Arun D. Ellis's Blog, page 7

27 Serialisation of the book 'Uprising' 1st book in the 'Corpalism' series - by Arun D Ellis

Liberty Valance


In the part of this universe that we know
there is great injustice,
And often the good suffer, and often the wicked prosper,
And one hardly knows which of those is the more annoying.

Bertrand Russell


Jimmy waited opposite the ‘Lord Nelson’, a pub frequented by local coppers and their informants; he’d been waiting 20 minutes and was already fairly ticked off when Paddy and Brendan finally appeared at the end of the street with about twenty other blokes.

“About time,” said Jimmy when they reached him, “where the fuck you been?”

“It took a little longer than we thought,” said Paddy.

“Where’s Sean?” asked Jimmy.

“Well, that’s why it took a little longer,” said Paddy, “he’s gone and got himself arrested.”

“What the fuck?” moaned Jimmy, “how? I thought you were looking after him, Brendan.”

“It wasn’t my fault,” said Brendan.

“You know what he’s like, Jimmy,” said Paddy, “he got wound up, saw a couple of coppers, went berserk and attacked ‘em.”

“An’ you just left him?”

“Nothin’ we could do,” said Paddy, “there were two van loads of pigs round the corner, they were on him in seconds, and if we’d tangled with them then we wouldn’t be here now.”

“Oh fuck it, he’ll have to sweat it inside for a couple of days then… come on, let’s get this thing started.” As they strode across the street pick axe handles and strong sticks appeared from nowhere. “Come on lads!” screamed Jimmy as he burst in the door and started swinging left and right. Within 10 minutes they’d trashed the place and run off, leaving a few battered coppers behind; disappointingly the pub had been virtually empty.

Later that night they smashed up 3 mini-markets and a pawn shop.

∞

The following day ten police vans pulled up around the ‘Lord Nelson’ depositing a hundred coppers on the streets. They went from door to door looking for witnesses but none were forthcoming.

Back at the station Sgt Smith pored over several hours of CCTV footage finally identifying unequivocally Jimmy, Brendan and Paddy O’Connell. Five minutes later thirty police piled into three of the vans and shot round to where the O’Connells lived.

“They’re here,” said Brendan.

“Good,” said Terry, “Everyone in place and tooled up?”

“Oh, we’re ready,” said Jimmy, “we’re ready alright.”

“Pay back,” said Paddy, “you gotta love payback.”

The police abandoned their vans and bee lined for the O’Connell house. As soon as they stepped onto his path Jimmy opened the front door, he had a fog horn in his right hand.

“Right,” said the lead copper, “you come along now.”

“Fuck you!” shouted Jimmy as he blasted on the horn.

At the signal scores of young men, all wearing some form of makeshift helmet appeared from surrounding houses, from alleyways, from behind hedges and parked cars, materializing like ants from a disturbed nest. They all carried improvised weapons; 2 ft lengths of wood, the ubiquitous pick axe handles, a few old baseball bats and they were all shouting.

The coppers froze not knowing which way to turn.

The youths smashed into the police and started to beat them mercilessly whilst others trashed the vans. One particularly enterprising youth smashed off a petrol cap and shoved in a length of material. The struck match produced an instant ribbon of flame indicating an accelerant and an unprecedented level of planning. The cops tried to fight back but they were easily overwhelmed. The vans were sacrificed in their flight; a headlong race back the way they had come, followed at a safe distance by their baying attackers.

∞

Sgt Smith banged on the Superintendent’s door and entered without waiting for permission.

“What the bloody hell do you think you’re doing Sergeant?”

“There’s a riot in one of the sinks sir,” said Sgt. Smith.

“Where?” demanded the Super.

“Sector 155,” said Sgt. Smith.

The Super examined his wall map, “Whose sector is that?”

“Donald Coogan’s sir,”

“Didn’t we get a warning?” demanded the Super.

“No sir.”

“Well, where is he?”

“He’s been off the map for months, now sir,” said Smith, “we’ve searched high and low.”

“Don’t be facetious, Smith,” said the Super.

“Seriously sir,” said Sgt. Smith, “he hasn’t been seen since those specials took him away.”

“Well, that shouldn’t have been a problem, should it?”

“Not that we can think of sir,” said Smith, “Donald’s always been reliable in the past, one of our best, I’d say.”

“Well he’s not now,” said the Super, “Do we have any numbers?”

“Maybe as many as 100; it’s hard to get definite Intel”.

“Okay,” said the Super, “well break out the riot squad and close this thing down now.”

“Sir,” said Sgt. Smith, “do you want any of the uniform boys in on this?”

“Not yet,” said the Super, “hopefully we can keep it contained.”

∞

Jimmy peered out of the window; he counted three Guardian Armoureds and six vans which meant there was probably something in the region of a hundred coppers out there, heavily kitted out in full riot gear.

“Now what?” asked Eric.

“Now we go fuck with ‘em,” said Paddy.

Eric nodded but he was clearly shaken by it all.

Five minutes later 200 youths were parading in front of the police, screaming abuse, hurling rocks, sticks and bottles at the police line.

“Is this it?” said Sgt. Dick Carter, “we’ll turn the hoses on these little shit heads and have the whole deal wrapped up by lunch.” He signaled the water cannon forward.

“Time to bring in the others,” said Terry.

Jimmy nodded and Paddy lit a flare, handmade with Terry’s help, surprised when it shot into the air and exploded.

Three streets away, behind the police line Brendan gave the signal and 300 hundred more youths ran forward, silent save for thudding feet, weaving through this alleyway and that street until they came out right behind the police. Ten minutes later the riot squad was retreating in disorder, minus three Guardians, six vans and one water cannon .

∞

Sgt Smith knocked quickly on Superintendent Travers’ door and entered, again without waiting.

“What is it?”

“The riot squad is in retreat sir,” said Sgt. Smith.

“What do you mean ‘in retreat’?”

“They’ve been overrun,” said Sgt. Smith, “and they’ve lost ‘Nellie 1’, the water cannon, sir.”

“Shit,” said the Super rubbing his brow with his palm, “okay sergeant; get as many uniforms as you can out there ASAP.

“Sir,” said Sgt. Smith,” Full riot gear sir?”

“Yes.”

Smith turned to leave, and then remembered, “Ah sir,”

“Yes?”

“We’re getting reports of similar disturbances in other sectors.”

“Anything official?” asked the Super.

“Nothing as yet sir,” said Sgt. Smith.

“Okay, well find out, I want to know how big this thing really is.”

∞

“Well, do we think this is real?” asked Bill.

He, Ken, John, Mark, and Gary were seated round the table in the station canteen.

“I don’t know,” said Gary, “they all seemed pretty intense about it to me, but whether it’s something they can do or not, I don’t know.”

“I feel the same,” said John, “I just don’t think there’s enough of them or that they can have any effect on things.”

“You’re right,” said Ken, “we’re better off just ignoring them, let things play out.”

“Right, then, if they achieve what they claim, we can always switch sides,” said Gary.

“Switching sides isn’t always easy,” said Mark, “besides I don’t like to do that sort of thing.”

“Well it’s not going to happen, is it?” said Gary.

“No way,” said Ken, “these fuckers couldn’t even organize a piss up in a...”

“Brewery,” said John, “I bloody hope not, that’s all.”

“They can’t,” said Mark.

Just then the station alarm went off and the Duty sergeant ran into the canteen, “ALL RIGHT EVERYONE!” he shouted, “RIOTING IN THE SINKS, GET YOUR GEAR ON AND GET YOUR ARSES OUT INTO THE PARKING LOT ASAP…MOVE!”

“Shit,” said John.

“Fuckin’ ‘ell,” hissed Gary, “what do we do?”

“We get into our kit and go down there;” said Bill, “a few twats rioting aren’t going to change the world.”

∞

Four hours later fifteen districts in Boro were in uproar, rioters running amok with random fires everywhere, smashed police vans and police cars; Boro was now a mini war zone.

The Chief Constable sat at the head of the emergency meeting. It took them just 15 minutes to agree that the situation was now out of their control and that it should be escalated to the Home Office.

∞

Ken sat in the curb and held a fist full of bandages to his bleeding head, around him were twenty of his comrades, sitting, crouching, all shocked, their riot gear scattered everywhere. It was getting dark and the burning vehicles gave off a warm red and yellow flame. Bill staggered over to where Ken sat and collapsed next to him.

“You alright?” he asked.

Ken nodded, slowly.

“I don’t know how big it's going to get but they look bloody well organized.”

“You can say that again,” said Ken, “I wouldn’t have thought it possible.”

“You seen any of the others?”

“Yeah, Gary was taken to hospital half hour ago,” said Ken, moving the mass of blood soaked bandages, “shit, I need more of these.”

“What’s up with him?” asked Bill.

“Burns,” said Ken, “he got hit full on by a Molotov.”

“Shit… and John, Mark?”

“Nothin’ on either of them.” said Ken, “Dunno, Bill… these fuckers ain’t messing around, they’re playing for keeps.”

“Wait until the army gets here,” said Bill, “then we’ll see some heads crack.”

Ken leant over, “Word is… there’s a unit just 30 miles down the road.”

“What?”

“Yeah, apparently they’ve been there training for the past 6 months,” said Ken, “for just such an event.”

“How’d they know?” asked Bill.

“How’d they ever know,” said Ken, “the informers?”

“Yeah,” said Bill, “bet they’re all in on it.”

“Well, maybe not all of them,” said Ken.




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26 Serialisation of the book 'Uprising' 1st book in the 'Corpalism' series - by Arun D Ellis

The not so simple task of turning your handler


When we are no longer able to change a situation,
we are challenged to change ourselves.

Victor Frankl

Ice Man waited in the shadows as the easily identifiable silhouette of Insp. Ken Jackson, his local handler, approached.

“Easy there man,” said Ice, “best stay in the shade.”

“What’s going on, Ice?” asked Jackson, “You’ve got everyone jumping left right and centre. So come on, what was the big meeting all about?”

“What meeting?” asked Ice.

“We know,” said Jackson, “so what the hell’s going on?”

“We need to talk,” said Ice.

“That’s what we’re doing,” said Jackson.

“No,” said Ice, “I mean a proper sit down.”

“What do you mean?”

“I mean we need to talk about where things are at,” said Ice, “and where they’re going.”

“What the hell does that mean, Ice?”

“It means, we ain’t happy no more with the way things have been going,” said Ice.

“What does that mean?” asked Jackson.

“It means we need a proper sit down,” said Ice.

“Okay,” said Jackson, “when? where?”

“I’ll get word to you,” said Ice, “but don’t report this back, not until we’ve spoken properly.”

“Okay, but you know they’re going to want something,” said Jackson.

“You got a brain; think of something.”

∞

Two days later Insp. Jackson entered the same small community hall where Terry had held his meeting. He was 10 mins late, fashionably he’d thought and it served to keep Ice on his toes. He was shocked to see the place filled with over a hundred people. He turned to leave, he was in the wrong place, either actually or figuratively, the whole deal was sus and he wanted out.

“Jackson,” said Ice.

Jackson stopped and turned back into the room, spotting Ice in the group, he shook his head, hovering uncertainly. Jimmy moved in behind him, helping him make up his mind, “Take a seat with your man.”

“What’s going on?”

“Take a seat and you’ll soon find out,” said Jimmy “You’re okay, Ice saved you a place.”

“Ice saved me a place, did he?” repeated Jackson, “fuck off, I’m leaving.”

“No, you ain’t,” said Paddy standing in Jackson’s way.

Jackson thought about trying to force his way through but looking at the size of Paddy figured he couldn’t, he’d make a spectacle of himself trying, and he’d look weak and now was definitely not the time to be looking weak. He shrugged, “Okay, whatever.”

When everyone was seated Don stepped up to the lectern, “Thank you for coming and thank you for bringing your associates.”

“What the fuck’s going on, Ice?” hissed Jackson.

“My colleague Terry will now address you,” said Don.

Terry rose from his seat in the front row and stood in front of the gathering, “First of all I should mention that we know the authorities are monitoring this meeting. We know about the new programme so we know you will have to report back and we expect you to report what has occurred here, as accurately as you can. I say that to let you know that we aren’t worried about what you say, we aren’t worried whether or not you chose to listen to our message, we are supremely confident. You are here to listen to what we have to say.”

There was a muttering of resentment from the assembled handlers, muted; the proximity of so many community hard nuts had a depressing effect on strong reaction.

Terry started to pace, “We are the majority, we are the mass, we are the real strength, we hold the keys to the real power, not them and by them, I mean the rich 1%.”

“What the fuck,” whispered Jackson, “not this shit again.”

“Shut up Jackson,” said Ice, “just listen to what the man has to say.”

“Why?” whispered Jackson, “all this 99% crap was crushed years ago and they’ll crush it again.”

“Maybe, but I figure he’s right, we ain’t been payin’ attention. Youse, me and the rest of these fine gentlemen have all been playin’ by the rules for the past 20 years and look where it got us?”

“What’re you gettin’ at?” asked Jackson.

“We been taken,” said Ice, “and that don’t sit well.”

Jackson glanced around him looking for other responses similar to his; he found them but now was not the time to exploit it.

Terry took a sip of water, “Now I will admit that we’re going to try to persuade you to join us, but let me be clear, we don’t care one way or another if you do or don’t. We don’t need you.”

He looked deliberately round the room, his level gaze probing, his meaning unambiguous, “Sure, it would make things simpler for us if the local police were on our side but we all know you’re not the main threat. That comes from the security forces. But I will remind you we number in the millions, the police only in the tens of thousands and the security forces in the hundreds of thousands.” He let that sink in for a moment then continued, “Not only do we number in the millions but we are also united in our endeavour. This is something that they, the 1% don’t understand. I know this because I’ve lived amongst them for most of my life. They don’t see us, they don’t see our plight, and it doesn’t enter into their heads or their daily routines. They mix with their own kind, in the same clubs, same offices, same parties, at the same beaches, at the same holiday resorts. They don’t care about our suffering – they don’t care about us.”

He walked out to the front of the stage, leaving the safety of the lectern, his confidence apparent to all, “and don’t anyone try to say ‘oh but they don’t know’ and ‘if they knew, they’d change things’ … they know, how can they not? They just don’t give a fuck. They’re immersed in their own little world of numbers, constantly looking to see who has more billions than them. They believe they have what they have because they deserve it. They think we are all lazy and shiftless individuals who clutter up their world.”

He took another sip of water. “But tell me, how are they better than us? Are they better under the laws of nature? Are they fitter and stronger than us? Are they kinder and more thoughtful? Are they brighter and more intelligent than us? Do they have superior minds? No, they are none of these things; they are soft, flabby, fat, lazy, indolent, useless individuals, most of whom inherited their money. They live in a world separate from us, a world where there is no want, where there is obscene quantity and unbelievable waste. They live in that world knowing they’re exploiting the workers of the 3rd world and forcing the ordinary people of the west into dire poverty. But the big question is ‘how have they achieved this’?”

“Don’t tell me you’re falling for this shit, Ice,” whispered Jackson.

“I don’t fall for nothin’, but this is real, brother, you just be listening, then we talk.”

“So how have they achieved this miracle?” asked Terry, “Simple really, first, they told us that capitalism would allow each of us a piece of the pie. Then they said if we worked really hard then we could get a bigger piece, like them. But is that true? Has that ever been true?” He pointed out into the crowd, singling out individuals, forcing them to think, to engage, “You there, and you, you all know people who have worked hard all their lives but they never seemed to get more than just enough to get by.”

“That’s true enough” someone shouted, shushed at once by the handler to his left.

Terry accepted the comment with a brusque nod then spoke again, “But then, we’re told that to get that bigger slice you have to be an entrepreneur, a businessman, then you can enjoy the big time and again anyone can be an entrepreneur if they try hard…but that’s not true either, because to set up in business you have to have money… and we, the people, don’t have any spare money because the greedy 1% have kept it all for themselves…” He stopped talking and looked behind him to Don and Dave, a ‘how I’m doing?’ question on his face. Don nodded encouragement; Dave shrugged and made a face.

“I know this is a lot to take in” Terry said abruptly, swiveling his gaze back to the room “So anyone got any questions at this point?” No-one took up his offer, instead satisfied themselves with shuffling and shared glances, no doubt some echoing Jackson’s unspoken ‘I’m in the centre of a communist revolution, how the fuck do I get outta here?’

He took the silence as acquiescence, “The other way to make money is to exploit people, oh, no sorry, that’s the ‘only’ way to make money, exploit other people, that’s how the billionaires have acquired all their money by exploiting others…So how did they achieve it? You’re going to love this…they changed all the rules to accommodate what they wanted to do. How? I hear you ask…easy, they own the politicians, they own the banks, they own industry and they own everything. They made it easier for themselves to invest in so called emerging markets. What once would’ve been considered treasonous was now considered virtuous. Instead of building up the nation state and its resources, all of its resources, including its people, they concentrated on building up their profits. That’s all they did. They invested in parts of the world where children could be worked for 12 hours a day 7 days a week, where grown men and women could be treated like slaves and all for a pittance and they did this because we here in the west had made it illegal to work children, because we’d abolished slavery, because we had fought for workers’ rights, for a minimum wage, for a 40 hr week, for pensions, for the right to retire, for a free NHS, for free education, all of these things were getting in the way of them making a quick and easy profit and worse …had been making us feel we were worth something.”

“He’s going to get you killed,” whispered Jackson.

“You ain’t listening,” said Ice, “did you take a look round you when you came here this morning, Jackson? Did you see what this place is like? What ‘bout you? What ‘bout your life?”

“I know that some of you will have thought all this before, you might have been on the picket lines, you might have campaigned against the hikes in student loans, the year-on-year reduction in the earnings level before payback was due, the obscene Work Programme that put the disabled into slave labour for the hypermarkets, you might want to come up here and tell me about it… you were there, I wasn’t. I’m too young; I was at school, not even born when some of this was happening…” He looked round and saw no takers to his challenge, “I know also that some of you will be thinking that this was crushed years ago, that the state is now all powerful and that the 1% are so entrenched and so influential that nothing can change.” He encouraged the murmurs, accepting their fear of what he was saying, recognising and absorbing it, “They’re monitoring this meeting, but that doesn’t mean that we have to let them dictate to us, that doesn’t mean we have to accept third, fourth or fifth best in this world.” He raised his hands to his shoulders, in a questioning pose, “Where is it written that one man must be the economic the slave of another? Or a thousand men must carry the burden of just one man? Where is it written that they are so much better than us? Where is it written that we must sit idly by whilst they party and wallow in luxury whilst half the world’s population starves? Where is it written that they should have all the money and that they should decide who lives and who dies? I ask you, where is it written?”

Isolated figures round the room were on their feet, whether in support or preparing to leave was unclear but Jimmy and his brothers moved swiftly to settle them back down.

“Why you asking about my life?” said Jackson.

“What about your family?” pressed Ice, “Are their prospects so good? What have you been promised? Have they delivered? Will your kids have more than you ever had or are they already in debt? Well? Huh! Admit it Jackson, we’re already dead.”

Terry spoke again, “Capitalism, we were told, creates prosperity… and so it does, in a properly regulated environment. That way everyone gets a piece of the pie. But in a world where the game is rigged so that those with the most keep getting more and those with the least keep getting less, and those with some find themselves driven ever lower down the chain, then it doesn’t create prosperity, it creates want. That’s what they have achieved in their crazy desire to own all of the money. It’s insane, they are insane … they are economic psychopaths.” Terry glanced round the room then continued, “Now some of you might be thinking ‘What’s he on about’?” He expected the short bursts of laughter and grinned easily, “I’ll explain… psychopaths lack morality, they can be charming, they can be aggressive, they mimic others but what they are all incapable of doing is empathizing. That’s the difference between them and us; between normal people and psychopaths… it’s easy to identify this group of obscenely wealthy individuals as psychopaths because they aren’t the first rich people to have ever existed.”

Jackson stood to leave, with a loud “Fuck this”. Ice Man stood as well and Terry stopped talking, awaiting the outcome, a test case for the rest of the room’s occupants.

“Not yet, he’s not done” said Ice, “an’ we need to talk first.”

“What?” said Jackson, “Are you crazy? Have you really swallowed all that crap?”

“No!” said ice, “I’ve lived it. Sit down.”

Jackson paused, shuffled his feet, and then sat.

Terry waited for the mutterings that’d been activated by Jackson’s loud irritation to die away, and then continued. “We’ve had periods in history where the gap between rich and poor was as wide as now but at that time some of the wealthy empathized with the poor, they cared for the conditions under which the masses live; we know this because history proves it. They fought against exploitation, against slavery, against children working up chimneys and down mines, and they fought their own kind to achieve social justice. Other countries needed revolutions to achieve change, Britain always changed without that upheaval, common sense prevailed, and a sense of decency and justice was alive in the land.”

He was entering the last phase of the talk, the bit where he hoped to attract most support from the police in the group.

“The problem we have is that the ones at the top, the ones who have all the money, are the same type of people as those who thought slavery was acceptable, who thought nothing of sending a child up a chimney… those people were psychopaths and so are the people now at the top.”

He took another, final sip of water, “But none of this can be true, can it? If it was, surely we’d do something about it? Surely the masses would rise up as one and change things? You’d think that, wouldn’t you…. But how, how can we … legally? When the wealthy 1% not only has all the money, but has also written all the laws; laws which value property above life, which value the wealthy above the poor. Laws that prevent us from speaking out against this intolerable injustice, laws that prevent the masses from gathering, that prevent us from taking what is rightfully ours whilst protecting the rich who regularly steal what is ours, laws that say the rich own everything whilst the poor own nothing. Who wrote these laws? Who approved these laws? They did…” He raised his arms in front of him, palms into the room, “but who enforces these laws? They can’t do it themselves because there’re not enough of them. So, I say again…who enforces these laws? …We do, we make the rich safe, we protect them, we keep other workers down and in the process keep ourselves down and we support the injustice of obscene wealth for the few. Without our obedience they couldn’t do it. Without our obedience they couldn’t maintain their position in the world and tell me, please someone tell me, why we’re the only species on the planet to live such pitiful lives, simply at the whim of another.” He paused, “Now I know most of you coppers will want to get the hell out of here and report back which is fine, as I said, we don’t need you… but you are going to need us. We are the mass and we are unstoppable. We will rise up, we will march and we will be victorious.”

He had finished speaking but the room still echoed with his words. The handlers sat in their various places round the room, waiting for whatever was meant to happen next, for the first movements being made to empty the hall. Jimmy and his brothers were still positioned by the doors and whilst that was the case no one wanted to be first to the exit, or indeed to test whether they were being allowed to exit. Since Jackson and Ice were loudly continuing their argument most of the room’s occupants were content to listen.

“What you don’t see” said Ice, “is how shit it is here, day in, day out.”

“Hey, you chose the mission.” said Jackson.

“That ain’t the point, things were never meant to be this bad.”

“You got TV, You got Mackey Ds, and you got other stuff.”

“We ain’t got shit,” said Ice, “TV is shit, Mackey Ds is shit, and we ain’t got freedom.”

“Freedom?” Jackson’s eyebrows shot up to join his hairline.

“Now I ain’t gonna force you to join us,” said Ice, “and I ain’t gonna let my boys harm ya’, but I am gonna ask you to go home and think about it, to look at your life, at your home, at your kids and their prospects, look at your debts, at your kids’ debts and see where they’ll be at 10 years time ‘cause I’m willing to bet they’ll be here, living in the sinks with us.”

“No way,” said Jackson.

“Oh no?” questioned Ice, “Really, you can be that sure, can you? What’s your debt?”

“I’m not tellin’ you that.” said Jackson.

“I’ll bet it’s right up there,” said Ice, gesturing at the top of his head, “and I’ll bet your kids already have loadsa debt. What happens if you lose your job? What happens if there’s no work for your kids?”

“There’ll be work,” said Jackson.

“How many kids you got?” asked Ice.

“Why do you want to know about my kids?” demanded Jackson. “you threatening me?”

“I don’t wanna know ‘bout your kids, I want you to think ‘bout them and how many of ‘em‘ll get jobs, or manage to scrape a living outside serving the system and which one will end up here.”

“My kids are gonna be fine,” said Jackson, “they’re gonna go to Uni and they’ll get good jobs.”

“Well I hope so,” said Ice, “’cause that sounds like a load a debt to me.”

“They’ll be fine,” stated Jackson, “now, can I go?”

“Sure,” said Ice, “Sure thing man.”

Jackson stood up; stared at Terry, now seated on the stage, for a long moment, making sure he’d know him on sight. Then he squeezed past the still seated Ice Man and marched to the door. On his approach Brendan looked for permission from the stage and receiving it, stood aside. The sight of Jackson exiting safely started a general rush for the doors and within a few minutes the hall was empty of handlers.

“How do you think it went?” Dave asked.

“Oh they’ll go running home and tell all,” said Terry.

“Is that what we want?” asked Eric.

“It’ll do,” said Terry, “they’re gonna find out anyway, besides some of them will think about what’s been said.”

“Where’d you get all that stuff?” asked Don.

“I lived with them, it’s just how they are,” He put his hand on Don’s shoulder, “Can you tell them they need to dig out their chips? They won’t like it, and some of them might need persuasion but they’re no good to us until they get rid of them.” Don nodded, pleased to have a concrete action to perform. Terry watched for a moment as he went from leader to leader murmuring and pointing to their forearms, then signaled Jimmy and his brothers over, “Okay guys, it’s time we employed some of your special talents, Liberty Valance style.”

“Liberty what?” said Sean.

Terry frowned, “I thought you’d all seen Eric’s film, at least that’s the impression I got.”

“Yeah, we have,” said Brendan, “but this is Sean.”

“Now we’re talking,” said Paddy.

“What are we talking?” asked Sean.

“Liberty Valance,” said Jimmy, “the film, The Man Who Shot Liberty Valance.”

“Eh?”

“Forget it,” said Jimmy to Sean, then turned to Terry, “leave it to us, we’ll stir things up good and proper.”

“Now that’s something I can relate to,” said Brendan.

“What is?” said Sean.

“Hang on,” said Eric, “before they go off half cocked, do we want any restrictions on this?”

“Absolutely not,” said Terry, “let’s really stir things up, just don’t get caught.”

“Don’t worry about us,” said Jimmy, “it’ll be smash and run.”

∞

Inspector Jackson made his report and then drove home to his wife and family.

That night as he sat alongside his pretty wife on the faux-suede 4-seater settee in his outskirts of Boro suburb, semi-detached, 3 up 2 down with integral garage, staring at his 42” 3D TV he couldn’t help running the numbers through his head.

They’d known for a long time that they’d run up huge debts… everyone they knew lived the same way. It was how all his colleagues and their families lived. You had to have things and it was all expensive. No-one he knew lived within their means, it just wasn’t possible. The debt was always there and they could never hope to repay it in their lifetime. Even the kids, barely out of their teens, already owed vast sums. Once they went to Uni the figures would be astronomical. He made himself total it up – something he and Michelle usually avoided doing. He whistled, shocked, allowing the magnitude of it all to enter his brain for the first time in years, acknowledging the potential for ruin. His family debt came to something in excess of 5 million, and his being allowed to owe that much was reliant totally on him keeping his job.

Jackson turned to his wife, speaking low to avoid disturbing the kids, Kevin in particular who was at that age, “Can we have a little chat?”

“What?” She was engrossed, she and Kim both, Kevin looked over at him, interested immediately.

“I need to talk to you… in the kitchen?” said Jackson.

“What, now?” Michelle gave a lingering glance at the TV.

“Now” Jackson stood up and led the way. Michelle followed, although rather irritably.

“What’s wrong, Ken?”

“I don’t really know what to say.”

“What is it?” said Michelle, her mind still on the TV, “spit it out.”

“Just give me a second to work out where to start.”

She turned on him abruptly, “you’re not having an affair are you?”

“What? God no,” said Ken.

“Oh, you got me really worried there, what’s going on?”

“Look,” said Ken, “this is really serious, and really dangerous so please…”

“What’s happened, Ken?”

“It’s the sinks,” said Ken, “I think they’re about to explode.”

“My God…will you have to go in there?”

“No, it’s not that,” said Ken, “Look, Mich, you know how worried we are about, well you know, about the money and the kids and things.”

“Yeah, but what’s that got to do with the sinks?”

“They’re going to rebel against the system,” said Ken, “like before.”

“You mean like the Occupy movement?”

“Yeah.”

“But they were communists… are we in danger?”

“It’s not like that,” said Ken, “besides they weren’t really communists, were they.”

“What? What’re you talking about?”

“They weren’t communists,” said Ken.

“How do you know that?”

“Come on,” said Ken, “that’s just what the Government said.”

“Why would they lie to us?”

“Okay,” said Ken, “That’s not important; the thing is they are going to fight to change things.”

“Change what things?”

“Well,” said Ken, “I think they’ll get rid of our debt for one thing.”

“Get rid of our debt, how?”

“I don’t know,” said Ken, “it’s a revolution I guess, they intend to take money from the rich, you know the 1% and spread it out amongst the 99%.”

“You’re not seriously considering joining them?”

“We owe so much. All we’re going to leave the kids is debt and they already have a heavy debt of their own.”

“I know that, but the risks Ken? They can’t win, you know that.”

“But what if they do?” said Ken, “and I was on the other side, the wrong side.”

“Can they win?”

“I don’t know,” said Ken, “they think they can.”

“Yes, that’s all very good and well, but can they? Can they win?”

“If they get the support they reckon they will then yes they can win, but if they don’t, then no they can’t.”

“Well what are you saying? What about Bill and Mark? What do they think?”

“Same as me,” said Ken, “it all looks shaky but if they can get enough people involved, if they rise up then… who knows.”

“But the police will be sent in, and if you can’t handle the situation they’ll send in the army, they can’t win.”

“Well, that’s what happened last time,” said Ken, “but things don’t always work out how you think they will.”

“So, what are you going to do?”

“Nothing at the moment,” said Ken, “I’m just going to go in, do my job and do as I’m told and see what happens.”

“For god’s sake Ken, be careful, it’s not just you who’ll suffer; it’s me and the kids as well.”

“I know that,” said Ken, “but if the revolt takes off, if they really do have the numbers behind them that they claim then we’re going to be swamped in a few hours, which means the army will be here and then who knows what will happen.”

“The army will put it down.”

“It’s not that simple, the troops come from the masses, and it depends where their loyalties lie.”

“Won’t they just use European troops like before?”

“Well they could, but you remember what happened last time, the army nearly revolted, they don’t like their families being shot at by Krauts or Frogs.”

“What are you going to do, Ken?”

“I don’t know, but you and the kids might be better off going to Jack and Hayley, I’d be happier if I knew you with your parents.”

“I’m not leaving you.”

“It might be for the best, and then I can make decisions on the hoof.”

∞

Sean sat watching Jenny, his bull mastiff, drink from her bowl.

He stared for several minutes, even after she’d finished he continued to stare; it could’ve been 5 minutes it could’ve been 10. Jenny stared back at him; self conscious, water slipping unnoticed from the side of her jaws, dropping unheeded onto the floor.

Sean started to lap air with his own tongue, slowly, trying it out ‘Why don’t we drink like that? Cats lap, lions lap, tigers lap, buffalos lap, cows lap….’

Abruptly, startling the watching dog, he knelt down and stuck his tongue into the bowl and commenced lapping. Frustrated with the small amount he was getting into his mouth he leaned over and put his face in further, slipped and got a load of water up his nose. He snorted and Jenny sat back on her haunches, quietly observing. He got even lower, tilted his head back a bit and tried to lap some more but it was really uncomfortable, hurting his neck.

“What the fuck are you doing?” asked Brendan.

“How did cave men drink?” asked Sean.

“What?”

“If he didn’t have a cup, how did a cave man drink?”

“With his hands,” said Brendan.

Sean pulled a face, then scooped some water out of Jenny’s bowl and drank it. Brendan shook his head and walked out of the room.

“Or he could’ve sucked,” said Sean, bending over the bowl again.

Jenny sat further back on her haunches and watched her master.




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25 Serialisation of the book 'Uprising' 1st book in the 'Corpalism' series - by Arun D Ellis

It must be love


Keep love in your heart.
A life without it is like a sunless garden
when the flowers are dead.

Oscar Wilde


Terry and Sandra sat and cuddled in her front room watching daytime TV; chat shows, reality TV and reruns.

“I miss my Dad.” The words entered starkly into the comfortable space. “And my Mum sometimes, even though I didn’t know her really.”

“Yeah, you will do” Terry muttered, his face in her hair, his eyes suddenly watchful.

“What were your parents like?”

“Real or adoptive?”

She snuggled against him, “sorry, adoptive…”

“Dunno know really,” said Terry, “They sent us all to boarding school.”

“What do you mean, ‘all’?” asked Sandra.

“Well, all the orphans were adopted by party members, it was some sort of media exercise designed to unify the nation.”

“Doesn’t sound very loving,” said Sandra.

“Loving it definitely wasn’t; I don’t think they wanted us really, not the wives anyway, that’s why they packed us all off, I guess.”

“What is she like?” asked Sandra, “your adoptive mother.”

“Cold,” said Terry, “I didn’t really have much to do with her; we were looked after by the nanny more than by Cynthia really.”

“You have brothers and sisters?”

“Well,” said Terry, “sort of, we didn’t really get on.”

“Why not?” asked Sandra.

“Well I was away so much; at boarding school I only saw them in the holidays. We just never clicked.”

“Did they go to boarding school?” asked Sandra.

“Oh yes,” said Terry, “to be fair Cynthia wasn’t any better with her own kids.”

“They didn’t go to the same school as you then?” asked Sandra.

“No,” said Terry, “it was just us orphans at this school, strange but that’s how they played it.”

“How many brothers and sisters?”

“Two brothers and 3 sisters,” said Terry.

“Wow,” said Sandra, “big family.”

“Big but not really a family,” said Terry, “I don’t think they even like each other.”

“Oh, shame,” said Sandra, “all we really have is family.”

“I’ve always found friends more reliable,” said Terry. She looked puzzled. “You choose your friends, family is foisted on you.” She still didn’t look convinced so he continued, “Well you could be related to say, Jack the Ripper,” he smiled as Sandra shivered theatrically, “and that wouldn’t be good. But you can be friends with someone you choose because you like them, someone you can talk to.”

“D’you have a best friend?”

“I did,” said Terry.

“What’s his name?” asked Sandra.

“Rob…Rob Spencer”

“Where’s he now?” asked Sandra.

“Not sure really,” said Terry, “though he’ll be around somewhere.”

“Oh,” Said Sandra, “but you can always rely on him?”

“Not so much now,” said Terry, Rob’s parting words, ‘we’re even now, remember that’ popped into his head, “but we always used to be there for each other, when we were younger.”

“My dad and brothers have always been there for me,” said Sandra.

“It’s different for girls,” said Terry, putting all thought of Donald’s last moments from his mind, “dads and brothers are always there for them.”

“Is that how you see it?” asked Sandra.

“Yep, girls need protecting.”

“I dunno,” said Sandra, “never really thought about it like that.”

“Girls also expect their dads and brothers to be there for them,” said Terry, “mum’s are for listening and dads are the big stick and brothers are there to help if you get into trouble.”

“I never knew my mum,” said Sandra. “She died when I was little.”

“Oh, I’m sorry,” said Terry, wishing not for the first time that Donald had kept his mouth shut.

“Yeah, well, I never knew her, just one of those things.”

“I’m still sorry,” said Terry, “It must’ve been hard being the only girl in the house.”

“It wasn’t so bad… anyway, what about brothers?” she changed the subject and he accepted the change without comment.

“What about them?”

“Well,” said Sandra, “don’t brothers stand together against all comers?”

“Hah… only in films, not in real life, I mean you stand by them as best you can, whether they’re right or wrong, but, well if your brother’s a total arse then you should let him take what’s coming, but you can’t stand back and let your sister take a hit no matter how awful she is.”

“You’re a chauvinist,” said Sandra.

“No I’m not.”

“Yes you are,” said Sandra, “if she’s a bitch you should leave her to get what’s coming.”

“Ah,” said Terry, “bet you always expected Don to be there for you though.”

“And Darren,” laughed Sandra, “they’d better be anyway.”

“Anyway that didn’t really enter into things for me, I was never around the family enough to build any kind of bond with them, and I don’t know them or understand the way they think.”

“I think that’s sad,” said Sandra, “not to have a real family.”

“Oh don’t get me wrong, I had a good relationship with my father, he was always there for me, always wanted to know how things were and that.”

“Really,” said Sandra, “well that’s good.”

Terry was silent for a moment, replaying the pictures of his father lying on the mortuary slab. “Yes,” he said finally.

“Are you hungry?” said Sandra, with another obvious but welcome change of subject.

∞

Sgt Smith knocked on the Superintendent’s door.

“Enter,” said Bill Travers looking up from his desk, “right, what have you got for me sergeant?”

“Well sir,” said Sgt. Smith, “it looks like some kinda big powwow alright; we have every community leader from the Southside in attendance.”

“Are they all our people?” asked the Super.

“Well, apart from the foot soldiers,” said Sgt Smith, “definitely our people.”

“Well then, we’d better find out what the fuck is going on,” said the Super, “get onto their handlers and tell them I want an update ASAP. I don’t like getting emails like this from upstairs Smith; please make that clear to them.”

∞

Don burst into the front room, obviously extremely irritated.

Sandra sighed and tried to distract him, “Where’s Darren?”

“I don’t know and I don’t care,” said Don, “What do you know about our dad?”

‘Shit,’ thought Terry, ‘great timing Don.’

“What do you mean, bursting in here like this?” demanded Sandra.

“He said dad was a plant, an informer for the state,” said Don.

Sandra looked at Terry, “What?”

“Look, I should go…” said Terry.

“No you don’t,” snapped Don, “what the fuck was all that?”

“What do you think?” answered Terry.

“I want to know,” said Don.

“What’s he talking about, Terry?” asked Sandra.

“He said dad was a…” began Don.

“I heard you first time, I’m asking Terry.”

“I never actually said that,” answered Terry.

“Yes you did,” said Don, “by implication anyway.”

“I said that the community leaders you invited to the meeting are informers.”

“Yeah and by implication, so was my dad,” said Don.

“What’s he talking about Terry?” demanded Sandra, “What’s he saying about dad?”

“Not necessarily, Don, there are bound to be plenty of community leaders who aren’t and it’s a good bet your father is one of them.”

“I asked Ice,” said Don, “but he wouldn’t tell me anything.”

“Well, perhaps there’s nothing to tell,” said Terry.

By now Sandra was on her feet, “What do you mean? What’s going on?”

“Nothing’s going on,” said Terry.

“Yes it is,” said Don, “he’s also Special Forces, now I bet he didn’t mention that in one of your quiet tête a têtes.”

The door bell rang, Don looked out the window, “Shit, it’s Jimmy and the others.”

“Terry, I want to know what’s going on…” Sandra’s tone was ominous.

“Nothing,” said Terry, “He’s got the wrong end of the stick, that’s all.”

“Fuck have I,” snapped Don.

The door bell rang again.

“Don’t let them in,” said Don, “I want answers from him first.”

“Look,” said Terry, “it’s really very simple, when I was at boarding school we were put through specific Special Forces training, I think they had the idea we would all be some élite squad or something, okay.”

“What about my dad?” demanded Don.

“I don’t know anything about your dad,” said Terry, “all I know is that there are informers in every sink and as a rule they have been planted near the top of the tree.”

“Why?” demanded Sandra, “I don’t understand.”

“Because they’re here to direct as well as monitor for trouble makers,” said Terry.

“Well, dad never split on anyone,” said Don, “no-one disappeared or anything.”

“Well, then he wasn’t an informer,” said Terry.

“What do you mean wasn’t?” demanded Sandra.

“I mean isn’t,” said Terry, “look this really is …..”

Darren wandered downstairs, opened the front door letting in Jimmy, Dave and the others, then turned and walked back up the stairs.

“What the fuck was all that?” demanded Jimmy, “I’ve just spent half the day settling my people down.”

“Alright, alright,” said Terry.

“They are shit confused about us, you Donald and everything and they don’t know whether they’ve been blown or set up or….” Dave was almost incoherent, rambling.

“Look,” said Terry, “let’s get everyone into the room, okay, then I can tell you what I know.”

Lawrence collapsed into a chair near the door; Eric perched on the arm, looking much the worse for wear, both of them looking to make a quick exit if it seemed appropriate. The O’Connells sat together on the settee, disconcertingly similar in both appearance and mood. Dave, pugnacious and red-faced, chose to stand next to Don by the fireplace, his arm draped along the mantle, trying for a relaxed pose.

“Okay,” said Terry, “Sandra, Don, I don’t know anything about your father, I don’t know where he is, what’s happened to him. I don’t know if he’s a plant or not, I don’t have any names of any informers okay? I know that hundreds have been planted in all the sinks, that they’re respected members of each community and that they have a great deal of influence.”

“How do you know all this?” demanded Dave.

“Let me finish … their job is to keep things on an even keel, to make sure there’s no real unrest in the sinks. They monitor for rebels, for trouble makers, identify them to the law and they mete out special treatment.”

“Special treatment?” demanded Jimmy “is that what happened to Dale?”

“No,” said Terry.

“How d’ you know that?” demanded Brendan.

“Yeah,” said Paddy, “how d’you know what happened to Dale, all of a sudden?”

“I don’t,” said Terry, “but believe me, if Donald was an informer you O’Connells would’ve disappeared years ago.”

Jimmy frowned and waved his brothers back, “he’s got a point; Donald was always there for us, he could’ve sunk us anytime.”

“Donald seems to have protected you, not the act of an informer.”

“Then who is?” demanded Dave, “it has to be someone in this room, that is if what you’re saying is true.”

“Well, maybe it was Tom, after all,” said Lawrence.

“There you go,” said Terry, “Makes sense, doesn’t it.”

“Quiet you,” said Eric, “we need to think on that.”

“Well,” said Terry, “I don’t know anything, and I don’t know anything about your history, only you have those details but I think it’s safe to say Donald isn’t an informer and I’m pretty confident nobody in this room is, so all things being equal I’d say Tom was probably your man.”

“How do you know it’s no-one in this room?” demanded Jimmy.

“Well if my cover had been blown I think I’d have known by now, the fact that you’re all still here suggests to me that none of you have anything to hide.”

“Could it really’ve been Tom?” asked Eric, “I mean, did we get that right?”

“I think we must’ve,” said Lawrence.

“So we didn’t kill the wrong person,” said Paddy.

“Kill?” Sandra’s voice was a squeak of disbelief.

“Figure of speech, Sand … that’s all” Don’s hand on her arm did little to calm her.

“Yeah Eric,” enjoined Jimmy, “Did we get that one right? Didn’t I hear you say you thought he was innocent? Didn’t I hear you accuse us of…?”

“Ah, now come on,” started Eric, “I didn’t know we had….”

“Look, leave it out guys,” said Dave, “let’s just concentrate on what we do know, okay.”

“Does that mean dad wasn’t … isn’t…an informer?” asked Sandra.

“Look we need to all stop a minute and ….” started Don.

“Hey, you accused us of killing an innocent man, you fucker,” yelled Brendan at Eric, “so now you fucking apologise.”

“We need to just speak one at a time,” yelled Don.

“Stop saying kill!! shouted Sandra, “just fucking SHUT UP!” The room was instantly silent as all heads turned towards her. “Answer the question. Was my dad an informer or not?”

“Not,” said Terry, hastily “by the looks of things, it was Tom.”

“Yes,” said Don, “it was Tom,” though his tone wasn’t as confident as it might’ve been.

“Yes it was Tom,” said Dave, firmer and accompanied with a strong nod.

“Tom,” agreed Jimmy, “Eric? Well?”

“Yes,” said Eric, “it was Tom.”

“Right,” said Sandra, “and no-one is saying anything else about killing anyone?” A general chorus of ‘no, no – a figure of speech is all’ went round the room; she nodded, “and everyone’s happy with Terry’s explanation of his training?”

There was silence for a few moments before Don spoke, “erm, I guess so, I mean, are we?”

The others exchanged flicked glances and then sort of shrugged.

Eric asked what they were all thinking, “I still want to know how you ended up in Relocations and how you got sacked.” He took courage from the grunts of appreciation coming from the others, and continued his theme, “If you were put through Special Forces training and all that they must’ve had big plans for you?”

“I dropped out,” said Terry.

“Dropped out?” questioned Dave, narrowing his eyes.

“Yeah but they’d spent a lot of money on you,” said Lawrence.

“My dad’s quite high up, he prevented any serious repercussions.”

“Looked after you, you mean,” said Jimmy, “bloody silver spoon.”

“He didn’t look after me; I’m here, aren’t I? He could’ve stepped in and paid my debt.”

“Then why hasn’t he?” demanded Dave.

“Because the last time I saw him he said he’d washed his hands of me and I was on my own, okay.” The lie came surprisingly easily, although he avoided looking at Sandra as he spoke.

“And d’he mean it?” demanded Sean.

“What do you mean, did he mean it? Look, I’m here because I turned my back on my adoptive family and their way of life. That’s it, plain and simple”

“Right you lot,” said Sandra, “I’ve had just about enough of it. You burst in here, ruin our afternoon for no good reason. Most of what you’ve been ranting about is either impossible to prove, a lie, or obviously just rubbish. Why don’t all just sod off and leave us alone? Don?

“Er…” said Don.

“Don?” repeated Sandra.

“Er, we’ll go then.” said Don.

“Good,” said Sandra, “well go then. Now, all of you, go, go on, OUT!”



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24 Serialisation of the book 'Uprising' 1st book in the 'Corpalism' series - by Arun D Ellis

Community Leaders


Experience demands that man is the only animal
which devours his own kind,
for I can apply no milder term to the general prey of the rich on the poor.

Thomas Jefferson


Three days later a group of community leaders from lower Boro, Southside made their way to a small community hall; 30 people give or take and each one had received a personally delivered verbal invitation, issued in the name of Donald Snr.

Terry had insisted on all wards being represented and had borne impatiently the resultant delay. He’d been given the low-down on the leaders, including a vivid description of the one woman in the group; Irene, widow of one of the most feared men in Boro whose viciousness paled now besides the rumours that surrounded her name.

It was 19:00 hrs by the time the last one was seated. Jimmy had posted his brothers and several of their mates at the various doors; a dual purpose was served, keeping the selected in and the interlopers out. The community leaders understood the risks of such a large meeting and their attendance indicated implied acceptance, but the added burden of knowledge concerning the chip’s locator facility was known only to Terry, Don and the others.

Terry had positioned himself on the stage behind a lectern; a shield, a leaning post and a symbol of authority. Don was seated in one of the chairs in the row behind him, with Lawrence and Dave, stand-in father figures protecting Donald’s boy, positioned solemnly on either side of him. Eric was in the audience, his choice. Sandra had been persuaded to stay home, to be there in case Donald turned up had been Don’s argument, stoutly supported by Terry.

He looked out over the assembly, thinking again how glad he was that Sandra was out of it, if this went wrong, it could go seriously wrong. Then he spoke his voice betraying none of this concern, “Gentlemen, and Irene, thank you for coming,”

She acknowledged the personal salute with the barest flicker, some in the audience nodded, others sat stony faced, and all wondered who Terry was.

“You’ve been invited here to talk about the future,” said Terry, “but before we can do that I have to raise a rather thorny issue, that of informants.”

“Where’s Donald?” demanded a large black man in the front; he’d caught Terry’s attention at the start, not just size but demeanour singled him out, this must be the feared Ice Man of whom he’d been told.
Moment of partial truth… “Donald’s not here yet,” said Terry

“Why not?” demanded a small wiry man from a few rows back, “and pardon my French, but who the fuck are you?”

“My name’s…” began Terry at which point Don stepped forward.

“It’s okay,” he said, “most of you will know me and for those who don’t, I’m Donald’s son.”

“So?” said someone.

“My dad would vouch for Terry,” said Don, “if he was here.”

“Well that’s dandy,” said Ice Man, “but not good enough.”

“It’ll have to be,” said Terry, “that is, until Donald gets here.”

“Where is Donald?” demanded the wiry man, getting into his stride.

“Late,” said Terry.

The room was filled with blank looks.

“Look,” said Terry, “you’ve all been invited here by people you know and trust, and Donald would be here if he could. You all know each other and you know Don or most of you know Don, so there should be no real problem.”

“If there is,” said Ice Man, “you’ll be the first to find out about it.”

“I’m sure I will,” said Terry.

“Okay,” said Don, “just give us a chance to explain, that’s all we’re asking.”

There was no reaction from the group so Terry chose to ignore the silent hostility and ploughed on, “First,” he said, “I’d like to tell you a story and I’d appreciate it there were no interruptions until the end, if that’s ok.”

“No it’s not,” said Ice Man, “I didn’t want to be here. I’m not about to sit here an’ let someone I don’t know talk at me.”

“Well,” said Terry, “that’s understandable but please, if you bear with me I think you’ll like what I have to say, eventually that is.”

“I’m with Ice Man,” said someone else, “this is a shit thing you got me into, O’Connell.”

Jimmy jumped in, “Listen, you might not like being here but this needs to be done, things need to be said, we ain’t none of us gettin’ nothin’ outta the way things run round here and it’s about time we did something about it.”

“Is that right?” said Ice Man, rising to his full 6’ 6”.

“Okay ‘Ice Man’,” said Terry, “we can all see how big you are but what are you doing for your community? How are your people coping with the shortages?”

“I’m doing just fine,” said Ice Man, “ain’t no whitey gonna try and slip into my territory and take over.” Having said his piece he folded himself back onto the chair.

“That’s not what this is about, Ice,” said Don, “it’s about all of us acting together, to change things.”

“Ah, this is a waste of time,” said someone from the back of the hall, rising to leave, “you ain’t gonna change nothin’. It’s been like this for years and it’ll always be like this.”

“Sit down Jake,” snapped Jimmy as Brendan readied himself to bar the exit.

Terry thought quickly, recalling the bios he’d been given. If memory served, Jake controlled a small ward, not mission critical; he could use him as a test case. “It’s okay Jimmy, if he wants to leave, let him, at least we’ll know which side of the fence he’s on.”

“What the fuck does that mean?” demanded Jake.

“It means the sinks are crawling with informants,” said Terry, “and anyone who isn’t interested in changing things for the better is more than likely an informant.”

“I ain’t no informant,” said Jake, “and I’ll kill any man who say’s I am.”

“No one’s saying you are an informant, but,” said Don, turning his hands up in the classic questioning pose, “if you’re not interested in improving things then it’s a bit sus.”

“Sit down Jake,” said Ice Man, “first we’ll hear what little whitey has to say and then if we don’t like it,” he paused for effect, “we’ll kill him.”

Jake grunted a bit, then nodded and sat.

“Okay,” said Terry, “let’s begin at the beginning shall we, where this war really started.”

“War?” demanded someone, “What war?”

“Please, gents,” said Don, “just listen.”

“Yeah, but you said there was a war,” said the same voice, thin and reedy, anxiety paramount.

“He didn’t mean between us, Tim,” said Eric, turning in his chair to look at a young man three rows behind him, “just listen and you’ll see where he’s going.”

“Give me a chance; all of you” said Terry, “please.”

There was a brief silence.

Then “We’re listening whitey,” said Ice Man, “but we ain’t patient types.”

“Okay,” said Terry, “the beginning then. Back in the 80’s...”

“Are you taking the piss? What the fuck do you know about the 80’s?” said someone.

“Look,” snapped Terry, “The world outside your little ghetto is turning to shit and if you really want to change things for your community now’s the time to jump on board.”

“That’s cute, whitey,” said Ice Man.

“Well, you might think so, but it doesn’t seem so cute to me, whilst you people are stuck here, barely scraping a living, d’ you have any idea how the rich are living? How much they have? How completely different your lifestyles are? They live like gods and you live like slaves so listen up, ‘cause this is a wakeup call.”

Ice Man stared at Terry for a full 30 seconds before leaning back in his chair and crossing his arms, “I ain’t no slave … and the clock’s tickin’, so get on with it, white boy.”

Terry waited a few seconds, “Okay, so we’re back in the 80's with Thatcher. I know everyone’s heard of Thatcher, hell one of the streets here is named after her, but what she did to this country takes some understanding so I’d like to run through it again so we can see how they achieved all of this.” He waved his arms, indicating all of them, the small hall, their small lives. Those gathered moved restlessly in their seats, some nervously, some irritably and some he noted, rather aggressively. Jimmy nodded to Paddy to move closer to the most restless group …all known bully boys. “Okay, first things first, Thatcher wasn’t the architect; that dubious honour belongs to Keith Joseph, Thatcher was a believer and a credible mouth piece.”

“Keith Joseph? Why’s he got two Christian names?” Sean hissed at the person nearest him who happened to be a Muslim, obvious to anyone but Sean, and one clearly not pleased with the assumptive reference to the infidel’s religion.

“Keith who?” whispered Don to Lawrence.

“Bit before my time,” said Lawrence, “no idea how Terry’s heard of him.”

“Probably his posh education,” sneered Dave, by no means a ‘Terry’ convert, and having taken a seat on the stage only in support of Donald’s son.

“Thatcher and her cronies told British workers that they weren’t competitive enough and then created the right circumstances for British industrialists and entrepreneurs to close their factories and businesses in Britain and then reopen them in poorer 3rd world countries where costs such as wages and rents were nonexistent,” said Terry, passion trembling in his voice.

He’d vented and decried the whole concept to whoever would listen throughout his adolescence. This was the first time he’d tried it out on a real audience, sod’s law it had to be one so hostile.
He made himself continue, “The intention of economists at the time was that the private sector would create or develop a service based economy in Britain.”

The room was quiet, all eyes on him.

He took a sip of water, ‘Christ why am I doing this? “The rich invested in what was termed at the time ‘emerging markets’, namely, companies being set up in the 3rd world by western industrialists and Corporations.” He stood upright; he’d been leaning over the lectern as he spoke, trying to get his message across and putting his whole body into it. “The idea was that the west would invent, the third world would build and the western worker would buy.”

“Yeah, we get the idea,” said a female voice, the infamous widow, “and we know already.”

“You should do,” said Terry, looking out across the room, trying to locate her, “but somewhere along the way you’ve learned to live with it rather than resist the unfairness of what occurred.”

“Who’re you to talk?” said Jake, “What d’ you know about what we’ve learned to live with? Who the fuck is he, anyway?” He directed this at Don.

“Look please,” said Don,” If you’ll just bear with us for a bit longer.”

“Keep going,” said Ice Man, “I want to hear what you gotta say.”

Terry nodded, “So that was the plan they sold to the people…that the west would ‘invent’, the 3rd world would ‘build’ and the western worker , employed in the service industry which replaced the manufacturing base, would ‘buy’. Now, whether it was meant to be permanent or they had other long term plans, we’ll never know… but what we do know, and what should’ve been clear at the time, is that the ‘private’ sector didn’t create enough service based industry jobs.”

He took another sip of water, he didn’t like public speaking and his throat was painfully dry, “So people were out of work, not enough buying going on….to fill the gap the government created public sector service jobs, all governments did it, right or left; they had to reduce unemployment, to create demand for other services, to increase spending power, maintain the number of consumers for these goods being made in the 3rd world.”

The room came alive at that moment, throat clearing and murmurs of what? Dissent? Agreement? Terry couldn’t tell. Neither could Jimmy who made himself more visible and pointed organizing fingers at the door guards.

“Yeah, they created the national debt that we’re still paying off,” shouted someone.

“All of this was designed to make sure,” continued Terry, raising his voice against the catcalls now emerging from the crowd, “that the industrialist and the investor had their constant return of interest.” He paused briefly, ‘this is a nightmare. How’m I ever going to convince these people that they’ve been had.’

“You got this all wrong.” shouted someone else.

Don and Dave were on their feet; Lawrence still seated was making ineffectual calming hand gestures.

“What’s he on about?” hissed Sean to Brendan.

“Fucked if I know,” said Brendan, “I just hope he knows what he’s doing.”

“What d’you mean?”

“You been paying attention?” asked Brendan.

“Yeah.”

“Well, he’s pissed off just about everyone in the room, and if he don’t put it right there’s gonna be an awful ruckus.”

“So?” said Sean, “We can handle it.”

“Idiot,” said Brendan, “can you count?”

Sean scanned the room, “I’m not scared of any of these fat fucks.”

“Good,” said Brendan, “then you can fight them, all of them.”

Ice Man stood up and signaled to the room for silence, and then he sat down again; an unexpected ally.

Terry took heart and continued, “In the end, a service based economy, shops, restaurants, hotels, holidays, is vulnerable to collapse when there’s a recession and that is exactly what happened, with the great banking disaster of 2008.”

He started to pace, coming out from behind the lectern and moving from one side of the stage to the other, his stride lengthening as his confidence grew. “I’m not going to go into the ins and outs of how the banks lost all the money, I’m just going to say that it put huge pressure on the world economies and governments when they were already exposed…most of them, just like the UK, had spent a lot on creating jobs that didn’t bring any financial return by way of Gross Domestic Product. The net result was that the economies of several countries collapsed and a desperate period of austerity began for all, except….”

He paused and took a drink before continuing, then recommenced his pacing, “It wasn’t actually austerity for all. It was austerity for the likes of you and me. The seriously rich are seriously rich still. The industrialist still had his factories in the 3rd world and the investor still had his money in emerging markets, all they had to do was find a new consumer for their products …which they did.”

Ice Man started to nod his head almost imperceptibly; it was not wasted on Don and the others.

“They made money more available to the workers in the 3rd world so they could become buyers as well as builders” he was almost shouting now, “Western governments told their people that they had over spent on their credit cards, bringing this recession upon themselves” he paused, and then he did shout, a controlled burst of fury “but this was a lie.”

Terry paused and checked the room, he had their attention.

He softened his voice “The industrialists and investors wanted to maximize their return, so they put all their funds into the 3rd world. The result was massive unemployment and poverty in the west, western governments raised fewer taxes, and to top it off those same governments reduced the taxes for the rich, scared of the threat of them leaving if they didn’t.”

He walked over to the lectern and leaned against it, needing its shelter and all his energy for the finale. “Governments, like the UK government, hid behind ‘austerity measures’ to reduce services for the masses, like libraries and refuse collections, to privatise the NHS, to cut social benefits and scrap free public education, then they forced up property prices and cut out social housing.” he glared round the room, his anger at the conspiracy fuelling the tirade. “You’ve all heard of the Occupy Movements of 2011? Ordinary people taking to the streets to protest peacefully about the 1% who own everything? People willing to stand up for the rest of us against the system and its weapons; pepper sprays, tear gas, water cannon, rubber bullets…”

“Yeah, we heard” Jake stood up and spoke, looking round at his fellow leaders, rallying support, “and where are they now? In prison, dead, destitute…”

Terry looked down from the stage and met his eyes. He nodded slowly, “Yes …they were crushed, deliberately and coldly crushed in the tidal wave of anti-terrorist laws brought in to combat so-called atrocities on our streets.” He lifted his arms “As was Colin Carpenter and the rest of the Independents, who were trying to achieve a fairer society using democracy, trying to occupy the political space…yet the real atrocity is here and now, in Boro and places like it all over the world, where hundreds of thousands of people, millions of people, are condemned to live their lives in squalor and penury while the world’s 1% still lives in obscene luxury.”

He stopped talking, took a deep steadying breath, wondered briefly if he was insane, and then continued, “They drove the poor to places like this; fenced them in, no way in or out without a pass, ghettos. The mass of the British people now live in places like Boro…I know this for a fact…” final pause, “because I used to work in Relocations.”

The hall erupted. Chairs overturned as their occupants leapt to their feet, a few were sent flying towards the stage. Jimmy and Paddy waded in, fists flying as some of those nearest the stage leapt on to it, trying to get to Terry. Dave happily gave as good as he got, standing back to back with Don who was enjoying himself for the first time since his dad’s disappearance.

Lawrence disappeared; physical violence had never been his strong point. Terry cleared the stage swiftly of the most ambitious attackers, a motley crew of barrel-bellied bullies who were used to size being important. He had the look of someone prepared to defend a position for hours if needs be and gradually the number of takers lessened.

It took a good fifteen minutes for tempers to cool and for people to settle down enough so that individual voices could be heard. By that time Sean and Brendan had cut a swathe through the section of the crowd who’d been luckless enough to sit their side of the hall. One of these had been Eric, apparently unrecognized in the mêlée and now unconscious on the floor. It was another twenty minutes before Terry felt able to reclaim his position at the lectern. The chairs had been righted and people who could sit comfortably were doing so, those more appreciably damaged were leaning against the walls and some, like Eric, had stayed down.

Ice Man had remained aloof from the fracas. He stood and made sure he was seen, “We’re gonna sit here a little longer, and you get to finish your little lecture but you better have something good at the end of it ‘cause if not, that little confession of yours is gonna cost you big time.”

“Fair enough,” said Terry, “but to be honest with you, I don’t really get why you’re all so upset with me, considering most, if not all of you, are informers.”

There was a collective intake of breath as Don moved swiftly to Terry’s side, “you can’t call them informers,” his voice a hiss.

“That’s not a thing for you to say,” Ice Man’s control was slipping, “and you’re asking for it, saying such a thing.”

“Come on, we all know you’re informers,” Terry persisted, shrugging away from Don, “you know it and I know it, the only ones who don’t know are your followers.”

Jake made a lunge onto the stage, Terry sent him flying backwards with a front push kick, resuming conversationally “Look, we can all end up fighting again but that’s not what this is about, we’re here to work together and find a real way forward.”

Don tried again, “you won’t get anywhere calling them informers.”

“Why not,” said Terry, “they are; how else you think their little empires run so smoothly?”

“They don’t have to be informers for that to be the case,” said Don, “look at dad and how he ran things.”

Terry looked at him without speaking, sighed then turned back to the audience, “Listen,” he shouted, reaching to the back of the room “I know you’re informers but not in a bad way. I know you’ve just been trying to make things work for your people, trying to work out a set of rules with the pigs, trying to keep things calm in the ghettos to keep the riot squads out but that hasn’t worked, all that’s happened is they’ve left you here and swelled the size of the ghettos.”

“Who the fuck do you think you are?” yelled a voice from the back.

“Don’t you get it? You’re as much victims as anyone who’s ever been sent here, you’ve not been rewarded for your loyalty, with a big house, money, beautiful women fawning over you...”

“That’s what you fink” said the same voice, nursing a black eye and a grievance.

“He’s seen your Brenda, Mike, he must’ve.” laughed another.

Terry grinned but continued quickly, “you live here, with the rest of us, in a ghetto and you have probably lived here most of your lives. Some of you’ve had children here…but what are you getting out of the deal? What are you getting for your years of loyalty?”

“Quiet everyone,” yelled Ice Man, “as for you” he gave Terry a long, hard stare, “you’re talking yourself into a nice early grave, whitey.”

“He keeps callin’ him ‘whitey, ain’t that racist, Brendan?” Sean whispered hotly into his brother’s ear, for once apparently thinking before he spoke.

“Sean, shut the fuck up” the subtlety evidently wasted on Brendan.

“Yeah, don’t I know it,” said Terry, “the authorities want me dead, you guys probably want me dead and if I don’t win you over, one of you will make certain that I am dead. So yeah, I’m taking a very big risk here but I’m prepared to do that for a better life, for a better way, for me and my friends. All I ask is that you let me finish.”

Ice Man stared at Terry for what seemed an age but was probably only a few seconds, and then he nodded and sat back down.

Terry continued, “What you might not know is there is more than one place in the UK called Boro” he stopped, waited for it to sink in, then continued, “there are three; Boro; Boro 2 and Boro 3, each with a total population of 5 million. Boro is a Triplet city.”

There was a shared intake of breath and a shuffling of feet, but no-one spoke.

“There are other cities, Liverpool, known as ‘the Pool’; Manchester aka Mancs, Newcastle or ‘Toontown’; all of them ghettos and all of them Triplets.”

He looked behind him at a noise from Don who shook his head quickly; he was just as appalled as the rest of them.

Interruption over, Terry began again, “The M4 corridor is now the UK’s dividing line; anything north of the line is a ghetto. Meanwhile the nouveau riche, those who belong to the new global aristocracy, the super rich, they all live south of the line, below the M4 corridor, in luxury.”

He pointed south for effect, “They have everything you can only dream of and it’s all financed by dividends from manufacture and sale in the 3rd world. They don’t need us anymore and that’s why the government doesn’t look after us, why there’s no investment in UK manufacturing.”

Ice Man rubbed his chin, “You claim to know a lot about us but we don’t know nothing about you ‘cept you claim to have worked in Relocations.”

“He did,” said Don, quickly defensive.

“There’s more to it,” said Ice Man, “no-one who just worked in Relocations would know all that.”

“You’re right, Ice Man, there is more.”
Don and Dave leaned forward in their chairs, Lawrence put his head down, grimly awaiting this next revelation, “I’m Special Forces and I’m trained to infiltrate and destroy.”

Jimmy responded with a loud burst of amused annoyance, “I knew it, yer bastard!” He gestured to Paddy, “see he’d never of taken us otherwise.”

Sean’s loud; “I told you he was a liar” was hushed swiftly by Brendan’s elbow to the gut.

Don and Dave looked shocked; Lawrence sat still and silent.

The community leaders, each of them an informant as Terry had said, all of them a government plant, were equally stunned. What was going on? Why had the government sent a Special Forces operative to brief them like this?

“Were you sent here to tell us all this?” asked Ice Man, “or are you rogue?”

“Both,” said Terry.

“Which means what, exactly?” demanded Don, recovering and angry.

“I was sent here to contact community leaders, the government informants here” he waved his arm to indicate the whole group, now sitting as if pinned to their chairs. “I was to monitor the situation on the ground.” He paused and turned to face Don, “However, I’m also rogue - I’m a member of a group trying to overthrow the current regime which is driving our country into the ground and destroying the lives of the vast majority of its people.”

“Are you accusing my dad of being an informant?” demanded Don.

“It is what it is,” stated Terry, “ask your friends here, they know.”

“What in hell’s going on?” demanded Eric, conscious now, having missed all but the last 5 minutes of the proceedings.

“This sounds well dodgy,” said Jake.

“It is,” said Ice Man, “Quiet everyone. Quiet. What are you up to, whitey?”

“You’ve got to listen to me and think about what I’m saying.” He broke off and stared out at the angry faces. “The state is meant to represent the will of the people, the will of the majority of people but today it only represents a few thousand people, everyone else is either ignored by or is a slave to the system. That’s it. That’s all there is. Whatever you were promised in the past, whatever you’ve been promised recently, none of it is real, none of it is ever going to happen, you are always going to be here enforcing their code and if you should ever question it or ask for your pay off… they will kill you.”

“And how do you know that?” asked Ice Man.

“Because I’m the man they’d send,” answered Terry.

Even Ice Man felt the need to get involved this time; he made it as far as two feet in front of Terry before a turning kick to the head floored him. The rest of the activities took place over him and next to him and he was quickly joined on the floor by a few colleagues who’d not taken heed of the warning afforded by his prone position.

The fighting was over quicker second time round; Jimmy and Paddy were faster off the mark and isolated the worst troublemakers, Sean and Brendan’s side of the hall still hadn’t recovered from the first bout and most were too damaged to join in at all, others with a bit more energy threw a few punches but their hearts weren’t in it. The vocal arguments went on for a bit and then after some sub-debates, a bit of shoving and pushing everyone was back in their seat.

Recovered from his brief flirtation with unconsciousness, Ice Man took up Terry’s spot by the lectern, “Okay, okay” he said, flattening his hands in the universal signal of calm, “I don’t like him any more than you do” rubbing the side of his head as he spoke “but it seems to me he got a point. We been stuck in this shit hole for 20 years grubbing out a living and I don’t see anything changing, we still gonna be here another 20 years time.” There were murmurs of assent all round him and much nodding of heads. “I don’t like the idea that some fat banker is sitting on his arse laughing at us, thinking we too stupid to know what’s going on, that don’t sit well with me at all.” More nods, “but if we act, then we all gotta go the same way ‘cause if just one of us sings the wrong tune this place be crawling with Feds and we all be dragged out an’ shot.” He glared at Terry and then back at the crowd, “I don’t mean to get shot, so if anyone thinking to sell us out, he better know we’ll find out an’ when we get him he take days to die.”

“We’re all in this together,” shouted someone, “we all gotta make an oath.”

“An oath is good,” said Ice Man, “and it better be on the bible.”

“Not everyone’s religious, Ice,” said Jake.

“Don’t matter, they sell us out, we get them, the pigs hate this shit as much as us, they won’t take much persuading to come over, anyone does sell us, we get to them,” He tilted back his head, raised his eyes to the ceiling and opened his palms, “and they face the Lord or me.”

Terry walked to the lectern “Remember it won’t just be us in Southside, we need to spread word across the whole of Boro and to the other ghettos so there’s a general uprising.” There were shouts of agreement, “and remember, the people who have jobs and work within the system, the ones working to keep the rich and the ghettos in place are so heavily in debt and so screwed by their workloads that they will join us.”

“But can you be sure of that?” asked Eric.

“Oh they’ll join us, they might be slow off the mark because they don’t look outside their tiny bubble, but they will, once we make it clear to them that they, the workers, are serfs to a system, that their debt is the yoke that holds them, once they realise the reality they will rise with us.”

“They will rise,” intoned Ice Man.

“And remember,” said Terry, “We, the people are the state. So the 1% who have seized control of the nation and its money, they’ve committed an act of treason, treason against the people is the same as treason against the state.”

Don, Dave and Lawrence surrounded Terry, “We need to talk,” said Don.

“I know,” said Terry, but first we need to see this ends smoothly or we’re all dead.”

“We need to talk,” said Don.

“Okay,” said Terry, “tomorrow.”

“No, now,” said Don.

“Tomorrow, we gotta make sure this all ends well here tonight or else everything is lost.”

“You got a lot of questions to answer,” said Dave.

“Not really,” said Terry.

“Tomorrow?” said Dave.

“Tomorrow,” said Terry.

∞

Superintendent Bill Travers opened his emails.

There was one marked high security. He opened it and entered his password. The message told him that over 30 local community informants had been gathered in one place with a number of known transgressors. He was instructed to resolve the issue. “What the fuck does that mean,” he muttered, “resolve the issue?”



More books in the 'Corpalism' series















Compendium editions

23 Serialisation of the book 'Uprising' 1st book in the 'Corpalism' series - by Arun D Ellis

The Way Forward


All the people like us are we
and everyone else is they.
Rudyard Kipling

Don placed the tray of tea and biscuits on the coffee table and stood in the centre of the room, “All right, now that everybody’s calm again we can work out what we’re going to do.”

“Well I know…” started Jimmy.

“Jim,” interrupted Dave, “wait your turn, we agreed.”

Jimmy cursed, grabbed a biscuit and crossed his arms.

“Right,” continued Don, “Lawrence, you’re up first.”

Lawrence nodded and leaned forwards in his chair, “Personally, I think we should lie low for six months and….”

“Oh, come on, Lawrence,” groaned Dave, “We’ve been lying low …we need to do something.”

“That’s right,” said Brendon, “for Dale’s sake.”

“And Tom’s,” added Eric.

“Don’t start that again,” snapped Jimmy, “you were as much a part of all that as the rest of us.”

“That’s right, Eric,” said Don, “in fact Terry’s the only one who wasn’t involved.”

“Well, that’s what I think,” said Lawrence, “so I don’t have anything else to say but that.”

“Okay,” said Don, “thanks Lawrence, and before any of us gets too out of line that is one of our valid options and it’s the one dad has already recommended.”

“Except dad ain’t here, is he,” said Jimmy.

“Yeah, dad ai…” started Sean.

“Shut up, Sean,” said Paddy.

Sean shot Paddy his best piercing look; Paddy ignored him.

Don rubbed his brow, “Okay,” he said, “what about you, Dave?”

“I say we bomb the pig bin.”

“Oh that’s brilliant,” said Jimmy, “why didn’t I think of that? Oh yeah, we don’t have any bombs, or bomb making equipment, oh and to top it all off we don’t know how to make bombs.”

“I do,” said Terry.

As one they turned to look at him.

“Say what?” said Jimmy.

“TA,” said Terry.

“TA?” said Don, “they teach you how to make bombs in the TA?”

“Not all units,” said Terry, “just some.”

“Which ones?” asked Dave.

“The one I was in,” said Terry.

“Shit,” said Jimmy, “we could build a bomb.”

“Make a bomb,” said Terry, “but I don’t think that would be the best way to go at the minute.”

“Why not?” asked Dave, “it would give us instant strike back.”

“And give them an instant and easily identifiable target, besides that would just be a small prick in the side of the beast. No, we need to bring this animal down.”

“Oh yeah,” said Eric, “and how do you suggest we do that?”

“From the inside,” said Terry.

“What does that mean?” asked Dave.

“It’s from The Art of War,” said Terry.

“The what…?”

“The Art of War by Sun Tzu,” said Terry “It’s the definitive book on The Art of Warfare,”

“Oh, the definitive book…” mimicked Jimmy, “and how’s that help us?”

“For one thing, it tells us that if we want to have a low key, meaningless and futile battle which no one will ever hear about in the first place let alone remember or join, then we bomb the local police station.”

Dave made a face, “It was just an idea…”

“But if instead we want to create the wave of resistance that they won’t be able to ignore or crush, then we must attack the beast from the inside.”

They all stared at Terry for a bit, wondering about him and trying to get their heads round the change. He let them stare. Don spoke first, “Okay, let’s hear what you have to say then.”

“That’s not right,” said Sean, “I haven’t had my turn yet.”

“Shut up Sean,” said Jimmy, “Paddy, see to him” he added with a nod.

“Sure Jimmy,” said Paddy giving Sean a sound thump.

“Fuck,” wailed Sean, “Jesus, Jimmy.”

“Go on, Terry,” said Eric.

“Well,” said Terry, “we lack numbers so we need to grow, we need to get out there to each community, and every sink and tell people what’s wrong with the system…”

“They already know what’s wrong with the system,” interrupted Dave.

“That’s a good point, Dave and well made.” Dave smirked. “But you need to give credit to Government propaganda. Most people, even those on the sinks at some level, still believe that this is the only way the system works and that this is all for the best.” He glanced round, checking his audience for reaction. “Even though they know they’re being screwed, they still believe in the system.” Don and Eric nodded; they knew people like that, a lot of them too. “We need to get out there and reinforce their fears, their hatred and most of all their anger. We need to get each community well and truly riled up so this place is like a tinder box ready to blow.”

“Then we’d just need a spark,” said Dave.

“Which we’ll provide,” said Paddy.

“But before we do that,” stressed Terry, “we need to get the pigs on side, or as many of them as we can.”

“The pigs?” said Jimmy, “They gotta pay for what they did to Dale.”

“It’d take a lot to find out which ones did that, Jimmy.”

“I don’t like this – you come in here and turn it all upside down. Tell me I’ve to forget about me own brother now…” Jimmy’s voice rose, Sean and Paddy were on their feet behind him.

“Believe me; I know what it means to lose someone you care about and if there’s any way we can ID those bastards, we will…” Terry’s voice was calm but the intent deadly. Jimmy nodded slowly, “but for now we wage a campaign; this place has to collapse from within, and for that we need the people rising up and the pigs not stepping in to crush it.”

“But they will,” said Lawrence, “that’s their job.”

“Think,” said Terry, “they’re as low down the pecking order as us, they have hopes, dreams and aspirations too and none of these will be being satisfied; they’re going to be ripe for the taking.”

“Okay,” said Don, “but if things were that easy I’m sure dad would’ve come up with it before now.”

Terry, paused, his mind racing, how do I say this? he didn’t because he was a state plant and oh by the by he wasn’t even your dad, “Well Don,” he said loudly, a cover for his thoughts, “Possibly it wasn’t the right time then, or maybe your father thought it too risky, I don’t know or maybe things weren’t that bad.” He glanced round the room again, “but things have changed, Dale’s dead, Tom’s dead,” Eric shuffled uncomfortably, “and we still don’t know what’s happened to Donald.”

“That’s right” Brendan observed, slowly, watching Terry as he spoke. “We don’t know anything about what’s happened to Donald.”

Terry nodded and quickly changed the subject, “Remember, every other sink has similar issues, similar problems, they will all be ready for some kind of leadership or direction, someone to tell them how to improve their lot...and that’s where we come in.”

∞

Rob entered the room; he noted as he always did that it was small and overcrowded with furniture and ornaments; at odds with its occupant; already seated behind his desk, his voice urbane as ever, “Everything went smoothly, I trust?”

“No problems,” said Rob, “he believed it – all of it.”

“You are certain?”

“Take it from me - as far as Clay is concerned you’re dead and he’s now free to exact revenge.”

“Good,” said Sir Phillip, “I’m impressed with you… a sublime plan. You know your man”

Rob took the rare compliment with a nod, “he just needed nudging in the right direction and everything else fell into place.”

“However, it doesn’t pay to be over confident; the incident with 459 demonstrates that. What did happen there, exactly? How did you let Clayton outwit you, knowing him as well as you do?”

Rob lifted his shoulders apologetically. “Mea culpa, I thought he was chained to the table and he wasn’t. And you know what he’s like, he’s so fast, sir …he always was.”

“Well, it serves as a reminder that things can go wrong, and people can do unexpected things sometimes. Fortunately we had no further use of 459, so no real harm done.” He started shuffling papers, indicating an end to the meeting, “on your way out, send in my secretary, would you.”

∞

“Okay,” said Terry, “we’ve got to expect that it’s known you’re all here – in this house, together.”

Eric stood up abruptly, looking for the exit. Don put his hand on his arm, slowing his progress. Dave didn’t budge apart from sticking out his chin in a ‘let ‘em try something’ stance. Jimmy was still, his eyes ranging his brothers’ faces gaining tacit consensus. Eric subsided into his chair, getting a nod from Lawrence for his efforts. Terry nodded, satisfied.

“I don’t think it’ll be a problem, not so soon after being pulled in … they know you hang out together and for the most part have left you alone.” That was when Donald ran things, his thoughts intruded, and he had to work hard to maintain a placid exterior, “But we have to think and plan fast. They don’t know I’m here” he lifted his arm slightly; the bandage patched a dull brown, “so they won’t cause you any grief on that score.”

“You’ve caused enough grief as it is” Sean’s comment was sullen; it had no energy.

“We need to remind people why there’s no work,” Terry spoke firmly into the gap, “why they’ve been made to live here on the sink whilst the fat cats live down south in luxury.”

“It’s ‘cause Britain’s a shit hole full a crap,” sneered Jimmy.

“We still invent a lot in this country,” Terry chose his words carefully, trying not to offend.

“Yeah, but we don’t make nothing no more,” said Paddy, “We’ve been pushed out by the krauts and the chinks.”

“You’re right about that, Paddy … we don’t manufacture much anymore. Not in this country anyway – all our factories have been re-opened abroad”

“Yeah but that’s because those countries are more competitive than us.” said Dave.

“No, it’s not” said Lawrence, “it’s because they are in a better position to kill or imprison any opposition to their power. So the people are willing to work for a $ a day”

“Exactly,” said Terry, “and we did the same thing in this country.”

“What do you mean?” asked Eric.

“When the Government crushed the strikes 20 years ago they managed to create the impression that they were crushing a communist rebellion.” Terry was approaching the difficult bit; if he lost them at this point he didn’t think he’d get them back.

“Which they were.” said Don.

“No,” said Terry, “it was all a lie.”

“I knew it,” said Eric.

“Oh fuck off Eric,” snapped Dave, “I’m fed up with you claiming to have known everything all the time.”

“Fuck off yourself,” said Eric.

“They took out all the people who were resisting the movement of manufacture abroad,” Terry moved it along, building momentum “moved all the jobs overseas, then cut benefits to unemployed people in the South to force them to move to cheaper areas.”

“Yeah, well, we know all this,” said Lawrence, himself an expelled Londoner.

“You know it,” said Terry, “but you live with it, why aren’t you out on the streets fighting?”

“Hey, hey” said Dave, “it’s easy to come in from the outside and say all this shit, it’s completely another thing to try and live here.”

“But that’s what I’m asking; you’ve tried to live with it, why?”

“How else are we going to survive?” demanded Eric.

“That’s the way they want you to think.” He found himself pointing at Eric and folded his finger into his palm. He took a breath and began again, “The whole thing is unacceptable. But you’ve done everything you can to make it work and that’s what keeps them in power and you up here in the ghettos.”

“What choice did we have?” said Dave, his hackles rising almost visibly.

“Yeah, dad always said we had to live in the system because it couldn’t be beaten,” said Don.

“Well, perhaps he was wrong,” said Eric, “I mean if all we’ve been doing all these years is making the system work better for them.”

“He wasn’t wrong.” snapped Don.

“Look,” interrupted Terry, “I’m sure it was the right thing to do at the time, they had the power, and they’d just crushed what they painted as a communist revolution. I’m sure anyone trying to resist would’ve ended up inside or dead, but that was then, this is now and things have changed.”

“How?” asked Lawrence, “How’ve they changed?”

“They got greedy” said Terry, “they got so far up their own butts with success they forgot to keep the middle classes happy.”

“What do you mean?” asked Eric.

“Well for one thing they have huge debts,” said Don. He looked at Terry, “ain’t that right, Terry.”

“Exactly,” said Terry, rewarding him with a smile, “they know they’ll have to work forever just to keep paying the interest, they’ll pass their debts to their kids who’ll do the same to their kids and so it goes on.”

“Why should we care? We’ve got nothing and we work at shit jobs.” Jimmy spoke up, his tone resentful.

“I’m telling you so you know they’re not happy living in the system either.”

“And you know this, for a fact” said Lawrence, “it’s not just you wishful thinking.”

“The vast majority are just working serfs with debt as their yoke,” said Terry. “There’ll be some doing better than others who aren’t so bothered, others who think they can manipulate the system to suit their needs and there’ll be still others who are ‘living with it’” he emphasized the words and looked straight at Eric, “in order ‘to survive’.”

“So where does that leave us?” asked Jimmy.

“Excess to requirements.” Lawrence said, in the tones of one who’d thought this all out himself long ago.

“Unfortunately he’s right,” said Terry, “To the ones who run the system you don’t matter and what they’ve managed to do is convince you that they’re right, that it’s all inevitable and somehow persuade you to accept this as the new status quo.”

“Status what?” asked Sean.

“A 70s band,” said Jimmy. “Got ‘em in that Rock through the Ages book I found.”

“It’s a saying,” said Dave, “means maintain the pecking order or something.”

“I think we’ve drifted from the point though, haven’t we,” said Lawrence.

“Right,” said Terry, “yes, you’re right, okay. Look we need to give people an easily understood message and it must encapsulate the truth of what has occurred.”

“Which is?” said Eric.

“One, manufacturing has been deliberately off shored to countries with massive and cheap labour pools,” said Terry, pulling back a finger each time he enumerated a point, “Two, the world’s run by Corporations not Governments. Three, there’s a new global aristocracy that owns these corporations and consequently rules everything.” He paused, watching their faces, seeing varying levels of acceptance and understanding but no obvious dissent, “ Four, the wealthy earn their living from dividends earned from investments in so-called ‘emerging’ markets, basically off the backs of cheap labour in the 3rd world and Five, the banks and their owners are the supreme power behind everything.”

“When you put it like that…” said Lawrence, “I guess we all already knew this but somehow….”

“Speak for yourself” muttered Paddy.

“It’s easy to forget how important these things are,” said Eric, “when they have control of everything and you’re just struggling, yes, struggling to survive.”

“I know,” said Terry, “but unless you want to spend the rest of forever just surviving at their whim, ‘cause let’s face it, things could still get worse if they wanted them to, you need to act.”

“Sometimes I just wish I was a dog,” said Sean, “dogs are cool, they always have fun and they never seem to have anything to worry about.”

“You are a dog,” sneered Dave.

“Hey,” snapped Paddy, “he’s my bro, if anyone’s gonna call him names it’ll be me or Brendan or Jimmy.”

“Yeah,” said Sean, then, “Oi! Wait a minute.”
Everyone laughed.

“Actually,” said Lawrence, “he’s right, we would be better off just being dogs.”

“What?” said Dave.

“Think about it,” said Lawrence, “I mean we’re the only creatures on the planet that have these problems.”

“What are you talking about?” said Jimmy, “Sean’s just an idiot.”

“We’re slaves, slaves to some cruddy system that doesn’t make sense” said Dave, “How can it be right that the rich and their kids control everything? They might not even be the best people for the job.”

“And they’re protected by the law,” said Terry, “the law of the land which they write.”

“For their own benefit,” said Lawrence, “but guys, it’s always been this way, we know it, we always knew it and there’s nothing we can do about it.”

“Why not?” demanded Terry.

“Because they always win,” said Eric, “Lawrence is right, we can’t do anything about it”

“Except survive at any price.” Terry put it mildly enough, though he was seething.

Eric continued unperturbed, “and even if we revolt then the people we put in power will eventually turn bad as well, it always happens, just like in Viva Zapata.”

“What?” said Jimmy, this conversation was stretching him to the limit, ‘just point me in a direction’, he muttered inaudibly, or so he thought, but Paddy grinned at him and winked.

“It’s a really old film,” said Don, “one of Eric’s favourites.”

“Stars Marlon Brando,” said Eric, “he leads a revolution and finds….”

“Right,” said Terry, “We all know where you’re going with this Eric, but the alternative is to do nothing and accept things the way they are now and that’s just not good enough.”

“Well,” said Eric, “things aren’t so bad, I mean, we’re alive right.”

“Yeah but,” said Lawrence, “is this really what life is meant to be like?”

“And the other example would be The Man Who Shot Liberty Valance,” said Eric.

“Really,” said Dave.

“Yeah,” said Eric, “an example of when law breaks down and might rules the day.”

“Okay,” said Terry, “obviously there are concerns about what would follow but….”

“Ignore him,” said Jimmy, “he’s talking crap.”

“I am not,” said Eric.

“Yes you are,” said Jimmy, “you’re worried you won’t ‘survive’ if things get hairy ‘cause you’re a coward.”

“I’m not a coward,” snapped Eric.

“Sure you are,” said Jimmy.

“No I’m not.”

“Fight me then,” said Jimmy.

“You’re stronger than him,” said Lawrence.

“Not the point,” said Jimmy, “If he wasn’t a coward it wouldn’t matter. He’d take his beating and…”

“Okay guys,” said Don, “I’ve absolutely no idea where this leaves us.”

“Simply with the fact that we must fight if we want to change things,” said Terry, “and the first thing to do is rabble rouse.”

“Not a problem,” said Jimmy, “we can do that alright.”

∞

Terry held Sandra’s hand as they strolled slowly round the streets. He loved the feel of her hand in his, petite and yielding; a soft warmth. He loved the way she walked, the way the tip of her nose moved when she talked, the way her hair hung, the way she smiled and he loved to sink into her deep dark eyes, if things got too tough he could always sink into her eyes.

“I want to know more about you,” said Sandra, “from your childhood.”

“What sort of thing?” asked Terry.

“Everything,” said Sandra, “I want to feel like I was there.”

“I’m not sure there’s much to tell.”

“Where were you born?” asked Sandra, “What were your real parent’s names?”

He took a breath then rattled the words out, “I was born on the Sussex coast, a small place near Brighton and my parents were Anton and Kimberley Price.” His voice was tense and Sandra squeezed his hand, “I was six years old when they were killed, it was 20 years ago, and I don’t remember them or the place. It doesn’t bother me anymore; I can’t remember them so I don’t feel anger or pain.”

“Really?” said Sandra.

“I only know my adoptive parents,” said Terry, “everything else, well it isn’t even a blur.”

Sandra smiled, “I’m sorry for what I said about it,” she said.

“About what?”

“About 12/12,” said Sandra, “I know it must hurt.”

“Really, it doesn’t hurt how you’d think. It’s hard when the anniversaries come up and everyone bangs on about it, first it was every year, then it reduced to waiting for the 5th, then the 10th anniversary… if I get angry it’s because of what happened to all those people more than just what happened to my parents, you know?”

Sandra nodded, “it’s coming up to the 20th soon, isn’t it?”

He shrugged, affecting nonchalance, and then asked, “Why d’you think the Muslims didn’t do it?”

Sandra winced, “please, just ignore that.”

“No,” said Terry, “I’m really interested, seriously.”
Sandra held his face and kissed him, “another time?”

“Okay,” he said, “but I’m more willing to listen than before.”

They walked and talked for hours, arms wrapped round as close as a second skin, stopping to kiss every few feet; they didn’t go anywhere, there wasn’t anywhere to go in the grimy streets of Boro but they were together and everything seemed wonderful; each street had its own beauty.



More books in the 'Corpalism' series














Compendium editions

22 Serialisation of the book 'Uprising' 1st book in the 'Corpalism' series - by Arun D Ellis

Freedom

Sometimes, even to live is an act of courage
Seneca

Clay perched on the edge of his bed, he knew the real violence would start soon and he had to be mentally prepared. He understood his limitations: he could and had stood up to physical beatings, no problem but he’d never kidded himself about his resistance level to real torture. He’d had sight of the implements of inflicting pain, had even been privy to their use and he knew that he’d cough up eventually if he ever found himself on the receiving end, so why wait? He’d considered suicide but at the moment he wasn’t desperate enough, and as yet he hadn’t the means; that time would come later. He heard voices and then footsteps. Then he heard an unexpected yet familiar sound, a dull thump of air, a sound designed not to be heard. The door opened, an armed man appeared in full SAS black kit. Clay didn’t know whether this was the end or help.

The man threw a black hold all on the floor of the cell, “Put these on.” Clay ripped open the bag and pulled on the clothes as quickly as numb fingers would allow. “With me,” said the man, “now.” Clay left the cell, counting two men, both identically clad. They ran through the corridors passing the occasional dead guard as they went, then they were outside the building. Clay was shoved into the back of a waiting van which was moving before the doors fully closed. They drove for what seemed like hours before stopping, then the rear doors opened and Clay was kicked out, rolling as he hit the floor. The van sped away, one of the doors still open, banging.

He got up in a crouch and looked around him. He was in a lay by of a busy duel carriageway; sharing the space with an old Volvo and a brand new Mercedes. Clay felt in his pocket and pulled out some keys. The driver’s door of the Mercedes opened and Rob got out. Clay moved towards him.

“Clay.”

“Rob.”

“I guess we’re even now,” said Rob.

“Guess so,” said Clay.

“I’m sorry about Sir Phillip, if I’d been in charge it wouldn’t have happened like that.” Clay cocked his head, nothing to say. “He was like a second father to me, you know, I would’ve chosen anything but that for him.”

“I know,” said Clay, although he didn’t, in truth he hadn’t known they were that close, “but it would’ve still happened.”

“I like you Clay,” said Rob, “but if it wasn’t for Helmand we wouldn’t be having this conversation.”

Clay nodded, “I know, you’re a company man.”

“Don’t let there be a next time,” said Rob.

“There will always be a next time,” said Clay.

“You can’t beat them,” said Rob, “nobody can, they’ve been here forever and they’ll always be here.”

“You make them sound invincible,” said Clay, “they’re just people.”

“No …they’re not,” said Rob, “they’re society, they’re a culture. The individuals change, but the system goes on, always has, always will.”

“It doesn’t have to be like this…” said Clay.

“Yes it does,” said Rob, “Think of it like the Cavalry versus the Indians. People like you, you’re the Indians and people like me…we’re the Cavalry.”

“But I have to try.” said Clay.

“Then you’ll lose,” said Rob, “like those before you. Whoever you remove will always be replaced by another, it’s the corruption of power, it’s always there. You will never win.”

“Well, perhaps I’ll win for a little while,” Clay grinned suddenly.

Rob nodded once, “Perhaps you will, if anyone can, it would be you, just for a little while anyway.”

“Then join us,” said Clay.

Rob smiled, “No, it’s not for me, Clay… just keep safe and stay away from me.” He went to shake hands then withdrew before completing the movement, “we’re even now, remember that.” He turned, threw “the Volvo’s yours, by the way” over his shoulder, got into his car, typed a quick text ‘Pigeon is flying home’ and then he was gone.


Homecoming

Dream as if you'll live forever, live as if you'll die today.
James Dean

Clay dumped the Volvo a mile outside Boro, in the barn where he and Don had sheltered. In the night it was easy to imagine it would stay hidden, during the day who knew? He sneaked back in the way he and Don had come, heading for Donald’s, hoping Sandra would be there. It was still dark when he arrived and he made a space for himself behind the shed in the back garden and waited until he saw early morning movement inside the house. Cautiously he approached the back door and knocked; banking all he had on Sandra and Don knowing nothing of Donald’s death and his part in it.

Don threw open the door, reaching out “Terry! Shit, man!” he said, pulling Terry into the kitchen “Get inside quick in case someone sees you, Christ … where’ve you been? How did you get here?”

Sandra heard the commotion, heard Don speak and ran in, “Terry!” she cried, and “Oh my god I’ve been so worried.” Terry threw his arms around her as she hugged him, “where’ve you been?”

“They had me banged up somewhere down south,” said Terry, “but they let me go.”

“Same here” said Don, “though they released us months ago.”

“Guess they forgot about me then,” said Terry.

Sandra hugged him and sobbed gently.

“How’d you get here?” asked Don.

“They dropped me outside Boro,” said Terry, “told me if I didn’t report in at the station ASAP then they’d bang me up again.”

“Right,” said Don, narrowing his eyes, “see they roughed you up a bit.”

“Yeah,” said Terry, “but not as much as I thought they were going to.”

“Same here,” said Don, “bit strange really, not what we were expecting.”

“Yeah, well don’t put any store by it,” said Terry, “next time they’ll be sure to give you a good thumping, believe me.”

“Guess so,” said Don.

“Where’s Donald?” said Terry, knowing it would be odd if he didn’t ask.

“We don’t know.” Don’s voice was flat.

“He hasn’t been seen since 28th June and we’re out of our minds….” Sandra’s voice broke and Terry’s arms went round her.

“Did they mention him?” asked Don.

“No,” said Terry, “nothing. They said they’d held me long enough and let me go.”

“We should ask again at the station.” said Sandra.

“Is that wise?” asked Terry, “I mean after what happened an’ all.”

“Oh, they’ve been really helpful down there,” said Sandra, “nothing like you’d expect.”

“Isn’t that a bit strange?” asked Terry. Sandra frowned so he continued quickly to avoid argument, “Well, my experience of them isn’t like that, unless they’re after something.”

“They know all about us, what more could they want?” asked Don

“You told ‘em about your contacts here and on the outside?”

“Course not,” said Don indignantly, “I’d never tell them that, what are you getting at?”

“Maybe they’re just waiting…” said Terry.

“Waiting for us to start up again, you mean.” said Don.

“That’s right,” said Terry, “so you’ll lead them right to ….”

“Yeah, well, someone along the chain must’ve sold us out. If that happened the plan was always to lay low until the heat died down and start up again with a whole new set of people,” Don sounded depressed at the thought.

“What happened with the O’Connells?” asked Terry.

“They botched their exit,” said Don, “so they turned around and came back again.”

“Oh, so it was all for nothing.” said Terry, smothering the urge to talk about what happened to Dale or to ask what Donald had meant about Tom. Curiosity killed more than the cat.

“Are you hungry?” asked Sandra, suddenly, “you must be starving.”

“Look, you two eat, I’m going to nip to the station and ask more questions, someone has to know what’s happened to Dad.”

Terry’s release had fired him with new hope.

∞

Jimmy opened the door, “Don? What you after?”

“Terry’s back,” said Don.

“Did you say anything?”

“No, I played it cool,” said Don.

“What about Sandra?” asked Jimmy.

“She doesn’t know anything about it, anyway,” said Don.

“Right, I’ll get my brothers then we’ll fix this fucker once and for all,” said Jimmy.

“Wait until I get the others,” said Don, “you know what happened last time you lot tried to take him on, and you’re short Dale now.”

“Yeah, yeah,” said Jimmy, “you’d better hurry up then ‘cause I want this son of a bitch.”

Don headed down the path, “And you’d better run,” yelled Jimmy, “’cause we ain’t waitin’.”

Don turned and pointed, “Don’t start anything without us… I mean it.”

“Fuck you,” muttered Jimmy under his breath as he closed the door.

∞

Terry sat back in the settee; contraband ham in white bread, washed down with a hot cup of tea, nothing like it. Sandra came back into the room and snuggled up to him; they sat like that for several minutes before either spoke.

“I really missed you,” she said.

“I missed you as well,” said Terry.

“How much?” asked Sandra.

Terry frowned, “a lot.”

“What’s a lot?” asked Sandra, “like you miss football? Or like you miss roast dinners on a Sunday?”

“I missed you a lot.” said Terry, tensing imperceptibly at the sound of a door opening.

“Well I’m sure that’s not why you came back,” said Sandra, “although I think I can safely say I’m the only girl you know in Boro.”

“I really missed you, you’re the only thing I could think of in that cell, the only thing that kept me going and I really wanted to see you again.” Actually the truth of the matter was that if he’d let himself think of anything but the ordeal in front of him he’d have collapsed but he’d never thought you could say that sort of thing to a woman.

“Honest?”

“Honest,” said Terry, hearing soft footfalls and voices; bracing his feet for quick movement.

Don entered the room closely followed by Jimmy and Sean, with Paddy and Brendon clipping the backs of their heels. A moment later Lawrence and Dave joined the party.

“Don,” moaned Sandra, “couldn’t you leave us a bit of time together, he doesn’t want to talk to you lot at the moment, do you, Terry?”

Terry pulled a face and shook his head, “Not really, but if the guys have some things to clear up, then I think we should talk, after all, things got a bit crazy.”

“That’s right,” said Jimmy, “we need to clear some things up.”

“Where are the others?” asked Terry.

“Eric will be along soon.” said Don.

“And Dale and Tom?” asked Terry.

“Um,” muttered Sandra, “I should be going anyway, I’ve got work, see you later,” she leaned in, kissing Terry on the cheek. He smiled at her, apparently putting his whole self into it but at the same time noticing that Dave and Brendan had taken up position covering the door, Sean and Paddy had done the same for the window, and Don and Lawrence had placed themselves, just out of range, in front of him.

The front door shutting was the signal; Don started in on him.

“So Terry, what happened to you after we got taken?”

“Figured you guys would want a full run down,” said Terry, “surprised you didn’t ask earlier, Don.”

“Well?” said Jimmy aggressively, “What happened?”

Terry ignored him, “Guess they just split us up and sent us to different places, but it’s no longer a mystery how they caught onto us though.”

Don raised his eyebrow, emulating his father “How’d you mean?”

“Yeah,” demanded Jimmy, “how’d they get onto us? They’ve never done before, not before you joined, that is.”

“Yeah,” said Dave, “so what happened this time?”

“Don’t know why you’re so peeved, Dave,” said Terry, “you weren’t there; you haven’t just spent three months in a shit hole.”

“Yeah, but how’d they find us and how’d you get out?” demanded Jimmy.

“What d’you mean?” said Terry, “Don got out, you got out.”

“We weren’t arrested, not properly” stated Jimmy, “they pull us in whenever there’s anything goes down, an ‘cause of Dale they thought we was up to something as well…they missed Sean out ‘cause of his ankle … pretty funny when you think how he did it.”

“They still let you out” replied Terry.” I’d like to know why…”

“What are you getting at?” demanded Don, “you’re the one with questions to answer, everything changed after you joined.”

Jimmy moved towards Terry, “let’s just stop fucking around,” he snapped, “he’s the one who told the cops, he’s the one who spilled the beans, that’s why Dale’s dead, that’s why…”

“Dale’s dead?” said Terry, feigning surprise as best he could, “How? What happened? Look before you guys get too excited, no-one split on anybody.”

“What?” said Lawrence, “of course they did, someone must’ve blabbed, why else did the mission go down?”

“It was Galaxy,” said Terry, “they released a new programme.”

“What are you talking about?” said Lawrence.

“When I was banged up one of the inmates told me about the new system,” said Terry.

“That was nice of him,” said Dave sarcastically.

“I helped him out of a tricky situation,” said Terry, “a few knuckle heads had the idea they were going to gang rape him.”

“Oh what?” said Sean, “so you thought you’d save him for yourself, did you?”

“Shut up, Sean,” snapped Paddy, “leave it to Jimmy.”

“How’d he know about it?” asked Don, “Did he get an invitation to the launch?”

“One of the screws told him,” said Terry, “don’t ask me why, probably trying to scare him or something, or maybe put him off trying to escape, I dunno.”

“What are you talking about?” said Don, “what’s it got to do with Galaxy?”

“Well, I can see it wouldn’t mean much to people who’ve been stuck in a ghetto most of their lives,” said Terry, “but on the outside Galaxy controls everything...” Terry pointed to his bandaged forearm, location of the mandatory microchip implant, “with these.”

“What I want to know is when you told the pigs about the mission?” said Jimmy

“I didn’t,” said Terry, “and believe me, I was more fucked off than any of you, and after all I’ve spent longer in the cells.”

“Dale’s dead,” snapped Paddy, “so believe me you ain’t more fucked off than us.”

Terry paused for what he thought would be a respectable period of time, mourning someone he’d hardly known. “I’m saying, they can now read every single chip in the country, anywhere and at anytime.”

“What do you mean?” asked Lawrence.

“They have a programme, and it knows roughly where everyone should be at any one time and it throws up a warning when people aren’t where they’re supposed to be.”

Lawrence frowned, “but that’s not possible.”

“Sorry, but it is… don’t ask me how they do it, whether it’s a satellite or masts I don’t know but all the chips are in the system already, where you live, where you buy things, where you work if you work, what you earn…”

“Yeah, yeah, we get it,” said Brendan, “but what’s that to do with Dale?”

“Everything… a warning went up the minute we stepped outside.”

“Where we shouldn't've been,” said Don.

“Exactly, they knew the minute we crossed no man’s land and scaled the outer wall.”

“Which explains why they were onto us so quickly,” said Don.

“And how they knew exactly where to find us,”

“What?” demanded Jimmy, “what’re you talking about? He’s the one who’s responsible for Dale’s death, we all said so.”

“No, Jimmy,” said Lawrence, “it doesn’t look like that now.”

“Christ,” said Dave, “what about Tom?”

“Tom?” said Don, “shit.”

“What about Tom?” asked Terry, asking in genuine ignorance this time.

“Nothing,” said Jimmy.

“We thought he’d sold out,” said Dave, “so we…”

“Jimmy…” corrected Lawrence, “We got Jimmy, Paddy and Brendan to deal with him.”

“Oh,” said Terry, “I’m guessing that’s what you intended for me.”

“It still is,” said Sean, “we don’t believe none of your crap.”

“Shut up, Sean,” ordered Jimmy.

“No!” snapped Sean, “I don’t believe a fucking word he says, Dale’s dead and it’s his fucking fault.”

“No, it’s not, Sean,” said Brendan.

“Yes it is,” said Sean, “he’s a liar, and he’s always been a liar.”

“We need to run a test,” said Dave, “see what happens.”

“And how will that work?” asked Terry, “you going to sacrifice someone?”

“Yeah,” said Jimmy, “you.”

“Really,” said Terry, “… see your thinking, but it won’t work with me.”

“Why the fuck not?” demanded Sean.

“No chip,” said Terry, waving his bandaged forearm again, “I dug it out.”

“Christ.” Sean was impressed, inflicting pain on your own self; now that’s cold.

“That’s against the law.” said Brendan.

“Like you care, Brendan, anyway it’s the only way not to be tracked.” said Terry.

“Smart,” said Jimmy, “’cept now you can’t go where the sensors can read your chip.”

“Of course I can,” said Terry, “the programme can’t read people, only the chip implant.”

“But if you go past a sensor and it sees you haven’t got a chip…” started Sean.

“That’s not how it works,” said Don, “it only reads the chip, if you’ve got no chip it doesn’t know you’re there.”

“Then why haven’t we got rid of ours?” asked Sean, not keen on pain but deeply interested in anonymity.

“Because it takes you right out of the system,” said Lawrence. “It means you can’t get into most buildings, you can’t buy anything, you can’t claim your benefits, and you can’t do anything within the system and, therefore, society at all.”

“So, why’d you dig out your chip?” asked Dave, still suspicious, “…and when?”

“I did it this morning,” said Terry, “in Don’s shed.”

“Why?” asked Don.

“Because I’ve had enough.” said Terry.

“What exactly does that mean?” questioned Dave, just as the doorbell rang.

“That’ll be Eric.” said Don.

“That’s good,” said Terry, “after what you said about Tom I was a little worried for him.”

“Shut up, smart mouth,” hissed Sean.

“Leave it, Sean,” said Paddy, “Jimmy’s got it.”

“Fuck off,” muttered Sean under his breath, Paddy thumped him on the arm, Sean winced but said nothing more.

Eric and Don entered the room and each took a seat.

“Say again - why’d you dig out your chip?” asked Don.

“He did what?” said Eric, behind the curve. No-one bothered to bring him up to speed.

“You gonna go live in the hills, Terry?” asked Brendan.

“Or kill yourself, maybe?” asked Jimmy hopefully.

“I’m going to fight back,” said Terry, “and my first act was to get rid of their chip.”

“Get rid of the means to exist, you mean,” said Don, “nobody can survive without a chip.”

“How will you buy food, ‘n’ water, clothes, an’ shoes? Anything? Everything?” asked Dave.

“What’s been happening?” asked Eric, “What are we talking about? I thought…”

“Yeah,” interrupted Don, “things might not be how we thought.”

“I’m going to fight back,” said Terry.

“What d’you mean by, fight back?” asked Dave.

“I’m going to attack them,” said Terry, “I’m going to wage war on their arses, that’s what I’m going to do.”
Jimmy burst out laughing, “Oh you’re going to war, are you? And on their arses, no less?”

“I’ll bet they’ll be quaking in their boots when they hear that,” added Brendan, also laughing.

“No they won’t,” said Terry, “I know that, but what else are we meant to do other than just sit here taking it?”

“We can carry on as before.” said Dave.

“Wait a minute,” said Sean, “we don’t know if he’s telling the truth yet, we should test him or something.”

“What do you mean?” asked Eric.

“Apparently, according to Terry anyway, or should I say Terry’s friend inside the nick, Galaxy can now track us all wherever we go,” said Dave.

“What here, now?” asked Eric, “what all of us? Even me?”

“Everyone in the country, Galaxy can track everyone in the country, all the time.”

“Fuck.”

“Which is how they caught on to us,” added Terry.
Eric frowned, “Wait a minute,” he said, “…what about Tom?”

“We know,” said Don.

“You know,” said Eric, “what does that mean exactly? You know? Since when?”

“Since just ten minutes ago when Terry told us,” said Dave, “it looks like Tom was telling the truth.”

“What!” said Eric.

“I know,” said Dave, “I know.”

“You know? You know? Is that all you’re going to say?” demanded Eric, “We ki….”

“Alright Eric,” snapped Jimmy, “We all know what happened okay, no need to go shouting about it.”

“Yeah, take it easy, Eric,” said Lawrence.

“Take it easy?” continued Eric, his voice rising “I said we shouldn’t’ve done it, I said he was innocent…”

“Okay,” snapped Jimmy.

“At the time I said it,” continued Eric, “remember? But nobody would listen to me, no….”

“Eric,” snapped Don, “that’s not how I remember it, you were all for it...”

“Dave just kept on and the rest of you…” continued Eric.

“ERIC!” shouted Dave, “leave it, we all know, okay?”

“No, I won’t leave it.” He too was shouting. “We need to have this out, you can’t just ignore it, just brush it under the carpet, we killed him, we killed Tom and we were wrong.”

“Eric,” said Don, “we made a mistake but it’s done now, there’s nothing we can do about it.”

“We can at least have the decency to acknowledge out loud that we fucked up,” pressed Eric, “he was our friend, and he was one of us.”

“He wasn’t my friend,” said Sean, “And he wasn’t Jimmy’s or Paddy’s or Brendan’s or Dale’s either I know ‘cause they were always slagging him off.”

“Shut up Sean,” snapped Paddy, “you never know when to keep your mouth shut.”

“Don’t know why you’re being so sanctimonious, you two faced git,” snapped Dave, shoving his face in Eric’s “you put up your black straw like the rest of us.”

“Black straw?” said Terry, “what is this, Treasure Island?”

“Shut up you bastard,” roared Jimmy, “I still don’t fuckin’ trust you.”

“That’s right Jimmy,” yelled Sean, “let’s kill the fucker.”

“Shut the fuck up, Sean,” snapped Jimmy.

“Yeah shut up Sean,” said Paddy.

“Keep him off my back, won’t ya?” said Jimmy to Paddy.

“God, what have we done,” moaned Eric.

“For Christ’s sake,” shouted Dave, “will everyone just shut the fuck up.”

“Who are you to give orders?” demanded Jimmy, “who appointed you boss?”

“We need to give each other time to…” Lawrence tried to intercede.

“Dad’s in charge and when he gets back…” said Don.

“If he gets back,” said Brendan, voicing the doubts of the whole room.

“What the hell does that mean?” demanded Don.

“Jesus Christ,” shouted Dave, “shut up, everyone, just shut up and take a few seconds to think won’t ya?”




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Five minutes after Alb gave the command twenty model Spitfires were circling Big Ben to the excited oohs and aaahs of the watching crowd.

The ex-RAF boys, having made their way round from their spot on the Westminster Abbey lawn, were standing in Parliament Square, each controlling his individual squadron with consummate ease.

The troops and police watched in consternation, uncertain how to handle this spectacle without upsetting the watching crowd.

Alb then sent a text to Cynthia.

Moments later the ladies of the WI, some of them sporting patriotic pink and blue rinses, tumbled out of their coach; bobbing like buoys in a rough sea.

"Out of my way, girls," hollered a big round woman in a large floral tent of a dress, her multiple chins flapping like a walrus, "pass me my cane, Ethel," she yelled back into the coach, "it’s with my gun thing."

"Don't crowd me, Hilda," hissed a frail yet waspish old lady, flapping her stick wildly against all and sundry, "don't crowd me."

"How does this thing work?" asked another, whipping out an Uzi from under her dress and waving it in the air. She was gloriously bedecked, leaning on a wheeled Zimmer frame.

"Good Lord," said a sightseer who was walking past the coach, "has that old girl got a gun?" He was hurried away by his wife, intent on getting a good viewing point for when the Queen left the building.

"Steady on, Clara," said Cynthia, her diamond bracelets clacking together as she waved her arms "we haven't had the off yet."

"Come on," said Fiona quickly, "hide your guns before they're spotted by the fuzz."

The police officers stationed outside Parliament stared over towards the WI coach, a sergeant clearly speaking into his radio. Several hundred feet above them a Police helicopter hovered. The Guards on the ground also turned their gaze on the WI coach, the men of the household cavalry pulled at their reins as if preparing to charge, though charge what they did not know.

∞

“Let’s get this show on the road," said Alb.

Gerry nodded and removing his flat cap waved his arm above his head from side to side; the attack signal to the RAF boys. Immediately the Spits zipped off in different directions, circled and then flew directly at the building where the House of Lords was situated.

"Someone shoot those bloody planes down!" yelled a sergeant from the guards, at which a hundred L85A2s, the standard British army rifle, aimed skywards.

The infantry fired and two spits exploded but the others sped on and smashed through the paned windows, exploding on impact, sending glass, brick fragments and splinters everywhere. Then the remaining planes flew through the openings and crashed into the red leather seats bearing the rich and obscenely plump behinds of the Lords.

At the same time the OSS set off smoke bombs that they had cunningly taped to the underside of their wheelchairs, though not so cunningly as it turned out, for two of them promptly keeled over and died of asphyxiation.

Alb turned towards the crowd and, pulling his AK47 from under his coat, fired off a couple of rounds into the air and shouted, "Get back!"

Immediately the crowd started a panicked dispersal, running for cover, away from Parliament. At the same time Gerry and the others let off a smoke bomb each. The soldiers stationed just in front of Alb's little army turned and aimed their rifles.

"Get out of the way!" ordered the soldiers, seeing only age and infirmity. The old people hastily complied and scurried as fast as they could past the red coated warriors, towards Parliament.

The Police on duty all turned their attention to Parliament Square; they were looking for an ethnic minority group or maybe a young terrorist faction but all they could see was a bunch of old codgers stumbling their way towards them, they presumed desperately seeking cover.

"Over here," yelled the sergeant of Police, waving frantically as he did so, "and keep down."

"They're in the way, Sarge," said a young copper, "I can't see who's firing."

"Out of the way," yelled the sergeant at Alb and his troops.

"What the bloody hell's going on?" yelled a rotund copper; known to his mates as six bellies, "where did those shots come from?"

"Over there," stated Gerry pointing towards Westminster Abbey, "Over there."

"Quick lads," shouted six bellies, "get the chopper over ‘ead, see if they can't see anything."

∞

Meanwhile Bill and Johnno had opened up the rear doors of the van from where Wilf, his sights zeroed in, was taking pot shots at the Police. Unable to identify where the shots were coming from the officers withdrew to the visitor entrance off Cromwell Green.

The nearby guards had fallen back on the Parliament building itself and were also looking for the source of the incoming rounds.

Alb, Gerry, Mags and their small army were still shuffling across the road, intermittently gasping their “For Britain” battle cry. They eventually made it and piled into the courtyard to the side of Parliament, to be joined by the freshly cut and dyed, tight curly perms of the WI.

"Where did all these bloody old gits come from?" demanded a sergeant of the Guards.

"I don't fucking care," yelled the Colonel of the Grenadier Guards, "just get them out of the bloody way."

"This way mate," said a young guard to Alb and Gerry as they paused for breath, Alb with his hand on Gerry’s shoulder, wheezing at the smoke, "If you hang around out there you'll end up getting shot."

Alb and Gerry nodded and squeezed past, followed by Mags and the rest of their motley crew.

∞

"What the..?" yelled a police sergeant as a tiny, wrinkly old lady dressed in a voluminous dark blue evening dress and be-jewelled in diamonds and emeralds appeared through the smoke. For a moment he thought in horror that it might be the Queen then, eyes adjusting to the smoke, he realised his error and called, "quick granny, over here."

"Less of the granny, my boy," snarled Clara as she levelled her Uzi and let rip with a long burst, emptying her magazine. The bullets smashed into everything around the police sergeant. He blinked, unscathed; a shocked expression on his face. "Oh dear," she mused, "I seem to have run out."

"Run for your life, BOY!" yelled the big round woman in the floral dress as she bounced out of the smoke wafting across Parliament. She stepped in front of Clara, shielding her with her huge bulk. "Or I'll waste your ass."

"Shit!" hissed the Sergeant, scuttling backwards for cover.

∞

Wilf, never having had the patience to be a sniper, had abandoned the van and was leading his happy band across St. Margaret Street in what he considered a charge but which was in fact a muddled shuffle. "Death or Glory!" he muttered intermittently, not having the energy for the rallying battle cry he could hear so clearly in his head.

"Keep moving that way," yelled a Colour Sergeant, pointing in the direction of the Peers’ entrance.

Puffing uncontrollably Wilf nodded, wanting very desperately to sit down and never get up again. Cursing himself for an old fool, instead he dug deep and stumbled on until he came to rest at the impressive entrance to the Lords, "Fire in the hole!" he yelled, dumping a satchel of grenades through the doorway before seeking cover further back. The double doors disintegrated into a whirlwind of splinters.

"Up and at 'em, lads!” He yelled to his collection of ruthless warriors; Bill, Johnno, Pete, Ron, Dave and Sticky. Johnno responded with quite a loud shout of “Death or Glory!"

Behind them three Chelsea pensioners, who had been sight-seeing for the day but were now lying in the road sheltering from the mayhem around them, struggled to their feet, they stared wide eyed for a minute or so then with broad grins spread across heavily lined faces they were off and hobbling, screaming at the tops of their voices, "Death or Glory!"

"Give no quarter, take no prisoners," yelled Sticky savagely, surprising himself.

"Who are they?" demanded Johnno of Pete, pointing over his shoulder at the Chelsea old boys.

"No idea," said Pete, "they didn't come with us, did they?"

"They haven't even got weapons," said Sticky.

∞

Alb had been watching Wilf’s assault on the doors with something approaching envy. "Who does he think he is?" he demanded, "he's not running this bloody show."

Suddenly Cynthia appeared, displaying agility that belied her years, hurdling a prone and groaning policeman, then dashing into the darkened, smoke-filled building, following in Wilf’s footsteps, firing madly as she went. Bringing up the rear was Vera, re-loading as she ran, bunions forgotten in her haste to get into the action.

"Bloody crazy woman," muttered Alb, "she's going to hurt someone with that thing in a minute."

Gerry, at his side as always, made a very strange growling noise; his dander was up and he had the scent of fresh blood in his nostrils, "Death or Glory!" he yelled.

"Er....er, Nobby," stammered Mort, "I need to go to the lavatory."

"Well hold it," ordered Frank, pushing Nobby back into line.

"I can't," said Mort, pulling his dressing gown close around him, "it's all this excitement."

"Then go where you are," said Jonesey, "it won't matter in a minute will it; you'll be dead so you're going to piss yourself anyway."

Just then the Deputy Prime Minister stumbled out of the doorway clutching his head; blood running from a slight graze, "Help me," he moaned, "help me."

"Certainly matey," answered Lenny, taking aim and loosing off a whole clip.

The Deputy Prime Minister fell to his knees, "Don't shoot,” he begged as the rounds bounced around him, none finding a target.

"Bugger," moaned Lenny as he struggled to change his mag.

The Deputy Prime Minister checked to see if and where he had been shot, then realising that all of the bullets had missed he struggled to his feet determined to make good his escape. One of the RAF boys, having witnessed the incident sent his last spit crashing into the ground at the Deputy PM’s feet. There was a terrific explosion, a burst of flame and as the huge cloud of smoke and dust drifted off only a forlorn pair of shoes remained where the Deputy PM had stood.

The Prime Minister, from his hiding place in the doorway gulped and slunk further back into the shadows. Ron, emerging from the dust cloud pulled out a butcher’s knife, "Gotcha, you bastard," he snarled. Bill said from close behind him, "I've got the Labour leader."

"He's all yours," said Ron, party loyalties on the back burner, as he shuffled into the blackened building.

Just then the Queen, head held high, crown in her left hand and her tattered and torn robe hanging from her shoulders, strode out of the crumbling building, the Duke of Edinburgh strolling on behind.

Alb and Gerry were immediately transfixed. Mags moved slightly out of line of sight. Lenny stamped to attention, closely followed by Frank.

Prince Philip saw commoners and moved towards them, hand outstretched, "Hello, how are you?" he said, shaking the spell bound Lenny's hand.

"Well, it just isn't good enough, Philip," said the Queen.

"I was only helping her up, cabbage," he protested.

"It didn't look like that to me," stormed the Queen.

"Your Majesties," stumbled Alb, not at all sure of the etiquette required.

"Oh dear, more little people," muttered the Queen.

"Got to put on a good show, old girl," said Prince Philip.

"I don't need you to tell me that Philip," hissed the Queen over her shoulder, "Ah hello," she said, turning her attention to Alb and Gerry, both still mesmerised, "and what is it that you two do around here?"

"Leave this to me, cabbage, old thing," said the Prince, "I know how to talk to these types. Now see here urm, old man...."

"Corporal, Albert Rayner, of the 1st Battalion, Middlesex Regiment, your highness," said Alb, stamping to attention.

"Ah yes," said Prince Philip on firmer ground now, "don't suppose you've seen our carriage have you? It should be around here somewhere, or maybe the Colonel of the Guards?"

"You there," called the Queen pointing to Wilf who was kneeling over the prone figure of a pot bellied MP, "would you be so kind as to call me a cab?"

Wilf stared bog eyed, a bowie knife in one hand and something small and red in the other.

"I say, what do you have in your hand?" asked the Queen.

Wilf shook his head and stuffed something into his pocket.

"Oh my god!" hissed Alb, knowing Wilf, it was probably a trophy.

"What?" said Prince Philip. Alb nodded at Wilf. Prince Philip looked back and forth, a puzzled expression, "What is it?"

"I say," said the Queen, "a cab, per chance?"

"My kingdom for a cab," said Prince Philip sarcastically.

"Philip," snapped the Queen, "that isn't funny."

"Ear necklace," hissed Alb in Prince Philip's direction.

"I need someone to call me a cab," said the Queen.

"You're a cab," chuckled Prince Philip under his breath.

"I heard that Philip," said the Queen. "I say, what do you have there?" she said, addressing Wilf.
Like a naughty school boy Wilf found himself unable to speak or even to think, slowly he reached into his pocket. Alb's mouth opened in a silent scream, Prince Philip smiled benignly and time slowed down across the universe. Then, just as the bloodied trophy cleared Wilf's pocket, Prince Charles stumbled through the doorway, his multitude of ornamental medals dangling precariously from his chest, "Mummy," he wailed.

∞

Meanwhile in a sumptuous Executive suite at the Savoy, Mackie had positioned himself in front of three lap tops. He had a Skype connection open on two of them; the one on the left was the legal representative of a man identified only as Mr CS and the one on the right was representing a similarly identified, Mr MAF. The centre screen held 12 CCTV images of the events currently unfolding in Westminster.

"Okay, gentlemen," said Mackie, "as agreed, bidding will begin when the target is revealed."

"To clarify," said the man on the left screen, "how do you intend for this to work?" His usual urbane presentation had been overtaken by an unhealthy -looking sheen of what could only be termed, sweat.

"Simple," said Mackie, hiding a smile, "my man will usher the target towards one of the exits. They are all covered by SIG-Sauer SSG2000s which carry an armour piercing round. Each weapon is rigged up to my laptop from which I can control the shot, or shots. Each is fitted with a twenty round magazine. For the right price, working upwards from 5 million, sterling naturally, I will release that control to your client who will then be able to take the shot or shots."

Each of the two screens went blank momentarily; Mackie was untroubled; the middle men were, no doubt, conferring with their employers.

The one on the right, the representative for Mr MAF, came back on, "And how do we take the shot?"

"Press enter once I've switched control across," said Mackie.

The screen went black again.

"Oh, there he is," said Mackie, homing in on Prince Charles, "have to hurry you, gentlemen."

"Ten million," said the representative for CS, abruptly coming back on screen.

"Fifteen," said Mr MAF's representative; a disembodied voice.

"Twenty."

∞

The Queen turned her gaze towards her weeping son, only for a second but it was enough for Wilf to seek cover in the dust clouds sweeping back and forth across Parliament.

"What is it, Charles?" demanded the Queen.

"I think I'm going to be sick, mummy," he wailed.

"Bloody useless idiot," hissed Prince Philip.

"Charles, pull yourself together," commanded the Queen.

"It might be best if you moved on, your Dukeship," whispered Alb to Prince Philip, "it could get dangerous around here."

"Quite," said Prince Philip, smiling, "well, keep it up," he murmured, giving Alb a friendly pat on the shoulder, "you're doing a damned fine job, whatever it is."

"Come on Philip," said the Queen, "We have to be getting orf. What about a bus? Do you think they'll let us on without any money?"

"Doubt it, old girl," said Prince Philip following on behind, "you know what things are like these days, got to pay for everything, gone are the days of the freebies."

"Yes," said the Queen sarcastically, "You would know all about them."

"Protect the Queen!" screamed the Sergeant Major and the guards doubled over to surround their Monarch.

"Fix bayonets!" yelled a corporal.

"Wait for me mummy," called Prince Charles, realising a bit late that he'd need to scurry if he wasn't to be left behind.

"Charles," Camilla had emerged from the smoke, her hair and face blackened, "help me."

"Not so fast, you bounder," snarled Hilda, the floral pattern of her dress clashing wildly with the AK47 she was levelling at Prince Charles' chest, "time to say hello to the devil."

"Bugger," groaned Prince Charles, abandoning Camilla and nipping back inside the House of Lords.

Hilda pulled the trigger but it wouldn't move, it was the same problem she'd been having all afternoon, "Wouldn't you just know I'd get the broken one," she complained.

"Remove the bloody safety catch!" yelled Gerry, as he shuffled past.

"Safety catch?" said Hilda, "what's a safety catch?"

Alb shook his head and followed Gerry into the smoke filled gloom, "Where do we go from here?" he said.

"I don't know," said Gerry, "just push on, I guess."

Meanwhile Prince Charles was ushered by his security detail towards the entrance by Cromwell's Green.

∞

"Okay gentlemen," said Mackie, "I'm going to need you to finish off now, the target will be available in a short moment, final bids please."

"50 million," said the representative for SC.

"60 million," said the representative for MAF.

"70 million," said the representative for SC.

"100 million," said the representative for MAF.

"Sold," snapped Mackie, "transfer of funds required up front, of course."

The representative for MAF then started to type frantically into his lap top.

Mackie sent a quick text, 'Hold at the entrance for my clearance.'

Meanwhile, Ken and Val, having also managed to slip passed the troops and police, a bucket each of hot tar and a bag of feathers in hand, were closing on Cromwell's Garden.

"Money is transferred," said the representative of MAF.

Mackie checked his account on his laptop and smiled, "I am transferring the shot to you, now," he said, "be ready because you will have only a split second in which to fire." Mackie then sent a text to his man in Prince Charles' security detail, 'Now.'

"It's alright, sir," said the security man, to Prince Charles, "I've just had the okay, the way ahead is clear."

"About bloody time," hissed Prince Charles.

"Not so fast," screamed Clara from the shadows behind.

"Bloody hell," groaned Prince Charles, before ducking out of the door.

MAF stared wild eyed at the tablet in his hands, his finger hovering over the enter button, then he saw his target and he started to bash away. At precisely the same moment Tom and Harry leapt out of the smoke and together launched a bucket load of tar all over Prince Charles. Horrified he raised his hands to his face and, stepping backwards, slipped on a police truncheon, just as the rounds from the Sig came crashing into the entrance killing his security escort outright. Ken and Val emptied their bags of feathers all over him.

Crowing with victory the small group disappeared into the grey and white smoke swirling around Parliament.

MAF stared at his screen, eyes bulging. He couldn't see anything through the smoke. His representative stood next to him, also peering.

At the Savoy Mackie was busy putting away some of his other equipment when he saw a lone figure standing up in the camera shot, a figure covered head to foot in tar and feathers. Mackie squinted, shrugged and closed the PC.

MAF looked confused, he stared at the screen, "Did I get him?" he asked, then, "He's still ALIVE!" he screamed, hurling the tablet across the room.
Prince Charles groaned and started to shuffle towards Bridge Street. Behind him he could hear the burst of automatic fire and the screams of dying politicians. "Bloody stupid...." he muttered under his breath.

No one stopped him, checked his progress or attempted to molest him in anyway; they steered clear and let the sad lonely figure stumble on down the road, that is, all except a small mousey looking old lady, a bowie knife clamped firmly between her gums as she manoeuvred a bent and squeaky Zimmer frame along the uneven pavement, an empty Uzi dangling at her side.

∞

The Prime Minister, his tie pulled loose and his shirt buttons open at the top, crawled along the floor towards the House of Commons. Behind him he heard the continuous cracking of machine guns. He crawled onwards past a cowering reporter who, realising he had the opportunity of an exclusive, thrust a mike under his nose.

"Prime Minister, what do you make of the day's events?"

"Look," said the PM, falling into his usual intro, then he groaned and crawled off. Trust bloody Blackmore to balls it up.

∞

Outside the army had formed a defensive square around the Queen and the Duke. The police had cordoned off Parliament.

"Are you alright your Majesty?" asked the Colonel.

"Yes, but I'm just a bit tired," said the Queen.

"Sergeant Major!" shouted the Colonel, "seat for the Queen."

"Sir!" shouted the Sergeant Major turning to a couple of privates, "On your hands and knees lads and look sharp about it." The two privates dropped on all fours and the Queen and Duke of Edinburgh sat down.

"Don't suppose you could rustle up a cup of tea, could you?" asked the Queen.

"Cup of tea for the Queen!" shouted the Sergeant Major.

"Whiskey if you've got one," said Prince Philip.

"It's too early for a whiskey, Philip," snapped the Queen irritably.

"Damn it all," he muttered.

Just then about thirty MPs burst from the Peers entrance and dropped to their knees; gasping for air and praising the Lord for their salvation. Seeing their chance the OSS wheeled passed the distracted household cavalry and watching policemen, and rolled on towards the peers' entrance.

"Get them!" shouted a police officer, pointing towards the OSS but too late, for they had reached their target. The MPs, realising they had been approached by ancient invalids, acted as one and sought cover behind the wheelchairs, convinced that no-one would shoot a cripple. Ebullient that their prey had reacted so helpfully, the members of the OSS detonated their charges blowing themselves and the thirty odd MPs into the next world.

∞

Inside the Lord's Chamber Wilf and his merry band were busy despatching the few remaining MPs who had sought refuge behind the seats. They'd been joined by Fiona and Esmé; both of whom had proved to be excellent and ruthless shots. Pete was watching Fiona with a new level of admiration and not a little fear.

"I just got the Chancellor of the Exchequer," bragged Johnno.

"Well, I got the Foreign Secretary," yelled Sticky, "little toad that he is."

"He only counts as half," joked Dave.

Bill staggered into the chamber, blood running from an open chest wound.

"You alright Bill?" asked Esmé, pausing in the middle of a re-load.

Bill slumped down in one of the seats and grinned, "I got the bloody leader of the opposition." Then he slumped forward, his last breath rattling in his throat. Dave and Sticky bowed their heads for a moment, Johnno put his hand on Bill's shoulder and then they all moved off.

∞

Alb and Gerry had reunited with Mags, Lenny, Dora and Cynthia.

"What now?" asked Cynthia, her hair askew and eyes wild.

Gerry's face was filthy, his smile stretched from ear to ear and his eyes were wild, "Who cares? Never expected to get this far."

"Where are the others? Where's Wilf's lot?" asked Alb.

Gerry shrugged; he'd been with Alb all the time so he knew what Alb knew.

"Mort had a stroke," said Lenny "and I saw Frank and Jonesey get it near the entrance."

"What about Val?" asked Alb.

Everyone shrugged, no one had seen Val or Ken or any of that team.

"And Vera, Esmé?" Dora looked like she might cry; the excitement giving way to despair.

"I say we go down shooting," said Cynthia, brandishing her weapon like she'd been born to it.

"Like Butch and Sundance," said Gerry, smiling at Alb.

"Why don't we just escape?" asked Mags, not altogether ready to meet her maker.

"We're through, Mags," said Alb, "these old bones won't get much further."

"But there's a war still to fight," said Mags.

"That's right," said Lenny, "there'll be others to replace these scumbags, someone will have to tackle them."

"There's no way out," said Alb, "I can't face prison."

"See if there are any more left," Mags said, authority personified, "then gather back here in ten minutes."

"You know a way out?" Alb's voice was high, thick with renewed hope.

"Of course," she said, smiling gently, "I know everything."

Cheers for reading

Arun





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'Helter Skelter' by Arun D Ellis is 'FREE' for Kindle & PC download from Amazon until Monday 18th March 2019 - book 7 in the Corpalism series

I am making this statement as an act of wilful defiance of military authority, because I believe that the War is being deliberately prolonged by those who have the power to end it.

Siegfried Sassoon
(1886 – 1967)


Preface

The man poured tea into a translucent porcelain cup then, after flexing long, elegant fingers, he caressed the keyboard and opened the file entitled 'New World Order/Final [1]Yishuv', sub heading 'Significant threat to British autonomy'.

He had discovered the file on first taking up his post; he'd been adding to it since taking office. He hoped he was doing justice to the earlier work by his predecessor; a man of dogged purpose and relentless patriotism.

He looked at the now familiar graphs charting the rising global debt which would ultimately culminate in global financial collapse. This collapse, he knew, would be followed by a financial lifeboat, courtesy of the IMF, in the form of a new global currency issued by the World Bank, controlled behind the scenes by the elite banking families, primarily the Rothschilds, in the interests of Israel.

From this point onwards, Israel would control the global banks, the markets and the world.

He leaned back and thought about the growth of Israeli influence and power in the west from the country's inception to the present time.

He considered the careful placement of individuals as CEOs in banks, and as leading politicians, others achieving positions of seniority in the judiciary, the skilful use of powerful lobby groups across Europe and America, control of the Council on Foreign Relations (CFR).

He marvelled at the deft way they had achieved control of the media, and the take-over of Hollywood, and the master stroke, duel citizenship of Israel and the US, along with Zionist control of the Federal Reserve.

He clicked on a link; 'A Strategy for Israel in the 1980s'; published by the 'World Zionist Organization', author Oded Yinon, objective: to divide up the Arab countries Iraq, Syria, Libya and Iran into smaller and, by definition, weaker territories.

He sniffed his derision; clearly Israel could not have expected to achieve this on her own, with insufficient military hardware and personnel, besides which, under normal circumstances, the superpowers would have stepped in to prevent it.

He clicked another link; 'A clean break. A new strategy for securing the realm'; a document calling for the cessation of peace talks with Yasser Arafat, the launching of attacks on occupied territories in Palestine and the overthrow of Saddam Hussein.

He noted the authors: Richard Perle, Douglas Feith and David Wurmser, all with dual Israeli American citizenship. He noted further that the document had been written in 1996, at the time when they held high office in Benjamin Netanyahu's Likud government. He found it interesting that they all later held office in the Bush administration, post 9/11.

He nodded as he read; appreciating the step by step approach to the destabilisation of the Middle East. The challenge for the Zionists would be to make these objectives become American objectives as well.

He scrolled through, found a new heading: 'Project for the New American Century': a think tank created circa 1997 dissolved 2006. Founders: William Kristol and Robert Kagan, both holders of dual American/Israeli citizenship. Key signatories: Jeb Bush, Dick Cheney, Donald Kagan, Paul Wolfowitz, Donald Rumsfeld, Dan Quayle, Elliott Abrams.

The project described the US as 'the World's pre-eminent power', and stated that the US needed to 'shape a new century favourable to American principles and interests,' with increased military spending, ensuring US 'political and economic freedom abroad,' and that the US should 'challenge regimes hostile to our interests and values.'

He checked the Foreign Policy Initiative, clearly designed to control the Democrats in the same fashion as the previous think tank controlled the Republicans. This too was founded by William Kristol and Robert Kagan, but the described objectives had now changed; 'address the rising challenges facing the US such as a resurgent Russia and China and rogue states that sponsored terrorism and pursued weapons of mass destruction.'

He found it interesting that the plan had survived being temporarily blown off course when Donald Trump had shocked the world and won the presidency.

Whilst none of the documents referred to the world's dwindling oil stocks or to OPEC directly he read between the lines; without the power to control the price of oil or its production America would become insignificant on the world stage. Russia, on the other hand, with her abundant stocks would be preeminent.

He sipped more tea, it helped him to think.

Whilst he could not stop the projected global collapse or the Israeli land grab, yet he was determined to secure Britain's place in the world.

He was Sir Phillip Blackmore, supreme Head of British Intelligence and, as such, in a position of some authority. He was also a knight of the realm; surely that had to count for something.

As he saw it, in the same way that Britain had been manipulated into giving the Zionists the Balfour Declaration, America was being manipulated into destroying the stability of the Middle East.

The resultant vacuum and the distraction of America's renewed confrontation with Russia and China, thanks to the Foreign Policy Initiative, would allow Israel to expand her influence and power from the Mediterranean and a line drawn from the Euphrates to the Nile incorporating Eastern Iraq, Eastern Syria, Lebanon, Jordan, Sinai, Western Egypt and Northern Saudi Arabia.

He couldn't help but admire the long-term thinking; Dick Cheney, Paul Wolfowitz, Donald Rumsfeld had all come to high office in the Bush administration.

To his mind, they ran it, backed by the likes of Perle, Feith and Wurmser. Jeb Bush, signatory to the 'New American Century' had stolen the 2000 election for his brother GW and without a Bush in the Oval Office there could've been no intervention in the Middle East.

9/11 had been the new Pearl Harbour, Osama Bin Laden the CIA operative, a Lee Harvey Oswald-like patsy. Blackmore recalled his shock at the willingness of so many people to believe the events of 9/11.

To his mind, and that of any rational person, he reasoned, the idea that a steel skyscraper could be toppled by a passenger jet was preposterous. Trying the same con twice and topping it off by bringing down a 3rd building, claiming it to be the result of vibrations and office fires was laughable. When the mythical passenger plane crashed into the Pentagon, the most heavily protected building in the world, he gave up on the credulity of the masses.

He turned to his paper notes and the conclusion he had written:

Israel : a young and energetic country with a widespread, influential and deeply embedded propaganda network, supporting a forceful and uncompromising global purpose based on a deeply held belief in her own supremacy.

As such her ambitions cannot be contained.

It behoves me, on behalf of my country to ensure that the men with power in that network are either controlled by or, failing that, become in some way deeply beholden to Britain.



He sat quietly for a few moments, committing his notes to memory. He re-read the final paragraph, intoned the last sentence out loud. Then he put the sheets neatly together and fed them into the shredder.





Descent 1

Hitler has only got one ball...

He was an attractive young man; his mother told him, often. He was a serious person; Jenna, his girlfriend, said that a lot, somewhat accusingly. He was extremely clever; this from his tutor, somewhat despairingly when his work didn't match up.

Whilst he agreed he was good-looking, (tall, brown-haired like his father with his mother's steel blue eyes) and conceded he was serious, (dour) enjoyed being called clever, (to the point of scholarly, albeit lazy) he wished he could be more easy-going (as opposed to intense, bordering on obsessive).

Good-looking, too serious, too clever, lazy. What did any of that matter now?

He stared at his laptop, his mind in turmoil. How could he work? He leant forward and rested his head in his hands, moaning softly into his palms.

He stood up and started to pace, suddenly aware of the confines of the bedsit of which he had been hitherto so proud. The front door opened straight on to a large living room/kitchen; high-windows, ceiling rose and coving. There was one large bedroom with an en-suite toilet and wash basin. The bath was a shared facility down the corridor. Gampy had found it for him, paid the key money and he had loved the place from the first moment he set foot in it but now, like everything else linked to his Gampy, it disgusted him.

He kicked out at the remains of last night's pizza. Then he slumped onto the sofa and stared at the wall for several minutes.

His phone rang; the jaunty tone an insult to his mood. He picked it up, stared at the screen; his mother, just what he needed. He tossed the phone onto the sofa. It rang again. He put it on silent but in the end he succumbed.

There was silence for several seconds before she spoke, "Louis, are you ok?"

He snorted, "Fucking great, what do you think?" He knew it wasn't her fault; she was only the messenger.

"I'm here, if you need to talk about it...."

"Oh? Talk about what, exactly?"

His voice broke and his thoughts scattered. His sweet-natured, great granddad, Gampy Jaggs ...a cold-eyed killer? He felt sick, all those years at Gampy's knee, enjoying an affinity across the ages that he'd not felt with his grandparents, not felt even with his own father, destroyed. This new knowledge put him at variance with the rest of the civilised world, with Jenna, his class mates at Uni, with Dean, both friend and class mate. He groaned aloud, how the hell was he going to approach his thesis from an unbiased viewpoint? Louis Walker, great grandson of the infamous SS Oberleutnant Friedrich Jaeger of the SS Das Reich, offers you his unbiased, scholarly thoughts on: The Causes of the Great War'.

"Louis, talking sometimes helps..."

"What's to say? Oh Louis, your great granddad was a Nazi? And everyone knew except you?"

"We waited until you were older, Louis. Until we thought you could handle it...."

Her voice died away, no further comment required about the proven fragility of his coping mechanisms, the shared knowledge of his vulnerability; the strange voices he'd heard as a child, the worrying behaviour, the deep depression that had culminated in a race to the hospital after what his parents preferred to call an accidental overdose, and what Louis knew had been anything but.

Louis broke the silence, "Where shall I start with the handling? He shot Russian peasants. Let me think, oh yeah, I'm OK with that. He was a mass murderer. Yeah, that's cool. Is that what you want? What else? Oh, Auschwitz...yeah, I'm down with that. See Mum? I'm handling it."

"Louis, don't do this to yourself," her voice was a soft plea.

"You did it to me, all of you... why didn't you tell me before?" He gritted his teeth and clenched his fist around the phone. This ruined everything.

She paused, "You knew he was German, that he was a soldier in the war. As for the rest, it's a matter of public record, Louis, if you'd have looked it up..."

"So it's my fault now, is it? I didn't look it up? I believed in him?" His voice was rising now, "I knew he was a soldier yes, but not SS, I mean, fucking SS."

She heard the panic in his tone, tried to dampen it, "Louis, they weren't all like that....."

"Like what exactly? Raving loony fanatics, hell bent on conquering the world, not to mention murdering every single Jew that ever lived."

"I can't talk to you when you're being...."

"Oh well done," he snapped, "you called me, remember?"

"You flew out of the house in such a state, I was worried you might..." She paused, started again, "I thought we could talk about it, sensibly."

"Talk about what? What can we possibly talk about? You're a Nazi and I'm not."

"Now you're being ridiculous, Louis. I'm not a Nazi, I'm not even full German. I'm as English as you are."

"Great, thanks, Mum, that means a lot."

"Louis, you should try to understand what it was like back then."

"Oh, yeah, understand why Gampy was a heartless killer? Yeah, Mum, I'll get to work on that right away."

Hope you have a nice weekend

Cheers

Arun



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