by Amy Cross
"You will hate me," she continues, her voice suddenly sounding a little more steely than before. "Turn around."
"There's no time for another argument," I say. "We just have to -"
"Turn the fuck around," she says, and a moment later there's the sound of something clicking.
Slowly, and with a growing sense of unease, I turn to face her, and finally I see that she's standing a few steps back from me, with a gun pointed straight at my face.
"Here's what we're going to do," she says firmly. "We came here on a mission. That mission is not complete, so we're not going anywhere until we get what we need. Now we know where the boat is, so we can get this done quickly. If you promise not to do anything stupid, there's no reason why this should be more than a minor detour."
I stare at her.
"There's something here that I need to collect," she continues. "For the company. Something important. Something that can't be just left to rot in an abandoned office. It's in suite 301 of the Compidome building on Church Street. That's only a few blocks from here. We just need to go in, retrieve the item, and then we can leave. I know where they are. More or less, anyway. If all goes according to plan, it really shouldn't take too long. We can still make it back to the boat by sundown."
"You're kidding," I reply. "There's -"
"Do I look like I'm fucking kidding?" she asks. "I can do this on my own if necessary. I'd rather not, because it'd be a lot easier if I had someone to do the grunt work, but if you cause me any problems, I'll shoot you. No-one'd know anyway." She pauses. "So you're going to come with me, and you're going to do what I say, and we're going to get the item from the company's office, and then, and only then, are we going to go back to the boat, and then I guess we'll work out how to get away from this goddamn place."
"But -"
Before I can say anything, she raises her wrist to her face. "It's me," she says, causing the device to immediately start flashing green. "We're back on course. It shouldn't be much longer."
There's a burst of static from the device, before a faint voice bursts from the device. "Copy that," the voice says. "The Shades are in position. Keep us informed if the plans change again. Countdown holding steady."
Lowering her wrist, Lacey keeps the gun trained on me. "You understand the situation, don't you?" she continues. "You don't seriously think that the company would pay for this mission out of idle curiosity? Failure isn't an option. We're going to the Compidome building, and we're retrieving the item." She closes one eye, as if she's checking her aim. "Are you going to cooperate, Ms. Grant, or do I have to kill you right here and now?"
Caroline Jones
Fifteen days ago
"I've found them," I say, staring at my phone's screen. "Compidome. I've totally found them."
"What does it say?" Reed calls over from the other side of the hotel room, where he's looking through the minibar.
"There's a website," I reply, waiting for the page to load. Fortunately, even though my service is no longer working, my phone still works when I can connect to a free connection, which the hotel provides. "I swear to God," I continue, "I looked them up yesterday and I didn't find anything. Do you think..." I pause for a moment, but the idea seems so incredible, I can't even bring myself to utter it out loud. Then again, so many insane things have been happening lately, I figure there's no reason not to add one more to the list.
"Do I think what?" Reed asks.
"Maybe it was hidden," I continue, watching as some kind of forum page opens on the screen. "Maybe, somehow, I couldn't see it, in the same way that people don't seem to be able to see us."
"And now?" he replies. "What's changed?"
"We've changed," I point out. "Now we know what we're looking for. Now our perceptions are different. Maybe the results for Compidome were always showing up on my phone, but I just didn't notice them." I start scrolling down the page to take a look at the forum. It seems that someone asked a question about Compidome, and received a lot of vague replies until, finally, someone else left a cryptic message asking how the original poster had come across the company in the first place. There's a lot of pointless back-and-forwards rubbish, until finally...
"Found anything?" Reed asks as he brings some bags of potato chips over, along with two small bottles of wine.
"Most people have never heard of Compidome," I reply, still looking at the screen, "but the few people who have, really seem to be worried. There's not much detail, and most of it seems like a kind of conspiracy theory. Lots of talk about experiments and massive defense department contracts. There are a few claims about leading scientists never being heard from again after they join the company, but..." I read on for a moment. "The weirdest thing is that people just seem to vanish when they get close to this outfit. There's a mention of a building on Church Street. Do you think that's their office?"
"Only one way to find out," Reed replies. "As soon as we've got some rest, we need to get down there."
"There's something else," I continue as I reach the bottom of the page. "Everyone who posts something about Compidome stops posting within a day or two. They put up these fevered, almost frantic messages asking about the company, and then they stop responding, and no-one ever asks if they're coming back. Eventually, the thread just dies. The last message is dated six months ago." I pause for a moment. "Could a multi-billion dollar corporation really exist in the heart of New York, without anyone knowing that it exists?"
"Until a couple of days ago," he says, unscrewing the lid from one of the small bottles of wine and taking a swig, "I'd have said it's impossible."
"And now?"
"Now I'd say anything's possible. If someone can get into my son's head, then I guess there aren't many places they can't go. You mind if I take a look at your phone?"
Passing the device to him, I find myself lost in thought for a moment. I've walked along Church Street plenty of times over the years, and I'm pretty damn sure I've never noticed a building with a Compidome logo on the front. Then again, these people seem to be very keen to say under cover, and while I have no idea right now how they could be linked to the whole mess with John Lydecker, it definitely seems like too much of a coincidence. I don't want to start getting paranoid, but it's clear that going to the Compidome office is our only chance of finding someone who might even have the faintest idea what's happening to us.
"Church Street is out best bet," he says eventually. "I'm looking at a map right now, and I can't find anything, but we're just going to have to walk up and down that street until we see the damn place. There has to be a sign, or at least a door. Even if we can't see it at first, the fact that we're specifically looking for it, that we know it's there, means we might have a chance." He pauses. "That's all I've got, anyway," he adds with a faint smile. "Running up and down a New York street, looking for a door that might or might not be there."
"In the context of the past couple of days," I reply cautiously, "that sounds like the best plan ever."
"I'm sorry about my behavior earlier," he says suddenly, placing the phone on the small nightstand that separates the two beds. "When we were at Lydecker's apartment, you must have thought that I was some kind of madman. I've got to admit, I kind of lost control for a while back there."
"You're worried about your family," I reply. "It's fine. Anyone would do the same."
"Just the thought of him being caught up in all of this..." he continues, visibly worried. "My own son didn't even remember that I existed. Do you realize what that means? It means someone, somehow, has got inside his head, inside his mind, and messed with his memories. And Emma's. And pretty much everyone in the city, maybe even the world. They've gone into my son's head and they've taken some of his memories and replaced them with a whole different set. What kind of person believes they have a right to do that to someone? To a child?"
"I don't even know how they could do something like that," I say. "I know it's like, every day, there's some amazing new development in the news, but
I didn't know the technology existed to go into someone's mind and alter their memories."
"I guess it does when you're a multi-billion dollar corporation," he replies. "Especially one that goes to great lengths to conceal its existence. Maybe it's all about perception. Whatever method they use to make people seem invisible, they also use on their own company. Maybe you only notice them once you're explicitly looking for them, or once you're somehow connected to them. I can't even begin to understand how that might work, but I guess we've seen it in action when all those people just walked around us as if we weren't there."
Turning and staring over at the window, I realize that I'm exhausted, but at the same time, I'm terrified of going to sleep. I can't shake the feeling that maybe I'll just fade from existence completely, like a ghost. I guess Reed probably doesn't share my worries, but I feel as if I'm hanging onto my mind by my fingernails, and at any moment I could just disappear. As he stands up and walks through to the bathroom, I find myself almost panicking at the thought of being alone for a few seconds. Finally, even though I know it's a little dumb, I end up walking over to the bathroom door and watching as Reed removes his shirt to check on the bandage covering his shoulder wound. I can't help looking at his toned, muscular body. If we were in a normal situation, I'd definitely be making a move by now, but somehow it wouldn't seem appropriate given the circumstances.
"You think they'd still bleed if we uncovered them?" I ask, making conversation purely so that I can hear my own voice and know that I still exist. I'm scared that if we stop talking, we'll forget each other.
"I don't know," he replies, leaning closer to the mirror. "Hopefully we'll be able to get some proper help tomorrow. By some kind of miracle, we're holding up pretty well so far, but sooner or later we're going to need a professional to take a look. For one thing, I'm worried the bandages are getting stuck too deeply to the wounds. I didn't really know what I was doing when I tried to patch us up, so I might have used all the wrong stuff."
"You really think we're just going to walk in the front door of Compidome and someone's gonna know what to do?" I continue. "You think it's going to be that simple?"
"I think it's our best shot right now."
"Best or only?"
"Let's just focus on trying to find a way out of this mess," he continues. "Look at it logically. John Lydecker's at the heart of this mess, right? And we know he works for Compidome, or at least he's linked to them. Do you really think it's a coincidence that this Compidome company seems to be mysteriously hard to find, or to notice? Given everything that's happened, can you honestly discount the idea of some kind of link?"
"It's just hard to get too hopeful," I reply. "It could all still go so horribly wrong."
Realizing that he's busy examining his wound, I decide I might as well do the same. Slowly, and with considerable pain, I remove my shirt and walk over to the mirror. The bandage on my shoulder is bloodied, but it looks as if all the blood is from earlier, which I guess means that the wound has started to heal.
"Let me take a look," Reed says, turning to me and reaching up to touch the bandage. "I'm going to just peel the edge away, okay? Just so I can see."
I nod.
Slowly, he removes a piece of tape and pulls back one corner of the thick white padding. He has to slip my bra strap to one side in order to get a proper view of the injury.
"What do you see?" I ask, feeling a stinging sensation under the bandage. Still, considering I got shot earlier today, I guess a stinging sensation isn't too bad.
"I see dried blood," he replies. "No sign of infection. Just a nasty wound and some blood drying around the edge. I don't want to get too confident too soon, but we might just get lucky here. If it had been a proper bullet, we'd be looking at a bigger wound, and probably some broken bones. Since it was rubber, the only problem seems to be a nasty hold in the flesh, but that's something that'll heal over time. I think so, anyway." He smiles. "I'm not a doctor."
"I noticed," I say.
As he starts to rearrange the bandage, I wince at a sharp stabbing pain that shoots through my shoulder.
"Sorry," he says.
"It's okay," I continue, even though the pain is now throbbing a little. "Just do what you need to do." Once he's finished putting the bandage back in place, I watch as he turns to the sink and starts washing his hands. "Aren't you scared?" I ask after a moment, aware that by even asking the question, I'm acknowledging my own fears.
"Of our injuries?"
"Of closing your eyes," I reply. "Of being alone. Of just... disappearing completely."
"Let's just get to Compidome as soon as possible," he says, drying his hands. "I don't know about you, but I'm in danger of falling asleep while I'm standing up. I think we should just get a couple of hours' rest, and then we'll get moving again. As long as we have a focus, we can keep moving. That's the most important thing. We just have to get to Church Street and find these people. Deal?"
I nod.
"We will get through this," he continues, turning to me. "I guarantee you, neither of us is going to fade out of existence or vanish or anything else. My son is going to remember me, you family will remember you, and we'll both get our lives back. One day we'll look back at all of this and..." He pauses. "Well, we won't laugh, but we'll understand it. We'll be able to talk about it. Things will get back to normal."
"I know," I reply, even though I don't really share his optimism. Is he really so confident that we'll be okay, or is he just better than me when it comes to hiding his concerns? I've always considered myself to be a strong person, someone who can hold up under some pretty major pressure, but right now I feel as if I'm falling apart. After all, in the past twenty-four hours I've tried and failed to save a woman's life, I've seen my entire life disappear, and I've killed a man in self-defense. I guess anyone would struggle in those circumstances. Reed wasn't there when Chloe was suffocating, and he wasn't the one who smashed an elbow into the side of Lydecker's head. He doesn't have those demons lurking in the back of his mind, threatening to take control at any moment.
"Trust me," he says, stepping closer and giving me a hug. It feels good to have his warm body against mine, but I feel almost frozen in place, as if I can't work out what to do next. Maybe it's shock, or maybe it's just pure fear, but I can't shake the feeling that I'm slowly, almost imperceptibly starting to disappear already. Are my atoms fading away, one by one? Is my mind shutting down? I keep trying to force myself to think back to my childhood, to go over and over my memories, in case some of them are missing. Then again, how would I know if anyone of them were missing? How would I know if I'd already started to fade to nothing?
"Are you sure I'm still here?" I whisper.
"Feels like it to me," he replies.
"But are you sure?" I ask, turning to look up at him. "Am I less here than I was five minutes ago?"
He shakes his head.
"How would you know?" I continue. "How -"
"Stop," he says firmly. "You're starting to panic. We both just need to hold things together for a little while longer."
Stepping back, I realize that he's right. "I need to sleep," I say, trying to hide the fact that I'm almost trembling with fear. "Then we'll go to Compidome, okay?"
"Okay."
Smiling awkwardly, determined not to burst into tears, I hurry back through to the bedroom. Right now, sleep seems like a trap, and the bed is like some kind of monster that's going to lure me into darkness. I know I'm probably being irrational, but I can't help thinking that I might just turn to dust while I sleep, and the bed terrifies me. I can hear Reed coming through from the bathroom, and finally I turn to face him. I'd rather do anything than go to sleep, and I need to get my mind of things. With sudden, crystal clarity, I realize that there's one thing, and one thing only, that might make me feel a little better now. Something that would take my mind off the fear in my heart.
"It's almost midday," he says, checking his watch. "Let's just get some sleep for a few hour
s before heading over to Compidome. I swear, I don't think I could even manage the walk right now."
Desperate to avoid getting into bed, I hurry across the room, place a hand on his waist and - when he turns to me - I lean closer and kiss him. I can tell that he's shocked, but he quickly reciprocates, and as I push him against the wall I realize his body is so much warmer than mine. The heat feels good, although I can't help but worry about the difference. Is something wrong with me? With him?
"That came a little out of nowhere," he says quietly as we break from the kiss for a moment.
"In a bad way or a good way?" I ask, hoping against hope that I don't seem too desperate.
"Well..." He pauses.
"You said earlier that you don't have anyone in your life," I continue, shocked by my own forwardness, "and I don't have anyone. We might disappear in the night. Have you thought about that? We might just stop existing." I reach behind my back and unhook my bra, pulling it away before pressing my cold breasts against his warm chest. Right now, it's the most amazing feeling in the world. "We might disappear," I whisper.
"You're just saying that because you're scared," he replies cautiously.
"So?" I take a deep breath. "Isn't that a good enough reason?" I kiss his shoulder, taking care to avoid putting any pressure on either of our wounds, and then I look at his face and we kiss again. I swear to God, I can almost feel the warmth from his body starting to radiate throughout me. Maybe this is a mistake, and maybe it's something I'd never do if circumstances weren't so totally messed up, but I can't help myself. My body feels so cold, and his is so warm, that I just need to spend the night in his arms and hope that, somehow, we can save each other from disappearing.
Dr. Stef Grant
Today
"You look shocked," Lacey says, with the gun still aimed at my head. "If you're going to cycle through all the usual emotions - shock, anger, despair and so on - can you at least do it while we're walking? We're on a time limit, and the storm isn't going to die down any time soon. Trust me on that. I know. It's my storm."
