The Dead

Courtney put her arm round her.

‘We’re all right now, babe,’ she said, and Aleisha forced her grey lips into a smile.

‘Yeah.’

Kyle looked out of the windows into the night.

‘I’m going to see what’s up,’ he said. ‘We’re all over the place. Doesn’t feel like no one’s driving this thing.’

He walked off but as he got to the exit there was a horrible crunch and the boat lurched to the side. Everyone was thrown to the floor and Courtney was aware of a massive stone bulk passing the windows.

‘We’ve hit something!’ she shrieked.

The windows all down the side where Aleisha had been sitting were cracked. Two of them had smashed completely, letting in smoke and the rushing, roaring, gurgling din of the river. There was also a screeching, scraping noise and the sound of splintering wood and breaking glass.

Courtney looked for her friend. Aleisha had fallen to the floor and hit her head on the table on the way down. She was still just conscious, but dazed. Courtney took a step towards her as the boat gave another sudden lurch and tilted over at a crazy angle. Kyle grabbed Courtney to stop her falling. Aleisha rolled against the side.

‘Hold on, Aleisha!’ Courtney tried to break free from where Kyle was holding her steady, and the next moment, with a deafening crack, the boat split completely open. A gush of water burst through, reaching in like a giant black hand, and closed round Aleisha. And then it withdrew, sucked out as the boat tilted back the other way.

‘Aleisha!’ Courtney screamed, but her friend was gone.

‘You idiot, Matt,’ Ed shouted, picking himself up from where he’d been thrown to the floor by the force of the collision. ‘That was Westminster Bridge.’

‘We’re sinking,’ said Archie, clinging on to the wheel to keep from falling over.

‘It’s worse than that,’ said Jordan, looking out of the windows. ‘We’re breaking up. We need to find the lifeboats.’

‘Out there, look!’ Archie nodded through the window of the wheelhouse. There was a short deck in front of them with two dinghies tethered to it.

‘We’ll never all fit on them,’ said Ed. ‘There must be at least thirty of us.’

‘Look for more,’ said Jordan, struggling over to the door. ‘I’ll get these two sorted.’

Matt was staring out at the flames that raged over the south side of the river, his face lit with writhing yellows and scarlets.

‘The third angel sounded his trumpet,’ he said quietly. ‘And a great star, blazing like a torch, fell from the sky on a third of the rivers and on the springs of water – the name of the star is Wormwood. A third of the waters turned bitter, and many people died from the waters that had become bitter.’

78

Kyle had got rid of his garden fork and swapped it for a fire axe. He was up on the roof of the top deck with three of Jordan’s boys, hacking through the ropes that held four more lifeboats in place. It was tricky and dangerous work with the cruiser lying at such a steep angle, and every few seconds it gave a sharp jolt as the water tugged at it, slowly tearing it in half.

Ed appeared and helped them, clinging on to a bit of rope to keep from falling off. Amazingly, Kyle still seemed to be enjoying himself, as if this was all some mad game.

Kids were swarming over the boat in a panic. There was nowhere to go except up on to the roof or on to the short deck at the front. Ed heard DogNut down below yelling at them not to jump in. He leant over and shouted down to him.

‘There’s lifeboats up here. We’ll get them into the water, but be careful getting in. Jordan’s got two more boats at the front.’

The next few minutes were a nightmare. Ed was only dimly aware of all that was going on around him. Kids trying not to fall off the cruiser as she broke up. Other kids trying to get the boats into the water without losing them. Dead bodies and bits of floating wreckage knocking into them. Screams. Shouts. Arguments. Hands burned on ropes. Clothes drenched with water. Courtney yelling in one ear about Aleisha. DogNut yelling, ‘Hurry up! Hurry up!’ in the other.

Then the kids were spilling off the cruiser as she sank lower in the water, packing the lifeboats and threatening to capsize them. Jordan was in control at the front, snarling at the kids to slow down. Ed was trying to keep some sense of order on the roof.

‘Don’t aim directly for the lifeboats,’ Ed barked as kids lowered themselves over the side, or jumped or slipped. ‘You’ll sink them. You’ve got to land in the water next to them. The guys in the boats can pull you in.’

The water between the cruiser and the lifeboats was soon thick with splashing kids. It was too dark and too chaotic to tell if anyone was sinking or being swept away. Ed just prayed that most of them would make it.

Now it was his turn. If he left it any longer, the cruiser was going to sink and drag him under.

He launched himself into the air. Hit the water with a punch to his guts. The cold snatched his breath away. He reached out for the nearest lifeboat and then it was gone and he was under the water. Someone had landed on top of him, forcing him down. He felt hard shoes kicking at him. It was freezing and he could sense his body shutting down. A pale face looked at him through the murk, the features frozen into a scream, eyes wide, mouth gaping, then it floated away and he was alone again. The current pulled at him. He wanted to shout but had his mouth clamped shut against the poisonous waters of the Thames.

Then suddenly he was in the fresh stinging air. The light of the fire was blinding him. Strong hands had hold of his jacket and he was being pulled into one of the boats.

It was Kyle, still gri

‘How many of us made it?’ he croaked once he’d got his voice back. Nobody heard him, so he struggled to sit up. He saw Courtney packed in among the other kids next to DogNut. She was crying.

Ed looked back at the cruiser. It had finally split in two. The back half had sunk, but the top half was still afloat and drifting down the river, half submerged.

Then he saw an amazing sight. Matt and Archie and the four remaining acolytes were standing on top of the wheelhouse roof, like the crew of a submarine coming into harbour. They were holding their ba

Ed looked at the ba

79

The last stragglers were crossing the bridge, the feeblest, the weakest, the sickest, shambling along as behind them the flames tore at the sky, raining down ash and soot.

He’d stayed behind to eat a part of one of the small bodies lying in the road. The others, the stupid ones, just wanted to get away from the fire. Not him. He knew he had to eat. Meat Is Life. He’d stayed there, squatting in the road as the fire ripped into the buildings. It was pretty. He liked fire. Always had done.