by Gareth Otton
38
Saturday, 31st December 2016
08:26
Once again, Brad had not slept well.
He couldn’t remember the last time he slept the night through. Maybe back when he was on his ranch, before the Merging changed everything. He thought he had problems back when he had a mortgage to pay and two ghosts who liked to talk his ear off day and night. Now he’d give anything to return to what felt like a simpler time.
Knocks on the heavy door of his cell made him look up, and he found Tommy waiting. The young man was in his early twenties and was one of Jacob’s younger recruits.
He’s barely more than a kid, Brad thought, and not for the first time. The boy had his whole life ahead of him and now he was living it in a place designed to imprison dreamwalkers, and he was surrounded by people who didn’t deserve to be here. They had just backed the wrong horse and let their fear lead them to drastic action. Brad might deserve to be here and definitely Jacob, but this kid should be out in the world enjoying his new powers and making something of himself.
He wasn’t even the youngest recruit, Brad thought bitterly, thinking of one boy who lost his life trying to take the DTHQ.
“You hear me, Brad?” Tommy asked, and Brad realised he had been staring at the kid but not listening.
“Sorry, son, I’m not with it this morning. What’s up? Please don’t tell me that Jacob needs to see me again because he can—”
“No, he’s holding court in the common room as per usual.”
“Of course he is,” Brad muttered, rolling his eyes.
There was a reason they followed Jacob on his crazy mission; his silver tongue. He might be locked away from his powers by the enormous dreamcatchers in this custom-built prison, but that silver tongue had not gone away and the man could still spread his poison. Even here he was planning and scheming. Brad dreaded what might happen if he ever got out.
With everything going on out there, he might just be right, that traitorous voice in the back of his mind whispered, the same one that made him follow Jacob in the first place. He choked it down and turned his attention back to Tommy.
“Then what can I help you with?”
“One of the guards sent me to find you. You’ve got a visitor.”
Brad sat up, swinging his legs off the narrow bed and frowning at the boy.
“They say who it is?”
“Hey, it’s not like I’m doing a favour for a friend here. They told me to get you, so I came to get you. I don’t need to know anything more than that, so I don’t know anything more.”
Brad smiled and climbed to his feet, wincing as old injuries pulled at his tired muscles. Some mornings, he felt ten years older than his actual age.
“You’re right. Thank’s for passing on the message.”
The kid nodded, then ducked back out of the cell, running off to find someone who was closer to his own age to talk to.
At least he’s not with the brainwashed zombies listening to Jacob.
Heading out of his cell into the well-lit corridor, Brad turned his mind to who might be waiting. He hadn’t had a visitor since he arrived and not received so much as a phone call from home. Proxies were solitary by nature, but the few people he did have in his life had disowned him after what happened. He didn’t blame them, but it did leave the question of who would visit him here, of all places.
As always, when he walked down the hall, his eyes were drawn to the enormous dreamcatchers that were built into the walls between each cell. This place had been created in record time to deal with dreamwalkers, and not a single chance had been spared that any of them could ever get out. When he first arrived, they had glowed often as the prisoners tested their limits, but there was no way that they were getting past these things.
Tad did it, that traitorous voice whispered again. Surely if he can do it, you can too.
Once again Brad choked down that voice. He didn’t need to think about such things. He was right where he deserved to be and wouldn’t hear otherwise.
The door at the end of the long corridor was open and when Brad stepped out of it, he found himself in a large common room that was the centre of the prison. It was where they came for meals, where they socialised, and where they spent most their time when they couldn’t face being in their cells. There were TVs on the walls, a pool table in the corner, and comfortable chairs scattered about. It was more than he expected on arriving, and though he was glad for that, he also thought it was more than he deserved.
A few people nodded at him as he passed, but he didn’t stop to talk. He felt guilty for them being here and therefore kept to himself mostly. Of course, a few of them weren’t speaking to him for other reasons. These were the ones that still bought into Jacob’s bullshit and didn’t like that he had turned his back on the man.
Speaking of Jacob, Brad caught sight of him in his usual spot, but he glanced away, not wanting to acknowledge his existence. He was sitting on the top of a dining table, surrounded by ten men who hung off his every word. He glanced up when Brad passed and Brad could feel his eyes boring into his back, but he didn’t slow nor turn, instead he headed to the main exit and knocked on the door. A moment later, a familiar face looked through the caged window and a second after that, a lock was undone and the door was opened up to reveal a large man geared up like he was heading into a war zone.
“Present your hands,” he snapped, his gun levelled at Brad’s face while his partner behind him did the same thing.
Brad tried his best not to react, knowing it wouldn’t lead to anything good. He tried to remind himself that these people had good reason to be nervous around him. He placed his hands before him and waited to feel the cool steel of the dreamcatcher inlaid handcuffs that had become familiar to him for whenever he had to leave the main area protected by the larger dreamcatchers.
With practiced ease, there were two clicks and his wrists were secured in front of him.
“Follow me,” the lead guard demanded before turning and walking away. Once again Brad did as asked, forcing himself to ignore the second man who locked the common room door and then followed them down the corridor, keeping his gun trained on Brad at all times.
Brad fought hard not to chuckle. He was in chains, his powers were blocked by the dreamcatchers on his wrists, and there were dreamcatchers all over the walls. What the hell did they expect him to do?
However, his humour faded as he remembered some of the things their dreamwalkers had done, especially Simon’s team at the DTHQ. A lot of good people lost their lives that day.
“Through here,” the lead guard said as they turned into a corridor he had never been down before and he was led into a room that was bare save for a table, two chairs, dreamcatchers on every wall, and a tall, skinny man who was the last person Brad expected to see in this place. He was so shocked he skidded to a stop and didn’t start moving again until he felt the barrel of a gun in his back nudging him forwards.
“Here he is,” the first guard said, not talking to Brad this time. “There are cameras all around this room, men with guns waiting just around the corner, and there are dreamcatchers everywhere. You try anything and we’ll take you out. That clear?”
“Understood,” Tad Holcroft answered, sounding surprisingly unbothered by the threat. “Thank you for bringing him.”
The guard grunted and then turned to Brad before leaving.
“Don’t try anything,” he warned, and then he was gone, leaving the room and shutting the door behind him.
“Brad, you’re looking well,” Tad said. “You want to sit?”
Brad did as asked, walking to the nearest chair and carefully lowering himself into it. He stared at Tad for a long moment before speaking.
“What are you doing here? I never thought I’d see you again after what I did.”
It was only small, but Brad recognised a flicker of discomfort on his friend’s face. Strangely it was good to see. The earlier calm confidence was not the sort of expression Br
ad was used to, and it only reminded him just how scary Tad could be when he got serious. This more nervous expression was more like the Tad that Brad remembered from the meetings, the man he respected and never should have turned his back on.
“I’ve been meaning to come, to make sure you’re all being treated okay. But Stella didn’t like the idea of me being inside all these dreamcatchers and then the war happened and…”
His words trailed off and he shrugged. Brad filled the following silence.
“You don’t owe me anything. I never expected you to visit. You don’t have to explain yourself to me.”
“I know, but… All the same. How are you doing here? Are they treating you alright?”
This time Brad did laugh.
“No worse than I deserve.”
Tad frowned and glanced up at the camera. “They’re not doing anything they shouldn’t, are they?”
Brad waved him off.
“No, sorry. I didn’t mean to say they were. I just…” It was his turn for his words to trail off and he realised he didn’t know how to talk to this man anymore, not after what he had done. So instead he asked, “What are you doing here, Tad?”
“I wanted to see if time had given you some perspective,” Tad said, the nervousness leaving his expression as that cold confidence returned. One minute it felt like he was talking to his friend again, the next Brad felt decidedly uncomfortable. “Do you still think what you did that day was right?”
Brad hesitated before answering, recognising that there was more riding on his answer than just a conversation between ex-friends.
“Not a day goes by that I don’t regret that we took things that far. That doesn’t mean I have one hundred percent changed my opinion though. I mean, look at what’s happening out there right now. A war has broken out over people who want to come kill us. I still think we needed to strike back and defend ourselves. I just wish we’d picked a better way to do it, and maybe picked a more deserving target.”
Tad frowned, not liking the answer.
“This war is not about people coming to kill us. That’s just a smoke screen. I take it you haven’t seen the news this morning?” Brad shook his head and Tad sighed. “In that case, I need you to keep an open mind,” he said before starting into a story that would have been hard to believe if Brad hadn’t spent the last year travelling around the world with a thought and learning to throw fireballs from his hands.
“This has never been about us, not really. This is about controlling the Borderlands,” Tad said.
“Doesn’t mean they’re not coming for us at the same time. A war can be about both things.”
Again Tad sighed and looked away for a second, thinking something over.
“I’m tired, Brad. It feels like I’ve been fighting non stop for over a year. First, I’m fighting just to stay alive from a mad man hunting Proxies, then I’m fighting nightmares and the media, then I’m fighting ideological idiots tricked into thinking I’m evil and wanting to kill me for it, then I’m fighting people I thought were my friends. Now, after I think that all the fight has been knocked from me and I’ve got nothing left to give, I’m faced with an even bigger threat that wants to destroy everything I hold dear. A little over a year ago I was just a history teacher who talked to ghosts in my spare time. Now look at me…”
He turned back to face Brad and again there was a shift in his expression. This time he didn’t just firm up, he leaned forward in a way that made Brad afraid that the man might attack him.
“I’m fed up of having to fight every battle, even the ones that shouldn’t need to be fought. I shouldn’t need to explain to politicians how it’s inhuman to draft that law that treats people as less than animals. I shouldn’t have to convince a nation that the actions of a psychopath killing innocents is an act of war and completely unacceptable. I shouldn’t have to convince the world that a shadow organisation acting behind the scenes for millennia and starting wars for their own gain is a bad thing. And I shouldn’t have to explain to you why what you did was wrong.”
“I know it was wrong,” Brad argued. “I told you I regret it.”
“Maybe. But here’s the problem with your thinking, Brad. You think someone is coming for you, so you want to shoot first and your only issue is that the idiot you trusted to fire the gun for you used a bomb instead of a pistol. You might not have taken things as far as Jacob from the start, but you’d have got there eventually. You would have fired first and it might not have been as bad as what happened in Cardiff, but then someone would have fired back twice as hard, meaning you would have to go twice as hard again to protect yourself. It would keep escalating until you were right back where you didn’t want to be, throwing bombs instead of bullets.”
“We have to protect ourselves,” Brad said, refusing to back down.
“I was never arguing that. I was just asking you to not escalate things further while doing so. But it doesn’t matter now. Like I said, I’m tired and I can’t be bothered to try to convince you anymore. I came here hoping that I might still find something of my friend today, someone who I might just be able to trust to help me take a little of this weight off my shoulders, but I can see that I was wasting my time.”
He stood up and said, “I’m glad you’re being treated okay. I hope that one day you can get some perspective on this. Goodbye Brad.”
Then he was walking away and his expression told Brad that if he walked out of that room now, it would be forever. He would never get another visit like this, and for good or for ill, he’d never see his friend again.
“Tad, wait,” Brad said, jumping up and trying to grab his friend to stop him from leaving, but forgetting that he was cuffed. The awkwardness of his hands being tied together brought him up short, but Tad stopped regardless. “Please, if there’s something I can do, I want to help. We may not see eye to eye on some things, but betraying you never sat right with me. I fought Jacob to the end not to do that, but… It didn’t feel like we had a choice. I know better now but… You know what they say about hindsight.”
When Tad didn’t answer, he pressed the issue.
“Look, you do not know how sorry I am about what happened, and I know this is going to be hard to believe, but deep down, I was only doing what I thought was best for you. You saved my life in Chicago, Tad. You’ve saved countless other lives. You’re a good man and a better friend than I ever deserved. Please, give me a chance to repay that and start making up for what I did to you. Whatever you want, I promise, I won’t let you down again.”
Brad was surprised to find a catch in his voice as he struggled with his words, and bizarrely his hands were shaking. He didn’t know what was wrong with him, but every second he stood there waiting for Tad to answer, the shaking got worse and his eyes were getting watery. He had never been a man accused of being sentimental, but seeing Tad again was making him relive every mistake he had made over the last year, the worst of which was betraying this man who had done so much for him in the past.
“Please,” he begged. “Let me help you. Let me make this right.”
For the longest time, Tad said nothing. He simply stared at Brad as though he was trying to see inside his head. Right then, Brad wished he could do that, wished that he could open up his mind and let Tad see how serious he was. He wanted to make this right… he needed to make this right.
“Please,” he begged one last time, and finally Tad answered.
◆◆◆
Brad rubbed his wrists as the cuffs were removed, but flinched again at the sound of the slamming door. It was like every time he heard the sound, it only got worse, like it would be forever echoing around his mind. However, even that hated sound couldn’t distract him long as his attention went back to his conversation with Tad. He was so caught up with thoughts of his meeting that he didn’t even notice the man approach.
“I hear you had a visitor,” Jacob said. Brad looked up, surprised to find Jacob without his entourage. “Anyone interesting?”
> “It was nothing,” Brad said, and started walking away, not wanting to talk about it.
“Really, because a little birdie told me it was Tad Holcroft.” Jacob stepped in Brad’s path and asked, “Was he here to gloat?”
“No, he was here to see if we’re okay.”
Jacob laughed and rolled his eyes.
“Of course he was. Typical Holcroft, he’s already regretting what he did to us and I bet that guilt is eating him up inside.”
That deep voice that belonged on a radio somewhere had once been something that had made its owner seem wise and it had helped Brad trust this man. Now it only ignited his anger and, for the first time in a month, he thought it might not be such a bad thing to stop avoiding Jacob and tell him what he really thought.
“No, there’s much worse than guilt eating him up inside. There’s the weight of the world on that man’s shoulders, a burden only made worse by you and me.”
Jacob’s smile fell and he glared at Brad.
“Oh, so that was why he was here. Even now he’s trying to turn us to his way of seeing the world. He can’t bear that he was wrong and wants validation for—”
Brad burst out laughing, cutting Jacob off.
“It sounds more like that’s what you wish he was here for. Maybe he’s not the one desperate for validation.”
“Well, if he wasn’t here for that, why did he come?” Jacob snapped, angry at being mocked.
“He came to see if there were any friends still here in this place.”
Jacob snorted a laugh and said, “Then he came to the wrong place.”
Brad decided he was done listening to this man and started walking away, but Jacob wasn’t done with him and he grabbed his arm.
“He came to the wrong place, right, brother?”
Brad pulled his arm away and glared at the man. Something in his expression must have looked dangerous, because Jacob’s eyes widened and he took a frightened step back. Suddenly Brad was reminded of just how non-threatening the man was. With that voice of his and the power of a dreamwalker behind him, Jacob was a force to be reckoned with. But in here, where none of that mattered, Brad realised just how weak this man was.