The Enemy of My Enemy Is My Enemy (short story)

 was the fifteenth story in The Book of the Enemy. It expanded upon the narrative author Jay Eales had began in his previous Faction Paradox short stories Mightier Than the Sword and Born Among Briars.

Summary
1953


 * James Sheldrake is born, blind in his right eye and deaf in his left ear. In the maternity ward a couple in black clothes watch him before departing.

1960


 * Gideon Barrow is born, in later years claiming to have been able to recount the entire experience through drugs. A comic book writer, he used this material in his work. What he was unable to recall is a couple in black that seemed to fade into the background, present at his birth as well.

1965


 * Michelle Louise Montague was being brought home by her parents as a couple in black stood in their lounge, looking at the bookshelves, nodding in approval, and vanishing before the Montagues reach the lounge.

1967


 * The first memory Montague has is of her sister, Donna, being born. As Donna took up her parents time, Donna would push herself back into the spotlight in attempts to reclaim attention in increasingly bold ways.

1969


 * Bobbie Buchanan was born. Rumors of occult circumstances at this birth in later years were started by Buchanan. None were ever substantiated. There may or may not have been a couple in black present at his birth.

1970


 * Sheldrake is expelled from school for dealing psychedelics, and two parents wearing suits of all black depart the headmaster's office as he waits outside, propping the headmaster not only to expel him, but to contact all potential schools he might go to and would have a letter of reference for jobs discouraging them from accepting him. As such he takes a job in a tannery.


 * That same year, at the age of five, Michelle Montague writes a story about a turtle. She asks her parents to get it published.

1974


 * Jim Sheldrake marries Edith Neville.


 * Barrow reflected on his life as a cover story for his father, an anti-nuclear activist, who would sneak around nuclear bases and use his son as an excuse if caught, and how he hated this life but misses his father now that he's left.

1976


 * At school, Montague was an outcast for various reasons, but in part because of her writing. She had completed her first novel, which she showed to nobody.

1977


 * Sheldrake starts a new job at the Gas Board and his wife, Edith, announces that she's pregnant. Sheldrake, not able to be stuck at the job for another four years, quits it, though later says he quits the job prior to being told about his child. Sheldrake submits idea after idea to publishers, including comics based on the Mister E television series, stories he didn't even remember writing.

1978


 * Barrow received a second-hand typewriter from his estranged father - which he then took and used to write his own comic book strip for the local paper.

1979


 * Barrow was gifted a pack of tarot cards from an uncle who encouraged him to investigate the occult.

Characters

 * Sceneshifters
 * Jim Sheldrake
 * Gideon Barrow
 * Michelle Montague
 * Martin Montague
 * Donna Montague
 * Bobbie Buchanan
 * Edith Neville
 * Del Rictus
 * Leonard Holland
 * Steve Mandrill
 * Jez Splatt
 * Nicola
 * Ricardo do Nascimento
 * Philip Goodman
 * Billy Nguyen
 * Simon Sheldrake
 * Colin Shields
 * Belinda Sheldrake
 * Story
 * Steve O'Dowd
 * Daniel Strunk

Continuity

 * Jim Shelrake's time in Camp Gulliver is expanded upon in PROSE: Mightier Than the Sword.
 * Sheldrake writes a series of back-up stories for a licensed comic based off the Mister E television series. One of them explores Mister E's homeplanet being in a time war with a terrorist organisation known as the Black Sun Brigade whose motivation lies in actions Mister E's people had yet to take. This story is "a shade too close to the truth". (COMIC: Star Death, 4-D War, Black Sun Rising)
 * Imaginary Friends: The Hundred Year War: 1969 has a 1960s spy character named Malachi Yarrow (PROSE: No Enemy But Despair) and an imaginary spy character named X-12. (PROSE: Pre-narrative Briefing S)