at them not to shoot.
Sergeant Walfield turned to look at him. ‘Sir, what do we do now?’
Oh, Christ.
There were a dozen over the wire now, more snagged on the razor sharp blades and tugging their clothes clear, being pushed forward by a growing momentum from behind.
Adam swallowed anxiously. Walfield again looking back at him.
More of them were stepping over, and more behind them. The policeman who’d fired the shot was struggling with his weapon; the thing had jammed or he’d slipped the safety catch on in panic. Then suddenly he was down, clutching at his head. Someone had thrown a brick at his face. And more projectiles were arcing over the top.
If this barrier folds these people will flood into SZ4. We will have lost control and they’ll strip us clean - Maxwell’s briefing from several hours ago as the crowd outside had started to swell in the darkness. Do you understand? If you have to shoot, do it.
‘Open fire!’ Adam heard himself utter to Sergeant Walfield.
Walfield bellowed the order again a dozen times louder.
The crackle of gunfire oddly reminded Adam of bubble wrap being twisted tightly. The gunners in his platoon fired single and double taps, the policemen emptied their magazines. A dozen people, probably more, flopped like pathetic rag dolls amidst the wire; England football strips, FCUK tops, sensible Primark shirts . . . exploding in unison, spraying curious Rorschach splatter patterns and question marks of dark crimson onto the tarmac, leaving dust motes of polyester and cotton fibres to float lazily to the ground like cherry blossom.
Behind the downed civilians the crowd ducked as one, an instinctive acres-wide herd response. Then they broke and ran, tangling with each other, falling over those behind who reacted with less urgency. The coach-parking area cleared rapidly from the front, rolling back like a receding Mexican wave, leaving behind a mess of items dropped in the panic; and those wounded and twisting in pain on the ground, or who’d stumbled in the rush and were now scrambling away on twisted ankles.
Most of his men ceased fire. One or two of the coppers - unforgivably in Adam’s mind - fired further opportunistic shots at the backs of the parting crowd.
‘For Christ’s sake, STOP FIRING!’ he shouted.
Walfield bellowed the order and the popping of gunfire halted.
The backs of a sea of bobbing heads receded into the distance, still running, swerving around the football academy, streaming down a sloping grass bank towards the Blackwall Tunnel Approach. Adam could hear the awful chorus of screams and slapping feet diminish leaving them now with an unsettling quiet punctuated by soft moans of agony coming from the prone bodies in front of them.
He realised his hands were trembling violently, the muzzle of his assault rifle wavering erratically. Not a good thing for his men to see. He clicked the safety on then lowered it until it was pointing harmlessly at the ground.
In front of him, just a dozen yards away, the mother he’d spotted earlier was rocking backwards and forwards on her knees, lacerated and encaged amidst the shaking coils of wire, expanding again now no one was weighing the board down. She seemed to be unaware that she had a gunshot wound to her arm, instead she stared dumbfounded at the ragged and inert remains of her baby.
Adam dropped down to a squat, feeling a wave of nausea roll up from his cramping stomach. He dry-heaved, not giving a thought to how it looked to his men.
He straightened up after a while and felt the first warm rays of the morning sun on his face.
Oh, Jesus, what the fuck have we done?
Chapter 17
10 years AC
‘LeMan 49/25a’ - ClarenCo Gas Rig Complex, North Sea
‘I don’t know, Walter. I haven’t made up my mind about him yet.’
Jenny hunkered down amongst the troughs of compost lining the walkway along the front of the second tier of the accommodation module. Clear plastic sheeting, attached to the safety rail and stretched up to the overhanging ceiling of the tier above, protected the newly sprouting plants from the occasional drops of salt spray. The sheets flapped and rustled noisily in the breeze like the slack sails of a yacht luffing close to windward.
Walter shot a glance over Jenny’s shoulder at several ladies carefully watering the onion sprouts further along the walkway.
‘You know,’ he lowered his voice, ‘he’s been on his own for a long, long time.’ He squatted down beside her. ‘He’s exactly the type, you know? The type you worry about.