the dimming of the light (Part 14)

Peter Hunter

  over two hundred miles above the Earth's surface and at a speed of seventeen thousand miles per hour Cyclops watched over a still and silent United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland - as it toiled on its relentless surveillance travelling around the globe

  just one of at least three spy satellites in the last few hours that had passed over the island called

  Great Britain

  their owners and operators in the USA Russia and in China had peered at their screens and wondered as they had done for many weeks and days now

  since the British Isles had apparently 'closed down' no communication by any normal or official channels. Admittedly a few aircraft had landed - aided by standby generators at the lager airports

  some vessels had docked at smaller ports around the coast - but these facilities soon faded leaving a strangely silent and almost lifeless taste to the country

  soon nothing was heard or known Great Britain as a living, thriving economy had apparently ceased to exist

Other countries watched using satellite surveillance - the occasional overflying aircraft - and some expeditionary voyages that had landed on the coast. The vessels found only a diminishing population who could only relate a massive power failure and increasing deprivation

  with no sign of organisation or authority

As they watched and waited reluctant to help or interfere many speculated

  would the country recover of its own accord or simply decay with most of the population dying within a few weeks, a month or a little longer. In the larger countries such as the USA or China experts made complicated calculation

The results varied but on one thing most agreed

  starvation, exposure to the winter weather plus illness and disease would weaken most people with mutations of the already existing Winter Vomiting Virus, the new strain of 'Asian Flu' and an increasing epidemic of Ebola would soon reach a disaster level and have a greater effect than all the plagues of old

  the cynical, the opportunistic and the ambitious saw the prospect, the chance of a lifetime

  once major country up for grabs for the taking

  land, cities and all the infrastructure almost devoid of its population - ready for the taking

  already fleets from the USA and from China were steaming towards the UK...

(To be continued)

Peter Hunter 2012

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