I could have been anything.  A teacher, a doctor, a lawyer.  Instead, I became a terrorist.  In my defense though, I was forced into my choice when they took everything away from me.  It’s hard to believe now but I had an idyllic childhood with my parents in well paid, socially active jobs and at school I was something of a prodigy.  Everything came easily to me.  I starred on whichever sports team I chose, I was socially adept and I was an intellectual genius.  You don’t have to take my word for it, my grades were off the charts and my year book shows the rest.  Things have changed so much for me now that I sometimes have to look back at them myself to believe that was what life was really like.

I was ready to leave for one of the most prestigious universities in the country when it happened.  It seems that my parents were not the self effacing innocents that everyone took them for and in reality were subversive anti government agents.  Of course, I only found this out later.  The newspapers called it a gas explosion that killed them along with my two younger sisters.  A tragedy that was unfortunate.  I called it murder.  I called it day zero.  I was still I shock when I learned the truth about what had really happened.  I was staying with relatives who were as ill equipped to deal with the situation as was I.  I took to running for as long as it took to get me to a state of exhaustion.  It was the only way that I could get to sleep and even then, my nights were terrorized by endless nightmares.

I was half way round the circuit of the city when they first made contact.  Of course I was suspicious.  She was of a similar age to me and even fitter than I was, able to keep up with my pace easily whilst holding a conversation.  That first time, she didn’t give me any details, just confirming what I already knew.  It hadn’t been an accident, just government sponsored murder.  In return, I was too winded to reply and after a few minutes, she accelerated away, leaving me in her tracks.  I varied my route each time so I never knew how they were able to find me but the contacts kept coming.  It wasn’t always the same person but I started to look forward to her company for those few minutes.

I was given small snippets each time, leaving me with sometimes a single day, sometimes more to absorb what I had been told.  A picture built up of an authoritarian government and an underground opposition, repressed and in hiding for fear of their lives.  My family were not the first to feel their reprisals and they would not be the last.  Eventually, they got the point of all of this – an offer to allow me to replace my parents in their organization. I told them that they had been wasting their time.  With the anger that was boiling inside of me, I would have joined on day one.  And so I became a terrorist – or so the government labeled us.  I use the term government loosely as a number of years back they had temporarily suspended free elections but had subsequently ‘forgotten’ to reinstall them. 

Of course, the so called ‘terrorists’ were the excuse that they used to justify their suppression and a police state was the inevitable result.  My new colleagues were much the same as my parents had been, normal hard working people who dare not show any external signs of opposition to the government but who worked hard underground to destabilize them.  Until now, it had been low level insurrection that had little or no effect but I wanted more.  It took me two years to rise through the ranks to a position where I was part of the decision making leadership group.  During this time, I did attend University and showed no sign of my real intent to those around me.  I worked even harder though on behalf of the underground opposition and managed to persuade them to step up their operations from what was in effect a leaflet and poster campaign.  In my opinion, this had been a total waste of time as there had been zero signs of the populace changing their head in the sand viewpoint of these evil monsters.  

Day 700 saw me entering, for the first time, the library of a grand country estate that was as far away from the capitol and seat of government as was possible.  The owner of the house was from a family that had provided politicians and military leaders throughout history and although he had suffered less than most, his innate sense of reason had led him to start the original opposition.  Lord Strathearn met me personally and led me through the long and lavishly decorated corridors. There were twelve people in this book lined, opulent room, most of whom were known to me through my previous actions over the course of the last two years.  I had gained the reputation of a deep thinker but one who was prepared to go much further than any of the others.  I was directly responsible for the planning and execution of several events that had notched up our profile and had also put much needed money into the coffers.  

As I sat down, I could see that I was being assessed, weighed up by the leadership group.  I had been invited to join this meeting after one of the group had been uncovered and subsequently died in a ‘road traffic accident’.  If I proved my worth today, I would be invited to stay as a permanent member.  I intended to do just that and as a result push my agenda to the front.  I wanted to remove this government from power and this was the place from which I would start.  It was time to move on from the ineffectual policies of minor subversion and time to start making some major statements. 

I had dressed for the occasion.  Jeans and T shirt.  I didn’t want my appearance to distract from my message.  The problem was that they didn’t want to hear it.  They were basically nice people who were significantly out of their depth.  You cannot fight an authoritarian dictatorship with kind words and hope.  You fight fire with fire and that was what I intended to do.  They had the keys to the finances but were not prepared to back my ‘lunatic schemes’ and by the end of the meeting, I had become persona non grata.  I was out.

To be honest, I had expected nothing less – as they say, hope for the best but plan for the worse.  Oh yes, of course I had planned.  I needed the money that they had banked and after all, I had stolen most of it on their behalf.  My final words to them were a portent of the future.  Work with me or suffer the consequences.  I hadn’t come this far to back down now.  I told you at the start that I had a genius level IQ.  Hacking their accounts and moving the money was easy.  Insurgency wasn’t cheap.  Most of my consideration was about their future or lack of it.  Did I want to spend the rest of my life looking behind me for my former allies or should I make a clean start and eliminate them.  Would this make me as evil as the government that I had sworn to bring down or did the end justify the means.  It took another day to come to a decision.

I had assembled a group of friends during the last year or two that were of a similar mindset to myself and I always listened to them carefully before coming to a decision.  By default, I was their de facto leader but they were young, intelligent people who were as hungry for change as was I.  Between operations, we would talk and brainstorm for hours with some often odd suggestions.  It was late in October when Vega had made her most bizarre contribution.  The only child of a couple of astronomers, she was usually quiet and thoughtful, saying little but was incredibly incisive on the rare occasions when she did speak.  There were six of us sat around my apartment and as usual, I was listening to contributions about our next move when she randomly referred to ‘Guido Fawkes’.  

Yes this was the same ‘Guy Fawkes’ that was immortalized every November 5th in the UK.  He had been executed for trying to assassinate the King by blowing up the parliament building but had been caught before the plot had been completed.  Random as it was, it caught the imagination of several of our group and a long involved discussion started about its probable effect, practicality and so on.  Amazingly, of dozens of suggestions that day, I heard three that I was certain would work.  Guy Fawkes was the most popular amongst the group.  Wipe out the existing government in one decisive blow and start all over again, install a democratic system and disappear into the background.

Two years later, our plan had been successfully implemented.  I was now an influential figure in the decision making process and was rapidly rising to the top.  What?  You think that I blew up the seat of government?  That I am some kind of mass murderer?  I told you that I had a genius level IQ, was socially adept and was born for leadership.  It was ridiculously easy once you realized that the real power was not held by the politicians but by their advisors.  The people at the top were generally idiots, spending their time fighting off party squabbles and attempted leadership coups.  They didn’t have time for policy making.  That was done by the real people in power.  A combination of fake news, false e-mails and hacked bank accounts enabled me to remove the advisors that were already there and so here I am.  Chief policy advisor to the president.  

The next steps will be much simpler.  As he becomes increasingly ‘ill’, I will nudge him towards a more democratic process until his successor will be elected by popular vote.  Who knows, it might even be me.