IRL

May 2022

It was November 2021 when I became notorious as public enemy number one, hunted by the organisation known as FreeMind.

FreeMind, as I’m certain everyone is aware, seemed to be a cult of asshats moaning about Armageddon, the end of the world, you know? All the usual cultish crap you see on TV. They were evangelical and recruited fiercely. Their numbers growing like humping rabbits locked in a Viagra factory.

I’m not really sure how I got myself into this, but I need to write it down so someone can hear the truth in case they get to me. They’ve been close a few times, and I’m more paranoid now than I’ve ever been in my life—and that’s saying something!

I always thought of myself as a nice guy with a lot of geeky interests. I read plenty of science fiction and fantasy, enjoying the same things on TV and at the movies. But most of all, I’m a real Dungeons & Dragons and online gaming fanboy.

So, I class myself as a geek, and I’m proud of it. I’m not one of the herd, staring goggle-eyed at the latest celebrity crap that nobody needs to know about, let alone watch the so-called reality shows. Who wants to spend their time looking at Barbie wannabe’s with their fake orange tans and over-inflated boobs and asses—Jeez. It wouldn’t be too bad if it were a silent movie, but hell, they try to talk as if they’re actual people. Is it just me, or does everyone rely on watching this shit, thinking it’s real and relevant to their lives? Who cares who’s shagging who before getting preloaded for a night on the pull drinking until you pass out? Is this what the world is now?

Sorry about the rant, but it annoys me—a lot. Conforming to the social trend—I call it the CoST of living. Get it? Sometimes I think they’ve already won, FreeMind that is. As if there was ever an organisation with a more contradictory name. They are enslaving us, creating identical unthinking drones. Keep your head down, do what you’re told, and don’t rock the boat.

Well, “Balls to that!” says I. I’m here to wake a few people up and explain some unpleasant truths that they won’t want to hear. But, I guess that’s why FreeMind is out for my blood, and they are not afraid to get their hands dirty.

But I’ve got ahead of myself. Let me tell you how a mild-mannered geek like me became involved in all this shitstorm.

Jan 2020.

I was on a train heading back from Manchester towards Leeds. I’d been to a comic-con, mainly to have some books signed by a couple of authors I really admired. It was early evening, but pitch-black outside, and rain bounced off the windows, running in meandering rivers that fractured the yellow sodium street lights as we rattled east.

As usual, the carriage was packed, but I’d reserved a seat, so didn’t face the aching legs of having to stand for an hour and a half. It was a slow train, stopping at all the stations in the back of beyond. Places even I hadn’t heard of—and I lived in this area.

We’d just pulled away from Halifax and had a good run of around fifteen minutes before the next scheduled stop. That’s when I saw them.

A commotion at the door between carriages, a short scuffle, then three tall figures pushed their way through the crowds. Their long robes reminded me of TV footage I’d seen of the Ku Klux Klan, especially with the deep hoods. But, rather than white, these FreeMinders swathed themselves in dark grey with highlights of blood red—which is also the colour of the formless facemasks they each wore. I had to admit, it was a good look with the narrow horizontal grille for vision, the sort of thing I would wear at a cosplay event. But these were part of the militant arm of FreeMind—Inquisitors. 

They were known for incisive and violent action if they discovered anyone violating the ideals they upheld. The main area they clamped down on was the inappropriate use of tech. It was as if they were twenty-first-century Luddites crossed with extreme Christian groups who believed watching Harry Potter was the first step on the slippery slope to Satanism. But they went far beyond harsh language. They weren’t afraid to burn the sinners they exposed.

If you were a hacker, you were their number one target, but if you were into technology in any level of complexity, they had you on their radar. There had been several underground media reports of bodies found, alleged hackers who had been enticed to repent by the liberal application of electrical current. Somehow this never hit the main news agencies and was dismissed by FreeMind as a vile slur. After hacking, the next most heinous crime, in their eyes, was online gaming. If you happened to love rock music as well, then that was the unholy trinity. Expect the next knock at your door to be the inquisition replete with burning crosses.

I wasn’t a hacker, but I knew a few. Online though, not IRL. But I was a prolific gamer, and that made me worry. Why are they here? Heading towards me? Crap!

I followed their progress, blood red metal visors scanning between the passengers as they edged closer.

The guy across from me had been working on a laptop, but with his back to the direction of travel, he’d no idea they were approaching. He had a pretty trick rig: Black Razor 2020 gaming edition, brand new by the looks of it, along with a rugged case—cool.

I did the right thing. He looked up at me with an angry frown after I kicked his trainers. I could see the WTF look in his gaze through the thick glasses, but I flicked my eyes behind him towards the approaching trio of technophobes.

He turned, spotting them. “Fuck,” he said, trying to keep it under his breath. He started pounding on the keyboard. The Inquisitors were only a few seats away now, their heads orienting in our direction.

The guy ejected a micro-sim from the device into his left hand and kept it low, out of sight. He made an impressive three-fingered-salute, one-handed. His laptop blipped once, and shutdown. His eyes found mine, through the thick dark-edged lenses he wore, pleading for my help.

I looked past him, the Inquisitors were almost here. I blew air through gritted teeth, but nodded, holding my right hand out below his. As the warm rectangle of plastic and circuitry hit my palm, I sneaked it back, dropping it into a zip pocket on my khaki cargo shorts. Trying to seem casual, I leaned into the dirty seat as the trio arrived and stopped in the aisle by us. Their dead faced masks scanned the area, one lingering on the laptop. “Release the tech for inspection,” their leader said, its voice distorted as if through a gravelly vocoder.

“What?” the guy replied.

“Hand it over. Now!”

The guy’s glare hardened beneath the lenses. “Screw you. Who do you think you are, telling ordinary folk what to do?”

The entire carriage fell quiet, all eyes focused on him.

The Inquisitor turned to its colleagues. “Take it.”

As they reached past the older man in the seat between the aisle and their target, laptop boy pulled something from his rugged case and thrust it into the grasping hands. With a spray of sparks, blue arcs of electricity shot up the Inquisitor’s arm and robes. A high-pitched scream, like tearing metal tore the air, and ozone and burnt hair filled my nostrils.

“Enough,” yelled the leader, pressing a device in its palm. The carriage plunged into darkness, no emergency lighting, nothing. Just a faint red glow from the horizontal vents in the facemasks, then they too faded.

A muffled scream sounded from the chair opposite, and then a whooshing of movement as things thrashed through the surrounding air. They retracted with a loud popping sound and the feeling in your ears you get when coming in to land.

A mobile singing the Nokia tune broke the silence, then all the lights flickered back into existence. I stared at the empty chair opposite, a dozen small patches of exposed yellow stuffing slowly darkened as they drank the surrounding crimson stains. 

Streaks of blood covered the floor where they’d dragged the body before heading through the door into the next carriage. The two passengers on the aisle seats shared vacant stares, a mist of scarlet speckled their flesh, and their faces told me I must look the same or worse. I glanced down at my hands as they shook uncontrollably, covered in droplets of blood, wobbling and streaming like the rain-soaked window.

I left my seat, trying to avoid stepping in the wet smears and followed the drag marks through towards the next carriage where they vanished. What the hell?

I checked, but there was no sign further ahead of anything dragged between the carriages. As I slumped back against the swaying train wall, I let myself slide down and sat there on the blue carpet beside the smeared blood stains, cradling my head in still shaking hands. What is going on? How could three cultists just disappear with a body and leave no trace?

I reached to my zip pocket, not knowing what to expect. Had I experienced some weird hallucination? But, no. I could feel the micro-sim through the thick fabric. I needed to get home and see what it contained. What was so important that you’d give it to a complete stranger rather than have it taken from you by the Inquisitors?