The Fall of Man

Part III chapter 6

Chapter 6

The next day arrives bright and sunny. Inside the tent, Eve lies in a vibrant world of green and yellow light that is streaming in through the nylon rainscreen. Water droplets stand like pimples across its surface and the petal-shaped wings of a butterfly casts soporific shadows on the pale skin of her arms. Outside, a clearing that was cavernous and mysterious by night now appears petite and picturesque. The tent was pitched discretely at the rear of the small semi-circular glade, and sits nestled amongst the hanging fronds of evergreen trees. The surrounding boughs are woven together into an impenetrable perimeter. The embers of the fire still smoulder in a small pit dug between the tent and the water, within a ring of ashen grey rocks that were collected from the riverbank.

After collapsing the tent and cleaning up their impromptu camp site, Noah and Eve make an early start back on the river. The water is moving quickly and a stiff breeze blows at their backs. Beneath their paddles, the surface of the liquid is a shimmering mosaic in a multitude of colours, and they chat away with their spirits lifted. Every so often, they drift past the rust-red shell of another drowned car, stationary and decaying in the free flowing water. By early afternoon, the forest backdrop has thinned along one side of the river sufficiently to reveal mile after mile of open space. Noah recognises the manicured plains to their left as the agricultural territory surrounding the city. However, the organised fields of well-groomed crops are gone, replaced with scrub-land and short grasses, which undulate across the barren plains like the bunkers of a giant golf course. Large patches appear waterlogged and marshy. Elsewhere, whippet-thin trees have taken root in small copses and lean away from the prevailing wind like old men bent over their walking sticks.

When Eve squints up into the sky to assess the time of day, the sun is a hazy, indistinct orb in an overcast sky. A filmy sheen obscures much of the cloud, which scuds at pace across the heavens. Through the thinning tree-line to their east, a grey fog has settled low and heavy across the fields.

An hour or so later, the river is still coursing due south along the westerly perimeter of the vast, open terrain. It has grown in width; from its fast-moving centre, the obstacle-strewn sides are somewhat distant. The trees are no more; the river banks themselves are now formed in grey gabions full of machine-cut stone and ribbed concrete sections. Plastic containers and other unrecognisable objects bob collectively in the shallows at the water’s edges, in a mature slurried medley of organic and inorganic matter. Partially submerged metal hulks stand rotting in this quagmire; the bent chassis of abandoned vehicles piled on top of one another in varying states of decay. The sun has disappeared from the sullen sky, which exudes a dull, even spread of light.

Slowly, far out in the open landscape, a vision reveals itself through the haze. At first it is nothing more than an indistinct, iridescent band on the horizon. A few minutes later, the first towers standing behind the Wall emerge from the ethereal mist, like the forgotten tombstones of an ancient necropolis.

Noah’s heart grows heavy when he recognises the prickly silhouette of the city he fled so long ago. He turns to watch Eve where she sits at the front of their boat. Her eyes are glued to the ghostly image, wide with a mixture of excitement and trepidation. As he looks on, a deep shadow sweeps across their little boat, and the river turns dark beneath them. Without warning in the blustery afternoon haze, great anvil-shaped storm clouds have drifted across the heavens and now hang, pregnant with rain, over their heads. The sky deepens to a malignant, brooding tone.

A fat glob of water lands on the side of the dinghy with a rubbery twang. The air prickles in preparation. Almost imperceptibly at first, raindrops begin to fall. They bounce from the surface of the boat and dance on top of the water. As Noah and Eve watch, the river comes alive with movement and sound. In the space of a few minutes however, the plip plop of droplets accelerates into a steady downpouring. The lashing rain stings Eve’s face as she struggles to pull the hood of her waterproof jacket over her bedraggled hair. As the pressure builds, the downpour becomes a seething storm. Along the banks of the river, water cascades from the hard, man-made ground. It courses between the larger rocks that stand in the channel. The driving force behind the rain intensifies, and anything more than a few feet from them is obscured in a world of water.