A Declaration of Independence

A few days later, I was woken up in the night by a series of distant explosions. I jumped up and looked out of the window. The sky over the island was lit up with illumination flares. There was the sound of sporadic machine gun fire. It didn't last long. The flares finally fizzled out and I went back to bed, where I lay awake for a long time, wondering what had happened. I thought of calling Toby on my mobile, but then thought better of it. Watkins and Bailey would probably be checking my mobile phone records. If they found out I'd called him, they'd have even more cause to think I was involved in some way in whatever it was they thought was going on.

From what I could gather from the press in the days that followed, Toby's friend, Butler, had made his way to the island shortly after I'd left. Butler, for some reason that was never fully explained, was being trailed by MI5. The police, on some pretext, visited the island to see what was going on there. They got a frosty reception: Toby, apparently, demanded to see their passports and told them they'd be deported. According to the police, the two men were involved in the construction of crude fortifications, leading them to believe they were in possession of firearms. According to the news, when the armed unit stormed the island, though, they found no trace of either of them. It was assumed they'd both got wind of what was going on and escaped by boat.

In the weeks that followed, I expected another visit from Watkins and his sidekick, Bailey, but they never came. I never heard news of Toby, either: he and his chum seemed to have vanished without trace. Even assuming they made it off the island, the North Sea is a dangerous place in the dark, in a rowing boat.