𝐇𝐨𝐦𝐞┃ Anthony Lockwood┃2┃

Chapter Fifty Six - The Other Side

It was very silent. The wind that had blown across the fields earlier had gone, and the night was bitterly cold. Thick wires and horseshoes of frost lay in the dents and ripples of the hard black earth. The whole land was white with it. A flat brightness lay over the field and the escarpment beyond, and on the dark trees at its top. The source of this brightness was hard to make out. There were no stars in the black sky, and no moon showing. Lockwood and Nola stood alone in the field, looking back at where they had been.

"Well, no one seems to be after us." Lockwood said. His voice sounded small. It didn't carry well in the freezing air. "That's good."

"Were there men at the doors?" Nola said. She found it hard to speak. "I didn't see any."

"No. They must have gone. Lucky for us."

"Yeah. Lucky."

Looking back, Nola saw that the floodlights had been turned off. She could see the poles hanging above the roofs like giant insects, bent and dead. The buildings showed like pieces of pale grey paper stuck onto a dark grey board. Even the lights in the hangar that they had just run from had been switched off. The institute was bathed in the same subdued, flat, grey glow that lit the field and trees.

"Power cut." Lockwood said. "Maybe that's what distracted them."

The outside of Lockwood's cape was thick with ice. Nola could feel the weight of hers hanging on her too. The insulating qualities of the feathers still worked well, though – she sensed, rather than felt, the gruelling cold all around. White threads swirled around the agents.

"Where's all this mist come from?" She said. "All this frost? It wasn't here before."

"Some effect of their experiments?" Lockwood suggested. "I don't know."

"It's a strange light. Everything's so flat."

"Moonlight does odd things." Lockwood was looking towards the trees.

"Where is the moon?"

"Behind the clouds."

But there were no clouds.

"We'd better get on." Lockwood said. "The others should be halfway back to the village by now. They'll be getting help. We should join them, reassure them we're okay."

"I don't understand it." Nola was still looking up at the sky.

"We need to catch up with them, James."

Of course they did. They started walking. Frost cracked underfoot and their breath hung before them in the air so that they plunged through it with each step.

"It's so cold." Nola said.

"We were lucky they didn't come after us." Lockwood said again. He glanced over his shoulder. "Odd, though... I'd have thought somebody might come."

But they were the only moving things in that wide, wide field.

By unspoken agreement, they took the lane through the forest. The light was different there, too. The grey haze seemed to penetrate everything. The lane was white as bone. Thin lariats of mist wound in and out of the trees.

"This is weird." Nola whispered. "There's nobody anywhere."

She had thought that they might see the others ahead of them, but the road was empty, and they could see a good distance in the soft, flat light. The pair hurried on, following the gradient downhill. They passed the side-track to the open quarry, with its little memorial cairn of stones. The flowers that had decorated it were gone, and the photograph at its top was frosted with ice. There was no sound in the grey forest, and no wind. Shimmering crystal flecks fell from the surface of the capes and their breaths came in brief and painful plumes. Soon, they would reach the village. Their friends would be there.