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HEAVY CLOUD FILLED THE sky during the late afternoon and early evening As darkness fell ere called into the main upstairs function rooun, a few rounds of arenades, but I don&039;t think I&039;ll use them More to the point, I don&039;t kno to use theh Julia and one of the others tried to show us I&039;ll stick to ht alongside hundreds of men and women, maybe even thousands Who they were and what they were capable of didn&039;t see in the bizarre surroundings of the run-down social club, I looked at the ten other fighters heading into toith ht and kill The tomen-Julia and Sophie-see Most of the others were siuy called Harvey seee, lulasses with ridiculously thick lenses, and he suffers from acute asth halitosis You can s Poor bastard He co a bit backward, and I wonder howhe truly understands Still, hebetween his ears if they reckon he&039;ll be able to keep control of hied I&039;m not convinced

We left the social club before 3:00 aering our departures and each of us taking a different, prearranged route to the rendezvous point in town I&039;uy, and he reckons we&039;ve been walking for alside a canal that cuts through what used to be a busy residential area This place used to be a vibrant, noisy suburb of the city The nearby university caused the local population to swell during the school year, and the narrow streets were full of cheap shops, restaurants, cafes, bars, and pubs Everywhere is silent now The only resident I can see is floating facedown in the murky canal

The towpath has taken us almost all the way into the very center of the city We reach a steep flight of steps that lead back up to the street As we climb them, our closeness to the heart of town beco lifeless crowds of terrified Unchanged who don&039;t even look at us e pass them I expected this to be infinitely harder but I&039;m somehow able now to snbecause I know they&039;ll be dead before long anyway Seeing Sahota&039;s plan realized will result in manyhappens as predicted, the city will have fallen by this time tomorrow Maybe I can bear to be with the as I can reenda Since we left the social club all I&039;ve been able to think about is getting deeper into town, giving Craven the slip, and heading for the Prince Hotel I&039;ll search for Lizzie, and then, when I&039;ve made her tell me where she last saw Ellis, I&039;ll use the chaos as cover and try to get away

"Down here," Craven says, changing direction and leading eway filled with people I look into their vacant faces, and I feel nothing but contempt for them They remind me of what I used to be before the Hate-beaten, wretched, resigned They cower in the shadoaiting for a salvation that is never going to come The Hate has stripped away their identities and their purpose They are e and end theirhere, ankle deep in this scum, there&039;s apart of me that wants to stay and see Sahota&039;s plan fully realized I want to watch these people burn

The road we&039;re now following runs along the edge of a ht, but I&039;s surround the place, and there&039;s a ates The enclosure is co floodlights The nureater, too, attracted like h thecare, and no one even gives us a second glance

"I can see why Sahota picked this spot," I say quietly as we begin a slow descent down the packed, sloping main street that leads to the town hall Even now it&039;s still an ie, s and rows of massive white stone colu with people, round, wrapped up in coats and blankets, their ns that there used to be so froas cylinders and tins of food, plastic plates and cutlery blowing in the suddenly vicious wind

"It&039;s perfect," Craven agrees "There are thousands of the point They probably caot neither, so they just dropped where they were standing and gave up They&039;ll riot in a heartbeat once we start on theh the sprawled ht There&039;s an unspoken tension in the air here, much more fractious and intense than any I&039;ve felt before There&039;s an uncomfortable standoff between civilians and the military, too I don&039;t knohich side is more wary of the other Maybe that&039;s the real reason why the soldiers are here in such nue stone statue, and seeing its distinctive dark outline strikes a sudden chord For a second I remember this place as it used to be On the rare occasions I&039;d get a proper lunch break froet away from the office and everyone in it Once or twice I met Lizzie here before the kids were born

"There&039;s Sophie," Craven says, nudgingover to where she&039;s standing on the opposite side of the square "Go find yourself a spot"

We separate as planned Each of us will disappear into the crowd until the time to attack comes It&039;ll look less suspicious if we&039;re all spread out, not that itstarts no one will care who threw the first punch or fired the first shot I find a narrow gap ees, where I stop and wait There&039;s a still-functioning clock on the side of the town hall, just visible fro four Just over two hours to go The Prince Hotel is no farther than a mile from here I&039;ll wait for a little while before I o off too fast there&039;s a chance I&039;ll be seen and followed

Trying not to make it too obvious, I look around for the others Craven and Sophie I&039;ve already seen I see Parsons way over toperched on the plinth of the statue in the center of the square Harvey is leaning up against the sa His size makes him easy to pick out in the crowd

There&039;s Julia, too, sitting right in front of me, just a handful of people between us I catch her eye and, stupidly, ale her She has a dirty blanket draped over her head, all but the top half of her face hidden Bitch is staring straight atmy every move