'Is Suzie really as dangerous as everyone seems to think she is?' said Joanna, after a while, just to be saying something.
'More, if anything,' I said honestly. 'She built her reputation on the bodies of her enemies, and a complete willingness to take risks even Norse berserkers would have balked at. Suzie doesn't know the meaning of the word
Joanna had to laugh. 'Damn it, John; don't you know any normal people here?'
I laughed a little myself. 'There are no normal people here. Normal people would have more sense than to stick around in a place like this.'
We walked on, and though people were giving me plenty of room, no-one even glanced at me. Privacy is greatly valued in the Nightside, if only because so many of us have so much to hide. The traffic roared past, never stopping, rarely slowing, always in such a hurry to be somewhere else, to be doing something somebody else would be sure to disapprove of. There are no traffic lights in the Nightside. No-one would pay them any attention anyway. There are no official
street crossings, either. You get to the other side of the street through courage and resolve and intimidating the traffic to get out of your way. Though I'm told bribery is also pretty effective. I looked at Joanna, and asked her a question I'd been putting off for too long. Now we were finally getting close to Cathy, I felt I needed to know the answer.
'You said this wasn't the first time Cathy ran away. Why does she keep running away, Joanna?'
'I try to spend time with her,' said Joanna, looking straight ahead. 'Quality time, when I can. But it isn't always possible. I lead a very busy life. I work all the hours God sends, just to stay in one place. It's ten times harder for a woman than a man, to get ahead and stay ahead in the business world. The people I have to deal with every day would eat sharks for breakfast, as an appetizer, and have turned betrayal and back-stabbing into a fine art. I work bloody hard, for the security Cathy takes for granted, to get the money to pay for all the things she just has to have. Though Heaven forfend she should show the slightest interest in the business that makes her comfortable world possible.'
'Do you enjoy your work?'
'Sometimes.'
'Ever thought about trying something else?'
'It's what I'm good at,' she said, and I had to nod. I knew all about that.
'No stepfathers?' I said casually. 'Or father figures? Someone else she could turn to, talk to?'
'Hell, no. I swore I'd never make the mistake of being tied to a man again,' Joanna said fiercely. 'Not after what Cathy's father put me through, just because he thought he could. I'm my own woman now, and whoever comes into my life does so on my terms. Not a lot of men can cope with that. And I have trouble hanging on to the few that can. The work, again. Still, Cathy never wanted for anything she really needed. I raised her to be bright, and sharp, and independent.'
'Even from you?' I said quietly. Joanna wouldn't even look at me.
And that was when the world suddenly changed. The living city disappeared, and abruptly we were somewhere else. Somewhere much worse. Joanna and I stumbled on for a few steps, caught off guard, and then we stopped and looked quickly about us. The street was empty of people and the road was empty of traffic. Most of the buildings surrounding us were nothing more than ruins and rubble. The taller buildings had apparently collapsed, long ago, and everywhere I looked nothing was more than a storey or two high. I could see for miles now, all the way to the horizon, and it was all destruction and devastation. I turned in a slow circle, and everywhere was the same. We had come to a dead place. London, the Nightside, the old city, was now a thing of the
past. Something bad had come, and stamped it all flat.
It was very dark now, with all the street-lights and the glaring neon gone. What light there was had a dull, purple cast, as though the night itself was bruised. It was hard to make out anything clearly. There were shadows everywhere, very deep and very dark. Not a normal light to be seen anywhere, in any of the wrecked and tumbledown buildings; not even the flicker of a camp-fire. We were all alone, in the night. Joanna fumbled in her bag and finally produced her cigarette lighter. Her hands shook so much it took her half a dozen goes to get it to light. The warm yellow flame seemed out of place in such a night, and the glow didn't travel far. She held the lighter up high as we looked around, trying to get some sense of where we were, although I already had a sinking feeling I knew what had happened.
It was quiet. Very quiet. No sounds at all, save for the shuffling of our feet and our own unsteady breathing. Such utter quiet was eerie, unsettling. The roar of the city was gone, along with its inhabitants. London had been silenced, the hard way. I only had to look around in the awful purple light to know that we had come to an empty place. The heavy silence was almost overpowering, until I felt like shouting out... something, just to emphasize my presence. But I didn't. There might have been something listening. Even worse, there might not.
I'd never felt so alone in my life.
All around us the buildings were squat, deformed, their shapes altered and the edges softened by exposure to wind and rain. Long exposure. All the windows were empty, every trace of glass gone, and I couldn't see a single doorway with a door; just dark openings, like eyes or mouths, or maybe wounds. There was something almost unbearably sad in seeing such a mighty city brought so low. All those centuries of building and expanding, all those many lives supporting and giving it purpose, all for nothing, in the end. I moved slowly forward, and puffs of dust sprang up around my feet. Joanna made a noise at the back of her throat and moved slowly after me.
It was cold. Stark and bitter cold, as though all the heat had gone out of the world. The air was still, with not even a breath of wind blowing. Our footsteps seemed very loud in the quiet, loud and carrying as we walked down the middle of what had once been a street, through what had once been a vital, thriving place. We were both shivering now, and it had nothing to do with the cold. This was a bad place, and we didn't belong here. Off in the distance, broken buildings stood blackly against the horizon in jagged silhouettes, shadows of what they had once been. The city, inside and out, was over.
'Where are we?' Joanna said finally. The hand holding up the lighter was steadier now, but her voice trembled. I didn't blame her.
'Not... where,' I said. 'When. This is the future. The far future, by the look of it. London has fallen, and civilisation has come and gone. This isn't even an epilogue. Someone closed the book on London and the Nightside, and closed it hard. We've stumbled into a Timeslip. An enclosed area where Time can jump back and forth, into the past and the future and everything in between. Needless to say, there wasn't a Timeslip here the last time I came this way. Anyone with two brain cells to rub together knows enough to avoid Timeslips, and they're always well sign-posted. If only because they're such arbitrary things. No-one understands how they work, or even what causes them. They come and they go, and so do whatever poor bastards get sucked up in them.'
'You mean we're trapped here?'
'Not necessarily. I've been using my gift to try and find us a way out. The physical area of a Timeslip isn't very large. If I can just locate the boundaries, crack open a weak spot...'
'Not very large!' Joanna's voice rose, harsh with emotion. 'I can see for miles, all the way to the horizon! It'll take us weeks to walk out of here!'
'Things aren't always as they appear. You should know that by now.' I kept my voice calm and light, trying to sound knowledgeable and reassuring, and not at all as though I was just guessing. 'While we're in the Timeslip, we see all of it; but the actual affected area is comparatively small. Once I can crack
a hole in the boundary, and we walk through, we'll snap back to our own time. And I'd say we're only half an hour away. Easy walk. Assuming, of course, that nothing goes wrong.'
'Wrong?' said Joanna, seizing on the word. 'What could possibly go wrong? We're all alone here. This is the far future, and everyone's dead. Can't you feel it? The lights of London have finally gone out...'
'Nothing lasts forever,' I said. 'Everything comes to an end, in Time. Even the Nightside, I suppose. Let enough centuries pass, and even the greatest of monuments will fall.'
'Maybe they dropped the Bomb, after all.'
'No. The Nightside would survive the Bomb, I think. Whatever did happen here ... was much more final.'
