THALIA by Bergotte (ebook reader .txt) 📕

would be engulfed in flames as the fire took hold and found the fuel tanks. She jumped and succeeded in struggling yards from the crippled plane, when it exploded, sending debris in all directions. She could not understand how she alone survived the crash and had remained unscathed when the plane blew up.

She made her way towards what was left of the terminal buildings, but the short journey that normally took the airport bus a few minutes to ferry passengers to and from the plane was a worrying, half-hour undertaking over very difficult terrain, in the present circumstances.

Thalia looked at the burnt out wreckage of the many other planes that had made forced landings and the dead bodies that were scattered in the vicinity of each crash site. She had nothing with her apart from the clothes she was wearing. She needed to seek shelter, food, drink and clothing, but the chances of finding any of these essential items were dim. The wind howled about her as she made her way towards the remnants of the terminal buildings.

Chapter IX

Most of the buildings had been turned into rubble. However, there was one structure that was badly damaged but partially standing and Thalia decided to try to make use of it. She managed to crawl through an opening, finding herself in a large space of what was once the check-in area of the terminal. Twisted pipes and cables covered the floor, which consisted of broken up concrete slabs, the pungent smell of burning plastic reaching her nostrils causing her nausea and the inevitable vomiting.

She held a tissue she had found in the pocket of the short jacket she was wearing and held it against her nose and mouth. At least it was out of the wind, but rather cold. She shivered as she looked down at the rivulets of water running through the concrete blocks of masonry that had fallen round about her. The water, she reasoned, was obviously caused by the sprinkler system, which would have come on when the fire started.
Thalia felt very hungry now. She had eaten a satisfying meal on the plane, but that was many hours ago. Her most pressing need was to try and find some food. She stood still, looked about her, trying to decide which way to go when a loud crash signalled to her that more masonry was falling. The building was not at all safe.

She hurried away from concrete, glass and dust that rose around her. She looked tearfully at the hundreds of lifeless bodies strewn about her. These people must have died when the building collapsed and the roof fell in, she thought. Then, in the quiet after the sound of the falling debris died down, she heard a faint moaning sound. It was a human voice. It was not far away, she thought, but could see no signs of a living person.

She approached a fallen pillar and discovered on the other side of it, a man trapped underneath.
“Are you all right?” she asked him.
“I’ve been better,” replied the man. “Actually, I’m not hurt. I’ve been caught by my clothing.”
She struggled to release him, but without success. The pillar was holding him fast by his overcoat.
“I can’t do anything with my bare hands,” she explained. “I need something sharp to cut the cloth with.”
“In my hand luggage, over there… that brown case…” She went over and picked it up. “It’s open, it’s not locked. There’s a pair of nail scissors in one of the side pockets. That will help you.”

Thalia unfastened the zip of the bag’s side pocket and felt inside. Her fingers touched metal. She withdrew a small pair of scissors, returned to the man lying on his side and began to cut him free. She made little progress. The coat’s material was thick and heavy. She stopped to draw breath and rest awhile.
“I’m very hungry,” she explained to the man. “Have you any food with you?”
“Yes,” he replied, “but I have only enough for me.”
“Well, I have no strength to help you unless I eat something, so I suggest you share your food with me. You can’t get to it in any case in your situation, can you?”
“No, but I don’t want you stealing my food.”
“We are in a predicament and you must share with me to help us out of it.”

The man sighed.
“I suppose so,” he said, “but I don’t know how long I’m going to be here, do I? And I need my food.”
“You will be here forever unless I help you,” replied Thalia, “after all, there’s no-one else here at all who can give you any assistance. They’re all dead.”
“What everyone? All these people are corpses?”
“Yes, I’m afraid so. We are the only living souls here,” replied Thalia, going over to the bag and drawing out a large bag of crisps and a packet of biscuits. She handed some of the food to him.
“What’s your name?” she asked.
“Mickey,” replied the man. “What’s yours?”
“Thalia,” she replied.
“A beautiful name.”
“Yes, but having a beautiful name doesn’t help us in these circumstances, does it?”
“No, not at all,” agreed Mickey.

After they had both eaten something, Thalia returned to the task of cutting the man free. She eventually managed to sever one arm from the rest of the coat and free Mickey.
“Thanks very much. Now let’s have some more to eat. I’m still hungry. I’ve been here for hours,” he said, looking at his watch and saw that it was shattered. Thalia handed him the bag of crisps, which he hungrily finished off.
“There’s a bottle of lemonade in there, as well, if you can find it,” he informed her.
She handed him the bag.
“You can find it,” she informed him. Mickey delved in the bag, rummaged around and extracted a large bottle from inside. He removed the top, then handed her the bottle. Your manners are improving, she said to herself, as she put the bottle to her lips and drank deeply of the welcome liquid.
“That is very refreshing,” said Thalia, as he took the bottle from her. “What do you think we ought to do?”
“Do?” he asked blankly.
“Yes, do. There’s no point in our staying here is there? We are in an airport that has been totally destroyed. We need to get away from here and try and reach some civilisation, don’t we?”
“If there is any civilisation,” mused Mickey.
“There must be. We can’t be the only two people left in England, can we?”
“Can’t we?”
“No. We have to act on the assumption that other people have survived and try and find them,” argued Thalia, warmly.

CHAPTER X

After some hours of walking, picking their way carefully through the airport, the pair came upon what was left of a major road. It was completely deserted as were the fields surrounding it, except for the sight of dozens of cars, lorries and coaches of all descriptions which lay abandoned by their drivers.
“No sign of any living, breathing human beings,” said Mickey, in a dispirited monotone voice.
“No,” agreed Thalia, “but I would have thought that senior members of the government must have secret bunkers deep in the bowels of the earth, that they could escape to, in case of an emergency. There must be contingency plans.”
“Yes, I suppose it all depends on how much time they had to escape and whether there was any warning of what was going to happen. We don’t actually know what has happened. We can see death and destruction on a large scale all around us, but we don’t know what has caused it, or how widespread it is.”
“It’s world-wide as far as I can tell,” said Thalia. “In fact, I flew in from Sydney and as we crossed the country there were all kinds of natural disasters occurring. The same applies to Asia and Europe. All communication systems seemed to have failed. So, there is no chance of getting any news from elsewhere. All shipping will have been sunk and all aircraft crashed or grounded. I can’t imagine any rail networks will have survived either and I suspect that the populations of most parts of the world have been wiped out by the earthquakes, erupting volcanoes, tornadoes and the like.”
“So you think it is effectively the end of the world?”
“Yes,” replied Thalia. “Where have you flown in from?”
“I haven’t. I was flying to the States, but no planes could take off because of the freak weather conditions. And if this catastrophe is truly on a global scale, it is extremely likely that there will be nuclear fallout from wrecked nuclear power stations also.”
“I hadn’t even thought of that.”
“What are we going to do, then?”
“I suggest we keep walking towards London until we meet up with other people and join them. Let’s see what they do.”
“Even if there are bunkers in London, those in charge are not going to let us in, are they?”
“That depends on how many we are and how well they are provided for,” said Thalia, “but let’s think positively and we might be able to get through this crisis.”

They walked on until they were both too tired to move another step.
“I need to rest,” said Mickey. “Everywhere we have been so far looks like a war-zone, except there are no wounded, only the dead.”
“Yes,” Thalia concurred, sitting down by the side of what was once a main road to London, “and with this number of bodies littering the country it won’t be long before disease spreads all over the place.”
“True. Be careful of that ditch there. You could roll over into it…”

Thalia rolled over and landed with a crash on the living room floor. She awoke immediately, opening her eyes to see Andrew looking down at her.
“You turned over in your sleep and fell off the sofa,” he observed. “Have you been dreaming again?”
“It was more of a nightmare!” exclaimed Thalia, glad to have been shaken out of her terrible ordeal.

PART THREE
(Thalia’s Fight)

CHAPTER XI

The weeks passed. Autumn turned to winter as Thalia settled down to study for her A levels. She continued to speak in the Abbey Courtyard on Saturday mornings and occasionally spoke to the sixth formers at Andrew’s school during their assembly time. In the February of 1969 she spoke at the mid-week fellowship meeting of a local Baptist church,