Titanic 2020: Cannibal City

17 The Punishment

It was safe to say that Jimmy was not the most popular member of the troop. In fact, it was also inaccurate to say that he was the least popular, because any sentence containing the words 'Jimmy' and 'popular' should be regarded as unsatisfactory, such were the negative feelings engendered by his behaviour. Simple words like 'hatred' and 'loathing' would fit much more neatly into any sentence you could care to construct in reference to Lucky Jimmy Armstrong. Most of this had to do with hunger. When you've been worked into the ground in the morning, then missed your lunch, then trained even further into the ground in the afternoon, then missed your dinner and spent an evening lying about, exhausted and starving — well, one can understand just how you might feel about the boy responsible. One would also understand why you hurled him out of the barracks — incidentally, showing splendid teamwork in the process — so that he landed face down in the mud, and why you slammed and locked the door behind him so that he had to spend the next six hours wandering miserably around the fort by himself, aware that he'd made a big fat idiot of himself and that he'd not only betrayed his new comrades but also his old comrades on the Titanic as well. Even Rain Man joined in, and they hated him only marginally less than they did Jimmy.

Jimmy was still tramping around the camp as darkness fell and the floodlights snapped on. Searchlights began to rove across the plain and up into the hills surrounding Fort Hope. The guards in the watchtowers changed shift; those coming off duty appeared relieved, those going on looked nervous. Jimmy remembered Mohican's warning to be quiet as they'd approached the fort the previous night and wondered what could possibly be out there to cause such fear amongst those defending Fort Hope.

It was only as Jimmy wandered between the barracks that he began to fully appreciate the scale of what the President was undertaking — there were literally thousands of soldiers here, all undergoing similar training. There were armoured vehicles, missile launchers, even several tanks. It was an army. But what he didn't quite understand was what it was for. An army represents the citizens of a country; it defends that country, or attacks on its behalf. But there were no ordinary 'citizens' here — there were no mothers, wives, children: no bankers, carpenters or newspapers to protect, there was just the army. Everyone was in the army.

Fort Hope was completely different to any of the other settlements Jimmy had seen — as pathetic and disorganised as they had been, they'd also been determined attempts by survivors to put down fresh roots, safe havens where families could live together, start again. But Fort Hope felt. . . temporary. It was massive, but it wasn't permanent, it was more like a camp, somewhere you expect to move on from. It seemed clear to Jimmy that the President had a plan, and he was building an army with which to execute it. The Titanic now featured in that plan — although almost as an afterthought.

Guilt sat heavily on Jimmy's shoulders. He had more or less given up hope of ever returning to the Titanic. If he did see it again, it would most probably be as part of an army sent to capture it. He cursed himself for being such a big mouth. He must learn to keep his trap shut. He seethed inside. He would not be responsible for the Titanic falling into enemy hands — he would have to do something.

Jimmy stared at the perimeter fence. The chances of scaling it, cutting through it or digging under it without attracting the attention of the guards were minuscule. He had watched movies about prisoners of war escaping from camps like this — but such daring feats were always undertaken by large groups of inmates working in highly organised teams. Any individuals who tried to escape were usually discovered very quickly — and invariably shot.

But there had to be a way to escape.

Or to warn the Titanic.

In trying to keep as far away as possible from the delicious smells emanating from the mess hall, Jimmy found himself on the far side of the camp and outside a hut with a red cross marked on both sides of a slanting roof. As he wandered past it he could see through the open doors a dozen beds inside, with half of them filled. There was a nurse standing by one of the beds, and someone he supposed was a doctor sitting at a table, studying charts. As he moved around the back of the hut he saw that something like a picnic table had been set up in the fresh air. A girl of perhaps twelve or thirteen was sitting there, with a tray of food in front of her. She wasn't eating, just staring into thin air.

Jimmy wandered casually over. 'How's it going?' he asked.

The girl continued to focus on something invisible and far away.

Jimmy sat opposite her, directly in her line of sight. She stared straight through him. He might as well not have been there.

'I'm Jimmy,' he said.

She was very pale. Her eyes were green, but they were set in a face that looked sunken and starved. Her blond hair sat dank and tangled. Jimmy had often seen this vacant look in the settlements; it spoke of unseen horrors and tragic loss. Jimmy wasn't unsympathetic, his focus was just elsewhere.

'Jimmy Armstrong,' he said. 'Only arrived last night. You here long? What do you think of this place? What's wrong with you? Are you not eating your pie?'

His mouth was watering. It was a great big hunk of something pie. He didn't care what it was. There were potatoes and vegetables and a dessert bowl with custard swimming over a sponge cake. There was a can of Coke.

'Do you mind if I take a nibble? Just a teeny bit of crust? Been training all day and I'm absolutely...'

The girl didn't react at all.

Jimmy liberated a generous handful of pie and crammed it into his mouth. It was delicious. That said, he was so hungry that cardboard with gravy would also have qualified as delicious. The girl continued to stare right through him.

'What's that?' he said, playfully cupping a hand to his ear. 'Help yourself to some more? Don't mind if I do.'

He was just reaching across for a second helping when he saw the nurse glance out of the window behind her, then do a double take.

'What on earth do you think you're doing?' she demanded.

Jimmy choked down his mouthful of food. 'Nothing — she said I could help myself.'

The nurse's eyes narrowed. 'That poor girl hasn't spoken since she arrived here.'

'In that case,' said Jimmy, 'I'm lying.'

He grabbed the tray and took off.

Mohican stood in the middle of the barracks, resting his foot on Jimmy's back and glaring around the gaunt, starving, exhausted troop.

'Charge one — stealing food from a starving child. Charge two — refusing to halt when ordered to do so by a superior officer. Charge three — resisting arrest. Charge four — bleeding on an officer's boot without permission. Charge five — possession of a smart mouth. Have you anything to say in your own defence, Private Armstrong?'

Jimmy knew exactly what Mohican was doing. He was willing Jimmy to say something sarcastic, something defiant, to just open his bloody lips — he'd put up a bit of a fight when they'd eventually cornered him — and come out with something to make matters even worse. Jimmy knew it, and he also knew he couldn't resist, he couldn't help himself. He was Lucky Jimmy Armstrong, guaranteed to make a bad situation even worse.

'Well?' Mohican demanded. 'Anything to say, Armstrong?'

The words felt thick and unwieldy in his swollen mouth. 'Yes . . . sir. I just wanted to say . . . that the pie . . . was really, really . . . nice . . .'

Mohican thumped his boot hard into Jimmy's back. Jimmy couldn't stifle the cry of pain.

'Five charges, Private Armstrong, and I find you guilty on all counts. Once again the punishment applies to this entire troop. You will learn your lesson, Private Armstrong! No breakfast for anyone!'

There was no reaction. They had expected it. They stood silently. Only one emotion filled the air.

Pure hatred.

'OK,' Mohican snapped, 'six o'clock start tomorrow morning, so lights out in ten minutes. We begin with a boxing competition. Private Armstrong will be first in the ring. He will have both hands tied behind his back. Now I need someone willing to punch his stupid head off. Any volunteers?'

Every single hand was raised without hesitation.