The Blackout War

Chapter 7: "War Paint"

Alongside the metallic buzzing at the distance of the tunnel with the yells and celebratory singing at the distance, it was odd to see a man so peacefully asleep on top of a rusty metal bed. His dirty appearance did not shy away due to the dim light of candles and gas lanterns that sat across the improvised room built inside an abandoned subway bathroom, with black filth covering most of his face and his snoring open mouth revealing his weirdly white teeth, not to mention the rips and holes on his used-to-be white T shirt.

"Boss! The tin-cans, they are at the door." An awfully deep voice called out from the entrance of the room.

The man immediately opened his eyes without much struggle, time passed faster in the dark… and underground. Sleeping had become a sort of prize activity once scavenging was unavailable. He sat on his bed, stretching his bare strong arms and sounding his finger bones together, he stretched his neck to it's absolute edge until it sounded and only after that he stepped up, the clinging of a golden chain jumping up and down as he walked to the door.

As he stepped out, the light of fires made inside steel barrels illuminated the tunnels of the old London Subway to their disgusting coal-y black, creating a sort of path made out of them deeper into the railways. He stepped down the cubic platform connecting the once bathroom with the railways.

"Hey, fellas! Look! Caesar is up!" A bearded man taking heat from one of the barrels saluted, alongside other men surrounding them

Caesar chuckled and waved jokingly "Now don't any of you forget who is working his ass off for you" he grinned "Gotta talk to Snow White now."

"The tin can?" one of the bums said, gun around his hip 

"Yeah, her name is alpha, thank you~"

He moved along, bald men with rifles resting on their chests nodded in salute as he walked deeper down, into the yells of the tunnels. The walls to his sides were filled with trash of the old world, broken plasma TV's, cellphones, car batteries, laptops, toys… you name it. Everything and formerly everyone that used electricity was salvaged by the Scavengers, next sold at the best bidder. 

He turned right from the tunnel, finding another station, with a crowd of people surrounding two guys fighting. He didn't pay much attention to bets, but he did have his favorites to watch, nevertheless he stayed focused. Victor caught the edge of the platform and raised himself up, catching himself face to face with a tired elderly woman resting on the wall next to him.

"You hungry, gov'na?" He asked with a straight face, cleaning his chest off 

The woman tiredly opened her eyes, nodding up and down with a puppy-like sound. 

He gestured with his lips "We scavengers help each other, go to the storage and tell the guys Victor tells them to deal with it. That's code, if you didn't know."

"Thank you!" the woman gleefully said.

He moved along, walking next to the stairs that once used to bring to the surface, now blocked off with piles upon piles of sandbags stacked on top of eachother blocking everything to the last little small gap. He made his way to the other end, towards the other railway and turned left, contrary to where the now inactive and awfully decorated speed train rested motionlessly, blocking the path into the other tunnel.

At the end of the road, a fortified path led to the actual entrance, diverging away onto another road that was used for storage. This was, for all intents and purposes, a market entrance. People would peak their heads on the entrance in front of 13 armed men and 4 mounted machine guns behind those men and trade in stuff with them… in this instance Aces.