Carl turned on the tap that would allow water into the levies running through the cabbage fields. It shouldn’t be a problem. There’d been plenty of rain earlier in the year and anyway, they were still connected to the main grid. Ever since everything had settled down after the Changes, there had never been any problem with the water supply. Someone was still managing the big reservoirs, so it seemed, and the climate, despite the predictions of the previous century, was behaving well. The cycles of winter and summer, cold and heat, rain and sunshine, and all that they brought, had carried on just as before.
It was hot, now, though and it had been pretty dry for the last six weeks. All the crops had to be watered, clearly, but the cabbage was now particularly important. Deprive it of water now and they might lose all of it.
Carl pushed back his base-ball cap and wiped the sweat form his forehead. Any second now he would hear the gurgle that told him the water had arrived in the pipe, and the woosh-woosh as the levy filled. He could imagine himself putting his hand into the cool water, cupping it, and taking a welcome drink. So, what if irrigation water wasn’t recommended? He’d been drinking it for years and had never had any ill effect. What usually took seconds seemed to be taking hours, though, today. Carl shut his eyes and waited.
There was suddenly a loud clunk and the pipe leading up to the tap began to hum.
“What the blazes…?” said Carl to no one in particular.
Carl sat in the Great Hall fanning his face with his hat. The air con units still worked but they were used sparingly: since the Changes energy as well as water was precious.
“So you tested the whole network?” said the senior Proctor. “And there was no sign of a leak anywhere?”
“Nope!” said Carl. He had checked. Absolutely thoroughly. Not that he’s needed to. He and Barnaby always kept the pipes in excellent order. “The leak must be before it gets to us,” he said. “Or else it’s a problem with the reservoir.”
“Very well,” said the Proctor. “I’ll send a team to investigate. I’d like you or Barnaby Jackson to head the team. Not both of you.”
It would be the first time anyone had left the Compound in over five years. The last time had been when they’d buried those that had died of the mystery illness. They’d gone as far away from the survivors as they could without putting their lives at risk in other ways. The reservoir was at least a week’s journey away, if they kept stopping to listen for leaks.
Carl nodded and left the Hall. The coolness of the dark corridors outside was welcome. It didn’t make him feel any more comfortable, though. Now he had to go and have a difficult conversation with Barnaby Jackson. Yet, he felt strangely excited.
Carl stared at the great expanse of water that stretched in front of him. He hadn’t realised the reservoir would be so big. It looked still and calm but the breeze was enough to make small waves ripple at its edges. It matched the turquoise of the sky. Where the sides weren’t built-up there were sandy beaches. He suddenly had a longing for the days when people took leisure trips to places such as this. Families having picnics by the side of the water. Kids swimming and young men diving off the rocks. Older guys like him fishing or perhaps taking a boat across.
There was no time for that sort of thing these days. They only survived if they worked.
“Well, there’s nothing wrong with that,” said Patrick O’Leary. He was pointing to the high water mark. It was only about a foot above where the water was now. “There must be something blocking it up right here,” he said. All of the pipes they’d listened to had been totally empty.
Carl nodded and got down from his horse. He was saddle-sore but otherwise glad he’d come instead of Barnaby. There’d been no straw pole in the end. Banrnaby had a wife and three daughters. Carl was single. It had been a no-brainer. And it had all been worth it. They’d seen plenty of water on the way. There were lots of other supplies they could use if there was something wrong with the reservoir, though it would mean piping them. He’d been overwhelmed, too, by the richness of the scenery; the lakes and streams, obviously, but the pine forests with the deep blue sky setting off their dark green needles, and the mountains in the distance, terracotta fingers, nails lacquered with snow. He knew he would have to find other excuses for leaving the Compound. Now he had seen all of this, though, he could not be without it.
“So what’s the plan?” said Bradley Spenser, the one who’d been mainly responsible for finding the way here.
“Try to find out who’s been looking after this place,” said Carl. “And see what’s wrong. Maybe we can help.”
Two hours later they had found out very little. There was a cottage where it looked as if someone had lived for a while. It was untidy and abandoned and whoever had lived there had left in a hurry. There were the maggot-infected remains of what looked like a half-eaten meal on the kitchen table. And it whiffed.
“I’m going to barf if we don’t get out of here soon,” said Wilf Atkins.
Yes, Carl knew what he meant. It stank. But it still didn’t help them to work out why the water supply had failed though the water was plentiful.
“Why don’t we go for a swim and look again later?” suggested Bradley. “It’ll give us a bit more energy.”
Well it wouldn’t hurt,
It was quite good in the end, even if it hadn’t been the type of family holiday leisure day out Carl had thought about earlier. It just wasn’t the same with a group of ugly middle-aged men skinny-dipping and telling dirty jokes. Still it was good to feel clean from the water and then sleepy from the sun on your back as you stretched out to dry.
Until Patrick shouted out just after he’d gone into the water for the third time. “Cripes, mate, will you look at this? Holy shit, I can’t move it.”
The others rushed back into the water. Patrick kept taking a deep breath and diving down. “It’s a body,” he said. “And it seems to be blocking up the main channel out of the reservoir. There’s some sort of door down there, and it’s half shut. Mates, I think we’ve found the problem.”
It took them another hour to get the body out of the water. They were as hot and thirsty after they’d finished that as they were before they’d had their swim. They got him out at last and even managed to open the door so that the water could flow freely again.
“There must be some sort of system to that,” said Bradley. “And I bet he’s the only geyser who knew how it worked.”
They found a set of keys in his pocket. Carl guessed they would be for the cottage and perhaps something to do with some engine room that worked on the gates of the reservoir.
Carl stared at the body. It was bloated and grey. Half of its face was missing. Eaten by fish, he supposed. Poor guy. “How long do you think he’s been there?” he said.
“About a week before we lost our water supply?” suggested Bradley. “That’s how long it would take the pipes to empty, I’m thinking.”
That made sense, he supposed. He didn’t have time to think about it for long, though. Suddenly they could hear motor-bike engines.
“Where’ve the bastards get their fuel from?” murmured Wilf, grabbing his clothes and picking up the rifle that never left his side. It looked good but it would be useless if the visitors posed any real danger: ammunition other than blanks for it had run out more than ten years ago.
“We’d better hide,” said Bradley.
Carl and Spenser picked up their clothes and followed Wilf into the bushes.
Carl watched the two riders get off their Triumphs. For a few seconds he envied them. Before the Changes he used to own a small Triumph. One of the classier ones like one of those had been next on his shopping list.
The riders took off their helmets. One of them shook out long straight hair. It looked just like the hair in one of the old shampoo ads. How did they mange to stay so well-groomed?
The strangers walked towards the water’s edge and stood right in front of the bushes where the men were hiding.
“Plenty of water here,” one of them said. Cripes, it was a girl.
“Shall we set up camp here, then?” the other rider replied. Another female.
The first girl turned towards where they were hiding. My god, she was gorgeous. Carl wished he could touch her. He’d not come across a woman who’d made him feel like that in a long, long time. He mouth was dry and his heart was pounding. And for the first time in months he was getting an erection that he hadn’t induced himself. She was so close now. It was unbearable. He turned so the others couldn’t see; there had been no time to dress.
Atkins fired his rifle into the air. The plainer of the two girls shrieked. Then both of them ran towards their bikes. Seconds later they were riding back towards the road. Carl’s erection collapsed.
What did you want to do that for? thought Carl. We could have got to know them, maybe invited them back to the Compound. They’d surely make good breeding stock? It was getting a bit critical back there. A shadow of the erection returned. He wouldn’t mind being involved in that particular programme. Not of that girl was one of the females.
All at once, though, he couldn’t move. Cripes, this hadn’t happened since before the Changes. It was a rare form of epilepsy, the doctors had said. They’d given him some medication that kept it under control. Of course that ran out shortly after the troubles started. But he’d never had another attack, and he guessed it was because life was actually even less stressful once everything had settled down than it had been before it all kicked off. He felt himself topple to the ground.
“God almighty, Carl,” he heard Wilf say. “What’s up?”
Bradley felt his pulse and then put his ear to his chest. “Nothing,” he said. “I think he’s gone.”
Get a mirror, you bastards, Will thought. He was still breathing and he did still have a pulse, though both would be very hard to track without a stethoscope. He could hear and see but he couldn’t move a muscle.
“Poor bugger,” said Wilf.
“Quite a nice way to go, though,” said Bradley.
I’m not dead, you clots, thought Carl. Don’t you dare try to put me six foot under.
“Hey,” laughed Wilf, “you don’t think it was because he got a bit too excited about that one with the blond hair, do you? I’d swear he’s still got a bit of a stiffy.”
“Oh, come on mate,” said Bradley. “You shouldn’t joke about the dead. We’d better do something about these two.”
Fortunately, it was too hot for the men to do more than just dig two very shallow graves, put the two bodies in and cover them with leaves. Carl could still breathe. It was just a matter of waiting.
Six hours had gone by, Carl reckoned, by the time he could move again. It was dark but at least there was a bright moon. The others had taken his clothes and his horse. His first priority was to find something to wear.
When he raided the reservoir keeper’s cottage, he found that the stench that had almost made Wilf barf came not from the leftover meal but from the bodies of the woman and the baby he found upstairs.
“At least you had a woman, you lucky sod,” he whispered to the reservoir-keeper as he laid the woman and child to rest in what had been his own grave, “and she must have been okay to shag if you managed to impregnate her. Well, you’re lying together again now. Enjoy.”
He soon got the place tided up and found out how to work the doors and gates on the reservoir. All of the machinery still worked beautifully. He smiled to himself when he thought of the folk back at the Compound amazed at how lucky they were that the reservoir was still holding out. He wondered whether they’d held a memorial service for him.
But he didn’t want to try and get back. There would be too much explaining to do. Besides, it was glorious here. He could enjoy the trees against the sky and the snow-capped mountains all of the time now. The cottage was cosy and there were plenty of fish in the reservoir. If he got a bit lonely, he would go and talk to the graves of the reservoir-keeper and his wife.
And who knows, one day he might hear the sound of a Triumph motorbike again. And it might even deliver a beautiful blond woman.
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