Merely a Madness Read Free Page A

down to disappointment.
    The bedrooms are just as bad: filthy and wrecked, and accompanied by the same stench of pre-human waste. They wait downstairs for half an hour for Fisher to get back, then Mullen and Hannah head back up the stairs to see if he's back. He isn't, and the truck is missing from outside of the building, their baggage with it. Mullen suppresses a surge of anger. No clothes. No food. He's going to wring the fat little sod's neck. Cut-price is one thing, but this is ridiculous. They go back downstairs and wait.
    And wait. Fisher doesn't come back. They go back upstairs to check at hourly intervals, but the truck remains missing, and the rain doesn't let up.
    Finally, the Kozlows make a nest out of some of the least spoiled bedding, and the littlest Kozlows burrow into it, bookended by their parents. The Europans spend their time tidying and reading the books, then do the same.
    By the time Mullen starts to think sleep is a good idea, there's no bedding left that doesn't reek so badly it catches in his throat, so he stacks some of the chair cushions against the wall of the platform and rests against them. Hannah leans her head on his shoulder. It takes a while before her breathing slows. Mullen isn't sure he's going to sleep, but in the end he does.
    The storm grows worse. It bangs, rattles, and crashes as if the sky is falling. He hears it through the fog of sleep when he half-wakes a few times, but the railway tunnel stays solid and real, even if it feels like it's shaking in his dreams.

2.
    The electricity fails sometime in the night. When he wakes, it's to pitch black and the sound of someone crying. It's Hannah. The warm weight of her shakes into his side. He squeezes her close, and kisses her on a damp cheek.
    “I know this wasn't what you wanted to show me,” he whispers, “but you were right. It's quite the experience, but it's just one night. We'll get it sorted out in the morning.”
    For some reason, that only makes her cry harder. He holds her in the dark, pressing gentle kisses to the top of her head, until she stops shaking and her breathing slows.
    Hannah has always been the more emotional of the two of them, the one so easily moved to tears.
    The first time Mullen saw her, she was crying. She was twelve, he was thirteen. She'd been new to the city, crying for what she'd left behind, and he'd watched in fascination. Somehow, there was no shame to her tears, the way there would have been to his. She'd cried openly and publicly as if that were the way everyone did it.
    And then he'd got to know her better, and found she cried all the time , but the tears were balanced by a joyfulness like nothing he'd ever witnessed. Nothing was ever dull for her. It was either wonderful, or it was terrible, and those extremes were infectious . He caught her moods like a cold. She infected him, burrowing deep into his bones, so that any time she wasn't close by, he ached as if part of him were missing.
    They'd grown up. Life had gone on, and Hannah had gone on without him – into her politics and campaigning, same as she always had been, caring too deeply about everything . She'd left him behind to be the sensible one, and he'd gone to work for Harbin-Beck like everyone else. He'd known it had always been one-sided, and that it was coming. She cared for him, yes, but not the way he adored her.
    And then, two years ago, she'd come back and it had been perfect. Maybe he wasn't her sun, not the way she was his, but somehow she loved him, and that was enough.
    He falls asleep again, smiling, because no matter how awful this place is, Hannah still has her head on his shoulder.
    When Mullen wakes again, it's still pitch black. The stink of mud has somehow grown heavier, eclipsing every other bitter stench the place harbours. Water trickles somewhere not far away.
    Something has gone wrong; he can feel it in his bones. It's not just the ruined accommodation or the missing supplies. Fisher should have been back by