The Bitter End Read online

  In the afternoon she took over up top. A grey mist had settled low over the canal and the moisture in it soaked her clothes as good as rain. She watched the open countryside pass by at a steady ten miles per hour. She had never been much of a country girl. She preferred the hustle and excitement of the big city but she would have given anything to stop the boat and run through the green fields. Anything except what it would actually cost.

  Alone with her thoughts she tried to remain upbeat but really, what was there to be upbeat about? The world was over, there was no more civilisation. The people who were left lived like gypsies, roaming from place to place in search of a safety that no longer existed.

  As the sun began to set Dennis appeared with dinner. A steaming plate of meat, cooked almost to ash.

  "You want to talk about it?" he said.

  She shrugged and chewed on a mouthful of what might have been beef. "What's the point? It's not going to change anything."

  "Maybe not," he said, "might make you feel better though."

  She kept eating but knew he'd get it out if her. She wasn't putting up much resistance, she didn't have the energy for it.

  When she had finished eating he took the plate from her but didn't go back inside.

  "So what is it?" he said.

  Hannah swallowed the last of the meat, playing for time. Then she spoke; "Don’t you ever wonder what the point of all this is?"

  Dennis nodded as if it was what he had expected her to say. For all she knew it was, he could be surprisingly perceptive at times. For a long time he didn't say anything. The world around them became dark. She could hear the kids inside shouting and laughing, playing some silly game they'd made up to pass the time.

  "What's the alternative?" he said at last.

  She shrugged. She knew what her alternative was, it was up to him to find his own.

  "We just give up? Stop the boat now, get off and wait for the first group of those things to find us?"

  "There's other ways. I mean, I'm not saying that I want to, but we don't have to keep running."

  He shook his head and she thought he looked disappointed. "What about the kids?"

  "We could take them with us."

  "You don't mean that."

  "Don't I?" she was starting to get upset now, could feel the tears burning behind her eyes. "What is there for them here? They'll spend their whole lives running, scared and alone. Is that the kind of life you want for them?"

  "It's better than no life at all, isn't it?"

  She wasn't so sure but she didn't have the energy for an argument. She just shook her head and said, "I don't know Dennis. I just don't know."

  He reached into the back pocket of his jeans and pulled out a battered piece of paper. He started to unfold it and she saw how weak the folds were, like it had been opened and poured over hundreds of times.

  "What's that?" she said.

  He held it out and she took it. It was a map of the canal network with pencil scribbles she couldn't read. "I didn't want to tell you, until I knew for sure."

  The fact that he had kept it secret from her was almost as surprising as the fact that he had a plan at all. "What is it?"

  "Somewhere we can go. I think. I guess we won't know for sure until we get there."

  She examined the map but didn't really understand it. She hadn't read a map since she was in the Girl Guides, sat-nav had been a common feature in cars by the time she was old enough to drive.

  "It should take us another week," he said and took the map back from her, folded it and put it back in his pocket. "If we don't run into any trouble."

  He did not need to elaborate on the sort of trouble they might run into. "And if there's nothing there?" she said.

  "Then we can consider alternatives," he said, which was as close as he ever got to saying there was merit in her idea of a quick and painless death.

  Dennis took over so that she could put the children to bed. She washed them at the sink because they hadn't figured out how to get the shower to work. While they were drying and brushing their teeth she pulled out the two sofas and put bed sheets over them. Ben got into bed wearing Spider-Man pyjamas that were getting too small for him. Cora was still little enough to be happy in a pink nighty.

  They hadn't brought any books with them which was a shame. She had a lot of books, leather bound editions that had been worth a lot of money. Not that it was the money that bothered her now. Now it was the knowledge that those books were gone, lost, as if they had never been written at all.

  She had an ebook reader but without electricity to charge it was a lump of plastic. She kept it with her in the hope that one day they would be in a position to waste petrol running a generator and that the books it contained could once again be accessed. If that ever happened maybe she would copy the books out onto paper, to preserve them for the future. If there was going to be a future.

  The only books she had to read to the children were those left by the boats original owner. Unfortunately most of those seemed to be smutty erotica. Not the sort of thing she wanted to expose her children to. Instead she told them the stories she remembered, making up the words and some of the character names. They weren't really sleepy yet but they listened anyway, there wasn't anything else for them to do in the dark.

  At some point during Hannah's version of Oliver Twist the door opened.

  "Hannah?"

  She looked back but she couldn't see anything in the dark.

  "Could you come up here a minute?"

  She recognised the tone of forced calm. Something was wrong and he didn't want the children to know about it.

  "What is it mum?" said Cora, she sounded sleepy but she was fighting it.

  "It's nothing honey," she said but couldn't think of a reasonable explanation for Dennis calling her away from them. "Just wait here and I'll go and see."

  She bent over and kissed her little girl on the forehead. She turned to do the same to Ben but he scowled so she made do with patting his arm.

  "Close the door," said Dennis in a calm whisper that worried her at once.

  She did as he told her. "What is it?"

  He didn't speak but pointed towards the bank on their right. It was lined with overgrown trees and tall grass. She squinted into the dark and saw two shapes running along the bank, easily keeping up with the boat despite the obstacles presented by fallen branches and fences.

  She jumped when she felt Dennis's arm around her. She hadn't realised that she had moved closer to him. He held he firmly. "It's alright," he whispered. His mouth was so close to her ear that she could feel the warmth of his breath on her neck. "They can't get us while we're on the water."

  Hannah watched the shapes that from a distance might have been mistaken for human. But if you watched closely you could tell the difference. They moved like animals: their long limbs making smooth movements through the air. They were faster, they had better vision, hearing and smell. If you got close enough to one, they said, you could see their smooth pale skin, like white porcelain. Personally she didn't think anyone had come that close to one and survived. If you got that close they would just grab you and sink their sharp fangs into your neck. If you were lucky they would kill you outright, if not you'd become just like them: superhuman in some ways, subhuman in all the important ones.

  Hannah sunk into Dennis. She could hear them, grunting and growling. "Are you sure they can't cross the water?" she said.

  "If they could they would have done by now. They've been following us for the last half hour."

  She shuddered to think that while she'd been making up beds for the kids those things had been out there. Waiting for them to get close enough so they could jump across.

  "What are we going to do?" she said.

  He didn't say anything and she knew there was more that he wasn't telling her.

  "What is it Dennis?" she said.

  She turned to see him squirming. Whatever it was it was the reason he'd called her up. If they had been foll
owing the boat for thirty minutes then something else must have changed.

  "According to the map," he said in a way that made it clear he thought the map was to blame, "we're approaching a lock."

  She nodded. She felt serenely calm. This was what she had expected, there wouldn't be a happy ending for them. "How long?"

  "About fifteen minutes."

  That was long enough. If she got the kids to sleep she could use a pillow on Cora. Dennis would need to deal with Ben, he was too strong for her.

  "Are they asleep?"

  She shook her head. "Not yet."

  "Do you want to see if you can sleep for a bit?"

  She turned around so she could see him and frowned. Why would she want to sleep now? She was going to be dead in fifteen minutes.

  "I can keep going for a few hours," he said, "but not all night."

  "Keep... what are you talking about?"

  She noticed that they were passing the same cluster of trees again. Or were they? It was difficult to tell in the dark and all trees looked about the same.

  "One of us needs to keep driving until morning."

  Hannah felt sick to her stomach. Of course, it had been obvious. They just had to keep going until sunrise, by then they would be safe and they could continue to the lock. In her mind she had already stuffed a pillow over Cora's mouth and held it down until she stopped struggling. She started to cry.

  "What is it?" said Dennis.

  She shook her head. "You go in and get some rest. I don't think I could sleep yet."

  He didn't argue with her. She took the tiller from him.

  "Give me a call if you need me. Otherwise I'll be out in a couple of hours to take over." He kissed her softly on the lips and went inside.

  She watched the creatures on the bank stop as the boat turned. They were smart, that was just one of the things that made them so dangerous. When the boat pulled away again they started to follow.

  It started to get cold and Dennis appeared with a jacket for her. "You alright up here by yourself?"

  She nodded and took the jacket from him. "You should be resting."

  The creatures continued their journey up and down the bank while she continued theirs up and down the river.

  "I couldn't sleep," he said. "Are they still there?"

  "Still there." She had considered switching off the engine and letting the boat drift along to save fuel but there was a slight current towards the bank and she was afraid that if she fell asleep they would drift towards shore and the first she would know about it would be when she woke up as one of them.

  "You want a coffee of something?"

  "Coffee would be good," she said.

  He disappeared back inside and returned a few minutes later with two steaming cups of black coffee. There was no milk left. "We should think about weapons," he said, settling his cup on top of the boat and closing the door behind him.

  Finding weapons would be easy. There were thousands of guns just laying in the street where the army had been overrun. Getting to them would be more difficult but, she supposed, if they set off early enough they could be there and back before sunset.

  "Is there a city on your map?" she said.

  He took it out of his pocket and peered at it. He wouldn't be able to see anything in the dark, frankly she was surprised he could see anything in the light. His glasses had broken when he tripped over, while they were travelling to the boat. There hadn't been time to find another pair.

  "We can't be too far from Reading," he said.

  It was on the tip of her tongue to say that her sister lived in Reading but, of course, she didn't. Probably no one lived there anymore.

  Dennis sat with her until she started to yawn. "Go and get some sleep," he said.

  "I'm alright," she said. But a few minutes later her eyes were starting to feel heavy and she couldn't keep them open. The fear of the creatures stalking along the bank remained but it wasn't enough to keep her awake anymore.

  "At least let me steer, before you run us into a bridge or something." He didn't need to say what 'something' might be.

  "Maybe I'll just go and check on the kids," she said and let him take the tiller. She saw him smile but kissed him anyway and then went back inside.

  It was warm and she knew she wouldn't be able to stay awake for long. She also couldn't look at the faces of the sleeping children who, just a few hours earlier, she had killed.

  Without getting undressed she climbed into bed, closed her eyes and fell asleep.

  3

  That night she dreamed. She dreamed that they were back at home. They had a nice home, a nice life. They lived in a new apartment block near the city centre. Dennis was in stocks, 'not a stockbroker' he'd told her but she could never remember what he actually did. She had been in marketing before Ben had come along. She hadn't worked since.

  They were in their mid-thirties and their friends were all settled down having children as well. They had a good social life. A good life. Then she dreamed that the creatures came and it wasn't a dream but a memory.

  She was laying in bed and she could hear Dennis beside her, breathing heavily, his throat making that irritating irregular rasping sound. He had been drinking the night before. But she could also hear something else, a scratching noise that sounded like hissing.

  She didn't know what it was, no one knew what it was back then. The population just exploded overnight. One day they were nowhere, the next day they were everywhere. And that was the night.

  The night that they swarmed all over the building. Climbed up the outside of the sleek glass and steel tower. They could constrict their bodies, stretch them out, to get in through air vents that would have been impossible for a human.

  And there they were now, crawling through the pipes above their heads, scratching and hissing from behind hollow walls. She could hear them and she knew they were there but she couldn't move. She was paralysed. In the dark of the night she was the only one who knew what was coming and she was the only one who couldn't move.

  She tried to scream but nothing came out except a soundless gasp. It was like spiders crawling up her spine. If she couldn't save herself then she wanted to warn her family but she couldn't even do that. She was trapped, they were trapped, there was nothing she could do and they were all going to die.

  It hadn't happened like that.

  No one had known they were coming but it hadn't happened over night. It took weeks rather than days for it to become an epidemic. It was true that no one seemed to be able to stop them but it was also true that no one even seemed to try until it was too late.

  She woke in a cold sweat to find sunlight streaming through the thin white curtains behind her. She was panting, out of breath. Hannah jumped up and ran out of the bedroom to find her children gone, their beds neatly made. She could hear them laughing and joking outside.

  4

  The river had flooded the Oracle shopping centre. It lapped against a deflated bouncy castle, the blue plastic had faded and turned yellow in places. Little waterfalls had formed running down the bricked hills. The McDonalds on one side was beneath a foot of water, on the other side the tables outside Starbucks had been turned over and lay half submerged.

  Hannah steered the boat. Dennis jumped off holding a length of rope and looped it around the metal safety barrier that ran along the length of the the river. He pulled the boat towards him and then tied the rope. Ben threw another rope from the back and he tied that off as well.

  She stopped the engine and the silence was like being punched in the stomach. The Oracle wasn't as big as some shopping centres but it had always been noisy. The sound of a thousand people talking, laughing and joking, their only worry being whether the dress they liked would be available in their size. There had been music and the sound of children. Now there was nothing.

  "All ashore that's coming ashore," said Dennis.

  She turned and saw him helping the children down. They soaked their shoes and trousers in a foot of w
ater that had once been dry land. She wondered if it was safe for them to be doing this, whether it made more sense for her and the kids to stay on the boat while Dennis went looking for weapons. She didn't much like the idea of Ben and Cora handling guns but what other choice did they have? They needed more than just guns if they were going to keep going.

  Dennis helped her down and she winced as the cold water climbed up her trousers. The children were already standing at the top in front of another coffee shop. She let Dennis take her hand and lead her up the wet steps.

  The automatic doors were stuck on open. The floor was slippery with about an inch of water running down into House of Frasier and to the escalators. Which weren't working. Hannah reached for Cora's hand - she knew that Ben wouldn't let her take his - as they passed the cash machines which might as well have been spitting out fifties for all the good they could do them now.

  At the top of the stairs they passed Thornton's which was one of the few shops to have its shutters pulled down. She would have liked to take some chocolate with them but supposed it was all beginning to rot now.

  The floor was dry at the top and their shoes squeaked as they walked. The lights were off but there was a dirty glass ceiling that let in enough light for them to see by. They walked slowly around the corner and then out the other side, across the bridge and up to John Lewis.

  She and Dennis had been discussing the plan for the last three days. She knew exactly what they were there to do. But she hadn't accounted for an increasing desire to look around the shops she used to buy clothes from and maybe pick herself up a nice outfit. She thought it would make her feel better. She kept quiet and followed Dennis through the narrow passageway and onto the high street.

  This was where the damage had been done. The air still smelled faintly of smoke. The brick ground was carpeted in glass from the windows that had been broken, overturned army vehicles lay in ruin. An old book shop must have been hit with a bomb or something, the buildings on either side of it leaned towards each other like drunks at a party. Hannah hadn't realised how much she would have liked to take away a few books but all that was left were charred pages and empty covers laying in the rubble.