He had just scrambled up to the higher landing and ducked down behind the metal railing before they barged into his flat and began to ransack it, taking everything they could, pushing each other aside to grab handfuls of food cans, clothing, pieces of furniture. Simon grimaced as a fight broke out, wincing as heavy fists landed with hollow thuds. While the men were distracted he took his cue, hurrying down the stairs and out into the cool autumn air, his bag of belongings wedged under his arm.
He ducked into the nearest alleyway and leaned back against the cold concrete of the building he no longer lived in, sucking in a couple of deep breaths.
Everything he knew had turned on its head. His father would never return, and he would never be able to find him. When the DCA took you, you were gone for good. His father had demanded a modicum of respect in the community, but now the gangs would move in, take over his flat, and steal or sell everything he and his father had called theirs. Simon felt strangely empty; not angry, not disappointed. Relieved, even. While his father had ploughed the digital airwaves looking for some shred of news that Europe gave a crap about life in London GUA, Simon had felt the watching eyes of the DCA hovering at his shoulder.
It could have been worse, he supposed. They could have sent the Huntsmen, and half the building’s tenants would now be dead.
He glanced up at the thin sliver of grey sky peering down at him from between two grimy walls of concrete. It would be dark soon. He had to find cover before then.
St Cannerwells London Underground station, where the Tube Riders hung out, would do. With a bit of luck Marta, Switch, or Paul would be there, and while he couldn’t rely on any of them for somewhere to stay, they could at least help him out with some gear until he found a new place. London was filled with abandoned buildings, so it wasn’t difficult to find a roof. The hard part was finding a safe one. Wraiths that had once been respectable people haunted the dark corridors of derelict apartment
blocks and factories, preying on anyone not resourceful enough to put a lock between them and the outside.
It was only a handful of tube stops to Hopewell, the nearest operating station to St Cannerwells. He could jump the tube and be with his friends in half an hour.
He headed out on to the street, threading himself through the piles of rubbish and abandoned cars, the stench of rotting food and decaying flesh so familiar it barely registered. At the end of the street he turned left, dodged out of the way of the rusty, lumbering hulk of a government-run bio-bus, and hurried across the street to the nearest Underground entrance.
At the top of the steps he paused, his heart sinking. A notice taped to the metal shutter doors at a crooked angle flapped in the breeze.
STATION CLOSED
NO FURTHER TRAINS TODAY
Simon ran a hand through his hair. It was a long way across London to St Cannerwells on foot, and he didn’t dare risk a government bus once twilight set in.
There were too many shark operations that would sell you a ticket and then cut your throat.
The market where he worked during the day was halfway there. Perhaps he could find somewhere nearby to sleep. It was worth a try.
Feeling a leaden weight hanging about his heart, he hurried off into the gloom. Around him, the fires and the lights of London crackled into life.
Jessica
She hung back in the shadows, the hood pulled down over her face. The market was dark, most of the streetlights broken, only a couple of trashcan fires further down and a tired, indistinct moon illuminating the closed market stalls, the awnings pulled down over them and tied up.
The boy who had asked her for the time had been working on one of these little stalls. She immediately felt foolish for coming back here – after all what had she expected, the market to still be bustling with people and the boy to be standing there warming his hands over a paper cup of steaming coffee? She knew London. Nothing savoury happened after dark.
‘I’m a stupid little girl,’ she muttered. ‘Dad’s going to kill me.’
A clattering dustbin lid somewhere behind her brought more immediate danger to mind. She glanced around, looking for somewhere to hide. Several pairs of running feet were approaching, but she was too far out in the open to make it to an alleyway before whoever was coming reached her.
‘Shit,’ she muttered, spinning around, assessing her options. A friend of hers had been raped and murdered just a few streets from her house. London was so dangerous that even in her up-market part of town the schools had armed guards. At nineteen she was unemployed, but hopeful of getting a lower office position in her father’s government office so she could ride the same armoured transport to work and avoid the dangerous streets.
She heard the crash of breaking glass, and the whump of a fire igniting. It was another rampant mob, protesting their frustration at the government in the only way they knew how: by causing wholesale destruction.
The only options were to run or to hide. She started to walk through the closed up market stalls, only to hear shuffling footsteps coming from up ahead. Perhaps this was an organized gang fight, two groups meeting in the closed up market to settle old scores, or simply to take their anger out on other people. Father always condemned them, but the cause of all the unrest depended on who you listened to. Father blamed the people of course, while the people blamed the government.
As the footsteps were joined by others, she darted to the nearest market stall, dropped to the ground and crawled under the tight awning into the dark space beneath. If they searched for her they would find her, or if they torched the waxed canvas awnings that covered the closed stalls she would burn with it, but she had no other
choice.
In the near pitch darkness she lay there, heart pounding, tears running down her cheeks, as the sounds of a riot filled the air around her.