D. Mitchell - The King of Terrors

Billy found the way out blocked. He came up against Slimer and the rest of the staff, backing away from the rear doors that led to the warehouse yard; more people were spilling in this way and forcing them back into the store.

‘We’re all going to die!’ Slimer screamed, and Billy, looking at the rampaging crowd swarming like killer bees and settling all over the supermarket, shared similar gloomy thoughts.

He saw Beth briefly, barged out of the way and falling to the tiled floor, disappearing beneath a thicket of legs. If he felt the urge to rush to her aid it was quickly drowned by a cold wave of choking fear. Slimer ducked through the door that led to the upstairs office and everyone played follow-my-leader again. He allowed so many people inside the office before trying to shut out the remainder, saying there wouldn’t be enough oxygen for everyone. ‘Fuck you,’ said two of the weirdos in perfect harmony, and soon the small office was crammed to capacity. They could now look through a small window onto the madness swirling like a menacing whirlpool below them.

Slimer telephoned the police, who it seemed at first didn’t want to believe him. ‘We’re all going to be murdered here!’ he yelled almost incoherently. As if to give weight to his predictions he saw smoke begin to billow from one of the aisles. ‘Jesus, the bastards are using our own firelighters!’ he cried disbelievingly; how anyone could light anything with those crappy things he’d never know, but they’d certainly got a good blaze going now. He waved everyone out. ‘Back down the stairs! Back down the stairs! Get back, damn you! We’ll all be boiled alive!’

Billy would have liked to have corrected him — there was a distinct absence of water around — but he wasn’t going to hang around long enough to debate the matter. He pushed his way out and headed down the stairs. Others took his lead and abandoned their hysterical manager to his fate.

As the flames took hold the crowd shrank before them like cellophane in a fire, gradually retreating back to the front of the store and out through the broken windows, or back into the warehouse yard. There came the sound of a police siren and even the hardiest of hardcore rioters, who’d lingered to load up with a few more bottles of vodka, made a dash for the exits, some cursing the blasted trolley wheels for refusing to go straight.

The smoke started to choke Billy and his eyes began to stream. He coughed as he ran, keeping his head low. He came across Beth, sat on the floor, dazed, her leg bloodied. She looked up at him, her eyes cold. Well to hell with you, he thought, and stumbled towards the window. But something made him stop. As the last of the rioters tried desperately to lift their heavy trolleys out of the window Billy turned and went back to look for her. But when he reached the place where he’d last seen her she was no longer there.

Now the smoke was getting really thick and black as the blaze consumed plastic and rubber. He coughed so much he choked, and his chest was gripped by painful spasms he couldn’t do a thing to control. Ah fuck, he thought angrily. He staggered towards where the windows were supposed to be, pausing on the way to snatch a mobile phone from the shelf. ‘They’re cheap crap anyway,’ he said.

The fresh air outside was welcome. He stood bent over, his hands on his knees, retching and bringing up bitter bile. Blue flashing lights of police cars and fire engines lit up the front of the store like it was a nightclub.

He realised a tiny crowd of his colleagues had also gathered, drawn protectively to each other, and Beth was there, standing with them.

‘Is everyone accounted for?’ asked a fireman of one of the weirdos, who shook his head in shock. ‘Who’s your manager?’ he persisted. ‘Who is in charge here?’ Someone pointed at Slimer who sat on the concrete floor staring at the supermarket flames racing through the building. ‘Who is your fire officer?’ Slimer shook his head. ‘How many staff did you have in there? We need to do a quick count, see if anyone’s missing.’ But Slimer appeared not to understand a single word.

To Billy’s surprise there was a small TV crew and a photographer already on the scene, pointing a camera at Beth and the small group of employees. He noticed she quickly turned away. At that moment there was a series of small explosions as aerosols burst open in the heat and Billy’s attention was diverted.

‘They’ve been running wild through the city,’ explained a police officer when Billy questioned what was happening. ‘The riots just flared up without warning. Started with a guy being shot by police in Tottenham. Then rioting broke out all over London, spread to other cities. It’s happening everywhere,’ he said, his voice slightly panicky, which didn’t do much to reassure Billy. I mean, he thought, you’d expect the police to be in control, but obviously nobody was in control of anything anymore. It was as if the world had gone mad, all order broken down, normal rules ripped up and stamped upon.

The building was quickly turning into an inferno. More fire engines raced onto the scene and hoses were played upon the blaze. Someone put a friendly, reassuring arm around his shoulder and led him away. He heard the tinkling of glass at his back.

The staff of Speed Save — the ones who had not escaped by the rear exit — were herded meekly to a corner of the car park, a shivering, frightened group clearly shaken by their experience.

Billy noticed, however, that Beth Heaney wasn’t amongst them. He looked around and caught sight of her slim dark form, some distance away, hurrying from the scene.

‘Yes?’ he said, eyes squinting in the harsh light, speaking through a narrow crack as the door was still on its chain. His face clouded over when he saw the two young men, both wearing flashy suits in charcoal grey, white shirts and neat black ties. One of the men was white, the other black. The black guy clutched a fancy leather briefcase. They both smiled broadly but the smiles cut no ice with him. ‘We don’t like Jehovah’s Witnesses here!’ he said abruptly, about to close the door unceremoniously on them.

‘Neither do we,’ said the white guy.

‘We don’t like people coming round cold selling either. Double glazing, that kind of thing.’

‘A blasted nuisance,’ agreed the white guy. ‘We’re not here to sell a thing, not even God. We came to see your son, Billy. Billy Krodde. He does live here, doesn’t he?’

‘What’s he done wrong now? He said he was sorry for nicking that poxy mobile phone. They sacked him from that poxy supermarket because of it. What else has he been up to? You the law?’

The two men exchanged a quick glance, their smiles not once showing signs of withering. ‘You could say that, in a round about sort of way,’ said the white guy.

‘The police?’

‘Dear me, no!’ said the black guy.

‘Then who?’

A pause. ‘The Church of Everlasting Bliss,’ said the black guy. ‘I’m called Gabriel. My friend here is called Isaiah.’

‘Look, it’s a Sunday, day of rest and all that,’ said Billy’s dad, for whom every day was technically a day of rest, but he felt it was the principle of the thing. ‘We don’t want any churchy people round here, especially on a Sunday, preaching the end of the world or anything. It puts you right off your day.’

‘We’ll pay,’ said Isaiah, and the door stopped in its tracks, ‘to see Billy. It’s vitally important we speak with him, Mr Krodde.’ He fished out two twenty pound notes from his wallet and handed them over to him. ‘And we promise not to mention the end of the world, not even in passing.’ He grinned.