Chapter VIII: Mr.Matale Part II
August 3rd, 1908
The Albanians had the last laugh.
One of the captured Albanian men, one of the ones who had been to our stronghold, revealed our location to Turkish authorities.
Fortunately, the Turks didn't capture any significant documentation (maps, names, plans, or otherwise) in the raid, it was smuggled out during the bloodshed.
However, nearly all of the highest ranking members of the party in the Empire were killed. Those were good, hardened, experienced men...and they were friends.
I had known Dirk since I was a teenager. We both joined the party together and had fought in the revolution back home. I remember when we helped seize and subsequently burn down Buckingham palace. That was where we met Jean, in London. We helped him build the gallows that the party leaders used to hang the royal family. We were nothing in the party then...
And really all three of us still are nothing. Those two are dead, and I'm in command of a headless snake located in a backwards, arid empire on the wrong end of Europe.
The party is scattered. The raid couldn't have come at a worse time. The civilian population is growing extremely restless. The looming tax increase has finally arrived. The middle class is breaking, as are the lower classes. A storm is coming; a revolution is coming. But the party has no one to lead it.
The regional commanders were all here the night of the raid, to be briefed by me as to the procedures of the revolution. I don't know how we can overthrow the Ottomans now. Who will lead the uprisings in each region now that the experienced commanders are dead? I have sent a dispatch to London asking for assistance.
What a day for the Ottomans to attack. Perhaps they have an informant in our ranks? I was running late that day. There was a knock at the door and one of the recruits thought it was me (he didn't know that we didn't just knock), he opened the door and had his head promptly blown off.
Our men ran to get their weapons but were swiftly overwhelmed. The Ottomans struck hard. One of the more fast-thinking members of the party grabbed everything of value and ran, and told me what happened.
The people who stayed were brutally murdered. Against my instincts, I returned to Matale's factory a few days later. There was blood, bones, brains, intestines, and other grotesque monuments to the frailty of the human body, all in Matale's old factory.
Matale's factory used to make cradles.