on their side. This section had fallen onto the roadway, completely blocking it. The others looked uncomprehendingly at Dealey and Culver.

There was an enclosure, a compound, beneath the bridge,' Culver told them. 'A thick brick wall with barbed wire on the top. A mini-fortress, if you like. It's been destroyed by the bridge.'

His face set into grim lines and it was Dealey who explained. The main entrance to the shelter was inside that enclosure.'

From a distance the wreckage had looked simple, just a collapsed iron bridge, broken in sections so that one part formed a waterchute into the river, the midstream portions mostly submerged, concrete supports shattered in half. Close up, it was a complicated tangled mess of bent and twisted steel girders, scattered red brickwork, huge chunks of masonry, and riddled with cables and wires. A segment of railway line rose from the disorder like a ladder into the sky. An engine lay on its side among the jumble, carriages behind piled up in zigzag fashion, the rear compartments ripped off, the top of one protruding from the river. Culver made a point of not looking into the broken windows; he had seen enough dead for one day without searching out more. He guessed the train driver had made a desperate dash to reach the station, Charing Cross, in the hope that he and his passengers might find a last-minute refuge. Had the train been delayed on the bridge when the sirens had sounded, or was it far back on the southern side of the city? He imagined the race across the river, passengers chilled by the rising and falling sirens, helpless and depending on the driver to get them to safety. The murky grey-brown water below, the panoramic view of London, Big Ben and the Houses of Parliament to the left, St Paul's in the distance to the right, renowned landmarks of an historical city that would soon

cease to exist. What must have gone through their minds in those last moments? Impotent rage, unable to help themselves, unable to run, hide, to be with loved ones? Or total, shocking fear that blanketed all thought, that paralysed their senses? It was obscenely terrible, the thought of their sterile waiting. The sudden emptiness as the sirens stopped, the terror of fellow passengers and the chuggajig of metal wheels somehow not filling the silent void. The incandescent flash that would have seared their eyeballs had they looked directly into it. The thunder that followed.

Culver shuddered. It was as though the souls of the dead were revealing their story to him, their horror still existing in the complex of torn metal, the last thoughts of the dying collected there, waiting to be absorbed by receptive minds. He shook his head, a physical act to disperse the notion.

'I know this place,' Kate was saying. The down-and-outs used to sleep under this bridge. There was a mobile soup kitchen every night. But I was never aware of any compound.'

Dealey spoke with some satisfaction. 'Nobody was meant to. It's surprising how anonymous and innocuous these enclosures are.' He corrected himself. 'Were. The tramps actually wrapped themselves in cardboard and slept against the very walls of the compound. They presented a perfect camouflage.

The bridge overhead was thought to be adequate protection in the event of a nuclear explosion.'

'Looks like someone goofed again,' Ellison said bitterly. 'Is there any way we can get through to the entrance?'

‘You can see for yourself. It's buried beneath hundreds of tons of rubble,' Dealey replied.

'But there are other places.' Culver was alert once more. ‘You told me there were other entrances.'

This was the obvious one, the one I planned to use. It was the most protected. The others are mostly inside government

buildings, and they, of course, will have been covered by the ruins, just as this has.'

They must have realized what would happen,' Fairbank said. They had to have other escape routes.'

'In the main, the other exits are outside what was considered the danger zones.'

Culver frowned. Wait a minute. Yesterday you told me there were other, smaller points of access along the Embankment.'

Yes, yes, that's true. But I'm not sure that we can get into them, even if they aren't covered by debris.'

'Can't we just knock?' Fairbank asked wryly.

You don't understand. These entrances are meant for maintenance inspection and are really only narrow shafts and tunnels.'

We're not choosy.'

Tm not sure we'll find a way into the main complex.'

'It's worth a try,' said Culver.

'How the hell do we get past all this?' asked Ellison, indicating the massive debris before them, then pointing towards the even bigger mass that was the destroyed Charing Cross railway station. 'I don't have the strength to walk around that lot -1 think a couple of my ribs are fractured.'

We'll work our way through here,' said Culver. 'It might be dangerous, but it'll save time. Are you up to it, Kate?'

She gave him a nervous smile. ‘Ill be fine. It's strange, but I feel so exposed out here.'

That's what comes from living underground for so long.'

"Yesterday it was different. I felt free, liberated, glad to be out of the shelter. Since this morning, though, since we were attacked...' She did not bother to complete the sentence, but they all knew what she meant; they shared her feelings.

Culver took her hand and led her towards the beginnings

of the wrecked bridge. The others followed and began to climb, Fairbank giving assistance to Ellison in the more difficult places.

'Keep away from anything that's loose,' Culver warned. 'Some of this junk doesn't look too solid.'

The smell of oil and rusting metal was everywhere, but it was a relief from the other odours they had been aware of that day. Culver chose the easiest route he could find, wary of touching anything unstable.

The climb was arduous in the damp heat, but not difficult. Soon they were on a level section, overlooking the continuation of the road they had just left. Culver paused, giving Kate a chance to rest and allowing the others to catch up.

Below, the wide roadway curving slightly with the river was jammed with scorched, immobile traffic.

Another road, equally wide, veered off to the right towards Trafalgar Square. The mist was minimal now, but Nelson's Column could not be seen. Victoria Embankment, running alongside the Thames, was relatively free of debris (apart from vehicles), for the offices on the north side had been set back from the thoroughfare, gardens and lawns between. As expected, the buildings were no more than crushed ruins: the Old War Office, the Ministries of Defence and Technology - all were gone. The Admiralty at the beginning of the Mall should have been visible since nothing obscured the view but, of course, that had vanished too. He briefly wondered if all the works of art in the National Gallery, which was on the far side of Trafalgar Square, had been destroyed beneath the deluge. What significance did they have in the present world, anyway? There would be little time to appreciate anything that was not of intrinsic material use in the years ahead. As he knew they would be, the Houses of Parliament and Westminster Abbey, at the end of the road