The Fight for Life

by S G Read

  ‘So what are we doing today?’ Jericho asked as he slid his plate away from him giving sign that he had had enough!

  ‘We are sweeping the second area for dogs and other animals which we do not want inside.’ Ray answered.

  ‘What other animals?’ Jericho asked.

  ‘He means if there is another elephant inside we will chase it outside.’ Evelyn answered from the other end of the table.

  ‘Elephant?’ Jericho echoed.

  ‘If there is one Uncle Ray, it is better outside so it can get together with the other elephant and have baby elephants, isn’t it?’ She asked, ignoring Jericho’s remark.

  ‘Good for the other elephant if we find a girl elephant Evelyn.’ Ray answered.

  ‘They are called cows!’ Evelyn corrected. ‘Felicity taught us about elephants!’

  When breakfast was over they all gathered in the compound except Felicity. The women were there as well and armed. The plan was to sweep each area with lookouts watching to see if anything ran in front of them. With one person by the wooden gate as a pivot the rest would sweep from the area just down from the new hospital and push anything they did not kill before it, stretching to a thin line right across the area but with each one visible to the ones on either side of them. Any animal nipping back through was to be eliminated, if it was a threat or noted if it was not. Ralph turned out with Ralphy as well to make a better line when they started. The ones farthest out moved quite quickly and the people nearer the gate moved slowly. They crossed fields, orchard and fought through woodland driving dogs before them. Killing them when the chance arose. Some had hunting horns which they used to frighten any animals which were hiding and send them running. When the line reached the middle of the settlement making a straight line from the gate to the farthest end they stopped to rest but they still had to keep a wary eye out for dogs trying to sneak back through. After the rest they walked on and reached the other corner. Now it was the drive to the finish! The gate was purposefully kept closed to make sure no dogs escaped, if they did meet an elephant they were told to give it a wide berth and deal with it later. Up the other side they had to deal with houses and outhouses, garages and cottages, fences and hedges but now they all moved at the same speed with Ralphy and Ralph walking next to the wire. They kept going making sure they missed nowhere, until they reached the other end.

  Now they compared figures and started to gather up all the carcasses for burning; the area inside was declared safe! They all returned to the compound, the gate closed, although there was no need and everyone felt happy.

  Brian drove up to Sevenoaks and followed Bradley’s instructions as to where to go. They stopped next to some garages, parked and waited. Half an hour later the garage door next to them opened and a young man walked out.

  ‘Come with me.’ He ordered. ‘Give Wally the key to your car. Glad to see you are still alive Brad.’

  ‘Their doctor did a good job but don’t punch me it the gut just yet Jorgen.’ Bradley answered.

  ‘I wasn’t planning to, yet.’ Jorgen answered.

  They walked into the garage and out the other side while Wally stayed with their car. There was another car parked outside the garage and they all climbed into it. Jorgen drove and they were soon at a spot neither of them knew.

  ‘The clan have been a bit busy round here, so we move around a lot.’ Jorgen announced when he parked. ‘This is the latest hideout.’

  The three followed Jorgen inside an old manor house where Gareth was sitting waiting.

  ‘Still alive then Bradley?’ He declared expressing pleasure with his tone of voice.

  ‘Getting better Gareth, and you.’

  ‘Still kicking the clan’s arse when I can Brad. Thank you for bringing him back.’

  ‘There was an ulterior motive.’ Will admitted and held out the letter. ‘This is from Ray.’

  Gareth hesitated then took it. ‘Thank you I will read it later.’

  Will and Brian stayed and chatted for some time to find out what the clan were up to, without disclosing too much about what was happening at the settlement. Not lying or refusing to answer, just telling part of it each time. There were more posters for them which they took when they were driven back to their car which by now was at an entirely different location. They drove up to a wall and waited, after a few seconds a tennis ball landed on the ground and Jorgen drove off without a second look. He drove to another location and waited, this time inside a barn. An hour later Wally arrived with a different car.

  ‘Sorry the clan were all over your car when you got there, they seem to know which cars are where!’ Wally declared. ‘I found you a replacement.’

  By then Will and Brian were glad to load up the posters and drive away with a wave to Wally and Jorgen.

  ‘Do you think Bradley will be alright Will?’ Brian asked.

  ‘Hard to say Brian; if he gets involved in any sort of fight it will probably kill him!

  ‘Let us hope he has the sense to lay low and keep his head down.’ Brian said hopefully and drove home.

  They were glad when they saw the finished towers and both pulled the gate open. When they were inside they pulled it closed again and drove up to the house through the other two gates.

  ‘It’s like fort Knox!’ Will complained.

  Everyone was at the house was waiting for their return. They bought out bottles of chilled champagne and corks popped.

  ‘Are we celebrating something?’ Brian asked sipping his champagne.

  ‘The fence right round this place is finished!’ James answered, downing his glass of champagne in a mouthful.

  Later Ray found Will relaxing in his usual quiet spot.

  ‘No book?’ He asked.

  ‘I am giving this champagne the attention it deserves.’ Will answered.

  ‘So what did Gareth say about the letter?’

  ‘He said he would read it later.’ Will answered and returned to his champagne but something made him look at Ray again. ‘That was alright wasn’t it?’

  ‘I probably just wound him up, I’d say.’ Ray answered. ‘I can only think of one reason not to open it and read it while you were there, even if he cleared the room to do it.’

  Will looked mystified.

  ‘It will come to you.’ Ray said as a challenge.

  ‘So he didn’t read it then, he said he will read it later.’ Will said putting the champagne glass down while he thought. ‘If he had read it he could have sent an answer back with us.’

  ‘That is true but I did not expect an immediate answer, or at least the answer I wanted.’

  Will flicked his fingers. ‘He can’t read!’

  ‘That’s the way I read it, so someone else will have to read it for him.’

  ‘Simon was his right hand man.’ Will declared.

  ‘Or is Simon running things and is Gareth a figure head as no one would give Simon any respect at all.’

  ‘Probably not.’ Will replied. ‘Gareth escaped from the clan though, which is why Simon is using Gareth or Gareth needs Simon, as he can’t read. Either way Simon is really running things because all he has to do is to read out what he wants and not read out anything he doesn’t want to!’

  ‘Doesn’t bode too well does it?’ Ray declared.

  ‘No: Unless Simon is willing to do anything to sort out the clan. I was rather glad he didn’t read it while we were there; he might have had us shot!’ Will exclaimed. ‘Especially if he had Simon read it out to everyone who was there!’

  ‘I just want to make sure that they don’t use the women and children as shields to get out,’ Ray argued, ‘and that seems to be the only way to do it safely.’

  ‘I don’t want that either but I don’t think I would have had the balls to ask him to go back in there with what will face him inside. Jamal might just have him killed!’

  ‘But if it gets the women and children out and Jamal and his bunch are wiped out it would be worth it, he could think of that when Jamal is with him!’ Ray dec
lared.

  ‘Would you go back in there?’ Will asked.

  ‘Hell no, have him do that to me: No way!’

  ‘I rest my case.’ Will declared and picked up his glass.

  ‘I think I need one of them!’ Ray said and wandered of to the kitchen.

  Ray took a glass and a bottle up with him to his room and after a look out of the window, which only told him it was getting dark out there, he sat on his bed drinking champagne.

  He was not up early the next morning and nor were a good many others. Jethro was laying blocks before anyone else moved, except for Clem who was mixing up for him. She was actually starting to enjoy doing it! During the morning the rest of them roused themselves and the work on the wall moved a bit faster. The wall between the tower attached to the compound and the nearest tower on the gate, started to grow. Before it was a wall with a gap in the middle of it, now it had blocks all the way along and more than one block high. Ray did not appear until the afternoon, as he was relaying messages with the two other settlements using Ralphy as a go between, as he could talk the code quite quickly and understand the answers without too much delay as well.

  Ray was not expecting help from the Sevenoaks group, well not the help he was hoping for! After lunch he drove round the perimeter fence looking for damage and found none, which was pleasing but the sooner the wall was built right round the safer it would be inside. He spent the last hour keeping watch at the gate for visitors, friendly or other wise but no one came.

  They all packed up together and returned to the compound. Dai from the Wales settlement was on the radio and Ray came to a decision.

  ‘Tell him to meet us on the M4 where we met the 303 lot, tell them as well.’

  ‘When?’ Ralphy asked.

  ‘Friday night; just before dark.’

  ‘Okay. Is it on then?’ Ralphy asked with a lot more interest.

  ‘Yes it is on. We are going to try to get your mum back.’

  Ralphy punched the air. ‘Yes!’ Then he sent the messages.’

  Ray walked into the dining room and sat down. He said nothing but waited until the other settlements answered. He piled food onto his plate and started to eat. Halfway through Ralphy walked in and slid a note in front of him. He read it, as he ate but still said nothing.

  When his plate was empty he tapped his glass and slowly a silence fell across the room. Heads appeared in the doorway to hear what he was about to say, the people listening in were possibly forewarned by Ralphy.

  ‘On Friday we will be going up to meet the Welsh and the 303 settlements ready to sort out the clan. It is not going to be as I wanted but it was a long shot. As it is we will have to do our best at getting in and getting the women out with as few casualties as possible!’

  He took a sip from his glass to let that sink in.

  ‘Before Friday I will let each one of you know what is expected of you during the battle, where you will be and what you will be doing!’

  Ray stopped speaking and Will raised his glass. ‘To Friday then!’

  They all did the same and echoed his words, then the conversation hummed once more. The people in the doorway returned to what they were doing and everything went back to as it had been.

  Ray sat talking with anyone who wanted to talk, until it was late; again he looked out his window for the elephant and smiled at his reflection in the glass as it was dark outside.

  ‘Must be going senile.’ He said to his reflection and drew the curtains.

  When he drew them back in the morning, he saw the elephant eating from what appeared to be its favourite tree, he watched it for a while then walked down for breakfast. There were only a few there; the rest had walked as far as the back wall where Clem was letting them go up in the hoist for a closer look at the interloper. Ray had seen them as well, out of his window but only the ones going up in the hoist as the fruit trees in the back garden were blocking his view of anyone on the ground.

  Chapter 10

  Work continued on the latest section of the wall as Jethro had expressed a desire to get that section finished before he helped them sort out the clan. If he did not come back at least that section would be complete! Two teams went out for more blocks as they were getting low and the cement works were getting low on everything except water. After the clan was defeated and life returned to this new normality they could take more ballast, cement and sand to the cement works. The wall went up above head height and men were spread along it with Jethro working near the gate. With no mixer running, he could hear what was going on and heard a car approach. He walked to the gate and peered through the wire to see Brian’s car driving up.

  That confused him as Brian was not out anywhere, until he remembered Brian telling them that he had to swap cars as the clan had his. He put his hand on his pistols handle and moved out of sight. He watched the car until it stopped and saw that Bradley was driving it. Now he moved into sight and waved. He also waved to Jeremy who was nearby with the tractor and he used the lifting mechanism to lift the gate and tow it out of the way. Bradley drove in and stopped as Jeremy closed the gate again.

  ‘Hello Bradley, visiting or staying?’ Jethro asked through the open window.

  ‘Just visiting, I brought Gareth down to see Ray.’

  He drove off, turned onto the side road which led to the wooden gate and signalled for it to be opened. When it opened he drove through it and waited the other side as it closed. He drove up to the house and parked.

  Jethro walked over to see Jeremy who turned his engine off so that he could hear what he was saying.

  ‘Gareth is here to see Ray, can you tell him?’

  ‘Okay, I am going that way anyway.’ Jeremy answered.

  Jethro returned to his bricklaying as Jeremy drove away.

  Jeremy drove up to where Ray was working; he was moving mortar to whoever needed it.

  ‘There is a visitor here to see you Ray.’ He shouted and when Ray put his thumbs up he drove on.

  Ray delivered his load, put his shirt back on and drove back to the compound. He saw Brian’s car parked in the compound and wondered who was driving it. Inside he saw Bradley in the kitchen talking to Donna and Lulu, who were busy with the cooking.

  ‘Gareth is in the study waiting for you Ray.’ Bradley said when he saw him.

  ‘Okay I’ll go and have a word; nice to see you still alive Bradley.’

  ‘Thanks.’ Bradley replied as Ray walked up the small staircase to the study.

  Ray walked in and found Gareth sitting there with a glass of wine.

  ‘You must be Gareth.’

  ‘And you must be Ray.’

  Ray walked over to where he sat and held out his hand: He had no idea what the outcome would be but he did so anyway. Gareth looked at his hand as though he was coming to a decision and then shook it.

  ‘So you are the one who wants me to go in and get myself nailed again!’ Gareth declared.

  ‘If you time it right I hope it may never come to that.’ Ray answered.

  ‘Oh I agree timing is everything but I must have enough time to ingratiate myself with Jamal again and contact a couple of gladiators who might just help me.’

  ‘I thought they fought to the death?’

  ‘Oh they do but these two have found a way round it. Carlton a large man, black in colour and as strong as they come was forced to fight Barnaby a small timid bespectacled man. As you can imagine the fight did not last long but when Carlton stood over Barnaby ready to strike with his triple pointed spear, he refused to kill him, risking his own life! What he said was and it is probably not word for word. ‘I will let this one live so that he can come and fight me again and make a battle of it’ Well Jamal looked down and signalled okay. Barnaby was so annoyed that he had not been killed that he trained and trained until he was a miniature Carlton, only white. They fought again and it was a long thrilling fight which Barnaby won. He stood over Carlton with his short sword and said ‘He let me live to fight another day, I do so to him in r
eturn’ Now they have regular fights with the winner finding a reason not to kill the loser and if I didn’t know better I would think the fights are choreographed!’

  ‘Do you think they will help?’

  ‘Well every fight depends on what Jamal says, he knows his crowd and they like the two fighting but if he gave the signal both would be killed there and then: A hell of a thing to have hanging over your head all the time!’

  ‘So how long do you need?’

  ‘I will go in there on Friday, just before dark. If they don’t kill me there and then I will be taken to Jamal. After that it might go either way but Saturday is match day followed by the fights. If I am to fight I will be penned up with no chance to talk to anyone but one of the gladiators might come by, we were friends when I was in there. If so I can line things up inside but you must be there ready to act on Saturday while the game is on. Everyone will be watching the game except the gladiators and new fighters. There is a lorry parked against the back of the stadium, it is there to stop anyone getting out of the windows. It you push the lorry along so that the window with the blue cross on it can be opened the women and children can come out through it and on to whatever you have there for them to climb down on. I have the plans of the stadium here with everything marked as I can remember it but numbers vary all the time. Men are killed in the arena, new men arrive and join the clan or are readied to fight in the arena, they even make women fight in the arena once a month!’

  ‘Women?’ Ray exclaimed. ‘Now that is sick.’

  ‘It’s Jamal’s way of keeping them in line, step out of line so to speak and you are likely to end up fighting in the arena. It is a lot easier to lay back and count the flies flying round the light bulb. It didn’t work for me as I was looking at the floor so I counted tiles, cracks in tiles in fact anything I could.’

  ‘And you are still willing to go back in there?’ Ray asked a little set back.

  ‘As long as I get to try Jamal for his crimes, when we catch him!’

  ‘I can’t guarantee he will survive the attack.’ Ray warned.

  ‘If you can get a gun to me he will and I will bring him out alive for questioning, I would like to know who was behind all this. All my family was wiped out, they may not have been worth much but they were my family.’