The Return of Spring Heeled Jack, or 'The Terror of Swindon Town'
Chapter Six- A New Year's Lamentation
It’s been weeks since I’ve written a thing, and in all honesty, I thought, at one stage at least, that I’d never write another word ever again, but here I am, typing away, in 2024, happy to do so, but more than that, happy to still be alive after the bizarre situation that I’ve had to endure over the past few weeks.
Where to begin? Ah, with the girl, and the inevitable disaster that was to befall me, after I’d been stupid enough to lower my guard, and tell her the truth. Why would I ever divulge the truth to another human being, you may ask? Because the other human being was pretty, and I was lonely, and she asked, and appeared to care, and for someone like me, not used to anyone who cares, the combination of pretty eyes looking into my own, feigning empathy, and asking that all so rare question, ‘Tell me more,’ the end result can be absolutely lethal.
I’ll explain:
My last post ended with a telephone call. It was Lucy, the pretty young blonde that I met at the Vic one evening, and she wanted to meet up, ‘As soon as possible,’ she said, ‘I have something serious to say to you, and it has to be said in person.’
Sounds like a trap, right? Well, yes, in hindsight it does, but bear in mind that I’ve been alive for a long, long time, and in all of that time nobody has ever said something like that to me, with urgency in their voice, and for the first time in my life I felt needed, wanted, perhaps even desired, so my brain shut-down, and loneliness drove me head-first into an obvious trap.
We met at the same low-class, deteriorating McDonald’s restaurant in Swindon Town centre, the same venue where Spring Heeled Jack had made his ‘racist’ attack on the group of masked economic migrants, an attack witnessed both by myself, and the pretty young lady who was luring me into this web of deception, and predation.
She was waiting for me when I arrived, the first time in my life that I’ve ever had a pretty young female do such a thing, and she greeted me with an enthusiastically tight hug, and proceeded to mesmerise me with her beauty and charm. The words that were spoken are unimportant, for she could have been speaking in Chinese for all that I cared. What mattered was her body-language, how she giggled at my self-deprecating (low status) jokes, how I squirmed in shyness as she stroked my arm, and how she leant in close, letting her freshly scented blonde hair seductively brush my cheeks.
An hour later I was melted putty in her hands, and when she invited me back to her place, with the subtext of putting a plan into action in order to discover the truth about my new master, something I was quite frankly uninterested in, now that I had been thoroughly charmed by this blonde temptress, ‘Yes,’ flew from my mouth without one single consideration for the danger that I might be putting myself into.
The fact that Spring Heeled Jack himself, a mysterious entity I had sworn solemn vows to, might not be too happy about what I was doing, which amounted to me conspiring against him, to expose him, wasn’t even a factor that I had considered. It’s amazing how vulnerable loneliness can make you.
You won’t be surprised to hear that as soon as I made it back to Lucy’s place I was feeling somewhat sleepy, and as I slumped upon her sofa, knowing at once that I had been drugged, the last thing that I saw was a door opening, and a black shadow enter the room, a black shadow that was greeted with a hug by the smiling young girl, who had delivered her fly to the spider that was waiting for me.
Christmas, and New Year passed by, without my involvement, as I languished in a black, featureless cellar, illuminated by a dim bulb hanging from the ceiling, shackled by a chain attached to manacles around my ankles, tied to a wall, kept alive by a black shadowy figure who would place bottles of water and bread, before leaving me with a typed ‘confession’ letter, that required my signature, before release would be considered.
No words were spoken, the instructions were on a card that came with my confession, and that confession read, as far as I can recollect, as follows:
‘I (my full name) herby admit to being the leader of far-right terrorist cell (name of group that I was/am unfamiliar with) that targets immigrants, people of colour, and other marginalised groups. My cell was responsible for (list of various activities that I was unaware of), and our funding comes from the Russian government. The entity known as ‘Spring Heeled Jack,’ is a Russian agent, a gymnast by the name of (I forget the exact name of the individual) using advanced Kremlin technology to perform inhuman displays of athleticism, displays that are designed to scare new Europeans away from settling in their new home countries. I list below the names of my accomplices and place myself at the mercy of the judicial system, as I feel terrible remorse for the xenophobic, racist, intolerant crimes that I have committed. Signed (blank space for my signature).’
For day after day I sat, slept and wasted time, fearing that I would never see the light of day again, but there was something within me that resisted the easy way out, and as the days turned into weeks, time I could record through the creek of an opening door, a black shadow placing a bottle of water, a plate of bread, and new written confession before me (for I ripped every sheet of paper that was given to me) I grew not weaker, but stronger, and knew one thing for sure, that I would never submit, and sign that tissue of lies before me.
One thing is true of me, a fact that you can take to the bank, and that solid gold fact is that I will never lie about myself, because to lie about myself is to destroy the only thing that I have ever truly processed, the sovereignty of myself. If I give that one thing away, I give everything away, and so the likelihood of me ever signing that piece of paper was always zero, not one single chance in a billion, not a chance in the world would I ever sign my self-determination away.
You might ask how I passed the time in that small, dimly lit room, how I didn’t go mad through boredom, isolation, lack of stimulation, but if you have ever met me in the real world, not in print, you won’t be particularly surprised, for if ever there was a man who could endure time passing by in isolation, boredom, and useless suffering, it’s the man you are reading right now.
I dreamt, cuddled up in the mattress that was provided for me, covered my form in a blanket that was also provided, and dived back into the womb of sleep that always was the highlight of my day. When I woke, I exercised, press-ups, sit-ups, squats, tiring myself out before resting again, occupying my mind with silly little stories, inventing fantasies of happiness as I did when I was a bullied/ignored child, during every stage of my schooling. The only thing that was missing was work, and Friday night drinking, ending with embarrassment, disappointment, regret. Not so bad, really.
As the weeks passed by, I grew even stronger, a mind gone mad through the daily exposure to modernity regained a semblance of sanity through a forced detoxification of the toxic ideologies and distractions used to enslave the working man in the economic zone known as ‘Britain’ today.
It all came to an end when the shadow revealed itself with a simple question, speaking in a soft female voice, not Lucy, but an older voice, a voice that spoke with a curious mixture of hatred and respect, ‘We could torture you, you know, in order to get you to sign.’
‘Go ahead then,’ I replied, with a tone of complete and utter indifference, not even bothering to look up from the mattress that I was laying upon, not a pose, I assure you, as I almost welcomed a ramping up of the situation, more pain needed, the masochist in me relishing the continuation of defiance.
The soft female voice sighed, a sign of utter exasperation, and I could hear her footsteps getting closer and closer to where I lay.
‘We can do a deal with you,’ she whispered, kindly, falsely, a failed attempt at empathy, standing just a couple of feet from my prone body, ‘A deal that will place the blame on somebody else, as the leader.’
‘Leader of what?’ I angrily roared, a genuine question, as the name of the supposedly terroristic organisation that was on my confession sheet was completely unknown to me.
‘You know what you are,’ she snapped, dismissively, with a tone of stupid moral superiority that infuriated me to the core.
I threw off the blanket, sprang to my feet, annoyed beyond words with the accusations levelled against me, fictitious nothings, concocted by a delirious mind, projected onto a person (myself) who had no idea whatsoever of what she was talking about.
Facing my ridiculous accuser I couldn’t help but break out into a bout of uncontrollable laughter, as the black shadow was nothing more than a plump, middle-aged lady, who looked absolutely terrified of the ridiculous situation that she herself had manifested.
‘Just what is the end goal here?’ I demanded, as she retreated backwards, her large, clammy hands flailing behind ample buttocks, searching for the open door, as a look of confused horror writ large upon her pudgy, dinner lady face.
That same face flushed a startled red, and a look of panic shot through her sunken eyes. Both hands clutched towards her chest, she gargled once, slumped to her knees, and collapsed, face first into the floor with a dull, meaty thud. Dead, of a heart attack (I presume) caused by the most horrific event that had ever befallen her, a chained man not caring, not submitting, and daring to call out the nonsense that she was spewing.
Luckily for me, the chains that kept me confined were long enough for me to be able to reach her body, and after some none to pleasant searching of her obese frame I managed to find a set of keys, attached to a rainbow decorated pendant, and freed myself from the locks that had tied me to the wall.
Memories of Pulp Fiction and Bruce Willis flooded into my mind as I walked towards freedom, through the open door, up a set of stairs, into a government funded activist/charity shop, with messages of tolerance and diversity decorating the walls.
A brief search of the empty shop unearthed my jacket and I found, to my immense relief, that my house-keys had not been removed. It was a sign to head back home and so that is exactly what I did, out of the darkness, back into the cold, dank streets of Swindon Town.
Twenty-four hours + later you find me here, writing these words, after a good meal, and long sleep. I’ve just called my workplace, to explain my absence with a concocted story about a family crisis, and was faced with the rather amusing realisation that even though I had gone missing for the entire Christmas/New Year period, nobody had enquired about my whereabouts, nobody particularly cared, and my manager was just happy that I’d be coming in for a shift tomorrow, as he was rather short of workers at the moment.
I guess I’m just another human resource, minus the human part, and if the resource goes missing it’s easily replaced with another. All interchangeable cogs in a corporate machine, humanity destroyed by the need for higher dividends during the next financial quarter.
I’m laughing, really, because you have to, don’t you? You spend your life trying to care, and ultimately realise that nobody really cares at all. So now I’m back, and this Friday night I guess I’ll be going to the Victoria Pub again, to listen to emo music, to drink too much, to face a bit of rejection/humiliation, and see if Spring Heeled Jack is waiting for me, to start our adventures anew in 2024.
Do you think he’ll turn up?
Do you think he missed me?
Do you think I’ll bump into Lucy again?
If you want to find out the answers to these questions, keep reading. I’ll let you know how it goes. Same time, same place, next week. Let’s get this show on the road again. I’m alive, so I guess that means I still have some living to do.