Fall of the Cities_Branching Out Read online

  Branching Out

  Fall of the Cities – Book III

  BY

  VANCE HUXLEY

  This is a work of fiction. Any names or characters, businesses or places, events or incidents, are fictitious. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, or actual events is purely coincidental.

  No part of this eBook may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying, recording or by any information storage and retrieval system, without written permission from the author.

  © 2016 Vance Huxley

  Published by Entrada Publishing.

  Printed in the United States of America.

  Dedication

  Acknowledgements

  Chapter 1 — Drizzle and Gunsmoke

  Chapter 2 — Soggy Mudpuppies

  Chapter 3 — Getting Medieval

  Chapter 4 — Splish Splash Bunnies

  Chapter 5 — Spreading the Happiness

  Chapter 6 — Orchard Close Armoured Corps

  Chapter 7 — Gifts for Good and Bad Children

  Chapter 8 — A New Year, a New Start

  List of Characters

  To my Noeline and to the Joy of my life

  Thank you to my editor Sharon Umbaugh,

  for turning my words into a book worth reading.

  My thanks to Rachel at Entrada

  for all her hard work and encouragement.

  Chapter 1:

  Drizzle and Gunsmoke

  Across the globe, chaos reigned, while the cabal, the conspirators who had triggered the whole disaster fought to control the consequences and shape the new world. Their aims, to generate all electricity by renewable means, to reduce oil consumption, and to ensure that every region of the world produced enough food for their population, seemed admirable. The methods were draconic.

  In 2016, the top ten oil refineries worldwide processed ten percent of world’s oil production, scattered around the world among the hundreds of smaller facilities. Within years, the new Gulf States refineries alone treated ten percent, while the Chinese and Russians built similar facilities, driving smaller refineries out of business. The cabal attacked in only thirty places, destroying almost fifty percent of the now concentrated global oil refining facilities. Their attacks used the cheap simple sugar rockets perfected by groups such as Hamas, while messages on social media claimed responsibility on behalf of dozens of terrorist organisations. Unfortunately, all over the world, groups of terrorists and militant eco-groups copied them, launching their own attacks on pipelines, wells, fuel storage tanks and smaller refineries.

  The resulting chaos helped the cabal in virtually destroying or taking over major governments, and specifically seizing control of major naval and air forces at a government level. On the oceans, as refined oil stocks dwindled or were destroyed the ships delivering food ran out of fuel, and large areas of the world faced starvation. In Europe the cabals planned to extract the smaller population they needed from the cities, then pen the rest of the people inside to die. They failed, in the most part, and starving mobs swept west to the only country growing a surplus of food, France. There they fought over what remained.

  In the UK, the generally unarmed population were penned in their cities, while the Royal Navy stopped the starving European mobs from crossing the channel in their search for food. The UK cell of the cabal choreographed a series of riots to reduce the trapped populations of UK cities one at a time. Mobs tens of thousands strong roamed the cities, smashing and killing, their rage turning to panic and starvation. Hastily fortified housing estates were swamped, shopping centres burned, and anyone in their path died. When the cities no longer provided enough food or victims, the mobs tried to escape and met armour and soldiers, dug in and waiting for them around the perimeters. In city after city the tanks and machine guns drove the survivors back and killed most of them. The army retreated to their positions on the perimeter, and the armour moved to the next city.

  Amid the ruins of the cities, small groups of friends or even strangers gathered together, found similar minded groups, and coalesced into enclaves. Some found a strong building or one with resources such as food, parkland for farming, steel, fuel or clothing, or just houses with water and electricity. In many places, the second-rate criminals or unscrupulous took their chances, forming gangs and carving out little empires by using threats or violence to subdue other survivors. Elsewhere, groups of ordinary citizens found a leader or leaders and a place to defend; sometimes they simply decided to stop running, exhausted or losing the will to continue.

  The cabal seized the reins of power but still didn’t have the resources to finish culling the population. The new rulers’ grip on power was shaky, and they dare not order British Army to massacre civilians. Instead, a system of coupons and marts, huge superstores replacing all the other shops, kept the survivors fed while paramilitary contractors swept the rest of the country clean of undesirables. Coupons were only issued to stable groups within the cities, named enclaves, which forced the surviving population to join an enclave or form their own. Although some of the enclaves tried to maintain civilised rules, even the pacifists had to fight roaming gangs or other enclaves just to survive.

  Three years after the crash, in late January, one such peaceful enclave calling themselves Orchard Close seemed to have found a balance with their neighbours. Much of their survival depended on the reluctance of neighbouring gangs to go up against their leader, Harold aka Soldier Boy, an ex-soldier. Harold had led a small band of survivors to a group of intact houses and the disparate group had built defences and survived the initial chaos. Now they had trade deals with other gangs to bring in a few extra coupons, as well as extra food planted on land reclaimed from the rubble.

  * * *

  Six miles across the ruins from Orchard Close, the SIMS were being forced to defend their way of life. A young man called Stevie crouched among derelict buildings, peering through the rain at the advancing group of armed men. “Are you sure they’ll work in this rain, Julie?” He glanced back. “The Men in Black are reversing a van to protect their fighters.” The invaders were coming from left to right across Stevie’s line of sight, aiming at the rough-built brick wall and group of houses registered as the SIMS enclave. “If we can’t stop the van they’ll get over the walls.”

  In response a young woman’s head showed briefly above the rubble nearby. “Bert and the rest said they’d work. They’re under a roof so the rain won’t matter. Has the van reached the marker yet?” The woman crouched back down into a nearby manhole, out of sight yet still clear of the water in the pipes beneath. She held a box sealed inside a plastic bag and attached to an insulated wire running down into the water and off along the drain.

  Stevie kept up a commentary. “The van is past the rear marker but the fighters on foot are straggling. Bert and Maisie said get as many between the markers as possible.” A savage grin crossed his face. “Those smart-arsed MiB bastards won’t be making a bloody corporate takeover here.”

  “Just keep your head well down Stevie. They’ve got machine guns.”

  “Don’t worry Julie. Right, the front ones are just coming up on the front marker. Send the signal.” He brought up a target pistol and aimed as best he could through the rain.

  Behind him in the manhole Julie pressed a button, holding it down firmly for several seconds. Moments later a green light showed through the plastic. “Message received. Get your head down.” They both ducked and waited, and waited.

  “Oh shit, it hasn’t worked. Make a run for it Julie. I’ll keep them occupied.”

  “You’ll stop a machine gun for about ten seconds with that pistol. You
stay down and we’ll run together once the blokes with guns are past.” She sighed. “There’s rumours of a place to the north, some professors and students from the college.”

  “We could go east? I’ve heard of an enclave near an Army post, where the gangs can’t attack with automatics. There’s some big black woman in charge, and maybe an Orchard.” His voice sounding despondent, defeated, Stevie put his head back up to let Julie know where the attackers were. “The last of them are past the back marker. Shit! Christ! Keep down!” Both of them cowered in cover as lines of smoke curved in and the column of armed men came apart under a deluge of explosives. Another line of smoke tore across the rubble from nearby and the van blew apart. More smoke trails arced in and more explosions rippled across the roadway.

  “Yes! Nail them, Stevie!” Julie popped up out of her manhole with a bow and lofted an arrow towards the chaos.

  “Aim at the ones in the front, Julie. We’re supposed to drive them backwards.” Stevie fired, reloaded, and fired again and again as fast as possible. He wasn’t sure if he hit anything, but some men were falling. Another arrow arced over and a man pointed towards Stevie. “Duck Julie.” Automatic fire lashed the heaps of bricks briefly. He peeked again. “They’re running. Yee-ha! It worked! Go, go the SIMs!” He fired and then turned to see why there had been no answering cheer. “Christ! Hang on, I’ll give you a hand.”

  “Keep shooting Stevie, it’s only my arm.” Julie looked sheet white, concentrating on wrapping a bandage around her upper arm. “We can sort this once they’re gone. Keep them running.” She ducked out of sight as shots whined overhead, emphasising that the enemy were retreating but not running. Stevie went back to shooting until two minutes later, as planned, another salvo straddled the rear half of the ambush box and the road beyond, breaking the last organisation. The remaining attackers turned and fled into the driving rain.

  Julie’s radio crackled. “Stay in cover everyone. Let those who have a clear shot deal with the wounded who still have some fight in them.” Stevie kept watch, firing once at a moving figure. Single shots cracked out here and there, not many because their enclave didn’t have many firearms, and feathered shafts flew whenever a target showed. Eventually a man stood up in the rubble beyond the roadway, waving a machete above his head. Other figures rose and closed on the dead and dying with machetes, clubs and homemade spears. Stevie went to help Julie out of the manhole, and to tend to her wound. The SIMS had survived again, and better still they now had the firearms and weapons on the bodies and dropped by fleeing gangsters.

  * * *

  An hour later seven immaculate young men in suits, wearing dark glasses despite the gloom and pouring rain, looked over a group of wounded and demoralised fighters. Beyond them a smoke-blackened van drove into the old warehouse, bringing the survivors who couldn’t walk. The seven in suits all carried automatic rifles or pump action shotguns, and wore handguns and machetes. “That didn’t go to plan.”

  “Hah bloody hah Jones. Fucking artillery. Where the fuck did that bunch of airy fairies get artillery?” The oldest of the group scowled. “How many weapons did we lose?”

  “Not fairies Branson, the SIMs are commies, some sort of commune. They call themselves after that bloody computer game because they’re all ordinary people. Yeah, right. We lost four automatics which is what matters, and two of the vans so ammo as well.” He spat. “We lost crossbows and handguns as well, and machetes of course. At least we’ve got a fucking blacksmith to replace the machetes.” Jones turned on another youth. “You, Scrooge, I thought you said the plate on the vans would stop whatever they’d got.”

  “We plated the back and then reversed towards them. The bastards got the vans from the side with fucking great rockets. We got ambushed.” The youth shrugged. “It worked the first three places we hit.”

  “Yeah, I think that’s the trouble. We’ve only got one trick. A fucking good one with all the automatics we picked up from the city centre after the crash, but this lot have something as good. Worse, they’ve got some bastard who can plan a fight.” The older man looked over at the defeated fighters. “We’d better give these wounded heroes a drink and a woman each before they desert to some other fucking gang.” He sighed. “We need an ally, someone with more men and some sort of experience with this shit.”

  “Someone who knows more about tactics and all that bollocks? Christ, do you mean the General? Risky, Branson, he sort of eats up allies.” Jones looked at the defeated gangsters. “There’s an enclave to the west that’s not too strong, but they’re in sight of the Army so we can’t use automatics. These pussies haven’t got the balls for a fight without heavy firepower.”

  “The General has a lot of men who are used to fighting with machetes, but we’ve still got a lot of really good weaponry and a shitload of ammo. More than him.” The older man, in his mid-twenties, smiled. “Treat this as a miscalculation; we got a wee bit too ambitious and the opposition rejected our bid. First we’ll snap up that small enclave to the southwest because they haven’t even got a proper wall. That’ll give the fighters an easy win. Then we’ll open negotiations with the General. Very careful negotiations. After all, I’ll bet he’d like those bloody rockets out of the way as well.”

  Scrooge sighed. “Right, give them a beer and a woman and explain about all the rape and pillage once their bandages come off. Oh, and smile.” He plastered on a beaming smile before heading towards the despondent fighters. The other six leaders of the MiB, Men in Black, weren’t smiling. It had all gone very well to start with, because the average peaceful enclave couldn’t resist a few nutcases and automatic weapons. The leaders knew they were ex-business trainees, not military geniuses or even gangsters, who had got lucky in this bloody new world. They’d taken an opportunity and ended up with a shitload of automatics when nobody else had any. Now they had to work out how to make the most of them because the easy times were over.

  * * *

  Nearly three miles to the northwest another new enclave, the Professors, stood to their defences. An elderly man stood on the flat roof of a concrete multi-story car park with a pair of binoculars to his eyes. Behind him a group of young men and women frantically wound a cable onto a drum until a loop came near enough to slip over a hook. The elderly man glanced back. “Ten kilos, incendiary this time. Then wait for my word.” Behind him a young man placed the sealed tub of liquid into the sling hanging from the home-made trebuchet, and waited with a cigarette lighter.

  “Ready, professor.”

  The older man waited, watching something through the binoculars. “Fire.” The young man lit a short fuse and stepped back. A young woman pulled a lever, releasing the loop on the cable.

  The steel trebuchet swung up, the sling came over and the container arced lazily across the grey sky, trailing a thin line of smoke. The missile plunged down the other side of the partially cultivated parkland, splashing flame on and around a van. A group of armed men accompanying the vehicle scattered, then moved back in to rescue the occupants. The elderly man raised a fisted hand. “Hit, sound the attack!” A bugle blared, again and again.

  Along the far side of the parkland where a line of bushes and trees had been preserved, loudspeakers blared out a section of the Nutcracker Suite. Gaily painted figures darted into view, launching arrows and javelins into the gangsters trying to rescue their comrades from a burning van. The figures turned in time to the music and leapt back into the greenery. A fusillade of shots tore through the leaves but as they stopped the music swelled. The figures sprang out again, loosing their missiles before turning as one and retreating into the greenery. A gangster waving a pistol started forward, shouting to the rest. “Come on, they’re only fucking women and ponces in paint. Up close we’ll slaughter them. Follow me.” He fired into the bushes and charged forward.

  Behind him thirty young men and youths followed, waving pistols, machetes and clubs. Those with handguns emptied them into the bushes as they ran, pinning the defenders. With a cheer the firs
t few broke into the bushes before reeling back, blood spurting from long slashes. Even as the rest paused, ten tall, broad, black-clad figures stepped forward, wearing hooded helmets with hideous faces painted onto the front grill, and wielding long blades or staves. The figures struck out savagely and accurately. In moments over half the attackers were down, dying or unconscious. Even where the machetes and clubs hit back, they had no appreciable effect on the black armour. Meanwhile missiles flew out of the greenery wounding or killing more attackers. The tall figures stepped back into the bushes before any gangsters could reload to shoot at them.

  Half a dozen attackers went into the bushes to the side of the Kendo fighters, but none came back. A few screams and some shaking foliage were the only signs of their fate. Even as the rest of the gangsters ran the music swelled again and the gaily painted figures darted out to launch more missiles. The rewound trebuchet dropped another firebomb near the stranded vehicle, driving back those trying to rescue men or weapons, and the surviving attackers broke and ran. On the car park roof the elderly man lowered his binoculars, smiling quietly. “Brains against brawn.”

  “Professor, did it work?” A willowy woman in a flowing dress ran across the roof. “Are my boys and girls all safe?” She put her arm round the elderly man and rested her head on his shoulder. “I worry about them.”

  “There are wounded but they are all alive, Celeste. Your students jumped in and out of the trenches just as planned. Their choreography is perfect.” He hugged her. “You were right, they do have war paint to die for.” Behind them the trebuchet crew cheered and chanted, four of them linking arms to high-kick in time. The professor glanced back. “We should resurrect the cheerleaders, though as the Tigers instead of the Pussycats?”

  “Really? That would certainly keep everyone fit, and will be something normal for them all in this chaos.” Celeste looked across the neat lines of crops, and the trees and bushes beyond. “Will that gang be back?”