Chapter Twenty-Four

 

The footpath is steep, but that's not so bad, as I'm on the downslope. Trouble is, it's uneven, chunks of stone threatening to turn my feet as I go. Not easy with a limp.

Before the flood, the air was fresh up here. High above the world, far from the cities, et cetera. Oh, you'd catch a whiff of those nice agricultural smells, like silage and cowshit. But there'd be the smell of grass and fallen leaves too, wildflowers, new mown hay, all depending on the time of year.

Not anymore. After the flood there was a constant stench of sewage and decay, from everything in the water. That began going in the last week; the air was fresh again, the wind with a hint of saltwater. Yes: the sea I fled from has truly come to find me.

The smell's changed again now. I breathe through my mouth as I wind my way down, between the ranks of the walking dead. For most of them, that green mould, or whatever it is, has arrested the decay. But not reversed it. Even a fresh corpse needs some time in the deep, being charged up with whatever powers the Deep Brain possesses, to develop that protective coat. So I get the smell of the dead, along with the stink of that green stuff. I don't know what the hell it is - maybe I would have once, back in my old life with more brain cells left to play with - but it smells like the bottom of a drained pond.

They turn and look at me as I pass. There is nothing on their faces. Slack and empty. I'm used to seeing that now. On the faces of the living and the dead.

Smoke still rising in the distance. Beyond that, far down, lies the open water. I keep walking. And no-one moves. There is only the silence. The cold hard wind blows keen across the fell. And I walk on.

 

I spent the first night after the flood in an upstairs room at the farmhouse the soldiers commandeered. When I woke, I could still hear the sea-sounds. I went to the bar and got to work on the first available bottle. People glared at me at first; finally they just ignored me as best they could.

Later on, there was shouting in the distance. Gunfire. A few minutes later, McTarn came in, and he brought a woman. She was in her late twenties and tallish, with chestnut hair. She was half-soaked and shivering, too, but you could tell she might be pretty, or more than that, under it all. Everyone was staring at her. McTarn reached out to steady her, but she pulled away.

"I'm fine. I'm fine. I don't need any help. Which way is the toilet, please?"

McTarn pointed. When she'd gone there were sniggers, a few laughs. Taking the piss. Uncomfortable.

Over the past few years there'd been plenty of time for brooding. And I'd done a lot of that, about Ellen Vannin. She had, literally, been made for me. Soft. Alluring. And in the end, submissive. A little coy and teasing, but... she'd asked for nothing. Just come along and given things to me, done things for me. Wanted nothing for herself. So what did that say about me?

The bed-hopping, the never settling down... I understood now it was not because I had nothing to give, but because I wouldn't give. Oh, I told myself, and anyone who'd listen (less and less of them as time went by) I wanted to get married, settle down, but in the end all these women wanted things from me. Under the outdoorsy adventurer I played at, there was just a scared little boy who didn't want to get hurt again. That was who Ellen had been made for.

When I saw her - Katja - for the first time, I saw a woman who was the complete opposite of that.

When she came back from the toilet, a few minutes later, face scrubbed clean and hair scraped back, she didn't tell anyone anything. No effort to charm or flirt. I didn't understand why, not then.

I don't believe in love at first sight. It wasn't love. Not then. I just saw someone and realised I wanted something from her. Not sex. Just a pair of arms to hold me, to take the weight off my shoulders, soft hands to stroke and soothe the pain away.

I huddled down, away from the probing, demanding stares of all these people expecting me to pull some miraculous rabbit out of the hat. McTarn barking at me, spitting out his rage. I flinched from it; it added to the voices, calling.

And then I heard Katja saying "Please don't."

The sounds in my head subsided a little, as I heard her talking to McTarn that low voice, that accent. So gentle and so soothing. The sea-sounds, the voices, were louder. I wanted to tell her. Warn her. I didn't know how. It hurt when I tried - the voices rose to a din.

Say something, Ben. You have to say something.

"They're calling me," I said to her.

She looked over at me, studying me. Those great dark eyes. "Who?"

"The voices. The souls. All the dead."

They roared. I gulped down whisky, refilled my glass. Pain stabbed behind my eyes. It faded when I drank.

"Go on," she said. It was a whisper. Soft as snow.

I shook my head.

"Please?"

"Can't."

"Why?"

"Hurts."

She sat there, waiting. I didn't want her to go. I started talking about the diving accident. And anything else I could think of. Maybe I could slip sideways onto the subject, tell her before the voices could realise and scream.

She listened; of course she did. In case I said something useful. Because she needed to be useful too. Be an asset, and not just a pretty face. There were too many men here, too much testosterone. Too much potential for things to turn ugly.

As it got dark, she walked me back to the caravan, up the dimming footpaths. I was very drunk. We didn't speak much.

I slumped on the divan. Katja sat on the one opposite. She smiled a little at me. Like at a pet, I thought.

"Will you..." I asked. "Will you do something for me?"

Her face lost expression. "What?"

"Just hold me." Her eyes narrowed. Shit. "I don't mean - not sex, I don't want sex." Although I wouldn't have said no. "I just want someone to..."

She pursed her lips. Thinking it over, calculating the odds. "All right."

She knelt beside the divan, held out her arms. I rolled into them.

Drifting off to sleep; cool fingers stroked my brow.

 

The two farmhouses. The scene of the last attempt to hold them off. Bullets have chipped the walls and the windows are shattered. Scorch marks. Scattered remains of people. Ours, theirs, it doesn't matter now. Gnawed bones, torn fragments of clothing. A group of them crouch over four or five dead sheep. One tears at a severed leg. Another lifts a tangle of intestines, looped around its fingers like a bloated, slippery cat's-cradle and tries to bite through it.

 

Some of the things are inside the nearest farmhouse. They're in the front room. I stop and look.

They're staring at the walls, looking around the way someone waking up after a long drunk might try to take stock, to understand where he is and what's happened. Take it from me on this one; I speak from long experience.

Another stands in front of the mantelpiece, staring at the pictures along it. It picks one up, holding it upside down, its head cocked to one side.

One of the sheep-eaters looks up from its feast. It's a fresh one, not covered in the mould yet. Blood smears its face. An eye has burst; the socket glows. The other eye burns dully, like a grimy light bulb. Its clothes are soiled with blood. So are its hands. Some of the blood might be its own; in places the clothing is ripped open. Its stomach is an empty cavity. The meat it's been chewing drops out of it onto the ground.

The other sheep-eaters are staring at me too. Another stands in the farmhouse door, watching. The ones in the living room are staring out through the glass, even the one with the photograph. It falls from its hands. Glass shatters.

Stop dawdling. Stop mooning. Go. Go now.

Is that my own thought, or the message in their eyes? Or someone else, calling me? I start walking again. They part to let me through, dead flesh brushing mine. I pass without incident, but feel their eyes on my back as I walk on.

 

When I woke next morning, I rolled over to see Katja with her foot braced on the opposite divan, lacing up a boot. It was one of mine.

"Where did you get those?"

She looked over at me. "We're the same size," she said. "I didn't think you'd mind. You've a few pairs. Is that OK?"

"Sure." Then I noticed something else. "Your hair..."

She half-smiled and ruffled it; she'd cropped it short. "I thought it was time for a change of image."

"OK," I said, feeling stupid and slow.

Katja sat on the divan and faced me. "I want to know what you know, if I can. Not for McTarn or the others. For me. I need to make myself useful around here. Otherwise, all I'll be, sooner or later, is another hole to fuck." Her face went hard, her voice too. "And I will not go through that again." She took a deep breath and relaxed. "I'm going to McTarn now - see what else I can do to help. I can use a gun. I can fight. I think he might find that useful, don't you?"

"Yes," I mumbled. I felt betrayed. Weak. I couldn't look at her.

Then I felt her hand squeeze mine. Surprised, I looked up. "Last night," she said. "You liked that, didn't you?"

I nodded. I couldn't meet her eyes.

"I have no problem giving you what comfort I can. If that's what you want. In exchange, you tell me what you can."

"Difficult," I said. "Hurts when I try."

"Try," she said. "It's all I ask. Alright?"

"Alright," I said.

She stood, hands on hips. "How do I look?"

I almost said beautiful, then realised it was the last thing she'd want to hear. "Like someone you shouldn't mess with."

She smiled. The first real smile I'd seen her give, and it was all mine. It lit her face up, and I could see what she'd been trying to hide ever since arriving. "Good answer," she said. "See you later."

 

The narrow footpath leads along a twisting, sunken stream. From the banks, trees lean over the waters, branches splayed out like twisted hands, roots writhing free of the earth as if poised to strike. One has fallen in the stream. The chill waters wash and lap over it.

It's quite painful now. Every step brings fresh agony from my knees and hips.

I dig a quarter-bottle of Bell's from a pouch in the wetsuit, and take a deep swallow. The liquor burns its way down to my gut. The joint pain loses some of its edge.

Not far now.

Drinking alcohol before diving is a very stupid and dangerous thing to do. But in my case, so is diving, full stop.

But then, I'm not coming back from this one. I've always known that.

I haven't seen any of them since the farmhouse, except for a couple in the meadows below them, chasing sheep. They'll go after animals if humans aren't available. Hot blood and living flesh. Something that can sustain the existence the Brain's given them. All that energy's got to come from somewhere.

The path is clear. They must have congregated higher up. Ready for that last big push. Why are they waiting? Maybe because they know I'm coming to them. And maybe not. It'll be dark soon. That'll make it easier for them.

Katja...

I put one foot in front of the other.

Then I hear footsteps. Slow and dragging. They're coming up the path one by one. Single file. Slow, plodding steps; there's no hurry now, no sense expending energy. They're coming straight towards me.

No weapons. Except my knife. No diver leaves home without one. To cut whatever you might get fouled in. I could, maybe, get one of them with a lucky stab, in through the eye sockets, into the brain...

And the others would pull me down and tear me into pieces. Maybe better to use it on myself.

There's nowhere to go. No point, no sense in retreating. If I don't get where I'm going, it's all over. It might be anyway. No guarantees this will work.

I grip the haft of the knife. I've run long enough. Not anymore. Not anymo -

The first has reached me. Literally inches away. It stops, staring into me with empty, glowing eye-sockets. And then it steps sideways off the path and crashes into the stream.

One by one, the others do the same. They clamber along the stream and then back up onto dry land as soon as they're past me.

My luck is holding. Or something is.

I press forward, starting to laugh as they drop out of my path. A couple step aside, up against the chicken wire fence hiving the path off from the field alongside.

I keep going, because I have to.

Katja...

 

Quid pro quo. That was what she was offering.

Katja would give me what I needed, in exchange for the one thing I couldn't bear to do.

I sat on the divan after she'd gone, and I thought it over long and hard.

What decided it for me, in the end, was the thought of the look she might give me if I said no. Or if I said yes and broke my promise.

Despite her hard-facedness, I had an odd feeling she liked me. I didn't want to lose that.

So, about an hour after she'd gone, I began whispering to myself. I imagined Katja sat there listening, and I started telling her about the Deep Brain.

The voices began rising almost at once, and eventually I had to give up. I flopped back across the divan, moaning. My head rang and throbbed.

I lay there and breathed deep. Then, after a few minutes, I sat up and began again.

By the time Katja came back, I was exhausted and running with sweat, but I was, at least, able to utter those few words when I limped down to the Inn. I was able, at last, to tell someone else about the Deep Brain.

Death is coming. Not the most cheerful way of putting it.

I slumped into my chair afterwards, barely noticing it when Katja came to sit beside me. "Are you alright?" she asked.

I shook my head. "Managed to talk about it. A bit. Difficult. Hurts." I told her about my day. "It hurt like hell, but I managed more than I had before." The pain was bearable now. I wasn't taking directly about the subject, so it dwelt in the background with a vague suggestion of menace.

"I'm proud of you," she said. When I looked, there was something in her face, something I hadn't seen before. Respect? Something like that, maybe. She had some idea, anyway, what it cost me to speak.

She touched my hand. "Why don't you tell me something else now?"

"Like what?"

"Not about these things. Not about this Deep Brain. Tell me something about you, instead."

"Really?"

"Yes. I would like to hear."

So I started talking. I was more than a little hammered by then, so I'm not sure of all of it. I'm pretty sure it was a fairly, maudlin, rambling piece, most likely about my love life. I might have cried a little. I don't remember.

What I do remember is this: her taking my hand, stroking the back of it with her thumb. I didn't dare look up, to see her face, but I felt the warmth of her touch and thought that, perhaps, this was not an act.

I drank myself into a stupor that night, and so I didn't see much of her. Her and McTarn carried me back to the caravan. She came to see me the next morning, and held me a little while.

"Have you tried writing it down?" she asked.

"I did before," I told her. "When I sent in the report. But I destroyed my copies of it. There's nothing here." A pain unrelated to the hangover twinged at my temple.

"Perhaps you could try doing it again?"

"Perhaps."

Over the next fortnight, we spent more and more time together. After a few days, she began to volunteer information about herself. Where she'd come from, what had happened to her, the journey to Pendle. Her voice choked and halted at points; she didn't always meet my eyes, and I think once or twice she wept. Her hand was in mine throughout, and I no longer knew who was giving comfort and who was receiving it.

 

I make my way down the path where it rejoins the stream, and come out onto Pendle Row. The dead are shambling up; they bump and jostle me as I pass, but none of them offer any direct violence.

I step out into the road. There's more room now.

Smoke's still rising from the burned-out homes. I saw it from a long way off. The Inn is still standing, anyway.

Four of them are in the Pendle Tea Rooms as I pass, sitting at one of the tables. They look up and watch me as I pass, stepping over corpses and pieces of corpses.

The pain stabs at my joints. I sag against a wall, sinking down. The sun is sinking too. I must move on soon. And I will. But I have to rest. Just for a few minutes. I'm almost there.

 

Katja and I slept together for the first time about a week before she moved in with me.

I'd developed a schedule. After she'd gone for the day, I took pen and paper and wrote for as long as I could. Which usually wasn't very long. I'd have a drink, rest up, and then set to work where I left off. If I was lucky, I managed a third of a page a day.

Destroy it. Destroy it. Destroy it. I would hear a voice whispering that at least once a day, usually as the clamour of the voices rose to new, agonising heights, but always clear above them, and it was always the voice of Ellen Vannin.

But I didn't. I was, after all, used to living with pain.

I didn't talk to Katja about it. It took all my strength to focus on the subject long enough to write the day's quota down. The time I spent with her... that was for me.

"You're nearly done, aren't you?" she asked.

"About halfway," I told her. "But I'll get it finished."

She looked at me, stroked my face. I almost recoiled, it was totally unexpected. I was used to being held, to my brow being stroked as I drifted off. But this? "You are stronger than I thought," she said. "Ben..."

"Yes?"

"If you want to... you know... then we can."

I didn't know what to say. "But... but you said... I thought..."

"It would be..." she took a deep breath. "It would be because I wanted it too."

"Seriously?"

"Seriously."

"But... you were just... I mean, for the information, to be useful..."

"Things change."

It wasn't what you'd expect. You'd expect it to be pretty special, swinging from the chandeliers kind of stuff. I mean, despite my physical state, I knew what to do. Years of experience. And Katja - well, of course, she had a lot of experience too.

But it was different from that. More hesitant. This wasn't about her giving some punter his money's worth, or me showing what a stud I was. We undressed slowly and carefully. I folded back the sheets on the divan and climbed under them; Katja followed. We just lay there for a while, facing each other. I could feel the brush of her bare skin against mine.

"Kiss me."

I leant forward and put my lips to hers. I felt rusty, out of practice. Clumsy. Her too. Kissing was one thing she wasn't into. Each of us was afraid to make the first move, to start things, because we'd been something else before and that wasn't what we wanted to be now.

But once we started, we got there in the end. And, yes. It was good.

 

Jesus Christ.

It's almost dark. There should be lights coming on in the street. If this was the world we used to live in. But the only lights are from the figures walking up the road.

I stand. Joints scream in pain like rusty hinges. Start walking. Nearly there.

I reach the end of Pendle Row. Cross the bridge onto Barley Road. The road from the village descends and finally disappears, down into the water below. Dead men and women clamber out onto it and totter past me. Dead children. Further out, the converted mill sticks up; beyond it, the top of a drowned white house.

No dead animals, though. Odd. They'll kill and eat animals, and an infected bite'll kill a beast, but it won't come back. I don't know why.

This is it, then.

 

The night before they destroyed Roughlee, the sea-sounds woke me. Katja was a soft, warm weight beside me on the divan, but I knew we weren't alone.

Above the bed, a dark shadow moving.

Above the bed, two dim green points of light.

Above the bed, the figure leaning down, the glow brightening, and Ellen's grey and rotting face coming down out of the dark, blackened lips peeled back for a snarling kiss.

"Ben."

I screamed. Katja woke. The room was empty. But all I could do was babble it, over and over and over again.

"Ellen. Ellen Vannin. She's found me."

 

I pull off the boots. Put on the flippers.

I walk down into the water. It laps coldly around my ankles. I can hear the sound of the sea breaking, hear voices moaning and crying. The water rises to my knees, to my thighs, my groin - Fuck! My bollocks have just imploded - then my waist, my chest.

I wet the diving mask and pull it over my eyes and nose, making sure the seal is watertight. Check my tanks.

"Ellen?" I shout it. "Ellen. I'm coming."

And I put the mouthpiece in and for the last time in my life, I dive.