Conspiracy Theory
Copyright© 2026 by Dark Apostle
Chapter 1: The Event
*January 1st, 2010*
It was nine in the morning when I turned onto the road and slowed to check the house numbers. Finding the address, I pulled into the driveway, parked and sat back with a sigh. For a moment, I stared up at the house through the windscreen. It was plain, purpose-built and well maintained, looking much like every other house on the street. Clean windows, tidy brickwork and a neatly painted front door gave it an unremarkable, respectable appearance. A wheelie bin stood beside the side gate, and a faded ceramic pot occupied one corner of the doorstep.
Next door, someone had left a hose loosely coiled beneath an outside tap. Further along, a man in a dressing gown was collecting something from his car. He glanced in my direction before shuffling back indoors, apparently finding nothing interesting about another visitor arriving on the street.
A few houses still had Christmas decorations in their windows. An inflatable Santa had collapsed onto somebody’s lawn, its head folded beneath it, while a string of coloured lights blinked around a garage door. The street had the subdued feel of a morning when most people were still asleep or regretting how much they’d drunk the night before. I’d gone to bed early for this, which would make it particularly annoying if Grimes turned out to be another lunatic.
His instructions were written on a folded sheet beside me. Nine o’clock, come alone, sound the horn three times. Beneath that, I’d written the password and underlined it twice. Looking at it now, in daylight, I wondered why I’d agreed to any of this. Still, he hadn’t asked for money, and he’d refused to discuss details over the telephone. That alone had made him slightly more interesting than my last few contacts.
I checked the address once more, then sounded the horn three times, as instructed. Whatever this morning brought, I hoped it wouldn’t be another wasted journey. Collecting my briefcase from the passenger seat, I climbed out, locked the car and straightened my tie.
The garden was pristine. Neatly cut grass bordered the path, the hedges had been trimmed with almost military precision, and carefully tended rose bushes occupied the beds beneath the windows. Their bare stems had been cut back for winter, the soil around them cleared of weeds. A small bird feeder hung from a bracket beside the gate, with spilled seed scattered across the paving beneath it. Someone clearly spent a great deal of time keeping the place in order.
I was halfway through reaching for the doorbell when the door creaked open. The gap was just wide enough for me to glimpse a dim hallway, a coat hanging from a hook and a pair of shoes arranged beneath it. Whoever stood behind the door remained out of sight.
“Password.”
The voice was old and rough, as though its owner had spent the morning gargling gravel.
“Hydra,” I replied, feeling faintly ridiculous saying it on somebody’s doorstep.
The door slammed shut. I stared at it for a moment, then sighed and adjusted my grip on the briefcase. Another wasted journey, another dead end. Oh, fuck it. I’d passed a decent-looking coffee shop on the way over. At least I could get a doughnut and a latte before heading home.
I turned and started towards the car. Behind me, the door opened again.
“Well, are you coming in or what?”
An elderly man stood on the doorstep, leaning on a walking cane. He was in his eighties at least, with a stooped back and a full head of white hair that needed a trim around the ears. His face was deeply lined, his cheeks freshly shaved apart from a small patch beneath his jaw that he’d missed. Behind a pair of ordinary reading glasses, his eyes were an extraordinary blue.
He wore a brown cardigan over a checked shirt, with grey trousers and a pair of worn slippers. One cardigan pocket sagged beneath the weight of whatever he kept in it. A folded handkerchief protruded from the other. He looked like somebody’s grandfather, the sort of man you might find buying a newspaper or arguing about the price of stamps.
“I know what you’re thinking,” he said.
I stopped beside the garden path. “Is that so, Mr Grimes?”
“Yep.” He ran a hand through his hair, looking thoroughly pleased with himself. “Still got all of it.”
For a moment, I simply stared at him. Then he cracked a grin and started cackling, and I shook my head as I walked back towards the house.
“Good to know you’ve still got a sense of humour.”
“In my line of work, you have to.”
“And what line of work would that be?”
His smile faded. He glanced past me towards the road, studying the parked cars and the houses opposite. The change was abrupt enough that I found myself looking around as well, although I couldn’t have said what I was looking for. The man in the dressing gown had disappeared, and the only movement came from a bird hopping beneath the feeder.
Grimes gave a small nod towards the side of the house. A teenager emerged from beyond the hedge and came jogging up the path.
“Yo, Mr G.”
The kid had long, messy brown hair and wore blue Levi’s and a black T-shirt bearing the name of a rock band. His trainers were scuffed, and he looked as though he’d got dressed in a hurry. In one hand, he carried a bulky electronic device with a narrow probe attached by a coiled lead.
“Harry, scan the place,” Grimes instructed, stepping aside to let us in.
“Roger,” Harry replied with a grin.
The hallway was narrow and comfortably warm. A small table beneath the mirror held a bowl of keys, several unopened envelopes and a supermarket receipt. Beside them lay a pair of gardening gloves with dried soil caught in the creases. Grimes shut the front door, checked the latch and led us into the living room.
Harry immediately got to work. He passed the probe along the window frames, behind the television and around the telephone, watching the display as he moved. Whatever the device was supposed to detect, he seemed to know how to use it.
The room smelled faintly of furniture polish and old tobacco. There was a patterned sofa beneath the window and two armchairs facing a television that looked several years overdue for replacement. A newspaper lay folded beside the remote control, its crossword half completed in blue ink. On the hearth sat a biscuit tin containing a jumble of batteries, pens and loose screws.
Books filled the shelves on either side of the fireplace. Gardening manuals stood beside battered novels, an old road atlas and a dictionary with a cracked spine. Several framed photographs occupied the mantelpiece: children in school uniforms, a wedding party and a younger Grimes standing beside a woman on a windy beach. In that one, he wore shorts and sandals and had an ice cream in his hand.
There were no maps covered in pins, no newspaper clippings pasted across the walls and no photographs of blurred objects in the sky. I was faintly ashamed to realise I’d been looking for them. One man I’d interviewed had devoted his entire dining room to photographs of vapour trails. Grimes appeared to have devoted most of his living room to being comfortable.
“Sit yourself down,” he said, moving a television listings magazine from the nearest armchair. “Mind the cushion. Zip’s gone on the bloody thing.”
I sat while he lowered himself into the chair opposite. The seat had moulded itself to him over the years, and the fabric on one arm was noticeably darker where his hand usually rested. He propped his cane within reach and adjusted a coaster beneath his glass of water.
“Would you like a drink?” he asked. “Tea, coffee?”
“Coffee would be good, thank you.”
“Harry, put the kettle on when you get to the kitchen.”
The teenager looked up from behind the television. “Am I scanning it or making breakfast?”
“You’re capable of doing two things.”
“Depends what you’re paying.”
“Same as yesterday.”
“So, nothing.”
“You had half my biscuits.”
Harry grinned and returned to his work. Grimes shook his head, although he was smiling too. The exchange sounded familiar enough that I suspected it happened in one form or another whenever the boy came round.
Harry finished in the living room and moved through the rest of the house. I could hear cupboards opening and the occasional electronic chirp while Grimes took off his glasses and polished them with his handkerchief. From the kitchen came the sound of running water, followed by the click of the kettle.
“Your grandson?” I asked.
“Neighbour’s boy. Known him since he used to kick footballs into my roses.”
“And you trust him with all this?”
Grimes glanced towards the doorway. “I wouldn’t have him here if I didn’t.”
Harry returned a few minutes later carrying two mugs, one with a faded seaside picture and the other advertising a building firm. He handed me the latter and set Grimes’s tea within easy reach, moving the old man’s newspaper before it could get wet.
“Milk’s in yours. Sugar’s there,” he told me, pointing to a bowl on the table. “All clear, boss. You sure you don’t want me to stick around?”
“No, I’ll be fine.”
“Sure. Holler if you need me.”
Harry nodded at me on his way out. Grimes waited until we heard the front door close before putting his glasses on the side table.
“He’s a good kid,” he said with a smile. “Knows his way around that equipment better than I ever did. Had to get him to sort out the television last week, too. Pressed something on the remote and lost all the channels.”
“What exactly was he checking for?”
“Anything that might be listening.” He shifted in his chair and looked directly at me. “We don’t have a lot of time. They’ll know you’ve contacted me, and they’ll no doubt send someone to investigate.”
“Who are they?”
“You know who they are.”
I let the silence stretch for a moment. A clock ticked on the mantelpiece, and somewhere deeper in the house a pipe knocked as the heating came on. I’d heard variations of that answer before, usually from people who couldn’t supply a name, a document or anything else I could actually check.
“Well,” I said, setting my briefcase beside the chair, “what have you got to tell me that’s different from the rest of the crackpot stories I’ve heard?”
Grimes laughed, but it quickly turned into a harsh coughing fit. He leaned forward, pressing a fist to his mouth, and I started to rise before he waved me back down. After taking a drink, he settled against the cushions and wiped his eyes.
“My story will sound just as nuts as some of the others,” he said, his voice rougher now. “But there is one difference.”
“Oh?”
I leaned forward despite myself. He did the same, lowering his voice as though someone might still be listening.
“I’ll be telling you the truth.”
I sat back again. “Funny. They all say that.”
“Of course they do. Like me, they believe their stories.” He smiled, apparently untroubled by my scepticism. “The difference is what happens after you leave here. You’ll be investigated. You’ll most likely be threatened. Someone may visit you at work. You’ll get strange phone calls in the middle of the night, or find the same car parked outside your house three days running.”
I glanced towards the window before I could stop myself, which seemed to amuse him.
“Your phone can be tapped,” he continued. “Your home can be bugged. They can put a microphone in your office or a tracking device on your car. If they get close enough, they can put something on your clothes.”
“That’s preposterous.”
He raised an eyebrow. “Seriously?”
“The way you’re describing it? Yes.”
“Have you seen that Will Smith film, Enemy of the State?”
I nodded.
“Then take a bloody hint.”
“That’s a film, Mr Grimes.”
“And you think that makes the idea of surveillance fictional?”
I opened my mouth, then closed it again. “Okay. Point taken.”
“See Harry before you leave. He’ll give you a few pointers.”