Long Division (28 page)

I crouched down beside the sofa till we were eyelevel. ‘Do you need anything, James? Honestly. Just tell me if you do. If you’re in pain, or hungry or anything at all. Please. I want to help.’

He opened his eyes and studied my face for a long moment. I didn’t know what he was looking for. Or what he saw. I hoped my pity and revulsion from my experience earlier didn’t melt through too much. I needed that to stay hidden from him.

He reached forward and gript my hand. I watched our fingers intertwine.

‘One of the board members of InVizion Technologies was voted in as a MP today,’ he informed me.

I sighed and brushed his hair from his face. ‘I know. It doesn’t matter.’

‘That’s the eighth one so far. It’s only started.’

I didn’t like the glazed look in his eyes. ‘James, it’s all right. There’s nothing to be done about it.’

To my surprise, he smiled. Those lovely lips pulled upwards grimly. ‘I know. Funny…I cannot help but think myself selfish now. I’m dying…I want to not care.’ His fingers released mine to reach up and touch the side of my face. I had to fight to not close my eyes and sink into the touch. ‘But you’re still here, Mark. My leaving won’t save you.’

What a very unselfish thing for him to say. I was taken aback by it. ‘You
have
saved me, James.’

‘No, I—’

I shook my head. ‘Don’t you worry about me. I’m not afraid of whatever InVizion has planned and you just try and let them screw with my brain. My life was shite till you came along, and well, this isn’t really what I’d expected of myself, but it’s a hell of a lot better than anything I imagined, so don’t you go fretting about things like that.’

He sighed. ‘Funny, the things one becomes concerned about, near the end. Things one wouldn’t think would matter.’

I rested my chin on the sofa cushion. ‘What sort of things?’

‘Oh,’ he growled, ‘I’m finding it hard to remember…’ His hand curled into his hair.

I swallowed. I hated hearing that, and I knew I’d be hearing it a lot more. ‘Remember what?’

His breathing kicked up an almost noticeable notch. ‘How we met.’

I closed my eyes and rested my head against his. ‘What do you not remember?’

He huffed his breath in frustration. ‘Our first real conversation. I don’t know how…how we became friends.’ He shakily pushed himself to a sitting position, offering me room on the sofa. ‘I’ve spent all morning attempting to recall.’

That was what he’d spent his morning thinking about? Not what I would have expected. I took the warm cushion next to him and pulled out my mobile to scroll back through my message inbox. ‘Oh, well,’ I tried to keep my voice casual, ‘I think I can help with that.’

‘How?’

‘All of our messages to each other. They’re archived on my phone. Here you are.’

I handed the mobile to him and he took it in his hands. He frowned at it for a second. ‘You saved all of our messages?’

I flushed, embarrassed. Saying it out loud made it sound a bit weirder than I’d ever paused to think about. ‘I guess I did.’ I shook my head. ‘I just don’t clean out my phone that often.’

A sly smile pulled at his lips, and then he nestled down into my lap, as if it were the most natural thing in the world. I immediately wanted him to never leave that spot. I brushed my fingers through his hair as he lost himself in his reading.

The experiments and torture of his past did not trouble James Nightgood.

Recalling our first conversation did.

19:Mind Over Matter

The outside air was cold. I’d forgotten to turn up the thermostat and now the prospect of leaving the warmth of the covers seemed unmanageable. From behind my closed lids I couldn’t tell my position. The sheets and duvet were all wrapped round me in a cocoon of comfortable warmth. Pressed in close to my side, was James. My right arm throbbed with a numb ache from how long I supposed it had been resting under his weight.

I lifted my head from the pillow. The glow from InVizion’s tower lit up the floor. I wondered if James had purchased this flat on purpose, so he could look at it. I had no idea why he’d want that. I found it hard to relax under its glare, as if it were some malevolent eye always focused on us. I supposed I didn’t need the tower to know that. Every damn electronic device in this place was doing that job for them.

We’d not left the flat yesterday. Fox had bombarded us with angry texts and cryptic messages: demanding to see us straight away; demanding James translate baffling lines of numbers before nightfall. Yet my friend’s concentration was shot. I tried to help, but the equations and code—this time about gardens—was far beyond me. James had already had a forgetful spell and lost his temper completely. Fox only grew more belligerent when I informed him it was impossible, that James was not well enough, and things rapidly devolved into a fallout. Eventually I cut off all communication. I couldn’t handle it.

Whatever Fox was in a fluster over, he would have to deal with on his own. James was out of commission and that meant I was, too.

It wasn’t long after that he’d had one of the worst seizures I’d yet seen him have.

That made me close to cutting off all contact with Fox. It upset him too greatly.

I was not sure what had awoken me. A glance to the clock told me it was a little past three in the morning. I groaned and dropped my head back to the pillow. When sleep did not immediately overtake me, I cast a glance over to James.

What I saw frightened me.

He was staring up at the ceiling, breathing rapidly. The light from the tower gave his eyes an animalistic gleam I did not recognise.

‘James?’ I put a hand on his chest and was alarmed by how hot his skin was. How quickly his heart beat.

He wouldn’t respond.

I attempted to shake him, call to him, jar him out of his state, but nothing worked. I panicked and tossed water on his face. That did not work either.

With nothing to bring him back to me, I went to hunting for my phone. What if he was slipping into some catatonic state? What if the tumour had grown so quickly this was the end?

I didn’t get the first nine dialled before I heard the mattress creak. I turned slowly to see James rising from bed in a fluid, swift movement, very unlike how he ever moved these days.

‘James? All right?’

He paid me no mind but shuffled towards the door, his movements those of a sleepwalker. In alarm, I jumped after him.

It didn’t take long to work out, as I followed him into the sitting room, that his actions were not his own. Nor was it the work of insomnia. I dodged around to the front of him to see the dazed, drawn look in his eyes. No, this was something else. This wasn’t a dream. This was intentional. Something much more terrifying than a dream. Something was directing him. That sent a new wave of panic through me.

He was headed for the door. In nothing but his bare feet and pyjama bottoms. It was three-thirty on a Thursday night in London. He could not go out. I could not let him leave. Whatever they wanted him for, wherever they wanted him to go, or do, I could not let him.

I had heard you shouldn’t wake a sleepwalker; should just let them do their own thing and come out of it on their own, but I had no other option, I could not let James leave the flat. I planted myself in front of him and stopped his chest with my hands.

He ploughed right on through.

‘No! James! What the hell are you doing?’ I struggled against him, baffled and afraid by his actions. It was like trying to stop a charging elephant.

James had shoved me off of him without a noise, without a glance. It was as if he was in a trance. Yes. Good word for it. But I didn’t have any time to appreciate it.

I threw all of my weight against him, my feet slipped on the floor, sliding in my socks. ‘No! James! Snap out of it!’

Too quickly he gripped my arms in a tight clamp with his big hands. I was taken off-guard and staggered as he easily ripped my hands free from him. I had a brief moment of fright, as I looked up at him, my wrists caught. He was gazing at me with unseeing eyes. I felt my stomach drop. He did not know me.

James shoved me backwards, powerfully. My feet went tangling up in each other and I lost my balance. The room tipped around me as I was sent down with a strangled cry. There was nothing to grab hold to, and James simply stood there, watching me.

I hit the ground hard and my head snapped back. There was a blinding crack of pain and my entire world went dark. I remembered no more.

When I awoke, I was shivering.

I lifted my head off the carpet and a roaring stab of white-hot pain shot up from the base of my skull. With a hiss of breath all air escaped my lungs at the surprising hurt. I slid a hand to the back of my head and it felt sticky. When I pulled it away, it was red. Must have hit it on the table.

I swore and struggled to a sitting position despite the roar of pain. The room was dark and the door was wide open, letting the cold in. I scrabbled to my feet only to almost topple again at the sudden pitching in my brain.

Out the door I crashed against the railing to look down to the carpark below. The one lone light set it aglow in shadow and yellow. There was no one. No sign of James.

I cursed again and went tearing back inside to grab my mobile and something besides pyjamas to wear. Then I was back, charging down the stairs. He’d left his mobile, he’d left everything. I had no idea where the hell I could even begin to search for him. My heart thudded in my chest achingly strong. He was gone, dear God, he was gone again and how would I ever find him?

My phone read four-thirty. I’d been out for about an hour. He could be anywhere by now. I ran down the street, pushing past those solitary few that were always out late on London nights. I didn’t know where I was going; I had nothing to go on. I scanned side-streets, making my way, without much thought, towards the InVizion tower.

A scream of sirens went tearing past me and I stopped dead, watching one—two police cars and an ambulance race by. The ache in my chest turned to dread. Call it intuition, or desperation, but I took after them. It was not exactly the easiest of feats, and before long they were far ahead of me. Still, I ran, for their sounds still echoed down the canyon of buildings. Slowly it began to dawn on me where I was headed.

And my stomach crashed as I finally saw.

I froze outside of block of flats where Fox’s dirty little rat hole was situated. It was crawling with police. Automatically I stepped backwards, hoping I was out of sight, as I watched the commotion. The lines of police tape fluttered in the breeze.

Had the hacker finally been caught?

It was then I noticed the ambulance. My stomach sank. Oh, God. Under a sheet. Fox. Had to be. At least, I prayed it was. Prayed it wasn’t James, instead.

Had James come here? My mind tumbled with the idea of him being sent for some awful purpose to do with what I was seeing now. I looked round at the darkened alleys, desperately hoping to see him.

God…I watched the commotion in numbness. Did this have anything to do with what Fox had so desperately been trying to reach us with all day? Had he known something? And if so, why not just call? Why send us so many cryptic messages if he’d known he was in danger.

Or known James was.

I scuffed my shoe against the pavement, indecisive about what my next move should be. Instead of having things answered, I just had more frustrating questions now.

‘Hello, Mark.’

I spun round so fast I almost fell. My stomach certainly did. Standing across from me, smug as anything, was Slater. The lights from the police cars flashed against his face.

I was surprised that instead of fear, rage filled me. How dare he have the gall to be here? My head spun with new questions. If Slater was here, and Fox was dead…had it been James or…?

‘What are you doing here?’ I managed to snarl, surprising myself by the animalistic quality of my tone.

Slater blinked as well, as if he, too, was surprised someone of my stature was capable of such an attitude. ‘Me? Why, I was here to see my good friend Laurence Fox.’ He spoke as if he were talking about the weather. His eyes slid towards the commotion just beyond us. ‘What a terrible pity. I couldn’t have imagined…though I do suppose when one deals in such a dangerous world as Fox did…it does tend to happen.’

I wanted to strike him, pin him to the ground and beat him until he choked on his teeth. Something told me if I tried anything of the sort I’d be dead in a matter of seconds. ‘Did you kill Fox?’ I could barely get the words out. They came in a tight whisper.

‘What?’ Slater laughed incredulously.

‘DID YOU KILL FOX?’ I for a moment forgot we were skirting a crime scene. The amused look in Slater’s eyes warned me to keep some control over myself.

‘Now why would I do that?’ He stepped towards me. ‘Fox was my friend. He was desperately trying to reach me! Why would I ever wish him harm? His father was a very dear friend, a colleague!’

I felt strange, uneasy, doubtful. It was wrong. All wrong.

‘Where’s James?’ I choked.

The smile grew nastier. ‘Oh? He’s not with you? I heard he wasn’t feeling too well. I do hope he’s all right.’

I felt another snarl building in my throat. ‘What have you done to him?’

Slater cast a lazy look towards the flashing lights. ‘I would go back home, Mark, if I were you. Both of us clearly have no more business here. Unless, of course, you had something to do with this?’

I swore, close to striking him again. ‘You can’t get away with this,’ I said, lamely.

He chuckled. ‘Away with what? Go home, Mark.’ He gave me a weak wave, and then pushed past me, walking into the dark.

I watched him go, the noises of the crime scene behind me draining away to a distant buzz. My throat clicked as I swallowed. He was right. I could not stay here. I would be recognised. I could do James no good—wherever he was—answering questions or locked in a cell. I did not doubt it wouldn’t be difficult to find ties between Fox and me.

I spun on my heel, stuffing my fists into my jacket in frustration. For once I would listen to Slater’s words. For once, I felt he was right.

When I returned, I was almost not surprised to see James Nightgood lying face down on the floor. I swore and went to him. He didn’t respond as I rolled him over. There was nothing good about what I saw. His pyjama pants had blood on them, as did his bare feet.

‘Hey, hey, James? Wake up!’ I patted the side of his face, trying to draw some sort of reaction from him.

To my relief, a low drone escaped him.

‘Come on, James, snap out of it!’

His eyes shot open and he jerked in my arms, a panicked gasp ripping from his lungs as he struggled against me.

‘Whoa, hey, easy! Easy!’ I clung to him, gripping his bare shoulders, pushing him back to the floor. He wouldn’t look at me, he only fought.

‘JAMES!’

He froze and his eyes locked with mine at last; bare stomach heaved against me. ‘M—Mark?’ His beautiful green gaze went wide, and then, to my surprise, welled with tears.

I shushed him, stroked the side of his face. His breath hissed from his nose, flaring his nostrils, but I eventually calmed him, lying over him, running my fingers through his hair. James let out a broken moan and lifted his head off of the floor. His nose brushed against mine. We hung there for a moment, his breath hot on my lips, before he eventually slumped back to the floor. I reluctantly pushed myself off of him.

‘Do you remember anything?’ I whispered, looking over him again. He didn’t seem injured. The blood on his pyjama bottoms did not appear to be his. His battered feet were painful to look at but they would heal.

James shook his head miserably and pressed knuckles to his eyes. ‘No.’

I nodded. I’d expected as much. His memory was bad as it was. ‘Fox is dead.’

His head flopped back against the floor and he let out a deep, frustrated breath.

I numbly told him what had happened, what I’d seen, what I didn’t know.

James sat up with wobbly arms. ‘Mark…do you think I’m responsible…?’

I glanced back down to his trousers again, at the flecks of blood. He followed my gaze and I watched one of his long fingers go scratching at a splotch.

‘I don’t know, James,’ I said miserably. I wanted to blame Slater. It made sense to blame Slater. I cleared my throat, seeing his blank expression. ‘It wasn’t you, James. You didn’t kill anyone. Even if it was your body. They were controlling you. It wasn’t your fault.’

I wasn’t even sure if James was listening to me.