Purification

the few rooms that the survivors were permitted access to.
    ‘Morning, Bernard,’ Emma replied. ‘Bloody cold, isn’t it?’
    ‘Isn’t it always?’ he sighed. ‘Get yourselves something to eat, the soldiers left us quite a lot last night.’
    Holding onto Michael’s hand, Emma followed him as he weaved through the crowded room. About six metres square, it was used by the group of survivors as a dormitory, a meeting place, a kitchen and a mess hall. In fact it was used for just about everything. As bleak, grim and imposing as its grey and featureless walls were, the fact that the room was always filled with people made it just about the best place for any of them to spend their time. In spite of the uncertainty and unease which still surrounded everything, the heat and noise made by the group of frightened and frustrated people made this room a more inviting place than anywhere else. At least here they weren’t always looking over their shoulders. At least here they could, for the time being at least, begin to try and relax, recuperate and heal.
    A basic shift pattern had been drawn up shortly after they had first arrived at the bunker. Although there had been the expected few missed shifts, most people seemed prepared to pull their weight and contribute by cooking or cleaning or doing whatever other menial tasks needed to be done. Rather than evade work as some of them might have done before the disaster, just about all of the survivors now willingly did as much as they could. How much of this work was done to help the others was questionable. Most simply craved the responsibility because it helped reduce the monotony and boredom of every long, dark day. As each of them had already found to their cost on many, many occasions, sitting and staring at the walls of the bunker with nothing to do invariably resulted in them thinking constantly about all that they had lost.
    Emma and Michael collected their food from Sheri Newton (a quiet and diminutive middle-aged woman who seemed to always be serving food) and sat down to eat. The faces of the people sitting around them were reassuringly familiar. Donna Yorke was at a table nearby talking to Clare Smith, Jack Baxter and Phil Croft. As the couple began to eat Croft looked up and around and nodded at Michael.
    ‘Morning,’ Michael said as he chewed on his first mouthful of dry and tasteless rationed food. ‘How you doing today, Phil?’
    ‘Good,’ Croft replied, wheezing. He took a long drag on a cigarette and coughed.
    ‘You should think about giving those things up,’
    Michael muttered sarcastically, ‘won’t do your health any good. They’ll be the death of you!’
    Croft grimaced as he coughed and then managed a fleeting smile. It was a sign of the grim hopelessness of their situation that death was just about the only thing they could find to laugh about. The group’s only doctor, he had sustained serious injuries in a violent crash when they had first approached the military bunker. The dark, dank conditions underground were not ideal and did nothing to aid his recovery. The only visible signs of his injuries which remained now were a scar across his chest and a severe limp and, as far as the rest of the group were concerned, he appeared to be getting stronger and fitter with each day. A trained and experienced medical professional, however, Croft knew that his body had sustained a huge amount of damage and that he would never be fully fit again. With his discomfort and pain seeming to increase day on day, and with the military on one side and a crowd of thousands of decomposing corpses on the other, the potentially harmful effects of smoking cigarettes was the very least of his worries.
    Cooper marched angrily into the room, his sudden, stormy appearance instantly silencing every conversation and causing everyone to look round. He fetched himself a drink, yanked a chair from under the table and sat down next to Jack Baxter.
    ‘What the hell’s the matter with you?’ Baxter asked.
    ‘This place is full of fucking idiots,’ the ex-soldier snapped. Since returning to the base he had steadily distanced himself from his military colleagues to the point where he now had very little to do with them. Perhaps symbolically, he now only wore the lower half of his uniform, and he only kept the boots and trousers on because they were the most practical clothes he possessed.
    In fact, they were just about the only clothes he had.
    ‘Now who’s he