Going Underground

by Denison, L. N

  Jen had not joined the battle so far, but the sights she had been forced to witness prompted her to put an end to the scavenging once and for all by using the grenades she carried. She took one of the devices from the right-hand pocket of Oscar’s coat, looked at it in puzzlement, and again wondered how something so insignificant could cause so much damage.

  Jen set her sights on a small clique of enemy soldiers. Recalling Myron’s tutelage, she pulled the pin from the grenade ever so carefully and tossed it underhand. It landed with a tremendous explosion within a couple of feet of the greedy vultures, putting a swift end to their pilfering.

  ‘Wow!’ she marvelled. ‘Myron was right—these little babies pack one hell of a wallop!’

  Jen’s act was part and parcel of the horror of war, and she had no regrets. Indeed, her lust for blood grew as she continued on with her scavenger-killing rampage. Gradually, others began to emulate her, abandoning their rifles and replacing them with grenades.

  Jen sustained another head wound from shrapnel from one of her own grenades, and was once again knocked unconscious. Pinned down under enemy fire, Myron watched helplessly as the event unfolded, before he ran back to the fortifications for help. He found two medics and breathlessly explained the situation.

  ‘Take us to her, kid!’ one of the medics exclaimed as he and his comrade grabbed a stretcher. Braving sniper fire and artillery shells whistling overhead, they navigated among the field of corpses to retrieve Jen, taking her to the field hospital.

  *

  After five hours of non-stop battle, the Scots had begun to retreat, pushing back towards their boundaries with drastically depleted numbers. The English, however, continued to push forward, giving the Scots little room for manoeuvrability. The advancement would be short-lived as the Scottish fortifications became more visible to the English, and gave Brigadier Howard cause to call a retreat. This afforded the Scots the chance to regroup, count heads to determine losses, and re-strategize.

  The English themselves had taken a significant hit, and were also in need of reinforcements. For the moment, the fortifications offered ample protection, and they could rest easy for the night. The elite sniper division could be counted on to protect the fortifications, and the troops within them. In addition to the snipers, the English still had a full complement of tanks and heavy artillery strategically placed on the battlefield, keeping the enemy at bay.

  Fires blazed within the English enclosure. Many of the troops rested their weary bodies next to them, consuming what little food they had been given. These morsels were again washed down with a foul, syrupy substance that passed for coffee, and which was just as likely to end up in or around the fires as in the soldiers’ bellies.

  *

  Myron had strayed from the rest of the group to visit Jen in the insufficiently supplied, drastically undermanned field hospital. One of the field doctors approached him upon his arrival.

  ‘What are you doing here, lad? You should be with the others getting some rest,’ he said, not unkindly.

  ‘Yeah, doc, but I’m looking for a friend of mine,’ Myron pleaded, ‘Please help me. A young woman with dark red hair.’

  The doctor smiled, seeming to know exactly who Myron was talking about.

  ‘Ah, yes, her,’ the doctor said with a chuckle. ‘She’s been nothing but trouble since she woke up, causing commotion and panic among the other wounded.’

  ‘What do you mean, doc?’

  ‘It seems she’s been having flashbacks to her stint in a labour camp, which was apparently hit by a missile. She claims to have been tortured there, too. All the while she’s been calling out the name Myron.’

  ‘That’s me!’

  The doctor grinned knowingly. ‘I thought as much. Your concern for your friend is written on your face.’

  ‘Can I see her, doc? I have to see if she’s all right.’

  ‘She’s fine, son, but we had to sedate her. She became extremely disoriented in her unfamiliar surroundings, and kept touching the area around her freshly bandaged eye. She’s lucid enough now for a brief visit.’

  The doctor led Myron to Jen’s bedside. Myron bent over her and softly kissed her forehead. Slowly, she opened her one good eye.

  ‘Myron?’ she said in a hoarse croak. ‘Myron, is that you?’

  He was overwhelmed, but at the same time relieved that she finally remembered who he was.

  ‘Yes, it’s me, my love,’ Myron said, taking her hand in his.

  Jen talked about the day they were separated and what had happened within the labour camp, still struggling with details. In return, Myron told her everything that had happened with him over the longest few days of his life.

  The conversation lasted until Jen became too weary to continue.

  ‘She needs to rest, son, so you’d best go back to your unit,’ said the kindly doctor, placing his hand on Myron’s shoulder. ‘But seeing you has done her a world of good.’

  ‘Me, too,’ said Myron. ‘Me, too.’

  *

  After seven hours of lying in a makeshift hospital bunk, Jen was finally released. Her eye bandage was removed and replaced by a black padded patch, giving her an even edgier appearance. Myron greeted her on the outskirts of the encampment with a satisfied look on his face. He had spent most of his downtime thinking of schemes to get his team, Jen, and himself to safety, and as far away from the battlefield as he could. Of course, Jen was the first person with whom he wanted to share his ideas. He took hold of her hand and walked her over to the area by the arms wagon, which was tranquil now after having been a hotbed of activity before and during the battle.

  Myron had thought long and hard about how he was going to get them out of the encampment. During the brief ceasefire, he had taken the opportunity of carrying out his own survey. Every effort had been made to keep the soldiers within the battlements, and the only option for escaping their surroundings was to go back the way they had entered: through the forest, which had so far been spared the ravages of war. In fact, that had been the whole point of this particular battle: to protect the forest from Scottish encroachment. If by some chance the Scottish won and managed to penetrate the forest, it wouldn’t merely be a battle lost: the England that was would be wiped from existence, as the Scottish would be emboldened to take all the land that England possessed.

  Myron turned to face Jen and cupped her chin in his hands.

  ‘Jen, do you remember when I told you that I was going to look after you?’ he asked expectantly.

  Jen nodded.

  ‘I’m going to get us out of here tonight—take you away from all this,’ he said, looking deeply into her one good eye.

  Jen was a bit apprehensive. She took hold of Myron’s hands and pulled them away from her face.

  ‘And how do you propose to get us out of here?’ she said, cocking her eyebrows sceptically. ‘It won’t be easy—you do realise that.’

  Myron shook his head in disbelief at her reaction and reassured her that he had thought his plan through.

  ‘I made you a promise, and I intend to keep it. Just trust me on this, OK?’ Myron sounded positively exasperated.

  ‘What about the others—those guys that were with us?’ Jen enquired.

  ‘They’ll be coming too! I’m not going to leave them behind, if that’s what you’re insinuating!’ Myron barked.

  ‘I wasn’t insinuating anything, I was just asking! God, take a pill, will you?’

  The conversation was turning into a heated argument, which Myron needed to nip in the bud before anyone overheard them—Simon Besson, for instance. That bugger was the last person that Myron wanted to learn of his intentions, although it was already too late. One of the guards in the doctor’s company had been hanging on every word from inside the canvas-covered latrine, stood ten feet away from Myron and Jen.

  The guard peered through a small split in the canvas to see who was talking. He didn’t recognise Jen straight away, but soon realised she was one of the inmates at camp
five. In fact, he and his colleague had left her for dead after the missile had hit.

  Having made up, Myron and Jen ambled hand in hand back towards their group. When they were well out of sight, the guard slunk away to give Besson the intriguing intel.

  *

  A look of satisfaction bloomed on Besson’s face upon hearing that Jen was in the encampment. She had been on his mind since he had first clapped eyes on her. He had mentioned on more than one occasion that he would like to finish what he started; it was almost a dangerous obsession, unfathomable to his cohorts. The guards had managed to gather that there was a lot more to his obsessive behaviour than met the eye—that much was evident. They had given up pursuing the subject upon being threatened with death if they persisted.

  ‘And you say they are planning to escape tonight?’ Besson pressed his minions.

  ‘Yes, sir—tonight!’

  ‘We need to prepare! Gather only the necessary items and retrieval gear,’ Besson ordered. ‘I intend to have the prisoner placed back in one of the labour camps by tomorrow morning! Camp four should sort her out!’

  Camp four was, by far, the camp with the harshest regime, and if Jen ended up there she would not last out week. The guards had zero tolerance for insubordination. Legend had it, a fight over a spoonful of rice had resulted in the instigator being stood up against a wall without a blindfold, before being shot seven times at point-blank range. His body was given to the starving camp dogs for their dinner.

  ‘Let’s see how long that impudent bitch lasts!’ Besson cried, his words veering off into maniacal laughter.

  Chapter Ten

  The time had just struck one-thirty in the morning. Myron and the others would soon make their move to freedom, beyond the fighting and Spartan trappings of the encampment. Everything they needed to sustain them during their journey had been gathered: the necessary food and water rations, a few rifles for protection, and medical supplies—a necessity, as Jen’s eye was still susceptible to weeping.

  Myron, Jen and the others made their way from the encampment back towards the forest as quickly and quietly as possible. By Myron’s estimate, it would take around three days on foot to reach what was left of Central London, not taking their need to rest along the way into consideration. Myron’s main concern was whether or not Jen would be able to make it that far. She seemed very lethargic after her near-fatal experience.

  They had decided to separate into two groups, with Myron and Jen heading one way, their comrades in the other.

  ‘Good luck, my friends,’ Myron said to them. ‘Maybe we will meet again one day.’

  With that, both groups disappeared into the darkness.

  *

  In only half an hour, Myron and Jen covered a less than reasonable distance before Dr. Besson made any attempt to track them. Besson seemed to be in a trance-like state, as he sat devising ways to satisfy his sadistic nature when he finally caught up with her. The two guards had tried to attract Besson’s attention repeatedly, with little success. It was almost too late to take up the pursuit without arousing suspicion, as people were getting out from under their tarpaulin-covered shelters to face the next stage in the offensive.

  ‘Sir, come on!’ said one guard desperately. ‘We have to go—everyone else is beginning to stir!’

  Besson shook himself out of his trance and turned to face his subordinates.

  ‘Is everything ready?’ Besson demanded.

  Both guards nodded, and gathered the equipment he had requested.

  It had just turned two o’clock. Scottish cannon fire boomed, rousting any stragglers from their slumber. The Scots wasted little time reigniting their lacklustre campaign against their formidable enemy. Even though the odds were monumentally stacked against them, they were hell-bent on achieving their lofty goal.

  The sniper division had been ordered to stand down, to be replaced by their daytime counterparts along the fortifications. The four-man rotation had taken place within the tank division on the battlefield, giving the twilight shifts the chance to rest until needed again that evening.

  *

  Myron and Jen had made it only a little way through the forest, and it hadn’t escaped Myron’s notice that Jen was dropping behind. Every step she took seemed to be a chore, as her old injuries got the better of her. She stood a good ten paces behind Myron, panting, with her hands on her knees.

  Myron trotted back to her and began to pull on her arm.

  ‘Stop, Myron, please stop!’ she begged. ‘I can’t take another step. My legs feel like lead.’

  ‘You’ve got to, Jen! We should be a lot further along than this. It’s taken us thirty minutes to walk half a mile—I expected to have covered at least two miles by now. Look! We only have a few more yards to go, and then we’ll be back at the bunker where we can rest. I promise.’

  Jen grimaced at the thought of having to walk another step, but she knew that Myron would never break a promise.

  For Myron and Jen, the war was over for the time being, but the unmistakable sound of cannons roaring and the heavy artillery trudging relentlessly forward could still be heard in the distance, as the English pressed their advantage, crushing the enemies of the realm—intent on breaking their waning spirits, and then finally obliterating them. An English victory would spell the extinction of a race of barbarians, plunging them into their own special hell.

  Jen mustered her last ounce of strength with Myron’s encouragement and they reached the bunker, where they could rest until morning before setting off on their journey to London. Jen secretly thought the city was a strange destination. Why risk everything by going back to the heart of the oppression?

  But Myron was working on the premise of keeping his friends close and his enemies closer. His father was chief among those he regarded as an enemy; the only bigger enemy was the tyrannical system the government had set in place.

  Everything in the bunker was just how they had left it. The charred remains of the fire, the old ration papers strewn across the ground, Jen’s blood-sodden socks that had been tossed in the corner, and the unmistakable smell of damp that had them retching on first encountering it.

  *

  Another smell that was becoming all too apparent was the smell of death, as the casualties of war mounted in the new wave of attacks. The living had no escape from the stench of decomposing and maggot-infested bodies, which mixed with the odour of excrement and urine—released involuntarily by the victims in their death throes—to create an ungodly fetor.

  The English troops were currently winning the battle for the forest, preventing the Scots and their allies from passing through it even as they were pushed back towards the Watford Gap two miles distant. Victory clearly wasn’t coming quickly enough for Brigadier Howard. Meanwhile his nemesis, Lt. Col. Stuart MacAulay, was determined not to let Howard have his way completely. MacAulay had fewer troops due to heavy losses the day before, but he certainly wasn’t giving up. He was determined to get his final victory before hanging up his hat for good.

  The English managed to acquire a lone prisoner in the first hour. The Scotsman had been caught rifling through the pockets of a dead English officer’s dress coat. Brigadier Howard beckoned Sergeant Mason to his side again.

  ‘Sergeant, bring me the prisoner,’ he commanded. ‘The cur will do nicely as a runner to get an urgent message to the armoury!’

  Sergeant Mason lumbered over to the tree against which the prisoner had been tied. The prisoner regarded him warily, his eyes wide as saucers. The Scots didn’t have enough manpower to win the war on the ground, and used other means to render the English helpless. They carried out successful raids on communication towers that dotted the countryside. As a result, the English had no means of communication to relay their messages and were forced to use what were known as runners. Few runners survived long enough to get their messages through, and this unfortunate casualty of war, who was being unceremoniously dragged by his hair towards the brigadier, wouldn’t fare any bett
er.

  Sergeant Mason forced the kicking and screaming Scotsman to his knees in front of Howard, and then placed a tracking collar around his neck. Though nondescript, the device held a deadly secret: tiny razor-sharp blades had been placed within the inch-thick collar, and were situated where they could pierce the carotid arteries when activated.

  Sergeant Mason would monitor the prisoner’s every step with the aid of a hand-held device. If he were to deviate from the prescribed path, even unintentionally, the sergeant wouldn’t hesitate to trigger the blades, whether or not the message had been delivered.

  Scottish snipers were still roaming the Kentish countryside in small numbers, killing unsuspecting English troops who dared enter their snares. English runners were among their favourite victims. Like others before him, the prisoner was forced to put on the uniform of a dead English soldier. He was then bound and gagged, preventing him from moving or making a sound, while the brigadier prepared to engrave his message on the Scotsman’s chest with the tip of a knife heated over a flame.

  The sergeant summoned two idle soldiers over to hold either side of the prisoner while the brigadier carried out the painful procedure. Brigadier Howard approached his restrained captive with the red-hot blade, and he began to squirm as one of the soldiers ripped open his shirt. As the blade touched his skin, the soldier closed his eyes tightly and puffed out his cheeks, trying to break through the gag to let out his screams. The poor Scotsman writhed in agony as the putrid smell of burning flesh filled the air.

  The prisoner was freed from the vice grip of the two soldiers holding him once the procedure had been completed. He dropped to his knees in his weakened state and began to weep like a baby, much to the amusement of those around him.

  Brigadier Howard walked up to the petrified Scot and wiped away any traces of blood with his own handkerchief. He then buttoned the Scot’s shirt to hide the coded message. The procedure had caused the prisoner a great deal of pain and he was physically drained; they allowed him a brief respite before sending him on his perilous journey—and, inevitably, to his death.