The Human Condition

closer than we hoped they'd be at this stage, that's all.'

    `So what do we do?' Elizabeth pleaded, desperate for someone to answer.

    `Seems to me you've got the same two options you've always had,' he answered, his voice low and resigned. `You can sit here and wait for the inevitable to happen, or you can run for as long as you can keep going, then stop and then let the inevitable happen anyway.'

    `I'm running,' Jones said. He was already edging closer to the door to the fire escape. `I'm not just going to sit here waiting for them to get in. Fuck that. I'm leaving now...'

    `Me too,' Wilcox agreed.

    Bushell looked at Proctor and Elizabeth, although he didn't really care what they were going to do. Proctor began to nervously side-step closer to the two men waiting by the fire escape. Elizabeth , struggling to hold herself together, instinctively did the same.

    `Come on,' she pleaded. `Don't stay here. It's suicide.'

    `I know,' Bushell smiled, `but it's suicide on my terms. Why do you all want to keep on running when there's no point? It's not your fault, but can't you see that the game's over?'

    `It's not a game,' Jones interrupted angrily.

    `I know, I'm sorry,' Bushell said, regretting his choice of words, `but you don't have to keep fighting. You can choose not to. That's the difference between us in here and those things out there. You can stop and switch off if you want to, they're cursed to keep going until there's nothing left of them.'

    `Come on, Barry,' Proctor said quietly.

    `I'm not running,' he replied. `I've had enough.'

    Sensing that there was nothing they could do to persuade him otherwise, the four remaining survivors pushed their way through the fire escape door and began their dark descent down towards the ground floor of the hotel.

    It was suddenly quiet. Save for the thumping noise coming from the mass of decomposing bodies on the other side of the main door, Bushell's hotel suite was suddenly quiet and empty. More to the point, it was his again. His and his alone. Just how he'd wanted it.

    Tearful (he knew he didn't have long) he walked around the vast suite dejectedly, collecting together his things. He salvaged everything that he could from the little that was left and packed it all against the wall of the master bedroom. A sudden sound distracted him. More noise from outside. He peered through the spy-hole to see that the corridor outside was now a solid mass of flesh. It wouldn't be long before they broke through. He wiped a tear away from the corner of his eye (still taking care not to smudge his make-up) and then took one last, long and very definitely final look around the suite which had been his home for the last few weeks of his life. Ignoring the increasing noise coming from the door he took a moment to walk around and look out of each of the windows in turn, staring at the remains of the city where he'd lived and remembering everything and everyone that had gone and been left behind. The memories were harder to deal with than the thought of what was to come. It still surprised him how much it hurt to remember all that he had lost. Thinking about the little he had left to lose didn't seem to matter. He'd collected everything he'd needed. With the door rattling and shaking in its frame, he slipped quietly into the master bedroom and closed the door behind him. Once inside he shoved the bed across the entrance to the room and wedged it into position with other furniture and belongings. If he'd had a hammer and nails, he thought, he would have nailed it shut. The bedroom door wouldn't be opening again.

    Barry Bushell, with tears streaming down his cheeks, selected another outfit from his wardrobe and got changed. Finally presentable, he lay down on the bed and picked up a book. With his hands shaking so badly that he could hardly read, he lay there and waited.

    `Keep moving,' Elizabeth yelled, slamming her hands into the middle of Wilcox's back and sending him tripping further down the last few stairs to the ground floor.

    `Watch it!' he protested, grabbing hold of the handrail to try and stop himself from falling. He looked back up the stairs. Proctor and Jones had stopped a short way back.

    `What now?' Proctor asked. They'd finally reached the bottom of the staircase. It was a pointless question. They didn't have a choice. Wilcox cautiously edged closer to the door and teased it slightly open before, equally carefully, closing it again.

    `Well?' Elizabeth asked