The Cult of The Enemy: The Dark Places Trilogy

by S. G Mark

  Emma turned to Jack, “Alan is - for want of a better word - chef around here.”

  “I’ve not seen him before?” he said.

  “Nope, I’m up on the farm during the day like,” his words dripped with a smooth Geordie accent, “Helping oot Joseph an’ Aiden an’ comin’ down ‘ere to feed yous lot.”

  “Right, so you don’t fight?” Jack asked.

  “Don’t fight?” Alan reeled from out of the fridge and within two steps was head to head with Jack, “Don’t fight you say?”

  Jack felt Alan’s foul breath meet his nose. Up close the man’s face was crinkled with lines and his youthful appearance was vastly drowned by the years etched on his skin.

  Emma pulled Alan back with pacifying arm, “Alan, he didn’t mean that.”

  Holding his ground, Jack remained silent. He didn’t mean to offend, but he also didn’t care if he did. With the rest of The Resistance fighting and arming themselves with guns and bombs, he just found it odd that Alan did not join them.

  “Alan, take an hour. We’ll sort out the rest. Have a rest. You’ve earned it from all your hard work,” Emma said gently, patting him soothingly on the back.

  Untying his apron and throwing it on the ground, Alan stormed out of the kitchen and disappeared down the corridor. Words were lost on Jack. He didn’t know what he had just witnessed or what he had inadvertently triggered.

  Closing the fridge door, Emma rattled around the drawers and pulled five onions out and handed them to Jack.

  “What happened?” he asked innocently.

  As she dug around the drawer for some leeks, Emma explained, “Alan can’t serve for us.”

  “Why not?”

  “He has diabetes. He isn’t well enough to go out there and fight, not in the way that the rest of us do,” she said, “Alan is amazing. He tends the farm and he helps cook us food every night. He works harder than any of us at times, but that doesn’t prevent him from being hurt when someone accuses him of not fighting. We can’t all be out there, some of us have to stay behind to keep the rest of us going. Up here, Alan’s our guy for that.”

  “I didn’t realise, I’m sorry.”

  “Don’t be to me, but maybe let him know when he comes back? It isn’t worth him spitting in your food,” she said.

  “He’d… he’d do that?” Jack was disgusted and faintly wondered if that had already happened.

  “Oh I wouldn’t cross Alan,” Emma said, “Anyway. Why aren’t you chopping those onions?”

  Ever since she had handed them to him, he had been absent mindedly holding them.

  “Oh, right, sorry,” Jack apologised, lining the onions up beside the chopping board. “What are we making?”

  “God knows, but it’s normally some sort of stew,” she said, “So keep chopping until you can’t dice them anymore. No waste either!”

  “Christ, you sound just like Maggie.”

  “Who?”

  For a second Jack had forgotten where he was. The slow, burning realisation that he was not in the comforting surroundings of the Reader’s kitchen threw him slightly. Maggie. He wondered how she was coping. Did she even know about his disappearance? What had Alex told her? It was not hard to imagine that everything she had been told was a lie. Still, it was difficult to picture his home without him; Maggie making meals for two, Eliza isolated in either anger or abandonment.

  “Jack?” Emma gently placed her hand on his, which held the chopping knife.

  He dropped it instantly, stepping back from the worktop. The knife bashed against the corner and fell dully to the floor.

  “S-sorry,” Jack stammered, bending down to pick up the knife.

  “Are you alright?” Emma knelt down beside him, concern spread across her weathered face. “Do you need some water?”

  “I’m - I’m alright,” he said, “I just... I just… never mind.”

  He rose to his feet, steadying himself on the counter. Emma took the knife from his limp hand and washed it under the tap.

  “Don’t think we don’t all do it, cos we do,” she said, taking out a tea-towel from one of the drawers, “That minute second between sleep and being awake - that’s when I forget.”

  “What are you talking about? Forget what?”

  “That I’m here, fighting for my country against a faceless enemy, playing espionage and war instead of bringing up my children.”

  “You have children?”

  “Every morning when I realise where I am and what I’ve become, I feel a little sting in my chest. Funny thing is even after all this time, it’s still painful.”

  She handed Jack the cleaned knife. Jack took it, lost for words that might have given her comfort.

  “Best get chopping - there’s plenty of mouths to feed before the day is out!”

  They chopped onions and potatoes in silence for the next twenty minutes. Jack was pleased by this as he was able to sink into deep thought without disruption. Inside his head were tangled thoughts he was keen to order. In the past few days he had learned so much more about The Resistance than he had ever anticipated. He did not agree with their tactics, but the more time he spent with the people who called themselves members, the more he realised how ordinary they were. What he was unable to fathom was why - why would such normal people be disposed to - as Emma had put it - playing espionage and war? Was there something he was not understanding - some integral thought process these people had that he did not possess? The Crash had been hard on everyone. ShutDown wasn’t easy to deal with at first. Neither were Rations. Jack had been arrested twice, treated horrifically on both occasions; had his Rations removed and lost his job all within the same year. He had not resorted to terrorism. He was not angry with the government. He just dealt with it and he was completely unable to see why the people he was surrounded by - who were presently filing into the dining chairs - were not also able to deal with their problems in such reasonable terms.

  “What you cooking up today, Em?” a man shouted through the hatchet between the kitchen and dining area.

  He was lean, unshaven and his forehead was beaded with sweat. Jack did not like his demeanour at all. His clothes were frayed and caked in dried mud. Awkwardly, their eyes met as Jack glanced over at him surreptitiously from his chopping board. The man rounded on him instantly, leaning further through the hatch.

  Instinctively, he kept his eyes on the bubbling cooking pot. Whatever he thought of these people, he did not want start any fights with them: he would almost certainly lose, though he was so skinny Jack could see his ribcage through the thin T-shirt he was wearing. Yet the way his eyebrows clung to his forehead intensified Jack’s fears over what this man was capable of.

  All that Jack registered was that a hand was fast approaching him. With lightning reaction, he gripped the knife he’d been chopping with and swung his arm backwards threateningly. The blade, however, caught the man’s skin and Jack was horrified to see blood begin to drip down from his arm.

  “What the fuck did you do that for?” the man yelled in pain, reeling his arm into his chest.

  “I’m sorry - I didn’t mean,” Jack was stunned. He hadn’t intended to inflict pain, only issue a warning.

  Several of the man’s friends were standing menacingly on either side of him. In a matter of a few steps they could be in the kitchen, beating him to a pulp. Jack maintained his position, petrified.

  Meanwhile, Emma, swooped in between the two men.

  “It was an accident, I didn’t mean -” Jack stuttered.

  “You’re a fucking psychopath - I fucking try to introduce myself and this is what you do? Where the fuck do we recruit this arseholes?” the man shouted, catching the drips of blood in his other hand.

  Jack was disappointed with himself. He threw the knife onto the counter and stormed from the kitchen and flung himself on to his dormitory bunk.

  He had fucked it up again. Another chance, blown. He yelled out as if in physical pain and a small man Jack hadn’t realised was in the roo
m scurried out like a mouse. Was he incapable of reading any situation properly? Mistakes repeated themselves - he was in a continuous loop of error.

  “Jack, are you alright?” Emma’s voice curbed his rage.

  Looking up from the comfort of his pillow, he saw her shadow in the doorway. The candlelight behind burned a silhouette around her.

  “Leave me alone,” he said abruptly. He felt pathetic, right to the very core.

  “Jack, what just happened out there? Did you mean to attack him, or was it really an accident?”

  Remaining silent, Jack turned over to face the opposing direction to Emma. He did not want to answer her questions.

  “Can you stop behaving like this?” Emma’s tone was tiresome, “You’re acting like a child.”

  That was it. The string snapped, the elastic worn out; the straw laden the proverbial back. Like a ragdoll, he leapt to his feet and screamed in her face.

  “LEAVE ME THE FUCK ALONE YOU BITCH!”

  The sting that reverberated around his cheek came quite unexpectedly.

  “Don’t you dare speak to me like that again,” Emma recoiled her palm. “I don’t know what the fuck your story is, but Alex told us all to trust you. So far you’re proving to be nothing but a fucking problem. You don’t even seem to want to be here. I don’t know what happened to you but you better snap out of it - and quickly - because you are going to get yourself killed.”

  “I’m sorry,” he sighed, gently massaging his reddening skin.

  “What happened with Lance?”

  “Lance?”

  “The man you hurt. Did you mean to do what you did?”

  Jack shook his head sheepishly, “No, no. I… I panicked, I thought he was going to…”

  “Going to what?”

  He looked up at her turquoise eyes, “I can’t do this. I need to go. I need to leave.”

  Before his feet had touched the ground, Emma pinned him back down again. Her hands gripped around his shoulders like a vice.

  “You cannot leave this place,” she said, “Direct Orders from Alex himself.”

  “Tell me, if you’re meant to trust me, why is he telling you to trap me?” he said delicately.

  Emma’s grip loosened, but at the same time defiantly remained.

  “Talk to me, Jack. Tell me what is going on with you.”

  “I need to leave. I can’t… I can’t do this anymore. I can’t pretend that it’s all okay. You - I don’t even know who the fuck you are? You could be in my head - this…. this thing that’s persuading me to stay, but I don’t! I don’t want to stay! All that’s here is… is… and she’s out there, she’s out there and I can’t tell her that it’s not my fault. I can’t fucking say a thing because I’m being held here. And she’s there.. and I don’t know what she knows and what she doesn’t… I don’t know the lies she’s been told…”

  Tear tracks streamed down his face. He couldn’t control himself.

  Emma’s grip loosened and she wrapped her arms around his shoulders, comforting his head in her chest.

  “Who was she?”

  Jack looked deeply into her eyes, “Eliza.”

  He broke down; his heart only continued out of habit; his mind was a mudslide of emotion and turmoil. Weeks of isolation, worry and fear poured out of him like water bursting through a sinking ship. Every second that he had missed Eliza and was not allowed to say her name, every moment that he had crept further into denial, was burning further into his soul. Etched upon it were the words he last remembered saying to her; the last words of any importance. He could not take them back, he could not shield his heart any longer. It was a loss far greater than death because it was not final, it was not the end of the line. Their time together was so callously cut short; Alex sneering with the pair of scissors in his hands, pleased with himself beyond measure. It was all for Jack. It was all for him to hurt, to bleed him slowly until his veins ran dry. This is what Alex wanted, the great orchestra of pain.

  “I can’t stay, I can’t,” he sobbed into her shoulder, “I hate it here. I hate everything.”

  “Then why did you come? Why are you here now?”

  Jack pushed back from her, frightened by how his response may be taken.

  “I don’t want to be. Not for one second. I don’t want to be here, I don’t want any of this. He took me - he took me from her and now I’m nothing.”

  Despite his fears, Emma remained calm and did not move an inch. Instead, she looked into his glossy dark eyes and spoke to him softly.

  “Do you think we like this? Do you think any of us want to be here? We are here because we have to be. We are here because if we weren’t, we might be dead. We are here because if we don’t fight, then no one else will. You think this is easy? You think we don’t want to be out there, living life as normal people? You don’t think we ever dwell on our previous lives? You think we don’t yearn for trivial arguments and indecisions? You think we just forget who we are - as soon as we walk through that door, you think we just lose ourselves in the game?”

  “I… I don’t know,” he whimpered pathetically. “I don’t know anything anymore.”

  “Jack you don’t know the first thing about this place. You don’t know who we are and you certainly don’t know who I am. I don’t know why you came here, and quite frankly I don’t care. But you’re here now. You’re here and you need to believe what is going on. You need to open your eyes to all the good that we do,” she said,” You see I notice things. I notice things more than most and I’ve seen the way you look at us. It’s not obvious, but I can see it, hiding behind your irises. That little knot of doubt in your mind, that little crinkle of terror whenever you look at us. We frighten you.”

  Pushing Emma away, Jack forced his eyes to the floor. He did not want to her to read what he was thinking. He did not want her to analyse the thoughts in his mind, the doubt in his heart.

  “Listen to me, Jack. Listen to what we all have to say. We aren’t who you were led to believe we are.”

  “I can’t, I can’t…” Jack shook his head.

  “Then you’ll forever be like this. You’ll forever be trapped here. Is that what you want?”

  “Please, leave me alone. I need to be alone.”

  As he turned to face away from her, he wiped the tears from his eyes. It was too painful. He did not want to hear what she had to say. It would not heal his wounds. It would not miraculously make the world alright. They were just words - meaningless words used as ammunition.

  Emma placed her hand on his arm, rubbing it soothingly. It provided a hollow comfort.

  “I’ll leave you in peace,” she said, and her hand departed.

  However, no peace came as a second later footsteps thundered down the concrete corridor and came to an abrupt halt outside the dormitory. Jack heard heavy breathing.

  “Someone’s been spotted in the forest. We need to track him down. Alex’s is demanding everyone gear up,” Kyle called out to everyone.

  “Who is out there?” Emma asked.

  “We don’t know. Friend or foe, either way we cannot let them discover us.”

  “I’ll head over to the armoury,” she said.

  Jack heard her light footsteps leave the room. The door, however, did not close. The heavy breathing, subsiding slightly, continued.

  “Jack, this includes you too,” Kyle said.

  Turning over, Jack saw Kyle leaning against the doorframe. He was flushed and his dreadlocks were damp.

  “Me?” Jack said weakly.

  “Yes. Follow Emma to the armoury. She’ll gear you up.”

  “With weapons?”

  “No,” Kyle said quickly, “Not this time.”

  “What do you mean?”

  “Jack, please. I know you’re not an idiot,” Kyle said, “And neither are we.”

  Setting his feet on the floor, “I don’t understand, Kyle. I don’t understand any of what is going on here?”

  “Maybe it’s high time you did. Gear up. We need to fi
nd this man by dawn.”

  “Why?”

  “Because if anyone discovers that we are hiding here, then we are all dead. Every single last one of us. Including you.”

  “But I’m not one of you -”

  “You’re still here, aren’t you?” Kyle said poignantly, before marching off down the corridor.

  Alone in the near-darkness, Jack’s heart skipped a beat. Unfortunately, as Kyle said, he was still here.

  In the armoury, Jack found Emma handing out torches to the group of men and women who had been in the dining area. Lance was among them, and was the first to acknowledge Jack’s presence. He looked blankly at him and with an air of professionalism. Jack looked away quickly, not wanting to apologise even though he knew he should.

  The armoury was narrow, barely bigger than an average cupboard. The walls were stacked with shelves and boxes. Inside them were all sorts of guns and ammo, bullets and what Jack was horrified to see: grenades. On coat hangers at the far bar were bulletproof vests, neatly dangling as if they had just been ironed. Emma was crouched down over a box on the ground. She reached out and handed him a torch. Jack took it. When they each had one, Emma pushed the box back into place and took another from the shelf. As she opened the lid, Jack was surprised by its contents. Instead of weaponry, it was shoes. They were big and clunky - not trainers, but hillwalking boots. They were clarted in mud and dirty and many of their laces were worn and frayed.

  “Take your size. If you need more, there are some on the top shelf but I can’t reach them,” Emma said, taking out a pair of boots for herself.

  Everyone else dove in automatically, as Jack stared around and sought information as to what was going on. He did not want to be here, but he knew he must. It was his only escape.

  “What are we doing?” Jack asked, feigning eagerness.

  “Grab a pair and put them on. It’s been raining for a few hours so the paths are going to be slippery.”

  “Paths?”

  “Up the hill. That’s where he was last spotted. He’ll most likely still be there.”