Part One is Here

Bayleigh – Thursday: Plague Day

Someone was screaming. The sound was horrible, like the person’s throat was raw and all that came out was this animal howl. Something grabbed her shoulders and she shook it off and spun around and before she knew what she was doing he fist connected with Layla’s jaw.

Layla went flying, smacking off the wall of the alleyway and onto the floor. The screaming cut off and she put her hand to her throat, realising where the noise was coming from.

‘God, I’m so sorry, I’m so—’

‘It’s fine, it’s fine, just…’

Layla held her arms out and Bayleigh fell on her knees and they held one another until the tears came, like the shower after a hard day at work. Only they washed nothing away. But it felt better than the blankness that had got its claws in her before Layla grabbed her.

She pulled away and turned around. She didn’t want to look but she had to. She had to check. He was still there. His hands, so warm and loving, looked like something from a comic book, twisted and curled up and grotesque. She heaved and put her hand over her mouth. Vomit trickled from either side and she put her head down and let it come out.

Layla rubbed her back, murmuring something about it getting better. Bayleigh began to laugh. It started quiet but escalated until she couldn’t control it and she was scared of herself but couldn’t do anything about it. She was trying to say something though the gasps but she couldn’t form words.

Layla backed away and crouched against the wall. Her forehead was creased and she looked like a deer about to bolt. Bayleigh pushed her nails into her palms and stared at Ali’s body until the laughter stopped as abruptly as it had started.

‘It’s already got better. Hasn’t it? Wasn’t that what happened last week, with the flower seller? It got better, it all got better…’

She was crying again and she felt rather than saw Layla come back over and stand above her. When she looked up into her eyes, she saw something that surprised her. They were hard. Not bad-hard, just, resigned. Layla reached out a hand and pulled her up. Bayleigh rubbed the palms of her hands over her eyes and took a deep breath. They peeked out of the alleyway again.

The street was littered with bodies in all directions. People had fallen as they ran and were stretched out in all sorts of weird poses. Bayleigh’s gorge rose again and she took a deep breath. She looked sideways at Layla. He friend was staring at the bodies like they weren’t even there and she wondered if the hardness wasn’t something else.

They tiptoed out into the street as though at any moment something or someone was going to explode from somewhere. But the chaos of earlier had ended abruptly and now the silence was almost as unnerving. The city was dead. Why weren’t they?

‘Why are we here?’

‘Because we ran?’

Bayleigh sniffed. ‘No, I mean, why aren’t we, you know?’

‘Dead?’

‘Yeah?’

Layla shrugged and picked her way between the bodies toward the shop opposite. She flung her next words back over her shoulder. ‘I dunno, but I’ve wanted that jacket for ages and I don’t think anyone’s gonna mind if I borrow it.’

There was a boutique clothes shop on the far side of the road and Bayleigh watched open-mouthed as Layla wandered in and walked into the window display. She pulled the jacket off the model, checked the label and put it on. Happy with the fit, she strolled back out into the street.

‘Layla, that’s stealing.’

‘From who? Everyone’s dead in case you hadn’t noticed.’

‘I…’ She was struck dumb for all of two seconds then stepped forward and grabbed Layla by hew new lapels. Her words came out in a hiss she recognised no more than her screaming from earlier. ‘In case you hadn’t noticed, my boyfriend’s lying on the floor over there. It’s still stealing. And when did you start stealing?’

Layla frowned, looking at her feet. Her voice was small. ‘What’s happening?’

Bayleigh took a deep breath. ‘I don’t know. But we need to stay who we are and not start acting like lunatics.’

‘Hey, it’s just a jacket.’

‘It doesn’t make any difference.’

‘Jeez, who died and made you the law?’

‘Everyone, actually.’

Her voice had changed again and become hard-edged and blunt. Layla’s eyebrows rose from their frown and she stared at her boss. Some of the hardness went and what lay behind it reflected what Bayleigh thought might be waiting in her own mind. It wasn’t just a reluctance to accept but a willingness to choose a different reality to escape this one.

She shook her head. ‘We’re together and we’re still alive, so whatever’s coming, we can handle it, right?’

The edge was replaced by shaking, but she sounded convincing to her own ears and Layla nodded, playing with her fingers. ‘Can I keep the jacket though?’

Bayleigh barked a close approximation of a laugh and crossed to peer into the shop window. ‘Don’t think anyone’s going to mind.’

She looked around. It was the stillness more than anything. When she was the only one moving it felt like everyone was looking at her, even though they lay face down for the most part. But when she stood still, the city might as well be empty. There were no pigeons and the wind was almost non-existent. Only a pennant hanging from one of the posh shops further down the street stirred occasionally.

She longed to shout and scream to fill the silence, but she could still picture the soldiers perfectly. She didn’t want them to know she and Layla were still alive. What had they done? Why had they done this? Who were they? And why the hell were the two of them still alive when everyone else wasn’t?

Layla gasped and Bayleigh watched her stand on tiptoes and wiggle like she was dancing.

‘What is it?’

Layla turned to her, face pale and Bayleigh felt her blood run cold. She tried to run to her friend but there were too many bodies and she stumbled on them. She caught herself before she fell and made it to Layla’s side. ‘What is it?’

Layla pointed at a spot where the road ran down into a deep gutter. ‘Rat.’

‘What?’

‘Rat. There was a rat, a big one.’

Bayleigh’s laughter was fuller this time and carried some genuine humour. ‘You’re really worried about a rat?’

‘It was chewing on his arm.’

Bayleigh swallowed the saliva that filled her mouth and crouched beside the body. His face was twisted in a grimace as though he’d hurt himself falling to the floor. Perhaps he had. Perhaps he wasn’t actually dead but trapped in some horrible stasis where he could feel everything but not move.

Her fingers shook as she pressed them against his wrist. There was nothing there; no pulse, no warmth, nothing. He was dead and the corner of his trousers bore little ratty teeth marks. On second inspection they weren’t that small. She pulled his trouser leg up and looked at skin beneath. There were marks, red indents, but the rat had stopped the moment it broke the skin. Presumably, Layla scared it away.

She had an image of a mountain of rats feeding on the corpses and turned to her friend. Layla had gone from pale to white and had one hand outstretched, pointing, shaking. Bayleigh followed the finger and her heart slammed in her chest like a hammer, ferocious and exhausting.

Someone was sitting up. In the centre of the street, one of the dead people was sitting straight up. She couldn’t see her face, but she was stiff and her head moved slowly as though she was trying to loosen it. Bayleigh wanted to go over and check she was alright. Another person, a little further down the street did the same and the chill thawed a little.

The smoke was obviously temporary. It didn’t explain why it had happened, but it did mean Ali would wake up. She drew nearer to the woman and stopped with distance still between them. There was something about the way she moved her head, something a bit Exorcisty, that made her skin crawl.

From the front, she got a better view of the woman’s face, but her long dark hair still covered too much to be sure. Then the woman flicked her head from side to side. It was a normal gesture, but it looked affected and strange and was even creepier than the original movement. It exposed her face and Bayleigh screamed.

Her skin was the colour of pale concrete and her eyes were red and sunken. Veins sprang like tributaries all over her face and as her mouth opened, she saw teeth that belonged to a ninety year old who’d never brushed. The woman fixed her eyes on Bayleigh and a sound somewhere between a growl and sandpaper against a metal wall emerged. Then she lurched to her feet and came at her.

Next Installment Thursday 11th September

A slightly different cover image this week. It’s far creepier, but I’m not sure whether I like it. Please leave a comment and let me know what you think.

Part One is Here

David – Thursday: Plague Day

The song came to an end and he noticed that the sounds outside had changed. The sirens were making weird noises like they were being sick and there was screaming too. He pressed pause and glanced over his shoulder.

His eyes widened as he saw the approaching hordes. People running toward him, hands in the air, mouths open wide and screaming. What was happening? The beginnings of curiosity stirred in his gut but they were drowned out by the need for peace and quiet.

He got off his bench and braced himself. The crowd surged past him so he was assailed by smells and sounds, all too close and too strong. Someone caught his arm and spun him round and straight into the path of someone else. She slammed into him and they hit the ground together. His elbows bashed against concrete and he howled in pain.

The woman screamed something at him but went before he could respond. All he could see were legs and feet flying past. All heading the same direction. The wrong direction. He got onto his hands and knees and began to crawl.

He caught a foot in the head and spent a minute or two curled up with his hands over it. Then he got up and went on. The crowd were thinning and the way was clear enough for him to get to his feet. He dashed the last part and got back under his arch. He sat against the wall, knees pulled up to his chest and stared out at the world.

He found some other music, Coldplay this time, and the man was singing something about London. The tune brushed his heart and made him shiver and shudder until he couldn’t stop shaking. The people were gone now. He could see them further down the river, still running and screaming.

Nearer, though, were the ones who hadn’t made it. Some had been trampled, faces smashed against the concrete. But some of them were just frozen, arms locked solid and hands curled into claws. He couldn’t see anything wrong with them, but they weren’t moving. He closed his eyes.

If he imagined hard enough, he could blank out the bodies. It wasn’t completely silent, but it was close enough. He was home.

Something rumbled overhead and he jumped and scrambled out from under the bridge. A train bashed and clattered past and he watched it head over the river and further out of sight. His eyes strayed to a lone figure on the edge of the foot bridge. He could see the shapes of bodies up there, but this one was standing.

It was frozen, no doubt of that, but somehow it had balanced and now stood lone sentry over the river. His eyes were drawn back to the railway tracks. Something flashed in the distance and the sound reached him, a low roar that grew and then faded. There were flames and smoke.

He turned up his ipod and stomped to Embankment station. It was empty save a man in the ticket booth leaning against the glass front, eyes still open and staring. David watched him for a while, waiting. The man didn’t move. David waved his hand before his eyes but still nothing.

He shrugged and strolled on, up the street to The Strand. There were more bodies up here and it reminded him of the movie Saving Private Ryan, when the beach was littered with dead soldiers. This had that same smokey, unreal thing going on. That was the first time he realised how foggy it was.

It clung to the ground like an early morning smog, dark and curling around his legs. It hadn’t been down at the river, but up here it was hard to escape. He had the strongest urge to jump up and down and try to get away from it, but there was nowhere to go. He dashed into the nearest shop and slammed the door.

There were bodies in here as well, people lying prone over their baskets and bags. A serving girl was slumped at the counter, her face in an open till. David carefully pulled her back and then laid her flat on the floor. She was cold and stiff. He bit his lip, but he neither dropped her on the floor nor ran screaming from the shop, so that was something.

He heard a sound and realised it was himself, muttering and giggling. The music was joyous and epic and he yanked his head phones out and tossed them across the store. Then he swore and raced after them, shoving them back into his pockets. He was hungry.

He left the shop and walked to Marks and Spencers. In the food court he cleared a space in the corner, pushing the bodies far enough that he could eat without having to look at them. Then he gorged himself, eating as much of everything as he could. He’d done the same when the place was empty, but it felt naughtier this time. He kept glancing around for the person who would come in and drag him away.

Stomach bloated and burping, he staggered back onto the Strand and ambled toward Trafalgar Square. He didn’t know where he was going, only that he wasn’t stiff and dead on the floor and didn’t know why. Perhaps it was because he’d been in the other city, the empty city, when it had all happened.

Trafalgar Square was filled with bodies. They weren’t all the horrible stiff corpses. The panic he’d seen earlier had happened here as well and there were people covered in blood, sprawled where they had been trampled to death. They were somehow so much worse than the others. It was like… what was it like? He didn’t know. He had known, just then, but it was gone now.

His eyes saw movement on Whitehall and he ran across the street to the corner. As he got there he saw a flash of dark uniform and stopped in his tracks. A million things were running through his brain, but the main one repeated over and over. Someone had done this. This whole thing wasn’t an accident. Someone had done it.

He backed away until he felt something approaching safe and crouched in a doorway. Then he stuck his head out until he could see what was happening. There were four trucks in the street, moving slowly away from him. They were travelling slow enough for soldiers to walk alongside. He wasn’t sure they were soldiers though. They had no marking, no… what was the word?

They wore grey and carried guns and were about the most terrifying thing he’d ever seen. He was sure of nothing anymore, but he was close to certain that if they saw him, his life was over. He almost stepped out and waved at them. Almost.

But they were here and alive. He looked behind him at the bodies and bile filled the back of his mouth. They were all dead.

They were all dead.

They were all dead.

They were all dead.

They were all dead.

Dammit. He slammed the palm of his hand against his temple and bit down hard on his tongue. He was alone again and he wanted peace but not this much, not like this. He took a step out from hiding. Then the soldier nearest him stopped. He was staring at something on the side of the road. Without any further warning, the gun slipped off his shoulder and he opened fire. He kept it up for a few seconds before stopping and shouldering the weapon.

The scariest thing was that not one of the other soldiers even registered the gun fire. They just kept right on walking. David slipped backwards and crept into Trafalgar square. He reached Nelson’s column and looked back down Whitehall. He could still see the trucks as they neared the end of the road.

One in the middle was different from the others and smoke poured from it into the sky. But the smoke didn’t rise into the blue. Instead it sunk, like it was heavy, until it pooled around the base of the trucks and moved like water as the soldiers waded through it.

David crouched closer to the column and watched until he could no longer see them. Then he turned and ran and didn’t stop till he was halfway through Soho.

Next Installment Monday 8th September

Part One is Here

Luke – Thursday: 7 Days to Plague Day

Alex pulled at the ropes and growled again. It was interesting, seeing a smart man like him reduced so quickly to someone so feral. Perhaps he still knew something he hadn’t owned up to, some secret that Luke needed to know.

The decision had been swift and simple. This stupid man had sold his discovery to the government and signed a secrecy order so he couldn’t tell anyone. Anyone except Luke of course. However, he’d still been unwilling to speak, so Luke had been forced to kidnap him, bring him to this empty warehouse and tie him up. It was purely for research purposes of course, solely in pursuit of the truth.

He’d kept it simple so far. He’d bought some cigarettes and applied them to some out-the-way places. Now he was trying water torture, pouring buckets of water over his head in quick succession. It would be far more effective with a hose pipe, but it was better than nothing.

Alex shook his head, scattering water across the floor.

‘I can’t tell you. They’ll kill me.’

‘They probably will. But they’ll do it humanely. I’ve been watching men kill one another for thousands of years, so trust me, I’ve got some great ideas of my own.’

He paced back and forth in front of Alex. ‘All I need to know is what you gave them and where they took it an—’

‘I don’t know. I don’t bloody know. My girlfriend will have called the police by now. I’m having a baby. You told me to have a baby, how can you do this?’

His growl became a sob and his head rocked forward onto his chest. Luke knelt before him, grabbed his hair and pulled his head up. ‘I didn’t tell you to have a child. I showed you the future and you ignored it.’

‘I didn’t ignore it. I’m having a child to stop it.’

‘Only you’ve just sold your future and that of every other person on this planet and your baby won’t be born for another seven months. Except it won’t be born at all, because your girlfriend’s going to be dead long before that ever happens.’

‘But you said he’d stop it.’

Luke shoved his head back and stormed away across the huge open space. He ground his teeth together. He couldn’t argue with that. He had said the child would stop it, because that’s what his list said. Only somehow the fates had changed. And he knew exactly who to blame for that.

The Father.

It wasn’t just a set up in the list and subjects. This wasn’t just a ruse to get him out of the Flights. It was about screwing him up as much as possible and killing the human race along with it. But why? What did the Father have to gain by killing his people?

Unless this part wasn’t the Father. Unless someone had been watching it all and found a way to tweak things just enough. Or maybe it was all a coincidence. Maybe someone was messing with Alex and had no idea Luke would be here at all. If that was the case, he might have an advantage. He stomped back to the scientist.

‘What about a cure? You don’t have to say anything, but how quickly could you make a cure?’

Alex looked up at him, eyes sharper now. ‘I don’t know. I could make one, but it could take a while. I need to get back to my lab.’

Luke hissed and turned away. He needed to get it back from the government. It didn’t matter how quickly he made a cure, they could kill thousands of people before they even realised what was happening.

Why did he care so much? He’d have cared before he came here, but everything had changed the moment he became human. He hadn’t felt this way for hundreds of years and it felt good. But there was something gnawing at him, chewing away inside. A cancer that made him want to make this work and want to save humanity. And he didn’t know what it was or where it came from.

If he could ignore it, he could stop worrying. But the world would be awfully boring without anyone in it. And he had no idea how it would affect him. Perhaps this whole thing was about making him human then putting him here to die. Was this the Father’s way of finally getting rid of him without being blamed? He stopped short in his pacing, goosebumps running up his arms.

Could he die? He was mortal now, in a way. What would happen if this body died? Would he return to the Flights or was this it? He hadn’t entertained the notion for even a second but why should he? The Father had sent him here, body and all. There was nothing of him left above, so why would he return?

The cure was a dead end. He could be dead a hundred times over before it was created or useful. He spun around and went for Alex. His arm slammed into his chest and knocked him over. The chair and man slammed into the concrete and the air rushed from his body.

Luke crouched beside him and put his thumb against Alex’s eye. He pushed just hard enough for him to feel the pressure. ‘Tell me or I put your eye out. Time’s up and my patience is gone.’

Alex squirmed and whimpered, shaking his head from side to side, but getting nowhere. Luke pushed harder. He had a second when he thought he was going to have to go through with his threat and shuddered at the thought of having eyeball all over his finger with nothing to wipe it on. Then Alex coughed up.

‘Okay, okay, I’ll tell you. God, who are you? It was the M.O.D. They came in these trucks, two big armoured trucks in brown and green with these soldiers with gas masks and guns. Real guns in bloody England. They took the formula and my test vial.’

‘So you don’t know how to make it now?’

‘They didn’t take my board. That has the new equation.’

Luke grunted. ‘What were you doing, leaving that sort of equation on a board?’

‘It wasn’t me. Well, it was, but not that one. That one just appeared. I think I did it in my sleep or something, or had some kind of blackout.’

Luke chuckled quietly and took his hand off Alex’s eye. ‘It wasn’t you. You aren’t that smart, not yet. Someone’s been screwing with me and using you to do it. Where did they take it?’

Alex looked at him with his chin jutting out as though he didn’t want to accept the truth about his amazing discovery. Luke brought his thumb back and Alex shook his head, whimpering. ‘I don’t know. They said something about Yorkshire, some place up there.’

Luke sat back on his haunches, groaning. Not only could he die but he had to go to the back of sodding beyond to deal with a bunch of hicks and peasants. Someone was laughing. And the more he thought about it, the more convinced he was that it wasn’t the Father. He didn’t have the imagination for this. And as much of a bastard as he was, he wouldn’t kill the entire human race just to get rid of him.

But someone else would. The question was who. The answer wouldn’t matter though, if he didn’t get hold of the damned plague and hide it somewhere no one was ever going to find it. Perhaps he could combine the two things. He needed to speak to Az, which meant a summoning.

Plague first, then summoning. One thing at a time. Speaking of which…

‘You’re coming with me.’

The man groaned and closed his eyes and Luke patted his cheek. ‘You’ll be fine. It’ll be fun.’

Two hours later they left Alex’s room and headed for Paddington.

 Next Installment Thursday 4th September

Part One is Here

Krystal – Thursday: Plague Day

She was oddly warm. And she could smell something that wasn’t her. She woke and stared at the blackness, trying to work out what she was looking at. It was only when he stirred and his hair stirred with him that she realised it was Ed’s head. Her arm was wrapped around his waist and she could feel his body pressed against hers.

Her breathing quickened and she couldn’t decide why. They’d fallen asleep on different bunks, so nothing funny happened. Had she climbed in with him or vice versa? She was pretty confident he’d made the move and if she could just start breathing again, it probably wouldn’t be that bad, or that big a deal. They’d spent every second of the last two weeks together.

It was part of the deal. He didn’t kill his rapist and they hung out. And actually, it wasn’t as bad as she’d expected. Once he was over the whole ‘I want to die, I want my mummy’ thing, he became surprisingly good company. And having someone to talk to was better than she’d expected.

He smelled pretty good, now that he was washing. There was something faintly Indian about his scent but maybe that was just from the tint of his skin. His eyes reminded her of an Indian girl she’d gone to school with, big and brown and soulful. He had long lashes that guarded his thoughts and distracted her just as she was asking the important questions.

Not that there were any important questions. The big ones were ‘how are we going to eat’ and ‘where are we going to sleep?’ Beyond that it was all details. But now they were lying in the same bed and her boobs were crushed against his back and her nose was tickled by his long dark hair and she was far more comfortable than she should be. Or wanted to be. This was dangerous.

She extricated herself and climbed over him, thankful for once he was a deep sleeper. They were on the bottom bunk and she felt a strange flush of relief that he had climbed in with her. It was easier to push away when she’d not done anything. She sneaked into the kitchen and put the kettle on. Krystal amused herself by making a list of the things they’d do today.

Quick trip to Harrods for some ice cream

Open-top bus back into the centre and then a ferry ride down the Thames.

Jump off at the London Eye and take a trip on that.

Into the Royal Festival Hall to see what was on.

She got bored pretty quick. There was too much to do. She was like one of those people who moved to London because of all the things they could do but never actually did them. They just replaced their home town local with the nearest one to them and went into Richmond or Ealing or Shoreditch once a year to remind themselves where they lived.

Maybe that came at the end of the list. Pub crawl down the river, grab a meal along the way. She sneered and poured herself a tea. She’d be happy with some money in her hat and another cup of tea before bed.

They were out before most, wandering in silence down Embankment. Ed had been blushy and mumbling when he came into the kitchen, but she’d laughed it off and warned him not to get any ideas. She hadn’t mentioned that she’d had some of her own and they felt like pretty good ones.

Now they seemed to have run out of things to say. She could vaguely remember talking to friends about TV shows and music and books and all sorts. Now there was nothing. They could compare detailed notes on the others in the hostel, guessing why they were there, but they’d already done that to death.

They contented themselves with finding a bench and commenting on the passers-by, creating stories for them. Ed was quick and funny and his stories were invariably better than hers. His was always more optimistic as well, at least at first. His men were going to find the woman of their dreams and marry them. Her men were angry and bitter and off to rob a bank or throw themselves from the top of The Shard.

That was when the idea got her and she couldn’t shake it off.

‘Let’s go to Canary Wharf.’

‘What?’

‘Let’s go to Canary Wharf. Let’s go there now and get in a lift and go to the top and look out over London. I want to go to the Shard, but they’ll never let us in. But the Wharf’s got a cafe and stuff at the top. And neither of us smell bad and you actually look pretty good—’

‘Thanks.’ He blushed.

‘Not like that. I mean, you don’t look totally homeless.’

‘Oh, yeah.’ His blush became a frown. ‘Why?’

‘Why? Because the sun’s out and I woke up next to you and didn’t slit your throat on reflex. I think my counsellor would have called that growth or something. Whatever, it’s reason to celebrate.’

He blushed again and examined the tips of his shoes until she nudged him with an elbow in the ribs. ‘C’mon.’

He shrugged and let her pull him off the bench. They stomped along the Thames, listening as the city woke, shook itself and came to life. The city changed as they walked. They reached the Tower of London and the Bridge and tried to imagine being locked up in the dungeons. Ed muttered something about the two of them being in close quarters not sounding that bad and she asked him what he thought he’d do if they were.

That led to more blushing and scuffing his feet which made her laugh. Laughing wasn’t something she remembered all that well. She’d certainly forgotten how good it felt. They moved on through Shadwell and the city got grubbier. She rarely came out this way, too much competition and no one she knew, no where she felt safe.

Then it suddenly got new again and the pavements and tattered buildings were replaced with glass and elevated roads and lots of bored people in suits. There were docks as well, water stolen from the Thames and hemmed in for the sake of people with too much money. She stopped herself spitting and made an effort to stand up straight and look deliberate. It was odd, trying to hide her homelessness. She hadn’t bothered in a long time, not since her pride about that sort of thing slunk off with her first night outside.

Canary Wharf loomed high above them, surrounded by confusing roadways, but they made it to the front door. She grabbed his hand on impulse and they made it to the lift and up to the cafe. She had cash, enough to buy a cup of tea, so they shared it and stared out over the city.

Dad brought her here, way back when. Not the Wharf, but the city. It was why she’d headed here instead of Reading or one of the other places closer to her home. She’d always dreamed about London and what she’d do when she grew up. Then Dad stopped wanting to just hold her hand and mum had gone away with the fairies and she’d stopped having dreams.

She shook her head and refocused her eyes on the steam rising from the cup. Ed watched her.

‘What?’

‘You looked thoughtful for a minute. I mean, more than usual.’

‘Is that a compliment or an insult?’

‘Um, don’t know. What were you thinking about?’

She sniffed and glanced around. The cafe was quiet on a Thursday morning and no one was staring at them. It made a pleasant change.

‘Thinking ‘bout what London used to mean. I used to dream of coming here and making my fortune.’

Ed grinned. ‘Didn’t we all? This was, like, my Mecca—’

‘Your bingo hall?’

He burst out laughing. ‘Mecca’s like another name for a holy place. The bingo people stole it.’

‘Oh yeah, of course.’ Her face heated up. She’d known that. Ed seemed oblivious to her squirming.

‘I mean, I was gonna come here and study art and become this famous artist and stuff. Now I’m…’

He looked out the window and she noticed how his hands gripped his knees. His fingers were thin and she’d thought of them as bony and spider-like. But now she wondered whether they weren’t artist’s fingers. She reached over the table and squeezed his arm.

‘Now you’re my friend. And hey, we made it.’

She swept her arm wide to encompass the whole city, spread out below a crisply blue sky. He managed a laugh. ‘Yeah we did. How long do you think we can stay here?’

‘You got money for another tea?’

He shoved his hands in his pockets and she watched his forehead crease. Finally he shrugged and hauled his cash out of his pocket. As he laid it out on the table, she flushed. He’d learned quick about keeping your money to yourself. Showing it to her was a big deal. They counted it and without knowing why, she pulled hers out and added it to the pile until she no longer knew whose was whose.

They had enough between them for a couple of cups of tea and maybe even a sandwich at lunch. The sun was shining in from the far side of the tower and they were warm and had somewhere to sit. They settled in, naming landmarks and sharing more stories about what they had planned to do. Always what they had planned, never what was actually happening.

It was close to lunchtime when Ed spotted the police cars. It was like a procession and they both searched for the black car that meant visiting dignitaries, or maybe the queen. Then they realised the cars were going way too fast for that. Ambulances came too, from three different parts of the city, snaking their way in from the main hospitals.

It was like a map with all the police cars acting as arrows, pointing toward a central point, Big Ben. She’d heard somewhere that the tower wasn’t actually called Big Ben. That was the name of the bell inside it, but the tower was called the Elizabeth tower. Whatever it was called, something was happening there.

Smoke rose from between the buildings, thick and sticky and she grabbed Ed’s arm. ‘There’s been a bomb. Has to have been, what else?’

‘We didn’t hear anything though.’

‘We’re bloody miles away, why would we?’

He rocked his head from side to side. ‘Don’t know. I’m sure we would though. D—’

He cut off as they both gasped. One of the police cars, visible for a moment as it sped along the river, careened off to the side, struck the barrier and flipped over into the Thames. It landed with an almighty splash, sending murky water up onto Embankment. Someone else looking out the window saw it as well and Krystal shared a wide-eyed look with them.

When she turned back, she shivered and wrapped her arms around herself. The next police car had also swerved, but gone the other way and disappeared from sight. The cars behind kept going but it was clear the drivers had lost control. They slammed into parked cars and buildings, bounced off street lamps and rolled into the garden behind Cleopatra’s needle. She watched, hands covering her mouth as someone on the pavement was tossed across the road, limp and unresisting as one of the cars took them out.

The people were tiny dots, but she could imagine the screams as they scattered. Many of them were just throwing themselves to the ground, lying still in the hope they wouldn’t get hit. In fact, everyone was doing that. The streets were covered in prone figures, spreadeagled and still.

They heard nothing. It was like watching TV with the sound off, some horrible disaster movie filming before their eyes. She looked elsewhere and saw the same thing. A row of ambulances got halfway across Westminster bridge before losing control. The first two went straight into the river, taking pedestrians with them. The others piled into other traffic until the entire bridge was consumed with burning cars.

She turned away and stared across the restaurant. If she looked out the other window, the world would be normal and there’d be nothing wrong. She shook her head and bit her lip. The world had ceased being normal three years ago. Looking out a different window would do nothing to change that.

Ed was still watching, vein in his temple pulsing. His eyes were wet and she shook her head. He was so young. He wasn’t that much younger than her, but he’d been on the streets all of six months and she thought he maybe still dreamed of being rescued. She put her hand on his shoulder and his eyes met hers. They were wide and tear-filled and disbelieving.

Back in the centre of town, she saw something far worse. All the cars were doing the same thing. They weren’t moving as fast as the police so mostly they just slammed into walls or lamp posts, but within a few minutes there wasn’t a single vehicle moving all the way from the Houses of Parliament to Waterloo Bridge.

Next Installment Monday 1st September