Tim Lebbon - Coldbrook

He slid the mechanism back into place to block the opening, a fresh surge of guilt making him feel queasy again. And as he climbed, Coldbrook pulled at him, with its terrible gravity and the implications of what they had done there. He resisted, sweat running down his sides and teeth gritted against the pain in his arms and legs. He wasn’t used to physical exertion. They had a small gym down in the living quarters — a few treadmills and exercise bikes squeezed into an unused suite — but it was rare that he spent any time in there. Vic was naturally skinny, but that didn’t mean he was fit. He regretted his laziness now.

The second damper took longer to get past, and the third one longer still. Maybe it was exhaustion, or panic, but the head torch started slipping on his sweaty skin, and he dropped three screwdrivers back down the duct. He held on tightly to the fourth — it was his last. Drop that one and he’d have to climb back down to retrieve it. . he was starting to fear that Coldbrook would never let him out. It had its claws in him, and Jonah had called him four more times. He was tempted to answer and find out exactly what was going on, but he had gained a momentum now. Jonah’s voice might be enough to change his mind. Ignorant old bastard , Vic thought, surprised at the affection he suddenly felt for the old man. He hoped Jonah was safe.

And Holly. But he was trying not to think of her, and when she did cross his mind it felt as though she was strangely far away.

As Vic climbed, he tried to ignore the fact that he was leaving an open route behind him. He shoved the mechanisms back into the openings he’d crawled through, though he could not secure them again from above. Jonah will lock it all down , he kept thinking, a mantra to persuade himself that security would be maintained. And he willingly let panic conceal the illogicality of that idea. What was ahead mattered more.

Reaching the head of the duct, he squatted on the small maintenance platform and started immediately to undo the access hatch that led outside, working quietly in case the compound guards were nearby. His nostrils stung with the acrid stink of melted metal and plastics, his hands shook from exertion, and for the last fifty rungs of the ladder he’d been desperate to breathe in the air outside the duct, a desperation that had grown the higher he climbed. He tried to calm himself, but as he scrambled out of the hatch and dropped into the cool night he sobbed.

The grass was damp and cool, the fresh air a gentle caress across his sweat-soaked clothing. Above Vic a thousand stars speckled the sky, all of them ancient history. To the east a smudge of light smeared the summits of the mountains as dawn began to break. The compound was quiet, motionless. He quickly flicked off his head torch, cursing his clumsiness, and ran crouching to the corner of a low supply building.

Does anyone up here even know what’s happening? he wondered. The only reason that they would not know was if Jonah was too busy to have informed them. Or if he was. .

For a second Vic thought again of calling Jonah. But not yet. He wasn’t away yet . When he reached home and saw Lucy and Olivia, then he would allow himself that call.

Right now he had to run.

As Holly fled into the breach she thought of the man who had come through, and wondered whether he had been like her when he’d stepped past the threshold. She could see through — the dark valley, shadows of plants and boulders across the hillside, the red sky brightening as the sun slowly rose — but that didn’t mean it was as close as it seemed. Distance and direction were concepts that lost meaning in the science of the breach. It’s exactly where we are and a trillion light years away , Jonah had whispered once as they’d sat drinking and musing upon their efforts. Maybe now, she would be walking for ever.

And then she felt the breach’s clasp.

Holly would have gasped, had she still been breathing. Her legs moved and her arms swung by her sides, but it felt like the processes of her body were frozen in the moment. Her skin chilled, as if it had been exposed to an open freezer. Thoughts jumped and scattered, formed and shattered: perhaps this was how everyone felt at the moment of death.

A slew of random memories erupted all at once, each of them richer in tone and sense than memory should normally allow. Holly at four years old, making mud pies in the back garden with her brother Angus, parents looking on with indulgent smiles, the wet soil warm between her fingers, the smell of dirt. The time in school when she had told her friends that she was seeing Ashley, the boy who’d been the object of her desires for months; their jealousy, and her certainty that the relationship would be short and precious. Her drunken eighteenth birthday when her mother had cleaned up her vomit and gently chided her, then sat on her bed and reminisced about her own youth for an hour while Holly sobbed herself to sleep, the acid smell, of puke tingeing the air. A long afternoon in college when the sun shone and she was filled with an unaccountable sense of joy; the death of her mother, withered and faded yet still smiling; one mealtime at Coldbrook when Vic had smiled at her and she’d truly noticed him for the first time, burning her finger with the coffee she’d spilled.

And many more memories came and went, each of them so intense that she relived them all again, crying and laughing, smelling and tasting, sighing with pleasure and cringing in pain. Then the brief yet endless moment of pause passed and she ran on, swinging her arms through air that felt heavy with potential. She experienced a momentary tug as the world she was leaving urged her back, and then the sensation suddenly shifted and she was drawn forward. She was aware of every movement of her body, every muscle stretching and contracting, and the first touch of somewhere else brought the smell of spicy heather and the taste of cool fresh air.

What was that? she thought, the scientist in her trying to make sense of what had just happened to her, and why. But Holly ran on. It was a few seconds before she realised that tall wet grass was whipping at her trouser legs, and that her boots were impacting on soft ground, not the uncertain hardness of the breach. She skidded to a halt, and when she blinked she saw red. She gasped in fear and fell onto her back, kicking out at anyone or anything that might have followed her through. But she was alone. Melinda’s bloodied face was not staring at her, and the guard’s ravenous jaws were no longer gaping at the thought of rending her flesh.

Tears burned in her eyes but she wiped them away. She was shaking. Holding up her hand, she saw that it was jittering uncontrollably, and she clamped her mouth shut to stop her teeth from chattering. I’m through , she thought, and what had happened so recently in Control began to retreat into the realms of memory. Holly welcomed the dimming of the terror.

Perhaps the dawning sense of wonder was drowning it out.

She closed her eyes and stood still, holding her breath, hearing her heart thudding and blood pulsing. I’m elsewhere , she thought, and she breathed out and inhaled again, slowly. Definitely heather, wet and somehow spiced, and below that she could smell damp soil and something like old chocolate. She held out her hands and felt a brief misty rain cooling her skin. She stuck out her tongue and tasted moisture on the air, frowning as the tang of something unknown played across her taste buds. She didn’t like it, but perhaps only because it was a mystery.

Silence hung around her.

And then she opened her eyes and gazed upon this distant Earth. She saw trees and grasses and plants and hillsides, and a stream running through the small valley, and a sky smeared with the gorgeous colours of an extravagant dawn. The alienness was staggering.