CHAPTER EIGHTEEN

 

 

THE NIGHT HAS passed, thick with rain, lit only by lightning and dying fires.

They haven't come back yet. But they will. You can put money on it. It's the one inevitability left. Death isn't as final as it was, and taxes - well, there's always an upside.

I'm going to give this to Katja when I'm done. It's going in a safe place, along with her account and Stiles' notes.

Maybe they'll be of some use to someone. Maybe someone else will read them all one day. Someone from Windhoven, maybe.

Maybe this will just be a curiosity by then. Maybe the nightmares will be gone, or at least contained. I like the idea that this will run its course, and the dead'll be dead again. At last. Permanently...

Focus, Robbie.

I haven't much time. I want to explain something.

I want to talk about the desert road.

 

 

7TH NOVEMBER. WINTER back in Scotland, but in the desert, it was still hot.

I read somewhere that a breakdown isn't normally down to one single traumatic event. It's cumulative, like erosion - one thing after another. Maybe it'd been building for a while. I'd helped fight enough dirty little wars, after all. Sooner or later, questions get asked. If only in the silent places at the back of your mind.

The city had been under insurgent control from around the middle of the year, with the civilians caught in the crossfire. Rumours circulated; civilians with white flags fired on, ambulances fired on. We dismissed it as lefty propaganda. Civvies didn't understand war.

So the coalition forces were going in.

But I wasn't involved in any of the fighting. I heard the reports. But I can't say for sure what happened in there.

What I can say is this:

On the afternoon of November 7th, I was stationed on a small desert road leading out of the besieged city.

With me was a section of eight men. Among them Chas Nixon. My CO, Lieutenant Alderson, had given me my brief. No males 'of military age' were to be allowed to leave the city.

"Military age being, sir?"

"Under forty-five, Sergeant."

There was no lower age limit.

"These orders are specific, Sergeant. They're to be turned back. Not detained or held at the checkpoint. They could end up massing and pushing through the roadblocks."

Fuck. That'd been the plan forming in my head. Not letting them through, but not forcing them back into the killing ground either. Someone had thought of that. Someone wanted blood.

"We want to make a clean sweep of all insurgents, not let them scatter to regroup later."

The road was little more than a dirt track. Other units were tackling the main roads. We saw very little. The main attack force was staging to the north. From the city itself came sporadic gunfire - insurgents staging live-fire exercises.

Time ticked by, hot and slow beneath that burning sun.

Late afternoon.

"Heads up!" Chas Nixon shouted.

Men reached for their guns, stood ready. I held my SA80 at port-arms, ready to rock.

A group of people were coming down the desert road. Four women, two girls. Two men in their seventies. A man of about forty, holding the younger girl in his arms. A man in his twenties. Two boys in their teens.

I stepped forward, held up a hand. "Ads?"

Ads was our translator, a scared young local man. We called him Ads because it was all we could pronounce of his name.

The group stopped.

The man holding the child spoke. He looked tired. Blood on his hands and face.

"He says they want no trouble. They just want to leave the city before the attack starts."

"Ask him where the blood came from." It was a delaying tactic.

I had my orders.

Ads spoke with the man. "It's from his brother. He was hit by sniper fire."

"Insurgent?" asked Chas.

"Ours."

"No. I mean, was his brother one of them?"

"He says no. They were trying to get out, that's all."

It didn't matter. "The women and girls can go through."

Ads translated. The father looked from his family to us. He spoke again. His voice had risen. Chas stepped back, lifting his rifle. The older girl - about fifteen - screamed. The father shouted over her. Ads was still trying to talk to him. One of the women moaned. Another seemed to be praying.

Ads turned to me. "He says they're not insurgents."

"We've got our orders. Turn them back. The women can go through. Not the men. That's final. No negotiation, alright? You want to debate it, talk to whoever the fuck's in charge."

Chas glanced at me.

The strain was showing. Who the fuck was in charge? What the fuck were we doing there? None of us seemed to know anymore. But here we were.

Ads stared back at me. What did he want me to do?

Of course, I knew. He wanted me to act like a man with a mind of my own. With some measure of fucking humanity in me. He wanted me to say fuck my orders. He wanted me to say stand down, lads. He wanted me to say let them through.

But I didn't.

Big soldier-boy, with his big gun, and a fucking coward under it all. Not even the guts to stand up to something a blind man could see was wrong.

I was a coward; Ads and the civilians had exposed it. And I hated the whole fucking crew of them for doing it.

I shoved him back towards the roadblock. "Tell him."

Ads started talking. The father shouted over him. The little girl he was holding began to wail.

Finally, he thrust the child into one of the women's arms and turned back to us. Pointed at me. Shouted something.

The men had their rifles shouldered. I waved them back, but kept my own gun ready. "What's he saying?"

"He says..."

"What?"

Ads looked back at me. "He says you're sentencing them to death."

I moved closer to the barricade.

"He says if you're going to kill them, do it yourself. Get it over with. It'll be quicker."

The man was shouting the same phrase over and over. He had a beard, dark hair to his shoulders. Western dress - white shirt, jacket, trousers. No tie. The children were all fucking wailing now.

Later, Ads told me the man had been shouting Do it. Do it. Just do it.

The man reached out and shoved me.

"Tell him to fucking cut that out."

The man shoved me again.

"Ads!"

I jabbed the rifle towards the man.

He tried to knock the barrel aside.

I pulled the trigger.

A high velocity rifle bullet, fired at that range, let me tell you:

Going in, it makes a small, very neat hole.

The hole it makes going out is a different story.

Blood hit my face and hands, sprinkled my uniform. Blowback from the entry wound in the man's chest.

Blood sprayed out of his back, splashed the women, the children, as he fell and lay still.

One of the old men, behind him, screamed and fell too. The bullet had shattered his upper right arm. Must've hit the brachial artery; blood hosed out across the dusty road.

Screaming.

So much fucking screaming.

The teenage girl, the little boy - they fell on the body. The girl screaming, over and over: Baba, baba.

Daddy. Daddy.

Rifles were up and pointed, a hairsbreadth from cutting loose.

One of the older women - the man's wife, I was guessing, the man's widow - she was screaming at us. Ads didn't need to translate. I could guess.

Bastards. Cowards. Murderers.

Nothing I wasn't already calling myself.

The old man went into convulsions. I shouted to the section medic who ran to him, fending off blows from the women and the younger men.

Some tiny piece of mercy.

Too little, too late.

The old man died too. Shock and blood loss.

Desert spread out each side of the road. Scrub trying to hold the sand together. A crosswind blew plumes of sand across the road. It clung to the blood, soaked and blotted it. Crumbs of it clung to the dead faces of the men I'd killed. And to the blood on my face and hands.

The report said suspected insurgents. The report cleared me.

But I'd know. I'd always know.

How long listening to the women scream at me? How long wanting to shoot them, or myself?

But it ended.

They picked up their dead and walked back towards the city. All of them. A Muslim has to be buried within twenty-four hours.

They walked away down the road. None of them looked back. The sand plumes blew back and forth, obscuring them.

I was screaming after them, screaming at Ads that the women could go through.

Ads did as he was told. He shouted after them. But if they heard, they gave no sign.

One turned back and looked. Just once.

It was the older girl. Her face was blanched and streaked with tears. Hatred I could have borne. But all I saw was grief, and mute incomprehension.

She turned away and followed her family.

When she was older, she would have been beautiful.

If she'd lived.

 

 

THE RUMOURS OF civilian massacres came out later, of course. And I saw with my own eyes the white phosphorous dropped on the town.

Estimated civilian casualties: 6,000.

Piss-pathetic by the standards of the flood and what's come after, I'm sure. But I'm guessing the population's much smaller by now. So it'll probably sound as bad as it deserves to.

I can't be sure they died. I only went into the city once, after the attack. I saw the shattered houses. The bodies piled up in the streets. The burned ones, bodies half-turned to ash, skin hanging off - the skin of the hands hanging down like gloves.

I couldn't speak of what I'd done. Not even to my wife. Especially not Jeannie. I couldn't bear to take comfort from her. I could not.

I had no right to it, not anymore.

She tried to stay the course. The drinking. The depression. The outbursts of violence and rage.

But one day I came home and found her gone.

No more than I deserved.

So now you know.

 

 

PRETTY MUCH DONE now

Dawn is breaking. I'm inside the farmhouse at the foot of Pendle Hill, finishing off. Just a matter of time now befo

 

 

"SARGE! SARGE!"

Fuck, I think, and put down the pen. Parkes, bursting into the room. "What is it?"

"We've raised Windhoven on the radio, Sarge."

"Fucking brilliant." I'm on my feet, energised. "Where?"

"Chinook, Sarge."

"Let's go."

On board - Hendry, hunched over the comms.

A woman's voice crackling out of the speaker. "Windhoven to Osprey. Osprey, this is Windhoven."

Hendry leans forward. "Osprey here."

"Who am I speaking to?"

"Flying Officer Hendry, ma'am. Also Sergeant McTarn - he's the ground commander here -"

"I know who McTarn is." Christ, my reputation travelled.

"- and Private Parkes." Which sounded too much like a bad joke.

"This is Captain Bowman. Where's Squadron Leader Tidyman?"

Hendry looks at me. "Killed in action, ma'am."

"Christ. What's your status?"

"Still on the ground at Pendle, with the surviving ground force and about a hundred civilians. Been trying to contact you for a while now."

"I was wondering where you'd got to."

"The Squadron Leader hadn't briefed us on your location. The paperwork was lost with him. Captain, can you give us your co-ordinates? We're under siege and need an evac."

"Not much point, I'm afraid."

A cold finger up my arse. "Ma'am?"

"Started showing up about a fortnight ago. Didn't do anything at first. Just wandering around. We shot a few. But then more turned up. We've got virtually the entire former population of the Thames Valley here right now."

"What's your status, ma'am?"

"Not good, Hendry, not good at all. Attack began in earnest day before yesterday. They've managed to breach the underground base, overrun the aircraft bays so we can't get out. We've been holding them off, but..."

She doesn't say more; just lets the hiss of static do that for her. Through it, I can hear distant gunfire.

"Can you get to the surface, Captain? We could fly in, hit them on the ground. At least give some of you the chance to -"

"Negative. We can't hold them. We're running low on ammunition, and they just keep coming. Soon, we'll be fighting them hand to hand. We'd be long gone by the time you got here. Besides, sounds like you have problems of your own."

"You know what they say, Captain; it's grim up north."

Bowman laughs. There's an ugly, jagged edge to it. "Any luck raising your regional control centre?"

"None, ma'am."

"Us neither. My guess is they've either gone under already or are in the same boat as us. I'm afraid you're on your own, Hendry. Take what action you see fit."

"Copy, ma'am."

A pause; muffled voices in the background. "I'm afraid that'll have to be it. They're breaking through. Must dash."

"God be with you, ma'am." I never pegged Hendry as religious. Then again, I never asked.

"You too, Hendry. Windhoven out."

The line goes dead.

 

 

"SARGE? THEY'RE MOVING."

This is it. This is it. The fuck do I do now? Chas?

I've got your back, Robbie. You need help, you got me. Alright?

I need help, Chas. Need it fucking now. Where are you? Where?

"Sarge?"

"Move..." Focus, Robbie, focus. "Move 'em out, Parkes."

"Yes, Sarge."

So, then. It's here. At last.

Outside, other survivors huddle under tarps. Those we've the space for - the women, the children - they're crammed into the farmhouse, or Stiles' caravan. The rest are out there, under whatever shelter we can improvise.

We won't need it much longer anyway.

The P226 at my hip. The SA80 at my side. Chambering a round as I go. The pages folded in a plastic bag, tucked under my arm.

Katja in the field, huddled under tarps with the rest. She gave up her billet for someone she thought needed it more.

You should have been in charge. Not me.

I walk to her. She stands. I give her the papers. We don't speak. There is nothing to say.

Stiles appears at the caravan door. He's pale. He half-raises a hand to me, in some kind of salute. But I'm already running.

 

 

ON THE SIDE facing Barley, we found a couple of farmhouses - one a working farm, the other converted into a residence - made into an open space by a dirt road crossing them.

They stand just below a ridge of high ground with the footpath cutting down it. On the left side of it is a field ringed with a solid drystone wall, where we've taken up positions. We've got Gimpys, Minimis, rifles, Molotovs, a few grenades. On the right is a small, pointed plateau, where we've set up a Gimpy and a couple of riflemen.

The fields, meadows and other open ground below us are all as heavily mined as we were able to manage, enough that any of them advancing over the open terrain will be blown to fuck. Parkes is down there with Neil and Steve. The fougasses have to be detonated manually. That's their job. Their orders are to wait till the nightmares are in range, blow the charges and run.

If we can use the fougasses to force the nightmares onto the footpaths - like the one leading up to the farmhouses and the space between them - they'll pour out into what we'll be able to turn into a perfect killing zone.

In the farmhouses, there's Levene and a few of the better local rifle shots, to whittle the odds down as they come up the path.

It'll work as long as the fougasses keep them to the paths. Or until they realise there'll be no further explosions once the mines are blown; when that happens, they'll start using the open ground again, and our last advantage will be gone. All we can do then is hold position as long as we can.

I crouch behind the drystone wall. I can feel my hands shaking. Fuck.

Chas, pal, I need you here now.

Mleczko's good. But it just isn't the same.

He isn't Chas.

Even if we can get the Chinook up again, what then? A stay of execution? In the long run, the result's the same. We all die. Nothing lasts. No-one gets away. One by one, we all fall down.

The nightmares move so slowly - except when they come at you in those short, deadly, bursts - it's easy to believe you can outwit them, outrun them. But they're untiring, relentless. And sooner or later, you have to stop.

For nearly a minute, I just crouch there, terrified someone'll ask me for an order. Hopelessness is a huge fucking weight, crushing me so flat I can hardly breathe.

Come off it, Jock. You've got a job to do. Deal with each problem as it comes. Worry about this attack, then worry about the next one. Worry about getting the chopper off the ground again, then worry about where you're gonna go. And for fuck sake, Jock, stop fucking snivelling.

"Sergeant Jock to you, grotbag."

"Sarge?" Mleczko, blinking.

"Noth -"

And that's when the fougasses go off like a fucking cannonade.

Yelps, a couple of whoops. I peer over the wall. Plumes of smoke rising. Flames crackling further down the slope.

Levene's voice, crackling out of the communicator. "It's hitting the bastards, Sarge. Got to have taken out hundreds of them."

"Good. And the rest?"

"Hang on..." A tinge of excitement in the voice. For Levene, that's saying a lot. "Yes. They're taking the footpath. I can see them at it, Sarge. They're heading our way."

"OK." I raise my voice. "Everybody, weapons ready. Company's coming. Levene?"

"Sarge?"

"Hold fire. Let 'em get in close."

"How close do you want 'em?"

"Wait till they start entering the killing zone. Then hit the ones who're still coming in. Hit them too early, they might pull back. I want this to fucking count."

"Copy, Sarge. Just keep them out of here, OK?"

"We'll cover you, Levene. Just make sure you do the same for us."

"Copy that, Sarge."

We can hear them coming now. The tramping squish of feet in mud. The distant hissing sounds. I flex my hands on the SA80.

And the smell. The thick ripe stench of the dead. Like a finger touching the back of my throat. I gag, spit out bile. More coughing and retching further down the line.

"Our guests have arrived, Sarge."

No shit. "Everyone stand ready, but hold fire until my command. I'll fucking feed you to the bastards myself if you fire early. Clear?"

"Sarge," comes the echo down the line, even from the civvies. There isn't really that much of a line between us and them now. We're all in the same boat. And it's sinking.

"Wait for it... wait for it..."

Sighting over the wall. The green-stained bodies shuffling forward. Yawning faces, blackened teeth. Eyes glowing with green torment, as they close in with outstretched, grasping hands...

Closer... closer...

"Fire!"

I shout orders, point. But everything seems too slow, not quite in step. It's not them. It's me. I'm out of sync. Not fast enough.

Not now. Stay together. Focus. Focus!

They go down quickly. They don't fall back. They keep coming. Till they're all cut down.

There'll be more of them soon.

"Sarge! Sarge!" Parkes.

"Parkes, go ahead."

"They're back on the open ground. There's something different... oh shit."

"What?"

"Sarge, you're not gonna believe this."

"What is it, Parkes?"

"God almighty, there's gotta be thousands, but -"

"Spit it out!"

"They're spread out in groups of fifty or so. Big gaps between them. The fougasses'll hardly dent it."

"Looks like they mean business this time."

"What it looks like, Sarge."

"OK. Blow the remaining charges and get back here. Levene?"

"Sarge."

"Cover their retreat, then get back to the bastards on the footpaths. Fire at will. Let's see how far we can whittle them down." I raise my voice to the others. "All riflemen move forward. Get into a position where you can see the enemy. Take your time. Acquire your target. Be sure of your shot. And drop the fuckers. Make every bullet count. Every one we kill now is one less to deal with at close quarters."

"Like when they get here, you mean, Sarge?" Mleczko murmurs.

"Bang on, Mleczko."

The fougasses going off. Levene's rifles start firing seconds later. I move forward into the yard of the working farmhouse, sighting down on the nightmares entering the wide-open meadow below.

Parkes and the others are running. The nightmares are close behind though, closer than they should be. Some of them break into runs. One leaps on Neil's back and he goes down. Others falling on him. Neil screaming.

I aim, look through the sight. A face swims into focus. I centre the tip of the blade in the Trilux sight between its eyes. Squeeze the trigger. It drops.

Good shot. Now do it again. But even with that slow, shuffling pace, how long before they get here? And if they run...

Fire. Fire again.

Parkes and Neil scrambling up the meadow and into the farmyard.

And then -

"They're running!"

"Fuck!" Yelling into the communicator. "Levene, get out of there now! Fall back, we are falling back!"

I unpin first one, then the other of the grenades I still hold - one white phosphorous, one frag - and overarm them both into the advancing horde, then run as the explosions ring out behind.

Diving over the drystone wall. Aiming over as the nightmares come crawling up into the farmyard, onto the footpath - fucking everywhere -

Focus!

"Covering fire!"

The MGs chattering. Levene and the others pour out of the buildings. Two, from the farmhouse on the right, aren't fast enough. The nightmares pull them down. Mleczko running forward, firing from the hip, lobbing a grenade.

"Mleczko!"

An explosion. Mleczko ducking, the others running past him. Levene hanging back, firing at the nightmares, a rearguard -

Going after them. "Get back here, the fucking pair of you!"

Levene's trips, he falls. Half back on his feet when one hits him in a flying tackle. Two, three, four more hurl themselves onto him, grabbing, tearing. He screams.

"Levene!" Mleczko, turning back.

"You can't do anything! Get behind the wall! Hold the line!"

I cover him as he goes. Nightmares closing in. I shoot one in the forehead. Then another. And another.

I realise I'm laughing.

I realise I'm going to die. Here, today, now.

I realise it's what I've wanted for a long time.

The girl turning back, the last look on her face as she goes.

For a second I see her, and lower the gun.

For a second, it's her father, and I don't shoot. And it never happened. And I'm redeemed.

And then I realise it isn't her or him at all, it's a nightmare. It looks a little like the man I shot. Tubby, a beard, shoulder-length hair. What's left of it.

Its eyes, burning.

I point the gun.

I pull the trigger.

Click.

Fuck.

It jumps.

I'm drawing the P226, but it's on me, teeth going for my throat. I get my left hand under its chin as we hit the ground. Its jaws snap, its lips brush my cheek - but not its teeth. Pushing it away from me, pulling the Sig-Sauer free to kill it. Thinking: Lucky bastard, McTarn -

Still thinking how lucky when it twists its head and bites three fingers off my left hand.

 

 

DARK. THICK DULL throb of pain in my hand.

My hand.

"Fuck!"

"Easy, Sarge." Hassan, pushing me back down on an improvised pallet bed. The ceiling above me. Spinning. I feel drunk.

"Alright. Alright. Get off." I put a hand to my forehead. It burns.

Gunfire. Close to.

"Where?" I bat Hassan's hand aside and sit up. My head and stomach roll.

"Sarge, take it easy."

"Bollocks." More gunshots. "Bastard things are right on top of us." I look at him. "Aren't they?"

He nods.

"What happened?"

He drops his gaze. "Mleczko killed your attacker, carried you back."

I remembered Levene. "I told the little bugger to leave the wounded. Still, if he knows when to disobey an order..."

Your attacker.

"Shit!"

"Take it easy, Sarge."

"Stop fucking saying that! Fucker bit half my hand off." I swallow hard. Nothing seems quite real. "I'm gonna become one of them. Aren't I?"

"You might have a chance."

"What do you mea..." I close my eyes and raise my hands to my face, but only one set of fingers touches it.

There is a swaddled stump where my left hand was. I hold it up, to be sure he's not just bound the undamaged fingers and thumb in tight. No. It's gone.

I let out a laugh that sounds odd and weak and strange to my own ears.

"Sarge..." Hassan, reaching for a needle.

"No!" I fend him off. "No time." I get off the table. My legs wobble. No. Stand straight. I'm in my underwear. "Get my fucking combats."

"Sergeant, you've just had surgery."

"I was bitten, Hassan. I'm fucked."

"We may have cut the infected tissue away in time. You might have a chance."

"Get me whatever pills and shots you need to keep me on my feet. I'm no fucking good to anyone in here. So do as you told. I'm giving you a fucking order."

Christ. I sound like Tidyman.

 

 

IT HASN'T WORKED. I can feel it. A terrible burning pain, in the stump of my wrist. Nausea, a pounding headache. I walk on.

Behind me there's the Hill, the farmhouse, Stiles' meadow. In front of me, another meadow, leading down to drystone walls and a gate. The defenders spread out along the wall. Mleczko at the gate, shouting orders.

Beyond the gate, down the path, they're coming in small, scattered groups.

Their eyes are glowing green.

Green like the sea. Like the deep sea.

I can hear, from far off, over the shouts and gunfire, the lapping of sea on the shore.

I reach the gate. Slump against it. Mleczko jumps, stares at me. "Sarge!"

"Mleczko. What's the situation?"

He looks older than before. Command'll do that. "They marched more of the fuckers up slower, while we were still fighting that first lot, so then they could go flat out. Full speed, you know? They were coming in on all fronts. Had to fall back, but soon as we got one defensive line, they were on top of us again. In the end, we didn't have anywhere else to go. So here we are." He rubs his face. "Lost a lot of people. Lot of kit, too."

"What we got left?"

"Still OK for rifles. Few Minimis, couple of Gimpys... pretty much it."

"Then we make them count." I look down the lane. There don't seem to be many of them. A few dozen, hanging back. They drop one by one as the bullets whine and crack out. "Doesn't look like much of an army."

"Not compared to what they were hitting us with before."

Green eyes glow down the path. I stare into them; they expand and swallow me up.

The sound of a huge ocean. Waves. But there's something else. Listen. Listen. I can hear voices. Human voices.

The refugees, back in the meadow...

No. Not them. This is different. I'm not even hearing the gunshots anymore. I can only hear the sea. And the voices.

They're crying out. I hear men and women. Children too. Crying for mercy, for release. In rage, at lives cut short so soon.

The gnawing pain in the stump of my wrist, the thump of my heart squeezing new pain through my body. I can feel it spreading. They've slowed it down. But once it takes hold, there's no shifting it.

Mleczko's mouth moving. Saying something. But I can't hear. And now all I can really see, all that really matters, are those glowing green eyes.

And the light flickers and fades and contracts - shrinks from a glow filling the whole world to two dying bulbs, the eyes of a nightmare falling forward as it dies.

"Sarge? Sarge?"

I turn back to Mleczko. "Alright. Here's what you do. Hendry made any progress with the Chinook?"

"If he had we'd be airborne by now, Sarge. And I don't reckon he's got long to pull one out of the hat."

"What d'you mean?"

"I think I know why they're holding off."

I picked the right man for the job, because I think I know too. "They're going to wait till dark."

"Yeah. In my eyes, that's what they're gonna do. Keep throwing cannon fodder at us, tire us out, use our ammo up. But once it's dark and we can't see the fuckers, they'll rush us. The lot of them. And they won't stop."

My forehead's burning. Rain hitting it. "Right. Here's what you do. Start picking people for evac. Find out off what's the maximum the Chinook'll carry. You're gonna have to pick who goes and who stays. Tell Hendry if the fucking thing's not ready to fly by dark I'll feed him to the nightmares myself."

Mleczko glances down the footpath. "What about..."

"I'll handle it here." He opens his mouth. "None of your lip. I'm not dead yet. Get your arse in gear."

I draw the Sig-Sauer and look down the lane, thumb on the hammer.

 

 

DUSK. THE SKY growing dim. A dulled sunset seeping through the clouds. Blood soaking through a bandage.

No word on the chopper. It was always a long shot.

They're gathering down the road. Clusters of tiny lights.

I've a splitting headache. The stump of my wrist throbs. Not just the stump, in fact. My whole forearm, now. The bandages are wet. Something seeping through.

Hassan gave me pills. Morphine and codeine. I dry-swallow two, think fuck it and down a third. Probably not a good idea for a man with a gun, but fuck it all over again. We left proper procedure behind a long time ago.

The lights moving. Shuffling forward. I can hear the sea again. Growing louder. The voices. Screaming. Moaning. Sobbing. Wailing.

Footsteps, coming up behind me.

"Mleczko? Hendry got that fucking chopper fixed yet?"

"No."

And it's not Mleczko, either. It's Katja.

She comes to stand beside me, watches the gathering mass below us. "Are you alright?" She shakes her head. "Stupid question."

There's someone else with her. His silhouette looks strange. Fucking drugs. I'm dizzy, weak. When the nightmares come I won't stand a chance. How much of them lingers on? Some fragment, some flicker of consciousness? I remember the empty farmhouse, the father staring up at his old home. The thought of being aware as my body kills and eats people I know...

Kills and eats Katja.

But it's not the drugs. It's...

"Stiles?"

"Yes." He looks very calm. Katja isn't looking at him.

He's wearing a wetsuit. An aqualung. A diving mask pushed up on his forehead. Boots, but a pair of flippers hang from his belt.

"What the hell?"

"He's going to get himself killed." Stiles reaches out and touches her arm; she pulls it away.

"Katja, we've talked about this. I have to try. It's the only chance."

"What is?" I demand.

"This."

He climbs over the gate before I can stop him, before I even realise what he's doing. "Stiles, for fuck sake -" I'm scrambling forward, to go after him. Down the road, the nightmares have started shambling forward.

But Katja stops me. She's crying. "No," she says. "Let him go."

I stop and stare. Confused? That's not the word for it. She turns and goes to the gate. He looks down the path at the nightmares.

"You're sure?" Her voice is tiny. Almost a child's.

"No," he says. "But I've got to try."

He turns back. They come together and kiss. I have to look away. Not out of jealousy. I'm past that now.

"I love you," I hear him whisper, and her whisper it back.

When I turn back, he's walking down the footpath. The nightmares have stopped their advance. They just stand and watch him, with their glowing eyes, in the deepening gloom.

Stiles reaches them and stops. For a frozen second, it's just them, contemplating each other.

The eyes of the nightmares in front of him begin to pulse, just like the ones back at the army base did. Stiles sways, nearly falls, but doesn't.

The pulsing stops, and -

The nightmares are parting. Stepping aside to leave a clear path. Stiles starts walking. They turn their heads and watch him go. Then they turn back to watch us.

It's like a ripple effect, extending as far down as I can see, as he goes. Until he's out of sight.

"What the fuck?" I say again. I tear my gaze from the nightmares and stare at Katja. "What the fuck is going on?"

"They want him," she says. "They always have."

"What?"

"His notes. Didn't you read them? It's all in there."

"What the fuck's he trying to do?"

"Save us all," she says.

"He's..." I remember the wetsuit, the equipment. "He's going diving?"

She nods.

"But I thought he couldn't. I thought he'd die if..."

She nods again. Then she turns and walks back the way she came.

I turn and stare out at the nightmares. They stand and watch us. Eyes glowing. As the darkness deepens.

 

 

A COUPLE OF minutes pass. I lean on the gate, shivering in the chill of the rain even as I welcome it falling on my burning forehead. A footfall behind me.

"Ged."

"Lad." He leans on the gate too, on folded arms. A farmer, surveying his land. The SPAS-12 slung across his back. "How you doing, lad?"

"How do you fucking think?" He doesn't answer. "Sorry."

Smiling slightly, he waves it away.

"I'm dying," I say at last.

"Aren't we all?"

And I have to laugh.

Ged chuckles as well. "So, what you planning to do, lad?"

"I'll stop here," I say. "This is it for me. Even if we get the Chinook airborne again, I'm fucked." I hold up the bandaged stump. Another sick, fevery shudder passes through me. "So I might as well go out on my own two legs, eh?"

Ged nods. "Good enough. If you've no objection, I'll join you."

I turn and stare at him. "Are you mad?"

He just looks at me.

"Ged, I'm not gonna be falling back, did you hear me?"

"I know the score, lad. They'll not get that chopper airborne again. We both know it. This is it for us all now. Barring miracles."

"Believe in them?"

"Oh, miracles happen." A smile softens his face. "My missus saying yes when I asked her to marry me, that were a miracle alright. And our Cl..." he trails off, the smile gone.

"I'm not holding my breath for any tonight."

"Nor I. If I've got to die, I'll do it here. This far and no farther, all of that. I've run enough from them bastards, killed my Clare."

There nothing to say to that. "Alright," I say. "I'd be honoured."

"I know, lad."

"Just one thing, Ged?"

"What's that?"

"Can you stop calling me 'lad'? My name's Robert."

"Alright then, lad. Robert it is."

 

 

THE SUN IS nearly gone.

And so am I.

I can barely stand. The pain and the sickness are almost too much to bear. The stump of my hand is like a second heart, pumping poison. With Mleczko's help and a roll of gaffa tape, I've strapped the hatchet to the stump of my wrist. Makes it hurt all the worse, but at least I can do some damage.

My hand shakes. I'm sweating like a pig. When I wipe it away, my forehead's burning like hot coals.

They're just shadows now. Shadows with eyes. Their outlines blur and break up as the light fails.

A full clip in the P226. No spares. How the fuck am I supposed to reload? I have an SA80 too - propping it on the gate, I can fire one-handed.

Mleczko's on one side of me. Ged and Katja on the other. Others spread out behind the walls.

In the camp behind us, people are crying. Someone praying. A few ragged voices rise in a song. A hymn, a folk-song, or just something that was in the charts a few weeks ago. I can't make it out. But I can hear the sea. Louder and louder, trying to drown everything else out.

The sea, and the voices.

       why me why me? i didn't want to die

no no no my baby my baby

   bastards you bastards

  for being alive

dear father in heaven

   pater noster pater noster

    hail mary full of grace,

the lord is with thee, blessed art thou amongst women, blessed is the fruit of thy womb jesus christ, holy mary mother of god pray for us poor sinners now and at the hour of hour of our death

want to live want to live want to live

   no not like this not to die like this not like this not like this

"Fuck," says Mleczko. "Here they come."

Down the road, the forest of glowing eyes is moving.

bastards bastards want to live why me and not you?

will live will live will live again kill you kill you KILL YOU

EAT EAT EAT EAT EAT

Like a tide.

A tide of souls.

Rising. Gathering. And then the wave breaks.

"Open fire!"

The GPMGs and Minimis sweep the advancing ranks. But the next wave just scramble over the fallen bodies. And that means you've got to aim up to hit them in the head. And the twilight makes accurate firing harder and harder with an automatic weapon.

Aim and fire. Aim and fire. They keep falling. But they keep coming too.

This is it. No matter how hard we hit them, they won't fall back this time.

Then they burst into a jerky, scrambling run. They're not coming direct for me. They're focusing in, closing on specific points, choosing their targets.

They're going for the machine guns.

Faces leap out, rotten. Aim and fire. Aim and fire.

Not one of you yet, you bastards, not one of you yet.

The answer is a furious wave that crashes on a sea wall. Their voices are screaming in rage. All the different voices, blending in and out. Now and again one voice leaps out. But it's a whole. An organ note. Sounding together. One voice. I stop shooting as I realise that. One voice blended out of many -

"Sarge!"

And if I listen to it closely I can hear what it's trying to say.

"Sarge!"

What?

"Robert!"

Katja's voice. Maybe the only one that could snap me out of this. As the wave of the dead crashes against the gate.

Firing. Bodies dropping. A nightmare trying to climb over, then jerking, falling past me, its skull shattered. They stumble back, bracing against the tidal force of the multitudes behind them. Hurling themselves forward again.

Screaming from further down, on either side. They've reached the machine guns, grabbing the barrels and dragging them down, leaping over the walls to fall upon the gunners. The other defenders firing into them, but it's not enough, never enough.

"Robert!"

Firing out the SA80, letting it fall -

"Back!"

They crash against the gate. I can hear it cracking, buckling.

"Back!" Mleczko, running. They're all running.

Except me. Me and Ged. Back a few paces to stand our ground.

Katja wrenching at my arm. "Robert! Robert!"

"No." My voice sounds thick and slurred. "Go. Go." I don't look at her. Can't. What must my face look like now? So sick, so sick. I'm full of it now, the sickness. The infection. All I can hear in my ears is the ocean's pounding roar. I can barely hear her voice.

Holy Mary mother of God, pray for us poor sinners now and at the hour of our death.

Ha. Funny, an old bluenose coming out with that at the last.

"Go on, lass," I heard Ged say.

"Go," I tell her. "We'll cover you."

I can't hear her reply, if she has one. But I feel the touch of her lips, a last kiss, on my cheek.

And then me and Ged are alone and the gate's giving way. They burst through and I raise the gun and aim on the first one and I pull the trigger and its head snaps back. And I aim again and...

We back away as they swarm through and over the gate, Ged still thumbing the last few shells into the SPAS-12, then firing, firing, firing.

Raising the Sig-Sauer, shoot - a nightmare close in - I swing at it, smash its skull with the hatchet taped to my wrist, shoot again.

Shoot and strike, shoot and strike.

The axe gone, buried in another nightmare's head, the bone locking round the blade, pulling me off-balance, the haft breaking. A nightmare diving on me; firing upwards, into its gaping mouth. Somehow I manage to stand.

The shotgun empty; Ged using it as a club, smashing skull after skull.

But there are so many of them. Too many. And then they're on him. He goes down, thrashing and fighting, and I hear a scream torn from his lips.

I aim and fire on him, hitting him in the head. He falls and I'm screaming now, firing into the face of another nightmare, and then another, and -

The P226's slide locks back. Empty.

Fuck.

They stop and stare, facing me.

I throw the gun aside. Can still fight. I grab at the ground. Fumble for a chunk of rock as they shamble towards me.

But my legs give way and I collapse as they gather round me with their burning eyes.

I grip the rock, somehow manage to lift it a few inches off the ground with an arm as weak as an old man's.

"Come on, then," I say, then shout up at them. "Come on!"

Ged rises, torn and ravaged, missing chunks of flesh and his eyes glowing, but still - just about - recognisable. And stumbles off after the rest.

A wave of sickness and shivering, a terrible weakness. I feel my bowels and bladder fail. A rush of shame, and then -

Screaming after them, but I can't even hear my own voice now it's so fucking loud, the sea, the voices

flesh and blood, flesh and bone -

     make us whole

    again

  let us live don't want to die let us live

rage rage rage against the dying of the light, against those still drawing

unearned breath on land

  leaving us down here in the darkness

down here in the darkness cold and alone

     alone

  ALONE

- drowning me out, eclipsing me, eclipsing -

Who? What's my name?

WHAT'S MY FUCKING NAME?

I scream - soundlessly to my own ears --and fall back to the earth. Too weak now. And they just keep coming on, stepping over or around me,

   me,

    me,

Me, Robbie McTarn

ROBBIE MCTARN MY NAME IS ROBBIE MCTARN

And I realise why as the sickness rises one last time like a wave and the pain washes through my body.

My heart is hammering hammering hammering, fastfastfaster, and I'm burning up, oh god I'm burning up.

And then the thundering jackhammer rhythm of my heart is all I can hear, even the ocean is gone and I hear the rhythm thunder thunder thunder

And skip,

 falter,

   Stutter erratically

   and then,

   finally,

  it stops.

And I can't move my eyes, can't look beyond what's in front of me as I lie dying, dying, DEAD upon the dull earth, as dead men and women stagger past me, mind screaming, beating the bone walls of its cage as it dies from lack of oxygen, the lights going out for good.

Things slipping away from me. My dad, something about my dad... did I love or hate him? Can't remember now.

I want to scream out in rage at it. Scream out in the fear I feel. But can't.

All I can hear are the screams I can't utter.

The screams others are uttering for me.

rage rage rage

  oh god no not me not like this

And I'm falling, crashing down, plunging through a deep dark endless ocean, glowing green eyes and rotting hands and faces reaching out for me.

Screams and voices all around me. And they're all my own.

I can't remember my name anymore.

Vaguely I realise my limbs are moving but it's not me moving them, that this is the last awareness of my body I shall have. I can't remember can't remember anything I'm just the tiniest little spark of consciousness and all that is left is my rage and my terror to swell the waters of this ocean and I feel myself fading and when this is done I will not exist at all anym