Chasing Imagination

Casper

‘Of course, it’s very rarely that easy,’ I pointed out as we returned through doors into the gloomy, concrete base victoriously. They couldn’t catch us down here; at least not yet anyway. I didn’t want to discourage her; I just didn’t want her becoming complacent.

‘The Vault raids are usually one of the easiest expeditions to undertake,’ I continued. ‘Of course, they’re not without their risks, and many people have been caught down there in the past, but currently we’re way ahead of the government in our knowledge of the underground, and until they catch up we should be alright.’

‘Ok,’ she agreed uncertainly. ‘What other sorts of things will I have to do then?’

‘All sorts,’ I said, ‘but nothing too dangerous too soon. However, I think they’re planning a bit of vandalism for a couple of days time; possibly smashing up a train station or whatever, and then there’s going to be a raid on the nearest Marauder base sometime soon, but you don’t have to join in with that just yet.’

***

I reported back to Markus, and he gave his nod of approval.

‘Casper?’ he said as I turned to leave the room.

‘Yeah?’

‘I’m putting you in charge of this vandalism stuff happening nexin the next couple of days,’ he said. ‘Sort it out; bring some people along, get yourself organised.’

‘Really?’ I asked, genuinely surprised and grateful. ‘You want me to do it? Thanks Markus.’

He shrugged indifferently. ‘You’re good at organisation, kid; I’ll give you that. And of course if it all goes wrong I’ve got you to blame.’

The smile abruptly faded from my face.

‘Well, ok then. Anything specific this time?’

‘Nothing really,’ he replied. ‘Cause as much destruction as possible; break a few things; make sure the Dreamer symbol is written on every surface you can find; just don’t kill anyone. You know the rules by now.’

‘Yeah,’ I agreed. I’d been on plenty of resistance missions before—letting off bombs, breaking a few windows; vandalising train tracks and other public services; spraying the Dreamer logo—the sideways diamond with a large circle inside it that was big enough to touch the diamond’s sides, and a smaller circle or dot inside that one; meant to represent an eye—anything and everything I could to annoy the government as much as possible. This was just the first one I’d explicitly led, though I’d taken a controlling position on several occasions before.

The first question was did I involve Amy? I wasn’t sure if she was ready for this sort of thing by now, and if the police saw her out and about—she had most likely been reported missing by her parents or friends—they’d immediately know something was up.

No. Amy just had to miss out on this one. I’d leave her here with Imogen or someone, and I’d take about six people with me. Matt was most definitely not coming—I took pride in my leading role, and didn’t want to jeopardise it for someone else—but there were plenty of other people I could ask. Linzy, Felix, Wolfie, Jay, Dan; even Leah if I got desperate. She’d probably force herself in anyway; it seemed there was nothing she loved more than taking a can of spray paint and spraying the word DREAMER in block capitals across a government-owned building. In all fairness, I could see where she was coming from.

I spotted Felix when I entered the canteen the following morning at breakfast time. Amy was sitting with Imogen and the new addition of Kira, so I swiftly departed and called his name out before he could reach the exit. With forty or more people sitting and standing around, eating and chatting and moving about, I was given very little notice.

‘Felix!’

He turned round. ‘Morning Casper,’ he said in his strong, Irish accent, which had never weakened in the five years he had been a Dreamer in and around London.

I moved out of the way of two girls walking past, going towards the corner.

‘You got any spray paint?’ Felix was one of those people I could always count on to have whatever I happened to need at the time.

‘When d’you need it for?’ he asked.

‘Well we’re planning a little bit of resistance for a couple of days time, so I guess as soon as possible,’ I said.

‘Sure, I can get it to you by tomorrow,’ he agreed cheerfully. ‘Anyways, what’s this resistance? Why aren’t I invited?’ He laughed in a friendly fashion to show that he bore no grudge against me if I didn’t choose to invite him.

‘Markus mentioned it to me last night after I got back from the Vaults,’ I said. ‘He asked me to lead it, so I thought I’d better gather up a couple of people now. You’re invited, if you wanna come.’

‘Sure,’ he agreed lightly. ‘Always happy to inconvenience a few government fuckers.’ His accent made the last word sound more like ‘fockers,’ which had always been the bane of jokes. ‘What’re you planning?’

‘Train station.’ There needed to be no more said. Everyone knew that train stations were a favoured spot for acts of resistance because of the inconvenience a minor task could cause, and it was also a hell of a lot of fun.

‘Well I’m in,’ he agreed. If he was afraid, he didn’t show it, but Felix was very much like that. ‘Do you wanna have a meeting about it, I dunno, later?’

‘Sure,’ I agreed. ‘Two o’clock; invite a couple of others. Not Matt. And don’t let Leah get word of it.’

He laughed at my unreasoned conditions, clapping me on the back and walking off.

‘What was that about?’ Amy asked with mild interest as she looked up from her bowl of cereal.

‘Not much,’ I said. ‘We’re going to go and vandalise a few places the day after tomorrow, but it’s not going to be any major resistance.’ I looked at Imogen. ‘Just the usual sort of thing.’

‘Well,’ Imogen said lightly, ‘I’m in.’ It always shocked me how casual people could be about taking part in these things. I had taken part in little acts of resistance too many times to count by now—sometimes planned, sometimes just something I spontaneously felt like doing whilst I was out or about to venture above ground, but I always thought it through carefully. At the end of the day, anyone taking part could be arrested, imprisoned, shot, hurt—the consequences were endless.

I pulled a face. ‘Actually, I was hoping you could stay here with Amy.’ My eyes flickered to Amy’s pretty, yet disinterested face that sparked ever so slightly as her name was mentioned.

‘I’m not invited then,’ she said.

I shrugged. ‘Didn’t think you’d want to come.’

‘If I’m stuck down here, I might as well do it properly,’ she said with a huff, her cold eyes not meeting mine. I knew beyond doubt that she still resented me for bringing her into this life, but she was slowly getting better. She’d learnt the truth already, and I knew that, even given the choice, she would never go back. It was all just an act in reality. She couldn’t change anymore, even if she wanted to.

‘I’m just trying to keep you safe,’ I said. She purposely didn’t make eye contact, twiddling her spoon around in the soggy cornflakes. I didn’t know whether that meant she agreed or not.

Despite what she thought, I left, and I bumped into Wolfie as I walked out of the room, so I mentioned our little meeting to him. 'Semi-organised resistance' was what I called this type of action—not exactly carefully planned out, not specifically authorised by Nightshade or Markus, but not spontaneous, and not without any sort of confirmation from the leaders.

It seemed that Felix had also managed to see him on the way, so he already knew what was going on. Either way, he turned up later in the little ‘meeting’ room behind the canteen—a partially tiled, but mostly just concrete room, with archways leading into various parts of the underground, dimly lit of course, with minimal furniture. Larger meetings normally took place in the foyer or the canteen, or sometimes the big ‘pillar room,’ as we normally called it—a large, completely unused room further through the underground, empty and low-ceilinged, but big enough to need dozens of pillars to support its roof.

There were six of us, including myself. Felix had done a good job—I didn’t want to over-invite, because then I’d have to turn people away, and despite the danger, no one loved anything more than breaking a few government windows and spraying Dreamer graffiti all over public areas. Increase the fear; increase the knowledge; increase the resistance; that was my philosophy. Even if people didn’t want to join us, at least they were more likely to have heard of us, and therefore to be scared of us.

‘Well,’ I said as people took seats around the large and very worn looking oak table in the centre. Around me sat Felix, Wolfie, Kira, Jay and of course the ever-begrudging Leah, despite my best efforts at avoiding her. ‘Considering there’s been a bit of a lull in open resistance recently, Markus has suggested that a few of us organise some. I was wondering if anyone’s interested in going down to the train station tomorrow night.’

‘Sounds good,’ Wolfie agreed.

***

For the rest of that day and the following, I kept mostly to myself. Amy remained cooped up in the little room she shared with Linzy, though Linzy was rarely in there anyway, mostly reading and listening to whatever music Imogen suggested for her. She, like so many other Dreamers, had succumbed to the power of imagination, and was now only too keen to utilise it—she could not keep her head out of a book for more than a short time.

This gave me a little room for manoeuvre—I had little idea what she was up to most of the time, but I doubted it was anything remotely sinister. She didn’t seem that sort of person, and I almost began to believe that she was growing to like it down here. Apparently, Leah had told her much about the world, but there was still so much more that she did not know, but that she should.

Even the Dreamers had barely scratched the surface of the secrets that lay buried all around us. We still didn’t understand half of the corruption the government were forcing down our throats, but we had time. We had so much time.

Amy

For the rest of the day, I read. The following morning, I went towards the canteen shortly after I woke up and got dressed, glancing around for anyone that I knew. Matt and Imogen were sitting at the side, but Casper was nowhere to be seen.

Already, I was a good way into my first ever fiction book, and I was enjoying it unprecedentedly. I seemed to be getting disturbingly used to imagination. It wasn’t a great place to be, but what choice did I have? I could sit down here, moaning and mourning my loss, disliked by most people, and disliking most of them myself, refusing to believe in the lies they choked me with. Or, I could embrace it. It wasn’t my first choice of life, but it was the only life I had left, and one thing I’d been taught throughout my life was to go with the flow—don’t question; don’t resist; don’t try and change anything. That was for the government to do.

And down here, Markus was my government, and the Dreamers were my police. And if I resisted them, I would be locked up.

And yet, didn’t that just make this place another kind of prison?