The Last Murder at the end of the World

TWENTY-ONE

Oblivious to what’s happening in the village, Shilpa and Abbas wake up in a tin-roofed shelter on the farms to the east, next to the dead cow they were trying to save. The cabbages, kale and parsnips around them are oozing and putrid.

‘Abi?’ queries Abbas, staring at a carrot that’s turned to mush under his heel.

‘I see it,’ I reply.

Shilpa lets the soil crumble through her fingertips. Every vegetable in a five-foot-wide patch around them is black and lifeless.

‘It’s dead,’ says Abbas, horrified. ‘The soil is dead. What could have done this in one night?’

‘Disease,’ I lie. ‘You should bury the cow before it begins to rot.’

‘Where are my boots?’ asks Shilpa, wriggling her toes. ‘I was wearing them when I fell asleep. Why would anybody take my old boots?’

‘We’ve got bigger problems than your boots,’ says Abbas, who’s wandered through the open door of the warehouse, where the harvested crops are kept.

Every shelf is empty.

‘Our stores are gone,’ he says. ‘We don’t have any food.’