“Never can true reconcilement grow where wounds of deadly hate have pierced so deep...”

John Milton, Paradise Lost

“I was surprised you replied,” said Anna, standing and holding out a hand in greeting. “I thought that you wouldn’t after we didn’t hear from you the first couple of hours.”

“I was busy,” replied Trials curtly. “You said you wanted to meet, well here I am.”

They were towards the edge of Green Park, the sun low on the horizon as sleet spat down around them. Anna wore a thick woollen coat, already heavy with damp, and a blue scarf hung raggedly around her neck. Jake hadn’t found time to change in days, not since before his first visit to the bunker, but he rarely sweat and certainly didn’t suffer in the cold, so he wore only a light sweater on his top half. He saw Anna raise an eyebrow at his lack of concessions to the weather.

“Not even goosebumps?” she asked, staring at his arms. “Mike was really onto something then, huh?”

Trials’ train of thought was derailed at the nonchalant mention of his friend; he had expected it to be a struggle to get anything out of her.

She must have seen something in his expression, because she pursed her lips and spoke again.

“You still don’t know, do you? You haven’t got a clue, Jake,” said Anna, shaking her head.

“Don’t know what? What was Mike onto?”

The way she had called him ‘Jake’ in such a knowing way added to his… frustration? Confusion?

“It’s his technology that’s swimming about your arteries, Jake; controlling your body temperature, your leucocyte count, your oxygen levels. He told us all about it, all about you. About the day his laboratory was raided, destroyed. About how you popped him in the face and left him and his co-workers to have their lungs burnt out. About how you stole all his hopes and dreams.”

The world seemed to swim for a few seconds, and Trials struggled to remember the details of that day, years ago, when he had libera… stolen… the nanotechnology.

He had socked a guy in the face, hadn’t he? And he knew that phosphorous was nasty stuff, but the smoke was a hell of a lot nicer than other things he could have left behind. People could easily get out of the way of smoke.

“That was Mike?” he asked, shocked.

Anna laughed nastily.

“Yes, you fool. That was your old friend, Mike. You stole his life.”

“He’s the reason so many people have lost their lives now!”

Even as he said the words, he wished he could take them back.

Anna’s eyes narrowed and she glared at him.

“That was not him. That was not us. I don’t know what their plan really is, but there’s a group of people who have been using us to get to you. It was them that attacked the Ministry.”

She paused, and when she spoke again her voice was softer.

“What happened in there? We didn’t get any details, just some info that something big had happened inside your buildings.”

“Everyone. They got everyone,” said a graven Trials, folding in on himself. He didn't need to say anymore.

Anna drew back, eyes showing their horror.

“This is why we mailed you, Jake. They disappeared as soon as they found out where your headquarters were located, as soon as they got to Mike and made him tell them where it was.”

“Made him?”

“He wasn’t willing to give up any more information after they made that move on you the first time. It was him who let us know you were coming to the reunion, that gave us your contact details to trace. But he gave them so you could meet with me, not so someone could try to kill you. He stopped talking to us after that.”

“And you? Why did you contact me now?”

“One of our members… one of my friends… had gone to see him, see Mike, to try to convince him to come back to us. I got a frantic call from him saying someone was beating Mike, torturing him. I asked him who they were, and he barely had time to reply before his phone cut off. By the time I got to the flat, my friend was dead. They left his body lying there, and there was no sign of Mike.”

“And who are they?”

“I… We… Don’t know. Mercenaries. Ex-soldiers. We thought they were with us for something more than money. It seems they were, but not for the reasons we hoped.”

“So why were they with you?”

Anna paused for a moment and looked around, as if searching for someone hiding in the sleet-soaked park, and then turned back. Her voice, now, was lower, flatter.

“I think I need to start at the beginning.”

Jake spent the next few hours feeling like he was drowning, suffocating in new and disparate information as Anna told him what her group, this ‘Organisation,’ had found out in the past few days. They walked as they spoke, without any specific route or destination, a slow stride through the sleet that was gradually turning to rain.

She told him about how the Organisation was started, long before her time, by a group who initially came together through a shared, indefinite feeling that something was going on behind the scenes of, well, everything. Failed projects, stolen files, inexplicable disappearances. Deaths. Of the current and original members she told him no names, but assured him they included those who were well-known in both business and politics, and those who were simply well-known.

Of course, in the time of the late Cold War it was clearly understood that governments undertook espionage activities that were often dangerous and violent, but such actions were almost exclusively directed at their ideological enemies - in practice, for the Organisation's purposes, the Soviets and Chinese.

The actions the Organisation was uncovering were not directed outwards at such threats, but inwards, within and throughout the supposedly united western world. The actions were so hostile at times, in fact, that at first it was assumed there was a major Soviet spy ring operating somewhere this side of the Iron Curtain.

It was only when investigations were shut down, when information mysteriously disappeared, when entire departments were axed simply for a single member voicing concern, that it became apparent that whatever this secret group was, it was being protected from high up. So high up, in fact, that had it really been a Soviet spy ring they would most definitely not have needed to hide their identities but could offer the whole of the UK up to the Eastern Bloc on a plate. And that was also clear; whatever this group was, it was based in the UK.

“How’d you come to that conclusion?” asked Trials.

“We didn’t for a long time. The missing tech would reappear a few years down the line in the States, in Germany, in Japan. Character assassinations based on fraudulent evidence would crop up around the world. Confidential information that could have been used to make billions simply disappeared. Very little seemed to be used for private gain, so it took years to even confirm the actions were emanating in Europe, let alone here. But we had years.”

“So why pursue it so far? If it was clear it wasn’t for personal gain…”

“Because it’s wrong, Jake. The Ministry, you, are perverting the natural order of things, slowing down progress, preventing people from playing on a level field.”

“We’re protecting people,” said Trials sternly. “It’s not a game out there, and there are people, there are… ideas… that threaten to bring the whole thing tumbling down.”

“So work against them, argue against them, but in the light of day. You can’t fight them in the dark.”

Trials stopped abruptly and turned to look at her.

“You can only fight them in the dark,” he said. “You have to bring a light into the shadows to chase them away.”

“You read that on a fortune cookie?” Anna asked dismissively. “Listen, Jake, I’m not here to debate semantics with you. It’s gone further than that now.”

It was during Anna’s time that the Organisation found its abilities growing. The rise of the internet and global anonymous communications greatly enhanced communication between members, even as it simultaneously saw a massive increase in the doings of the Ministry, as they learned it was called.

It was around this time that Korez Marais was introduced to them through a contact known as ‘Tarquinius,’ a trusted member of the group who had voiced concerns shared by others that they were heading into dangerous territory. After all, they had no idea who they were chasing, nor did they know what would happen if their investigations were discovered by their target. Tarquinius vouched for Korez and his team, and so they were brought on board.

“You just let a group of hired killers into your houses?” Trials asked incredulously.

“They were private security by this point: they came to us from Italy, where they’d been guarding some influential bigwig or something. Anyway, look who’s talking,” Anna replied, defiantly meeting his gaze.

“At least..,” she continued, gaze falling downward towards the ground, “…that’s what they told us.”

She looked up again as they resumed their walk.

“Don’t you get it, Trials? We weren’t a secret society, we weren’t able to call on powerful resources. We were just people, trying to work out what was going on.”

“Weren’t?” asked Trials, emphasising the past tense.

“They’ve all… disappeared. The forums we usually meet on, the numbers we have to call, to message, they’ve all gone dark. It’s just me and a few of the core group left. We can’t get in touch with anyone else.”

“You think something happened to them?”

“Yes, but I don’t see how,” Anna replied. “Our members come from all over the world, and even I don’t know who all of them really are. Surely there’d be something in the news if hundreds of people inexplicably disappeared.”

“That’s because they haven’t disappeared,” said Trials, pace accelerating in sudden deliberation. “You said you generally meet on forums, right? You use a code to set up the next meeting?”

“Yes, usually. We try to move around as much as possible.”

“So have you checked previous forums?”

“For what?” Anna looked perplexed.

“They’ve moved forums, and left you behind. It’d be too big a coincidence that only the leadership escaped – you’d be the first targets, not the last. I’ve seen this before, when the executive body is removed wholesale. What’s happened isn’t an attack, it’s a coup d’état.”

“You really think so?”

“Check the forums, check your records, see if there’s anything out of place,” said Trials.

Anna hurriedly took her phone from her pocket and made a call. It took a while, carrying them up winding cobble-stone streets and past gloomy shops that it was difficult to say were open or closed. Anna spoke little, listening to whoever was on the other end of the line with infrequent ‘mmm’s’ of assent and the occasional question.

At one point something changed in her demeanour. Her face whitened in shock and she said nothing for a while, whoever was speaking down the line calling out to check she was still there. Trials made to ask her what was wrong, but she held up a hand to stop him.

When she had finished, she replaced it back into her jacket and walked on.

“Did you find something?” Trials asked.

“Yes. It was all there, staring us in the face. Tarquinius. We should have guessed. After the mercs left, after everything that happened, we tried to get in contact with Tarquinius, find out if he knew anything, but he disappeared too. Turns out he’s been messaging and arranging private meet-ups for months, practically every member on the list. We had to crack his account to find this out, something we promised we would never do to members.”

“And what did you find out?”

“It was tough, we only had his I.P to go on.”

“And..?” Trials was getting impatient.

“Jake, have you ever heard of a man named Nigel Matterson..?”