Chapter 11: Our Second Fight for Survival

We were up early the next morning and sitting around the table with Graham and the original defence committee by eight o'clock. Kat made us all breakfast. Our meeting was to discuss just one thing, how to deal with the potential threat from North Frodingham before it became an actual threat.

We all agreed that we needed to eliminate the group 'running' North Frodingham quickly, the problem was how. Yes, we could pick off one or two but at some point we would have to confront the rest of them, and house to house fighting with innocent people in the way wasn't something I wanted us to undertake if we could avoid it.

Jim Bolton hit the nail on the head. "What we need is a trojan horse. If we could get half a dozen people into the middle of the village in an armoured vehicle then we could probably eliminate most of the scumbags."

I could see where he was coming from and rang Railway Farm. Scott answered and I said, "Can you get Larry and Katie to come down here urgently, we're going to have a rush job on."

Katie and Larry appeared ten minutes later and we outlined our plans. We would armour one of the Landrovers. We would make solid wooden wheels, not comfortable, but we wouldn't be travelling far in it.

Jim and Graham went up to Railway Farm with Larry and Katie.

I called all the villagers together at the steam engine shed and outlined our concerns. There was a bit of discussion about our approach. Steven, one of the two brothers now living at Cheryl's old house said, "If we just formed ourselves up into an army, the whole village, armed everyone and marched on their village, wouldn't the scumbags flee?"

Again we discussed our tactics, and I sensed that whatever we did was a bit uncertain in terms of success, it would depend on the reaction of the original villagers, would they 'rise up' against their oppressors.

To be honest I was far from happy with our approach but Steven's suggestion meant that I had to talk to Graham and the defence committee again. At least everyone agreed that we needed to deal with the problem at North Frodingham. Having the full support of the village left me with only one problem, our tactics.

I called the defence committee together and went through our options again. Eventually we decided on a three pronged attack. The newly armoured Landrover would drive into the centre of the village, two armed groups would wait on either side of the main road at each end of the village and three snipers would be placed where they could cover as much of the village as possible.

We decided that we would set off the following morning if the Landrover was ready. We would have to use radios, it was the only way an operation like this could be co-ordinated.

Later that afternoon I got the whole village together and asked for volunteers for the armed groups. Nearly everyone volunteered. In the end we decided to keep family groups together and had six people in each group. Kelly and I, Will and Jen, and Graham & Joan would form the sniper groups. We were going to have a difficult talk with Kat but it couldn't be avoided.

Harry, Emma and Scott were going to man the Landrover. We had tested the armouring that evening and it was fine against shotguns and handguns, even at point blank range. Our rifles would penetrate it easily but Graham did not believe that any of the people in North Frodingham had access to high power rifles. "The exchanges we have monitored don't indicate anyone with military training or background." The wooden wheels made it very uncomfortable but there was nothing we could do about that, better than having the tyres shot out.

That evening, after Kirsty was in bed, Kelly and I sat with Kat around the table and told her of our plans for the following day. She was distraught but, after a lot of tears and upset, she realised that we had to do this and she agreed to look after Kirsty. However, we did agree that they could travel on the train with us.

Then there was a knock at the door, there stood a very solemn looking Harry. He came in, sat down and told us that he did not think Emma should be in the Landrover with him. We asked him why not and he said, "Because she's pregnant!"

I knew congratulations were due but now was not the time and I asked him what Emma thought. He told us that she wanted to be with him and I said, "So are you going to tell her then?" This put him on the spot and I knew that he was torn. In the end I said, "Look, everyone on the mission is at risk but doing nothing and waiting for an attack when we are spread out in the fields is not an option. Talk to Emma and if she still insists on going with you, accept her decision. We cannot afford the old way of doing things, there are not enough of us."

As soon as Harry had left we went to bed and put Kat between us, we both made love to her.

We gathered at Railway Farm at four o'clock the next morning, I wanted everyone in place around North Frodingham at first light. Katie was going to take the train down as far as Nafferton and then we would have about three miles to cover from there.

While we were on the train Graham reminded us of our tactics and the two important code words. Plan H indicated that we were going to move from house to house, clearing each property in turn. Each group had three heavy, home-made, hand-held battering rams to gain access to locked buildings.

Plan S was our intention to keep every individual that we found separate; man woman or child. Graham reckoned that the situation was a lot less clear in North Frodingham than the one we encountered in Bridlington. Stopping people from talking would stop lies from being constructed, and discourage bullying.

By five we were ready to start unloading the equipment from the train at Nafferton station.

We then had a stroke of luck. We were challenged by a small group who appeared to be living in the station building which had been a large private house for many years. There were two men and seven women. Three of the women had escaped from North Frodingham, the last one only two weeks ago.

Their leader was a large black man who introduced himself as 'Blackie'. As I was outlining our plans Kat hustled past me, ran up to him and hugged him saying, "Monty, I thought you were dead."

"No Katrina, very much alive." he replied.

Kelly and I looked confused. Kat turned to us and said, "My brother, Montgomery, otherwise known by his friends and enemies as Blackie for obvious reasons."

Blackie wanted to join us on our mission to North Frodingham. I wasn't sure this was a good idea as they were only armed with shotguns. However, I asked him if he would help watch the train. I felt comfortable with him and he and Kat were catching up on their lives, they hadn't seen each other for three months. Graham backed me up on this and that meant we just left Kat, Kirsty and Jim Bolton on the train. I asked Kelly if she was happy leaving Kirsty with Kat and Blackie and she said, "Fine, Blackie seems like a good bloke. He and Kat are obviously pleased to see each other."

We agreed to take two of the women from North Frodingham with us, the third, Karen, was completely withdrawn and wouldn't be any help. They knew who was OK and who was not. I got the girl who had escaped two weeks ago, Jane Porter, to give us a list of everyone, good and bad, that was in the village. We then spent a good hour going through this list, trying to work out where everyone might be. I found out that they didn't have any guards posted at night, "All the men want to be with a woman," Jane told us. "None of them will do guard duty." I also found out that there were probably ten women and four men being held against their will by a dozen scumbags. However, some of the women appeared to have thrown their lot in with the scumbags but Jane said, "The trouble is, allegiances were changing from day to day."

Jane was an intelligent woman in her late thirties, she told us that the invaders had shot her husband when he objected to them raping her. She was plump with a large chest and short, spiky, brown hair. She looked sad as she said, "I'd been married to David for fifteen years. He was too straight-forward. It was just after the group had taken over the village, about eight weeks ago, when one of the leader's henchmen raped me. David just went up to Boss Hogg, as he called himself, and took a swing at him. Of course Boss Hogg just pulled his hand gun and shot him in the stomach. David was a day dying and he screamed in agony." At this she burst into tears. Kelly comforted her and she pulled herself together. "It was our own fault," Jane continued. "A few people in the village wanted to organise our defences but everyone argued and we had two people fighting over who was going to be leader." She then turned to me and said, "Don't take any of the invaders prisoner, they're all as bad as each other."

In view of the lack of guards I wanted to move quickly and we used my Landrover with a large trailer to move everyone to within a mile of the village. We had looked at the maps and the snipers had selected areas to look for suitable hide-outs. We decided that Jane would come with me and Kelly; the other girl, Wendy, would go with Graham and Joan. Fortunately we had spare kevlar lined jackets with us. We would keep radio silence until things kicked off. The sniper teams would take a target out as soon as it presented itself. We were faced with a twenty minute trek to our area. We all hugged each other then split into groups, by six-fifteen we were on our way.

Kelly and I had the first part of our walk in along a farm track. We held hands and Jane walked with us but we couldn't talk, we didn't want to alert anyone to our approach. Eventually we reached our vantage point, a small hillock to the north of the village. We were about two hundred yards from the nearest house, Jane indicated that it was occupied.

We settled down in a ditch, it was cold and wet but we had waders on as we expected wet. Kelly sighted her rifle on the front door. She whispered to me to sight in on an upstairs window and we waited. I had given Jane the binoculars, if she saw anyone she was going to indicate if they were friend or foe.

We must have been waiting at least thirty minutes before anything happened. We heard a shot, a single shot, from a rifle. Hopefully that was one scumbag down.

I heard the armoured Landrover rumbling up the road, then the front door of the house we were watching opened and a man came out. Jane gave us the 'bad' signal and another shot rang out. Kelly didn't miss. After a couple more minutes two women came out, actually a woman and a girl, and Jane whispered, "Tammi and her daughter, Crystal." She then exclaimed, "They're hobbled together."

They were making their way toward the village centre, not the way I wanted them to go. I whispered to Jane, "Damn, they're walking straight into the line of fire from the Landrover." At this she set off at a run towards them. As she got near them I heard more shots and I said to Kelly, "Second house on the left of the first target, upstairs window."

She sighted on it and fired. She looked at me and gave my hand a squeeze. "I got him but I don't think he's dead, it wasn't an easy shot."

Still, there were no more shots. Jane reached Tammi and half dragged them back towards their house. I waved them over to us.

About a minute later Jane was back with us, Tammi and Crystal were slower as it was like a three legged race for them.

Jane said breathlessly, "They're in a terrible state, those people have been roughing them up."

As they got closer I could see Tammi's face, it was a mass of bruises and her daughter, who looked to be about twelve, was almost naked and shivering. I said firmly but calmly, "Get down here, we'll sort you out later."

Tammi tried to kiss me and said, "Thank you, that bastard has raped Crystal every night for the last three nights. He got bored with me."

She hugged me and I said, "It's Kelly you should be kissing, not me. She's the marksman, or maybe I should say marks-woman."

Kelly sniggered and said, "Mark's my husband and our leader. Yes, I fired the shot."

Tammi looked at Kelly and said, "Thank you," then kissed her, full on. Good job Kelly didn't mind a woman's touch, but I think Tammi was in shock.

Jane then said to Crystal, "Are you OK?"

Crystal just said, "I hurt, everywhere."

I had a pair of strong wire cutters on my belt to deal with barbed wire. I started to attack the chain binding the two girls. After about five minutes of nibbling with them I had both girls free. Jane then tried to comfort Crystal. They knew each other and Crystal started crying. Jane held her and said to me, "What's happening"

"I don't know, no one has broken radio silence."

As I spoke all hell broke loose in the centre of the village.

We waited and then the radio crackled, "Harry here. We've killed three, two injured, remainder have returned to their houses. They tried to attack us. We're all OK."

I looked at my map. I asked Crystal and Tammi if they felt they could walk a mile or so. Crystal answered, "My bum hole feels like it's on fire and I'm bleeding from my fanny and my bum hole but I can try."

Tammi said, "Crystal, try and be brave."

"I will," she replied.

I told them to walk out of the village across the fields and meet up with our group to the west of the village, at the bridge.

They set off and we kept an eye out for anyone following them. I radioed, "Dan's Group, two refugees approaching from the north, mother and daughter. Get Sophie to look at the daughter then get them to the train."

As they were nearly out of sight Jane prodded me and went, "Shhh!" as she pointed. A woman was leaving the house where Kelly thought she had injured someone and heading north, the same direction that Tammi and Crystal had gone. Through the binoculars I could see that her right arm was injured and then Jane whispered, "That's Laura Johnson, she's obviously changed sides, she was shooting at Tammi and Crystal." I looked at Kelly, she mouthed, "Kill." and I nodded. She took her shot and, as I expected, Laura Johnson dropped to the ground.

Jane turned to me and said, "I'd wondered about her, she was always friendly with the scumbags and used to 'put out'. I think she was hoping to get in with them."

Then the radio crackled again, "Harry to Mark, four men holding hostages, demanding our surrender, otherwise they will shoot the hostages."

Fuck! I looked at Kelly and she nodded, we didn't need to say anything. "Harry, Mark here, attempt to shoot the hostage takers. Tell them they will all die and if any hostages get hurt I will personally make sure that anyone captured will die a slow agonising death, like Jane's husband. I take it they are in shouting range?"

"Yes, fifty to sixty yards away, holding the hostage in front of them with guns pointed to their heads."

"OK. While their guns are pointing at the hostages they're not shooting at you. Take aim on one target each and fire. On second thoughts don't bother replying to them until we see how many are left standing. Do it quickly."

The radio went quite for a second then I heard, "Dan to Mark, two refugees arrived. Sophie in attendance."

Jane looked at me and said, "They made it."

I then heard several shots, a gap, two more shots and then silence again.

"Harry to Mark, three bad boys dead, one hostage down, one bad boy escaped, heading north."

Kelly tensed up and watched the road north, which we could see.

Then we saw him running, he was at the limit of our range but Kelly took the shot, there was nothing to loose. The man stumbled, and slowed a lot but he was only injured. I set off, telling Kelly to cover me. He saw me coming, stopped and turned to fire. As he did so I dropped to the ground. At the same time I heard the shot and he went down. Kelly had got him this time.

I made my way back to the ditch and Kelly glared at me, "That was fucking stupid! He wouldn't have got far and you put yourself at risk."

Jane looked up and said, "Now then, children, no fighting in the playground."

Kelly suppressed a grin and I smirked. She gave me a punch, not really hard but not exactly playful either.

I picked up the radio and said, "One bad boy dead, ex-hostage taker."

By my reckoning that was seven down, five to go.

I then heard a car engine, it was going fast, away from us, and then a shot.

"Graham here. Car leaving south at high speed. One shot through screen at drivers side. Car left road and crashed."

"Will, move the Landrover to scene of crash."

"OK."

I heard the Landrover start, and move off.

"Graham here, there are signs of life at crash scene."

Hopefully Graham would hold his fire and wait for the Landrover.

A few minutes later I heard several shots.

"Will here. Two bad boys leaving the car wreck are dead."

"Mark here, any more life?"

"No. Harry is checking now."

A few more seconds silence then, "Harry here, three bad boys dead but driver was female, young, probably hostage, she's dead as well."

Kelly took the radio from me. "Kelly here, just remember two to go. None of us like to hurt innocent people but if we hadn't tackled this problem it could be us on the receiving end of these people."

I took the radio again and said, "Will, make your way back to the centre of the village and wait there."

The radio crackled again, this time it was a voice I didn't recognise. "I have four women here and unless you let me leave unharmed I'm going to torture them, then kill them." I heard a blood curdling scream before the radio went dead.

We had put our basic DF equipment in the Landrover, and hopefully Will would have got a rough fix on the scumbag with the radio.

"Will here, bad boy is between me and Dan."

I looked at Kelly and she said, "I'm thinking go house to house from both ends. Round up everyone we find and ship them back to the bridge but keep them all apart. Plan H."

"Mark here, two bad boys left by our reckoning but be careful, some locals could have joined them. Go to Plan H. Will, Graham and I will hold our positions. Also Plan S, remember this is just as important as H."

We then waited again.

Jane looked at us and said, "Now, if we'd had leadership like you two I think we could have fought them off."

I didn't say anything but thought back to our problems with Michelle.

Kelly voiced my thoughts. "We had a couple of run-ins through the winter and we lost a good man to scumbags from Hull jail. I think we learnt our lessons." She then looked at me and continued, "Mark and I have had to make some tough decisions but we decided our first priority was our family, then our village and then other innocent people."

I then heard shots again quickly followed by the radio. "Sophie, Urgent assistance. Dan hurt, arm injury, One hostage bleeding. One bad boy in custody."

I heard two more shots from the other end of the street and the radio again announced what had happened. "Bad boy escaping on foot. South." I waited for a while, we would have to stay put until the village was cleared.

I then heard a shot and almost immediately, "Will here. Bad boy dead. Walked straight into my line of fire."

We waited for another twenty minutes or so and then I heard Dan. "Dan here. Village is cleared. Eight women, three children and five men held here, one is hostage taker."