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My entry into the Vocal "The Mystery Box" Challenge to write a story about a mysterious package. You can enter that challenge yourself below.

Music is "The Box" by The Orb

Now

We are just about keeping alive. We go out daily to try and get something from one of the food posts but usually, they have nothing but gruel or a handful of rice. We are starving to death.

Twenty years ago the government plunged the country into recession and said they had to implement austerity to protect the economy. What they meant was to protect themselves.

The infrastructure was dismantled and the very rich now live on walled estates guarded by security forces. Hospitals and healthcare were shut for anyone who could not afford to pay. Wages became a thing of the past but people were still made to work, but eventually, the factories closed as well.

Elections were paused, indefinitely.

A brutal military police were brought into being to implement the government’s “austerity measures”. It was a case of “Do what you are told or you and your family will pay”

I remember that we used to have electricity and heating but fifteen years ago there were power cuts, and then one day they were never turned back on. The walled estates and inner London never had this and still seem to be ok, but if you venture anywhere near there you will probably be shot or disappear in some other way.

At least the permanent cloud over the country from the fossil-fuelled factories' furnaces keeps us from needing heating. I haven’t a clue what those factories are for, but they all have a high-security presence and the only things that go in and out these days seem to be drones. If you get too near the smell is noxious but I have not been near for years.

Ever since the power stopped we lost television, radio and news in any form. Some tried to rig up generators and solar power batteries but they are always smashed by the police and anyone responsible is taken away. I heard one guy found a wind-up radio, the police found him smashed the radio and shot him as he had broken a government directive. They never said what it was.

In The House

There was a tapping at the door. We were worried. We didn’t trust anyone. Anybody just wanted to take what you had. Nobody had helped anybody else in over twenty years, that was a legacy of government policy. He remembered government-sponsored bus convoys to the south coast to massacre any asylum seekers trying to come ashore and people saw it as a day out. This was a horrible place to be but there was no way out and these days there were no roads or buses outside of London.

I took an axe and unbarred the door and opened it slightly. It was being tapped by a drone, with a parcel attached. The parcel was marked “FOOD”. I grabbed the parcel, brought it inside, and my family gathered around.

“Open it!!”

I was thinking has the government realised we need this?

The parcel was odd, it was a sealed plastic container, I would need a knife to open it.

“Bring me the big knife”

I took the knife and stabbed the parcel ………..

In The Control Room

“OK, all the packages have been delivered to area NE5. It was a good idea to mark them as ‘FOOD’, the scum would have opened them straight away and the Novoachik/Sarin hybrid pressured gas will have killed them all in a few seconds. The rats will dispose of the bodies and it’s likely they will die of the poison they ingest. We'll send out patrols to clear up anyone who wasn’t home when the food boxes were opened”

The commander chuckled at the thought.

Since everything was now automated, there was no need for most of the population, although he was a little worried about the prototype Artificial Intelligence driven security systems that he had heard were being trialled in the capital.