Chasing Imagination

Amy

Tomorrow came with frightening speed. My sleeping patterns had been altered drastically, and I was now semi-nocturnal, it seemed. I hadn’t slept at all the night we’d raided the station, so I fell asleep during that afternoon, waking up in time for dinner. Of course, that then meant that I wasn’t ready to sleep for another few hours, so it was nearly two o’clock in the morning when I left Casper and Kira and Felix and Wolfie and Linzy; all of us sitting around in the main area which was full of activity even at this strange hour. I slept in late the following morning—I was tired anyway, and I knew that the upcoming night would be another sleepless one, and so surfaced from my room sometime shortly before midday.

The funny thing was how normal this was. When I got up and went and showered, Linzy was still laying in bed, evidently awake, but not bothering to get up just yet. A little later, when I found Casper in the dining room, now for lunch, he said that both Felix and Wolfie were, apparently, still fast asleep, having stayed up several hours later than me last night, listening to music and playing cards (which apparently was really just a code name for something a little more like strip poker.)

I started getting ready later on in the afternoon. Imogen came with me to analyse my style—apparently, we had to look normal enough not to arouse suspicion, but enough like Dreamers for Nightshade to actually let us into the London base.

‘We need to go overground to Wimbledon,’ she was saying. ‘That’s the hardest part. Overground, everyone can see you. Then after that we’re on...I don’t know, the Northern Line? Either way, we need to go underground to Tottenham Court road, and then it’s only five minutes through the underground tunnels from there.’

‘Sure,’ I said. I was confident that Casper or someone would ultimately deal with the directions. Personally, I was far more concerned about everything else that was going to happen. I had to go out in the open; something I had not done since I came down here about a week ago.

We met up with the three men shortly after, already ready to leave when we needed to, and discussing the best route to take.

‘Seriously, what’s wrong with underground?’ Felix asked.

‘Because it will take us about three hours to walk the whole distance,’ Casper snapped back.

‘But isn’t there a shortcut?’ he argued, ‘one long tunnel connecting the two bases. I mean, we’re technically one group of Dreamers, not two, just in two slightly different places.’

‘It takes quite a long time to walk down that tunnel though,’ Matt said, taking charge. Now that I knew how Casper felt about him, I noticed every glance, every flinch, every word and every tiny bit of body language towards him, and it became more and more apparent that Casper wished he wasn’t there. ‘It’s quite a few miles.’

‘So,’ Casper said, determined to take over once again. The other night had given him a glimpse of leadership, and it seemed that he liked it. He leaned over the table, unfolding and spreading out a large map of the underground.

‘Ok,’ he said, ‘so, we take the overground to Wimbledon—it’s not far; just a couple of stops. Then, from there we take the district line up to Earl’s Court; take another one Eastbound until we reach Embankment, and then change to the northern line, which we take up to Tottenham Court road.’

‘Tottenham Court Road?’ Felix exclaimed, wrinkling his nose. ‘Why bother going all the way up there? The tunnels occupied by the Dreamers extend all over South London—we could go down at Waterloo; at Westminster; at Hammersmith; all easier to access from here than Tottenham Court Road!’

Casper and Matt both gave Felix a very meaningful look. I suddenly felt like I was missing out on something.

‘You know why not,’ said Matt darkly.

‘Why not?’ I piped up suddenly, speaking for the first time since I’d entered the room.

Casper sighed. ‘Oh yeah, I forgot you didn’t know.’ He prepared to launch into something. ‘Recently, there have been various bits of activity that have enabled the government to guess where we might be hiding out. For that reason, they’ve got some places very well covered with cameras and in some cases, like Waterloo, even guards. Essentially, you can access the tunnels from tons of underground stations and subways, but it’s not that simple. They’re watching us. They nearly got into the base via the Shepherd’s Bush entrance a little further north less than a month ago, but we were ready—I was up there at the time, and we managed to cordon off that little section of the base, convincing them it was unoccupied.’

‘Wow,’ I said. Never before had I imagined the Dreamers to be in danger of discovery—they were always so careful, and keeping hidden was their main priority. Now I wasn’t so sure.

‘It’s alright,’ Imogen reassured me. ‘They ain’t getting in easily.’

‘And London’s prepared,’ Matt continued. ‘You’ve seen this place; it’s tiny compared to the main London bit, and it’s all in sections—about twenty at least, so they can evacuate and lock up little bits if they’re about to be invaded. Even if the authorities got in, they would be highly unlikely to find anything or anyone unless the attack was totally unprecedented.’

I still wasn’t completely reassured, but it was as good as it was going to get, so I followed them, feeling more uneasy even than when we raided the station the other night, into the main area.

Casper looked at me, his hypnotic blue eyes entrancing, but piercing into my mind.

‘Can I trust you, Amy?’ he asked.

I felt like this was another test; some sort of secret initiation. By uttering the words ‘yes,’ I would be bound to an oath to the Dreamers. It scared me, but I had to make the decision, and soon, or he would think it suspicious.

‘Yes,’ I said. ‘Of course you can.’ That was that. I was as much of a Dreamer as he was now—the Vaults and the vandalism had been my trials. I hadn’t tried to escape or draw attention to myself, so they knew I was truly on their side now.

After what Linzy had told me yesterday, I couldn’t force myself to be anything else. Even if I had the choice, how could I go back to my old life, knowing what the government did to Dreamers? If there was such thing as pure evil, it was within all of their black hearts.

Casper turned and walked away, and I made to follow, but Felix gestured for me to stay where I was.

‘He’ll be back in a moment.’

Sure enough, he returned two minutes later, carrying something.

‘I want you to take this, Amy,’ he said, holding the thing out towards me. I had never seen one up this close before, and I had certainly never held one like this, but it was most definitely a gun.

‘Ok,’ I murmured, suddenly even more uncertain. What if someone saw it at the station? They’d know for sure that I was a terrorist then.

‘I’m not sure I could ever use it,’ I said, looking up at Casper with wide eyes. His face was comforting.

‘It’s just a stun gun,’ he told me.

‘They don’t have to know that though,’ Felix said with a smirk.

‘Thanks for that, Felix,’ Matt said sarcastically. ‘It’s not made to kill; only to hold back the attackers.’

‘Oh,’ I said, feeling a little more relieved, but still confused and afraid. Would I ever be able to fire it, even if the situation was really desperate?

Casper continued to gaze at me in that mesmerising yet intrusive manner.

‘We’re not killers, Amy, not when we don't have to be,’ he whispered gently. ‘And I hope you never have to do anything like that.’

***

We left the base via the same entrance I’d come in the first day I’d arrived here, held at gunpoint in front of Casper. So much had changed since then; I was one of them now.
We emerged from the underground somewhere near the A road, and I followed the other four a short distance towards the station, wherever that was. They seemed a lot more certain than I was of where we were going. Hopefully, they’d done all this many times before. I liked to think I was in somewhat experienced hands.

In the end, we’d gone for subtle Dreamer clothing, concealed beneath larger jackets and coats. It was apparent that Matt was dressed the most normally out of all of us, so it was his job to buy five London travel cards for the rest of us, and we all boarded the approaching train in silence. Despite everything, I couldn’t help but watch the security guard, standing there in his fluorescent jacket by the ticket barriers. The others were far more professional than me, not giving him more than a random glance. But I would learn with time. That was, if we survived.

I knew I was being ridiculous. I was in safe hands here, and the Dreamers were used to doing this sort of thing all the time. We weren’t going to get caught.

It was beginning to get dark, but a train going into London at this time of day was relatively empty; there were about ten people in the carriage. But it wasn’t a weekend, therefore few people were going out at this time, and the majority of people were heading out of the city after a day's work and back to their homes.

We found a group of four seats, plus another pair next to it, and we spread out across them. I couldn’t help but glance around on occasion; just to make sure no one was watching us suspiciously, but Imogen began to nudge me every time I looked up until I realised I should probably stop, or it would give them more of a reason to be suspicious.

The journey was quiet, but it also didn’t take very long. I was immensely glad, however, to step off, and back out into the somewhat fresh air of Wimbledon station, glancing around, trying desperately to stay calm as I wound through the masses, eyes always on Casper directly in front of me, leading us to the underground.

Down in the underground, I thought I’d feel safer being back below the city, essentially in Dreamer territory, but in reality it was the opposite. The low ceilings and long tunnels were suffocating. If we were caught down here, there was no way out. We’d be cornered and trapped before we knew what was going on.

My time out in the fresh air had been short lived, and I certainly didn’t make the most of it. As we squeezed onto the crowded, claustrophobic train, unable to find more than two or three seats together, the doors slid shut and I took a deep breath.

Casper reached behind him and gave my hand a gentle, reassuring squeeze. Obviously, he couldn’t say anything down here. I had no doubt that the government had spies everywhere—perhaps that was who these Marauders everyone spoke of were.

As the train reached Southfields two stops on, another pair got off the train and I went and sat down with Casper a little further away from where the other three were gathered around.
‘Are you alright?’ he asked. The train was uncomfortably quiet—one woman wearing a business suit was making a call on her phone a little further down, and Matt, Imogen and Felix were talking in hushed whispers further down, far too quiet for even the closer people to hear. I was convinced in my new found, and now overactive imagination that we were going to get caught. Any moment now, someone would stand up and point at us, screaming ‘terrorists!’ or armed, uniformed men would charge in from the next carriage, guns blazing, pointing in my face.

But after what felt like forever, the train reached Earl’s Court and we were able to meet up with the others again, transferring to the next train and starting the slow torture all over again. This next journey was a little shorter, which was easier to handle, but there wasn’t a huge difference, and my paranoia took just moments to set in. At least this time we all got seats together after three of us sat down and another two seats became available opposite when we passed through South Kensington...or did all sitting together just make us more conspicuous?

Most people were travelling in smaller groups...most people were older than us...most people were dressed more formally; for work, or at least for a smart evening out, and no matter how we’d chosen to hide our more alternative clothes with fashionable jackets and scarves, we still didn’t look the same. We were not the same...we were Dreamers...if they found us now, there was nowhere to run and nowhere to hide.