Story Base #1 - Remembrance

"Soldier! Hey soldier! They gonna let you in, or lock you out with the rest of us?"
My face remained impassive, like they'd taught us. Glance quickly at the antagonist to make sure he didn't have a weapon, and then back to stoneface. Stare straight ahead, don't talk, don't listen, just be the barrier between them and the Shelter. Hell, if we're being honest, between them and the future.

This was back when the thing had only just exploded, before the fallout had washed over England. Of course, I forget you young people don't really read much of the history from before the explosion. Shelter was built in response to places like Iran and Pakistan building nuclear reactors to generate their power. There was a powerful feeling among governments that eventually something was going to happen and so Shelter got built, a fully enclosed city, completey self-sufficient, with air from outside pumped in through scrubbers that would clean it of radiation and other crap. One hundred percent fresh. The kind of tech they were building for Mars, and they stuck it in the English countryside. When a bomb's on its way, we'd rush all the important people in there, so they could continue being important. As it was, we had three days warning, which turned out to be less of a blessing than we thought. We got the government officials inside, ready to carry on their duties, along with the important among the civilians; doctors, engineers, farmers and the like. Everyone you could ever dream of to keep the society we knew alive. Oh, and a quarter of the military. I was one of the lucky ones, picked the long straw and booked myself a place in the brave new world.

It only took four hours for the first protest to begin, two hours for that to turn into the first riot. Who were we to decide who'd get to live or die? I didn't care then, I was following orders, and I was going to survive. Strang how becoming an outsider can give you that perspective back. I know what it's like to lose a future now, but back then all I could think about was making sure nothing happened to Shelter. Ten people gathered otuside it, begging to be let in, that was the toughest, seeing the desperation written on their faces, having to deny them again and again. Quickly, ten became a hundred, which became a thousand, which soon multiplied past the point that anyone cared to count. There were real worries that these people might try to rush the Shelter, or in some way destroy it. So the military who'd been selected to enter it, alongside the police and even fire service in the same situation, were borught in to control the populace. The populace, s'all we ever called them, never the people, or the human fucking beings. They were the populace, and they were the ones who might stop us from being saved. I saw people in the crowd I knew, most of us did. Old friends reminiscing in the hopes we'd get sentimental and let them through, ex-girlfriends saying how they always really loved us, and if we took them in they'd never say those hurtful things again. Bunch of short straws too, talking about how much bullshit it was that they weren't coming. They were the worst, they'd go on for hours about serving their country, years of hard work, giving up their lives. At the time I couldn't figure out why they didn't see it how I saw it. Serving their country one last time, really giving up their lives for God, Queen and Country. I was a lot younger then, I had a lot to learn about the world.

Nobody went home in that time, houses had been emptied and everything you owned was now safely inside Shelter, waiting for youalongside whatever family you brought with you. Military men like us will follow whatever orders you give, but never ask us to betray our families. Giving us that was the easiest way to ensure our loyalty. We were rotated from duty for eight hours sleep and then immediately put back on, but I don't know of anyone who managed to sleep at all. The camp buzzed with a nervous tension. We had to last the three days and then it would all be over one way or another. The first day came and went without any real incidents of note, the second day got worse, the people out there got more and more desperate and there were several uprisings of violence that were swiftly quashed. Ignoring them became harder, shouts and chants and songs and tears surounded us. Kettling became impossible once they'd ringed a good half of the city, and we were forced to just hold the line, and makse sure that only authorised people came through. I was on the gate for that second day, checking ID's, authorisation papers, and the boot of cars. I caught one poor bastard clinging to the bottom of a car, hoping to make it past us. His hands were a bright, lobsterish red. I remember that vividly. I also remember the pain in his face, and to this day I don't know what was hurting worse right then. The burns and scrapes from holding tight underneath the car, or seeing his last chance at a future lasting longer than another few days drive away from him.

If we thought that second day was tough, the third day was a killer, literally. All the worry and despair in the crowd just built up past a point where it could be controlled. They weren't people, they weren't even the populace anymore. They were fucking animals that needed to be put down. We retreated to the second barrier, then to the last line, then we started firing. I don't know how long it was before the last bullet was fired, you lose track of time in those kind of situations, but it was a good long while. For all of five hours it was the worst atrocity ever committed on British soil, then we moved inside the Shelter and closed the doors for the first and last time. Next to that, the slaughter of thousands of civilians by an armed military seemed like a footnote in history, death toll insignificant in comparison. Want to know something else? I was the last one in. You're looking at the last human being to walk through that door and enter Shelter.