It doesn't take long to break a habit, even a lifetime habit of ignoring the things at the corner of your eye, of not looking closely enough, of ignoring the pieces of the puzzle that don't quite fit.
I haven't got many friends. Maybe you've picked that up from my posts so far. I'm not sociable. I'm not like the girls you see on TV. Spoken words, they don't come easily to me. At least, not to strangers.
Maybe this...maybe this disintegration of the world around me is a reason – is one of the reasons I've never quite fit in. These gaps in the logic, in the science of everything – maybe I've lived in one of those gaps my entire life.
There was a fog this morning.
I catch the ferry to uni. There'd never been a fog before. I could see it on the horizon, this thick wall of white – so still, it was almost like it was being held back by a glass wall.
The captain made an announcement over the speaker, telling us we were going to be late.
Then we entered it, like breaking into a cloud.
It was so thick we couldn't see more than a metre around the ferry. The water around the hull was absolutely still. And that wasn't right, because the ferry crosses the harbour and goes past the heads, which lead into the open ocean, so there's always small waves – sometimes swell of more than a few metres. This mirror-like stillness was unnatural. Bizarre. And there was that thick fog, so impenetrable that we couldn't see the shore. It was like we were somewhere else entirely. Like we could be anywhere in the world.
The foghorn split through the air, and it felt like the sound shattered my eardrums. The foghorns of the other boats, invisible and distant on the water, were like an immense, haphazard orchestra warming up.
I looked around, smiling a bit, wondering whether the other passengers had also jumped, but then I froze.
Because everyone had gone. I was alone, on the deck. The sound of the engine had stopped. There was nothing but the eerie sounds of the horns in the distance.
That's when I heard the scream.
My entire body tightened up at the sound, doubled over – like a convulsion. Like one of those insects, slate bugs, curling up when you poke them. I didn't even think before completing the movement and crouching down on the ground, out of sight of the windows that connected the open deck and the interior of the boat.
Every single one of my senses strained towards the sounds inside.
I heard raised voices. I crept closer to the windows – so I'd be out of immediate view – and peeked up over the edge of the sill, but couldn't see anything. I heard a woman speaking. She had a rough voice.
" – there'd be one. First run of the day. He's got to be a... " Her voice trailed away as she moved further from my hidden position, though I lowered my head and held my breath trying to catch more.
The second voice made me jerk, it was so close. Less than a meter away. A male voice. "Nothing here."
It took every bit of discipline I had to keep from scrabbling away. It was coming from directly above me – as though he was standing on the other side of the window I had just been peering through. He must have been walking along the inside wall, out of my line of sight. I was swearing fluently and silently inside my head, though I probably should have counted myself lucky that I'd ducked back down behind the window when I had. Just one more second, and he would have seen me.
I didn't know what it was about these strangers that sent such an immense feeling of fear through me. The scream probably helped. I wondered who had made the sound.
"Check the front of the boat."
I nearly bit through my lip. That was another voice, nearby. Thank God, it was still on the other side of the glass. If anyone opened the door onto the front deck, I'd be discovered immediately.
I started to crawl towards the staircase that led to the exterior walkway on the lower level of the boat, my hands and knees slipping on the icy, fog-damp deck.
I'd just rounded the corner when I heard the door open. I scrabbled down the stairs backwards, my head spinning with adrenaline – probably not the most helpful response to stress – and looked around, still crouching, so I wouldn't be visible through the windows.
I know the ferry back to front, so I was able to duck into a shallow recess that held a box of life-jackets, hopefully concealing me from a casual look up and down the side of the boat.
I nearly jumped out of my skin when something behind me crashed, and leaned down a little lower to look through one of the vents that opened to the interior. I couldn't really see anything, except for a pair of worn leather business shoes unevenly backing away from two sets of dusty boots.
The voice I heard next wasn't any of the harsh, pragmatic ones from before. It was terrified.
"Where's everyone gone? What's going on? What the fuck's happening? This isn't fucking happening!"
The boots advanced closer towards the business shoes. They were backed against a wall, now.
The woman I'd heard before spoke again. "Our Hound was supposed to dream up a bank. One we're familiar with. Does this look like a bank to you?"
Business Shoes wasn't listening. "What the fuck's going on? Is this one of those TV prank things? It's not fucking funny."
"You can stop the act. We know what you are." That was a man speaking. I assumed his voice belonged to the boots that stepped closer to Business Shoes, and shifted, as though bracing themselves for something. "Only a Waker could fuck us over so spectacularly. One that's a lot better than our bitch. We were just out fishing for some loonies, but it looks like we've caught ourselves something much better. Put your hands out, let us cuff you, and this doesn't have to be painful."
The woman's boots shifted towards Business Shoes, and he made a run for it.
He didn't get far. I didn't see what the woman did, but he suddenly slammed down, into my line of sight.
He was just an ordinary looking man, in his mid thirties, in a cheap suit. His cheek was pressed against the dirty blue plastic floor, and he was staring right into my eyes, terror on his face. I saw someone's knee pressing into his back as rough hands jerked his arms back and fastened them together with pale blue loops that glowed a poisonous colour.
"We might not even sell you," the woman whispered. "We might keep you for ourselves."
The man tried to jerk away from her, "Get the fuck off! Who the fuck do you people think you are?" The woman hopped off him and the second pair of boots started to drag him up to his feet. "Help me!" he shouted, "Help me, please!" He was still staring at me.
The other two pairs of shoes abruptly went still.
"Who are you talking to?" the man asked.
The smaller pair of boots strode towards my side of the ferry and I scrabbled backwards and away.
No time for crawling. I skidded along the damp walkway to the steel door that led to the crew cabin. I'd never been there before, and I prayed it wasn't locked. My fingers slipped on the metal handle, and I heard a wooden sliding door further up the ferry slam open.
The handle was jammed, with rust maybe. I heard footsteps coming closer, and threw myself against the doorway as I continued to scrabble at the latch, praying that the shallow impression of the entrance would shield me from view. The gentle curve of the boat kept me out of view for now, but wouldn't the moment my pursuer rounded the corner.
I leaned my whole weight on the handle, and the brittle metal snapped in my hand. My fingers tightened around it convulsively, the jagged edge drawing blood. The door swung open and I threw myself inside the cabin, closing it behind me as quickly and silently as I could, praying that the person pursuing me hadn't seen. I'd only just shut it when footsteps thundered past. I nearly passed out as the blood pounded in my ears, leaning my forehead against the cool steel door.
A faint voice reached me.
"...says there's someone else here."
"Fuck!" I whispered without thinking. "Fuck, fuck, Jesus, fuck!"
Then I realised I wasn't alone in this small, dark space. Someone was breathing right behind me.
I spun around so quickly I got dizzy again, and it took everything I had to stop myself from exploding to the outside of the ferry again, into the waiting arms of whoever was looking for me.
My eyes strained against the dimness, and I saw the outline of a woman sitting on a stool, very still.
Someone jogged past, along the deck outside. "Search the top – "
I reached towards her. I'm still not sure whether it was to grab her and use her as some kind of hostage – with my ridiculous handle as a weapon – or just to make her speak to me, but the second my fingers touched her bare skin, my world felt like it ripped in two.
I was seeing through her eyes and my eyes at the same time. I could see me – face white and taut, hand outstretched – and I could see her, her red-lipsticked mouth stretching open in a scream, the whites of her eyes showing – in a nauseating double vision. Everything bent and warped around me, and an awful sound ripped through both of us – vibrating along our bones, making us shake inside our skins.
Dark rivulets of blood had started to worm from her nose when the cabin door behind me jerked open and someone grabbed me roughly, jerking me backwards and away from her, back into the cold, fog-soaked air. But it felt wrong, too still – everything was still stretching and melting and shivering.
An arm looped around my neck, and from the corner of my eye, I could see those awful, glowing handcuffs. I kicked out at whoever was standing behind me, and they let go. I spun round, and swung out with the stick of broken metal still clenched in my fist. I missed them, but hit the closest window. It caved around my fist, and the entire boat shuddered. A gaping black space appeared in the centre of the broken window, as though the glass had been holding back space, or chaos.
The black hole spread out, and the boat started to dissolve into it – falling apart in chunks, tearing with an awful ripping sound, and a horrible, drawn-out scream. A woman's scream. The woman I'd touched in the cabin.
Everything started falling downwards, including the section of deck I stood on. Dark, icy water rushed up through the cracks.
Someone grabbed at me, at my hair, and I jerked away. As I spun, I saw the businessman, out of reach, still inside the ferry, his hands still secured behind his back. Water rose and fell around his ankles like a devouring mouth. He fell to his knees. I couldn't have possibly heard him, but his words pierced through all the sound and chaos, anyway. Just two words.
"Help me."
He was too far away.
A fist came out of nowhere, and I swung out again with my jagged piece of handle. I swiped across a face, and my attacker fell back. The section of deck I was standing on was rapidly tilting on a sharp diagonal, falling down to meet the jagged edge of another piece of flooring, dozens of meters below. The edges were sharp enough to cut. Enough to kill.
I threw myself at the railing above me and dragged my body upwards. People screamed beneath me as the deck tipped until it was almost entirely vertical, but I ignored them. I had to.
I briefly balanced on the edge of the railing, looking down at the black ocean, so far below. A sharp propeller spun below me, exposed to the air. The section of boat I was standing on jerked and sank lower, slowly tilting, falling backwards.
I threw myself over the side – into the flat water, and safety. Into the fog.
Water broke around me with the impact of a punch, icy cold. Rushing darkness, then, air. And light.
I stumbled and a hard wooden bench took my legs out from underneath me.
I opened my eyes with a gasp, and people turned to look at me, concerned.
I looked around. I was back on the ferry. A miraculously whole ferry. The engine hummed beneath us. The fog was clearing. The light was different, clearer, sharper.
I looked down at my clothes. Dry.
My heart pounded, and I couldn't stop myself from taking in jagged breaths. My bloody fist was still clenched around an impossibly broken, impossibly sharp, piece of iron.
^^^
Author's Note:
Thank you everyone for reading! Let me know how you found the chapter, please vote or comment if you enjoyed! :)
For more Anna , check out the tumblr (there's fan art there now?!): http://annawakes.tumblr.com/
Or the (super awesome) soundtracks: http://8tracks.com/annawakes