This Other Country

by This Other Country [MLR MM] (epub)

  Nikolas tilted his head to one side, considering. “Breasts?”

  Ben gave him a very familiar, derisory look. “They’re hillocks, where you can go for respite if you’re not gay.”

  Nikolas nodded his head sagely. “Uh-huh. Oh, look. That’s me, scrambling desperately up the side.”

  Ben grinned evilly. “That one actually is a breast.”

  Nikolas shuddered and returned to his own drawing. He’d left it too late. They were out of time. He chuckled to himself and very quickly turned the nest with happy little stick people into the scene of a huge explosion. Happy gay families could be made to look like bomb victims very easily, he discovered. All it took was the application of red crayon.

  § § §

  They watched another movie after coffee. This one actually had a happy, life-affirming ending, which rather negated the doctor’s assertion the day before that there was a conspiracy against such outcomes. John, being a teacher, called the doctor on this, and Doctor Fergus proudly told them that this indie film had not been made in Hollywood—that it was a British production and that he’d been an executive producer. Nikolas reckoned they’d just watched some of their friends from the pub. The way he and Ben had left them looking, they could make a gay war movie next.

  Despite John’s interruption, the film set the tone for the rest of the day in which they discovered, if they didn’t already know, some of the very positive benefits of liking men. They weren’t just leaving darkness behind, they were celebrating the light—it was pride, sweet and simple: pride in the male body, the male strength, the male way of seeing the world…the male way of fucking.

  No excuses, no apologies, no regrets.

  Who knew there were so many men in the world with names like Zac and Zeb, Tory and Troy? Three thousand pounds was a lot of money to pay for porn when you could download it for free, Nikolas reflected. He hadn’t watched porn in a room full of other men for years. It was…uncomfortable…especially as they were all dressed and sitting behind school desks. Mixed messages.

  He was pretty sure Ben wasn’t enjoying this experience either. He appeared to be trying to keep his eyes averted from the screen, in protest, perhaps, that this could in any way be part of the purity of his new cause, tarnish the perfection of the shiny new medals he was planning to earn in his mind. Appeared to be…Nikolas noticed with a very amused smirk that Ben’s eyes stayed longer on the screen than his.

  Nikolas suddenly had an evil thought and whispered to Ben, “Did you have a pet as a child?” Ben, concentrating on not staring at Zac—or was it Zeb and did it really matter from that angle?—frowned in reply, “No.”

  “Later? In the army?”

  “No! A snail. Does that count?”

  A snail? Sheesh. “What did you call it?”

  “Bear.”

  “Bear? A snail? Seriously?”

  Ben pouted sheepishly. “After Bear Grylls. He was my mentor...”

  Nikolas pondered this for a while. When Ben’s mother had run away from her home in Devon, she’d gone to a small village on the edge of the Saddleworth Moors. To a council estate. Number six, Beck Side.

  He began to laugh and eventually had to leave the room.

  He’d just worked out Ben Rider-Mikkelsen’s porn name.

  § § §

  The manipulation was working on all the men in the room.

  When Nikolas finally returned, he could feel a palpable sense of belonging amongst them now, the knowledge they were part of history, part of a unique tribe—a nation. They were now a group who might be very willing to fight for their country—this other country. Is this what had led Michael’s young nephew to shoot Islamist students at his university? Had that been his rite of passage? For, of course, what did any group want of its initiatives but proof of their commitment, their new belonging? It wanted sacrifice. Colour it any way you wanted—suicide bomb, Christening, circumcision, pledge, forfeit, tithe—a group is a powerful force and powerful forces need feeding.

  At lunchtime, Ben announced he wanted a cigarette.

  Nikolas was practically dragged to the garage. He was bundled in, pushed to the back wall and then his commitment to leaving the darkness was tested very thoroughly.

  Nikolas couldn’t deny he was more than willing to commit any way Ben wanted. His response to Zac (or Zeb—or Troy, come to that) was prominent, hard, barely concealed by the tails of his shirt, which he’d pulled discretely out of his jeans on returning to the classroom. Ben’s tests were always thorough, Nikolas reflected, as he was fucked face first against the rough cement. He ignored Ben’s anger about his hypocrisy and childishness, letting it all wash over him in the exquisite delight of being brought to orgasm with such a vicious pounding.

  He actually had a huge graze on his face when they were finished, speckles of blood and grit embedded in the red lines. Ben was then contrite and apologetic and furious with himself for being so easily manipulated and…jealous.

  Ben Rider-Mikkelsen clearly didn’t like his boyfriend watching porn with anyone else but him.

  Apologetic was always good though. Nikolas made Ben apologise on his knees, mouth around his cock, dyed blond hair scrunched in his fingers, holding him on.

  Nikolas reckoned they did their bit for gay pride that lunchtime.

  Who needed suicide bombs to show commitment?

  § § §

  No one paid any attention to the florist Nigel Stannis standing for the first part of the afternoon. They may have wondered about his face, but probably assumed he’d fallen over…smoking. Perhaps that was why, when he did sit, he eased down cautiously and with a wince of pain. They were all busy writing. Their journeys—what they’d learnt about themselves over the week and where they wanted to go now. Nikolas dutifully penned his desire to see justice prevail and to right wrongs—historical, contemporary or otherwise. He left out he wanted a cape, too. He was trying to be more serious for Ben’s sake.

  When they were all done, it was time for the final event before departure—individual interviews with the doctor. While each man was being seen, the others were free to return to their rooms and pack. In his mind, Nikolas was picturing two doors exiting from the doctor’s office—one marked return to normal life, and the other marked…what? Radicals only? Would-be jihadists this way? Perhaps they’d be issued a copy of Jihad for Dummies.

  Ben’s name was on the list to see the doctor after him. Nikolas went up to his room and discovered his bag had been returned and was sitting on the bed—packed. After half an hour, he was summoned for his final session. He wasn’t looking forward to it, as it meant he had to make an effort to be the gay florist, but he felt fairly sure it would see him offered the chance to stay on for another three weeks. He wouldn’t recruit himself, but then, he reflected bitterly, he knew himself. They only knew Nigel Stannis.

  Afterwards, Nikolas thought it incredibly ironic he’d been thinking this exact thought—they knew him as Nigel Stannis—as he’d entered the consulting room. He was greeted not only by Doctor Fergus Atwell, but by Doctor Julian Wood. He wasn’t sure who was the more surprised. He reckoned Julian Wood was, because it appeared to take the psychologist longer to react. First a frown, then a hesitant, “You’re not…” and then a more panicked, “You’re…” and then he turned to his colleague and blurted out, “He’s not Nigel Stannis!”

  Two therapists would have been no match for Nikolas. Even the six thugs in their shiny suits, urgently summoned from lurking in the hallway, wouldn’t have taxed his strength too much. The sharp prick of icy cold to his neck as he had one shiny suit in a headlock on the floor, however, did much more.

  § § §

  Nikolas woke and knew instantly he was in a car. He could hear telltale swishes as other vehicles passed them on a fast, wet road, felt the car turning sharply, and at this, realised he was in the rear footwell, folded uncomfortably behind the front seats. His hands and feet were bound and his mouth taped. The car turned again. Now he heard loose grit, and they we
re going more slowly. The car began to bounce and rattle; they went even slower. They stopped. He heard another car behind them and that too came to a halt, tyres skidding slightly on the uneven surface. The man in the passenger seat of his car climbed out. They carried on, paused, engine still running, the man got back in. The rear wheels spun. The driver grunted something about a gate. It was very dark.

  Eventually, the engine was killed and both men in the front got out, standing by their open doors, apparently looking at something ahead of them. They shut the doors and disappeared.

  Nikolas almost had his hands free. They’d been secured with parcel tape, which was effective, but he’d been rubbing it against the rails at the bottom of the front seat. He felt the car move again and struggled to sit up. The men were pushing it from the back—four men, and there was another car parked a few feet behind them. Nikolas felt a surge of adrenaline wash into his body. He flung himself between the front seats. At exactly the same time the whole car tipped forward and he was plunging down. The car hit something hard, flipped. He couldn’t tell if he was up or down. He ripped with all his strength at the tape on his wrists, struggling, and then he felt the cold lap of water. He’d known of course. As he’d struggled between the seats, he’d seen the quarry, dark, deep, and deadly in front of him.

  Nikolas slammed his feet at a window, but the glass didn’t shatter. The motion unbalanced the car and it dipped to one side. The quarry seemed to sense its victim was vulnerable now, and cold water sloshed more freely, rising rapidly. He kicked again. The vehicle finished its lazy turn, tipped sideward and sank so fast Nikolas was taken down into icy darkness before he had time to even attempt a deep breath through his nose.

  He’d always thought he’d die like this—not this exact vehicle, or this quarry, of course. But something meaningless and squalid. This wasn’t fiction, and he wasn’t anyone’s superhero deserving a heroic death. He was an evil man, and his crimes had finally caught up to him.

  He was dying.

  It was painful.

  He wasted the air he had in his lungs still trying to kick out a window.

  He could feel himself greying out.

  The car hit the bottom.

  Nikolas wished he’d had time to say goodbye to Ben.

  He said it now in his heart and hoped one kind tendril of the universe would carry that dying thought to Ben.

  He heard glass shatter. A hand seized him. He pushed with his legs, trying to help. It seemed to get warmer. Then air and the best of all—the tape was ripped from his mouth, and he could take a great greedy lungful through his mouth of that beautiful air. It was all he could do. Swimming was quite beyond him. He lay like a useless sack, trussed and drowned, as he was towed along, kick by agonising kick. Gradually, he could hear over the sound of his own heaving, ragged breaths, “Fucking typical of a fucking great big fucking useless sack of fucking shit.”

  Nikolas tried to speak but took a mouthful of water instead. He felt them stop, and he was crushed to a chalky, gritty wall. A knife slit the parcel tape around his wrists and ankles, and then he came up close and personal with his saviour, and Nikolas’s first rational thought was, Thank God I didn’t kiss him. He’d thought it was Ben. Until the swearing began, of course. Then he’d known. Squeezy.

  Squeezy was dragging them along the chalky wall, searching for a place to climb out of the water. Nikolas recovered and shook off gripping hands, clinging now himself to the wall. “Where’s Ben?”

  Squeezy turned a furious face to him. “The fuck? You stupid fucking moron! I was this close! This close!” He wasn’t making the gesture with his fingers that would usually accompany such a declaration, so Nikolas was at something of a loss to work out what he was talking about, but this had been a feature of their relationship for the three years they’d known each other. What hadn’t been, however, was Michael Heathcote swearing at him and calling him a moron—not out loud, anyway. Nikolas suspected he often got called worse things in the man’s head. Before he could point this insubordination out, Squeezy had swum off again, examining the cliff face as he did so. Nikolas followed. He’d begun to shiver from the cold and the confusion. He caught up. “Ben?”

  Squeezy had found a place to climb out and was pulling himself up on a root until he was out of the black water and perched precariously on a small ledge. He put a hand down for Nikolas and heaved him up, too. From there, it was a short, crumbling scramble to the top. They lay on the quarry edge for a moment, recovering their breath, and then Nikolas coughed out, “What are you doing here? How did you know…?”

  “Jesus H Christ and all the fucking saints. I’ve been watching you the whole fucking week so I could follow you to the second stage place, and what did you go and fucking do? Blow it on the last fucking day. The very last fucking day, and I had to come and rescue your fat arse instead of finding the fucking place they took Jono and what they fucking did to him! Are you fucking happy!”

  Nikolas blinked. “Fat?”

  Squeezy stared at him in the dark. He nodded knowingly to himself as if this confirmed something he’d always thought. Then he looked down and admitted more genuinely, “They’ve got Ben, and I don’t know where.” He punched the ground. “I don’t fucking know where! Because I had to fucking rescue you!”

  “I know where he is.” Nikolas held out his hand. “Phone.”

  Squeezy had left his phone by his bike when he’d dived off into the inky water to pull his boss out of the sinking car. They trudged to where he’d left the machine skidded on one side, and Nikolas dialled Kate.

  Nikolas hadn’t given Ben a cheap watch to wear on the course to protect the expensive one he’d bought him as a present the first time Ben had agreed to meet him in a hotel room for the afternoon. The first time Ben had agreed to do other things. He’d given him a state-of-the-art GPS tracker he’d acquired from a reliable contact in the department. He’d almost lost Ben Rider-Mikkelsen once. Nikolas wasn’t about to make that mistake again. But if he’d told Ben what it was, he knew, he just knew, the one time Ben needed to be wearing it he wouldn’t. A gift. A new watch—that would be worn. It was just the way Ben was.

  Kate gave them the location.

  It was only a mile from the Victorian manor where they’d spent the last week.

  Squeezy dragged his bike up and climbed on, ramming his helmet down. Nikolas blinked. It was becoming a habit around Squeezy. He had to stop. “I’m not riding on that with you.”

  “Okay. I’ll see you there then.” Squeezy fired the bike up and began to bump it off the rough edge of the quarry.

  “What? Wait!” Nikolas slung his leg over the seat and clung onto the wet man in front of him.

  § § §

  Nikolas had always declined Ben’s offers to ride on his bike with him. After a few years together, Ben had stopped offering. It wasn’t a big thing between them. Ben didn’t smoke. Nikolas didn’t ride motorcycles. Each to his own. That ride from the quarry to Ben’s new location was one of the most unpleasant experiences of Nikolas’s life, which wouldn’t be unusual for most men; after all, he was soaking wet, had no helmet, and was sitting behind a man who Nikolas had always secretly thought should be locked up, not given the responsibility of a uniform and a gun. However, Nikolas Mikkelsen had experienced an unusual number of unpleasant experiences in his life. When he slid off, shaking, he wasn’t exaggerating for effect at all.

  They were in a wood on the side of a hill overlooking a large redbrick building. A mill. They were using an old mill.

  “How long was it from when they drugged me to the quarry?”

  “Couple of hours.”

  “So they’ve had Ben for three, maybe.”

  “What went fucking wrong?”

  “The other doctor was there. The one from London. He recognised me.”

  “So they know who Ben is now?”

  Nikolas shrugged then nodded. It was unrealistic to hope the connection hadn’t been made.

  “You used your real names? W
hen you went to the therapy in London? Your own fucking names?”

  Nikolas frowned and pouted. He wasn’t about to be lectured to by Ben’s idiotic friend, or have to explain himself. He was having a hard enough time reconciling his own stupidity. Now, shaking, freezing, standing on a hillside with this moron, Nikolas could see the whole panoply of ridiculous failure playing out behind him from the moment he’d been woken at three a.m. by a bruised and battered Ben trying to tell him he’d found his friend breaking into a gay therapist’s office. From that moment, when Nikolas’s first thought had been to pity any therapist who had to counsel Squeezy, he’d not given this situation one moment of serious consideration. It’d been a game. Something to amuse himself with, to put Ben under some pressure, make him say the gay word, see him squirm, toy with him…Nikolas closed his eyes for a moment—it was an improvement on the blinking. “Let’s go get him.”

  Squeezy eyed him for a moment. “Why’d they bring him here but try to get rid of you? Other than the obvious, of course.”

  The obvious? Nikolas didn’t want to ask. He didn’t have to. Squeezy explained happily, “You’d be the one I’d fucking kill first.” This almost cheered Nikolas up until, “Unpleasant fucking bastard,” was added. Squeezy rooted around in his boot for a moment and held up an impressive hunting knife. “You want?” Then timed to perfection he asked, “Or did Spetsnaz fucking think to bring his own?”

  Squeezy had another in his other boot.

  They approached the mill from the rear away from the river and vast wooden waterwheel they’d been able to see from their vantage point on the hillside. Whatever was going on inside the mill wasn’t being done covertly, as lights were blazing from the windows on the upper storey.

  They squatted down behind a wall, which ran as a perimeter around the back of the mill. Squeezy made an odd noise and rummaged in his pocket. Slightly alarmed, Nikolas was glad to see he produced the phone, which had been set to silent and was vibrating. It was Kate. She was hysterical.

  It was the first time Nikolas had ever heard his extremely competent colleague crying. She sent them a link. Glancing uneasily at Nikolas, Squeezy clicked on it. It was a video. It was being played on an almost constant loop on every national news station. According to the BBC, ex-Special-Forces-expert Ben Rider was being held by a militant Islamic cell somewhere in the northwest of England. They were claiming he was a homosexual (the BBC had faithfully translated the Arabic statement that had come with the video). Neither Nikolas nor Squeezy was listening to the reporter. They couldn’t take in anything else but the footage.