Author: Julian Miles, Staff Writer
They’re running about again, but at least they’re looking happy about it. When I – we – got here, there was running, but only grim faces.
Has it only been six days?
Can’t have been.
Wait. Go through it.
Day one would have been after I heard the crash during the night. Sounded closer than all the others, but another aircraft falling from alien-controlled skies wasn’t unusual. I dug myself deeper under the stack of bedding and went back to sleep.
Come morning I crawled out. Seeing it had rained, I went out water hunting with funnel, syphon, and five-litre carrier in my backpack. Then I saw the size of the tailplane sticking up above the houses across the road. After making sure no-one was about, I went to see. The overnight scavengers would have picked it clean, but water might have collected in the wreckage.
I was right. Got nearly two litres before I saw the hand. Unlike all the other bodies, this one was waving!
A shockingly short time later, I had Jemima and Bruce sitting in my improvised den, eagerly wolfing down protein bar crumbs. I’d found the box squashed under a toppled cupboard in a looted shop, but after eating the contents of the ruptured wrappers, enough remained to keep me going. Until that day.
They told me about the fix their mother had entrusted them with delivering. Something in their cybergear had the secret to fighting the aliens. I didn’t understand. Apart from the urgency, and them being stranded.
Day two started early. I’d seen a crashed 4×4 on the other side of the supermarket. An old one. Bruce said his dad had been a mechanic. Said he could get it going, especially as I had a charge box I’d been keeping topped up with hours of cranking the hand charger I’d had since my grandfather gave it to me decades ago. The old bastard would have been in his element in this chaos, unlike me.
By lunchtime Bruce had got the 4×4 going, and Jemima had shot Looter Dan. He’d been my only local competition. Being nearly twice my width and surly with it, ‘competition’ mainly involved me retreating. This time a girl half my size blew his head off.
Day three: that had been fun. I’ve always loved driving. The 4×4 had nearly a full tank, airless tyres, and a hybrid cruising drive. With Jemima riding shotgun and Bruce navigating, we covered nearly three hundred miles, had two shoot-outs, and only lost the rear windscreen.
We arrived here later that day. I nearly got arrested, got thanked, then got ignored. That last one becoming a state of existence… Yeah, it’s been six days.
“Tony.”
I look up from my daydream. It’s Jemima.
“Uncle Ben says you can take the repaired 4×4 and a full load of supplies if you want.”
Oh yeah. I’d asked for that. ‘Uncle Ben’ wears a uniform with insignia that makes people salute and get out of his way. I was feeling unwanted when he asked. Since then, I’ve compared living in a ruined furniture warehouse to living here. I think I made a mistake.
She looks down at the floor, then back up to me.
“He also said you could keep the 4×4 and become our driver. Bruce said you were really good.”
“What about aliens and stuff?”
“They’re not gone, but the scientists say what my mum made is better than she predicted. We’ll have peace before winter.”
“I’m only driving if you bring that enormous gun of yours.”
She beams at me.
“Deal!”