Autumn The City Page 0,77

to sudden pain had often been to curse - sometimes even to lash out and punch a wall or throw something in anger.

Perhaps that was what was happening to the decomposing bodies traipsing constantly through the city streets? Perhaps their increasing anger and violence were direct reactions to their suffering? His line of thinking continued down into even darker territories.

The displays of violence he'd noticed recently may well have been the first signs of further changes. With decay and disintegration tearing apart the remains of the corpses, their pain and, logically, their anger, hate and frustration would be likely to increase rapidly.

If the anger and hate he had witnessed was connected to pain, then it was likely things were going to get much, much worse before they started to get any better. There were more than ten thousand of the damn things out there.

Chapter Thirty-Four

The long day dragged unbearably. After many hours of arguments, counter-arguments and frustration, the atmosphere in the assembly hall was deteriorating rapidly. By early evening tempers were wearing dangerously thin. 'Have you looked out of the bloody window recently?' Baxter spat angrily. 'Do you know what's out there?' 'More to the point,' Donna interrupted angrily, 'have you seen what's still in here? Have you seen the level of our supplies? I tell you, we won't last long if we don't do something soon...' 'She's right,' Cooper added from across the room. 'Staying here isn't going to be an option for much longer.' 'And what the fuck do you know?' Nathan Holmes yelled, his voice hoarse and strained with emotion. This argument had been raging for the best part of an hour with, it seemed, much of the venom directed towards him personally.

'I'm sure you know a hell of a lot more than you're letting on,' he snapped. 'I bet you know exactly what caused all of this fucking mess to happen.' 'I wish I did,' the soldier sighed. 'Then at least I might know what to do.' Frightened faces peered out from every corner of the hall, illuminated by numerous candles, torches and lamps. The light in the room was dull and uneven leaving even more people hidden in darkness. For once almost all the survivors sheltering in the building were gathered together - even the most reclusive of them having been drawn out of hiding by the events surrounding the soldier's recent arrival.

For many others the hall had become the only room they used. Being alone in the individual rooms they had previously occupied had become too unsettling for most. Better to snatch a few moments of sleep in the company of others than to spend endless hours alone, wide awake and on edge. 'Look,' Donna continued, 'Phil reckons that in six months time the bodies will have rotted away to just about nothing. Isn't that right, Phil?' She peered round in the darkness, trying to find the doctor. He was sitting on the floor just a few meters from where she was standing. He'd been trying to avoid getting dragged into the conversation. Instead he'd been busying himself by trying to keep a seven year old boy interested in a jigsaw puzzle and hoping that he'd be able to stop him crying. 'Something like that,' he grunted, 'give or take a few weeks either way.'

'So we'll wait here for six months,' Holmes announced. Donna shook her head. Once full of macho pretense, the odious man was now letting his true colours show. His plans to get out of the building and take what he wanted from the dead city had been forgotten. He was as scared as the rest of the survivors, but he didn't have the intelligence to deal with his feelings. His fear displayed itself as antagonism and anger. 'Which part of this don't you understand, Nathan,' she sighed. 'We haven't got enough supplies here to last for six more days, never mind six months. We've got to go out into the city now, whether you like it or not.' Holmes didn't respond. He'd never admit as much, but he was intimidated by Donna. He didn't have the ability to able to reply to her words with anything that resembled a sensible and coherent argument as to why they should lock themselves down and stay put until the countless bodies outside had finally fallen again. 'She's right,' Baxter said, stepping forward out of the shadows into which he'd subconsciously retreated as the argument had become more