Chasing Imagination

Amy

Our meeting with the Master, or Mr Eisenberg as I had heard him called by Casper, passed in a blur. He told us more of what we already knew; more about the deaths and destruction and capture that I only wished we could get away from. Still, though, we knew nothing more about those who had been taken away by the police.

He explained a little bit about the base to us, but there wasn’t really a lot to tell. Nikolas appeared at the end to show us to a room, apologising that we were going to have to share for a few days. Personally, I didn’t mind. There were many worse things in the world than sharing a bedroom with Casper.

He led us far down a long tunnel, stopping outside a door and opening it into a room much the same as the one in London. There was a little bit of graffiti on the wall, presumably from the last owner, but other than that it was bare, with a bed on either side of the room.

‘I take it you don’t have much luggage?’ Nik asked.

‘Nothing,’ Casper said, shaking his head.

‘Well, there’s a huge clothes store if you go back to the hub—that’s the main, central area, and then take the tunnel on the far side of the room. In fact, we’ve got stores of just about everything down there,’ Nik explained. ‘I’ll leave you two alone now; I’m guessing you’re tired. You’ve missed the cooked dinner, but you can always go and help yourself to stuff from the kitchen if you’re hungry.’ With a brief smile, he departed, shutting the door softly behind him.

I flopped down on one of the beds; I didn’t really care which, and closed my eyes.

‘Do you want to sleep now?’ Casper asked.

I shook my head. ‘No...maybe.’

He chuckled slightly, and I heard a creak as he sat down on the edge of my bed with me. Without opening my eyes, I then felt his hand brush across my skin, entwining his fingers around mine.

When I opened my eyes, I was looking straight into his.

‘We’re gonna start a revolution, right?’ he said.

I smiled. ‘I think we should.’

‘It was Markus’s last words to us,’ Casper continued, ‘and I will adhere to them if it kills me. This is war now.’

It was war. There could be no denying. I knew it only too well.

Casper switched off the main light in the room, dim though it was. I closed my eyes once again, and the last thing I felt before drifting off into a deep sleep was the feeling of his arm wrapping round my shoulder.

***

Shortly after breakfast the following morning, Casper found a room with a computer. Desperate to find out anything and everything about the situation in London, he began to surf the internet. Meanwhile, I sat beside him with an ancient, crackling radio that Carl had lent to us—apparently he kept all these old fashioned artefacts almost like antiques, but a few of them still worked.

‘Do you think—‘ Casper began.

‘Ssh! Listen!’ I hissed abruptly as the English radio station crackled into life, and he needed no other persuasion to stop.

The newsreader was half way through a Dreamer update, but it seemed that the most important information was just coming.

‘...of the fifty-three who have been captured, now whom are all locked up in Institutions, three have been shortlisted for Demobilisation, having already been convicted of two previous offences in the past, in accordance with official government rules. We are now able to officially name these three. They are forty-seven year old Dominic Hawthorn; forty-one year old Jon Carter, and thirty-nine year old Carmen Simons.’

Casper went into shock, his hand falling from where it rested on the radio to limply by his side.

‘Shit!’ I cried, ‘what’s wrong?’

‘Carmen,’ he murmured.

‘Who?’ I asked in desperation. ‘Who is Carmen?’

‘Carmen Simons,’ he repeated, as though I should know her. ‘That’s Nightshade’s real name.’

My heart stopped momentarily.

‘No,’ I whispered, going into denial. ‘No, no they can’t! Casper, they can’t!’ My voice grew louder and more pleading with every word, until I was shrieking.

‘But they will,’ he whispered grimly, his eyes vacant and fixed on the wall behind me. ‘Carmen—Nightshade, has been sentenced to the Operation.’

‘No Casper!’ I cried desperately, the tears already falling freely from my eyes; great, cascading waterfalls down my cheeks. ‘Casper, they can’t! We have to save her!’

‘We can’t,’ he whispered.

‘Please, we can’t just sit here!’ I was bordering on delirious.

He stood up so abruptly that his chair clattered back. ‘There’s nothing we can do!’ he roared, angrier than I had ever seen him. He marched towards me and grabbed me by the shoulders, shaking me vigorously, those piercing, laser eyes of his staring deep into mine, full to the brim with fury. ‘We can’t do anything! It’s useless! She’s gone!’

I sunk back down to the chair, and he released me, his hands trembling violently as he stared at them, unable to believe how he’d just, well, attacked me. I was shaking, but with more than just the surge of rage. I was shaking with sadness and fear. Nightshade; Nightshade; the woman so full of life; so kind; so enthusiastic; so eager to do something real for this world...and now she was gone, or as good as. No. She was worse than merely ‘gone.’ She was going to be Operated on.

‘I’m sorry,’ he whispered, digging his nails deep into his own palms as though it could make up for any pain he might have caused me.

‘You don’t have to say anything,’ I murmured, understanding his reasons for such an unusual burst of rage. These were hard times; this was a dark day.

The door clattered open, and we both turned simultaneously to see Linzy peer in, a fearful, troubled expression on her face as she ran a hand through her dishevelled, spiky hair.

‘I heard raised voices...’ she said meekly, her large, dark eyes wide in her head, sparkling with concern.

‘Nightshade’s been caught, and she’s going for the Operation,’ Casper blurted out in one wavering, whispered sentence.

Linzy froze where she stood, half in the doorway, her hand setting like concrete as it ran through her hair so that a few dark strands fell forward across her eyes.

‘What?’

‘It’s true,’ I whispered, and more tears came before I could stop them.

‘Don’t cry,’ Casper said caringly, but he looked to be on the verge of falling apart at the seams himself.

‘No,’ Linzy stammered, her almond eyes widening in shock. ‘Are you sure...please tell me you’re not completely sure.’

‘I’m afraid they announced it on the radio,’ Casper said, his tone almost apologetic. ‘Carmen Simons, and two others who I’ve never met—must be from the central London base. It’s still hideous all the same.’

‘It’s sick,’ Linzy agreed, her voice thick with hatred.

‘There’s nothing we can do,’ Casper said, a tear finally leaking from his eye and dripping down his face.

Linzy glanced behind her where she still stood, just in the doorway. Carl was standing there, looking like he wanted to come in to use a computer. When he saw the sorrow that was suffocating the room, however, he stopped and went to back out.

‘Carl!’ Casper called after him. His face reappeared in the doorway.

‘Are you guys alright?’ he asked, looking awkward in this intense emotional situation.

‘Nik said something to me...briefly...about you being good with computers,’ Casper said, wiping his face.

‘Yeah, I know quite a lot about computers,’ Carl agreed.

‘Can you help?’ Casper asked, his voice a little tentative. ‘Is there any way of finding out who the police captured in London?’

Carl pulled a face but stepped up to the desk, ready for the challenge. ‘I can try. I’ve been hacking for the last few years; a police database isn’t going to be impossible.’

‘Thanks,’ Casper replied gratefully.

The rest of the day passed slowly, the three of us poured over computers. Evening came and we all headed gloomily in the direction of the canteen, starving hungry having not eaten all day, and thoroughly depressed. We had found nothing.