Dog Blood Part 7

"Are there any adults here?"

The big kid sitting on the desk finally looks up. "There was."

"But not now?"

He shakes his head.

"So what happened to them?" Paul asks.

"They went."

"You didn't go?"

"No point."

"What about the war? The fighting?"

"What war?"

His answer surprises me. I take a step forward and accidentally kick an outstretched leg, which is immediately pulled back out of sight. I crouch down and see a small girl curled up under a desk on a bed of soiled cus.h.i.+ons and pillows. She doesn't react, but she watches me. She remains perfectly still, her eyes following my every move. These children, I think to myself, must have a strangely blinkered view of what's left of the world. Like all kids, they're only interested in themselves. I know they'd kill any Unchanged stupid enough to get too close, but do they feel the same compulsion to go outside and hunt them down as the rest of us do? As long as they're warm and relatively comfortable and they've got a decent supply of food, what more could they want? They're nesting here.

"I'm going to check the rest of the place out," I tell Paul, eager to keep looking for Ellis. I leave the cla.s.sroom and work my way back toward the main entrance, checking the other rooms as I pa.s.s them. They're all empty.

"There's no one else here," a quiet voice says when I reach the top of the stairs. I turn around quickly, but I can't see anyone. A little girl cautiously steps out of the shadows and looks up at me with huge, saucer-shaped eyes. I try to estimate her age, but it's difficult. She appears completely innocent but at the same time strangely switched-on and knowing. She's a pitiful sight-desperately thin, pale white skin, dirty and bedraggled with long, knotted hair. She's wearing pajamas and has bare, muddy feet. Her clothing is bloodstained, and instinctively I'm about to ask her if she's hurt herself. But then I realize the blood is more than likely from someone else, someone she more than likely killed. I don't know what I'm supposed to say. We both stand there awkwardly, staring at each other in silence, until something I see just over her shoulder catches my eye. It's a line of metal coat hooks, hung on a long wooden rail about a yard and a half off the ground. The name on the peg directly behind her is Edward McCoyne. The girl suddenly becomes invisible as I reach out and lift a small cloth bag off my son's peg.

"That's just old stuff," she says. "My bag's down there. Want to see it?"

"No, it's okay..."

I open the bag and take out Edward's soccer s.h.i.+rt. His name's on the label inside the collar, written in pen in Lizzie's handwriting. I remember when we bought this for him. Christ, he nagged at us for months to get it because all the other kids had one like it. The team changed part of their uniform a couple of weeks later and the little s.h.i.+t stopped wearing it, complaining that he didn't have the right one anymore and ... and what the h.e.l.l am I doing? Got to stop thinking like this and get a grip. That life is gone now.

The girl brushes past me and leans against the a.s.sembly hall door.

"What's in there?" I ask, glad of the distraction.

"More stuff," she answers nonchalantly, shrugging her shoulders. She pushes the door open, and I follow her inside. I stop immediately, rooted to the spot. The entire floor of the large, rectangular school hall is covered with bodies. Some of them are piled up, almost as if they're being stored here. There are b.l.o.o.d.y handprints on the walls, some of them too big to have been made by kids. The girl tiptoes through the carnage without a care and disappears out through a gaping hole in the outside wall where a fire exit used to be. I follow at a distance, stepping over dismembered cadavers and swatting away buzzing flies. I'm distracted by an Unchanged woman's half-naked corpse at my feet, only a few days dead. She's facedown with her arms stretched out and fingers clawing the ground as if she died trying to get away. There are chunks missing out of the back of her naked thighs. Are those bite marks?

The overpowering stench in here is unbearable, and it's making me gag. I follow the girl outside, desperate to get some fresher air. I find her at the edge of a murky, weed-filled pool. I don't know whether it's a deliberately dug pond or the crater left by a small explosion or other impact. Whatever, she's lying on her belly in the mud, thirstily lapping up the dirty green water.

It's a struggle to get the children rounded up and into the van. There were eight of them, but three managed to get away. Generally it's the older kids who understand what we're trying to do and why we want them to leave here. The promise of fighting and food is enough to persuade them to go.

"Good result," Keith says. "Job done. We'll get this bunch back to the others. Preston can't complain about a catch like this."

I knew that was coming. For the last half hour they've been making noises about getting back to the people we left at the slaughterhouse. As far as they're concerned, it's mission accomplished. I know I should go with them, but I can't. Ellis is still out there somewhere ...

"I'm not going."

"You soft b.a.s.t.a.r.d," Carol snaps angrily. "Don't be so G.o.dd.a.m.n stupid."

"We've got a van full of kids," Keith argues.

"Yes, but we haven't got my my kid." kid."

"We don't need your kid."

"I do."

"You don't. All you need is-"

"I'll find her and bring her back to the rest of you," I shout over my shoulder as I start to walk away. "I won't be far behind. Few hours at the most."

I can hear them arguing, but it makes no difference.

"McCoyne, wait," Paul shouts. I take a few more steps before, against my better judgment, stopping again and turning around. "He's right," I hear him say to Carol and Keith. "We've been told to find as many people to fight with us as we can, haven't we? It makes sense to split up. You deliver this bunch, we'll keep looking for more. Okay?"

Keith thinks for a minute and eventually nods his head. "Fair enough. Makes no difference to me."

I start walking again, my backpack on my back and my axe held ready in my hand.

"I'll go with him," I hear Paul say. "Julia told me to keep an eye on him."

I speed up, more determined than ever to find Ellis. Seeing the kids in the school has made me feel more confident that she's survived, but at what cost? What condition is she in? If I don't find her and look after her, will she end up like the children we've found here?

"Hold on," Paul shouts, but I just keep walking. I don't need him. I don't need any of them.

15.

IT SEEMS THAT EVERY couple of minutes, something I see catches me off guard. This time it's a gas station, an innocuous, desolate sh.e.l.l of a building that I normally wouldn't have given a second glance. I stop in the middle of the road and stare at it. Lights hang down from its high canopy. The tall and once brightly lit welcome sign lies on its side, blocking the way to the now lifeless fuel pumps. Metal grilles pointlessly protect long-since-smashed plate gla.s.s windows. Inside, the shelves and displays have been stripped of everything of value- couple of minutes, something I see catches me off guard. This time it's a gas station, an innocuous, desolate sh.e.l.l of a building that I normally wouldn't have given a second glance. I stop in the middle of the road and stare at it. Lights hang down from its high canopy. The tall and once brightly lit welcome sign lies on its side, blocking the way to the now lifeless fuel pumps. Metal grilles pointlessly protect long-since-smashed plate gla.s.s windows. Inside, the shelves and displays have been stripped of everything of value- "Problem?" Paul asks.

"Nothing," I lie. "Just thought I saw something."

I take a couple of steps closer, wis.h.i.+ng I were alone. There's nothing here, and he knows it. I just wanted to stop for a second and look and remember. It feels like five minutes, but it was probably about five months since I was last here. Lizzie took her dad to the hospital, and I was left with the kids. I took them to see a film. We drove halfway across town and used half a tank of gas to get to the cheapest theater. They argued about what they wanted to see. Ed and I wanted to watch one thing, Ellis wanted to watch something else. Edward and I won the argument. Josh slept through the film, and Ellis whined all the way through it. We stopped here on the way back home to fill up the car, and I bought Ellis some candy just to shut her up. Then that started the other two moaning ... If I half-close my eyes I can still see her in there. She took forever to choose her candy, dragging it out and trying to get as much out of me as she could.

It's the contrast that's taken me by surprise today. Everything was so trivial and unimportant back then. I walked into this shop with Ellis and I was just like any other dad, trying to pacify his whining kid. Now look at me. A killer. A soldier (apparently, although I don't feel like one). Virtually unrecognizable as the man Iused to be. Living from day to day and hour to hour ... and if the war's had this much of an effect on me, what might it have done to Ellis? I wonder what the little girl who, on that day five months ago, had nothing more important to worry about other than what candy bar she wanted, is doing now?

"Any time today would be fine," Paul moans. "Stop f.u.c.king daydreaming. It's dangerous out here, you know."

"I wasn't daydreaming."

"You were. For f.u.c.k's sake, get a grip."

"I'm fine," I say as I march past him.

"You were away with the G.o.dd.a.m.n fairies again. You need to clear your head, man. Get some focus."

This guy never gives up. He's like a dog with a bone.

"I am focused," I snap back at him.

"Focused on what? A f.u.c.king gas station? Face it, McCoyne, you're drifting. You don't even have a proper plan."

"Yes I do."

"What, walk halfway across an enemy-occupied city to get to a house where you think your kid might might have been? You're making it up as you go along, man. Just give up and move on. You've got to start putting the fight first and everything else second." have been? You're making it up as you go along, man. Just give up and move on. You've got to start putting the fight first and everything else second."

"If it's such a bad idea, why did you come with me?"

"Like I said, to find more volunteers. Besides, I wasn't crazy about being shut in the back of that van with a load of feral kids."

"Volunteers-is that what you're calling them now?"

"Well, what would you call them?"

"Conscripts ... lemmings..."

"So are you not bothered about this war anymore, then? Are you happy just to let the Unchanged carry on attacking us? You saw the gas chambers-you know what we're up against."

"Nothing's changed, Paul. I still want to kill just as much as you do."

"Start showing it, then. Listen, man," he sighs, "I'm just trying to help you out. I understand what you're going through."

"Understand! How the h.e.l.l can you understand? My five-year-old daughter is out there on her own somewhere!"

For the first time in an age he's quiet.

"Do you really think you're the only one who's had it hard?" he finally says, his voice suddenly full of tension and previously suppressed emotion. "Think you're the only one who's been dealt a s.h.i.+tty hand by all of this?"

"No, I-"

"Because I'll tell you, suns.h.i.+ne, you're not. We've all had it hard. What's happened has f.u.c.ked everything up for every last one of us, and all we're trying to do is put things straight."

"I'm not saying that I-"

"You've never once asked me about my family, have you? About what happened to me? What brought me here? And do you know why? I'll tell you, it's because you don't care, and you're right not to. It doesn't matter. It's not important, none of it is. What's done is done, and all that matters now is what we do from here on in."

"I understand that, but if I can find Ellis, then I..."

I stop speaking because he's stopped walking again. I carry on for a few more paces, then turn back to face him.

"It was a Wednesday night, about a quarter to ten, when it happened to me," he says. "It was all so d.a.m.n ordinary. I'd been watching soccer on TV. My girlfriend had just gone to bed, and I was on my own downstairs. I was just sitting there, staring at the walls, when everything clicked into place and started to make sense. It was like someone had switched a f.u.c.king light on, you know? Like I could suddenly see everything clearly for the first time in years."

"What are you talking about?"

"So I sat there for a while," he continues, ignoring me and wiping something away from the corner of his eye. "Then I went out to the garage and got myself a mallet and a saw, best things I could find. Then I went back inside, went upstairs, and killed Sharon. After I'd finished with her, I did the same to Dylan. He was awake in his crib when I went into his room. He was standing there, bouncing up and down on his mattress, grinning at me, but I did it just the same. I had to."

"I'm sorry," I mumble quietly, feeling like a total s.h.i.+t and not knowing what else to say. He shakes his head and walks on, trying unsuccessfully to hide his anger.

"Thing is, since I heard the things Preston's been saying, I can't help wondering what would've happened if I'd left him. Could I have made him like us?"

"Do you believe all that?"

"I don't know what I believe. All I know is that you've got no f.u.c.king right to question whether I understand what you're going through. You've got a kid who's probably still out there fighting somewhere, and these days that's as much as anyone can hope for. Now shut up, wise up, and get a f.u.c.king grip. Forget about her."

16.

WE WORK OUR WAY along the outermost edge of the Unchanged exclusion zone, either just inside or just outside the boundary depending on whose map you're looking at. It's been uncomfortably quiet out here, and we've seen only a handful of other fighters since splitting from the others back at the school. Here, though, things suddenly feel different. Paul and I make our way quickly through the ruins of a sprawling college campus, moving away from the collapsing, battle-damaged buildings, then climbing up a number of terraced soccer fields, stacked like hugely oversized steps. From the farthest edge of the uppermost playing field we're able to look out over a huge swathe of the exclusion zone. In the distance I can just about make out the area of town where Lizzie's sister lived, and I can see all the way across the wide stretch of no-man's-land to the heart of the enemy refugee camp, too. But it's what's directly below us that is of more immediate interest. We're overlooking what's left of St. James's Hospital, and it's crawling with activity. Our fighters are all over it like ants over forgotten food. along the outermost edge of the Unchanged exclusion zone, either just inside or just outside the boundary depending on whose map you're looking at. It's been uncomfortably quiet out here, and we've seen only a handful of other fighters since splitting from the others back at the school. Here, though, things suddenly feel different. Paul and I make our way quickly through the ruins of a sprawling college campus, moving away from the collapsing, battle-damaged buildings, then climbing up a number of terraced soccer fields, stacked like hugely oversized steps. From the farthest edge of the uppermost playing field we're able to look out over a huge swathe of the exclusion zone. In the distance I can just about make out the area of town where Lizzie's sister lived, and I can see all the way across the wide stretch of no-man's-land to the heart of the enemy refugee camp, too. But it's what's directly below us that is of more immediate interest. We're overlooking what's left of St. James's Hospital, and it's crawling with activity. Our fighters are all over it like ants over forgotten food.

"What do you reckon?"

Paul shrugs his shoulders. "Got to be a reason for them being here," he answers, and before I can speak again, he crawls through a hole in a section of chain-link fence and starts running down a steep, gra.s.sy slope toward the hospital.

I try to resist for a second and force myself to concentrate on finding Ellis, but then I think about the fact that there must be Unchanged close by, and the temptation becomes too strong to suppress. My mouth begins to water as I sprint down the hill after Paul, desperate to get down to the hospital and start killing. I hear gunfire as I start to run, a sure sign that the enemy is close. Suddenly all I can think about is satisfying my hunger and ending Unchanged lives.

The main hospital entrance has been partially demolished, the automatic doors stuck midway through opening, their metal frames buckled. As I catch up with Paul he's looking for a way around what's left of this part of the site. It sounds like most of the heavy fighting is concentrated around the parking lots and the other buildings at the far end of the complex.

"Cut straight through," I suggest as I squeeze through the gap in the doors. He follows me as we head down a long corridor that has somehow remained surprisingly white and clean and that even now still has the faintest tang of antiseptic in the air. The building feels vast and empty, and our footsteps echo as we run along the hard marble floor toward the battle. A huge, dark, zigzagging crack in one of the walls makes me question my decision to come this way momentarily, but it's too late now and it's worth the risk. We're nearing the fighting. We're closing in on the enemy.

I burst through a set of swinging double doors, then stop at a staircase. Instinct tells me to head down, but the way through is blocked by fallen rubble from a collapsed wall. Paul doesn't wait, deciding quickly to head up and work his way around whatever damage he finds up there. I follow him through more doors, then along another, much shorter corridor, which ends with a sharp right-hand turn. We instinctively slow down when we enter a ward filled with corpses. I start to wonder whether these well-decayed people were just abandoned and forgotten when the war began, but a closer look at their injuries quickly tells me that wasn't the case. A skeletal woman has been skewered with the metal support that once held her intravenous drip, the stained and tattered threads of her flapping nightgown still wrapped around her shoulders. Sitting on the floor to my left, the withered husk of an old man is slumped with his legs apart. There's a vertical scar in the middle of his badly discolored chest, running in almost a straight line down from just below the level of his sagging nipples. At the bottom of the scar, right where his navel would have been, the wound has been forced open and his innards pulled out. This guy's been disemboweled by someone with their bare hands. The ingenuity and brutality of whoever did this is breathtaking. These bodies are old, though. Why are people still fighting here today?

A huge hole in the ceiling and a corresponding hole in the floor farther down the ward force me to concentrate again. I follow Paul as he edges cautiously around the narrow ledge that remains around the dark chasm. I glance down and see a ma.s.s of rubble, beds, and bodies directly below, then look up. There are more holes in each floor above us all the way up to what's left of the roof.

At the end of the ward we reach another staircase. I look down through a large safety-gla.s.s window over a vast crowd of people battling outside. Our fighters are swarming around a collection of outbuildings right out on the farthest edge of the site. Standing separate from the main hospital campus, they look like they might have been storerooms or boiler rooms. There are enemy soldiers in every visible window and doorway and more on the roof, all of them now firing relentlessly and indiscriminately into the surging crowd. On the other side of the wrought-iron railings that surround the hospital grounds are their vehicles, ready for them to beat a hasty retreat if we get too close.

Paul's halfway down the stairs, but I stay standing at the window. Something's not right here.

"Come on!" he shouts.

"Wait..."

I watch as another surge comes from deep within the crowd of fighters. People are jostling for position, trying to get closer to the enemy, using each other as human s.h.i.+elds by default. A pair of Brutes almost get close enough to strike before they're driven back and brought down by another hail of bullets. Other fighters immediately clamor to take their places, trampling their fallen bodies. Apart from those few brave attempts, the enemy seems to be managing to keep the bulk of the crowd at bay.

"You f.u.c.king idiot!" Paul yells at me. "They'll all be dead by the time you get down there."

He disappears, but I don't move. On the face of it this looks like any one of a hundred battles I've witnessed or been a part of before, but there's a subtle difference, and alarm bells are ringing. I sprint after Paul to try to stop him.

"Paul," I yell, just managing to catch sight of the back of his head before he disappears out through an open door. "Wait!"