[ WP ] War breaks about between the US and UK , and most countries quickly join one side or the other .

How many things last four hours? Cooking Christmas dinner? The Extended Edition of Return of the King? A drive from London to Manchester? 
 
 Had there ever before been a war that lasted four hours? James did n't think so. He'd heard about the war that lasted fifty-two minutes between Britain and Zanzibar, and he'd heard of the 365 year war between the isles of Scilly and Holland, but he doubted that there had ever been a four hour war before. 
 
 And it had never destroyed the world before. 
 
 He brought the binoculars up to his eyepieces. 
 
 `` Look!'' he pointed across the plain and spoke into the radio. `` Oxford's almost untouched.'' 
 
 `` They'll all be dead. If the blast did n't get them the fallout will have taken them by now,'' his companion, a stocky northerner did n't bother following where James was pointing. 
 
 `` But think of all that's there! Libraries full of books! Computers! Engineering!'' James gasped. `` And there's three hospitals. MRI machines, X-ray machines, anti-biotics by the cart full.'' 
 
 `` It's almost twenty miles away kid,'' the northerner growled. `` We need tinned food, and medicine that is n't irradiated too much.'' The northerner pointed to the stain of houses at the bottom of the hill. `` That village's food and medicine will keep us alive a lot longer than any number of books.'' 
 
 `` If we're going to rebuild civilisation-'' 
 
 `` We're not lad.'' The northerner picked up his bag and trudged over the fields towards the village. Around him the grass was dying. It was struggling hard, but large patches were turning brown, and some black. 
 
 There was not a bird in the sky. Not an insect on the wing. The air was empty. 
 
 `` Come on,'' the Northerner growled. `` Your radiation suit wo n't keep the fallout gone forever. The sooner we can fill these bags with food the sooner we can go back underground where its safe.'' 
 
 `` I still think its a sign,'' James said defiantly. `` We scientists in the particle accelerator building were the only ones who survived. All over the world it will be the same, the scientists in the deep labs will be the ones who survived when all others perished. We can build a perfect utopia.'' 
 
 `` Kid, there are fifty-eight of us men in the Diamond,'' the northerner just shook his head, making his radiation suit wobble. `` And there are only 13 women. Unless you want to do some real disgusting stuff the next generation is goin to be a lot smaller. And even if we force all the women to have six babies each, do you really think we can teach them all the stuff we know? WHat's going to matter to them is n't books or x-ray machines or the diamond light source particle accelerator. They'll worry about food.'' The northener paused. `` And other survivors.'' 
 
 James paused in their walk. They were standing on the highest point of the Bag's Tree Hill. Now all the trees were dead and barren you could see almost twenty miles in every direction. 
 
 `` You think there are?'' 
 
 `` Britain had three hundred warheads,'' the northerner said. `` France had about the same. That's enough to hit every American city with a population greater than 100,000 people twice. But do you really think its enough to wipe out every american? California alone is the size of Britain and France combined lots of space to hide.'' The northerner looked up at the sky. `` And that does n't include the Russians, or the Chinese. And there's the countries we would n't have hit at all, Brazil, Australia, South Africa. I'm sure the fallout is killing them just as surely as its killing us,'' a gust of wind whipped past them and the Geiger counter briefly went into a Prestissimo cacophony. `` But they had time to get people to shelters. To get things prepared and one day, maybe not for years but one day, over that horizon,'' he pointed south, to the Continent. `` We'll see helicopters fly in under a foreign flag and we, or our children, will be forced to speak whatever oingo-boingo language they demand and pray to whatever oingo-boingo gods.'' 
 
 `` You make it sound like we lost the war,'' James said. `` We wiped out New York, Chicago, Austin, Dallas, San Fransisco, LA-'' 
 
 `` Everyone lost this war kid,'' the northerner just walked on. `` And if you ca n't see that you're as deluded as the people who started it.'' 
 
 James just there and watched the Northerner head for the village. Wind rustled the dead tree branches and flicked away pieces of the decaying grass. 
 
 James would never again be able to feel the wind on his face or the sun on his skin. James stood under the Bag's Tree for a long time. Above him, the living history of a thousand years slowly crumbled to dust.
