by Rebecca Ward
‘Your mum, my dad.’ Bodi agrees. ‘Hard isn’t it, because you miss someone who was never really around in the first place.’
‘Dad was devastated when she had to leave.’ They stop for traffic and Reed says little more. Bodi crosses her arms and resists the urge to whistle. It’s like inappropriate behaviour is always a hair’s breadth away with her.
‘And now it’s me and Sam.’ Reed says.
‘And Populus?’ Bodi questions.
‘Kind of. Dad warned me not to trust them. He’d say they were good people. But they’re idealists. And that doesn’t make for a ‘happy reality’.’
‘But your room,’ she says.
‘It’s not a shrine to Populus. It’s me trying to work out where I fit into all of it. More what were they thinking when they were doing those awful things? Do I belong with them? Am I one of them?’
‘Can Sam help you?’ Bodi asks. ‘Does he talk about what they did?’
‘Sam has some great stories but they’re sea dog’s tales. I think he got into it mostly for the ladies – his word - and the buzz of the fight. He liked the partying after a good brawl. By nature he’s a cad, a joker, not really a mercenary. And age has made him quite mellow.’ He smiles at the thought of his uncle. ‘When I got to his house I was so angry and wanted to hurt Populus for what they did to my parents. But Sam has found a way to slow me down, to get me to consider all the angles. So I started to research everything rather than going in fighting. Sam said: ‘You’re more powerful working from the inside out. Stealth! Like a ninja!’ Sam laughed so hard at that one that the birds squawked for hours.’ Reed laughs too and his normal overwrought look evaporates from his face.
‘Yeah, the birds, right?! So weird. And you can’t even eat them!’ Bodi feels herself flush as the words come out. She sounds moronic. Reed gives her a hesitant ‘Er, okay’ and that is that. End of conversation. They cross the road. Bodi red from head to toe, crushed at how she ruined their chat.
They walk the rest of the way in silence, stopping for traffic, taking an avid interest in the stores they pass. Bodi thinks about what he said. She certainly doesn’t trust these people. Her mum has done her level best to keep her away from them but right now they are her only option for getting her back. How does that make sense? How far is she prepared to trust in what her Mum had written on a note who knows when? She is starting to doubt her own judgement.
Reed stops by a faded wooden sign that reads “St James’s.”
‘Peculiar that such a secular group meets at a church,’ Bodi thinks, perplexed.
They go to a side door and Reed leads her through the pews. The space feels lifeless, the air deadened with dust. There is no joy here, no praise the lord and ‘morning has broken’. It is freezing, dirty and abandoned. The altar cloth is gone, no chalice, no swinging incense or Sunday schools. Religion, for the few that want it, is now served mostly through the radio. People have lost faith, and the absence of glorious pomp and ceremony make churches less welcoming. Bodi crosses herself, she isn’t all that religious, but it is one of her self-created superstitions. She habitually crosses herself when she walks by a church or sees a funeral cortege. She tries to do it without attracting attention. She’s not ready to confess her peculiar quirks.
She follows Reed to the back of the church through the vestry to a smaller wooden door. Behind the door are steps down into what Bodi assumes is the crypt. Her heart races like a jazz rhythm section but Reed is so matter of fact she doesn’t have a minute to think what she is doing. He has obviously done it so many times before it has become a normal thing for him. Panic rises in her throat but she gulps it down.
Reed takes a torch out of his pocket and she follows him hesitantly. Descending into the crypt evokes every creepy cliché you can imagine: creaking stairs, cobwebs in her hair and a foul smell of damp. She keeps up with Reed and his great strides; she doesn’t want to be left down here alone. He walks ahead and turns into another smaller room. Inscriptions line the walls, flagstones radiate a freezing chill up through her boots. Bodi daren’t touch anything, clamping her arms tight to her sides. She goes to ask a question. ‘You…’ Reed cuts her off, holding his finger to his lips, shaking his head for her not to speak. So they venture further into the darkness. They aren’t under the church anymore. Bodi realises her exit strategies are redundant now.
Thirty seconds later they reach a dead end. Reed points upwards and starts to climb up a ladder, pushing open a door when he reaches the top. Bodi stands there looking up, wondering what on earth she has got herself into. ‘As if the tunnel isn’t weird enough, now there’s a trap door?! What is this? Houdini’s mansion?’ she thinks.
She takes a deep breath and climbs up, brushing the dirt off her hands when she reaches the top. Reed puts the trap door down behind her while Bodi takes in the scene. It is a huge room with vaulted ceilings and frosted glass. Solid wooden counters are edged in scuffed up grey carpet. What little daylight there is struggles to get through the dirt on the windows. Security cameras hang by wires off their high perches like long-dead birds.
‘Where are we?’ she asks.
‘I can’t tell you that or I’ll have to kill you.’ Reed jokes. Bodi’s eyes widen. ‘It’s an old bank.’
As they walk through the room Bodi trips up over another trapdoor in the floor. She bends down to look closer at the floor, there are a few of them dotted around. She nudges Reed and points at them, bemused.
‘They lead to different buildings. I only know the route we came and my way out but Sam comes through a bookies. He definitely chose that on purpose. He likes to bet on the dogs. Everyone has his or her own route. We had to be quiet back there because that section of the tunnel goes under some houses.’
She walks across the room carefully. At the end of the corridor she sees a huge metal door. The vault? The irony of a group of anti-establishment vigilantes meeting in bank vault is not lost on her. This really is ousting the rich.
‘A bank? Really?’ she raises her eyebrows at Reed.
‘Now Bodi, no one ever said that civil uprising can’t be fun!’ he quips. There is that other side to him.
Reed stands to one side with mock chivalry. ‘After you.’
Bodi walks down the corridor with as much confidence as she can muster, which is about zero plus adrenaline, and with a hint of corny theatrics the door opens as she approaches. She steps over the threshold into the unknown. Time to meet Populus.
The group that is pouring over a huge map on a table stop what they are doing and as one go silent. Like hitting the mute button at the crux of the film. A few of them give her an encouraging smile but others just stare. There are around a dozen of them in the room. Bodi had expected more and is sad that they don’t look a little more imposing. The vault has been cleared of its contents but the room retains the particular smell of paper money and it feels like there is not quite enough air in the room. Sam steps forward and Bodi nods hello.
‘Miss Boudicca. Glad to see you survived the journey. Confess your sins on the way in did you?’ He chuckles. ‘Bit spooky I know, but needs must and all that. Guess I should do some introductions.’
Taking her hand, he walks round the table. He comes to a small, round woman with glasses, dressed in a colourful array of mismatched Indian clothes, her grey streaked hair sticks out, like Einstein in drag. She is one of the few welcoming people, so Bodi smiles back.
‘This is Morag, and Morag’s brother Fergus.’ Sam says. An almost identical slightly rounder, slightly more conservatively dressed man nods at her.
A taller, slim woman with styled, long, blonde hair looks Bodi up and down. Sam introduces her with some reverence: ‘Penelope.’
‘And my daughter, Felicity.’ Penelope adds, with the aggrandised tone of a stage school mother.
A girl around the same age as Bodi steps forward from behind her mother. She is as tall as her and as blonde. Her eyes widen, looking her up and down. Her supercilious look quickly turns to disintere
st and she turns and walks away. Penelope doesn’t bat an eyelid at her daughter’s rude behaviour, simply holds her forced smile. Beads of sweat start to form on Bodi’s top lip, and she feels like Penelope is relishing in her discomfort.
Sam squeezes Bodi’s hand and hurries on through the group, reeling off a tumble of names, some of which she recognises from the note inside the locket. Hatty. Mo. Pierre. The infamous Pierre of the missing rent! All the while Bodi is aware of Reed standing just behind her by the door. From there he can watch everything that is going on in the room. Sam stops listing names when he reaches the end of the table where two remaining men stand in close discussion. Sensing the quiet, they both turn to face Bodi as one. The elder one walks towards her his hands outstretched. He has neat, short dreadlocks and is wearing a military outfit a hair’s breadth from a tin pot general. His immaculate tailoring stands out among the rest of the group’s threadbare ensembles. Bodi guesses he is probably the same age as her mum. His solemn face breaks instantly into a welcoming smile, but one that Bodi is nervous of. It feels disingenuous.
‘It’s so wonderful to see you again Boudicca. We’ve been expecting you but I do wish it were under better circumstances.’ He pauses and takes her in – her dirty hair, her grey skin, her fraught expression. ‘I’m sure we can do something to rectify that very quickly.’
Sam moves away from Bodi’s side, Reed steps back a little as well. It is like this man is surrounded by his own personal force field.
He stands right in front of her and put both his hands on her shoulders. ‘My name is Balthazar. You are very welcome.’
‘Balthazar? Okay. Hi. Thanks. How are you?’ Bodi gabbles her words, trying to avoid his gaze. He turns her by her shoulders to her right and steps back.
‘And this, is my son, Evan.’ Bodi looks at him and then instantly lowers her eyes. She works her gaze up from his feet. He has a similar military sheen to his father’s: boots tied tight, clean; pressed combat trousers; neat nails; a spotless jumper. He is stockier though and his face is different, a little softer, more of a baby face. A gold chain winks from under his collar. He has an earring. Bodi can tell he is trying to play the good son, trying to show he means business, but by rolling his eyes conspiratorially he reveals he too is finding it all a bit OTT. Evan holds his hand out to shake hers.
‘Boudicca.’ He smiles at her and she relaxes a little.
‘Bodi?’ she offers.
‘Boo?’ he challenges and she laughs, still holding his hand.
‘Sure. Why not?!’
‘We should get on with it, don’t you think?’ Reed interjects a little too loudly and Bodi drops Evan’s hand. Everyone turns back to the table but there is just enough time for Evan to give her a quick wink, look past her shoulder and nod.
‘Reed.’ He says curtly. Reed bristles.
‘Evander.’ Now it is Evan’s turn to bristle.
While Balthazar walks back to the head of the table, Bodi finally gets a chance to look at the map. It is the weirdest map of London she has ever seen. Gone are boroughs, postcodes and road names. In their place, symbols she doesn’t recognise and lines drawn in red and black. Areas encircled and shaded in. ‘Codes, perhaps? Safe areas?’ Bodi has no idea and she doubts she is going to be wiser any time soon.
Morag starts. ‘When they took me away, I was held in Highgate. In the rooms they had under the cemetery.’
‘That was years ago Mor.’ Her brother retaliates. ‘There’s no way they’re using the same place now.’
‘They may have come back to it.’ Morag sounds hurt they are dismissing her theory.
‘I think the less time spent on Morag’s short-lived incarceration the better,’ Penelope snips.
‘I think we need to step away from conjecture.’ Balthazar booms through the prattling. ‘We need to follow their logic and see if anyone in the network has any intel on what happened.’ At the word “intel” Sam gives him serious side eye. Balthazar catches him.
‘Intel. Yes, intel.’ Sam says, recovering. ‘Very good Balt. Anyone? Any intel?’
Bodi looks round the table. Someone standing at this table has to have the answer to how to get her mum back, but who is it? Balt pulls her next to him.
‘Where were you living Boudicca?’ he asks. Bodi points on their map the rough whereabouts of their flat. It is hard to be exact with all their strange areas and codes. ‘Turner Street. In Bateman House. We’d been there about a year, it was starting to feel permanent,’ she says wistfully.
‘Too long. Way too long.’ Balthazar’s tone is disapproving.
‘But you get so sick of moving. You don’t know anyone. You feel isolated,’ she counters. Morag nods in agreement. ‘We just wanted to feel a little bit of continuity.’
Balt sighs and continues his interrogation. ‘Tell me exactly what happened.’
Bodi tells her story to Balthazar and the rest of the group. It is like recounting a dream where some elements are still extremely, painfully, vivid and others have begun to fade. Every so often Balt just stares at her, close-up, completely invading her personal space. Almost as if he stares hard enough some unknown truth will fly direct from Bodi’s subconscious to his.
He pummels her with questions.
‘Did you talk to anyone?...Give your mum away?...Had she developed any problematic friendships?...Boyfriends? You, her?...Why didn’t you move more?... Why didn’t you stay in touch with Populus? We could’ve protected you.’
Bodi thinks she knows the answers but she starts to doubt herself, second guessing what Balthazar wants to hear. Finally, just when she thinks she will start screaming and never stop, Sam steps in between her and Balthazar.
‘Okay mate. Enough with the Stasi treatment.’ He puts his hand on her shoulder and she feels instantly safer. ‘Let’s give Boudicca here a few minutes and see what ‘intel’ we have so far.’ He isn’t going to let that one drop.
The adults huddle round, closing Bodi out of the circle. Like they’ve stripped the flesh from her bones and are gathering to devour it. She retreats to the corner of the room to lick her wounds, her mind awash with possibilities. Highgate, Battersea, London Bridge. Where will they even begin? She rubs her sore eyes and her aching back, trying to stop feeling otherworldly.
‘Why the hell do you even want to find her anyway?’ The blonde girl Felicity shoots at her, interrupting her fumbling thoughts. Bodi hasn’t even realised she is sat nearby.
‘You what?!’ Bodi is dumbfounded.
‘At least you’re free now. No one knows who you are. You’re not involved in this hideous carnival of freaks. You can just be who you want to be. Go off into the world and be normal.’ Felicity flicks her hair dismissively.
‘But I need to find her. She’s all I have.’ Bodi says quietly, feeling very defensive about her relationship with her mum even to this awful girl. Then again, if Penelope was her mum she might think differently.
‘You’ve got to wake up hon, once you get embroiled in all this crazy then that’s you in hiding for the rest of your life. You should go off now before you get completely dragged down with it.’ Contempt drips from Felicity’s perfectly lip-glossed pout.
Reed walks over and pulls her up on her comment. ‘What do you think is out there that you don’t have here, Flip?’ he challenges.
‘God Weed, were did you come from? Lurking in the shadows, again? I was just saying to our new friend that she should get out now, while she still can. Don’t you want that, to live like everyone else? None of this tunnels and plans and military BS. No plans to take back the city. As if they ever had any clue in the first place. They’re all certifiable!’ Flip’s anger is tinged with disappointment.
‘Well, let’s say, for argument’s sake..’ Reed says.
Flip cuts him dead. ‘What do you even sound like? You’re not right in the head Weed. Take the dictionary out of your arse and go plot another spectacular fail with the Hit Squad over there.’
Bodi stands up between their face off.
Sam takes the floor. ‘We need people on the inside. I can’t stress that enough.’
Bodi can hear Reed from earlier “Stealth! Like a ninja!” which makes her smile. She is starting to feel that she might have an ally in Sam.
‘But who can get away with it?’ challenges Morag ‘They know all of us. Christ, we’d be carted away before you could say ‘Evening Officer Dibble’.’
Bodi doesn’t know what on earth Morag is talking about. What any of them are talking about and why they’re not already doing something.
Bodi catches Evan’s eye across the group, he’s been listening in too. He steps to the head of the table and Bodi moves to stand beside him.
‘Us?’ he whispers.
‘Us,’ she replies conspiratorially.
Evan coughs and the group turn to him.
‘There is only one way this is going to work. They don’t know us. We should be the ones to go find Ruby,’ he says, firmly.
The adults’ protestations resound around the room. Their idea isn’t going down well.
‘You can be like our command post and we can infiltrate from inside. We’ll just do what you say. We’ll be your eyes and ears. Your chess pieces. Gathering intel and bringing it back to the group. You get to make all the decisions.’ Evan knows how to get round them. It is all about making them think they hold the power.