chapter three of opposite ends

Chapter 3: A dream comes true

The black smoke, the fire. Another dream. But this didn’t feel like a dream, it was like I was really there in the smoke, I could feel it against my skin. I could feel the rips in my beaten skin, I looked down at myself and sure enough my skin was torn to shreds and covered in blood.

I was wearing army greens, what was left of them anyway. I was missing two fingers on my left hand and could see the bone in my right arm; my legs looked like they had a minimum of three bullet holes in each leg. It was agony, but I had a sense of need . . . a need to keep fighting. Men were shooting from inside the smoke, I shut my eyes hoping it would go away, hoping it would all go away and I would wake up and rush to work with Ryan and bore the kids to death with history once more.

“Em! We need to move, they’re closing in from the north and west. They double our numbers; if we don’t move now we might not be able to fight!”

Ryan’s voice, my sweet Ryan. I look around and there he was, covered in blood, beaten and bruised. His shoulder was sticking out at an odd angle and a few ribs were visible through his skin.

 “Em! Come on!” How I had longed to hear his voice again, but not like this, not in a battle field. I hugged him so hard we both groaned in pain, but I couldn’t help it. Tears started to flood down my cheeks mixing in with the blood. “Why are you crying Em? We need to move.” His voice was more gentle and caring this time, it really was him.

 “I thought I would never see you again! I was so scared.” I cried into his shoulder, ignoring the guns pointed our way and the fire heating our skin slowly and unbearably.

 “Em, where have you come from? Where were you before you got here?” I didn’t understand the question, nothing that was going on made any sense! I collapsed onto my knees and Ryan stooped down and scooped me up, running with me in his arms, taking me to safety, taking me away from this nightmare.

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We sat in a small rain beaten tent; dark green and brown coloured tables and beds were huddled together so close you could barely walk between them. Covering the beds were wounded soldiers; the soldiers that weren’t as badly wounded were healing the ones who were and then fixing themselves up.

 “So where have you come from?” he asked me again.

 “I don’t understand what you mean Ryan. The last thing I remember is being in that god awful army base in the southern area where they were doing tests or something on both of us, then I open my eyes and I’m here! I thought I wouldn’t see you again and then I’m in a battle field! Explain to me what the hell is going on!” I burst into tears again, gaining some odd looks from soldiers around us.

“Sergeant Ember, are you all right?” a soldier on the bed next to me asked, looking at me concerned and slightly confused.

“Do I look alright?” I sobbed, “I just want to go home.” Ryan pulled me into his arms and started wiping the blood off my face with dirty water out of a bucket and an old cloth.

“Private Jamie, Ember isn’t our Ember right now. Remember the time issue?” he whispered, the last bit looking around, worried.

“Time issue? What time issue?” I blurted, wanting to know what in the hell was going on. “I think I have been very damn patient, I am in a lot of pain. I was just in a medical lab having needles shoved into my bones and no one will tell me what in the hell is going on!” I shouted, forgetting how badly damaged my body was. Broken ribs snatched the air out of my lungs as I finished my shouting and I groaned in pain.

“Calm down Em, it’s hard to explain. Let me clean you up then we can talk about it.” He kissed me on the forehead and continued cleaning the blood off my skin. We sat there in silence until he finished patching me up, then he started patching himself up, making quick work of it. “Ok Em, please bear with me, it is very hard to try and explain.” I nodded trying to hide my impatience. “So, it goes like this: the war in the south is here right now. That’s where we are. Our parents snuck us out as babies and I think they died in the process as I haven’t been able to find any record of them since. The southern people are different from the ones that we know back up north, their minds are using more of the abilities we are capable of, and they are more evolved. It scared the people up north so they banished them down here and tried to eradicate them, that’s how the war started and, as you know, it’s been going on for about a hundred years. We are like them and have, I suppose you could call them powers or abilities. It comes from our D.N.A. You with me so far?”

I nodded slowly, unable to process all of this new information. I’m a freak? The doctor was right I’m not normal. But I let him continue.

“If someone from the south was to have a child with someone from the north, it would be the strongest type of D.N.A in the world, the strongest most capable soldier. So the armies for the northern side are capturing and experimenting with blood and bone marrow trying to create the perfect soldier, once they succeed they will wipe out all of the south. One of your abilities is to travel into a future or past version of yourself in your dreams. When the doctors started the tests on you, your brain must have sent you here as a sort of S.O.S.”

I looked at him stunned, my mouth wide open; I pictured it looking like the cartoons when the jaw hits the floor.

“So I’m a freak?”I asked almost in a whisper.

 “We don’t use that word around here Em; every soldier in this room is different too. Except Jamie, you might recognize him.” I took a closer look at him and slowly I could picture him less scruffy, in a suit with gelled hair.

“Agent Cross!” I pushed myself back into the wall hitting my head in shock.

“That’s me, Jamie Cross. I’m sorry I was too much of a coward to help you where you come from, I’m so sorry,” he pleaded, almost as if he was praying for forgiveness to a higher power.

“So I’m a soldier?” I asked. My head felt like it was going to explode from too much information.

“Not just a soldier, the leader of the rebel army trying to stop the war and stop them from turning people like us into weapons,” Jamie said sounding like a proud father of a son who has just won a big football match or something. My head was buzzing, I wanted out.

 “How do I get back?” I just realised that, if this was real, I had no idea how to get back. Fear spread through my body, what if I couldn’t get home? I thought.

But then . . . did I want to go home? Back to being experimented on and watching us both slowly and painfully die . . . or get blown up and shot; my choices were hardly good! No I needed to get back, to make this all possible.

“How do I get back?” My confidence showed in my voice, full of determination. I thought if everyone was here now then I couldn’t possibly go wrong, the future is already set and we were free and fighting in this future.

“Were going to have to train you like you did us, well now I know how you learnt to train us in the first place,” Ryan pondered laughing slightly. I missed his laugh, it sounded so innocent and carefree, it didn’t suit this new soldier version of him but in his eyes I could see it was still my Ryan.

We travelled for three hours, walking south, careful not to be seen in case of northern army soldiers casing the area. The full three hours were spent in silence; Ryan didn’t even look at me. I wondered what could have happened between us that left us so distant and decided it must just be because of the war changing us both. I couldn’t bring myself to think we might not be together. We reached what looked like an old cinema theatre that had been turned to rubble in an explosion of some kind.

My thoughts were tearing me up, all of this was too much and then Ryan acting we weren’t together now . . . that was enough my make my world come crumbling down. I stared into space, lost in thought as we walked into the ruins of the theatre, down some broken crumbling stairs and into a tunnel and then some more stairs. I thought it would go on forever until we finally reached a group of men, scrawny compared to the soldiers but still not the average desk jockey size, all of them chatting away nervously like a bunch of hens.

As soon as we were spotted it went quiet and they scrambled to stand, all in a line looking straight ahead reminding me of the little action figures we used to play with as kids.

“Sergeant Kaelin Ma'am!” they all said at once, Ryan was all of a sudden by my side and made me jump when he leant over to whisper in my ear.

“We can’t let people know that you’re not you in case of infiltration, play along.” He grinned at me, causing some butterflies in my stomach to stir. “Welcome new recruits!” he bellowed. “You will refrain from talking to the sergeant unless asked to speak! You will not look at her unless requested! You won’t even sneeze without permission today! Is that clear?!” He paced between them like a drill sergeant in a cheesy army movie.

“Sir! Yes sir!” they bellowed back.

Jamie put his hand on my back gently and walked me into a separate room.

“This is where we will be training you. It won’t be easy especially as beaten up as you are. If it wasn’t for our healing herbs, you wouldn’t be walking right now.” Healing herbs? I didn’t understand until I looked at my missing fingers . . . and they were growing back!

“OK, so how do we do this?” I asked, shaking from head to toe. Jamie grinned at me and walked into a chalk circle on the floor about 12ft in diameter.

“This is the duelling ring; if you feel like you can’t go on all you have to do is leave the circle. Shall we begin?” I took my place in the circle and nodded. Jamie bowed to me and returned the nod before starting to pace around the circle like a wild animal hunting its prey.

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