Autumn: The Human Condition (43 page)

Carlton stumbled through several more fields before coming across a narrow, twisting road. For a while he walked along it cautiously, keeping close to the hedge at the side of the tarmac should a car or other vehicle be driving towards him. The longer he walked, however, the more he listened to the silence around him. He accepted quickly that there would be no car, van, bike or any other vehicle. Today � for one day only � he was completely alone in the world.

Further down the track Carlton finally came across a car. It was a small but pretty standard saloon car. He stopped and stared at it for a moment. There was nothing special about the car, and perhaps that was its strange attraction. It looked so normal and so usual. In the bizarre world he was walking through, however, what he considered usual was now most certainly unusual. The car looked completely at odds with its surroundings. Carlton looked further and saw that it had been parked on a patch of gravel next to a gap in the hedgerow. It was a drive. Curious, he took a few steps away from the road. There was a house. It took him a while to be able to properly distinguish the outline of the building. Once typical and ordinary, today the house looked strangely different. It had been partially obscured by growth from the unkempt and overgrown garden. It looked like it was slowly being swallowed up by the countryside. Its windows were covered with a layer of yellow-brown mould and grass and weeds had begun to climb over the brickwork. Untended garden shrubs and trees had grown across the face of the building, obscuring much of it from view. Carlton stood and stared for a while longer before moving on.

Another house, then another and then another. Soon he found himself standing in the middle of a cold and empty village. It was perfectly still � like a freeze-frame � and uncomfortably eerie. Several buildings on one side of the village had been destroyed by fire and were now little more than charred black outlines of their former selves. The rest of the silent shops and houses looked dirty and overgrown like the first building he'd come across. He stood in the middle of the road and thought about calling out. What good would it do? It had been an instinctive reaction. What if he found someone? There had to be survivors, didn't there? But what could they do for him? More to the point, what would they expect him to do for them?

Carlton continued to walk until he could go no further. He followed the road as it trailed back out of the village and dragged himself along it as it wound up and around the side of a hill. The earlier rain had passed and the world was now drenched in bright, warm winter sunlight again. The sun was well on its way down towards the horizon. The lone soldier watched its descent with fascination and a fond sadness, knowing in his heart that he wouldn't see it rise again.

At the top of the hill, the tired and disconsolate soldier clambered over a wooden stile and sat down at the edge of a steep field. There were sheep at the bottom of the field, and from where he sat he could see cows and horses in the distance. His eyes were tired and his vision blurred but he scanned the horizon constantly. It occurred to him that he couldn't see a single trace of man. It would be there all right, if he looked hard enough, but he didn't want to. Buildings, roads and everything else seemed to have been swallowed up and absorbed. Carlton felt an overwhelming sense of alienation and isolation. He felt like he no longer belonged there, but at the same time he was also glad that he'd been given this final opportunity to see the world.

It was getting dark. One last thing to do.

Carlton unclipped his pistol from its holster on his belt and loaded it. I'll take off my mask, he decided, and then end it. I'll take my life before the infection gets me. I'm ready to die now. I don't want to come back.

Nervous and cold, he took off the mask and slipped the end of the pistol into his mouth. He pressed it against the roof of his mouth, gagging as he shoved the oily metal deeper towards the back of his throat, and waited. Should it have happened by now? He sucked in cool, clean air through his nose, too afraid to take the gun out of his mouth just in case the infection caught him before he was able to fire. He'd heard his colleagues in the bunker talking about a germ which struck and killed in seconds, so why hadn't it got him? Was it over? Was the air here clear? He couldn't believe that � the soldiers in the base had been infected just a couple of days ago. The only alternative, he decided as the seconds ticked by, is that I am immune. The bloody irony of it he laughed, trying not to choke on his pistol. All that time! All those long, awful days, weeks and months spent down there and I could have walked out at any time!

Almost a minute had passed. Still no reaction.

Carlton took the pistol out of his mouth and shook his head and laughed out loud. The perfect end to the day he thought as he grinned and lay back on the grass.

I'll give myself a few minutes longer, he thought.

Carlton looked up into the sky and thought about his family and all that he had lost. He thought about the nightmare of being buried underground and how he'd had to battle through the reanimated bodies of his dead colleagues to get outside. He thought about Daniel Wright, the soldier he'd killed in cold blood just a few days earlier. He thought about the fact that he might well have been the only man left alive. He thought about the aching in his bones. He thought about his appalling physical state � the dehydration and malnourishment. He thought about how much effort it would take now to find food and clean water, and how much of a pointless struggle it would be to try and make himself well. The village he'd walked through earlier would be the most sensible place to start. He thought about those cold, empty, dead buildings and the distance he'd have to cover to get back there. He thought about the effort and whether it would be worth it.

Carlton enjoyed the next hour. He lay on the grass, completely at ease, and dozed and daydreamed and remembered until the light had all but disappeared and the sky above his head was full of stars.

Calm, composed and completely sure of his actions, he slipped the pistol back into his mouth and fired.

DAY THREE HUNDRED AND NINETY-TWO

THE LAST FLIGHT JACK BAXTER

About an hour ago, just before she went to bed, Donna asked me if we've done the right thing coming back here. I think it was just nerves talking. I told her to shut up. She knows full well that this was the right thing to do. Bloody hell, we'd been talking about it for long enough before today, hadn't we? We've been planning this for weeks.

About a month ago the group started planning to make one last trip to the mainland for supplies. We decided (myself and Donna included) that it was time to cut-off completely from the past and concentrate our efforts on developing Cormansey. But things suddenly changed. Two important events took place in September which started me thinking. It was those two events that altered how I felt about everything.

At the beginning of the month we reached the first anniversary of the infection. A whole year had passed since that dark day when all of our lives were turned upside down and shaken to the core. A year since the hurt began, and still I don't know whether the pain will ever completely go away. Two weeks later, though, and we were celebrating. For the first time in a long time we finally had a reason to be happy and positive about something when Emma and Michael's baby was born. Maggie, they called her. Named after Emma's mother and Michael's grandmother I think but I might have got that the wrong way round. We lived every moment of the labour and birth with them. The whole bloody group were just sat there in the church, waiting for it to happen. If I'm honest, I expected the baby to die the moment she was born, as did most people. Donna thinks she lived because both Michael and Emma had immunity. Whatever the reason, things suddenly stopped feeling as final and hopeless as they had before. That doesn't mean I think we've got a chance. I still think our days are numbered. We just might last a little longer than I originally thought, that's all.

Before all of this happened I used to read books voraciously. I always used to love post-apocalyptic fiction. I used to love hearing about the world being destroyed or invaded and mankind being brought to its knees. My problem was I hated the end of most of the books. Nine times out of ten they'd finish with some smug little community rising up out of the ashes. A little group of farmers and cooks and teachers and... and call me selfish if you like, but I've never liked the sound of any of that. Now I'm here, now that I've actually made it to the very end of the world, I don't want to spend my last years tending sheep, boiling water over log fires, growing a beard and wearing home-made clothes. For God's sake, we've got the remains of the entire world at our disposal, and I for one intend to rape and pillage it for as long as I can. It won't be sophisticated or clever, but I know that I can carve a better existence for us here out of the remnants of the past than I ever could on Cormansey. Some people are born to live off the land, but not me. Donna feels the same way, and that's why she came back with me. And as Clare is closer to the two of us than anyone else, she decided to come along too. We have to accept that the human race is all but finished. I'm not interested in trying to prolong it. The people on the island are trying to rebuild, but I don't think that's ever going to work.

They tried to stop us. I think just about everyone on the island tried to talk one or both of us out of coming back over the course of the last couple of weeks. Even Richard Lawrence tried during the flight over here this morning. He said it wasn't a problem if we changed our minds. He said he'd sooner take us back to Cormansey than a helicopter full of supplies.

The flight had been planned for a long time. Richard and one passenger (it was Harry Stayt who came over in the end) were flying back to the mainland specifically to fetch as much medical supplies and fuel as they could find to get the group through the winter. I've always thought that was another disadvantage of the island � the isolation was wonderful when we had to worry about the bodies, but being so cut off our food and provisions were always going to be in short supply. And it wasn't just a case of getting in the car and driving to what's left of the nearest village to get more either. Food has always had to be measured, monitored, rationed and controlled for as long as we've been there.

We left just after ten this morning and arrived back on the mainland just before eleven. We asked Richard to drop us off right on the coast, thinking it would be safer to check things out here before we headed inland. He left us in the middle of an empty car park on the sea front. He wanted to stop and make sure we were okay but I insisted he went. They flew on to the nearest large city. I told him to fly back over the car park on his way back to the island and if we were still sitting out there, to land again and pick us up. Needless to say we'd already found ourselves a place to stay by the time he flew back overhead.

The first thing I noticed were the bones. We'd been away so long that the bodies had rotted down to just about nothing, leaving countless piles of bones littering the streets. The place was quiet � eerily silent � like a ghost town. We're used to the quiet, but this was different. We knew that we'd probably got the whole country to ourselves. For a while I felt uneasy, particularly when we walked through a deserted playground and amusement arcade. It seemed strange to think that there had been hundreds of people there once. Families. Kids on the rides...

We let Clare choose where we stayed. I thought she'd be sensible but we ended up in a static caravan in the middle of a holiday park overlooking the sea. It was a sensible choice really � isolated, small and self-contained. Reminds me of being on holiday, sitting here. It's strange. Tonight I actually feel excited sitting here and looking out over the ocean.

Tomorrow morning the rest of our lives start again. We don't have any great plans. We'll get food and clothes and I'll try and persuade Clare to let us move into a house for the winter. It's going to be bloody cold. My guess is that because all the cities across the world are dead, the temperature will drop lower than normal. I don't think we'll have an ice-age or anything like that, but it's going to be bloody cold.

Donna's going to teach me to drive, if we can find a car that will start. It's about time I learnt. She says I should pick it up pretty easy. She says it will be easy for me to learn because I won't have to bother with the highway code or anything like that. We'll just be able to point the car forward and go. And that's what we're going to do eventually. Next summer, if we're still here, we're going to find a motorhome like the one Michael and Emma used to have. Then I'm going to fulfil my ambition and drive right around the coastline of our little country. It will be a complete waste of time but who cares, we've got nothing better to do. Michael used to say to me that all we can do now is make the most of the time we have left. That's exactly what we're going to do.

AUTUMN: THE HUMAN CONDITION

Appendix i

AMY STEADMAN

Is not a named character in the novels, but she appears in PURIFICATION as the figure on the other side of the airfield fence which grabs the recently re-animated corpse of Kelly Harcourt. "Eight weeks ago this creature had been a young, intelligent and attractive clothing store manager with a bright future ahead of it. Now it was a mud-splattered, half-naked, emaciated collection of brittle bone and rotting flesh."

JIM HARPER

Is one of the first six survivors to settle on the island of Cormansey in PURIFICATION. He is introduced when Michael arrives on the island and is seen collecting and burning bodies with another survivor, Bruce Fry.