Breaking Britain (Completed)

Chapter 14

14
Saturday 5th January 2030
18:55

           Razor had chosen Little Morocco well. He had travelled with Stiff and Louis. To him, they were the best of the King Crew, Stiff for his brains and Louis for his muscle.

          Stiff was mixed race and could easily pass for being Razor's brother, even though both of Razor's parents were black. His mum being a Bajan, red skin and his dad a Vincentian of Indian and Black mix. Louis was a white English boy, he had gone to school with Razor and Stiff. Louis was always large, not in a obese way, he was just naturally tall and solid. Razor and Stiff had instantly gravitated to him, better him being a friend than a foe. After a while they no longer saw him as a white boy, but as part of their extended family, as they did with the other three white boys in their crew. The difference with Louis, as opposed to the other three, was Louis didn't walk around trying to act black.

          'Where are they?', Stiff asked, feeling a little agitated.

          'You saw the streets, crawling with police. Not everyone knows the subtle little roads you took us down to avoid them', Razor responded calmly. 'They'll be here'

          Razor sat on the ground, with his back to the wall. In the distance he could see a group of about one hundred homeless people shuffling through the streets. He knew where they were headed, a charity organization provided food for them at the Ismaili Centre on Saturdays and Wednesdays.

         Razor knew it wouldn't be long before he was no longer a child in the eyes of the law and his mum would be forced to move out of her council accommodation, to provide space for someone else with a child. Over the past year, he had started to feel the strain of needing to find a job and both him and his mum knew well enough how difficult it was to gain employment.

          Louis joined Razor against the wall, Stiff paced back and forth in front of them. Louis followed Razor's gaze, as the procession of homeless kept walking. Out of the procession emerged three figures, Jim, Whistle and Sunbite, the only girl of the crew.
          Stiff was over to greet them first. Razor and Louis got to their feet.

          'We'll give the rest ten more minutes before we go', Razor said as they approached.

           After three minutes, Razor received a text from Will, saying how they had been stopped by the police twice and were heading back. They still waited the other ten minutes, but no one else from the crew made it through.

           'We've waited long enough, lets go'

           Trellick Tower stood menacingly glaring down at them. A parade of shops sat at the bottom of the tower, these lead to the stairwell, which was separate from the main building, each floor attached to the stair tower, by a walkway that seemed to hang in mid-air. There were elevators in the tower, only one worked and that intermittently broke down.

             'Stairs or elevator?', Stiff asked

             'Stairs, I don't want to risk it breaking down on us'

             'Are you fucking kidding me?',Whistle did not look pleased about the decision, 'It's got to be at least ten flights'

             'And the rest', Sunbite agreed

             Whistle had an unpredictable temper on him and when he got angry, he breathed hard. The small gap between his two front teeth, caused his heavy breathing to come out in the form of a whistle. Which was how he got his nickname. Although, he had beaten the first boy, who called him that, to a pulp.