The End of the World Running Club by Adrian J. Walker Read Free Book Online Page A

would I see? The air quivering? Red skin peeling back on my daughter’s reproachful face? My wife’s hair smoking and catching aflame? The world itself smearing away as my eyeballs melted? But the heat drew back and we remained squashed together breathing short, whimpering breaths of baking air.
    Arthur was crying, of course.
    “Hot Daddy! Too hot!” cried Alice, caught somewhere between terror and amusement.
    I started to answer, to comfort her, but the short period of quiet was being replaced by another disturbance above. It started like a distant subway train rattling up the tracks towards a platform. Very slowly it began to get louder until it became a single intense whistling roar like a billion throats exhaling long lungfuls of air. It reached a crescendo until all we could hear was a howling gale and the hatch began to rattle violently on its hinges. Somehow we felt the wind inside the cellar as well. We huddled together again as the sweltering air spiralled around us.
    It blew for what seemed like an hour and beneath it all we heard distant, deep booms and crashes. It was too loud to hear our own voices, but I watched Arthur crying relentlessly before finally giving up and settling into Beth’s arms. Alice had clearly gone into some kind of shock. Beth lay back with her head against the wall. Her eyes were shut and her face was creased in what looked like prayer. I lost myself in the sound of the wind.

    Eventually the noise settled down and we were left in numb silence with ringing ears. The hatch rattled occasionally and I wondered for the first time what was now above it. Had we been buried deep in rubble? Or were we exposed and vulnerable? My mind thought back to the nightmare nuclear scenarios I had imagined as a teenager: falling ash, levelled cities, burned corpses.
    The silence continued. Beth was still holding the children tightly to her and her brow was no longer creased in panic. She looked at me expectantly and I saw her mouth move. I shuffled along the wall to where she was sitting.
    “Is it over?” she whispered. He voice was dry and cracked.
    “I don’t know,” I said. “I think so.”
    “Was it...was that...” she began, struggling to ask the obvious question and all the other terrible questions that it led to.
    Was that an asteroid? Had Edinburgh just been hit by an asteroid? Had the United Kingdom just been hit by asteroids? Where else had been hit? What was left? Who was left? What about my parents, my family? Would we be hit again? What was outside now?
    I nodded and moved closer, putting my arm around her shoulder. Arthur was, incredibly, asleep. Alice was curled up in a ball against her mother.
    “It’s OK,” I said. “We’re safe, we’re safe here.”
    Beth lay her head back against the wall and straightened her left arm. Alice flinched and let out a moan, thinking that she was losing her cuddle.
    “Shh, it’s OK darling, Mummy’s just stretching.”
    Alice flashed me another look of distrust as she huddled back in. I stroked her brow.
    “Those people,” said Beth after a long silence. “Who were those people at our door?”
    I shook my head. I didn’t want to think about that last image of the world - a child looking back at me in the way only a child can: an open circle of curiosity, cold and untouched by everything around her.
    “Don’t think about them,” I said.  
    I was about to say they’re gone when I heard a noise from above. We both turned our heads to the hatch. It was distant at first, very quiet, but undeniably human: a muffled sob. Beth stiffened and darted me a look of warning. Instinctively she raised her hand and gently covered Alice’s exposed ear. Again, one single muffled sob in the far distance and then nothing.
    Then, much louder, a shriek. Pain. Unmistakable pain. Beth brought up her knees and quickly handed me Arthur, bringing her free hand over to shield Alice further. Alice accepted the renewed embrace without question. She had heard the