Part One is Here

Bayleigh – Thursday: Plague Day

It happened right outside. Of all the things she remembered from that day and all the dark ones that followed, the moment that it happened was stuck foremost in her memory. But seeing it happen to Layla was what woke her, for years afterward, from nightmares that remained when she opened her eyes.

Thursday morning and the early lunch time rush was in full swing. They were both worked off their feet, the easy back and forth of their morning conversation entirely absent. They’d been talking about dreams. Not the sleeping kind, but the things you looked forward to. She hadn’t talked about them to anyone, not for longer than she could remember.

It still felt like a betrayal of dad to even think about them, but she couldn’t help it. Every morning she woke up and set off for his room only to stop when she reached the landing and the open door. The room was empty, the bed no longer bearing bars and the corners bare of their rubber strips. And every morning she’d cry for a bit and go to breakfast with the biggest sense of confusion and a smile on her face.

But times like this were nice. This was why she’d opened the shop, for the easy banter over the counter and the methodical, caring making. Every sandwich was a miniature creation, put together with love and thought and every smile she received was payment that made it all worth while. She shook her head, handing over a mozzarella and tomato.

She thought too much. She always had. She needed to just enjoy herself, to relax and be in the moment. Layla nudged her in the back and nodded at the front door. Ali stood there, his flour-coated clothes absent. He strolled in, round the queue and to the end of the counter.

‘Morning.’

‘Hey, Ali.’ Layla’s bright, innuendo-ripe tones filled the shop and made Bayleigh wince.

‘Hi.’ She managed, blushing into a ploughmans with extra mayo. Ali gave her a grin and folded his arms, watching the coming and going like a local at a pub. He’d become a local now, appearing every day once his deliveries were done to chat and make his interest in her plain.

She loved it.

She handed over the ploughmans and glanced up. The queue was still out the door and she ran her eyes over the fresh stuff. They should have enough, but it always got close. It was the only way to turn a profit. She caught something out the corner of her eye and paused.

Two enormous trucks pulled up on the other side of the street, painted a uniform shade of slate grey and military-looking. They had stopped on the double yellows and were already causing chaos behind them. The back door of the rear one opened and a number of soldiers jumped out. She thought they were soldiers. They wore uniforms in the same dull colour of the trucks, but they had gas masks on and huge helmets covered in netting.

They were part-Vietnam war, part-Star Wars and they made her shiver. Goosebumps ran up and down her arms and her stomach turned over. Other people in the shop had noticed them as well and the entire queue turned to watch. She blinked and returned to her customer but his back was to her, staring with the rest.

She put her knife down and joined them, walking down the counter to peer out through the front window. Layla joined her.

‘What are they? Creep me out.’

‘Yeah, me too.’ Without knowing why, she slipped her hand into Layla’s. More soldiers poured from the other truck until twenty of them stood in a circle. Another truck pulled up, smaller and bearing a cylinder the size of a washing machine. The soldiers surrounded it, facing outward. They carried guns and it was that, more than anything, that made her take a step back away from the window.

A man dressed in white, with a shaved head and sunglasses above his gas mask, stepped from the smaller truck. He strode around to the side of it and pressed buttons set into the cylinder. The hissing sound was audible inside the shop and she watched as thick dark smoke jetted up into the London sky. The man turned away from the truck, putting his hands behind his back as he joined the ranks of soldiers.

Bayleigh’s mouth filled with bile. She didn’t understand what she was watching, but still her stomach rebelled and her instinct screamed at her to run. Layla gripped her arm so hard she pulled it away, hissing.

‘Sorry, Bay, what are they doing?’

‘I don’t know. I think we should leave.’

‘Where we going?’

Bayleigh turned away from the window. ‘Don’t know, just away.’ She froze as the first scream reached her. She turned back to the window, not wanting to but unable to resist. A man had fallen over and lay face down on the ground before the soldiers. His body was tense, his arms holding him up as though he’d got rigour-mortis. But he wasn’t dead. He couldn’t be dead.

She realised she’d picked up the knife again and dropped it. The clang as it bounced off the counter was loud in the shop and everyone jumped and turned. Then chaos erupted. Customers streamed into the street, shouting and shoving and in moments the place was empty save the two of them and Ali.

His face was pale, his usual confident grin very much absent. Bayleigh couldn’t take her eyes off the street. More people were dropping now. Some ran and just looked like they tripped. Others were standing and didn’t fall over immediately, just wobbled until someone else caught them. Then they went down like broken statues.

Every person who fell was rigid, hands curled up like claws and arms crooked as though they were pretending to be velociraptors. She saw one of her regulars approach the truck and start speaking to the man with his hands behind his back. One of the soldiers stepped out of line and smashed the butt of his gun into her customer’s face.

He dropped to one knee and she watched dumbfounded as blood streamed from his mouth onto the floor. It was almost scarier than the smoke billowing up; the casual violence with no cause and no comeback was so abrupt. What followed was just as shocking. The soldier drove his boot into the man’s throat and he fell to the floor, gripping his shattered windpipe as his life fled.

Bayleigh clapped a hand over her mouth. Finally, she was galvanised into action and headed out the back followed closely by the other two. The back door opened onto a dark alleyway empty of people. They ran out and headed to the end. The street was in pandemonium; tourists, office workers, students and everyone else running in all directions. She stopped short at the exit of the alley.

A Chinese man raced past, camera jiggling about in one hand. He stopped as he drew level with her and put his free hand to his throat. He coughed, once, and hit the pavement face down. She saw his hands curl, as though he got angry as he lay there. She knelt beside him and put her hand on his shoulder

She pulled it away, gasping at the heat. He was burning up and she took a step away, blowing on her hand. Ali came to stand beside her and nudged the body with his foot. It was stiff, moving as though he’d pushed a piece of wood. She looked up at him, but the sight of his pale face and flushed cheeks was too unnerving and she looked quickly away.

As her gaze wandered back across the street, she heard Ali cough. Her hands grabbed his as they turned to stare at one another. He coughed again and doubled over and she screamed as he dragged her to the floor. His hands curled within hers, the nails digging into her palms. Her knees struck the concrete and the scream cut off abruptly.

Then Ali fell face first to the concrete, hard and unyielding.

You may have noticed a new picture on this blog post. This is the current idea for the book cover when 13 Roses is released. What do you think? Do you like it? Would you change anything? Any comments would be greatly appreciated. Thanks 🙂

Next Installment Thursday 21st August

Part One is Here

David – Thursday: Plague Day

Something was different. He could hear something. He rolled over, scratching at the side of his head. He scratched a lot these days, which probably came from not showering for a few weeks. He’d scratched his scalp raw and his fingers came away with blood and hair under the nails. It should probably hurt, but he felt nothing.

There it was again. A shuffling skritch skritch.

Sound.

It ran through him like he’d been dropped into an ice-cold bath and every hair on his body stood on end. Sound meant he wasn’t alone. Or it meant the wind was blowing. It wouldn’t be the first time since he came here he’d thought he heard someone.

But something was different. He could smell it, a scent new to his desolate corner of the city.

David pushed himself up from his bed of concrete and slouched out from under the bridge. The Thames was sluggish this morning, moving like children on the way to school. He stopped to stare at it, keeping his eyes from the empty streets and empty buildings that surrounded him.

As he had done every morning, he tried to remember. He remembered finding a rose on his bedside table. He remembered looking down at Amber and shaking his head, then sneaking from the house and off to work. He met up with Steph at lunch and they banged like bunny rabbits. She loved the rose. Apparently one red rose was romantic, where twelve were cheesy and thoughtless. Eleven days of complete isolation still hadn’t given him the answer to why that was, but it didn’t matter, he’d got it right.

After that, he remembered nothing. He’d left her flat and the world had gone, or at least, the world that included other people. He’d rushed back to hers but she was gone along with everyone else.

He tried to kill himself in the first few days. He’d stood on the railing of the millennium bridge and readied himself to jump. But he couldn’t. He’d headed into Boots and filled his hand with painkillers and all sorts from the pharmacy. But he couldn’t put them in his mouth.

After the first few attempts he’d given up. Things… slipped. His mind didn’t work like it used to and he struggled to remember anything. His name was Dave, not David. He worked making greetings cards for… the company name was gone. Along with his mother’s face and his first girlfriend. Holes appearing like loose threads on his favourite t-shirt.

Sleeping outside had just happened. The trains weren’t running and he couldn’t sleep in a deserted building anyway. He felt less alone outside, for all the sense that made. He wondered how long it would be before he went mad.

Now though, he wondered what the sound was and where it was coming from. Because he’d just heard it again and it wasn’t the wind. He turned from the Thames and the world clicked back into focus. It was like being at the opticians when he was trying out different lenses. ‘Now, is it better with this, or with this.’ The optician had just slipped a different lense in and placed a layer over the world, a layer with people.

He screamed, the sound thin and unrecognisable to his desperately starved ears. He dropped to his knees, ignoring the looks he got from people passing by.

He wasn’t alone.

He wasn’t alone.

He wasn’t alone.

He wasn’t alone.

He wasn’t alone.

He stopped the loop by biting his tongue. He bit a little too hard and blood filled his mouth. He wasn’t alone. His filthy hands clutched the jacket of a woman rushing past. From the way she stared, he looked even worse than he felt, but she had seen him. And he could see her. He smiled, tears streaming clean tracks through the filth caked on his cheeks.

He got to his feet and stumbled away down Embankment. He got more looks and people stepped from his path. As well they should. He’d seen hell and returned. He was grinning like a madman by the time he reached the quay. He would take a ride on the ferry and drink in the city.

He had a hand on the gate when he stopped. What if they all went away? What if he was out there on the water and they all went away again? He’d be stranded. He turned away from the gate, shoving his shaking hands into his pockets.

What if they all went away?

What if they all went away?

What if they all went away?

What if they all went away?

Enough. He thumped his head with the palm of his hand and found a bench. He sat, pulled his knees up to his chest and wrapped his arms around them. The sounds washed over him and he struggled to breath. It was like the sea, soft but relentless. He needed peace and quiet and instead the noise came from everywhere, beating and beating at him.

He put his hands over his ears and moaned in his chest. Then another sound, one far louder than the murmuring of humanity cut through. Sirens. And not just one, but many. He joined the flock in turning this way and that in an attempt to be less ignorant.

Blue flashing lights appeared over by… what was the name of the bridge? He’d known them all, not so long ago. They drew closer, powering down the side of the river until they reached him. The noise was terrible, piercing his soul as they stuck and stabbed at him.

They flashed past one at a time and he counted them. He stumbled when he reached seven. Was it nine next? It felt wrong but he couldn’t remember what it was supposed to be. He did remember that nine or more police cars all heading for the same event was a pretty big deal though. He watched them down to the Houses of Parliament until the lights faded from sight.

A few minutes later, ambulances followed the path made by the police and there were just as many. He was half tempted to follow them. He wasn’t the only one. Here and there people wearing frowns that only half-masked their curiosity were heading in that direction with that half-run, half-walk that was supposed to look both dignified and sporty and failed at both.

With a shrug, he returned to his bench and stared out over the river. He knew what he could do. He dug through his pockets. He’d forgotten he got this a few days ago, but deep in one of his jacket pockets he found headphones wrapped around an ipod. Slipping them into his ears, he thumbed the play button and the scream of Thursday singing Rapture drowned out the incessant battering of the rest of the world.

Next Installment Monday 18th August

Part One is Here

Alex – 9 Days To Plague Day

Something was different. He knew the contents of this white board like nothing else. He knew every stroke of the pen, every figure and symbol. But something had changed since yesterday and it took him a few seconds to spot it. A difference in one of the equations. Stranger still, was that it looked like his handwriting.

He grabbed his notebook and scribbled down the new formula, trying to figure out why it would work. Had he done this before it all happened and just forgotten it? It wouldn’t be surprising. He could have cracked the cure for cancer and what happened on Saturday would have knocked it straight out his brain.

He was struggling to fit the events of the weekend into his mind and his world. He was having a child. They were having a child. In a way, that was easier to handle than the faded images he had of a future world. It had felt so real, yet now the pictures were like smoke, flitting away when he reached for them. They had been true though, he knew that.

He checked his watch. He had a lecture this morning and despite the strong urge, he wouldn’t skip it. This stuff wasn’t going anywhere and there was a large part of him that longed to junk it and toss it in the bin. He dumped the notepad back on the desk and headed for the door, smiling wryly.

He could never give up on it. He was the youngest student to be awarded a research grant in fifteen years. He was doing something no one else in the world was doing. This was his future. He just had to change it a little, move from creating a weapon to creating the cure for other weapons. He woke up thinking about it, which made a pleasant change from thinking about babies.

Chemical warfare was prevalent across the world. It was what had drawn him to it in the first place. Make the one ring to rule them all. But now he knew where that led, he could change the formula and create immunity. The shift wasn’t that great. His disease was based around changing the levels of chemicals within the brain. It would create the ultimate fight or flight response so the reptile brain took over. It would have to carry immune-suppressants to remove the body’s natural fight back.

This new formula would focus on the physical alone… he stopped, one hand pushing the door closed. Who was he kidding? This was entirely different. The only part of two years research he would be using was the basic chemistry of turning the solution into gas. Everything would change. He would be starting again.

The door clicked shut and he shrugged. If he had to start again, maybe he could finish this one first anyway. Whatever happened, when his son came along he would stop him doing anything stupid with it. He’d thought about that a lot last night. Perhaps just seeing his baby, a new person brought into the world, would stop him.

He drifted to class and made notes that would make no sense when he looked back at them. He’d only look back at them once and by then, they would have ceased to matter.

The formula changed again the following night and the figures he programmed into the machine were quite different from what he’d been working on before Saturday. He understood the changes, though he still doubted where they came from. They had to be him. There was no one else who understood what he was doing.

He realised when he stepped in to the lab on Tuesday that sometime between yesterday and today, he’d made his mind up. He would make it, he knew he could crack it. He would make it and put it somewhere no one could find it. But he had to finish it.

He watched as a series of chemicals were combined into a test tube that hung from a machine the uni had given him quite a considerable amount of money to buy. In some small way, finishing his project was the least he could do for the faith they had put in him.

He lifted the test tube gently and placed it in the centrifuge. He pressed the button and stepped away to look at the formula where he’d scribbled it down. It was right. He knew that without even testing it. His hand shook as he thought what that meant. He’d given himself five years at the least, though he’d told the uni four at most. But he’d cracked it in under two. He was a genius. He grinned as the shaking slowed.

Alex sat in his chair, folding his hands behind his head and leaning back. New Scientist was the first place to g— No. He couldn’t tell anyone. He knew where this would lead if it got out into the world. This was the greatest secret he would ever hold. But the University would be pissed if he turned around and said they’d wasted their money. That was fine, he would just have to make the immunity gas as well.

He turned to a fresh page in his notebook and began to write, lulled by the gentle whirring of the centrifuge.

Next Installment Thursday 14th August

Part One is Here

Act Two:

Luke – 10 Days to Plague Day

The ground was hard and cold. He shifted, rolled onto his back and opened his eyes. Between the trees he could see the stars and they terrified him. He closed his eyes again and waited. He opened them and the stars were still there. Muttering under his breath he rose to his feet and looked around.

The forest was open, thin naked trunks denuded of branches until far above his head where a scrappy sort of fern sprouted and reached toward the sky. In every direction he saw only more trees and bracken and ferns and not one damn house or coffee shop. He was human, he was finally here, and he was in the middle of a bloody forest. This was just like the father, typical of his warped sense of humour.

Luke spat and set off, stomping over the thick bed of pine needles and broken branches. It took an hour for him to arrive at a road and another half hour to reach a pub. He had money in his pocket. The bastard had given him that much at least and the pub was open, so he bought a pint and settled himself by the fire.

The flames did a little to burn away the horrible cold inside. He’d never been cold, not properly. Now it was all he could feel. That and anger. He stared down into the beer, wondering how he had spent so long wanting to taste it. There was nothing particularly wrong with it, but it was far from the glorious experience he’d expected.

That was a fairly good way to describe the entire human experience to date. The pub was what he thought would be called a ‘local’s place’, which meant it was too far off the beaten track for anyone else to ever come in. The locals were three fat men at the bar bitching about something on the TV.

Luke watched it for a minute and was shocked to see something on there about the tube explosion. The father had sent him here only the next day. He’d expected to be at least some time in the future. He thought back to the rest of the speech.

‘Luke will become human. And gifted with such an amazing ability, he will be able to make the changes necessary to save the world from any such fate that may befall it.’

On reflection, that was a load of woolly twaddle that meant next to nothing. He’d thought it meant going into the future to stop Alex’s son, Jason, but it could mean anything. Maybe he was supposed to spend the next thirty years drinking beer and getting laid. The thought put a smile on his face and the sudden silence in the pub brought him back to himself.

The three men at the bar were staring at him. It was in looking back at their round, red faces that he realised what had changed. In three hundred years of being back in the Flights, he had found within himself the compassion and empathy that he had been created with. The fires of hell had burned it all away, but the Father had helped him rediscover it. Somehow, in becoming mortal, that same compassion and caring had vanished. He was as he had been, back when he ruled the underworld.

‘Can I help you?’

The nearest one, named Beardy for his lack of facial hair in contrast to his thoroughly-hirsute companions, grunted and leaned forward, gesticulating with his pint glass.

‘We were just wondering what you found so funny about them bloody arab terrorists.’

Luke sat back in the chair and raised an eyebrow. ‘Well, there’s a few things there. First, the explosion wasn’t cause by a terrorist attack, arab or otherwise. It was caused by the tube carrying a container on board that really shouldn’t have been on a tube train. Secondly, I think you’ll find the word arab relates to people from Saudi Arabia and if you chose to investigate further, you’d find that every country in the world has supplied us with terrorists.’

He took a deep breath followed by a sip of beer. ‘However, with regards to what I found funny, it was simply the presence of three fat unkempt fools such as yourselves trying to debate something as complex as world politics.’

Beardy’s brow creased as he tried to decipher what had just been said to him. One of his friends was clearly a bit sharper as he leaped from his stool and came toward Luke, fists clenched.

‘Think you’re clever, don’t you? Think because we ain’t up in the city we got no brains.’

‘Well, your lack of grammar and inability to use full sentences does seem to support my hypothesis. But to be honest, I am clever.’

He smiled his brightest smile, set his pint down above the fire and stood. The man stopped before him, flattened lips visible through his beard.

‘Don’t think coming in our bar and calling us stupid is very clever.’

He raised a hand and took another step forward. Luke closed the gap and muttered under his breath.

The man stopped, eyes widening. Then he screamed. It was a sound that brought back so many wonderful memories it took Luke a minute to realise he was supposed to be doing something.

The man cowered, hands help up against some invisible foe. As always, it would be his worst fear, so in all likelihood he was facing dancing razor blades, or maybe a hot shower. Either way, he was entirely unprepared for Luke’s fist crashing into his face.

Luke winced. His strength was somewhat diminished by his recent switch to the mortal realm. Still. The man’s knees buckled along with his nose and he dropped senseless to the floor, streaming blood. The other two men were still on their stalls, joined in their staring by the barkeeper.

Luke folded his arms and tapped his foot. Beardy summoned up the courage and climbed off his stall. He picked it up and swung it experimentally before him. Luke muttered again and the huge man dropped the stool. He followed this masterstroke of fighting prowess by bursting into tears. They were followed by him linking his arms together as though he held a baby and rocking gently back and forth.

Everyone in the bar, Luke included, was transfixed. He raised his vibration a little and saw, around Beardy’s head, a number of tiny faces, all shouting and screaming at him. The baby cradled in his arms was him and he was the father he’d never had. It was beautifully sad and more than a little pathetic.

Luke retrieved the barstool and swung it full strength into Beardy’s tear-stained face. It shattered into more parts than he’d have thought possible. Okay, his strength wasn’t that weakened. Beardy spun most of the way round until he collided against the bar. He fell sideways into his friend and took them both to the floor.

Luke took a sip of his pint and smiled. The father had sent him here to save the human race, and he would, but that didn’t mean he couldn’t have some fun.

The last man shoved his friend’s body off him and staggered to his feet. He backed away, hands held out. ‘Hey man, that’s enough, we didn’t mean nothing by it.’

‘You didn’t mean anything at all. You didn’t say anything. I, on the other hand, meant plenty by it. Tell me… Richard, what’s your greatest fear?’

Richard shook his head and ran for the door. He was most of the way there when swarms of wasps attacked him and dragged him to the floor. This one’s mind was strong, his imagination full, and tiny red dots appeared all over him. Venom that existed only in his mind surged through his blood stream, enough to drive him face down and tear a blood-curdling howl from deep within.

Luke chuckled and sat back down in his seat, reaching for his drink.

Next Installment Monday 11th August