INVASION USA (Book 2) - The Battle For New York by T I WADE Page B

York, the cold weather hit at about 11:00 am. The temperature was already cold at 15 degrees and dropped ten by midday. The sky was blue, an icy cold blue that was the last view thousands of people witnessed as their bodies went cold and their eyes became vacant.
    Up to this morning, the north had been experiencing the highest numbers of deaths in North America, Europe, Russia and Asia. But on the third day, the population in the southern regions began to panic. There was no power, no open stores, no police, and no fire engines to put out fires, so the southern areas of the world began to turn to violence. For many people, their refrigerators were now empty, the milk gone, the pantry was down to a couple of items and frozen food was thawing—the non-frozen meat having to be consumed before it went rotten.
    All the locked stores had products people now needed. There was a new sense of survival—a new sense that nothing was going to happen for a longer amount of time than they had first envisioned. For the first time, neighbors met their neighbors, people began to form groups, arm themselves, and walk down to their local stores to meet other groups doing the same. Many didn’t want to break the law, but hunger and the welfare of their families came first.
    Humans were only human. It took one brave soul to walk up to a door and break it open with a crowbar or steel rod, and then there was a stampede for the food that was neatly packed on the shelves inside. Candy and chocolate were fought over first, once any shopping trolleys had been commandeered. People with guns entered the store, first civil and decent, but once they realized that they had more power than the people without guns, they held the others at bay while their friends and neighbors helped themselves.
    It was inevitable, but the first group with guns was confronted by another larger group with guns, and by the third day alliances were being made. Many of the armed people were still sharing their spoils with others. There was still enough for everybody.
    An average supermarket in the United States held several million dollars worth of food and merchandise, and in many areas of the country, including the south these were half empty by early afternoon. Like piranha, thousands upon thousands of people denuded the shelves.
    By late afternoon the food was gone, as were generators, pet food, lawn tractors, wood, gas cylinders and all heating and cooking items and steel fencing. Everything that could be eaten, used to heat or cook, or to protect people was on the move. Pawn shops and gun stores were attacked and opened. The owners were a little more protective of their institutions of business and dozens of people were shot trying to get inside until the owners and shooters were themselves shot or injured, and the invaders were free to help themselves—often climbing over the owners’ dead bodies to get to what was inside.
    The mass of people heading home with piles of merchandise began to push the junk aside and clear the roads so that they could get through. Cars were pushed off the road and fires were lit to burn the remains of trucks and cars for warmth, once their insides were emptied.
    Most of the people got supplies for several days of survival. Useless electronics were still taken by many, the people hoping that one day they would work again. Banks were attacked and many tried in vain to open the vaults and the buildings were then torched in frustration. Gas stations were cleaned out of snacks and drinks, the gasoline and diesel sitting safely below ground in tanks. The majority of the people had never hot-wired a car in their lives, never mind something more complicated.
    As the stores emptied, the late or honest ones were left with bare shelves and empty isles staring back at them. It was time to go and buy, barter, beg and then forcibly take it away from the people who had gotten there sooner.
    It was time for anarchy, exactly what Chairman Wang Chunqiao in