“You and the others are to leave,” Langford said, as the Russians closed in on their final location. The defeat of the tanks had ended whatever hopes he had had of winning the war; he had thrown his last dice and lost. “For what it’s worth, you all performed brilliantly in the final battle, and one day I hope that you will return to Britain.”
He sat back and watched as the small staff ran from the HQ, heading towards the jeep that had been placed there for a hasty retreat, hoping that they would make it to the ships before the Russians reached Liverpool or one of the other coastal ports in the west. Civilian resistance would be almost non-existent, but the Russians themselves had damaged the transport network; it would be weeks before some parts of the country saw a Russian, or were fully reconciled to Russian occupation.
Not all of the remaining soldiers would leave, of course. Some would choose to remain with their families, hiding as civilians, others had determined that they would carry on the war underground, forming a resistance movement that would violently oppose the Russians. There had been some seeds planted, some preparations made, but in the end, supplies had been too limited to arm a proper resistance movement. In the years to come, Langford was certain that there would be victories, but he knew that few of them would matter; the Russians were too strong.
They would grow lax, of course; they would even be influenced by British and European culture. It always happened; the barbarians at the gate would invade, thousands of people would get hurt, but in the long run, civilisation would spread further than it had before. Who knew what would happen in the future? Langford only knew his own future… and that had grown short indeed. He had planned for everything…
There were voices outside, speaking in harsh Russian; the tent flap was pushed aside and three armed Russians stepped into the tent, weapons pointing everywhere; they homed in on Langford as if he were wearing a tracer. He smiled at them.
“Hands high,” one of them barked, as more Russians filtered into the tent. “You will come with us as well.”
“No,” Langford said flatly, and pushed the detonator in his hand. “Goodbye.”
The explosion vaporised the tent and everyone in it.
Chapter Fifty-Two: The Fall of Night
For it was the same story everywhere. After the first stand in line, and when once they had got us on the march, the enemy laughed at us. Our handful of regular troops was sacrificed almost to a man in a vain conflict with numbers; our volunteers and militia, with officers who did not know their work, without ammunition or equipment, or staff to superintend, starving in the midst of plenty, we had soon become a helpless mob, fighting desperately here and there, but with whom, as a manoeuvring army, the disciplined invaders did just what they pleased. Happy those whose bones whitened the fields of Surrey; they at least were spared the disgrace we lived to endure.
United Kingdom
The Russian Army entered London two days after the Battle of Dorking.
Inspector David Briggs, created Lord Mayor of London — the previous Lord Mayor having vanished somewhere on the first terrible day — by Langford, waited for them outside Buckingham Palace. He hadn’t been able to decide if Langford had appointed him Mayor as a perverted joke, an attempt to give him the authority clawed back by several lord mayors since Ken Livingstone had won the role in clear defiance of the then Prime Minister, or if it had been an attempt to give him some form of protection. The Russians were arresting and detaining police officers all over Europe, but some politicians were being left in place; it was just possible that they would leave him alone, or at least in Britain. Maybe…
He wasn’t sure why he had stayed. The once-proud Metropolitan Police force had been reduced sharply to just over a thousand men in the last fortnight, as officers strove to vanish into the teeming mass of the civilian population, or attempted to get on one of the evacuation ships as the remains of the British Army embarked for Canada and the British dominions in the Caribbean. They were terrified of their fate under Russian rule; Briggs himself could have fled with them, but he had stayed. He had written a final letter to his wife, if he didn’t return home within the week; he wished, now, that he had spent more time with her before the war. It all seemed like a dream now…
The city had been on the verge of panic as the remains of the military pulled out. Briggs — as Langford and he had already discussed — had declared London an open city, in the hopes that it would preserve what remained of the city from a house-to-house fight to rival Stalingrad. The Russians, oddly enough, had honoured the declaration; it had been two days before their forces had finally begun to probe into London, a city that hadn’t been attacked for hundreds of years. Londoners had had to relearn much their grandfathers had forgotten; they had faced air raids, terrorist attacks… and now a Russian occupation. They had tried hard to calm the city, but Briggs feared for the future; who knew what would happen once the Russians had the entire city in their power?
They appeared as they marched towards the city, hundreds — no, thousands — of infantry, marching in an eerie silence. Briggs was only delighted to see that they hadn’t brought shackled prisoners as part of the march, as they had done in Berlin and Paris; it would only have inflamed passion on both sides. The irony was killing him; he had spent time enforcing ever-harsher bans on guns, and the net result was that now the Army had been destroyed, or at least soundly beaten, there would be no one to resist the Russians. There were still plenty of criminal guns on the streets, some of which had been used in the riots, but what good would they do against an organised army? The Russians had played it smart; before they had indulged in the victory parade, they had secured everywhere of vital importance, from power plants to the water supplies. They could cause the entire population to die of thirst if they felt like it; what could anyone do to stop them?
The Russians halted, just outside the gates; cameras were flashing, recording the historic moment, as a Russian stepped forward. He was tall and very pale, with jet-black hair; his cold blue eyes seemed to flicker power and responsibility. Briggs understood, finally, why some people couldn’t face a soldier; here was a man who had killed others, many of whom had been trying to kill him. The Russian stood in front of him, looked the Lord Mayor’s outfit up and down, and saluted.
“I am General Aleksandr Borisovich Shalenko,” he said. His English was perfect, without the hint of an accent, or even a tinge of Russian words. “I understand that I have the honour of addressing Lord Mayor Inspector David Briggs?”
Briggs winced inwardly. “I resigned my position in the police when I accepted the role of Lord Mayor,” he said, wondering who the Russian spy had been. They knew who he was, and about his role; they had to have had someone on the inside, somewhere. “I am the Lord Mayor of London.”
“Good,” Shalenko said, very slowly. “I must formally ask for the submission of London to my control.”
Briggs wanted to defy him, he wanted to spit in his face, but there was no choice. There were millions of civilians still caught within the city; a fight would be disastrous. They would all be killed when London burned like Dover had burned; the citizens had all seen the signs of battle from the hills. They knew what could happen…
“I surrender the city,” Briggs said finally. He saw a flicker of respect in Shalenko’s eyes as the Russians formally took possession of Buckingham Palace. “What now?”