Long Division (36 page)

James raised his head from my shoulder and I felt some strength come back into him. ‘Mark…’

Our eyes locked. And despite how utterly miserable he seemed to feel, his eyes were dry and didn’t waver. The look of them sent a chill through me. I didn’t know what was behind it, but it scared me. He was too serious. Too…well, too
there.
Too aware of what was happening as opposed to usual.

‘What, James? What?’ My chest clenched a little.

He sighed darkly. ‘I’m sorry.’

I blinked, but before I could ask what he meant, James raised two of those long, slender fingers and tapped me in the centre of the forehead.

And with that, the world went black.

When I awoke, I wasn’t sure how much time had passed. The sun was different in the sky, but I didn’t know by how much. My head was throbbing as if a tight band had been clamped round it.

Though my memory was swimming I could, after a moment of wincing and clutching my head, remember what had happened. James had put me to sleep.
Why?

I sat up. ‘James?’

The flat was quiet, save for the soft drone of the television. I hadn’t remembered that from before. Had James turned it on?

He hadn’t answered me. Not a sound came.

I turned my attention to the television because it was the only thing alive. I almost coughed on the breath I inhaled as I saw what was on screen: it was the Chelsea Flower Show.

My hands balled into fists in hatred as the banner of words at the bottom fuzzed into focus.

“InVizion Chairman, Tom Pembrew talks on moving forward after tower disaster”.

It took a moment to get to my feet and stumble in a drunken fashion towards the programme. Some man, all smiles, was standing with another man, tall, thin, shifty, with hooded eyes that did not meet the camera. Weirdly, scattered around them, were all of the brightly coloured flowers for the show. It was an odd display. Then again, everything was these days. Mad. Down the rabbit hole. All the rest.

I stared at him:
C
. The Chairman, Tom Pembrew, whom I hadn’t known till now. So, that’s what he looked like. Mr C: the one who hovered over every board meeting, mysterious even to James, in the background.

Why was he still here? Why was he acting so calm? One glance out the window and I knew for certain I had damaged the tower, and quite extensively, so why was he so chuffed about it all? I hadn’t known what I’d expected. Indignation, outrage, despair. Not…this was indifference I saw in Pembrew’s reptilian face now.

It was the smug look of someone who’d
won.

‘We will go on,’
Pembrew was saying.
‘It is a terrible disaster and we’ve lost so much of our hard-earned data and research, but…the minds of those who’ve worked for us are strong, and they are brilliant. We will go on.’

The floor might have started spinning because I was finding it hard to keep upright.
Minds. James. He had to go.
Oh, God.

His miserable departure from me made all the more sense now. He must have known. Despite what I hadn’t told him about his brain, his tumour, he must have known. The man onscreen blurred in my sight as fearful rage boiled through me.

I whirled back towards the door, heart beating its way up my throat. I didn’t know where I was going. But James, I had to find James, even if that was the last thing he wanted.

To simply go rushing down the pavement with no direction wasn’t exactly the plan I wanted. I could just be taking myself farther from James if I did that.

In desperation I searched the street. Two black cars were settled at either end; not cabs, not moving. I ground my teeth in frustration and thought rapidly. The Final Phase hadn’t happened yet. At least I hadn’t thought so. I didn’t really expect it to be…well, the same as life had been before. My head felt no different. That had to mean something, right?

But why would he leave? If he knew more than he’d let on—what I hadn’t told him about his head—then was he even in control of his own movements? He’d certainly acted like he’d been, but perhaps he’d felt it coming on and had to get away.

No. The nasty stone of dread that seemed to have set up permanent residence in my gut grew a little larger. I’d seen the look on his face. That look of bleak determination. There was something else he’d not told me. One final thing that wasn’t InVizion’s doing and I’d be
damned
if I let him go on his own for whatever it was.

Only one thing pointed me, and that was towards Chelsea. I didn’t know if I’d guessed right. I could be very, very wrong. But it was by far the closest from where I was, and if the Chairman was there, who was to say that hadn’t drawn James as well?

I hailed the first cab I saw and gave him directions to the Royal Hospital. On the way, I kept my eyes strained for any sign of him along the way. I also tried to reach him mentally, since he wasn’t answering his mobile. My mind was so frazzled and upset I was finding that particularly difficult, but I’d managed it once. I’d managed to bring down a bloody building with it. So how much different could it be now? Of course, I didn’t have that bloody tower helping me out now, did I?

The streets, grey but half-filled with people, were beginning to lull me into an inattentive trance. Everything was beginning to look the same and as we drove on through the traffic I began to despair that we’d gone completely the wrong direction and I’d made a terrible mess of it all. I’d lost him. Soon the Final Phase would hit and we’d be separated and I had no earthly idea what would happen to either of us. What a terrible, bloody mess.

And then I felt it. So slight at first I thought it might just be a twinge in my flesh, something brought on by my stress. But when it came again, I realised it was not strain at all. It was something mental. A little tug from the back of my mind, like what I had to assume birds felt as they migrated across the continent. Something was attracting me, pulling me, wanting me to go the other direction.

I struggled for a moment to focus on it, almost losing it completely in my desperation to snatch hold. It still stuck, right there in my mind, and shakily, I began to understand that it was James. I did not think he was signalling me, and I doubted he’d have wanted me to sense it at all, but I did, and I wasn’t letting go.

I shouted for the cab driver to stop and shelved out some money for him in haste, not bothering to see if I’d given him too much. No one would need money much longer, anyway. I then went haring down the street in a mad attempt to catch up to the sense tugging me.

I hadn’t been wrong in thinking James had gone to Chelsea. But he wasn’t at the show. That much was clear as I dodged across streets and round pedestrians. I had a feeling he’d intended to head that way, but had, for one reason or another, turned off and decided on a different path.

There wasn’t much making sense of his thought process at the best of times and I wasn’t about to attempt it now.

Where I found myself, where the pull was strongest, at the end of my exhausting charge, was not where I expected to be. A place where no one would expect him to be.

I turned round and round on the spot along the river, blood roaring through my ears so loudly I could not hear anything else. I was sure he was here, but where he was, that I had no idea.

I was at the elevated bridge where the trains went across the river, along the Chelsea Embankment.

My breath came to me in pants as I doubled over, struggling to catch it and my connection to the tug.

Time is running out, Mark.

A miserable moan escaped me and I cried in frustration. How could it end like this? This of all things? With blurring, hot eyes, I turned my head.

And then I saw him.

He was on the bridge.

He stood about half way across, Battersea Power Station behind him, not doing a thing. My insides gave a terrific jolt at the sight of him and I stumbled hastily towards the raised platform, struggling to find a way up. How the hell had he managed? I somehow did, scrambling like an idiot. My mind raced with too many thoughts. How often did the trains run this line? Were they electrified? I hadn’t a clue. And not really a care as I swung myself up and, moving a bit awkwardly till I found my footing, went dashing towards him.

As I grew nearer, my insides began to bunch in apprehension. Something was definitely wrong, though I suppose my first clue should have been the fact I’d found him over the water standing on a train bridge.

‘James!’ I cried, about ten metres off.

He turned to me and his eyes were blown wide. As I staggered closer he went back-peddling, shaking his head wildly. ‘N—No! No, go away, Mark!’

It was then that I saw the foreign, black object clutched in his hand. It did pull me up short.

It was a gun.

My first thought that ran through my mind was:
Where the hell did he get that?
But I really didn’t have time to question it, because it was shakily rising in his hand. Rising to his own throat.

‘James!’ My voice came out in a near shriek. ‘Stop! What are you doing?’ I wobbled, frozen, as he continued to back away from me, across the second line of tracks.

‘It’s time, Mark. You know it is. At exactly two-thirty the signal will go out and it will be the end.’

I shook my head wildly. ‘Wait, no. Hang on just a moment! How do you know that? How could you possibly know?’ In my belly, that same terrible knot already knew the answer.

He gazed at me with flat eyes. ‘I’m the transmitter.’

I went to swallowing, gaping like a fish.

‘The tower is down but I’m not,’ his voice came to me hollowly. ‘All of those infernal devices all around the globe haven’t been turned off. They’re all still running. And in five minutes they’re all going to give off one incredible burst, one burst to travel through their very special transmitter.’

My head was reeling. It was hard to work it all out in there. ‘Wait, but—’

James shook his head ‘There isn’t time. I’m sorry. I didn’t want you here. I thought you would sleep.’ His eyes flicked down, became hooded. Again, James raised the gun to his mouth.

‘Wait, wait, don’t!’ I stammered as quickly as I could. It was getting hard to keep my voice calm now. I could hear it shaking. ‘Just wait!’

James dropped the gun a bit. ‘I don’t have much time, Mark.’ He glanced to the watch he always kept at his wrist. It was all too clear. We had less than five minutes. I tried to steady my nerves.

‘I know. But just…it can’t end this way. James…you can’t…you can’t just leave me like this. I…I love you.’

His expression softened, became almost sad. ‘Mark.’ I watched him swallow and squeeze his eyes against the wracking pain in his head.

‘Look, James, we’ll figure something out. There’s got to be another way. Another way to stop this. We just have to think. Come on, you can think! You can block it out! I know you can. That mind of yours. You could stop anything if you’d set your mind towards it!’

I took a step towards him.

The gun swung tp me. ‘Don’t come near me!’ his voice was high, strung.

I put my hands in the air, alarmed by his sudden movement. The next set of tracks separated us. ‘Okay, okay, I won’t move.’ I tried to keep my tone as soothing as possible.

He took another step away from me. ‘You need to leave. I don’t want there to be any way they can connect this back to you. Go!’

I don’t move.

James’s eyes widened. ‘Mark, go!’

‘I’m staying!’

The tracks began to rattle, but I didn’t turn to see the train, which way it was coming, which tracks it was on. I didn’t care.

He shut his eyes and cursed. ‘You don’t want to see this…’

I didn’t either. I knew I didn’t. I couldn’t. If I did it will kill me, but I couldn’t leave him. Not like this. Not when he was all alone.

‘James, think this through. There has to be another way! You don’t have to do this! We can find another way! Don’t throw your life away like this.’ The words tumbling from my lips came weaker now, without conviction. We could both feel the seconds ticking away inside of us like bombs. This was the end.

‘Stop!’ Someone from below us, on the street, was shouting. A man in black. No doubt from InVizion. He struggled to find a way up. I hardly glanced to him.

‘Goodbye, Mark.’ His eyes welled with sadness I hadn’t known he’d ever been capable of. There was so much about him I’d never know.

My stomach sank. ‘No, James, no, God, don’t.’ I struggled to keep my voice steady. My heart thudded so strong I could hardly breathe. ‘James…’ On the inside, I had started panicking.

He raised the gun. His mouth parted. His eyes closed.

‘James!’ I went running towards him.

I wasn’t thinking. All I knew was I didn’t give a damn about the consequences. I didn’t care if what he said was true and the whole world would turn to slaves if he lived. If he died this way, I’d lose my mind anyway. I couldn’t survive without him. I knew that now. My life had been so stupid and pointless until he came along and saved me from my sadness. If he went this way, I wouldn’t be able to go on.