Them or Us

convoy out of the city. I saw the explosion in the distance, but I was far enough away by then. I dug in with the military until they were attacked. Me and a couple of others managed to get away, and that was when we ran into Peter here and his people. ’Cause he’s like you he was able to keep up all the bullshit and pretense and keep us hidden. Now here we are, several months and several stops farther down the line. And here you are, too. Jesus Christ, Danny McCoyne, it’s good to see you! I can’t believe it’s you!”
    I can’t believe it’s him, either. I try again to make sense of everything I’ve heard today, to unweave the stories Mallon and Sutton have told me and try to find a logical explanation as to why I’m in a bunker buried under a farm with a bunch of foul Unchanged, but I can’t. It’s as impossible as it sounds. My overriding emotion right now, stronger even than anything I feel for either Mallon or the Unchanged, is anger toward Hinchcliffe and Sutton. Now, if what Mallon’s just said is true, then that anger spreads to Sahota, too, because after dispatching me and many others into the city to fight and sacrifice ourselves in the name of the cause, he turned tail and ran. Cowardly fucker.
    “I need help to look after these people,” Sutton says. I look into his face, but in the half-light his expression is impossible to read. Is he genuine, or is he just another manipulative shyster, out to use me and exploit me like everyone else? “This is their only chance. This is our only chance.”
    “You shouldn’t have brought me here.”
    “Yes I should. Please stay, Danny, I need your help. I can’t do this on my own anymore.”
    “Can’t do what exactly? You keep saying that.”
    “I can’t provide for all these people by myself. I was working in Southwold to try to get food and water, but there wasn’t enough, and…”
    The penny drops.
    “So that’s it? That’s why you really wanted me here? You think because of my connections with Hinchcliffe I’ll be able to sort everything out for you and keep you stocked up with supplies? Fuck off, Sutton. Go hijack one of those trucks you saw in Southwold.”
    “No, it’s nothing like that,” he backpedals quickly. “I didn’t even know you were connected to Hinchcliffe. If I had, then maybe I wouldn’t have asked you.”
    “I wish you hadn’t.”
    “Take a look around you,” he says, his voice intentionally louder, wanting to be heard now. “These people deserve more than this.”
    “Not my responsibility.”
    “Yes it is,” he shouts, loud enough to fill the whole shelter and stop all other conversations dead. “It’s our responsibility.”
    I shake my head with despair. What do I have to do to make this dumb fucker understand?
    “Not my responsibility,” I shout back equally loudly, then lower my voice again. “I’m not interested. What’s to stop me bringing Hinchcliffe’s fighters here and ending this bullshit today?”
    “You won’t do that, Danny,” Mallon says. “I know you’re better than that. I know what kind of a man you are. I saw it.”
    “You saw nothing.”
    “Yes I did. Back at the convent I saw a man who still had his priorities straight, even after all that had happened. You were still thinking about your family when all that everyone else like you wanted to do was kill. Tell me, did you ever find your daughter?”
    “What was left of her.”
    “Sorry, man. Was she…?”
    I shake my head, but I can’t bring myself to explain. It hurts too much. I look deep into Mallon’s dark, staring eyes and wish with every fiber of my being that I’d never met either him or Sutton. Then again, I remind myself, without Mallon I’d never have been able to get back into the city and I’d never have found Ellis and shared those last few moments with Lizzie. They’d have died together in the bomb blast, and I’d have been none the wiser. Strange how important, in retrospect, those last few seconds we had together were. I think about them every day. Lizzie gave up everything she had left for Ellis. The memories of what happened to her and what my daughter became still fill me with unbearable pain.
    I can’t take this.
    I can’t do it.
    I push past both of them and run for the exit. Mallon tries to hold me back, but I shrug him off and keep moving.

 
    25
    THE COLD AIR OUTSIDE hits my chest like a hammer blow, but I keep moving. I run back toward the farm, but I’ve scarcely made it to the top