Nightmares had plagued the twelve-year-old for as long at he could remember. He knew these nightmares too well to ever even wish to sleep easy. Still, for his "training" he needed sleep. They required that he sleep and if he didn't they would make sure he didn't get a wink. Get the coffee. Kill that squirrel. Do what you're told. He wasn't allowed to have emotions. He wasn't allowed to think for himself. Yet through all this he had an escape. His refuge was his sister: Margaret Chaucer.
"Geoff!" Margaret cried from the dark door way as her eyes found her older brother in the dim red light that emitted from the eclipsed moon that shone through the window. She was only a year younger, but she was so naïve that she was thought to be only five years old. The door to Geoff's cubby of a room slammed as she ran to kneel by his side. She carefully touched the blood that was on the side of his face. "What happened?" She picked up his left hand that was bloody and twisted.
"Your dog," he said quietly—he tried to hide the fact that his hand hurt like hell when she moved it. "I was trying to save him. They…shot him because his leg was broken." He tried to force a sad smile as he looked into her teary eyes. "Now, now, don't you start crying." He reached up with his good hand and wiped tears as they rolled down her cheeks.
She cleared her throat and acted bigger than she felt. She felt tiny and compressed into a space that once her dog had occupied. All that was left was a hole. She rubbed her tears away viciously. She didn't like to cry in front of him. She knew it made him feel bad. "But are you all right?" she asked firmly, "They broke your fingers again."
"I got lucky this time," he said, "They only broke two. It's all right. It's just my left hand so I can still write your stories."
He realized she was examining his hand. He looked at the drying blood as it crusted between his fingers. The middle and index fingers were both blue and gnarled like old, arthritic joints. He noticed the revealed skin where once he had nails and pulled his hand away to prevent he seeing, but he was too late. "You're missing fingernails!" she exclaimed, horrified, "They ripped them off!"
"It's fine, Maggie," he insisted, "it doesn't hurt half as bad as it did before." He adjusted his back against his cot and cradled his bad hand carefully. He was beat up more than just his hand. His right eye was bruised and dark and there were quite a few nasty-looking marks on his chest. He had removed his shirt to try and wrap it around his bleeding hand. "Can you help me?"
She thought for a moment and then took the two sticks out of her hair and let it fall around her shoulders. She put them against his fingers and broke them to the right size. Then she tore a few strips from the shirt and bound the splints to his broken fingers. The red moon was lining the windowsill and bars with a bloody glow as she took the rest of his shirt and scraped away the dried blood on his forehead. Her job done, she leaned herself against him, the unshed tears from these horrifying images of his hand stinging her eyes. "Is it my fault?" she asked.
"No!" Geoff snapped, "Don't you dare think that!" He put his arm around her gently. He feared the arrival of his "teachers" at any moment. His sister was not allowed in his room. "I don't care that the dog was yours. I would've tried to help it anyway." He'd grown used to lying to make her feel better, even though it made him feel worse.
"It is my fault," she muttered, "Mother always said it was my fault. You would've had money if I hadn't been born. You could've lived with Mother and lived happily ever after if I hadn't come along."
"Shut up, Maggie," he commanded, "Stop being stupid." He felt her shoulder quiver with a sob that she was trying to hide. "Come on, don't cry. Want to hear a story?" He felt her nod against his chest. "Well, you remember the story of how the world began and the Sun made people to live on it so she wouldn't be lonely, right? As Sun observed her world and her People she was happy. People talked with Sun and praised Sun and appreciated Sun for her light. In return, Sun allowed People to do things with her power. Soon things were possible for People that they could never have thought of doing before. They built machines and technologies and empires to rule each other, but they didn't realize that their advancements were polluting the air. They didn't notice that Sun was getting dimmer as the air grew clouded with waste. They took Sun for granted, so Sun went away. Sun went away and a new body took the sky. This was Moon. His light was dimmer than Sun's and People couldn't use his type of power to work their machines. People began to lament and complain to Moon of their problems. Moon was a harsh tyrant towards People and ignored their requests to find Sun for them. When Sun finally did return, she and Moon fought over the world she had created. Eventually the battle was a draw. Moon agreed to split the world 50/50 and rule only the dark times that were night while Sun's light created day. Moon remained forever jealous of Sun's bond with her People. On nights like this, when Moon is dwelling on his lack of respect, you can see his face turn red with rage." He motioned towards the window where the moon was only half-visible over the sill.
"That's a silly story," she said with a yawn. "Why can't Sun and Moon just get alone? And why can't People rule their own world?"
He just shrugged and rubbed her back idly. She was sleeping after just a minute and a half of silence. He was not too far away from sleep, though he knew he shouldn't sleep. He didn't was to be caught off guard. He was already on thin ice because of the stunt he'd pulled with the dog. If they caught him with her he'd really be in for it. Then, suddenly she was gone. His arms were empty. He found himself kneeling before an unadorned glass coffin with a light illuminating the base. Inside was the figure of a girl, forever frozen in an unconscious, timeless state. Her hair had long ago faded to gray and her nails were slightly blue. Just like always when this image came, Geoff tried to pound on the glass, tried to break it open and save his sister. His hand shot out, but didn't make contact.
Geoff was sweating profusely. He had thrown himself into a sitting position with the motion from his dream but his arm wasn't outstretched, as it usually was when he had that dream. He was aware that he wasn't in his bed in his apartment. He tried to pull his arm in front of him but both were bound tightly behind his back. He looked around him into a blinding darkness. He knew there were walls because his breathing was echoing very quietly against them. It was cold and the floor beneath him was hard and uncomfortable. His back felt as if he'd been lying there for some time.
"Hello?" he said quietly. His voice was swallowed in the endless silence. On the black screen of darkness he saw a flicker of light that he knew was in his mind. It disappeared and reappeared and replicated. Soon there were lights dancing around him. He lay back down and tried to ignore the phenomena about him. He could almost make out the corners of the ceiling in the blackness. Then, suddenly, the ceiling morphed into a face, frozen in a deaf scream. Geoff gave a loud shout of terror. He tried to slide himself on the floor away from the illusion—for that's what he knew it was. He didn't speak to it, he knew better. It was in ancient lore that if you talk to a mere illusion or nightmare it becomes real.
As his back met the wall nearest him, the face had dissipated. He was starring into the wall opposite him. He strained his eyes to see anything. He noticed an indentation in the wall that was shaped like a rectangle. A door, perhaps? He then saw a little box in the corner of the ceiling above it. "What is that?" he wondered aloud.
"Get away!" he heard himself yell. He was seeing something else now. Something he knew couldn't be there. He was seeing his little sister. She was eleven again and clad in a white nightgown. There was no light to illuminate her, she couldn't possibly be real.
"Come play, Geoff," she said, taking a step forward. Her little hand outstretched; her skin seemed to give off it very own heavenly light. "Come play."
He found himself staring in awe at her. He kicked at the ground with his legs and tried to scoot away from the apparition. "Stay away," he muttered, more to himself than the ghost that was approaching him. "You're not real. You're not real." Still, through all this he did not take his eyes off of her for a moment. And in the back his mind there was the tiniest hope that he was wrong, that she was real.
Nicholas de Vilance: I promise, before anyone starts to get angry, Geoff's not crazy. It'll all be explained in the next chapter...