Them or Us

killing two more, before throwing it into the crowd when he’s out of ammunition. The gunshots are enough to force the people to scatter momentarily, and the brief distraction gives him enough time to get the access door in the gate open and get out. I can’t see much—several other fighters race to the barrier and close it again within a few seconds—but I see enough, and so does much of the rest of the crowd. The young fighter runs down the road, arms held high in surrender. Coming toward him, coming toward the heart of Lowestoft, is one of Ankin’s tanks. Behind it, for as far as I can see, the road is filled with more people and vehicles. As the gate slams shut again the crowd on this side reacts with increased anger and fear, and another fight erupts, which spreads rapidly.
    I need to find another way out of town. If Ankin’s this close and he has anything like the manpower he’s boasted of having, then the entire compound must surely have been surrounded by now. I double back, now running away from the ever-expanding riot and moving back toward Hinchcliffe and the courthouse again, seriously lacking anything resembling a coherent plan of action. In the space of just a few minutes the streets have begun to fill with even more chaos and confusion, wanton violence flooding the entire compound.
    I’ve run out of options. All the major routes north and south are blocked now, and everything to the west will be impassable before long if the panic and rioting continue to increase. The beach is the only sensible route left to take. It’ll take me much longer to get away, but at least it should be clear. Providing the tides are kind and the violence here is contained to the half-mile square around Hinchcliffe’s base, I should be able to follow the shingle and sand until I’m level with the development, then get back up onto the roads again and reach the house.
    I turn and head down toward the ocean, my body still fooled into thinking it’s healthy by the drugs. I know I can keep running at this speed if I don’t push too hard. The noise of the waves increases steadily as I approach the sea, but then I become aware of another, even louder noise. Ankin’s plane again? I look up and see a helicopter flying low and fast toward the town. For a second I stop dead in my tracks, transfixed as I watch the machine crawl along under the dark gray clouds, taillights blinking through the gloom. It’s been so long since I’ve seen anything like this … and now it’s directly over the center of Lowestoft, flying this way toward the ocean. My brain is screaming at me, trying to make me understand that whoever’s flying the chopper isn’t interested in me or even capable of attack, but common sense has gone out of the window and now I’m running like I think the pilot’s about to machine-gun me down. It seems that everyone else feels the same level of paranoia, because the arrival of the helicopter has whipped the crowds behind me into an unpredictable frenzy, herding many of them in this direction. Fuck, are we being rounded up? I’ve almost reached the beach now, but there are other people swarming nearby, and with the perceived threat of attacks from the air it suddenly seems a dangerously exposed place to be. I need an alternative. I look up again and then I see it: a place that’s out on a limb, isolated and alone; a place where I can shelter until the chaos dies down; a place where no fucker in their right mind would go.
    I put my head down and start sprinting toward Hinchcliffe’s factory.

 
    41
    THE PLACE IS DESERTED. Hinchcliffe’s guards are gone, and there are no signs of life around the outside of this vast, ugly building. Everything looks featureless and black in the late morning gloom. I plan to head straight for the entrance I used to get inside when I saw Rona Scott, but I’m disoriented and I end up at the wrong end of the site, outside the metal industrial units Hinchcliffe bought me to before. The doors of several of the small buildings are open, and I panic and freeze, thinking I’m about to be surrounded by a pack of feral kids, working together like starving hyenas. The helicopter flies off toward the other end of the compound, and as the noise of its engine finally fades I realize this place is silent. The children are long gone, probably released by the kid-wrangler. There’s only one of them left here. It’s the older boy I saw previously. I see him sitting in the corner of his