Dark Days by Ryan Casey

Author:Ryan Casey
Language: eng
Format: azw3
Publisher: Higher Bank Books
Published: 2019-11-20T05:00:00+00:00

Chapter Twenty-Three

It was already going dark when Martin and Ella reached Ambleside.

Martin knew long before arriving what the situation was. But now he was here it just drilled the severity of the whole damned situation home to home. Abandoned cars everywhere. People rushing down the streets, looking over their shoulders as they raced shopping trolleys full of all kinds of everything down the road. There was broken glass on the pavement. Some of the shops had boarded up already.

It was only the second night, and already tensions were mounting.

Martin held on to Ella’s cold hand as he walked down the street. She’d been quiet ever since the incident with the old man in the ambulance. It’d got to her. Reality hitting her, perhaps for the very first time. A sense that this caring world wasn’t so caring anymore—and these were just the early days.

Martin looked at Ambleside and felt his stomach sink. Seeing such a beautiful little lakeside town in such disarray was heartbreaking. Ambleside was always so quiet. So peaceful.

And it posed the question to Martin. If somewhere like Ambleside was already spiralling out of control, then what would the larger towns and cities be like?

One the one hand, at least there might be military there to try and ease things.

On the other... the military might just increase tensions even more.

Martin didn’t know what was worse right now.

“So what do we do now?” Ella asked.

It was a good question. One Martin knew he was going to struggle answering. After all, what did they do? He’d walked from the log cabin towards Eskdale Green. He hadn’t found any hope there. He’d headed even further into Ambleside and found it the same here.

There was only so far he could go before realising that things were the same everywhere.

This blackout. It was widespread.

He went to answer Ella, still not totally certain what he was going to say, when he heard shouting over to his right.

There was a beefy man standing in front of the supermarket. Another man had two baskets full of items. He was skinny. Trying to stand his ground.

But the beefy guy kept on prodding a finger into his chest and ordering him to hand his supplies over.

There were a few other people around. Some of them were trying to calm the bigger bloke. Others looked like they were encouraging him.

And Martin heard things. He could hear what the big bloke was shouting. “You’re not even from around here. You’re just a frigging tourist. You’ve no damned right taking our stuff!”

“It’s not your stuff,” the skinny man said. “If you wanted it, you should’ve got it when you had the ch—”

It happened, then.

The big man took a swing at the skinny bloke holding the baskets.

The baskets dropped to the floor with a clatter.

Browning apples and tins of tuna spilled everywhere.

And nobody helped the skinny man up.

Nobody went to his aid.

They just grabbed what they could of the debris before disappearing.

“Can’t we do something?” Ella asked.

Martin looked at that skinny bloke lying on the ground.

Download

Copyright Disclaimer:
This site does not store any files on its server. We only index and link to content provided by other sites. Please contact the content providers to delete copyright contents if any and email us, we'll remove relevant links or contents immediately.