I looked down the long corridor ahead of me — a shooting gallery if ever I saw one — then back to the burning room. He was right.
“Back outside, now,” I yelled, and we retreated to Speaker’s Green. Burning pages began to rain down from the walls as we backtracked.
“We need to think this through,” I said, turning to Jane. “Do you think he’ll stand and fight or run for it?”
“Fight,” she said firmly.
“Good, then what we have to do…”
My voice was drowned out by a roar somewhere off to our left. I glanced at the others in confusion then ran through the snow, underneath Big Ben and into the yard. A tide of children was pouring up out of the underground car park. At their head ran Caroline, a machine gun in her hands. The women from the Lords brought up the rear, yelping and whooping and firing in the air.
I tried to wave them down, to prevent them hurtling headlong into the Palace, but there was no stopping them. This wasn’t an army, this was a mob and God help anyone who got in their way.
Caroline ran over to me as the mob streamed into the building, screaming and yelling and tearing the place apart, every one of them carrying a club, chain or gun.
“Not quite how we planned it,” she said to me, panting and excited. “They left all our weapons in a pile in the car park, so we just collected them.”
“We need to come up with a strategy for this, some plan…”
Caroline cut me off with a derisive laugh. “Forget it,” she said. “Genie’s out of the bottle, Lee.”
I stood there, frustrated at the way the situation had slipped out of our hands so quickly.
“Fuck it,” said Jack. “Let’s follow them.” He didn’t wait for my assent, he just stomped off. Caroline went with him, Green shrugged as if to say ‘what can you do?’ and followed suit. I turned to Jane, who was looking anything but excited by this turn of events.
“Problem?” I asked.
Her face clouded. “I don’t want anyone getting to him before I do. Cooper’s mine,” she said. Then she too limped after the others.
I watched her walk awkwardly until she reached the door to the building — ripped off and smashed to pieces.
“I see what you like about her,” said the voice in my head. “She’s feisty.”
Jane stopped and turned to look at me.
“Are you fucking coming, or what?” she shouted.
I WALK THROUGH the Palace of Westminster with Lee at my side, trailing in the wake of the mob.
My foot pounds agonisingly as we shamble through the corridors of power. Everything has been ripped apart. Shattered wood panels litter the carpet, paintings and murals have been smashed and shattered.
The Commons is a scene of total devastation. The plush green leather benches have been slashed and the stuffing lies everywhere, mirroring the snow outside. The Speaker’s Chair lies broken next to the upturned debating table. Centuries of tradition reduced to firewood in a few minutes.
A soldier lies sprawled in the middle of the floor. His head has been bashed in with a dispatch box that lies next to him, its lid snapped off. There are two dead children on the stairs that lead up to the back benches. I hurry over and kneel beside them, but they are shot to pieces and beyond help. One, a young girl, is a stranger to me, but I recognise the boy from St Mark’s. I close their sightless eyes and stand, gripping my gun tightly, eager for retribution.
The row of grimy windows at the top of the chamber to our left begins to flicker orange as the fire sweeps parallel to us. It won’t be long before it reaches this chamber.
We emerge into the Members’ Lobby. Marble figures lie on the ground, arms broken, heads smashed off. We pass a group of four kids toppling a statue of some long forgotten administrator, his outstretched finger hectoring and stern; it snaps off as the figure crashes to the tiles.
Ahead there is gunfire and shouting, explosions and screams, and the constant angry roar of children on the rampage.
There are a series of loud reports down the corridor to my right. I spin to see a soldier backing away, firing a handgun as he goes. Then it clicks uselessly, the ammunition exhausted. He throws the weapon at whoever is advancing towards him, then turns to run in my direction. I raise my gun to cut him down but before I can fire a tall figure bursts into the corridor in a flurry of limbs and steel. The soldier raises his arms to protect himself, but the swordsman brings his blade down in a sweeping arc and cleanly severs the man’s head from his body. It rolls towards me, the cadaver toppling to the floor behind it. The swordsman stands upright and walks towards us, dripping blade at his side. His face is a mass of bruises.
“Ferguson, is that you?” says Lee.
The figure nods as he reaches us. One of the four kids, finished with the statue now, runs forward and kicks the soldier’s severed head as if taking a penalty. It soars into the air and narrowly misses a second sword-bearing Ranger who emerges from the corridor and ducks in alarm as the head flies past, breaking the window on its way out.
“Fucking hell!” swears the Ranger. He turns and shouts at Ferguson. “We’re supposed to disable when possible, Ferguson. You know the boss doesn’t like us killing if we don’t have to.”
Ferguson turns and stares at Wilkes who immediately puts his hands up.
“But, you know, do what you feel, pal,” he says sheepishly.
The kids laugh and high five the head kicker, then they take off towards the Lords, following the sounds of the fight.
Lee, the two Rangers and I follow on behind.
AS WE WALKED through that corridor something strange happened to me. I felt my pulse racing, faster than it had even when I was lined up in front of the firing squad. My hand started spastically clenching and unclenching on the stock of my gun and Mac began to shout at me.
“Come on Nine Lives, what are you doing straggling at the back?” he bellowed. “Fucking get in there. Crack some skulls. Come on, for fuck’s sake.”
I tried to ignore him but he was too loud, too insistent. The desire to kill grew so strong that I could barely hold myself in check.
“Stay with her,” I said to Wilkes. Then I looked at Ferguson as if to say ‘You coming?’ He nodded once, and we ran ahead, into the fray. I heard Jane shouting at me to be careful, but it barely registered.
We came to the Lords and found the doors smashed open. The noise from inside was indescribable. As we entered we found the mob of children, nearly all of them, I reckon, formed into a circle. Some were standing on the red leather benches to get a better view of the makeshift arena they’d constructed on the floor of the house. They were literally baying for blood, chanting, cheering, jeering and yelling. I fought my way through the crowd to the front edge and found two of Cooper’s soldiers — big, burly men in black combats, shaven headed and scary — standing with their backs to each other, circling around and around waiting for the crowd to surge forward and tear them to pieces. They were bleeding, desperate and cornered.
The men were unarmed, and the children had enough weapons between them to gun them down a hundred times, but it seemed the crowd was eager for a more primitive spectacle. They were hurling anything and everything they could find at the men — books, computer equipment, chairs, heavy wooden boxes. The men were, I realised, being stoned to death. I felt a surge of excited bloodlust and ran out into the lobby where I had passed some more shattered statues. I grabbed a heavy, sharp piece of marble and ran back, fighting my way through the crowd to the front again, cradling it in my hands.
The men were batting away the objects that were flying at them, but they couldn’t get them all. A gold finial smashed into the face of one of them and he reeled backwards. The children cheered as blood began to pump from his nose. He stopped for a moment and bowed his head, wiping the blood onto his sleeve. I smiled as I stepped forward, raised the heavy stone block, and brought it crashing down on the man’s head, feeling his skull crack and crumble beneath it.