The Cult of The Enemy: The Dark Places Trilogy

by S. G Mark

  Alex laughed and raised his glass, “It’s been quite the ride, hasn’t it?”

  “What the fuck?” Jack couldn’t help but react to Alex’s infectious laugh, “You really don’t see this as a problem, do you?”

  He shook his head, “When you’ve had the year that I’ve had, you’ll think rather differently. Still in…” he checked his watch, “In fourteen hours I’ll be the longest surviving leader, so that’s worth noting at the next AGM.”

  In all this time Jack had never appreciated how much danger Alex had been in.

  “I’m sorry,” he said, “It’s easy for me to complain about my life. You’re what, the most wanted man in Britain?”

  Alex shook his head, “No, I’ve been very clever… in that no one actually knows I exist.”

  “What do you mean?”

  “Well think about it,” he said, “By rights I should be dead. It doesn’t take long for someone to betray someone and eventually someone gets hurt. I’m still here. And there’s only one reason for that - only a handful of people know I run this organisation. I aim to keep it that way.”

  “But… I’ve heard people mention you, I’ve asked people if they know you.”

  “Oh they’ve heard of me,” Alex said, “But no one really knows what I actually do. Only people who have been to HQ know who I am, and you have to be invited there these days.”

  “Right, well that explains a lot,” Jack said.

  “And what does that mean?”

  “It means that nothing’s getting fucking done,” Jack said, “We’re no further to winning than we were when I joined, don’t you think a clear leadership might be needed for that?”

  Alex shook his head, “No, not yet.”

  “Fine,” Jack said, “It’s not my problem.”

  Alex poured him another glass.

  “Are you trying to get me drunk?”

  “No,” he said, “I’m just trying to make you relaxed.”

  “Forgive me if I don’t trust you,” Jack said, raising the glass to his lips again.

  The two men stared vacantly across either side of the room as wisps of the grim underworld they inhabited swirled around them in a tragic storm. Smoke clogged bars, stained with cheap alcohol and the sweet puckering of lips as the next glass arrived, a prize amongst inept thieves. Outside a rain cloud clamoured above, spitting down the heavens in a battle between land and sky - the ground the pathetic loser as it was pelted again and again by artillery fire. The window panes racketed and a warm shiver ran down Jack’s spine; a sudden rush of nostalgia of a school summer trapped in a barn in France.

  “I’m proud of you,” Alex said, slurring slightly.

  “What for?”

  “You could have ran out that night,” he said, “When you were in the forest. But you made a choice and you stuck to it. Sitting here right now with you, knowing what you’ve done and knowing what you’re capable of, I know I made the right decision.”

  Jack bit back his tongue, as a torrent of dormant abuse tumbled to the tip of his tongue.

  “How long have you been thinking of leaving though?” he asked, his voice even more quiet than before.

  Jack glanced towards him and flicked his eyes away almost immediately. He hadn’t even appreciated the decision himself; at no point had he ever voiced it, certainly not aloud and definitely never to himself in the sleepless nights he’d been on the run for. It wasn’t even a sense of wanting to leave or even desperation to quit. He hadn’t even articulated how he felt; but whatever it was, it didn’t feel quite right.

  “It’s not that I want to,” he began,” I mean, to return to normal life? Who wouldn’t? Who wants to be constantly looking over their shoulder, worried about who to trust and when they might be killed? But it’s not that.”

  “Then what?” Alex leant in closer, pouring them both another whisky. They were nearly at the halfway point.

  Jack had dwelled long over these emotions in the past, but only once someone else had posed him the question that the soft focus slipped into clarity.

  “They don’t want it to change,” Jack said, feeling a sense of relief cascade over him, “We’re trying to save them but they don’t know they should be saved, and I don’t particularly think they want to be.”

  Alex smiled from his eyes as a pool of whisky reflected in his dark eyes, “Finally, you’re ready.”

  He staggered to his feet, shooting the remains of the whisky down his throat, grabbing the bottle and staggering to the door. Jack instinctively followed him.

  Out into the fresh air, bursting on their skin like capsule of cold, they made their way along the street; Alex slightly in the lead. In the open, Jack knew not to speak. Instead, he followed Alex closely until they reached a terraced house not more than a few roads away from the pub.

  Extracting the keys, it seemed that Alex himself was the sole inhabitant of the house and when they stumbled in through the front door, it was obvious that they were alone. The place was completely unfurnished. Their footsteps echoed along the crooked corridor; dated wallpaper with fading fleur-de-lis suffocating them from all sides. Alex turned into the living room and collapsed in a broken fabric sofa. It faced a small patch of carpet, slightly brighter than the rest of the room. It was the only piece of furniture in the room. Damp creeped up the far wall like a disgusting ivy.

  Slumping on to the sofa to join Alex, Jack took a swig from the bottle.

  “What did you mean, you’re ready?”

  Sprawled across his half of the sofa, Alex’s inebriated state flung his arms around wildly.

  “Everyone else out there,” he shot an arm into the air, “They think throwing money at something will make it go away. Kyle, he thinks you can nice this place back to what it was. But it’s not. It’s been fucked for a fuck lot longer than this recession. Most of this fucking organisation thinks it can plant a few flower bombs and hope that the people will turn around because the government is shit - but the truth? Truth is most of the population doesn’t even realise anything is fucking wrong. All they care about is themselves. That’s nothing new. And the likes of Kyle can think they can just talk a bit of politics at them and assume they will listen? Recruitment drives? Free Rations for the poor? When the fuck was that ever going to win this fucking revolution. There isn’t even a fucking revolution. It’s just reversing the wheel back to the fucking start. We have more recruits, then they die. We give them Rations, and they still reject our support. People are bastards. Selfish bastards, so that’s why we have to completely fucking ignore them.”

  A weight rose up from Jack’s shoulders; months of resentment finally settled into place and an instant sense of ease poured over him like single cream.

  “I’ve been wanting to say that for a really, really long time,” Jack said, “I just thought I was being a wanker for thinking it.”

  He turned to look at his friend; his closest friend who knew his deepest fears, his darkest secrets; his friend who lead the revolution not at the behest of the people, but for justice and morality.

  “What do we do then?” Jack asked, appreciating the poignancy of the moment, “What can we do - it just seems that whatever we throw at them, they always win. We can’t take Kyle’s approach, it isn’t working. But what else is there left?”

  Alex stared back at Jack, his eyes swimming with danger, “The only approach left. We fight. And we don’t play nice.”

  “What does that mean?” Jack asked, not as remotely naive as he was attempting to act.

  At this point, Alex grinned, “Tomorrow, it begins.”

  “What does? If I’m going to be a part of this you’re going to need to tell me,” he demanded, soberly ploughing his way through conviction.

  “In an hour, someone is going to drop by and drive us to a secret location. From there, we will kit ourselves out and wait until tomorrow night. Then, we’re going to make the bastards scared.”

  Alex dropped a cushion to the ground and rested against it. Sleep burdened his e
yelids. Jack was a little less eager for rest. An uncomfortable feeling grew in his stomach; one that he could not accurately define.

  From the sofa, he looked down at his friend, “It’s been a long time since it was just the two of us.”

  “It has,” Alex sighed, “I’m glad you stayed. It takes a few months, to forget who you are. You have to take your loved ones and family and put them in a dark place at the back of your mind. It’s funny, you see the others with their little photographs of their children and letters home never sent… it provides them comfort, but in all these years I’ve never needed to remember a reason to fight. It’s always there,” he prodded his temple, “But they aren’t the reason I stay, just a part of why I joined. Do you think of them much?”

  “Everyday,” Jack whispered absentmindedly, a surge of heartache contaminating the moment.

  “I suppose, you hadn’t seen them in so many years, it hardly makes a difference,” Alex pondered and Jack’s depression sunk further. He’d not been talking about Eliza or Maggie, but Jack’s real family and the father he forced himself to remember every few weeks.

  “I was going to call him,” Jack said, “My dad, the day after you took me I was going to call him. After all that time I felt I was nearly ready to move on, but that chance will be long gone by now. Even after this is all over… I mean how can we move on from that?”

  Jack stared up at the ceiling. Any exhilaration he’d felt from the whisky was plummeting him back to reality and would be plunging beneath its sour depths soon enough. He turned to Alex for vague words of comfort, but found his friend curled over asleep on the cushion.

  The empty shell of a house creaked, cars swept by outside and laughter from a television set filtered through the cheap plaster walls from next door. A hollow cave where his hope resided had been carved out by the dark realisation that he’d never had any hope in the first place; simply nostalgia to return to the way things used to be. But he would never again have a relationship with his father; returning home to Relugas Road was a fallacy. The four of them living under the same roof, with Maggie slaving away by the stove complaining about her children to Jack, Eliza throwing him flirtatious glances across the dining table as Alex stormed in from a late night to regale them with tales of his dull interviews and self inflated ego: all confined to memory.

  An hour later there was a knock on the door. Alex had woken up minutes prior, splashed his face with water and waited by the drawn curtains for their driver to arrive.

  “It’s time,” he said, sweeping from the room.

  In the car, Jack caught some sleep, his head resting against the window, comforted by the hum of the engine and the whirring of the passing countryside. It was dark now, but Curfew was not for another few hours. As Jack slipped into an exhausted, alcohol infused sleep, his brain was addled by strange dreams that vanished from his memory when his eyes opened weakly at the sound of tyres crunching along gravel hitting his ears..

  Stumbling out of the car, it was pitch black all around save a solitary candle by the front door, held by a silhouetted figure who steered the three of them inside.

  Warmth enveloped Jack as he stepped over the threshold; crackling fire in the centre of the cosy living room; dark wooden beams striping the low ceiling and rippling in the burnt orange candlelight. Two men were huddled near the fire, rubbing their puffy red hands. They glanced up as Jack and Alex entered. Behind them a little kitchen poked into view, submerged in darkness though a faint sliver of moonlight sparkled against the shining taps.

  Creaking from the ceiling overhead preceded footsteps gently descending the stairs until a pair of feet appeared through the bannisters. A hearty laugh bellowed ahead of its heavy set owner as a set of arms rushed towards Alex. The two bodies collided, slamming into each other. Jack stood back, bemused as a commotion of beard withdrew from Alex’s far side.

  “And this must be Jack,” he stretched out a fat hand.

  Nodding and glancing to Alex for a lifeline, Jack shook it.

  “Henry’s the name,” he said. “I hear you’re the reason we’re all here.”

  “What?” Jack said, but Alex had already pounced.

  “That’s right,” he said, “We’re working from your intel.”

  “Well done, m’boy,” Henry beamed at him, his cheeks shining with eager delight, “You’ll go far, I’m sure of it!”

  He patted Jack on the side arm, swivelled on the spot and headed straight for an armchair nestled by a stack of old books, atop which sat a tiny glass of sherry.

  “Where’s Arthur?” Alex asked Henry.

  “Downstairs,” Henry said, his voice dropping a few ominous octaves, “Preparing.”

  Alex nodded curtly and headed through to another room closed off by a magnificent oak door. Instinctively Jack wanted to follow, but before his feet could muster the effort, one of the men by the fire spoke up.

  “I’ve seen you before,” he said.

  Jack surveyed him without recognition. He was middle aged, muscular and his neck bore a long thin scar.

  “I can’t think where?” Jack shrugged.

  “You spent any time in Cornwall?” he questioned.

  “Yes,” Jack racked his brains. When he’d been in Cornwall he’d only seen Emma.

  “Nah,” the other man said, “That’s whatshisface you’re thinking of - the guy who owned the caravan site. Can’t you see this one’s Scottish?” Mike’s the name, this one’s Phil.”

  Nodding, Jack smiled, “Are we all here for the same thing then?”

  “Good god man,” Henry bellowed, “Of course we are.”

  “Can’t be too careful,” Jack turned, delicately, towards Henry, faintly remembering the mole he was supposed to be investigating.

  “Quite right,” he said, “Quite right. Care for some sherry?”

  Before he could answer, the decision had already been made.

  “Boys,” he called to Mike and Phil, “You know where the loot is.”

  Phil stepped forwards and ushered Jack to join him in the kitchen. There he shuffled some boxes around and pulled out a dusty collection of bottles, the labels smudged off.

  “It’s my naughty stash,” Henry called from his spot with his sherry, “But you can have some!”

  In a low tone, Phil said, “He’s a bit precious at times, but he’s been a great host. Best safehouse I’ve ever been to.”

  “He looks after the place?”

  “He owns it,” he said, “Only lets a few of us use it though, and even then only if Alex stays too. Pick a bottle.”

  Jack pointed at the farthest one away from him. Amongst the collection were a few bottles he recognised as Highland whiskies and felt a yearning for his homeland.

  Phil tossed the bottle over to him, “Henry would kill us if we used his crystal glasses.”

  As they returned to the living room, Jack took a seat on the sofa and opened the stiff bottle cap.

  “How are you guys feeling about tomorrow?” Jack asked, taking his first swig. His liver groaned.

  Mike was the first to answer, “This is going to be the most challenging thing we’ve ever done. Any previous mission pales in comparison.”

  “Why?”

  Phil burst into laughter, “Because we’re breaking into the Home Secretary’s home?”

  “Anything could go wrong!” Mike chipped in.

  “But he’s going to be away,” Jack said, “What dangers are there going to be?”

  “He’ll leave his guards behind,” Phil said, “We’ll have to disarm them.”

  “And cut the alarms,” Mike said.

  “Neither of which are going to be easy,” Phil said.

  Meanwhile Jack sat nervously, clutching the bottle far more tightly than he’d like. There was a growing part of him that was having second thoughts about agreeing to join Alex on this mission; had he allowed the whisky to puppeteer his tongue too easily? He wished he had just boarded the train back to London earlier.

  Alex’s head popped
through the door.

  “Come with me,” he said, shutting the door immediately behind him.

  Anxious, Jack rose to his feet and followed him. On the other side of the door was a drawing room complete with built in bookcases that lined the walls and a carved desk that sat in the centre of the rustic space. It reminded Jack of Julian’s study, except wider and grander - somehow more exemplified situated in the countryside.

  “This way,” Alex’s head rose from underneath a hatchet in the floorboards.

  Pulling it open wider, Jack found a set of steps leading down into a candlelit basement. Expecting catacombs, Jack was surprised to see the whole area was fairly open. At the opposite end stood a man with his back turned to Jack. Between them, Alex was walking towards a table upon which something made Jack feel a little nauseous.

  “You haven’t used one of these yet have you?” Alex asked, staring down at the set of hand guns in front of him.

  “No,” Jack said, not sure if he even wanted to after the last time he’d held one. Being in their presence made him on edge, as if they might open fire at any moment without warning or reason.

  “They frighten you, don’t they?” Alex said, strangely emotionlessly.

  Jack felt that Alex almost relished his vulnerability. He could hardly describe it himself, it was more an ethereal warning in his heart, without anchor to evidence. The corner of Alex’s mouth curled with a slight glee, as if he enjoyed making Jack feel inferior.

  “Are we going to use them?”

  “Yes,” Alex said.

  At this point the man standing by the wall, which Jack now realised hung a crude sketch of a house and its ground, turned and introduced himself.

  “Arthur,” he said, his hands firmly behind his back, keeping his posture rigid, “You must be Jack.”

  Unable to place Arthur’s accent, Jack was immediately distracted by the detail of the map behind him. Without it being titled, Jack knew that it was Quentin Robson’s country house. From the bird’s eye view it was set to be one of those typical country manors with gravel driveways, separate garage and a magnificent lawn that stretched into the woods on either side. It was within these woods that two crosses were marked and a letter assigned to each one: M and P.