INVASION: UPRISING (Invasion Series Book 3)

by Dc Alden

  The catcalls started a few minutes into the speech, whistles and jeers competing with the amplified drone from the stage. Someone barged past him, a whip of fair hair, followed by a man with a camera perched on his shoulder. TV people, hungry for good footage, pressing into the crowd. As rain began to slice across Trafalgar Square, Roy’s eyes were drawn to the speaker onstage. He felt sorry for the man, his thin hair plastered to his head by the sudden squall, the pages of his speech clutched like a wet rag in his hand. Poor bastard.

  “Shut up, will you? We can’t hear him!” shouted the man in the sheepskin coat.

  A dreadlocked anarchist twisted around, lashing Roy’s face with his dreads. He snarled something unintelligible, then shoved Roy hard in the chest, causing a ripple through the crowd. Roy felt himself pushed forwards, and before he could recover his balance the fists began to fly.

  He heard a woman shout, saw the TV reporter being assaulted by a masked anarchist. Roy lunged forward and punched him in the face. The man went down hard and Roy grabbed the woman around the waist, pulling her back through the melee until they were swept up against a barrier.

  Missiles arced through the air, a barrage of bottles, stones and paint bombs. People were getting hit, some dazed and bleeding, many more covered in pink and green paint. The riot cops surged forward, unleashing a fusillade of baton blows on the closest demonstrators. Roy clutched the reporter’s hand and shoved his way through the throng until they found a break in the barriers. He ducked through and led her beneath the safety of the scaffold stand as the missiles continued to fly. Breathless, Roy sank to his knees.

  “Close one,” gasped the reporter.

  She was mid-thirties, slim, with a bob of mousy hair. Her nose was a little bloodied, her shirt ripped at the neck, her face paled by the proximity of violence. Still, she seemed pretty together despite her close call. Roy watched her cameraman squeeze through the gap and join them beneath the stand.

  “Thanks, buddy.”

  “No worries,” Roy muttered, getting to his feet. The woman held out her hand. “I’m Kelly Summers, MSNBC. You kinda saved me back there.”

  The cameraman winked at Roy. “A three-week stint in Kabul and she thinks she’s invincible.”

  Summers smiled sweetly. “Fuck you, Art.”

  “Classy,” Art chuckled, checking his camera.

  Summers asked, “What brings you here today?”

  It took a moment for Roy to realise the opportunity that had presented itself. He produced his placard and launched into his story until Summers held up her hand.

  “Wait. Let’s do this right.”

  Summers positioned Roy in front of Art’s camera and smoothed her hair down. “You’ve got ninety seconds. Take a breath, think before you speak, and be concise. Okay, here we go…”

  Summers launched into her piece to camera and Roy did his best to tell Jimmy’s story. As Summers wound up the segment a firework exploded overhead, a huge bang that rained a brilliant shower of sparks onto the crowd below. They panicked like a herd of cattle, and a phalanx of riot police charged into them, armour-plated Robocops swinging their batons mercilessly, their visored faces contorted with state-sanctioned rage. The noise was deafening, the chaos complete, the air ripe with body odour and fear.

  A barrier gave way and the mob spilled into the media pen, scattering in all directions. Roy found himself swept away on the human tide, clutching and clawing at those around him, desperate to stay on his feet. The historic square had become a coliseum of mayhem.

  “Come here, you!”

  Roy yelped as a cop’s gloved hand yanked his collar. He struggled free, plunging into a gap between two outside broadcast vehicles, the familiar dome of the National Gallery looming above him. He burst out of the narrow opening and collided with a trio of yellow-jacketed policemen, sending them tumbling to the ground like fluorescent skittles. They were on him in seconds, his arms wrenched and twisted into painful locks, stiff handcuffs ratcheted over his wrists.

  “You’re under arrest, violent disorder,” puffed an overweight plod as he frogmarched Roy toward a waiting van.

  His protests fell on deaf ears. He was searched and shoved into the van, squeezed up against a catch of grumbling detainees. He leaned his head against the mesh-covered window, bumping and swaying with the motion of the van as they headed along Pall Mall. His little interview, his one real chance of telling Jimmy’s story, would be swallowed up by the riot, the mayhem played out again and again on every TV and news channel across the country. Who’d care now about a missing Brit in Iraq? The opportunity had passed. He wouldn’t get another one like that.

  The van raced along the Mall and turned hard right into Horse Guards Avenue, passing the famous parade square, the Cabinet War Rooms, the bronze soldiers on their granite plinths. His thoughts turned to Jimmy and the dream, the pain it represented. When his parents had died their loss had been heart-breaking, yet he’d got over that eventually.

  With Jimmy it was different. Despite the passage of time, there was no coming to terms with his disappearance, no peace to be found. His brother haunted him, and Roy was scared.

  He peered out through the grimy Perspex window as the van howled through the busy streets of Victoria. He watched the crowds, saw their anxious faces, their nervous flight towards bus stops and train stations, escaping the city before the violence spread. Roy felt their fear too, a sense of trepidation that plagued his dreams, a growing apprehension that made his mouth dry and his heart beat fast inside his chest.

  Something was coming.

  Something dark and terrifying.

  Amen, Brother

  Reverend Clarence Hays was halfway through his sermon when he noticed the man with the red ponytail seated in the rear pew.

  He’d seen him before, several times in fact, but he stood out simply because he was white, and it was unusual for a white man to be a part of the congregation at the Calvary Southern Baptist church on West 131st Street.

  Not that Hays minded of course; all were welcome in God’s House, even here in Harlem, where white folk were scarce and usually only seen behind the windshields of police cruisers.

  Yet the man intrigued him. Hays recalled the first time he’d walked in, midway through a Wednesday evening service. He’d loitered at the back of the church, hands in the pockets of a black winter coat, baggy pants gathered around a pair of scuffed shoes, a few days of carroty growth on his face. Hays presumed he was homeless, seeking temporary shelter from the winter storms, but lately he’d re-evaluated that assessment. The stranger didn’t possess that beat down quality that bent the backs of most unfortunates. He had a presence.

  Hays finished his sermon and the first notes of the piano began to echo around the hall. Soon the swaying choir were in full voice, the achingly sweet sound of James Pullin’s He’s Faithful filling the room. Hays watched the white man bringing his hands together and mumbling the song’s words. There was a strange intensity about him, his lips playing catch-up with the lyrics, his clapping hands trying and failing to keep the simple rhythm, the expression on his face far removed from the beaming joy of his fellow worshippers. Hays had seen that look before, in the faces of the sick and the dying, the death row inmates back in Kentucky. It was a look of desperation.

  He knew he didn’t have long.

  As the hymn filled the rafters, Hays slipped out into the corridor at the back of the church. He grabbed a hat and overcoat from his office then threw the bolt on the rear door. Out in the alleyway, he popped the collar of his coat up against the chill and made his way to the street, a thin crust of frozen snow crunching under his shoes.

  As he reached the end of the alleyway, he saw the white man trotting down the steps of the church, stopping beneath the red neon cross to zip up his jacket and tug a Yankees beanie over his head. The street was empty, silent, the temperature hovering somewhere just above zero, crystals of snow drifting through the light of the street lamps.

  They were alone.


  Hays wasn’t a big man, or especially courageous, but behind his lectern, doing God’s work, he felt as big as a mountain. He felt that same strength now. He held up a hand as the man headed towards him.

  “Excuse me, sir.”

  Immediately the man veered to his right, large hands whipping from his pockets. He moved out into the street, watching Hays but saying nothing.

  “I don’t mean you any harm. I’m Reverend Hays, from the church.”

  Hays smiled and raised his homburg, allowing the light to reveal his ebony face. The man hesitated. A distant siren wailed on the cold night air.

  “What do you want?”

  Hays smile widened.“I have everything I need. It’s what you want that I’m interested in. Can we talk?”

  The church was empty, the congregation long gone.

  Settled in the warmth of his cramped office, Hays poured two coffees into chipped black mugs emblazoned with Christ is Lord in swirly gold lettering. The stranger sat in the shadows, out of the glow of the gooseneck lamp on Hays’ desk.

  The reverend eased himself into his creaking chair and studied the stranger as he sipped his coffee. He was a big man, over six feet, wide-shouldered, and there was some meat on those bones too, though not as much as there should be. He was thinning on top, a dusting of freckles on his scalp, his remaining red hair tied into a thin ponytail that dangled past the frayed collar of his shirt. Those deep-set eyes missed nothing, Hays was sure of that. They roamed the walls, the floor, the dusty bookshelves, the ancient laptop that whirred quietly on his desk. Most of all they studied Hays, his face, and especially his hands. The stranger tracked them as Hays moved, as he scratched the grey curls of his beard and drank his coffee. The man was stretched tighter than a snare drum. Maybe he was a fugitive from the law, although on second thoughts Hays doubted it. White men didn’t exactly blend in around Harlem.

  “It’s just us,” he soothed. “Please, try to relax.”

  “I’m fine.”

  His voice was deep, resonant. There was authority there, but Hays couldn’t place the accent.

  “My name is Clarence Hays. What do I call you?”

  “Frank.”

  “Okay,” Hays smiled, rising from his chair. “Well, Frank, let me officially welcome you to our humble church.”

  His guest hesitated, then took the offered hand. He had a strong grip, and clean fingernails too, unusual for a man on the streets. Frank retreated back into the shadows.

  “Without sounding like a bad movie, I’m guessing you’re not from around these parts.”

  Frank twisted the beanie in his lap with those big hands. “I like the singing,” he said. “Reminds me of when I was a boy.”

  He’s from Boston.

  “Yes sir, we sure like to sing around here,” Hays chuckled. “Prayers are mighty fine of course, but I truly believe that people connect with the Lord on a different level when they sing. Uplifts the soul, wouldn’t you agree, Frank?” His guest said nothing. Instead, he slurped the dregs of his coffee.

  “You want another?”

  “Got anything stronger?”

  Hays shook his head. “I’m not in the business of feeding a man’s vices, Frank.”

  The man smiled for the first time.

  “I’m no alcoholic, Reverend, though for a time I tried my best to become one.”

  He had good teeth, Hays noticed, clean, even, and the eyes were unclouded by the ravages of liquor or drugs. This was no bum.

  “Too much coffee makes me edgy,” Frank explained. “I tend to smooth it out with the occasional drink.”

  Hays believed him. He reached into the bottom drawer of a battered filing cabinet and produced a bottle of Old Crow Reserve and two glasses.

  “Made in my home state of Kentucky. Not the finest, but not too shabby either.”

  He poured a couple of shots and watched Frank take his glass without lifting it to his lips. Hays’ instincts were right. Frank had a story, one of pain and loss that would be as desperate as the thousands he’d heard over the thirty-five years he’d been a minister. All Frank needed was someone to tell it to.

  Hays leaned back in his chair and sipped his own liquor. The computer hummed faintly, the alleyway outside deserted, silent.

  “It’s not just the singing, am I right, Frank? There’s another reason why you came to us.”

  The big man nodded, staring into the untouched contents of his glass as he swirled it around in small circles. When he spoke he did so quietly, eloquently, without hesitation.

  “I grew up in a children’s home in Southie, a Catholic one. I remember taking confession as a boy, and I’d sit there in the dark and the priest would promise me all kinds of eternal tortures if I didn’t stop my sinning. I was ten years old, for Chrissakes. Back then the most sinful thing I ever did was use a curse word or two, but those images of damnation kept me awake most nights.”

  Hays watched him take a small sip of bourbon. He’d had ex-Catholics through his doors before, most burdened from a young age with institutional guilt, their spirits cowed by the withering gaze of a spiteful God who was quick to judge and relished the punishment of sin. That certainly wasn’t the Lord that Hays knew and loved, no sir. Frank would come to see that.

  “That priest told me it was a sin to take your own life,” Frank continued, “but God has to understand that sometimes people just can’t live with themselves anymore.”

  “Is that how you feel, Frank?”

  “I used to. There was a time when I’d wake up and promise myself I’d seen my last sunrise. I’ve stood on top of buildings and bridges, I’ve waited on subway platforms and closed my eyes when I’ve felt the rush of an oncoming train...”

  Frank’s voice trailed away. He tipped the rest of the bourbon down his throat.

  Hays said nothing, allowing the poison to flow, the layers of guilt to peel away and reveal the pain beneath. Across the room, Frank hung his head, the beanie wrung like a rag in those strong hands. When he looked up his eyes were moist, his voice a whisper.

  “But I couldn’t do it because dying would be the easy way out. I have to live, to be reminded of the pain I’ve caused, the families I’ve destroyed. Men, women, even children, God help me. I have to suffer.”

  Frank crushed his face into his beanie.

  Hays got to his feet. He was troubled, and not just for the man’s soul. It was clear Frank had blood on his hands, and two scenarios sprang to mind; either Frank was a murderer, in which case Hays would have to somehow steer him towards the authorities. Or he was a veteran.

  Hays had met plenty in his time, men haunted by their experiences on the battlefield, those battles continuing long after the homecoming bands had packed up and gone home. He’d have to tread carefully here.

  He walked around the desk and crouched down in front of Frank. The tears flowed freely, coursing down Frank’s hollow cheekbones, catching in the red growth on his chin. Hays took his hands in his own.

  “We’ve all made mistakes, Frank, each and every one of us. You carry this burden with you like Atlas with the world on his shoulders, but it’s time to let go. Jesus brought you to me, I can see that now, and together we’ll — ”

  Out in the corridor, the back door rattled violently.

  Frank shoved Hays to the carpet and sprang from his chair, sweeping the lamp onto the floor. Hays lay frozen, watching the gun in Frank’s hand. He heard a muffled curse from the alley outside, saw shadows flash by the barred and frosted glass, the sound of laughter and running feet. Then silence.

  Hays’ voice soothed in the darkness. “It’s just kids, Frank, fooling around. Happens all the time.”

  He picked himself up, retrieved the lamp from the floor, tinkered with the bulb. A soft light flickered, glowed. Frank was in shadow, his face ashen, the gun gripped in both hands and pointed towards the window. Hays moved closer.

  “It’s okay. Please, put down the gun.”

  He raised his hand, laid it on the sleeve of Frank’s co
at, felt the limb beneath, rigid, like rock, He applied a little pressure, felt no resistance, saw the barrel of that big, ugly automatic tilt towards the worn carpet.

  “This is God’s house, Frank. There’s no danger here, only refuge.” Frank lowered the gun. He stood in silence, his ashen face hovering like a ghost in the shadows.

  “We want to help you,” Hays whispered. “Me and Jesus, we’ve got your back, Frank.”

  “I’ve done terrible things — ”

  “We’ll get to that, son. Right now it’s what’s in your heart that matters.”

  He reached down, took Frank’s free hand in both of his own.

  “I believe Jesus has brought us together this night. He guided you to me, and He did it for a reason, Frank — salvation. Yes sir, salvation lies right here in this church. Let me help you, son. Please.”

  The gun clattered to the floor. Frank sunk to his knees, wrapped his arms around Hays and held on tight, sobbing like a baby.

  As Hays comforted the troubled soul he whispered a quiet prayer of thanks, for the abundance of God’s love, and for the strength to guide this broken man along the path to redemption. As he breathed that quiet litany Clarence Hays felt another, deeper rush of emotion, of compassion, of joy, and realised that God was with them both, right there in the room.

  Frank woke from a deep, dreamless sleep.

  Above him, the ceiling was adorned with heavenly clouds and a flock of multiracial cherubs. He shifted beneath the thick eiderdown, the small cot creaking beneath his body. He felt safe here, as Reverend Hays had promised he would. Memories of that first night came flooding back.

  He’d gone to pieces.

  Yet it was here, in a rundown church in Harlem, that Frank learned that the guilt that ate him like a cancer was nothing more than the affirmation of his own humanity, the spiritual declaration of a good soul determined to right a wrong. Frank Marshall wasn’t a good man, he knew that, but he no longer felt the desperation he’d felt that first night.