by Anna Day
Jeremy cradles his son’s head.
Blood bubbles from Willow’s lips. ‘Dad?’ he says.
‘My son, my son, I’m so sorry, my son,’ Jeremy whispers. ‘I didn’t know it was you, I didn’t know . . .’
Willow begins to cough. He speaks again, this time weaker. ‘Dad, this has to stop. Please.’
Jeremy buries his head in his son’s chest and begins to weep. ‘My son, my son, my son . . .’ He murmurs it again and again like a prayer.
Willow manages to whisper, ‘Violet.’
‘I’m here,’ I say. I glance anxiously at Ash, who’s firm nod gives me strength. I cross to where Willow lies.
Willow gazes at me, but there’s a faraway look in his eyes. ‘You really do look like her,’ he says.
And because I don’t know what else to do, I lean down and kiss him on the forehead. When I sit back up, he’s smiling. The light leaves his eyes and the smile leaves his lips, but he is still the most beautiful man I have ever seen.
The cry from Jeremy’s mouth is almost inhuman, animal in its rawness, its intensity. I can hear the gentle sobs of Nate, the awkward shuffle of the other Taleters. Fury pulses through me, lending me power and chasing away the grief. I clasp Jeremy by the face, digging my fingers into his cheeks. He is a broken man, but he will listen to me. ‘We have stopped the virus launch,’ I say. ‘Your President is dead. Howard is dead.’ I pause, saying Willow’s name is too hard, so instead, I say, ‘Your son is dead. The serum was a hoax. Stop with this evil before more blood is spilled.’
Jeremy looks at me. I think for a moment he’s going to order the other Taleters to kill me — my heart locks mid-beat — but instead he says, ‘Carry my son to the surface.’
The Gems hoist Willow as though carrying him in an invisible coffin, and exit the lab. Jeremy doesn’t even look at me, he just walks away. But before he does, he calls over his shoulder, ‘The chambers are rigged with explosives. Release Oscar and he will initiate the self-destruct sequence. The virus will be lost for ever.’
Yan looks down at Oscar and grins. ‘It’s OK, I got the self-destruct sequence from him too. He’s officially dispensable.’
‘You can’t,’ I say to Yan. ‘You can’t, there are hundreds of dupes through there. If you set off the explosives, they die too.’
Yan exhales slowly. ‘Violet, the canisters imploded, killing the virus before it was released. But all of the plans for how to engineer it again are here. They’re in this room in some form, in the computer, in Oscar’s head. There are no backups, Oscar is the backup.’
‘So you’re going to kill Oscar too?’ I shout, incensed. ‘Murder is murder, Yan. That makes us as bad as them.’
‘I believe you just killed the President,’ Yan snipes back. ‘Or doesn’t it count when you do it?’
We stare at each other for a moment. He’s right. And it’s our only chance to go home. Once the virus is destroyed for ever, once I’ve saved the Imps, I can save my little brother.
‘Besides,’ Yan whispers, ‘why do you think the Dupes called to you?’
I shake my head, confused.
‘Stuck in those tubes,’ Yan says. ‘Experimented on. Treated worse than animals.’
My hand covers my mouth. ‘They want to die?’ I whisper, my breath heating my palm.
Yan nods. ‘Wouldn’t you?’
I pause. ‘It’s time to go home, isn’t it?’
I catch those winter eyes. My breath shudders and my heart aches. Ash. I’m about to leave him behind; the least I can do is protect him from another viral attack.
‘Do what you need to do,’ I tell Yan.
Nate steps forward, a look of confusion gripping his face. ‘Can anybody else hear that?’
He has a distant look in his eyes.
‘What is it?’ I ask.
‘I can hear singing.’ He crinkles up his nose, like he does when he’s concentrating. ‘Somebody’s singing “Happy Birthday”.’
31
ALICE
I glance at Danny’s Corsa. Traffic will be heavy and the hospital isn’t far . . . I always was a fast runner. I take a few wobbly steps in my Jimmys, mutter, ‘Bollocks to this,’ and chuck them in the gutter. Then, I run faster than I’ve ever run towards the hospital. The soles of my feet hurt and my chest burns, but I press on all the same, thanking the lord for my long legs. I pummel down a main road, bumping into several pedestrians and ignoring their cries of indignation. The hospital comes into view and I swing across the street, nearly getting knocked over by a taxi. The blare of the horn spurs me on.
I reach the hospital slicked with sweat, my hair sticking to my head and neck, my chest aching and sucking for air that isn’t there. I don’t even glance at the receptionist, taking the stairs two at a time. Today is not a day to take the lift. I worry if I stop moving for even a second, I will collapse from exhaustion.
I reach the corridor of Nate’s ward just in time to hear Adam and Jane sing ‘Happy Birthday’. Their voices crack and bend under the weight of emotion, drifting down the corridor, mingling with the scent of candles.
I’ve made it, just in time.
I burst in to the room. ‘STOP!’ I shriek.
Adam and Jane are holding a chocolate cake out with sixteen candles on it, the flames lightly flickering, casting shadows across Nate’s face. They stop as soon as they see me, tear-lined faces freezing mid-song.
I take a deep, painful breath. ‘No, Adam, Jane, please don’t do this.’
‘Alice . . .’ Jane begins.
But a security guard has already arrived. ‘Is everything OK in here?’
‘No,’ I shout, ‘Everything is not OK. They’re about to kill Nate, they’re about to switch off his life support when we’re so close. I’ve already lost Katie, I can’t lose Nate too. And I know Violet can do it, I know she can. She’s already killed Fanboy, she just needs a bit more time.’
‘Violet’s in a coma,’ Adam says, his face filled with sorrow and sympathy.
‘But she’s going to wake up, I know she is, and Nate. Just give them a while longer, please.’
A doctor steps forward, a look of concern pinching her features. ‘Miss, are you feeling OK?’
‘Yes, I feel bloody marvellous, what do you think?’ I laugh hysterically. I can feel myself unravelling, the frustration and desperation of people not listening to me starting to pull at the tiny threads which barely hold me together.
The doctor takes another step towards me. ‘I think you need to just take a deep breath . . .’
Before I can stop myself, I’m reaching for her. I don’t know why. I think I just want to make her understand. I don’t intend her any harm, at least, I don’t think I do. But the security guard doesn’t see it that way. I feel his hands close around my shoulders and within seconds I’m being marched back into the corridor.
‘NO!’ I scream. ‘Adam, Jane, please don’t do this.’
‘I’m sorry,’ I hear Adam say.
I begin to sob. I sob and sob until my body feels like it’s going to rattle apart. The security guard and a couple of nurses try to scoop me up, telling me to calm down, telling me to breathe, asking if they can call someone.
That’s when I hear the flatline.
VIOLET
It hits me full force in the chest. And suddenly none of it matters. The virus. Oscar. All that matters is that through layers of time and space, somewhere, my parents are only moments away from turning off Nate’s life support.
‘Quickly,’ I scream at Yan. ‘Destroy the virus. The story needs to end before it’s too late.’
Nate steps back and looks at me. ‘I can hear something. A long tone.’
‘Oh, please, no,’ I whisper. We’re too late.
As Nate stares at me, the light goes out in his eyes and, very slowly, he begins to crumple to the ground.
I start to weep, hot angry tears pulsing from my eyes. My brother is dead. My real brother back home, and my new brother who I’d come to love here in this world. The grief
rips me into tiny pieces.
I expect the hand on my shoulder to be Ash’s. But when I turn to look, it’s Yan.
He smiles kindly, but it isn’t his voice which emerges, it’s Baba’s. ‘You were right, Violet. The story had to end in order for you to return home. But you didn’t need to save the Imps; forgive me, that was my own agenda. Though save them you have, Little Flower.’
‘Baba?’ I whisper.
‘Yes, my child.’
‘But you’re . . .’
‘Yes. I’m dead. And this is not a ghost you are hearing, but a telepathic fragment, implanted in the other precogs just before I died. Kind of like a tape recording.’ Yan laughs, and the way his face lights up, all full of wonder at the world, I know for that moment, Baba lives in him.
‘I didn’t need to save the Imps?’ I say. ‘What was the end of the story then?’
Yan smiles. ‘You’ve got the right idea, my child. You’ve just got the wrong story.’
‘What do you mean?’ I ask, my voice wavering.
‘It was never the Imps’ story which needed to end. It was yours.’
‘My story?’
‘What was the ending to your story, Violet? Just close your eyes, and it will come to you.’
I close my eyes and it arrives just as she said.
In less than a week, my brother will die.
‘Nate’s death?’ I whisper. ‘Nate’s death is the end of my story?’ I feel the weight of my brother in my arms. Hear the flatline still ringing in my ears. ‘Nate had to die in order for us to go home?’
Yan cradles my face. ‘That’s right, my child. But don’t lose heart. All the best stories are stories of rebirth, wouldn’t you say?’
But I barely hear the words. All I can hear is that sentence beating in my ears: In less than a week, my brother will die.
And I know that Baba is right.
My story has ended.
It’s time to go home.
I open my eyes just in time to see Ash, sitting beside Yan, an anxious expression on his face.
‘Goodbye, my love,’ I whisper to him.
Then I’m moving away, faster and faster, like a train shooting down a tunnel.
I’m looking down on myself, on Nate, on all of us: Oscar lying on the floor, Yan crouched beside me, looking into the sky like he can see me escaping. And I see Ash, my wonderful Ash lowering my body to the ground. Tears spill down his cheeks, questions pour from his lips, and the bluest eyes I’ve ever seen gradually slip from view.
And then, as though waking from a dream, I open my eyes.
I’m covered in wires, needles in my hands, a tube up my nose.
I sit up suddenly. ‘NATE!’ I scream.
I jump out of bed, pulling needles and tubes from my body and flinging them on the bed, swearing as the pain smarts. My legs quaver and my head spins, and I briefly notice the mess of letters carved into my arm, but I have to get to Nate. He’s only in the next ward.
‘Nate!’
I stagger into the corridor. Alice is slumped on the floor weeping, a concerned security guard and a gaggle of nurses around her.
She looks up and sees me. Her face bursts into the biggest smile I’ve ever see. ‘Violet! You’re awake.’ But then her face falls suddenly. ‘It’s too late. It’s too late. He’s already gone.’
‘No!’ I scream, my legs crumpling beneath me. ‘Mum, Dad. You can’t. You can’t.’
I hear Mum’s voice first, followed by Dad’s. ‘Violet? Is that Violet?’
They run into the corridor, their faces a mix of every emotion possible. To lose one child only to gain the other. What must they be feeling? But I don’t have time for empathy.
‘What have you done?’ I shriek, that flatline still ringing through the corridor.
It stops.
They help me to my feet and I hobble into Nate’s room, my heart pounding, my chest heaving.
The doctors look at one another. ‘Time of death . . .’
‘No,’ I cry, falling on to his bed, grasping at his face with trembling hands. ‘Please no, not after all that. We were so close. So close.’
But I hear something in my head, a voice which doesn’t belong to me. It’s Yan. It’s going to be OK, Violet. All of the best stories end with—
But he never gets to finish his sentence, because at that moment, I hear a sound. A sound which makes my stomach flip, makes my heart burst, makes the grey hospital walls flood with colour. A sound which sends the hospital staff into overdrive, brings my parents and Alice to their knees with joy.
A sound which can only mean one thing.
Rebirth.
Pip.
6 MONTHS LATER
VIOLET
Walking beside Nate through London still fills me with joy. I expected by now it would feel normal, having him beside me, prattling on about his newest sci-fi discovery. But I still can’t quite believe it. Every so often, I throw my arms around him and tell him I love him. And without fail, he wriggles from my grip and tells me I’m a twat. But like me, he remembers his second visit to the world of The Gallows Dance; he remembers his bleak backstory, he remembers the virus and Katie dying, and he remembers waking up amidst a sea of stunned doctors, smoking birthday candles, and weeping family members. So the word twat is always followed up with, ‘Love you too, sis.’
The London wind cuts through my parka; I’m hugely grateful when we round the bend and Frank’s café comes into view, spilling its golden light and coffee-bean scent on to the street. Through the windows, clouded with condensation and lined with snow, we see Alice and Danny. They sit side by side, snuggled around a laptop and two steaming cups. Ever since we sat Danny down and explained the whole fantastical, twisted story, they’ve gone from strength to strength. Admittedly, it took a few hours to convince him we weren’t collectively losing it, or he wasn’t a victim of an elaborate prank, but having seen the President inexplicably spewing blood from his chest and knowing the mystery surrounding our comas, he eventually believed us. And as Alice so blithely pointed out, someone who frequently asserts the existence of UFOs is in no position to quibble over transdimensional tunnelling.
Fortunately, neither Alice or Danny were implicated in the strange happenings at Timothy’s flat that day. They told the police that they went to check on Timothy, only to find his corpse stuffed in a cupboard, and an unknown man dead on the floor. The evidence supported the fact that President Stoneback murdered Timothy, and the coroner found that the unidentified male died a week after this from a heart attack. Thankfully, the cut inflicted by Violet, visible above Stoneback’s heart, was too superficial to result in death or account for the amount of blood loss in our world. He remains a mystery to medics and the authorities alike.
Only the four of us know the truth.
‘There’s Dalice,’ Nate says, sticking two fingers into his mouth and pretending to retch.
I jab him with my elbow. ‘Come on, they’re cute.’
He laughs. ‘Still a hopeless romantic, hey?’
I nod. I am a hopeless romantic. Losing Ash has only strengthened that. I mean, finding true love in an alternate universe has a way of firming up your belief in fate and, sadly, ‘the one’. I say sadly, because that’s the thing with ‘the one’: by definition, they’re irreplaceable. Even now, I miss him more than I thought possible. Every shadow bends into his shape, every distant laugh spins my head as I hopelessly seek him out, and every morning, just before I wake, I feel the press of his skin against mine. Sometimes I wish I couldn’t remember him this time round, then at least I could look at that achingly blue, winter sky without my vision smudging with tears.
Nate must notice the sudden change in my demeanour, cos he rests a hand on my shoulder. ‘Maybe this isn’t the end for you and Ash, maybe one day you’ll cross over again.’
‘God, I hope not,’ I say, as glibly as I’m able. ‘I don’t think my heart could survive another stint in that place.’ And therein lies the tragedy: the thing my heart craves
above all else can exist only in a place which will surely be the death of me.
I open the door to the café, enjoying the comfort of the warmth and chatter as it wraps around me. We slide into the booth opposite Dalice. Without even a hello, they spin the laptop to face us.
‘Ta-dah,’ they sing together.
‘Oh my God,’ I cry, grabbing the laptop. ‘This is beautiful, guys.’
A flock of golden swallows circle the top of the screen, free from the silver loops of barbed wire which glint below. And in the middle of the screen are three simple words: The Fandom Rising.
It was Alice’s idea. We were brainstorming how to maintain the freedom of the Imps, not just from the Gems, but from us. From the authors, the publishers, the film company, the rogue fanfic writers. And she simply said, ‘Maybe we should just give it to the Fandom.’
After my infamous meltdown at Comic-Con, the fans were intrigued for months. Why should there never be a third book? Well, the answer is about to be revealed: the third book isn’t ours to write, the story no longer belongs to Alice and me, it belongs to the Fandom. Alice managed to convince Sally King’s estate to approve the concept, she even sweet talked some really high-profile celebrities into getting involved with publicity. And whilst we finish our degrees, we’ll gatekeep the fansite and ensure no single voice becomes dominant, that no single narrative can influence their world. Perhaps then, the Imps and Gems can write their own future.
Danny and Nate click on the various pages, talking in really high, excited voices. There’s space to load fanfic, fanart, and fanvids; it looks amazing. Danny really is gifted at web design.
Alice reaches over and clutches my hand. ‘She would have been so proud of you, Vi.’
I take a swig of coffee, tears burning my eyes. ‘Maybe.’
‘Maybe, my arse,’ she replies. ‘One hundred per cent bursting with it. You saved the Imps, brought Nate home, and now you’re about to launch the most ambitious fansite out there.’
‘I just wish she was here to see it,’ I say.
Alice smiles. ‘She kind of is.’
Danny clicks on the dropdown menu and a new page opens. It makes my heart ache and swell in equal measure. Photos of Katie stare at me from the computer. Her beautiful smile shines from the screen; at parties, playing in orchestras, dressed as a helix and squeezed between me and Alice. And written at the top in gold font: This site is dedicated to our best friend, Katie.