Dreaming Of Strangers

Eli's POV

Eli Chapman tapped her foot her foot nervously, the noise from her stiletto black heels echoing around the vast hall. She adjusted her tight black dress for the 34th time that night, convinced that it had slipped. She wanted to look professional for this meeting, and you couldn’t look professional in a dress that was falling off your boobs.

Her flatmates had berated her for fussing so much - ‘It’s only a meeting,’ and ‘There’s no point in dressing up, you’re only showing people science experiments!’ - but none of them knew what she was actually doing. If they knew, they would have called her crazy. Eli was anything but crazy.

Beside her sat her lab partner, Alex Gaskarth. He was doing a good job of appearing calm and collected, but Eli knew he felt just as nervous and jittery as she did. Who wouldn’t, in this situation?

Eli checked her watch. 12:18. The people they were meeting were 18 minutes late.

What if they didn’t come? What if Eli and Alex had been set up by a couple of 17 year old boys? It was too horrible to think about.

She suppressed a shiver of joint nerves and excitement. This meeting was probably - no, definitely - the most important moment of her life. What happened in this gym today could quite literally change the world.

Eli opened her mouth to ask Alex about the case, but quickly snapped it shut again. Or course the briefcase was fine - it was literally right under Alex’s chair. She was just being paranoid.

Forcing herself to at least act calm, she stopped tapping her foot. But the tapping resumed after five minutes had passed and the two teens still hadn’t arrived.

Eli began to feel sick with nerves. Oh, god. What if they’d told someone? What if they’d called the police, and the next knock on the door was an officer coming to arrest them? Her an Alex hadn’t technically broken the law yet, but the experiment they were about to carry out could easily land them a prison cell. Not to mention the bodies -

Wait, how the fuck were they going to hide dead bodies?

“Oh my god, Alex,” Eli burst out, grabbing her partner’s arm frantically. “The bodies!”

He shot her a half amused, half unimpressed look. “Eli, we planned this. Remember?”

Eli shook her head quickly. “No, no I do not remember! Care to enlighten me?!”

Alex shifted impatiently. “Suicide attempts? They both jumped off a building together? Remember yet, Eli?”

It was coming back to her now. In her panic she had forgotten their carefully planned cover story. She needed to work on that - one slip-up and they were all fucked.

“Yeah, I do. Sorry.”

Another painful ten minutes passed. Eli was on the edge of giving up when, at last, the gym door was flung open and two teenagers stumbled through. One seemed to be supporting the other, who was obviously limping. As heartless as it sounds, Eli didn’t feel much sympathy. These two had just put her through the most agonising half hour of her life.

The two limped up to her and Alex, and the one supporting the other gave an apologetic smile.

“Sorry we’re so late. The bullies at school got James just as we were leaving,” He told Eli.

Eli felt a twinge of pity. She knew just how that felt from her high school days - she guessed that was why these two were suicidal.

“It’s okay,” Eli lied. “Just take a seat.”

The two boys pulled out the remaining chairs and on the opposite side of the table to Alex and Eli.

Eli reached out and shook their hands, and Alex did the same. The boys introduced themselves as Leo Frank and James Golding, which Eli already knew.

They both looked pretty beaten up, James the worst. But they were trying to cover it, which Eli had to admit was admirable. The forms they’d handed in a few days ago had read that they were boyfriends, so Eli assumed Leo had stepped in to help James with the bullies. But no time for questions.

“So,” Eli said, deciding to just get on with it. “You two are both suicidal, right?”

They both nodded uneasily. “Why else would we sign up for this?” Leo said with a dry laugh.

“So you’re both sure you want to go through with this?” Alex pressed, receiving more nods.

“Well, let’s carry on then.” Eli wasted no time in retrieving the briefcase from under Alex’s chair and placing it in the middle of the round table. Leo and James eyed it uneasily as Eli popped the clips.

She held her breath as she slid out one of the clear vials and held it to the light for inspection. It was incredible how something so powerful could be mistaken for something as harmless as water.

Alex was also eyeing the glass vial with awe. In contrast, Leo and James were looking slightly fearful. Rightly so, considering they were about guinea pigs for this lethal substance.

“I know the forms explained it roughly, but I’m going to explain in more detail what this liquid will do. Okay?” Eli asked.

Leo and James, lost for words, just nodded.

“Okay.” Eli sucked in a breath. “What’s in these vials will, to put it simply, kill you. You’ll be dead within a few seconds once this liquid passes your lips. That’s why we asked for suicidal people to to test it out on and not random kids off the high street. But this experiment also creates life. Once dead, you will be reborn as a human baby, whilst still keeping all the memories of your past life. Or at least, that’s the theory.”

Leo let out a slow whistle. “It’s even more impressive hearing someone say it aloud.”

Alex shrugged. “I guess. You do know you’ll have entirely new lives, right? New parents, homes, appearances, etcetera . . .”

For the first time, James spoke. “Of course we do. That’s why we signed up for this.”

“You still wanna go through with this then?”

The two teenagers exchanged a long, determined look. Then they turned back to Alex and nodded once.

“Good,” Alex said, sounding pleased.

Eli let out a breath she hadn’t known she was holding. If they’d have said no, then they would know Alex and Eli’s secret. Eli would never be able to sleep at night with the knowledge someone could easily turn her into the police.

Straightening her dress again, she reached into the briefcase and brought out another glass vial. Then she handed both to the teenagers.

Eli watched with growing excitement as Leo and James promptly yanked the corks out of the vials and chinked them together in a solemn ‘cheers.’

She turned away as they exchanged one final kiss, feeling her heart twist. What if the experiment didn’t work, and she had only damned them both?

No time for second thoughts now though, as Leo and James had both brought the vials to their lips. The contents’ were downed within seconds.

Eli and Alex waited eagerly for the outcome, and Eli reached out to give Alex’s hand a quick squeeze. They had spent years working on this, and now they were finally going to see if it worked.

All of a sudden, Leo’s body gave a harsh spasm and fell limp. James’ followed soon after. They both lay motionless, slumped in their chairs.

Well, the killing part had worked.

Eli heard Alex let out an uneasy breath. They had no way of knowing whether the whole being-reborn-with-another-body thing had worked - they would have to wait for that. It would take a few years, but eventually they could find Leo and James in their new bodies. There had been a tracker in the vials, which Eli and Alex had the controllers for . If you were close to either Leo or James, or whatever they were going to be called in their new lives, the tracker controllers would start to ring. Since they were disguised as mobile phones, no one but they would know what was going on.

Their job was far from over, however. Now they had to get the bodies to the roof of the building and throw them off, to make it seem like suicide. Which, technically, it was.

“I’ll take James, you get Leo,” Eli told Alex, who nodded in reply and then picked up Leo’s body, flinging it over his shoulder. Eli, being weaker, had to grip James under the armpits and drag him across the room.

At the last moment she grabbed the briefcase. She didn’t feel comfortable leaving it behind.

On the way there, Eli wondered why they hadn’t just got Leo and James to drink the vials on the roof. It would have been much easier.

After some struggle they finally got the bodies to the roof. Eli’s hair whipped her face in the strong wind, and her dress, though tight, was flapping annoyingly. Alex was struggling with Leo on his shoulder, and eventually had to throw the body to the ground.

Eli peered tentatively over the edge. The sight made her dizzy, and she had to take a few steps back to avoid toppling over herself.

The gym was only part of this massively tall building, and a hotspot for suicide. Eli had been counting on those facts to make James and Leo’s ‘suicides’ seem more convincing.

Wasting no more time, she hauled James’ body onto the ridge at the side of the building. When Alex did the same, all it took was one shove to send the bodies flying to the ground. A dull thud announced them hitting the floor.

Eli was exuberant. They’d done it! They’d finally done it! Half her life had been dedicated to this experiment, and now it was done! She could jump for joy, and probably would have if she weren’t standing at the edge of an extremely high building.

This exhilarated feeling did not last long, however. In fact, it was completely cut short the moment Eli turned around to see a woman standing at the door to the roof, gawking at them.

Holy shit! Eli thought. She panicked. Driven by fear, she swiftly picked up the briefcase and swung it, hard, at the woman’s head.

Surprise registered on her face for a split-second before she crumpled to the ground, unconscious.

"Shit, shit, shit, shit, shit!” Eli paced, consumed by terror, no clue what to do. How could she be so careless as to let them get caught? How? When this woman woke up - and she would, because Eli didn’t have the heart to kill her - she would surely report Eli and Alex to the police for murder, and then what? Eli couldn’t go to jail!

Alex seemed to be keeping pretty calm, considering someone had just caught them shoving bodies off a rooftop. He was stood there, arms crossed, leaning against the door, observing Eli with amusement on his face.

“What the fuck is so funny?” Eli snarled. She didn’t find it funny. Not one bit.

Alex shook his head. “Eli, the vials. Just take one and jump off. That way, you can’t get arrested. Am I right?”

Eli pondered this for a moment. He was right, but was she really ready to give up her life? Her friends? Her family? Her career?

But then she thought of jail, and how terrible it would be to spend the rest of her life there, convicted of a murder she didn’t technically commit. She thought of the hatred on the faces of her family and friends once they found out she’d murdered people, and decided that yes. She was ready to give up.

So, with her mind made up, she popped open the briefcase. A couple of vials had been smashed when she hit the woman, but most were still intact. She pulled out a vial for herself. However, when she offered Alex one, he shook his head and took a step back.

“Not for me. I’ll escape and hideaway, and try to find you if your memory wipes.” he told her.

No. She couldn’t do this without Alex; she needed him.

“Alex, please. I can’t do it without you,” Eli said. She was ready to beg if she had to. They’d both spent so much of their lives together, it would be torture to be separated now.

But Alex was adamant. He kept arguing, and in the end Eli just left him to it and accepted he wasn’t going to change his mind. It tore her heart, but she accepted it.

Eli drank in his face for the last time. The emotion she felt at that moment was overwhelming, and she could see it reflected on Alex’s face, but he still did not back down on his decision.

Wiping away the tears threatening to spill over, Eli finally turned away from him and back to the side. The height was making her slightly nauseous, but she reminded herself that soon she would no longer feel it. No longer feel anything.

She climbed onto the ridge, which was difficult in her high heels, but she managed.

Eli brought the vial to her lips and locked eyes with Alex. His brown ones, filled with raw pain, were silently bidding goodbye, as if he couldn’t bring himself to say it.

Well, I guess this is it, she thought.

Tipping her head back, she downed the liquid. At once a raging fire spread throughout her insides. It was as if someone had poured molten lava down her throat in an attempt to melt her bones.

Eli fell backwards in a free fall, feeling the cold air rush past her outstretched fingertips and stiff limbs. She refused to flail. In some ways it was like a trust fall; only she was trusting the ground to catch her, not a well-known friend.

Her last thoughts were consumed with hope. Hope that the poison would kill her before the fall; hope that Alex would be okay; hope the experiment actually works and she wasn’t just falling to the end and-

Then it all turned black.