by Vance Huxley
“Not until Caddi says, which won’t be until he’s caught Mercedes and Soldier Boy. It’s stupid if you ask me. No woman is worth risking all this for, and we should shoot Soldier Boy on sight. If he’s supposed to be a clerk how did he kill so many blokes, or learn to shoot like that?” The gangster glanced up the road, inside Orchard Close. “Still nothing. I hope he hurries up. This silence is giving me the creeps.”
“I like it quiet. Fuck!” Muffled gunfire, and barking, sounded from deeper inside Orchard Close. “Everyone, get to your windows and be ready.” Golf raised his gun as a figure burst out of a door and ran towards the guardhouse, pulling on an armoured jacket. He hesitated, then fired because the surprise part was a bust now. The figure spun and dropped, then tried to rise but two shots from the other gangsters killed him. Another figure ran up the road, staggering but diving for cover when the Hot Rods opened fire.
Golf quietly cursed whoever had started shooting before Caddi gave the word. He’d have cursed louder, and harder, if he’d known who it was and why the defenders were given a chance. Caddi had decided to grandstand, which gave his victims an outside, suicidal chance, and they’d taken it. The noise and shooting soon spread because the muffled gunfire had kicked off the main Hot Rod attack, the snatch squads. That wasn’t Caddi’s plan, but none of the gangsters waited for a radio message once the shooting started.
* * *
No human ears would have heard the men approaching but inside the brewery Malt and Barley, the Staffordshire Bull Terriers, came to their feet growling. As a hand touched the door, gently trying the doorknob, Malt the neutered male started barking. A low voice sounded outside. “For fuck’s sake shut the dogs up. Use a machete or a crossbow.” Men pushed the door open and barged through, but Malt never gave them a chance to get set. Running wild after the Crash, teaming up with Barley and surviving on rabbits, rats and carrion, had woken his wolf ancestry. Now the people upstairs gave him food and let him sleep in here and raise Barley’s pups, so this house was home and pack. Malt defended both, his jaws clamping onto a wrist before he threw his whole thirty-nine pounds weight into twisting his thickly muscled neck.
Upstairs Seth, the trainee brewer, jerked out of a sound sleep as a piercing scream rang out from next door! The brewery took up a pair of semi-detached houses. Seth slept upstairs in one of them, with his girlfriend and her dad sleeping in the other so now he didn’t hesitate. Scooping up his sawn-off shotgun and the bandolier of shells, Seth headed for his girlfriend Berry, his fiancée in a better world. As Seth ran along the landing to the connecting door he could hear snarling, shouting and a shot, and now the noise wasn’t all downstairs. Hearing Berry scream, Seth cocked the shotgun and kicked open the connecting door.
He raised the barrels to fire into the crowd at the top of the stairs, but he would hit Nigel, Berry’s dad. Despite all the guns and machetes, the gangsters were grappling, not shooting or hacking at their single opponent. Seth had barely realised the Hot Rods were trying to capture Nigel, not kill him, when one of them turned with a pistol in his hand. Nigel looked up, face frantic. “Do it! Save Berry!” Even then Seth might have hesitated, but the man with the pistol raised it. Seth closed his eyes as he pulled both triggers, riding the shotgun’s vicious kick with practiced ease.
Seth’s stomach heaved at his first glimpse of the butchery. The eighteen lead balls had spread perfectly at this range, filling the landing before tearing clean through the first men. From the cries some had thrown themselves down the stairs, but nobody upstairs was standing or interested in Seth. Even above the screaming and the ringing in his ears, Seth heard Berry shout, “Dad!” He turned, sick at the thought of how she’d feel about him now.
Seth heard a male voice answer, and realised some of the Hot Rods had got into her bedroom. “We’d better take really good care of you, in case your Dad just died.”
That meant more than one gangster, but Seth couldn’t use the shotgun with Berry in there! He snatched up a machete from the bloody ruin in the hall, braced himself and charged the door. As he did, Seth wished he’d taken machete lessons, but he’d always figured the sawn-off would stop any trouble. Seconds later he wished he’d hadn’t lost so much weight since the Crash, because instead of smashing the door open he bounced and nearly fell when it hit someone inside. His second attempt worked better because the gangster had staggered forward and fallen across Berry’s bed. Seth had to ignore him, too busy flailing away with the machete, trying to stop the other man aiming his crossbow.
At least the flailing worked. The bloke had to use the crossbow to defend himself, but Seth knew the other gangster would be recovering. The expected shot, when it came, didn’t hit him. The bastard shot Berry! Seth attacked with redoubled fury, cringing in anticipation of a bullet in the back, but the Geek-made steel crossbow stopped him getting at the man. When the second shot came, after a pause, the result might have been a bigger surprise to Seth than if it had hit him. The Hot Rod with the crossbow flew back, bounced off the wall and collapsed. Seth whirled to find Berry sitting up in bed, eyes wide, pointing a pistol!
She reached down under her pillow for another round, reloading the weapon with trembling hands. “It’s the single-shot Harold gave to Dad. When the scroat fell across my bed he looked back at you, so I grabbed it.” Both stopped, listening, as feet clattered on the stairs. Berry’s face set. “I’ll do it. I’ve practiced with a pistol.” She slid the gun from the belt of the dead man laid across her bed, checked the safety, and pulled back the slide.
Seth put a finger on his lips, taking hold of the door handle before whispering, “I dropped the shotgun out there. I’m sorry about…” His courage failed so Seth opened the door, then jammed his hands over his ears. Even so, the drumroll of shots in the small bedroom nearly deafened him. The three men who’d dived down the stairs in time to escape the shotgun, then heard the pistol and charged back up to help, never stood a chance. Berry didn’t mess about, she kept shooting until the gun fell silent, the clip empty. A voice downstairs tried to protest, then fell silent, though muffled growling continued for a little while.
Berry wasn’t listening. She’d dropped the gun and headed for her dad so any minute now she’d realise the sawn-off had killed him. Seth started to turn away, to give her some space and maybe hide away from her, but a man’s hand moved. A cold, hard something in Seth decided that whatever Berry thought about him after this, none of these scroats would ever bother her again. The apprentice brewer picked up the dropped crossbow, putting the point on the wounded man’s head before nailing it to the boards. The bloke had been scrabbling for his pistol, so Seth picked it up. He tested the safety by shooting a man who might not be quite dead. The gun worked, so he reloaded the shotgun and went downstairs.
“Fuck no, not that thing!” The man with a heavily-bandaged arm, sat by the door, cringed when he saw the sawn-off. “I’ll surrender, just keep that fucking dog away from me.” He pointed his machete at Barley, bleeding from a long slash down her flank. The man was right to be worried because the Staffy lurked behind the sacks of malted barley, teeth bared, waiting for her chance. Her mate, Malt, lay dead with a crossbow bolt right through him, several deep machete cuts in his body, and half his head blown off. From the blood on the floor and the bandages on the man, at least one of the dogs had scored.
“I’ll call her off.” Seth would have happily let Barley chew up the Hot Rod, but he’d kept walking and now he was close enough. Despite never bothering with pistol practice, both Seth’s shots punched through the armoured vest over the Hot Rod’s heart. The second also set his jacket smouldering while the third one, into his head, scorched his hair.
“See, no problem.” Seth whistled to Barley and headed back up the stairs, pausing to put a bullet through every head on the way. He’d give Berry time with her dad, but none of these arses would be taking advantage. At the top of the stairs he picked up another pistol, shooting the rest of the bodies before knocking gently on Berry’s door. “Berry
?”
“Come in.” Seth cautiously opened the door to find Berry in her dressing gown, her blood-spattered nightshirt on the floor. “Oh Seth!” He dropped the pistol and shotgun, because Berry pretty much took him off his feet in her own version of a bear hug.
“Your Dad…”
“I know. The one with the crossbow was telling me. Caddi wanted me alive, to make sure Dad kept making beer. You didn’t have any option, or not one Dad would want to live with, so I don’t blame you, Seth.” Berry wasn’t breaking down as Seth expected.
Seth stroked her back but he daren’t look at her face, at the pain in her eyes. “I wish….”
Berry seemed to be accepting the whole thing calmly, though Seth reassessed when she cut him off, her voice hardening. “I blame that filthy pig Caddi, and his pack of animals! I want to go out there and kill every last Hot Rod I can find, but I can’t. Neither of us can, because we never trained as fighters. Harold always said our beer was worth a dozen guns, so we’ll concentrate on saving that.” She sighed, and Seth fought for breath for a moment as Berry hugged harder. “Give me a hand to put dad in his bedroom, then we’ll sit at the top of the stairs with all those guns and wait. We can pile up the bodies as a barricade. Harold and the Riot Squad will kill the Hot Rods sooner or later.” She pulled back with a sad smile. “Or we’ll get our chance at them anyway.”
* * *
Elizabeth, thirty-eight and a widow, worked in the canteen, living above it with her fourteen-year-old daughter Pricilla. She knew she worked too many hours, but that helped her deal with her personal demons. Three years ago her boy, Will, had joined that treacherous bastard Jon and his friends when they killed Sandy the carpenter. They’d kidnapped Matti, Barry’s daughter, and the four of them ran off towards the Hot Rods. Harold and his fighters caught them in time to rescue Matti, killing the kidnappers including Will. For a long time Elizabeth hated the Orchard Close fighters, Harold in particular.
Despite that Harold never asked her to leave, or blamed her for her outbursts, until eventually Elizabeth listened to her daughter, Pricilla. The Hot Rods, especially Caddi, had been responsible for Will’s death, tempting her boy into abandoning his family. In her darker moments, Elizabeth admitted to herself that she should have been stricter with him.
Over the last three years she’d often fantasised about poisoning the soup and burgers she sold to Hot Rods, or catching one drunk on his own where she could cut the bastard to bits. Guns terrified Elizabeth but she’d even tried to learn to use one, in case she got her chance. Eventually, deep down inside, Elizabeth accepted that she’d never get her revenge. Now, when raised voices and shots woke her up just as they had three years ago, for a moment she was back there and Will hadn’t died, not yet.
As the well-worn memories wound their way to eventual despair, Elizabeth crossed to the window and looked out. Hot Rods? Armed? In the street, outside Emmy’s window? A chill ran through her when she saw one raise a pipe bomb. Tammy slept in there! The gangsters were going to burn a two-year-old girl! A noise from behind brought her round. “It’s all right Pricilla, no need to get up.” After all, what could the pair of them…? Steely resolve settled into Elizabeth’s soul, and a deep sense of salvation. “I’m just nipping downstairs luv. I won’t be a moment.”
As she headed for the kitchen, Elizabeth screwed up her courage. The Hot Rods had already cost her a son. The shits led him astray, and now they’d come to take her daughter as well. They’d make Pricilla into a gang woman, because the filthy gangsters wouldn’t care about her age. Elizabeth barely paused in the kitchen as she tied on a pinafore, backwards so she could put a few things in the pocket, hidden behind her back. One quick glance out of the door showed the men still talking, though two were moving towards Emmy’s door. Elizabeth didn’t hesitate; she daren’t or she’d stop and then Tammy would burn and the gangsters would get Pricilla.
“Help, help! Help me. Please!” Elizabeth ran down the road towards the gang, her eyes on the two with the bombs, though a quick glance showed Emmy at the window. She’d been right; Emmy daren’t shoot and risk Tammy getting blown up. “They’re killing people. Look after me. Help!”
A couple of Hot Rods turned to look at her and laughed, waving her forward and promising to keep her safe. Caddi wanted prisoners, and this one was volunteering. Elizabeth smiled back, a big, happy smile, and kept running.
* * *
A rattle of pebbles on the window woke Emmy, Queen of Orchard Close’s gardening gnomes and the first real shooter Harold ever trained. There may have been more pebbles but now Sooty, her hairy black mutt, drowned out most noises as he hurtled down the stairs to bark at the door. Even so, Emmy wasn’t alarmed because Sooty barked at everyone, hoping they’d give him a treat to shut him up. Emmy glanced at Tammy, but her daughter had learned to sleep through Sooty’s hello. Picking up the pistol by the bed before going to the window might have been pure paranoia, but Emmy was puzzled. Why had someone used pebbles to wake her up when she had a phone right by her bed?
Emmy pulled back the curtain and froze in shock. “Hey Emmy, shut that fucking dog up or else.” Emmy recognised some of the men from when they’d bought vegetables. Six Hot Rods stood in her front garden, two of them with lighters and pipe bombs ready to throw! Somehow they all had guns, when all visitors should give up their weapons at the gate! She glanced back, hesitating because if a bomb came in here it would kill Tammy, her beautiful baby girl and all she had left of Curtis. “Open the door and nobody gets hurt. If not, your kid burns.” Emmy almost brought up the gun, but she’d never get both the blokes with bombs. Could she dive back, get Tammy and get out of the room? Where the hell were the wall guards? Muffled gunfire broke out up towards the brewery, then nearer while she stood, her head going around in circles.
“Two of the blokes are coming in. You stay right there until they get upstairs and nobody gets hurt.” Again Emmy almost fired, but those bombs held her. Could she wait until the men were in here? No, those shits outside would still throw the bombs. She couldn’t let them take her, because Caddi would use Tammy to control her. Then, when Tammy grew up, was old enough…. Emmy felt it settle in. Tammy might die. She might die, but that had to be better than life as Caddi’s slaves. She braced herself as two of the men headed for her front door, but they paused. Those two looked up the street towards the shouting, but the rest kept watching Emmy.
Emmy shot a quick glance up the road, then took another, longer look. Elizabeth, in her nightie and slippers and running towards the Hot Rods? Why was she smiling like that when she hated them? Emmy set herself, waiting for her moment. At least one of the men down there would have to grab Elizabeth so he wouldn’t be ready to shoot back, and if one of the bombers turned to look? One of the Hot Rods called out, “All right love, slow up, we’ll look after you.” A couple of the others laughed, but Elizabeth kept coming. “Hey, whoa, stop.” The Hot Rod holstered his pistol and took a step towards Elizabeth, with his arms outstretched to stop her.
Elizabeth didn’t hesitate, and the big smile on her face wasn’t the slightest bit forced. A fierce joy filled her as she ran closer because the men had turned from Emmy’s door, and now three of them were looking her way. “Thank God you’re here! Save me please!” As the idiot Hot Rod took another step towards her, Elizabeth reached behind, plucked the cleaver from her apron pocket, and swung with everything she had.
The Hot Rod barely opened his mouth to yell before the heavy blade hacked far enough through the steel helmet to sink into the bone, just as it was designed to do. The cleaver wedged so as the man fell Elizabeth lost her grip, but the kitchen had provided plenty of other weapons. Her other hand found the handle of a bread knife to slash the next man, her free hand grabbing one of the big carving knives. The Hot Rod cried out and ducked away as the blade carved a deep groove across his face. Elizabeth swung wildly, again and again with both hands, but she kept her eyes on the prize. She wanted those two with bombs, the swine who thought they were going
to burn a baby.
“Stop her!”
“Shut the bitch up!”
“Fuck!”
“Shoot her!”
“No shots, Caddi…”
“Fucking shoot her!”
They’d all turned towards Elizabeth now, shock on their faces and guns coming up, so Elizabeth threw a knife at the nearest bomber. She’d never learned to throw one properly, but he cursed and ducked away from the spinning length of sharp steel. A shot boomed out from above and the other bomber staggered back, then flipped over as another shot hit him, his bomb rolling harmlessly away. Relief swept through Elizabeth because she’d done it, but then a hammer-blow knocked her sideways. Elizabeth kept her feet as she cannoned into a man, her arm going around his neck while her other hand began stabbing, and stabbing, and stabbing as the pain grew and the darkness closed in. “I got him, Will.” Though the words never made it past her lips, Elizabeth finally found her peace.
* * *
Emmy had been as shocked as the Hot Rods when Elizabeth buried a butcher’s cleaver in the Hot Rod’s head, but she recovered quickly enough to take her chance. Her pistol came up as another man reeled back with a shriek of pain and surprise, and the Hot Rods all turned towards Elizabeth. The bomb throwers had to die first. One of them jerked his eyes back up to Emmy, his mouth opening to yell as he saw her pistol which sorted out the priorities. The second shot blew out more window glass and knocked him flat, the bomb rolling away. As she swung her pistol across Emmy found the second bomb thrower still looking away from her. She put two into him as well, just to be sure, dropping into the groove.
All the training that Harold had put her through fell into place. The Hot Rod who’d shot Elizabeth got the next two bullets, because he’d turned to look back and up at her. That left one on his feet, the one who’d been slashed, so Emmy shot him next. Emmy took the time to make sure of the one with the cleaver in his head, because Elizabeth laid on top of the last surviving Hot Rod. The gangster pushed Elizabeth’s body clear, one-handed because the other was shredded, looked up and his mouth dropped open in shock. From the state of his chest he might not have survived anyway but Emmy made sure, heart and head.
