The Cult of The Enemy: The Dark Places Trilogy

by S. G Mark

  Puzzled, Alex delved into a drawer and obliged, presenting the two items on the table. Jack picked up the pen instantly and scrawled the message he needed to convey to Alex. When he was finished, he slid the paper round for Alex to read.

  The dead man told me that the CRU knew everything of the plan - they knew that they were going to be attacked that night.

  “Who else heard?”

  “Just me. He wanted to tell me before anyone else arrived.”

  “Get Kyle. Speak to no one else.”

  Jack rose to his feet, his chair scraping noisily on the concrete floor. Closing Alex’s office door behind him, he marched along the corridor with elevated importance. He was involved now. The point of no return was a junction miles ago and he had no intention of looking back. Every stride marked his determination and superiority for knowing something all but one other living person in the world knew.

  He found Kyle in the dining area, head slumped into his hands in demi-sleep; a book nestled between two pages lay solitarily at his side. Jack tapped his elbow to wake him.

  “Kyle, you need to come with me.”

  But Kyle did not stir. Another man, who Jack vaguely recognised, approached.

  “Can I help you?”

  Keeping to his word to Alex, Jack ignored the man and again stirred Kyle from his sleep.

  “He’s useless at waking up,” the man laughed, not reading the graveness of Jack’s haste.

  “Kyle, come on, please?” Jack gently persuaded Kyle, “Wake up now.”

  At last Kyle stirred, raising his head a fraction; bleary eyes gazed out through puffy circumferences.

  “Jack?” What’s happening?”

  “You need to come with me,” he said, gesturing the urgency in every syllable.

  At once, his fatigue left him and he stood up sharply. His exhaustion seemed to depart him as if it were a cloak sliding from his shoulders.

  Jack led the way back to Alex’s room and Kyle was savvy enough to not ask any questions en route. When they arrived in the room, Jack closed the door shut behind them. Kyle looked at Alex; Alex to Jack and Jack back to Kyle. Alex then presented a piece of paper for them to read.

  You are the only people in the world that I truly trust. We have a mole in The Resistance.

  Both Jack and Kyle remained silent. Alex, understanding that they had now both read the note, took the piece of paper and held it into candlelight. The flame devoured the paper and the dangerous words which should not be uttered outwith the room, burnt into smoke and ash.

  It was Jack who spoke first. For some time what he had to say had been trapped in his throat, bursting to be set free.

  “I’m in, Alex,” he said, marking the poignant moment in his memory, “I want to be part of The Resistance.”

  Alex smiled deviously, “Oh I think you decided that a lot longer than five minutes ago.”

  Chapter Seven

  The chilling wind lacerated his skin as he raced through the undergrowth, ducking for low hanging branches as the tips of their tentacles sliced his skin. His lungs were at capacity - they were exhausted from the moment he set off, but he was determined to ignore their wheezing and painful complaining. His heart was now thundering its discontent at the speed and endurance Jack was putting it through, but he cared not. Even as his calf muscles threatened to seize up in protest, he smiled. The sweat dribbling down his back made him excited. As his ribcage surrendered to pain, he felt a surge of energy.

  The trees were a blur. His only constant was the goal Kyle had set him: a goal he intended to meet. For the best part of half an hour he had been battling against the steep incline of the mountainside. Running in the daylight was far easier than his midnight ascent had ever been. For the second time that week his legs were carrying him off into the forest - the only difference was that now they had every intention of returning.

  The thrill was unbelievable. Though he was sure to collapse at the end, he was repeatedly surprised by his own determination. Since he had first set off, he had not stopped. He had not paused for branch nor stream nor even steep slope or delicate embankment. He was in control, not the terrain.

  Four days had passed since the Point of No Return. Four long, strange, uniquely intriguing and equally confusing days. As he ran, he tried to quantify what had happened to keep his mind distracted from disbanding all effort and collapsing to the floor in agony. Immediately after Jack agreed to joining The Resistance, Alex had thrown him under Kyle’s wing. That night, Kyle escorted him from Alex’s office and had taken him into the War Room for a debriefing. Jack was astonished by the professionalism. It almost felt like he had just been accepted for a job and he was being inducted into the company.

  Kyle took him through the Riot Act that night, carefully outlining the aims and protocols of The Resistance. There was no rule book as such, but from what Kyle was spouting forth, Jack couldn’t help but think there should be.

  “I’m so pleased that you’ve made this choice,” Kyle said, “I had faith that you would do the right thing in the end.”

  Jack smiled awkwardly, unsure of whether to take his words as compliment or patronising.

  “There’s a long journey ahead of you, though,” he continued, “I won’t lie to you. I can’t guarantee you’ll survive nor can I guarantee we’ll win.”

  “What will I do?” Jack said, “What role will I have?”

  “Firstly, we’ll need to get you trained up. The finest quality of The Resistance, unfortunately, is our ability to run. We cannot be caught - and we need to learn to run when we need to, and to always outpace those who would kill us.”

  “And then what?”

  “Then we show you the world through our eyes,” Kyle gazed at him despondently for a while, and Jack felt pity exude from his eyes, “But before that, you need to know a few things.”

  “Like how to shoot?” Jack was nervous. He had never even held a gun in his life.

  “The Resistance is more than just pointing a gun and pulling the trigger,” Kyle said, authoritatively. “It’s about stealth and trust, it’s about deception and distraction - we can’t just kill everything that is in our path. What we are fighting is too powerful for that. Every single person involved in the government stands in our way - if we started shooting the guilty now then we might never stop.”

  “Then what are we doing? If we don’t fight them, how can we defeat them?”

  “Not all fighting has to be violent,” Kyle said, “Though even I have to admit sometimes there is no other choice.”

  “That’s true, but then what is my role in all of this?”

  “You’re going to help me for a while. The Resistance is a strong movement, but we constantly need new members if we are to continue, and that’s not just as simple as having a signup sheet in a pub. It’s a whole lot more dangerous than that.”

  “Then tell me what it is - I’m sick of guessing, or being made to feel stupid for not knowing this stuff already. The others here, they all think that I just waltzed in voluntarily - I want to know more. I want to know exactly how this place is run.”

  “That’s going to take time, Jack,” Kyle had said, “I’m going to have to take you through it in stages - first we deal with what our enemy is, then who we are, how recruit and all that. In time, you will understand everything.”

  Sweat trickled down his temple. He was nearly at the finish line - or so he hoped. How long he had been running he could only guess at, but there was a little piece of him that hoped to impress Kyle - to prove that he could do it; to prove his worth. His ankles were beginning to feel the strain now but his heart had given up all attempts at complaint. Agonising and excruciatingly painful though it was, the running was soon taking second place to the thoughts in his head and becoming as natural as if he were walking.

  The ground was crumbling into gravel and the trees were more sparse down this side of the hill. He could see right across the valley as it dissolved into a hazy horizon. Morsels of civilisation were sprinkl
ed across the glen. Only a few miles away there seemed to be a hamlet and beyond were signs of farm buildings and tractors slowly migrating across muddy fields. A single road snaked across the landscape, but no cars followed its path. The view reinforced the sensation of loneliness Jack felt. Despite his decision to join The Resistance and fight alongside them, it did not cure his heart of the pain he felt. Though he had never been expecting to feel any better about himself, he had hoped he might be able to forget - at least for a little while.

  Dusty ground hardened into a light tundra underfoot. An autumnal day whistled into a wintry haven. A massacre of leaves lay under a bed of crisp frost and the tips of the evergreen pines were laced with snow. December punctuated three months of intense training. Every day his feet chased each other up and down the dreaded mountainside and every day it became that little bit easier. The focus shifted from the strain in his heart to the goal in his mind. Every training session was one step closer to being out there in the real world; to tearing down the government and making a positive difference for once in his life.

  Jack slumped over in breathless victory at the end finish line. Kyle was applauding as he slouched against the bough of a tree. Three long months and Jack knew he had finally broken Kyle’s record for the course.

  “Well done,” Kyle slapped Jack on the back, “I’m really proud of you.”

  Jack stretched upwards, regaining control of his lungs, “Better up your game, mate.”

  “Wait til we’ve got ten CRU officers chasing after us… watch me run then,” Kyle winked.

  Jack looked poignantly at Kyle, “I’m ready now, I know it.”

  They had had this discussion many times of the duration of the past few months. Each time Kyle dismissed Jack’s claims, citing that he was not quite ready and that he needed more time. But Kyle could never quantify exactly how much time and Jack had grown frustrated.

  “Come on Kyle, what are you training me for if not to fight?” Jack argued with Kyle’s expression of defiance. “I’m fit, I’m healthy - I’m strong. I want to fight, I want to be involved.”

  Kyle kicked the ground with his feet and Jack instantly knew what the answer was.

  “Don’t tell me I have more to learn,” Jack shook his head disappointedly, “What more can I learn here? This isn’t real! I can run forever more on the same stretch of ground but I’m not running from anyone. You can tell me all about the outside world but I can’t know it’s true until I’ve seen it for myself.”

  Kyle returned a deadpan expression, which only served to incense Jack.

  “I see you all leave this place for missions I’m not party to. The flowers I’ve planted for people who visited this place only once… I’ve said goodbye to people too many times. It’s my turn to get involved. I’m ready.”

  “Jack, please listen to me,” Kyle protested.

  “Is it Alex? Is he telling you to keep me amused while he conducts the real fight?” Jack spat.

  “This has nothing to do with Alex,” Kyle said.

  “Then what? What more do you want me to do? How many more times do you want me to run up and down this fucking hill before you say I’m ready?”

  “None,” Kyle said and Jack’s anger was swiftly stolen from him. “I can only prepare you for the world out there, Jack. You were physically ready six weeks ago.”

  “What the fuck Kyle?” Jack’s brow furrowed with confusion.

  “I’m scared, Jack. I’m scared to let you go outside headquarters and back into their world because I don’t know how strong you are up here,” he tapped his own head, “I’m scared you won’t return the same man, if you return at all.”

  Jack shook his head, “What more can I do to prove myself?”

  Kyle shrugged his shoulders, “Nothing. I just don’t want to lose another friend to this horrific fight.”

  Jack was aware that he was guilty of forgetting what the world was like. In all these months, he had not ventured farther than the mountainside. The only people he’d met, spoken to were Resistance members. He hadn’t tread on tarmac let alone walked along a village street. Though as vividly as he could occasionally remember being in the city and living a normal life, he knew that whatever world he returned to, it was never going to be the same as the one he’d been forcibly dragged from.

  For a number of seconds Kyle looked at Jack. The two friends had grown close in their training sessions, but all the laughter they’d shared and the bond between them seemed to pale against the crux of this one argument. Jack knew he was ready. For the past few months he had jumped every hoop Kyle had thrown at him. He had ran every route on the hillside; beaten his own records every time. He’d learned to fight and use melee weapons; he had learned methods of deception: there was nothing more he could learn without leaving the compound. He wanted to be a part of The Resistance properly. The only thing that stood in his way was Kyle Monteith.

  When Kyle did speak again, his voice crackled as if had frozen over since he last spoke, “Come with me tomorrow night. I’ll show you what you crave.”

  “Thank you,” Jack said gratefully.

  “Don’t,” Kyle said, “I don’t want thanks for this.”

  “Kyle, please,” Jack said, in an attempt to reason with his friend.

  “Come on,” Kyle said, “Let’s head back home now. I hear Christmas dinner this year is more than just green slop.”

  They walked down the hill, through the frosted heather and back through the secret tunnel under a steel grey skies. Christmas Day. Jack could hardly believe how quickly time had passed. Perhaps he had been too focussed on his training to care for the days that flew by, perhaps he just didn’t want to dwell on how long it had been since he had last seen Eliza.

  When they returned to the bunker, they found the place drowned in tinsel. More candles than usual were lit and were decorating every available surface. A delicious smell emanated from the kitchen and the dining room was set with a myriad of cutlery and crockery, much of which was plundered from abandoned houses and empty shops. Though home the concrete bunker had become, the was the first time that Jack thought of it as cosy. All the evenings spent laughing and joking in the dining area scooping up green slop and nibbling on the occasional slice of bread, this was the first time in a long while that Jack longed to be at the table.

  As they entered the dining area, a pair of arms swooped around Jack.

  “Happy Christmas!” Emma screeched in his ears.

  “Oh my god,” Jack clasped his arms around her back.

  It had been weeks since he had last seen her. Having been sent away for some mission, Jack had never expected to see her so soon again. Though her name had not been mentioned, Jack had feared the worst. Since August, eighteen members had died.

  “What are you doing back here?” Jack asked, pushing her slightly away to examine her better.

  Emma was beaming, “Job done,” she said and from her pocket she withdrew a newspaper clipping.

  Warehouse Destroyed By Fire, the headline read. Jack took it from Emma and skimmed the first few sentences.

  “Major CRU data centre,” Emma beamed, “They totally have backups, but it allowed us to extract thirty-eight people in the three hours it was down for.”

  “Oh my god, that’s fantastic,” Jack said, though he was not quite on board with how great an achievement it was.

  “How are you though? How is training?” Emma said, taking a seat at the table.

  As Jack sunk into a chair, others around him were skulking out from their dormitories and taking their places at the table. Kyle sat to his left, immediately falling into an intense discussion with the girl next to him.

  “I’m great,” Jack begun reciting his training sessions, “Kyle said he would take me out tomorrow.”

  At that point Kyle gently placed a hand on his arm and Jack felt a spike of naivety. Had he said the wrong thing?

  Emma winked at him encouragingly, “It’s alright, Kyle. He can tell me.”

  Kyle retracted
his hand quite emotionlessly and returned to his own conversation.

  “So where are you going?” Emma asked.

  “I’m not sure yet,” Jack said, though his enthusiasm was not wavered by his ignorance.

  “It’ll be a recruitment,” Emma said, “I’m sure of it. Kyle is fond of them for his training. He’ll want to show you off.”

  “Christ, I don’t know why - I broke his track record. Surely he wouldn’t want a new recruit outperforming him?”

  “Ha, if he did that, Jack, he’d never recruit anyone!” Emma smiled.

  A few seconds later, Alan tapped a fork on a glass as he leaned against the divide between the dining area and the kitchen. Grease dripped down his apron, and he was clearly sweating from all the cooking, but he was also radiating with pride. Beside him were four metal containers, the contents of which gave Jack’s stomach reason to grumble.

  “Ladies and gentlemen,” he began when the chatter had died down, “I’d just like to say… grub’s up! Happy Christmas!”

  There was a roar of approval but prior to everyone swooping in with their plates, Kyle rose to his feet.

  “Before we all stuff ourselves,” Kyle said, “I’ve got something a bit special for us first. It’s quite frankly been a fucking horrible year for us all. We lost… too many. Leaders, brothers, sisters, wives, husbands… friends. I’ve not a doubt in my mind that we have the strength of ten thousand of those bastards. I look around you all and I see courage… I see strength. I see what lies in all great men and women - I see what makes you special, unique. And it is for that, I wish to raise a glass to you all.”

  “Aye, yeh’ve nae got any booze!” an anonymous voice yelled out.

  “That’s where you’re wrong,” the familiar voice echoed from the darkness and Jack audibly gasped as the man stepped from the shadows.