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Did you miss the other parts?
Finally, as dawn began to break, the anger began to calm. In the moments right before the sun rose it seemed as though the new day reminded those involved in the melee that they had not yet slept.
The crowd dispersed.
The sirens stopped.
Finally, after things had been quiet for a while, Max felt comfortable peeking out of the alley. She was stunned by what she saw. It looked like a war had broken out in downtown Athens. It was a far cry from the tour guides she’d carefully packed.
The square was trashed. Garbage cans were still smoldering. A haze filled the air, whether from residual smoke or tear gas, she wasn’t sure. There was garbage strewn everywhere. Bricks and other rubble littered the streets. Windows were broken and a police car was still on fire.
But the area was all but empty of people. A couple sat on an overturned bench smoking, paying no attention to the American woman. A homeless man rummaged through the trash scattered on the ground, looking for something of value.
She motioned to her companions. Joan was moving very slowly as she pushed herself up from the wall, and Savannah took her arm to help.
The last mile, Max thought, would be a long one.
…
It took everything in Max not to speed-walk her way to the Embassy. She linked arms with Joan to help herself stick with the older woman’s pace.
“You two should go on,” Joan pleaded with them. “I’m slowing you down.”
“Absolutely not,” said Max in a tone that her daughter would recognize to mean she brooked no argument. “We are not leaving you behind. We get there together or not at all.”
Savannah nodded and added, “It’s okay, Joan. I’m tired too. We’re walking at just the right speed for my liking.”
Max was glad when they began to emerge from the Exarcheia neighborhood. While it was an interesting place to visit for the counterculture during good times, these were not good times, and it was not currently a setting conducive to personal security.
There was less graffiti now, and the buildings were in better repair. Nearly every window had been covered by the metal rolldown storm shutters so popular in Europe. Apparently, those weren’t just for use during Mother Nature’s storms. They rolled down or across to cover the glass with a mechanism that was deployed and locked from the inside. This protected the windows themselves from getting broken by an angrily thrown brick and dulled the noise of the protests for the people residing behind the protective barriers.
The streets were still all but empty. Here and there, the contents of trashcans still emanated smoke. Some were turned over on their sides, spilling garbage. It was a far cry from the city of yesterday, when it was filled with cheerful music, shopkeepers sweeping meticulously kept walkways, and people driving trucks with loudspeakers, announcing their services to potential buyers. There were no laughing crowds at the sidewalk cafes, no lines for coffee, and no businesses beginning to stir.
It was desolate.
However, the lack of interaction meant that they made better time. They didn’t have to duck into alleyways to hide from those who might not take kindly to their presence. It was a lot easier to avoid people when there weren’t any people around.
Every urban survival expert from whom Max had ever learned said the number one threat during situations of civil unrest in city environments was other people. After this experience, she whole-heartedly concurred. The police, the protesters, heck, even the homeless guy, all seemed dangerous and threatening.
The solitude was a relief. They set a slow but steady clip for the third mile and made it through the residential neighborhoods without further incident.
That is, until they got close to Vasilissis Sofias, the street also known as Embassy Row.
They were less than a quarter of a mile to the American Embassy and safety. But that last quarter of a mile might be even more dangerous than the three that had preceded it if the noise ahead was anything to judge by.
If her ears could be trusted, it seemed that the protests weren’t finished everywhere in the city. Max pulled out her phone and went back to Google News to see what was going on. 9% remained of the life in her battery.
She couldn’t stifle a groan when she saw the update.
The protests had heated up during the night and angry people were marching on Embassy Row. Guards at the embassies of Argentina, Serbia, Malta, and the United States were on high alert as the crowds were concentrated there.
Fantastic, Max thought. So close yet so far away. How are we going to get through that?
Be the gray women, she decided. The gray man (or woman) theory was a popular premise in the prepper world. It had roots, like many preparedness philosophies, in the military world. The basic concept was that a person who was trying not to be noticed should do everything possible to blend in with the crowd, or the “baseline.” Baseline, another military-originated concept, meant the general atmosphere at the current time. To stand out from the crowd meant that you were putting a target on your back.
In a group that was angrily protesting, the best way to blend in would be to protest with them. They didn’t want to appear to be American in a group of Greeks. They would do best by looking like one of the protestors. Then they could move along with the crowd. It would take longer to get to their destination, but it would be far safer.
She sat down on the bench beside her companions and quickly explained the situation to them.
“I think we need to blend in with the protestors,” she suggested.
“We can pull our hoods up and march with them!” Savannah agreed.
“You guys wait here,” Max told them. “I’m going to go check things out.” She put on her sunglasses and pulled up her hood, leaving Savannah and Joan on the park bench. She jogged a little closer to the crowd to get an idea of what was going on.
She found some signs that had been dropped and stepped on. She picked three of them up and rubbed the shoeprints into the paper with the hem of her shirt. It’s a good thing this hoodie is black, she thought. Otherwise, she’d have been noticeably dirty.
A lot of folks were wearing head to toe black, she observed, so the hoodies would serve as camouflage to help them “go gray” and blend in. The crowd was chanting what seemed to be anti-capitalist slogans, which tied in with last night’s protests at the market. Max took her signs and returned to where her friends awaited.
“Here’s what we’re going to do.”
If you want to read about the rest of Max’s escape from Athens, name your price for the novella here.
