The air was smoky. The shack was reduced to rubble and smouldering rope bridges dangled from charred trees. The Castle Guards were cocky and brutal as they looted anything of value and smashed up the remains of the Sherwood Women’s Union.
Most Union fighters evaporated into the forest once it was clear they were outmatched. One pair staged a daring return, darting from cover to rescue their comrade with the broken legs. But two adults and two younger girls were caught, cuffed and hooded.
One green-uniformed guard tensed his enormous biceps, resting his boot on a young prisoner’s back, while his colleague snapped trophy pictures.
‘Gonna have grey hair when that pretty face gets outta jail,’ the photographer taunted.
Little John’s ears still rang loudly from the explosion. He only caught flickers of sunlight through his hood as they marched him blind and barefoot, along with the four Women’s Union captives.
The thick mask made it hard to breathe and his pains got worse as shock turned to exhaustion. Especially the burnt left heel, where he’d stepped on a hot bullet casing.
‘Get in the front,’ the woman who’d kicked him in the back growled, then cryptically added, ‘Unit one says special treatment for golden boy.’
A big hunting knife slashed Little John’s mask and his neck snapped back as the guard ripped it off. His eyes still burned from the purple smoke, but after a couple of seconds adjusting to open sunlight, he realised they’d walked to a rest stop at the edge of Route 24.
Six lanes of traffic grumbled in each direction, with the forest canopy towering on either side.
‘Move, deaf-o!’ the woman taunted, giving Little John a shove. It was hard to hear with thundering traffic and ears ringing from the explosions.
Little John saw two small tourist buses with Sherwood Castle painted down the side and A King Corporation Resort in smaller letters beneath. As he got into a seat next to a driver, the two women and two kids were ordered into the back, still wearing their hoods.
A guard was last in, and he reached out to slam the sliding side door. The driver gave Little John a don’t-mess-with-me stare and turned the ignition. Disco music started up on the radio as the bus crunched over gravel and merged onto Route 24.
The side windows were heavily tinted, but Little John could see other vehicles through the windscreen. Salesmen in BMW wagons, a plumber’s van with a bathtub lashed to the roof and an SUV with a curly brown dog in the back.
It was a weird reminder that normal lives were going on, while Little John rode a van to hell, with bloody feet and glimpses of a sobbing nine-year-old girl in the driver’s mirror.
The Castle Guard convoy stayed in the outside lane and peeled off after a few minutes.
Exit 14C – Sherwood Castle & Resort
Access by invitation ONLY!
They rode a forest track for four kilometres, then turned through elaborate wrought-iron gates and past a Welcome to Sherwood Castle sign.
The van got waved through a checkpoint staffed by Castle Guards and accelerated onto a wide road finished in deep-red tarmac with pristine markings.
Little John noted posts topped with security cameras every fifty metres and saw that the forest on either side was manicured, with thinned undergrowth and winding bark pathways.
They passed an enclosure filled with kangaroos and a metallic silver helicopter with King Corporation logos, winding up for take-off.
‘How Sheriff Marjorie and the rest of the one per cent live,’ a woman in the back moaned, as the road arced and the castle came into view.
‘Get that mask back on!’ the guard demanded. ‘And shut your filthy communist hole.’