Tethered Twins Saga: Complete Trilogy (Twins, Souls and Hearts)

by Mike Essex

  I had no doubt that Corinna had been the reason for both of those changes.

  “I didn’t trust him,” said Grace. “So I made him make me a promise; that he would never set foot in a major city again. If he really had found love and faith in some backwater shack then fine, I could live with that but I didn’t want him around other people.”

  “And he didn’t break that promise?”

  “Not until he went to Birmingham yesterday and then made his way towards London today. One city was one thing but to make his way towards the capital so quickly afterwards. It was too much for me and I snapped, I wanted him gone.”

  “So where do we go from here?” I asked, knowing that Corinna wouldn’t want to help me work with someone who wanted her other half dead.

  “You want your body back right?”

  “Right.”

  “Well if this thing,” she motioned to the snatcher’s body, “is the only way to do it then what choice do I have? But when we’re done I don’t want to see him again.”

  That was a good enough deal for me. Grace had been the person I’d hoped to find again in London so meeting her in such a serendipitous way did have its advantages.

  “So does Rex know you’re alive?” she asked.

  “No,” I replied. “I don’t want him or Rufus to know until I’ve got my body back. I don’t want to put them in any more danger and I don’t want them to see me like this.”

  “Then who else should we trust?”

  “What about Jacobi?” I asked.

  “A few years ago I’d have said ‘yes’ but something has changed about him,” said Grace. “He’s not adjusting well to living in a city of 15 million when previously he lived in it with a few hundred.”

  “So he’s out, how about Tom?”

  “That could work,” said Grace.

  Tom was pretty much the only person left I could trust. All the other members of the Deck had disappeared after Eli had taken power, presumably helping keep me prisoner. As for the ex- citizens of Q-Whitehall, they lacked the knowledge of Eli we’d need to have the upper-hand.

  “Ok, let’s keep the group small,” I replied.

  It took two hours for Tom to meet us in the abandoned city. During that time I filled Grace in about what had happened whilst I’d been gone. Because Grace didn’t have a Tether she was one of the few people on the planet that I hadn’t been able to jump into. Her life during the last seven years was something of a mystery to me, as was Tom’s.

  Mostly she spoke about how she’s searched for me with Tom, Rex and Rufus, working their way through TethTech labs and scouring research on the 20 Day Siege and the Rapture to determine any locations they might have missed. They had a hacker in Q-Whitehall but without Jill, there were still pieces of information they couldn’t break through.

  As she spoke it felt like she was holding something back. I wasn’t surprised she didn’t completely trust me; perhaps she suspected the snatcher had somehow accessed my memories or maybe she thought Eli had sent him here. Nonetheless she trusted me enough to agree to my plan.

  When Tom arrived we briefed him on where we were heading. Although Grace explained that they’d been there many times, before Tobias assured me there was one place they wouldn’t have looked. Although I didn’t tell them about the monster in my mind I managed to convince them there may be something I could find.

  We powered up our bikes and rode back to where The Deck began.

  ELEVEN

  The derelict shopping centre that housed The Deck’s base had never looked so vacant; even the burger stand owner who had waited by the side of the road for lost passers-by was now gone.

  “Wait a minute,” I said to Grace as I pulled up my bike.

  “Yeah,” she replied.

  “The burger stand guy, did he work for the Deck the entire time?”

  “Duh,” she smiled. “He kept stray travellers from looking around too much.”

  I wondered where the burger guy was now. Maybe he had joined Eli or even escaped somehow.

  The shopping centre itself was still something of a twisted nightmare. The ground floor now had a layer of thick dirty water that came up to my knees, making it nearly impossible to move quicker than a snail’s pace. Not that I had any intention of running through there, the twisted metal shutters of the shops made it risky enough just to walk.

  Overhead the remaining glass shards of the roof hung precariously, as the stuctures holding them in place rusted and decayed, weakening day by day. The fire that had ravaged this place over twenty five years ago still left its mark to this day. It was a building beyond saving that would no doubt be swallowed up and destroyed as one of the new States reached its border.

  “You know I love a good conspiracy theory,” said Tom “But you won’t find anything in this cesspool.”

  “Did you have anything better planned today?” asked Grace.

  “Anything is better than this. I’m so glad you called me,” he replied sarcastically.

  For the entire time we’d been back together Tom had only looked at my face once, and that had been just a quick glance. Without the bike helmet the snatcher’s face must have been too much for him to take in. He’d been with us in Javon prison when Grace and I had been captured.

  Truth be told, the two of them were the last two people who would want to help him.

  That made their being here all the more meaningful. If Tom couldn’t look at me then so be it. At least he was here.

  “So where are we heading?” I said in my mind.

  “Down to the base,” replied Tobias. “I’m fairly sure it could withstand this damage.”

  “Fairly sure?”

  “Well ‘best laid plans’ and all that. We won’t know until we try.”

  That was great. If there was nothing down there I’d probably have used up all the trust I’d build up so far. There had to be something.

  “Don’t bother with that old thing,” said Tom as we reached the elevator that had once taken me down to the base. “It’s long gone out of service since the flooding.”

  We reached a staircase and Tom motioned for me to walk up it. I looked at the stairs heading down and saw that the water continued all the way to the bottom. We wouldn’t be getting down to the base that way either.

  I’d never been on the first floor of this shopping centre and with good reason. The walkways were cracked, with sections missing, creating huge drops down to the flooded floor below. Panels from the floor above us lay filthy and broken on the floor, whilst copper wires hung down that had once snaked between the shops giving them power.

  Grace explained that the power had long since been switched off and the only light we had now was from the rays of sunlight that flowed into the room from the large window above us. It was bright enough for us to navigate the floor and I was thankful we hadn’t planned this assault by nightfall.

  We passed an old pretzel stall and I made a joke to Grace about trying anything once. She laughed a little but not as much as I know she would have done if I’d been in my own body. I focused back on the path ahead, slowly stepping around the cracks, hoping the structure beneath me was stronger than it looked.

  “It’s just round this corner,” said Grace as we saw a sharp 90 degree turn. The corner of the walkway had collapsed down to the floor below, crushing a large marble fountain that would have once made an impressive centrepiece. All that remained of the corner now was a precarious bit of flooring attached to one of the shops.

  “Have you been this way before?” I asked Grace.

  “Once,” she replied, “and that’s how the walkway fell down to the fountain. This time we’ll have to jump.”

  With that, she tightened the straps on her backpack and dashed towards the gap. With one graceful movement she leaped over it and landed on the other side, her knees bending slightly to absorb the impact.

  Tom went next. He was a little slower than Grace and couldn’t jump as high but still cleared the gap with relative ease.
His landing wasn’t as delicate and the walkway shook slightly when he made contact. A small part even crumbled away.

  “You can do it,” said Grace whilst Tom tried not to look at me.

  “Can you find another way?” Corinna asked me. “You promised not to take unnecessary risks.”

  I wondered where exactly the off-switch would be for something that was wired inside my ear. Corinna’s constant signs of caring for the snatcher whilst sweet were becoming annoying.

  I stepped back as far as I could go until I reached the railing behind me. The jump didn’t look too far and in my own body I know I could have cleared it as easily as Grace. I took a deep breath and ran towards the gap that started to seem more like a chasm as I got closer.

  As the doubts filled my mind it was too late to stop and I leapt into the abyss.

  TWELVE

  The snatcher’s legs were old and frail but they had enough power to push me into the air and over the gap. I landed hard on the other walkway and it immediately started to rumble from the impact.

  “Run!” shouted Tom as the end part of the walkway began to give way. Grace and Tom grabbed my hand and yanked me upwards as I lost my footing. I landed flat on my stomach a few feet forward from where I’d been. Luckily the walkway held firm at that point.

  “Gently,” said Tom as he looked directly at me and helped me to my feet. “You had better be her after all this,” he explained.

  The walkway led us to a door marked “Maintenance” that was ironically broken from its hinges and laying on the floor. We walked through the nearby doorway and I looked down the staircase surprised to see nothing but darkness. Tom handed each of us a torch and I illuminated the way down, relieved to see the stairwell wasn’t flooded.

  We carefully made our way down the steps.

  “What are you hoping to find down there?” asked Tom.

  “Anything,” I replied. “Just one clue to where Eli is hiding me.”

  “If we do find your body, do you think it’ll still be usable?”

  It was something I’d tried not to think about but Tom had a point. My body and mind had been through years of hell. If I got back to my body would I even be able to move it? A few minutes in Tobias’ machine the first time left me burnt and had felt like torture, what would my body be like now?

  “I don’t know,” I replied. “Somehow he’s kept me alive this long. I have to hope.”

  “Help me with these doors,” said Grace.

  The large double doors that sealed The Deck’s base from the rest of the world were stuck tight. I shone my light on a control panel but its digital display was just a dull yellow with nothing on it. When I pushed the keys there was no feedback, not even a little beeping sound.

  “I told you, the power’s been switched off,” said Grace. “Now are you going to help me or not?”

  She was gripping tightly onto one of the doors and trying to pull it to the side. I helped her, whilst Tom took the other side. As we struggled through gritted teeth to pull it open I was starting to wish I’d brought more people.

  “Can’t we get the power back on?” I asked.

  “We tried last time,” said Tom in between grunting. “The generator is fried.”

  Eventually, like popping the lid from a jar the door slid open and moved the rest of the way easily. As the doors opened I was taken aback by the smell. It smelled of damp and decay and once I shone the light inside I could see why. Mould now covered the walls, the paintings of clubs, hearts, diamonds and spades were now covered in black circles running the entire length of the room.

  The lights in the room had all been smashed, their glass littering the floor. The main computer was destroyed, its monitors shattered, its machinery burnt. Without a computer or power I wondered what we could find down here of any value.

  “We’ve searched every room,” said Tom. “There’s no files, no hard drives and no data. They were very thorough.”

  “I bet they didn’t search one room,” said Tobias. “Check the sleeping quarters.”

  I led Grace and Tom into the barracks where the rows of beds that they had once slept in now lay shattered on the floor on top of each other, almost covering the red carpet of interlocking diamonds and hearts surrounded by thin black outlines. There must have been thirty double bunk beds whose frames were now twisted around each other. The room had an even stronger odour than the others and it made me want to gag.

  “There’s nothing in here,” said Tom. “Just beds, blankets and more stinking mould.”

  “Hear her out,” said Grace.

  “We need to move the beds,” I explained.

  Tom found some tools from a hardware store and together we started dismantling the beds one by one and tossing their parts back into the main room. The more time I spent in there the more I started to feel overwhelmed by the smell. There was no ventilation, which meant the odour was trapped in with us. It was truly overpowering and made it hard to breathe.

  I closed my eyes to try and focus on something else, but all I could feel was the smell overpowering me. When I opened them again my view had shifted completely. To my right sat a man dressed in an army uniform, he was well decorated with medals and looked incredibly important.

  “This meeting could change everything, John,” he said as he looked directly at me.

  With no control of my own actions I replied in a stern voice. “It is the only option. You know that Damon. We just have to convince the others.”

  The strong odour took over me again and I was dragged back to the snatcher’s body, confused by what Eli could be planning.

  Before I could process those thoughts I heard Grace shout out that she’d found blood. I took a closer look at the red carpet and could see it too, countless specks of blood practically hidden by the red hearts and diamonds that lined the floor.

  We tore through the remaining beds until the floor was exposed. Hundreds of blood splatters, strewn across the carpet. The smell that overpowered me hadn’t been the mould, it had been the blood.

  Something else wasn’t right with the carpet. It was layered in a grid pattern, each piece of carpeting around three feet either side for the entire length of the room. One of the middle bits of carpeting was rotated wrong so the edges of its suits didn’t match up with the others. I showed it to Grace.

  “I slept in this room for years and that carpet was always the right way round,” she explained. “I have OCD and that would have bugged the hell out of me.”

  She lent down and scratched her nails on the edges of the carpet. It came loose easily, like someone had wanted us to find it. She tore it up and tossed it out of the room. In disbelief she stared down at a hatch located under the carpet.

  Tom and I shone our lights onto the hatch as Grace opened it away from herself. The smell of death surged from the space and I looked away momentarily. As I turned back I saw what lay beneath.

  Piles of bodies stacked on top of each other, their flesh now decayed and their skeletons and teeth all that remained of them now. Dog tags lay scattered across the bodies. Grace grabbed the one closest to her without hesitation.

  She looked at it closely. A Three of Spades. That designation meant something very special to Grace. It was the suit used by her half-brother Kenan.

  She held the dog tag tightly and fought back the tears.

  THIRTEEN

  As Grace stared at Kenan’s dog tag I shone the torch down into the pit of bodies. Somewhere in there her half-brother lay dead, killed by whoever had cleared out this base.

  Tom reached down into the pit, doing his best to collect together the dog tags of his fallen friends. I could make out about twenty different bodies, although it’s entirely possible there could have been more, their bodies now so mangled it was hard to tell where one ended and the other began.

  None of us spoke about the horror in front of us, it was still too raw, but I had to know for sure if the monster in my head had been responsible.

  “Did you do this?” I a
sked Tobias, within my mind.

  “When exactly would I have given the order for this to happen?” he said. “Perhaps sometime between being dragged into your mind and never?”

  His lack of sympathy was something I’d come to expect. Personally I didn’t know how to feel about those who had died. On the one hand, some of the Deck had nursed me back to life, whilst on the other, they had been responsible for operating on me in the first place.

  I already knew that some of the Deck, including Gabe, were still with Eli so it stood to reason that these bodies here were either no part of his plan or had been killed by another party.

  If Eli had been the one to kill them then it made sense that those who had been wiped out were not a part of his plan. Even more worrying was that March or Gabe could have been the ones to kill them. I knew they were at his base and still loyal to Eli and that made them likely candidates.

  Then there was the mystery of the remaining members of the Deck not in the hole. If twenty or even thirty were in the pit that still left many of the original fifty two still out there.

  I was still outnumbered in every way.

  “This room,” I said to Tobias. “If you didn’t give the order then how did you know the bodies were here?”

  “Your father tortured me for days,” he replied. “I spent a long time finding out everything I could about him and the others who harmed me.”

  “So you knew all about this place?”

  “Of course. I’ve stared at the blueprints for the building more times than I can remember.”

  “But if you knew this place existed then why weren’t you aware of the Deck?”

  “That’s a good one,” he laughed. “I knew about the Deck for months before their first attack against me.”

  “You’re lying. Why not stop the Deck years ago if that was the case?”

  “Money,” he replied. “It’s always about money. Well, that and power.”