Outpost

‘What about food? What have you been eating this past couple of weeks?’

‘Cans. I ate them all. None left.’

‘So do you want to tell me about it?’

‘Tell you what?’ she asked.

‘You took my boat. You sailed away. Now you are back, talking trippy bullshit about walking cities. Did you leave at all? Jane told us you sent radio messages. You went south, then sank. Was it all lies? Were you here all along?’

‘It was a long journey. I passed Greenland. I nearly reached Norway. There were storms. I’m not entirely sure what happened. My memory plays tricks.’

‘But why? Why come back? All that effort to get away, and you came back. If Europe has turned into some God-awful hell-world I need to know.’

‘I saw cities on fire. And other stuff. I saw cities get up and walk. Strange creatures. Leviathans. It was madness. I knew it at the time. I knew it wasn’t real.’

‘But what will we find?’ asked Nail. ‘Your psychosis aside. If we actually make it back to Britain what will be waiting for us?’

‘They nuked the cities. The armies. The governments. Scorched earth. Whatever else I dreamed, that much was real.’

‘So if we head south we’ll hit a radiation cloud. Is that why you came back?’

‘I honestly don’t know for sure. I was at sea, and then I was here. I can’t explain it.’

‘But where’s the boat?’

‘The hull was crushed by ice as I approached the island. It’s at the bottom of the sea.’ ‘Shit.’

‘Maybe I didn’t come back at all. Maybe I’m dead. Maybe I’m a ghost.’

‘You’re sure they nuked the cities?’

‘A cleansing fire.’ ‘I’m from Manchester. You know that, right?’

‘Rubble. Plutonium dust. It’ll be safe to go back and take a look in a half million years or so.’

‘Fucking ironic. Jane and Ghost. Plotting how to get home, day and night. And it’s all gone.’

‘Are you going to tell them?’ asked Nikki.

‘We don’t exactly get along.’

‘My turn to wonder. Why are you and Gus skulking in this bunker when you could be back aboard Rampart? Did they run you off with a pitchfork?’

‘Like I say. We don’t get along.’

‘Well, that’s a shame. They’ve got drugs and dressings. Gus will die without them.’

‘So why did you come back to this island? Okay: they nuked the cities. Plenty of other places you could have gone. Plenty of wilderness. Why here? This place is death.’

‘I love it. I truly love it.’

‘Queen of the Damned. Jesus. This gulag has driven you batshit.’

An air shaft. Nail looked up. Massive turbine blades dripped rust.

‘I bet they were going to garrison whole armies down here.’

‘This is my little camp,’ said Nikki.

The installation manager’s office. A leather chair and a desk. A faded Soviet flag and a little plaster bust of Lenin.

A mural. Farm workers driving tractors and combine harvesters across a golden field of wheat. They gazed towards Lenin, who stood on the horizon shooting rays like the rising sun.

Nail examined a photograph on the wall.

‘Brezhnev. Early eighties.’

Scattered tins on the desk.

‘Like I said. Ate them all, I’m afraid.’

Nail picked through wrappers and cans. He found a muesli bar.

‘Hey,’ said Nikki. ‘How did I miss that?’

Nail split the bar in half.

‘What about Gus?’ asked Nikki. ‘What about his share?’ Nail didn’t reply. He crammed the bar in his mouth. He dropped crumbs. He picked them from the floor and ate them.

They found a couple of Russian Kraz trucks and a bulldozer parked in a cavern. The vehicles were slowly crumbling to rust. Nikki found a copy of Hustler in the cab. She tucked it into her coat pocket. ‘Kindling?’

‘Toilet paper.’

‘Maybe there’s some petrol in these tanks,’ said Nail.

Nikki kicked a fuel tank bolted to the back of a cab. Dull gong. Empty.

‘What about guns?’ asked Nail. ‘Find any weapons? Any old AKs lying around?’

‘No. I looked. There’s nothing.’

There was a leather jacket balled up on the bulldozer seat. Nikki checked the pockets.

‘Give me your knife,’ she said. She cut a small strip of leather and folded it into her mouth like a stick of gum. She cut a strip for Nail.

‘Go ahead. Chew. It’ll fool your stomach. Keep the hunger pangs at bay.’

‘Not exactly a permanent solution.’

‘It buys us time.’

They returned to the bunker entrance with armfuls of wood. They dumped the wood on the floor and fed the fire.

‘Miss me?’ asked Nail.

‘Fuck you.’ Gus smiled. He was shivering.

‘Are you all right?’

‘I need to get back to Rampart, otherwise I’m a dead man. They’ve got morphine. They’ve got antibiotics.’

Nail thought it over. Would Jane shoot him if he tried to board Rampart? Probably.

‘Their medical supplies were pretty depleted,’ said Nail. ‘No guarantee they could help.’

‘At least they’ve got hot food and water. I don’t want to die on this concrete floor, stinking of my own shit. I want to be warm and clean. I want to die in a bed.’

Nikki dragged a snowmobile to the bunker door. She stood on the saddle and chipped away at ice accumulated at the top of the doorframe. She threw Nail and Gus a chunk of icicle to suck.

‘So,’ said Nail. ‘Duke of Amberley. What was that all about?’