gold rings, slowly, reflexively curling open and closed as if beckoning her over.
She wondered why she felt nothing at all. Not for him, not for the other boys. She wondered if that made her as sick and empty inside as them. Impulsively, she stepped forward into the gloom and swung a leg at where she guessed his head was. She made contact, dull, cushioned and heavy.
‘You bastard,’ she spat through gritted teeth.
She swung another kick at him. And another.
You bastards.
She felt the bile in her throat, a stinging acid burn that threatened to bubble up and leave her retching.
‘Come on, Leona,’ said Harry softly, reaching for her and pulling her away from the body. ‘He’s dead now.’
‘Right then,’ Adam announced. ‘That’s everything. We should go.’
As if on cue a floodlight near the main entrance flickered on and she thought she saw a flurry of movement in the entrance foyer through the glass wall.
Adam swung the torch on her. She winced at the bright light.
‘You good to go, Leona?’
‘Yes,’ she nodded, swinging the assault rifle onto her shoulder. ‘I’m ready.’
Chapter 70
10 years AC
O2 Arena - ‘Safety Zone 4’, London
Maxwell watched the last of the workers being herded aboard the third barge - the end of the daisy chain; if it looked like they were running tight on fuel, or the load was simply burning too much diesel, they could easily just unhook the rearmost barge and let it drift. There were no supplies on that barge to lose, none at all; just a hundred of those malnourished scarecrows standing cheek by jowl in the hold. And if they had to cast them adrift it wouldn’t be the end of the world, they’d be able to recruit more workers from amongst those people living on that rig.
Four hundred-and-something of them living on there, that’s what the dead boy had said, wasn’t it? Depending on how much food was being grown there - if there was only enough to sustain four hundred-and-something, then he’d have to jettison that sorry-looking lot in the third barge anyway.
Better they were all on the last barge anyway - those workers might take it into their heads to try overpowering the dozen or so praetorians he was going to put on there with them. Since the breakout the night before last of a group of them - that officer, Brooks, and his comrades - news had seemed to spread amongst the peasants that Maxwell and his boys were packing up and leaving. The scheduled work routines had broken down. This morning a worried crowd had amassed in the entrance foyer just in front of the turnstiles into the arena. Some of the workers had attempted to make their way around the outside of the dome along the narrow quayside towards the rear to see what was happening back there. His boys had fired their guns into them, leaving several dozen bodies and the rest scattering back the way they’d come.
More of the workers had managed to push their way into the arena and down to the mezzanine floor to help themselves to the last few stacks of supplies; pallets they’d not managed to find space for aboard the second barge.
Well, you’re going to be disappointed, folks. There ain’t a lot left.
It had been something of a hectic morning so far.
The tugboat’s diesel engine chugged noisily, transmitting a thudding vibration that rattled through the small vessel’s deck, through his feet. The tug bobbed on the choppy water like a stir-crazy dog on a leash as the last dozen workers shuffled across the boarding plank and down into the third barge’s hold.
‘That’s it I think, Chief,’ said Snoop.
‘Thank you, Edward.’
The late-afternoon sun burned off the glass and steel sides of the distant office towers of Canary Wharf. He’d so very much wanted to get off at first light this morning without a fuss . . . without having to post cordons of guards, without having to waste valuable rounds of ammo keeping them back. And, of course, to make a day’s travel whilst the weather looked so calm. But wheeling the last of the stacked pallets of food and supplies up from the mezzanine, and the comforts and gadgets and perks the boys enjoyed and expected to bring with them, had taken much, much longer than he’d anticipated.
‘Your little trollops are all on?’
‘Yeah, we got all our girls,’ replied Snoop.
He spotted the last of his boys backing out of the north-east entrance, some personal possessions under their arms. Those that