Ousted: A thrilling debut novel of survival and humanity

by James M Hopkins

  “I thought you were asleep. I’m sorry for leaving you without saying anything. I wanted to catch a good look around while artificial lights and fires were going to be obvious and I wasn’t going to be.”

  “So,” she prompted. “Find anything?”

  “Yeah. It looks like there is a farm down the other side of this hill. There is power, probably from generators or something. It is the only source of light I could find, so I would make a guess that it is probably where Mina is being held.” Tariq pulled out the map and unfurled it between them. His dark pencil line marking their route was clear towards one edge of the map. “We should be somewhere near here.” He marked a circle with his finger. “Draycot Foliat is over here which we passed by yesterday. There are a few farms that it could be, here, here and here.” He had three fingers of one hand pointed at the separate points. “Now, I can’t be sure but it looked like there was a treeline at…” He thought for a moment. “I guess it is the northern and western edge of it. So, that one.” He removed two of the fingers. “-And we must be here by this road.” He rummaged his free hand into his bag until he had hold of a pen and marked a cross at their location and a circle around the probable farm.

  “-But we don’t know for sure she’s there though.”

  “No, but I intend to take our binoculars and camp out up there for as long as possible to get some confirmation that we are right.”

  “That’s a plan, I guess. If you can see them – and they are trained soldiers – couldn’t they see you? I mean Mina said they were dumbasses, but can we believe that they all are?”

  “I’m not a man fond of taking risks, but I think in the situation…” Tariq paused and said tentatively “Insha’Allah,” shrugging his shoulders.

  Grace laughed heartedly. “No offence, Tariq, but I never thought my country would get bombed and I would be getting bailed out by a Muslim man.”

  Tariq joined her continued laugh. “Maybe that’s only because you guys here never see what Islam is really about. I consider myself an atheist, but some circumstances seem only feasible with help beyond man. A bit of luck or a god.”

  “Well you seem to have the air of luck around you. If that’s God – or Allah – then so be it. I won’t be going anywhere, as you may have already guessed. You eat before you go and head east as far as possible so the binoculars won’t reflect light towards the town.”

  “Good shout,” Tariq said, with the information processing displaying on his face.

  “I watched a sniper movie once.” Grace winked.

  “-and a good job you did. Maybe help beyond man is woman.”

  “Don’t forget it.”

  Chapter 48

  Mina managed to press her eye against one of the wall’s cracks in time to see the man enter the large house to the right. “He’s gone into the house. Look through here to the right,” Mina said moving away from the wall. Leighton saw the house straight away. Two men stood guard outside. “Behind is a large silo.” She waited until Leighton gave her an affirmative grunt. “-And then look left, slowly. You will see a tree in front of the house and then the other side of the driveway bit is an animal shed.”

  “Mostly open,” Leighton said.

  “Behind that, is what I think is the most important part. The trees start quite close to the back of that building. It is quite steep, but the trees from ground level cover to the top of the horizon line.”

  “I like that. I need to see how much cover there is on the ground. I want to know if I can hide in the short term or whether running is the only option.”

  “I don’t know the answer to that yet. Let’s go look from the front. You can see the rest.”

  “What about out those ways?” Leighton pointed to the two walls next to the roof hole.

  “You’ll be pleased to know that there are no other buildings that way. Straight out onto farmland. I don’t think they have any lights on that side. You still want to climb out of that, don’t you?”

  Leighton nodded and shrugged. “I don’t have any other ideas yet.” Everyone else in the barn watched as they crossed the long length of the barn to the wall by the door.

  The cracks near where Mina had huddled were longer and allowed both to peer out, Mina sat down and Leighton stood leaning above her. She talked him through the rest of the buildings in the complex, mostly small outhouses and sheds.

  They saw Glen, in the clothes he had left in, shadowed by three soldiers. They passed out of sight shortly before the chain rattled and the door swung open, hiding Leighton and Mina from their view. “The next one,” the same voice as before bellowed out.

  Glen walked in with a grin as the next man stood up and started for the door. The older man clapped him on the shoulder as he passed and said, “Give him some grief, yea?” The younger man grinned as a walked forward and made a jerked motion as if he was about to sprint towards the door, before dropping his head and laughing as he disappeared out the door.

  “Find something funny, kid?” The younger man asked bitterly. A dull thud and a moan followed shortly after, cutting the laughs short.

  “That kid is Warren,” Mina mentioned as he walked past the corner of the building. “The other guy is Mark.”

  Leighton and Mina returned to Shannon and Zeke. Zeke threw his arms out to be picked up and held by his dad. Mina continued to talk through every scrap of information she had about the complex, the soldiers – somewhere around eight of them – and the routines and routes they walked around. She couldn’t put times to any of it. While she was talking, each of the other group went to take their shower.

  “Why are we even here, Mina?” Leighton asked after a few minutes of silence passed between them. “It makes no sense.”

  “I’ve been mulling that very question over in my head, but – alas – I’m at a loss.”

  “It caught me so much by surprise at first, I never questioned it. The more I think about the situation it seems unnecessary. I mean, technically we’re all prisoners of war, but is it a civil war now? I’ve heard the soldiers’ accents. They’re just west-country squaddies. Nevertheless, they were still attacked too, by above.”

  “You’ll have to ask one, if you get a chance.” Mina shrugged.

  The morning observations had already showed Tariq that this farm did contain soldiers in the same camouflage as those he had seen the village. He thought about it and concluded that it probably didn’t mean too much. He watched them move around, he was too far away to differentiate anyone, except that there appeared to be one wearing a blue beret, who was at that time near the main passing road. They seemed to have a few periodic patrols set up to maintain a perimeter around the buildings of the complex. No-one had yet taken up a look out position from the top of the silo, which in Tariq’s mind would have removed the need for walking. Perhaps they didn’t do it through fear of heights or – more accurately – a fear of falling from a great one, perhaps it was that they hadn’t thought of it. The sun was high in line with his left shoulder when he noticed someone being walked from the barn. The door of it was on the other side of the building from where he was, but they had walked around it, coming towards him. The man in the middle of the three was not wearing camouflage, instead a dirty flannel shirt and jeans. Tariq saw him get pushed and the man nearly fell. He supposed that if Mina was taken, others would have been too. As the morning progressed, more people came out of the barn, went into the building, only to return about quarter of an hour later.

  The rest of the farmers took their turns and it was left with just them to make the walk to the main house. Shannon went first, taking Zeke with her and Leighton recapped the main things he wanted to look at out in the open. When Shannon returned having taken longer than any of the others, Leighton proffered Mina to go first and she stood up reluctantly.

  She reached the door without a word. The youngest soldier with the blond hair that she had been watching through the cracks grabbed the hood of her poncho and pushed her roughly around the corner of the buildin
g. “Eyes forward. Straight to the house,” he said using a fake growling voice.

  Mina looked around conspicuously and saw the man in the blue beret walking alongside one of the fatter soldiers down the path from where the driveway eventually met with the main road. She caught him looking straight at her and proffer a hard-lined smile and she turned away, just catching a glimpse of his hand raising in her direction. She continued with her head down and started raising her hood instinctively, but the man behind pulled it out of her hands before she could cover her head.

  Within the large two-story building, she was pushed firmly by a calloused hand on her right shoulder. Most of the furniture in the house looked like it was from the 1960’s with a few more modern items squeezed in with them. In the downstairs rooms that she was pushed through, most of the inhabiting items had been stacked up against the rear wall. In the dining room, she could just see the top of French windows at the back. She only caught a glimpse at each room the most important of which was a utility room at the other end of the living room, stocked with guns and ammunition.

  The sun was warm, beating down on Tariq’s back and making him sweat within the only top he now owned, a tight cycling jersey. A few men came first followed by women wearing similar rural dress then – he was surprised to see – a black woman carrying something bundled tightly to her chest. Just before she disappeared behind the cover of the house he noticed it wriggle and a small hand reached up to the woman’s shoulder.

  “A baby?” he whispered “How many people are in there? Still no Mina. Damn.”

  Tariq pulled his eyes away from the binoculars to look around him and shuffle until the course patch of long dry grass was irritating a different part of his stomach. When he returned to viewing the complex, a blond woman in a grey poncho walked into sight, cowering her head.

  “There you are, Mina,” he said to himself, excitement filling him.

  Leighton paced from one end of the barn to the other recalling as much of Mina’s insight as he could. As he did so he became more and more furious. It crept up on him slowly and unprecedented until his fists were balled up and his shoulders so tight they were almost cramping his undernourished muscles. He made yet another turn just before reaching the bucket by the door and as he turned, he noticed that the five farmers were staring straight at him. He lowered his head, keeping an eye on them as they watched him walk back towards where Shannon and Zeke were napping.

  He drew level with them and pulled up abruptly and sighed. “What’s up?” he asked, fighting to keep the welling anger out of his tone.

  “-With us?” Glen answered. “You’re the one looking like your gonna punch your way through the door.”

  “We’re just sitting here. All chilled out. You’re making me real nervous, though,” Warren added, pulling his feet round as if he was about to stand.

  “Well, you don’t have to sit there watching me.” Leighton pushed his head forward.

  “Why don’t you just go sit down with your immigrant wife and wait for that weird-ass woman you adopted to come back.” Warren looked at the other two guys for a laugh and got only a chiding slap on the back of his head from the woman to his left. Mark was smirking, but Glen seemed impervious.

  Fire rose in Leighton’s stomach that pulled the corners of his mouth down fiercely. He breathed deeply as if that could put the anger out, but it only fuelled the flames.

  “Looks like you got to him, Warren,” Mark suggested.

  “You alright there?” Warren asked Leighton. “You don’t look too good.” The other two men seemed to enjoy watching Leighton’s internal battle. He could see them both free their legs from how they were sitting.

  “You wanna fight or something? Let it out.”

  Leighton blew his cheeks out. “Why,” he sneered. “Why on earth would I want to fight in front of my family? Are you guys fucking serious? What in God’s name are you doing by taking an unfair share of the food. I got a baby and breast-feeding wife. You lot are pitiful.” Mark looked up to where Shannon was only just stirring.

  “Oh, here we go,” Warren goaded.

  Before Warren could get to his feet, Leighton has covered the distance between them and lifted him the rest of the way to his feet by the front of his shirt, catching the young man off balance. Warren had no time for feet to get purchase on the ground, Leighton had pulled him into the middle of the barn and flung him onto the ground. The other two were still scrambling to their feet as Leighton pulled his arm back and swung down open-handed landing hard just above Warren’s Adam’s apple. He clenched his fist tight around the man’s neck who lay against the dusty ground trying to get all his limbs between himself and Leighton, but he was already at a loss.

  “This what you want?” Leighton spat. “Do you wanna say shit about my wife again, huh? You wanna die here in the middle of this God-forsaken barn? Do ya? Do ya?” Warren’s eyes started to roll before the large force of Mark’s body charged him, rolled Leighton off the cloudy-eyed man.

  Mark moved slowly enough towards him that Leighton was up on one knee as the hulking mass of man got within reach with large hands stretching towards him. Leighton twisted quickly hurling a right hook that connected with the man’s lower ribs, causing enough pain that the main retreated a step with a grunt. Leighton got to his feet and lunged forward to swing for the man’s open jaw, whose left arm clutched his side.

  As his arm pulled back to launch the assault, he stopped. Shannon’s voice cut through the cacophony of noise. He realised he had been watching as if a third party while his body enacted his rage, but now he was back in the driving seat. It didn’t stop Glen and Mark from moving on him. He raised his hands to show the end of his fighting. Either of the two men, could have reached out and grabbed him easily, but he still refused to take a step backwards, knowing that doing so would put his back against the wall.

  “Wait a minute,” he said, exhaling deeply.

  Shannon chis name incessantly, increasing in intensity, as Leighton worked out what he could possibly say to alleviate the tension. Glen’s face was still impervious to emotion, eyes locked on Leighton’s. Mark still clutched his side with one hand, holding out the other as if about to lock into a wrestling move on him. Between the two men, the women farmers tended to Warren, who was still on the ground, but had at least rolled onto his side.

  “Okay,” Leighton started. “I think it’s clear that we don’t get on.” He chuckled to try and lighten the mood. Neither man said anything. “What we need to do is look at the bigger picture and realise that none of us have any clue why we are in here and that we can’t stay in here indefinitely. As much as that might not be your guys strong point we need to think of a way out. If I do it, I will make sure you’re out too. I have a plan. I keep telling my wife this, but trust me. Okay? It doesn’t need to be so fighty nor stealy in here. It’s bad enough already. What do you say? Peace?” He put his hand out for either man to take.

  A long moment passed before Glen finally took it. “Peace,” he replied. “-For now.”

  “You only get this one do-over,” Mark put in before finally taking Leighton’s hand.

  It seemed to take ages before Mina left the farmhouse. Much longer than the others had taken. Suddenly, one of the pairs of men started running towards the house, rounding the tree with one either side. Then it became obvious why. Mina was now in view to Tariq, running towards the large rectangular building to the right of the complex. She appeared to be naked, but was pumping her arms to run. The man that had passed the tree closest to her managed to grab her and was only just able to keep the two of them upright and suppress her pace, wrapping his arms tightly around her middle. A soldier in a blue beret walked gingerly up towards her and grabbed her by the hair, pulling her roughly towards him.

  The image went black as the edges of the binoculars blocked his sight. He realised he had been wincing. He couldn’t quite grasp what he was seeing. “What are they doing to you?” he murmured. The man who had caught her slapped her o
n the bum as she was pulled away and the man immediately got slapped back-handed by the soldier in the blue beret. The man doubled over clutching his face. Mina somehow escaped the man’s grasp in that moment and took off for a second time, this time heading back towards the barn. She disappeared around the corner then into Tariq’s line of sight came two soldiers with rifles raised to their shoulders. The man in the blue beret clutched his crotch with one hand and held a pistol aimed at the grey-haired of the two men with his other.

  Mina dropped to the floor as she got out of sight of the men. Two new men were walking towards her with guns raised, but they weren’t aimed at her.

  “Stand down!” The older man shouted.

  “That bitch attacked me in there,” the man in the blue beret said. The second man turned his rifle on Mina instead.

  “I don’t care. Lower your weapon!” It seemed that the last words reverberated around the complex for an age before the older man loosened his body and relaxed his hand on his trigger. “Get rid of that fucking beret while you are at. I know it isn’t yours, private. I think you are forgetting your station here.” The man held his distaste apparent on his face. “-and you two wazzacks. Go get this woman her clothes. -And I bloody hope you had nothing to do with this.”

  Mina heard hurried footsteps moving away. She was pleased a few moments later when it was the older man who passed her the bundle of clothes. “Get dressed. God damn,” he said with clenched teeth as she took the clothes. “I can’t trust that man for a second. It would have been easier just to kill you all. I am a fool to think the same rules applied in this cursed land.” He seemed to be speaking to himself more than her, his tone filled with aggression. She focussed on getting dressed as quickly as possible. The other man kept his gun trained on her until she was safely back inside the barn and the chain closed behind her.