The Apocalypse Blog
by Melanie Edmonds

The mall is a strange beast. We arrived after a couple of hours’ walking this morning, stepping past the acid-streaked signs welcoming us to Paradise Arms and pointing us to parking.

The car parks still had a lot of cars sitting there, some with the doors standing open; the bomb had gone off in the middle of prime pre-Christmas shopping time and left a lot of people stranded at places like these. It looks like they took whatever they could out of the cars and then abandoned them in favour of walking, leaving their interiors to the untender mercies of the rain. I wonder where they all went. That time feels so long ago now; they could be anywhere.

The outside of the mall was marked with graffiti tags, both faded and fresh. That put us on the alert as we pushed our way inside. It was surprisingly tidy inside the mall; I’m used to finding wares scattered all over the floor, trodden on and discarded in favour of something better. The shops did have that turned-over look, as if everything had been picked up and put back down again, just slightly out of place. Careful thieves came here.

We were looking at the mall map when we heard the first sign of life. It felt so weird, standing in front of a plastic board and trying to work out what shop was where, as if it was any normal shopping day, as if we had come with money to spend. The interruption brought us back into the time After, turned us from shoppers to scavengers, and the world made both more and less sense again. A skitter of movement in the lack of music, the clip of a heel against the hard floor. It’s frightening to know how qiuckly the weapons leapt into our hands, and saddening that I didn’t hesitate over it at all.

My heart was thrumming against my chest as we clumped up, little ones in the middle. Dillon wanted to be up front, but I kept him behind me with a fistful of his shirt in my free hand. Ben lined up with the rest of us, a dark look in his eye, and my worry for him spiked. I was afraid that he would do something stupid and reckless just to dull the pain inside, or perhaps to vent it.

Realising that we were in the middle of the thoroughfare, Thorpe moved us over to the doorway of a bedding store. We shifted just in time; a hail of random missiles peppered the floor we had just vacated and made us shrink further into the store. Ornaments smashed on the floor, metal bowls clanged, even candles thumped down and rolled away. Following the objects were voices shouting at us to get out, leave here, this was their mall, get out.

We looked at each other, temporarily safe behind the glass front of the bedding store. We had no idea how many of them there were, and while they sounded young, there was no knowing what they had managed to get their hands on. They pelted the doorway with household decorations every time we peeked out. We called out for them to stop to give us a chance to leave, but they didn’t seem to hear us.

It was a few minutes before I realised that we were two people short. Matt and Alice were missing, and a quick search of the store didn’t find them. I was terrified that something had happened to them, that they had been stolen away by our unseen enemies. After Ben’s loss, I was determined not to lose anything – or anyone – more.

I was just about to suggest we go confront the ornament-chuckers when Matt reappeared. I smacked him for scaring me like that; he smiled and told me to stop being silly. In that moment, I saw a shard of my old friend, reassuring and confident and never unkind, even when he was telling me to calm down. It was enough to make me relax again and give him the chance to explain.

He and Alice had gone out the back way and circled around behind our attackers – there’s a way if you know how to navigate the back corridors and doors of a mall. Matt had had lots of practice in that when he was stuck with the Sharks. They were just kids, he said. No-one over fifteen or sixteen. Alice was still there, keeping an eye on them.

We decided to split up. A couple of us stayed in the bedding store, shouting answers to the attackers every now and then. The rest followed Matt around to meet up with Alice, to surprise them from behind. Sax stayed with me to keep up the pretence that none of us had moved.

The shouting was our cue to move. I crept out, and when no ornaments came hurtling towards me, ran up the thoroughfare towards the fight. There weren’t many of them and they were facing people a lot bigger than they were, but those kids were fighting hard anyway. I don’t like how hard we had to hit them to make them stop; I don’t like that some of our number hit them more than was necessary and had to be stopped.

By the end of it, we were all bruised and I could taste blood from where a teenager had split my lip. The kids were all sitting on the floor, having been tossed or shoved into a lump there, while we stood in a ring around them. They were all rebellious glares and wishing that they held the weapons we were keeping them at bay with.

Of course, then we had no idea what to do with them. What could we do? We couldn’t let them go free – they would just attack us again. We couldn’t watch them forever – there weren’t enough of us to do that and anything else at the same time. We were in a standoff, and the only hope for a decent resolution was to talk to them. I don’t think any of us was very optimistic about how that would turn out.

It sounds like Masterson is making himself unpopular again. I’d better go make sure they don’t staple him to a wall or anything. When did I turn into everyone’s mother?

Masterson is getting more confident with every passing day, and more reckless along with it. He got himself smacked in the mouth last night; it’s not going to be long before he pushes someone into something serious. He couldn’t have picked a worse time; we’re already tense enough. I can’t worry about him every second; I have enough people to look after right now.

Yesterday, once we had the kids subdued, it fell quiet while we eyed each other. My heart was just starting to come down from the fighting high, though not by much; it wasn’t time to relax yet. But I had to think about what to do next, how to handle the fact that we suddenly had prisoners. What the hell are we supposed to do with prisoners?

One of the teenagers kneeling on the floor spoke first. “So, you gonna kill us?” She was glaring at us angrily, one after another, daring us to try, as if they weren’t so much caught as resting.

“No.” That was Thorpe, I think.

“Of course not,” I said almost at the same time.

“Ain’t that what you do?” the girl asked.

“Maybe they wanna fuck us first,” one of the lads put in, spitting at Matt’s feet.

That they would even think that made my stomach flop over inside me. Sometimes, I despise this world that’s crawling through its own ashes.

Masterson just had to stick his nose in before anyone else could say something. “Why, are you offering?”

“Shut up,” I said even as the boy who had spoken started to swell up with outrage. I turned my attention to him and tried to look him in the eye. “No, we don’t. We don’t do that.”

“Sure you do. You’re the Pride, that’s what you do.”

I was so surprised – and relieved – that I smiled at him as I told him that that’s not who we are. They didn’t believe us at first, but then one of the smaller boys pointed out that we didn’t have any guns. I wasn’t thrilled to know that the big, vicious gang near here was armed with guns, but at least it was proof that we weren’t part of that group. They asked us who we were and we didn’t know what to say. With a shrug, I told them my name and started to go around the group, but the girl that had spoken first interrupted me.

“Oh, you’re the Seekers.”

I blinked at her. “The what?”

“We heard about you, too. You’re their leader, right?” Why does everyone think that? “The Seekers, travellin’ around trying to find families or somethin’.” At the mention of families, I couldn’t help but glance at Ben. He didn’t flinch, didn’t look my way at all. It was like he couldn’t hear them. It took me a moment to realise that the girl had said something else. “You ain’t nothin’ like the Pride.”

“No, no we’re not.”

“So, you gonna let us up now?” She was slick, this kid.

“Not so fast.” I didn’t need to look at the others to know that that was a bad idea. “You know who we are, but we don’t know anything about you.”

I saw the girl’s lips twitch and knew that she had been trying to get one over on us. I had to wonder just what she’d heard about us. In this strong-armed society, was a lack of a violent example a weakness? I suppose that a nasty reputation is a form of protection, but I can’t think about what we’d need to do to get one. We won’t do that. No-one here would do that.

“We’re the Rats,” the girl told us, her chin lifting with pride.

“Never heard of you,” Thorpe said flatly.

The defensive barriers slammed up again. “Yeah, well, we keep to ourselves.”

We tossed words back and forth for a little while longer. The kids had been holed up in the mall since just after the bomb went off, staying when all the adults left to find help, or hope, or someone else. They had never come back, but the kids had stayed. And they were doing all right, thank you very much. They had driven off a few groups before us, and they’d drive off anyone who came after, too; it was only because we’d surprised them that we had been able to get the best of them. That wouldn’t happen again; they were very sure about that.

I have to admire their resolve. They’re determined and strong; they’ve adapted well. They say they’ve got enough supplies to last ‘a while’ but wisely refused to be more specific about it. If anything, they were a little too smart, enough that we didn’t dare to lower our guard with them for a second.

We explained that we were there for supplies. They were quick to let us know that there wasn’t any food or water here, but that wasn’t all we were looking for. We needed to visit a chemist – I tried to ignore Masterson’s eyes lighting up at that notion – and fresh clothes would be nice. They didn’t like the idea, but they weren’t in a position to argue.

Eventually, we agreed to let them go on the condition that they stayed far aaway from us. Thorpe was quick to growl at them that if they tried anything – anything at all – we would hogtie them and take whatever we pleased. I saw some of the kids’ expressions grow angry, but their spokeswoman said that they wouldn’t try anything against us. I don’t entirely trust them, but at least it’s a truce of sorts. At least we didn’t need to tie them up at the outset.

There’s a part of me that wonders if we were too easy on them – I think one day someone we let go will turn around and stab us in the back. Is it okay to distrust everyone on those grounds, or do we keep going as we are until it’s too late and there’s blood on the floor?

We’re still in the mall now. The rain came before we were done yesterday, and there are more stores that we need to check for equipment. The Rats have largely left us alone, though I’m sure that they’ve been watching us. We’re keeping sharp vigils at night, just in case, and I’ve heard them moving around in the dark hours.

I’ve just noticed some blotches on my arm. I don’t think I spilt anything on it. I wonder how long they’ve been there.

We were all set to head out yesterday, just a little after midday, but we didn’t make it outside the mall. I thank the numerous little delays – having to fetch Nugget from the toy store three times, telling Dillon only to take what he could carry, pulling Masterson away from the chemist after he had scoured it repeatedly. All of those things saved us, I think.

We were heading down the stairs towards the exit doors when it happened, when the light on the concrete turned ruddy beyond the threshold, and we stopped in puzzlement. It grew dark very quickly – it felt strange to notice it inside, but there are no bulbs burning to disguise the outdoor conditions. When the sky thickened and turned to red-shot black, it dipped the mall into a gloaming.

The first crack of thunder scared the crap out of us; it sounded like it was directly overhead, splitting the roof in two. We all flinched, some of us ducked, and the gaping silence that followed it was peppered with muttered swearwords. When the second flashbang ripped the air above the mall, we retreated back up the stairs. It didn’t make any difference except to make us feel better.

There were a couple more lightning flashes before the rain fell. It was like someone had turned on a tap: all of a sudden, there was a downpour happening, hissing and spraying up off the concrete at the glass mall doors. I haven’t seen it fall that hard since the bomb went off. Usually, it’s a slithering, melting thing, but this was all about pounding and filling up the streets with its glistening, deadly mass.

If we had been out there, we wouldn’t have had time to get inside before it came.

Knowing that still makes my abdomen contract, shrinking in on itself with fear. The skin between my shoulderblades crawls as if it can already feel the acid trickling over and through it.

We were all quiet as we watched it turn the parking lot outside into a shallow lake. Then I sighed and said we should find somewhere to settle down. We trudged back to the bedding store and unslung our packs again, and set about making ourselves comfortable. We rescued the candles that the Rats had pelted us with and turned the store into a flickering haven.

The Rats came to harry us not long after the storm started, asking what the hell we were still doing in the mall. They wanted us out of there, and they definitely didn’t like seeing us making ourselves at home.

I lost my temper with them. I told them that if we had left, we’d all be dead now, melted into nothing like so many other people. Is that what they want: to wish death on people? Don’t they know how few of us there are left, how many more are lost every day? Hasn’t there been enough of that by now? But anyway, it’s tough; we’re here, and we’re staying, and that’s it. So they can either leave, or be quiet, or both.

I’m not sure what I was channeling in that speech. The closed look on Ben’s face. The desperate huddle in Alice’s shoulders. The rattling cough that’s keeping Sax awake at night. My own fear, twisted into an angry front. All of it was spilt on their heads.

They were surprised enough to be silent while I turned on my heel and walked away. I got as far as one of the beds and then sat down, shaking. The strange thing was that I don’t think it was adrenaline that was making me tremble; it felt like something else. It was hard to catch my breath. The spots are on more than just my arms now.

I think there’s something wrong with me.

The storm has been washing over us for more than a day now. It comes in waves, all wind and the shattering noise of thunder, and the thrashing of the rain. We’re too far inside the building to see much of the lightning, but it still crackles far too close for comfort. Then it’ll circle away from us, spinning out to punish some other district before it comes back around to us again. The drains are audibly thick with it, something which makes most of us nervous.

We relocated to a furniture store on the upper floor, further towards the centre of the mall. No-one wants to wake up to a flood that’ll eat us before we can get out of bed. The Rats are unhappy and have a tendency to linger within eyeshot, sometimes within earshot too.

I don’t dare to post while they might be around; I don’t want them to know that the laptop works. I had a pink vest yesterday and this morning it had disappeared, and it’s just not something that anyone else in my group would wear. That’s not the only thing that has gone missing; I’ve heard a couple of the others asking if anyone has seen something – a piece of clothing, a pocketknife, a broken watch.

We’re running short of food and water. We haven’t found any in the stores we’ve been in, and we don’t want to push our luck with the Rats – there are a couple of sports stores here and several household shops, all of which used to hold things that would make good weapons. The kids are wary but they’re not intimidated by us, and I think they’ve been around long enough to have a reason for that confidence. I would rather not find out what that reason is. This truce is so fragile.

We’re hoping for a break in the storm soon, so we can go out and check the other places around here for supplies.

This morning, Ben and I wound up sitting alone while the others were off checking out other parts of the mall. I didn’t feel up to trudging about and he was only too happy to stay behind and mope. I was tired, so I didn’t push him for a conversation, and I was surprised when he started one.

“Do you ever get frustrated with all the delays, Faith?”

I was lying on a couch and pulled my feet up so he could sit down. He didn’t mind when I stretched my legs across his lap. “Yeah, of course. But we can only do what we can do.”

He looked at me searchingly, and there was such darkness in his look. It crouched on his expression, heavy and pressing. “We’re always too late.”

It does seem that way. Sax’s daughter missing, Dillon’s parents moved on, Ben’s sister giving up. Something in his voice made me hesitate before I could agree and the words changed on my tongue. “It wasn’t your fault, Ben. We got there as quick as we could.”

He didn’t answer, just looked down at the hems of my jeans, streaked with dirt and grease and black rubber from my own bootsoles.

“You can’t blame yourself. Don’t torture yourself that way, please. We did what we had to at the time. You know that.” I reached over for his hand.

“I could have gone alone. I could have tried.” He took my hand, even though he was accepting my words.

“And you might not have made it at all. You might have walked into the Pride, into anything.” I know he was right. There’s more we all could have done to get there sooner. There always is. Is any of it enough? Are we trying as hard as we should be, as much as we can? But he needed something different from me right then, so I disagreed with him.

At least he wasn’t getting angry any more; he wasn’t shouting. He was quiet and concentrated about it; he was more like the Ben I had come to know. “I just don’t understand,” he said after a moment, a bleak puzzlement in his voice. “I don’t understand how it happened.”

All this time, the past few days, he’s been trying to make sense of this and just can’t. All he’s been able to feel is the hole in his life, like a blind man trying to figure out where a cup has gone from the ring it left on a table. There was an ache in my chest for him then and I shifted around to curl against his side.

“She did the best thing she could see to do, I guess.”

I can understand it, and that scares me a little. It piqued Ben’s attention, too; he looked at me again. “Could you ever do something like that?”

I didn’t know what to tell him. My throat closed up just at the thought of it, at how Kim must have felt when she walked into that baby-blue bedroom and picked up the pillow. At the thought of ever having to make that decision. “I don’t think I’m that brave,” I told him finally.

I saw his eyes shining brightly when he turned his head away, and sat quietly with him until the others came back. When I got up to see what they were fussing over, he squeezed my hand and came with me. He was the presence behind my right shoulder again, my steely support that was more silent than ever. It’s a step in the right direction, I suppose.

Last night, Ben drew me into the back room of the store and told me that he needed me. It was so dark that I could barely see him, but I caught the look in his eyes. I’m right here, I told him, I’m right here. A dam broke in him and what followed was the most intense sex I’ve ever had. He wasn’t rough – he’s never rough – but it was a lot about letting something give way, about not holding back. We hadn’t been together since we got to his sister’s building, and I think we both needed it.

It wasn’t until he got up this morning that I saw the splotches on his back, just like the ones on my arms. Neither of us had noticed them in the dark; even if the lights had been on, we wouldn’t have seen them during that. I asked him about them, and he got touchy until I showed him mine. He’d had them for a few days, he said.

I was sore and drained, far more than I should have been, even after such a bright bout of activity like last night’s. I didn’t like it, or the way the fear scuttled around in my stomach. A part of me knows that I was probably being over-sensitive and over-reacting, but what if I wasn’t?

Ben fetched Masterson over to us and made him check the marks. The doctor sighed and asked a couple of questions, and said that we’d all just changed our clothes. There was probably something in them that we’re allergic to. It’s also possible that the Rats booby-trapped the garments – maybe they made their own version of itching powder – and that could be causing it.

An allergy. I’ve never been allergic to anything in my life, but I guess there’s a first time for everything. It’s a relief to know that’s all it is. I’ll just switch to my old (yuck) clothes for a couple of days and wait for it to calm down.

Now, if only it would stop raining.

Courage has been swelling in the Rats; they are getting used to having us around. I’ve seen a few of them talking to Dillon and Alice. They don’t trust us adults and go quiet whenever we stray too close, but they chat with the youngsters easily enough. I wonder if they’re trying to tempt them to stay here.

I’ve even seen a couple of the girls fussing over Nugget; one of them managed to get her to sit still long enough to brush her hair out. She looks like a different girl with her pale hair all smooth and neat, though she was quick to rough it up with her hands when she was free of the attention. She did allow them to pat Jones, who I suspect has been visiting the enemy camp to beg for food. He hasn’t been getting much from us lately; we’re running too short.

I caught up with Dillon earlier and he told me about the tales the Rats spun. He had asked them how often the Pride come here – he’s scared of meeting them, I think, as are the Rats. I had wondered the same thing myself; I think we all have. It’s another reason why we’re eager to get out of here.

The Pride has never come here. I hadn’t seen any of their tags around here, but that’s because there aren’t any; it’s a relief to know that we hadn’t missed the signs. The kids were acting on rumours when they accused us of being from that gang. Rumours and accumulated fear.

The Rats leave the mall often, Dillon said, especially if they get visited. They like to sneak about and spy on the other groups, creeping close enough to listen to their conversations. That’s how they heard so much about the Pride, about their habits of killing and raping. I can just imagine the shell-shocked escapees exchanging trembling words and the hidden kids filling in the details for themselves. It’s hard to know whether to believe that they’re as bad as they sound, but can we risk believing anything less?

That’s also how they heard about us. The Seekers. As names go, it’s not bad, I suppose. I can live with that. I wonder who was talking about us. This is a long way from those we’ve encountered directly, but maybe there is still a gossip network in place even after everything ended. That would be typical; human nature exists in friend-of-a-friend told me and did you hear about and you’ll never guess what I heard.

The Rats picked up other things from the grapevine, too. Like the sickness that struck Alice’s group; they picked up word of a couple of groups falling ill, mostly from people fleeing from it in the hopes of staying healthy. They also caught word of mindless attackers harrying travellers and settled groups alike. They said that more people than usual had been passing through this area over the past couple of weeks, hurrying away from scenes of awful violence. One couple had been chased out of their home, and another gang had run for a week from an attack so bad that none of them said much about it.

And now the rain won’t stop falling. It hiccups every now and then, pausing for an hour or two – just long enough for us to start to think about heading out in it – and then it’ll be back, hammering our hopes into the ground and melting them away. The lightning is becoming rarer, so we’re hoping that this storm will blow itself out soon. We’re all on half-rations to try to make our supplies last long enough.

I wish the Rats had had some good news to give us. I suppose the fact that they’ve seen a lot of people lately is good; it means that there are more survivors out there. Knowing that people are still alive makes this all seem less terrible, less final, less like we’re the dregs of a species that has killed itself. It gives me hope that others I know might still be alive.

I don’t want to find what Ben did when I get home. My dad is a sensible guy; he used to teach me how to fix things and tell me to remember to take my little army knife with me everywhere, because you never know, Faithy, you never know. That little fold-out screwdriver might come in useful someday. You were right, Dad, it has. Someday came for me, and it came for you, too. It came for all of us. I hope you took your own advice.

Crap. I must have cut myself. Better go.

I didn’t cut myself yesterday. My fingernails were bleeding. I freaked out when I saw it; I didn’t even realise I’d made a noise until a couple of the others came running over. It wasn’t until Sally covered my hands with a towel that I managed to calm down. Then I fainted.

I’ve never fainted before. Ever. I’ve never felt my head swim and then plunge into darkness like that. For an awful moment, I thought I was suffocating. Then I woke up in the middle of being lifted onto a bed in the furniture store. Embarrassment was the first thing that flooded over me, followed by the sneaking footprints of fear.

The weirdest thing was that it didn’t really hurt. I was just… leaking. My fingertips are all bound up now – I look like I tried to pick up a porcupine.

The rest of the group has been really good about it. I’m not allowed to get up until we figure out what’s going on, and Ben and Matt keep bringing me things. Food, water, sometimes a conversation, though the latter not so much from Ben. He looks scared, I think, though it’s hard to tell with him. I haven’t told him how shaky I get when I try to stand up. I feel like all the strength has been drained out of me.

Getting harder to concentrate; I can’t post much. Sax’s cough is worse, and I think he’s laid up now as well. Could have sworn I heard someone else coughing too.

Need to rest. Post more later.

Whatever this is, it’s affecting more of us every day. I think it hit us some time ago, but we’ve all been ignoring it in favour of pushing on. The little shaky moments, blemishes on the skin, a random nosebleed; all easily discarded and worked through until it becomes too much.

There are six of us laid up now. Six. A part of me feels guilty, as if by being the first I somehow brought this on all of us. I don’t know if that’s true. I hope it’s not true. But what if it is? What if I’m the one who picked this up and brought it home to this strange little family of mine?

What if I’ve done something irreparable to us all?

Ben is lying on one side of me, Dillon on the other. The former came to sleep next to me last night, looking stressed and close-lipped. I asked him if he was all right and he shook his head, but he wouldn’t talk about it. He spat out blood this morning – his gums mouth was bleeding. I told him that he mustn’t get up. He was so pale and didn’t seem to want to move anyway.

A little while later, Dillon snuck up to my side and touched my arm. Tears had been roughly rubbed off his cheeks and he said he didn’t feel good. He had blotches on his legs and stomach, and he said his nose had been bleeding too. So I moved over and he climbed onto the bed with us. When I felt him trembling, I put an arm around him and he snuggled into my side like a little kid. He’s trying so hard not to be scared, as we all are. I don’t have any answers for him, any hope to offer, but at least the cuddle made us both feel a bit better.

Sometime since I fainted, Sally and Thorpe also fell sick. Sax was already immovable on the couch he had claimed for a bed. All of us are blotchy and weak, all of us leak blood from time to time, though Sax is the only one coughing.

I keep trying not to think about Ben’s bleeding mouth but my gums feel strange to me now. One of my nightmares is trying to step out of my head and into my mouth; my dream-self always loses teeth when I’m stressed about something.

I don’t think this is an allergy. Masterson agrees with me, though he’s keeping his thoughts to himself. He looked at all of us, with fewer and fewer comments as he went around. I think he lingered the longest over Sally, even though she was the last one to go down. He hasn’t said anything encouraging, not even to the kids, but at least he stopped sniping.

He disappeared for a while earlier and returned with an armful of thick books. He doesn’t know what this is, but he’s looking for us. He’s trying.

Ben and I managed to snag Alice and ask her about her group’s sickness, but she says that that was nothing like this; it was more like ‘flu. She seems coiled, like she’s freaking out within the confines of her own skull. Fear skittered over her face when I asked her if this was what she had seen, as if we were going to accuse her of bringing it here. Which is reasonable, I suppose, but luckily unnecessary.

Poor Matt has been run off his feet. He’s taken it on himself to look after everyone, distributing food and water and to hell with the rationing. He’s frazzled and I think he’d like the chance to talk, but I’m braced by a boy on either side right now. He came and sat with us a little while ago; we talked about nothing over Dillon dozing on my shoulder. I tried to tell him that we’d be okay, but it’s hard to be convincing when I feel like something is drawing the strength out of me, rubbing me thinner and thinner.

The atmosphere in here is heavy and silent. Everyone is speaking in undertones, afraid to ruffle the air in case it turns on us, too. I wish Sax was able to sing; his warm voice would be good for all of us, but it has been torn to shreds by his cough. I feel so useless just lying here.

Sometimes, it feels like I can hear our hope dying, and I remember what my dad told me when I had the ‘flu once: “There are two kinds of people, Faithy. Those who accept that they’re sick, and those who fight it until they’re well again. It’s not just about medicine; letting it win on the inside lets it take the rest of you, too.”

Our insides are losing. I don’t know what to do. Focussing on the others usually helps distract me from my own feelings, but the bleakness is inescapable.

Maybe I can get us singing. I wonder if we’re still strong enough for that.

It was strange, listening to the others sing last night. I got us going on a round of Row Your Boat – that was about as creative and complicated as I could manage. We were wheezy and thin, but our voices were there, pushing the silence away from us. Little things matter more than you think.

It was the rendition of What Do We Do With The Drunken Sailor that got everyone laughing. Matt started it, and when he saw us smiling, he hammed it up until we were all grins and giggles. He even got a glimmer out of Nugget and made her dance about with him. It made me tired just watching him, but I’d watch him in my sleep if I could, waving his sequinned pillowcases and turning a curtain into a cape. It made us forget for a while, and we all needed that.

It was quieter than usual when we woke up today. We had to send Alice out to check before we knew what it was: the rain had stopped. At last, the storm has blown itself away and the rain has stopped. That seems like a good sign.

Nugget had a nosebleed this morning. Masterson found splotches on her legs and has confined her to bed. She went quietly, hugging in next to Sally. I suspect her grip is tighter than her solemn face shows.

Coughs are tickling at Ben. He’s trying to hide it – or suppress it so that Dillon and I aren’t disturbed by it – but I know they’re there. He holds my hand a lot at the moment, gently because my fingers are taped but tightly when he’s not paying attention. I lean on him to let him know I’m here.

The Rats have poked their noses in here a few times since I fainted and we started becoming bed-bound. They didn’t come closer than the doorway, and when they realised what was happening, they threatened us, in case we pass this sickness on to them. I don’t blame them; I’d be scared too, in their position.

I’m scared enough in my own position. I’m so tired of thinking of everyone else. Is it someone else’s turn yet? I think I need to sleep for a week.

Masterson’s getting all excited. I should go find out what’s going on, but I can’t get up. Hopefully Matt will come and tell us what’s going on.

Scurvy. We have scurvy.

I can’t believe it. It’s so simple but so debilitating. It isn’t something I’ve ever had to worry about before; all I know about it is that it happens when you don’t eat enough oranges and sailors used to get it.

It’s the sailors that tipped Masterson off. Or, more precisely, us singing about them a couple of nights ago. It bothered him half the night, he said, and it came to him suddenly yesterday morning while I was writing the post. That’s why he was running around like a little kid. He sent Matt and Alice off to the chemist to get vitamin pills and then bounced around the room to tell us the good news.

I haven’t seen Masterson so animated since we left the hospital. He smiled at us – real smiles, not the sardonic lip-stretches that he usually tosses in our direction, or the drug-fuzzed approximations he wore when there were still drugs to take. He’d found the answer to the riddle, and the cure to what ails us is right here, in this building. He can make us better.

This is why he became a doctor, he said. This purpose, this feeling. He had forgotten what it was like. And I think that some of us had forgotten why he was with us at all, even me, though this was the reason I had been so determined to let him stay. This is why we all put up with his unpleasantness and drag his sorry ass around after us even when spite rolls off his tongue.

He’s a doctor; he heals people. That is so precious, even more now than it was before, because there are so few of them left.

One of the few things I know about scurvy is that it killed a lot of sailors before they figured it out. It didn’t get that far for us, though it was starting to get close.

Yesterday, Dr Masterson saved our lives.

We’ll be perfectly fine, he says. We just need to crunch down these pills and it’ll all come right again. I can’t express how much lighter I felt when he said that. I’d have kissed Ben if my mouth had felt better (my gums still feel weird, but I’m trying not to think about that). There were hugs, though, lots of hugs and tired laughter, for everyone.

Today, Matt and Alice have gone outside to see if they can find us some supplies. The Rats have been reassured. Things are looking up. I’d dance if I could – and I plan to once we’re all better.

I’m a feather with its down smooshed right now. I just need some time to fluff up again.