London Burns by Chris Philbrook

Author:Chris Philbrook [Philbrook, Chris]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Published: 2016-01-25T05:00:00+00:00

- Part Three -

The Last Few Steps

The men were crouched behind the monument in the dark of the first full hour of evening. They had been pinned down trying to radio the palace for almost an hour. Streetlights lit the world around them, and cast shadows in all directions. Beyond the close orange orbs of the streetlights distant fires lit the night. One exceptionally large fire to the west lit the horizon beyond the roof of the palace. The flames had erupted, casting their orange light against the roof of the clouds after a massive explosion not long ago. A crashed airplane perhaps, or a fuel truck.

Gunfire popping off in bursts from the palace was sporadic, but steady, and the crowds watching were the same. They had flocked to the sides of the streets and found cover but they still watched and filmed, lured in by the glory of violence and wanting to be near a calamitous event in history. Beck was certain they were idiots.

“Any luck?” Beck asked Patil.

“Naught,” Patil said. “I can’t get them at all. Forty Commando is trying to get in touch with the Palace for us but they aren’t responding. They are saying Heathrow is eating up resources left and right. I guess a plane crashed. Ran out of fuel.”

He could hear the planes circling miles above when the gunfire paused. “What the hell does that have to do with us?” Beck asked. “How did communications get so shit, so fast?”

“Can you imagine how crushed the phone service is? Look around. There has to be five hundred 999 calls running right now, and then for every phone ring there’s a radio dispatch to an emergency service. Then there’s the pricks on their cell phones calling for mum and dad,” Patil said, giving up trying to contact anyone. “Ten million pricks all screaming at the same time.”

“That’s a lot of pricks,” Thurgood muttered.

“Shut up,” Beck said. “Alright, brilliant. If we approach, we stand a good chance at getting shot. If we leave this cover, we stand a good chance at getting shot. If we remain here, we stand a good chance at being bitten or beaten to death. So, let’s let them know we’re here, identify ourselves the old fashioned way, and move to flank. Motterhead, get ready to throw smoke. Everyone else, get ready to move.” Beck got out a smoke grenade.

The horse-faced giant nodded and yanked a tubular smoke grenade from a pouch on his belt. He moved his rifle to the side and pulled the pin in unison with his sergeant.

Beck hurled his grenade with all the strength he could muster into the courtyard separating the monument from the gate. The same courtyard that saw tens of thousands of tourists every month, but had now been turned into the scene of a massacre. Motterhead saw where it landed, and threw his short of the spot.

The two grenades popped loudly and issued out massive streams of dense white smoke. The devices hissed and spat as the thick cloud shot across the ground and into the still June air, forming a wall of smoke.

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