White and Other Tales of Ruin (29 page)

“
Dad,” Laura moaned, “you’re hurting me.”

“
Honey, we’ve just got to go on a little longer. How do you feel?”

“
Everything hurts.”

I was already flagging beneath her weight, but I managed to stretch and give her a kiss on the chin. “A little longer. Chele, we need to move a long way quickly.”

“
You think they might come after us?”

I thought of what Black Teeth had said, about how outsiders were fodder and that barbing them was all they knew. Perhaps he’d fancied some sport, for once. The thrill of the chase. Maybe, for him and his people, revenge would taste sweeter if they had to work for it.

“
It’s crossed my mind,” I said. “Any signs of this tunnel leading anywhere?” I had my head down with the weight of Laura slung over my neck, so I couldn’t see much more than my feet and Chele’s shadow, thrown back by the torch.

“
Hang on.” She stopped and we stood there for a few seconds, silent and still. “No sign of a breeze,” she said. “Can’t hear anything. If they’re following, they’re very quiet about it.”

“
Let me down, Dad.”

“
Honey …” But she was heavier than ever, and in a minute or two I would not be able to manage any more. I hadn’t kept in shape, especially since Janine had died. I’d let myself go.

I set her down gently and she hissed, leaning back into me.

“
Laura?”

“
Pins and needles,” she said, and she giggled. “Bloody pins and needles!”

Laughter was the last thing I’d expected. Screaming, maybe, but laughter … and maybe that’s why it felt so good when I joined in.

Chele simply stared at us, unable to see a funny side. “They’ll hear us back in the cave,” she said. “They’ll think we’re laughing at them.”

“
We are!” I said, laughing out loud. “Did you see that couple? That barbed wire? What else can we do but laugh!”

Laura shook her legs, her giggles mixing with groans of discomfort as her circulation returned. Some of her wounds glinted once more as fresh blood started to flow. Her pains became real again, her laughter stuttered and she remembered that she had a lot more to worry about than pins and needles.

“
Daddy, don’t let them do it to me again,” she said. “Please, please don’t —”

“
I never will,” I said, wanting to hold her and hug her and love her here in the dark, in a cave in a place that was an idea of Hell. But Chele was glaring at me and I knew we had to leave. “Can you walk, honey?”

Laura nodded. “I think so. I hurt everywhere, so at least it’s pretty even.”

“
Do you feel weak?”

She nodded. “I think I need a sugar rush. Don’t suppose you have any chocolate?” She looked at Chele then, almost as if seeing her for the first time. Thank you so much,” she said. I felt a hot rush of pride for my young, insightful daughter. She didn’t know Chele and could have no idea of how she had come to be here with me. But still, she knew a friend when she saw one.

“
It’s my honour,” Chele said. “Your dad … he let me help him, and now I’m helping you. And you’re both helping me. More than you can know.”

“
Chele was on the same coach —” I started, but then Chele cut in.

“
Later, Nolan. Please, I want out of here and I really, really think we should leave. Laura? You agree?”

“
Dad?” Her voice was a plea in itself. I nodded, Chele headed off and I walked behind Laura, ready to catch her should she stumble or faint.

The tunnel turned and erred downward, so steep in places that we had to brace ourselves against the walls to prevent our feet slipping out from beneath us. We were going deeper and that wasn’t good, but the air was also changing — its smells, its tastes, its textures were different from the cave and the place we had left.

Lost underground forever, I thought. Now there’s an interesting idea of Hell. I started looking out for the creamy reflection of skeletons.

And then I looked around, wondering where the coach could be and whether I was looking into some spectator’s eyes at that very moment.

“
All those people …” I said.

“
What?” Chele did not turn around, and Laura seemed content just to listen.

“
All those people in that valley. The disease. The bombs. All stolen away from the real world, all fodder?”

Chele did not answer, but the light jumped along the walls as if startled, and I guessed that she’d shrugged her shoulders.

The numbers staggered me. And I wondered how many people went missing every year around the globe, how many are never found. What chance that a relative will see them on a journey through Hell?

What was the likelihood that I would find Laura whilst trying to come to terms with losing her?

I thought about Black Teeth’s comments, wondering whether I’d created my own god or simply found the real One at last.

There was a loud crack behind us, like two rocks being smacked together. We stopped, wide-eyed and fearful, as a sound bathed us in echoes. It was a sigh or a roar, a whisper or a shout, all concepts of distance and time making it difficult to discern.

Another crack, followed by two more in quick succession.

“
They’re gunshots,” Chele said. And as if in answer the cracks turned into one long string of explosions, and the whisper or roar emerged as very definite, very desperate screams.

“
They’re being slaughtered,” I said, thinking of the pathetic people we’d left behind, dancing in the cave as bullets found them.

“
I can’t be sorry,” Laura whispered. “I can’t be sorry at all.” And her voice, quiet though it was, cut through the destruction.

We stood there for a minute, avoiding each other’s eyes and listening to the murder. I heard screams and shouts between the gunfire and towards the end, as the volume seemed to decrease, moaning and pleading and crying between the intermittent shots. Chele moved the torch so that its liquid light shifted back along the tunnel the way we had come. I looked at her, caught the flames reflected in her eyes, and we both knew what the other was thinking.

Laura said it. “Maybe they’ll come for us now. The demons … maybe they’ll come.”

“
Let’s go,” Chele said, turning away and heading back into the tunnel. She did not wait for a response, evidently not expecting one, and I realised that she was taking over. Before, leaving the coach and challenging the group of people head-on, my hurt and desperation for Laura had driven me. Now that I had Laura back perhaps Chele thought that I was losing focus, my attentions divided two separate ways: internally, to what I should be doing for Laura; and externally, trying to get us out of this. Whatever
this
may be, exactly.

“
What are they?” I asked Laura, whispering because I was still listening out for the sounds of pursuit.

“
Dad,” she said, and fell silent without turning to look at me.

“
Honey? What?”

She glanced over her shoulder, and it hit me hard how much she had grown up.

I remembered the time when I thought that I’d grown from a child into an adult. It was when I fought back against the bully at school, a fat, ugly prick of a kid, who seemed to relish taking out all his own inadequacies on other people. He had terrible acne, so he beat up little kids. He had big ears and a long, hawkish nose, so he beat up little kids. He was fat as a cow, so he beat up little kids. Many times one of those little kids was me, because I was small and weak and insecure, and fighting back had just never even crossed my mind.

Until the bully slapped me around the head in front of a girl I was
desperate
to impress.

My reaction was instant and unconscious, fuelled as much by raging hormones as a need to protect myself. One kick to the balls and a flurry of little fists to the fat bastard’s nose, and he never picked on me again. He hit on other kids more than ever … I’d beaten him up, so he beat on other kids … but never me. And people looked at me slightly differently after that. Not only because I’d fought back, but because I’d stood up for myself in the face of superior odds. And that, as any kid knows, is what you’re supposed to do when you’re an adult.

Kids have a lot to learn.

“
I really don’t want to talk about it right now, Dad,” Laura said, and I wondered whether she’d ever look back and realise exactly when she’d grown up, and what she would she see in that memory. Faces beneath the trees, metal barbs sinking through her skin, demons storming in from blackened skies, forcing themselves down to her, onto her…?

It didn’t bear thinking about, but I knew that I’d have to ask her soon.

“
Stop!” Chele said suddenly, and like three drunken Stooges we walked into each other in the dark. The light from the torch blazed across the jagged tunnel walls, revealing an intricate map of dust-strewn spider webs. No spiders, just their ancient webs. Somehow that was worse.

“
What!” I hissed. I was jumpy enough without Chele pulling a stunt like this, and for the briefest moment I was actually pissed at her. Then I remembered what she had done and I felt ashamed at my blaze of anger.

“
What’s that noise?” she said. She was holding the torch in both hands, away from her body so that the light from the flames did not dazzle her. “It sounds like … something moving down the tunnel. Lots of somethings. Scraping the walls.

Laura hugged herself to me and I could smell her, stale blood and bad breath and fear. I kissed her on the temple. I was determined not to picture what was coming along the tunnels at us, but the more I tried the worse the images were; demons merging with the dark, black body-suits, their antenna twitching at the dank air like mandibles, legs and arms stretching out to fend themselves from walls and floor and ceiling, scampering along and feeling more at home when their hands clawed through the thick spider webs —

“
Water,” Laura said. “It’s water, and it’s coming from
that
way.” She pointed past Chele in our direction of travel.

“
Underground river,” I said. “That may not be such good news.”

Chele looked at me and her expression was a mystery. I thought she wanted me to say or do something, but I couldn’t figure out what. I shrugged and raised my eyebrows instead, and she was about to speak when we heard more noises in the cave tunnel. And this time they
were
coming from behind us.

Clicking, like the chatter of a thousand electrical switches, or a field full of crickets in intense discussion. The echoes added to the effect. It sounded wholly alien and threatening, and I could not believe that whatever was making that noise would be good for us. The fact that it was approaching at a staggering rate did not bode well.

“
That’s how they talk!” Laura said, and her eyes were so wide and terrified that I felt my knees weaken with fear.

I held her, both of us sharing in the comfort. Chele moved and I thought she was coming into the embrace as well. I would have welcomed it. But she changed her position slightly, cocked her head, looking first up the tunnel and then down.

“
We go down, we hit the water,” she said. “We go back … we have to face whatever’s making that noise.”

Again I thought of man-sized spiders, or spider-sized people, scampering through tunnels with automatic weapons held to bear.

“
The water,” Laura said. She broke away from me and staggered down the tunnel past Chele.

“
I’ll go first,” Chele said, trying to slip past Laura without harming her with the flaming torch.

“
Hurry!” Laura said. “Hurry, Dad!”

I glanced behind me but couldn’t see much. The tunnel had narrowed down considerably and my bulk blocked most of the light, casting my shadow far back along the floor. I wondered whether I would be able to tell when the first of the demons came out of its own shadow into mine.

The clicking increased in volume and intensity, as if they could smell us.

As we turned a sharp corner, the sound of water changed quickly from a whisper to a roar. It drowned out the noises of excited pursuit. That wasn’t necessarily a good thing. Each passing second I expected a hard hand to settle around my neck, or a slew of bullets to blast out my heart and lungs onto the damp cave floor.

“
Dad!” Laura screamed, and her voice was fading away fast.

And then the light went out.

I realised why as I too started to fall, tumbling in the pitch blackness, falling into another world entirely.

A world where Hell was wet.

The room was a pool of mud. I had time to make that out before I plunged straight in, and also in that split second I caught sight of two shapes struggling on the surface, twisting and writhing themselves deeper even as they tried to escape, sweeping the muck in swirling patterns with their hands, kicking it into slow-motion ripples, bubbles popping from their mouths and noses, slower bubbles rising to the surface from their clothes and popping ponderously, releasing the stench of underground, and the smell filled the air above it as the mud filled the room below, an almost visible miasma that stung my lungs as I inhaled before I plunged in.

I managed to hold my head up, keeping my eyes and ears and mouth free of the viscous mess, but the rest of my body felt twisted all ways with the suction hauling me down. I kicked for something solid to stand on but there was nothing. The mud oozed around my legs and body, cold and wet and sickeningly intimate. I looked to where I thought was up but I saw a window, smashed and allowing more mud to flow into the room. I glanced to my side and there was the ceiling.