I look down at him, gazing into his eyes for the first time since the whole nightmare started. They’re tired and bloodshot, but I recognise them like I last saw them yesterday. They look calm, at peace — or perhaps it’s just the tiredness. He’s squinting at me, as if even the little light in the room hurts to look at.

“I’ll give you a moment,” says Clarkson, vacating the room. I hear the door lightly thump shut behind him, and we’re alone.

I’m lost for words. I don’t know what to say. Those eyes are looking at me in that way they always did, piercing my soul, as if they knew my every innermost thought. Of course, they didn’t, which is what led us into this whole situation in the first place, but–

I blink and push the negative thoughts from my head.

“Adam,” I say at last after what seems like an eternity of the only sound in the room being the regular bleep, bleep, bleep of the equipment he’s wired up to. My voice cracks a little. “Adam,” I say again.

He keeps looking at me, but he says nothing, and doesn’t move. The only sign of life in him right now is in those eyes, and even then the spark within them is weak.

“I’m sorry,” I say. “Look, you don’t have to say anything. I know that I’m the one who put you here. I know that I’m the one who caused this nightmare to happen with my selfishness and foolishness. And I want you to know that I’m sorry.”

His eyes keep looking at me, but now I see them fill with tears. He doesn’t make a sound, but a sparkling droplet emerges from the corner of one eye and rolls down his cheek before plopping onto the sheet.

“I know there’s things you want to say to me, Adam,” I continue. “And I will hear all of them, listen to all of them. I owe you that much.”

I stop, and find myself sobbing, though I’m not sure why.

“I don’t even know if you want me here,” I say, tears blurring my vision. I blink them away. “After what I did I’d understand if you’d be disappointed that the first person you saw when you woke up was me. But I– I never gave up on you, Adam. I know you gave up on yourself — and on me. I know you felt like your world ended when I said those words to you. But I–”

I can’t finish the sentence, and only partly because I’m not sure exactly what it is I want to say. The tears are flowing freely, and trying to say any more only comes out as choked sobs. I take his hand in my own and lift it up. There’s no resistance in his arm, and his fingers don’t grip my hand in the way they once did. I squeeze his hand all the more tightly to make up for it.

I hear the door open behind me, and Clarkson comes back in quietly. He places a hand gently on my shoulder. It’s a comforting feeling, and it reminds me of my father.

“Okay, Evie,” he says. I’m only vaguely aware of his voice. “I think it’s time that we let him rest for a bit.”

I nod, trying to compose myself and failing.

“He’s been through a lot,” continues Clarkson. “And I’m not sure any of us will understand quite how much. Perhaps he won’t, even. But he’s on track to make a full recovery. I can’t say how long that will take, but it will happen. Then your life can begin again anew.” He hesitates a moment. “Assuming… you both want it to, of course.”

Do I? I can’t answer that right now, but the amount of times I’ve stood by this bedside imagining what this very moment would be like surely speaks volumes. Or does it? What if I was just coming here to deal with my own feeling of guilt? It was my sin that put him here, my sin that destroyed his world, his future.

Am I willing to give him what he wants? I still don’t have an answer to Annie’s question. I’m confused right now, not thinking straight, waves of emotion washing over me, making my knees tremble and my pulse race. I’m barely even aware of where I am or what I’m doing, and am surprised to find myself outside the room sat on one of those uncomfortable chairs, Clarkson kneeling before me.

“Evie,” he says. “I know this has been tough, and it might not be quite what you’d expected or hoped for. But I thought you would want to be there as soon as it happened.”

“Yes,” I say in a voice little more than a whisper. “Yes, I would. I do. I will. I– oh, whatever, I… Thank you.”

“Now,” he continues. “You’re clearly exhausted, and so is he. Despite being unconscious for so long, it’s pretty obvious that he needs some proper, uninterrupted, normal sleep before he takes on this brave new world he finds himself in.”

I feel Clarkson’s eyes on me and I’m suddenly aware that I’m barefoot, clad only in my robe and pyjamas.

“How about I call you a cab?” he says. “You’re in no state to be walking home like that.”

“No money,” I say weakly. My blood suddenly runs cold, but I calm down slightly as I pat my pocket and realise that I fortunately did have the good sense to at least pick up my keys when I raced out earlier.

“Ah,” says Clarkson. He stands and fumbles in his pocket before drawing out a leather wallet and lifting a crumpled £10 note from within. “My treat,” he says.

I’m overcome with gratitude. I want to cry again, but I really don’t have the energy. I take the £10 note and just look at it dumbly.

“Look, Evie,” he says. “What happens between you two from here is your business and your business alone. But I want you to know that I have faith that you’ll both do what’s right. I’ve seen the way you look at him every time you’ve been in here, even when there’s nothing new to report. And it’s inspirational. Few people have the strength of character to keep going like you have. That’s worth a lot. And I’m sure he knows that too.”

I’m glad someone has faith in me, because although I know he’s back, suddenly I feel very alone. It’s all on me to draw this sorry business to a close.

“So that’s your answer?” said my voice from somewhere in the darkness. “Interesting. Well, if you get the chance, let’s see if you can stick to it. Now, though, you have more pressing matters.”

There was a rumble, and the floor shook. Evie had disappeared immediately after I had answered what she’d said, but I was still sitting on the chair. The table was still in front of me, and the earth tremor was strong enough to knock it over. I leapt to my feet and planted them firmly on the floor to keep my footing as the ground seemed to buck and writhe beneath me. My heart was still pumping from the conversation we’d just had, and my senses seemed heightened, alert. I was in full-on “fight or flight” mode.

From somewhere in the darkness came a terrible roar. I couldn’t see what it was but I recognised the awful feeling of rage behind it. I knew that right now, I didn’t want to be anywhere near that thing, so I started running. All around the pool of light that had held the table and chairs was darkness, so I didn’t even know if I was running in the right direction. All I knew was that I needed to get away from that awful sound, that howl of anguish, that outcry of fury.

I kept running, looking only ahead of me, not daring to glance over my shoulder in case it was there. Before long, out of the darkness loomed one of the horrible fleshy walls, and in it, right in front of me, a door. This one had a handle, but it flew open before I got to it and allowed me through. Presently I found myself in a corridor much like that through which I had arrived in this strange place, only this time it was sloping slightly upwards — to freedom?

I couldn’t tell, but I had to keep moving. I raced up the shallow slope of the long staircase, taking care not to trip on the steps or slip on the puddles of liquid on the floor — blood or water, neither were something I wanted to skid on and injure myself or, worse, end up in the maw of whatever beast was pursuing me.

I ran, the adrenaline making my pulse thump in my ears and pushing my body forward at a speed I barely thought possible. The red lights on the walls seemed to swirl past me in a blur, and still I ascended, breathing deeply and panting as I did so. But I had to keep going.

The beast roared behind me once again and I knew it was in the passage with me. I chanced a look behind me, but the staircase descended into darkness behind me — it looked like the lights were going out as I passed — and I couldn’t see what it was that pursued me. I wasn’t going to wait around for formal introductions, either, because it didn’t sound like it wanted to talk — more to tear me limb from limb.

The walls blurred past me and in a strange inversion of what I’d witnessed on the way down, the fleshy, living walls gradually gave way to cold steel. And off in the distance, I wasn’t sure, but I felt like I could see a white light. Some of it was filtering down the corridor, giving the otherwise red-tinted scenery a hint of colour.

I knew I had to reach that light, and I had to do it before the creature caught up with me. A frustrated howl sounded behind me, and I could tell it was drawing closer. I couldn’t stop, though my breath was giving out, my legs burning with the effort of climbing and my heart beating so hard I felt like it would burst through my chest.

I let out a shout of my own — not in an attempt to intimidate the beast, but in an effort to spur myself on and make it through this final stretch. I could see my goal ahead of me in the distance, up yet more of these infernal steps, but it didn’t seem to be coming any closer, and all the while I felt the beast gaining on me. As I struggled to keep running, my mind started to turn to thoughts of what the creature might do if it caught me, whether there was even the slightest chance of me surviving if I didn’t keep moving.

Of course there wasn’t. Nothing that makes a sound like that is willing — or able — to negotiate. That sort of otherworldly roar is the stuff of fiction — or nightmares. But it was here, and it was closing on me.

I glanced over my shoulder and saw a pair of glowing red eyes in the darkness — or was it more of the red lamps? I didn’t know, or care at this point. I spurred myself on and pushed onwards, ever further up the endless staircase towards the brilliant white light in the distance and the possible freedom it held. It didn’t matter that I didn’t know what the light represented. It didn’t matter that it might turn out to be nothing. I couldn’t give up. I wouldn’t give up. Not after all this. I wasn’t going to let things end this way. Everything would have been for nothing if they had.

The beast roared again, this time right behind me. I was too terrified to look back to see how much space — and time — I had left, but I was close to the light now, so close. There were only a few more steps remaining. I was going to make it. I was going to be free. I was going to escape this horror. I was going to–

I felt the beast’s claws slash at my back and I stumbled forwards. The pain was unbearable. It felt like acid-tipped spikes had torn through my flesh. Tears sprang to my eyes and I cried out, but I regained my balance and kept moving.

I looked back. I shouldn’t have, but I did. It was upon me — a writhing mass of pure darkness, two flaming red eyes glaring at me as it bore down on me, nothing but death on its mind. In the smoky blackness I was sure I saw images, but I knew I couldn’t get drawn into them, for that truly would be the end. Instead, all I had to do was–

The beast interrupted my flow of thoughts by lunging for my leg, trying to grab me. I leapt forward, straight into the white light.

It was a strange sensation, like leaping through a silk sheet while someone shone a floodlight in your face. I was blinded. The beast was nowhere to be seen. My ears filled with white noise. I was disoriented. I couldn’t tell which way was up. I fell. I tumbled. I span. I called out, but the noise was too great. I was in the middle of everything and nothing, so insignificant in the midst of the chaos around me. I screwed up my eyes and waited for it to pass as I fell through — what?

Abruptly, the sensations and the terrible noise stopped, and I was lying on my back, my eyes still closed. It was surprisingly comfortable after what I’d just been through, though I felt like there was something stuck up my nose. I tried to move, but my muscles were stiff from the climb, and I only managed to twitch a finger.

Then I opened my eyes, and there she was.

Annie’s question haunts me.

“What are you going to do? Are you going to give him what he wants?”

As I lie awake staring at the ceiling — a familiar sight by now after many sleepless nights — I ponder it. Will I give him what he wants? I’m still not sure if I can, particularly after all this. When it happens — if it happens at all — I want it to be because we’re both ready and able to support both ourselves and the little one — oh God, a little person, an actual real human person…

I screw my eyes up and pull the pillow around my ears as if muffling the sounds of the outside world will also muffle out the thoughts whirling around the inside of my head. I’m going in circles, around and around and around. I don’t even know if the possibilities I’m considering are even, well, possibilities. But my brain, on edge as it is right now, is flitting from one extreme to the other of what might happen when — if — he comes around. And for all I know, that might never happen. Although if that were so why did his–

I growl to myself, more to break the silence than anything else, and the sudden noise in the otherwise almost completely silent room distracts me for a short while. Then it’s back to that sound of emptiness. In the near-silence, all the other sounds seem amplified. There’s the whirring sound of the fridge, the gurgling sound of the dodgy boiler, the sloshing of water in the pipes. Outside I can hear the occasional car going past, the occasional shouting drunkard in the street. These are all sounds so familiar to me by now that I just tune them out usually, but now they’re providing welcome distraction from the thoughts in my head.

Before long, though, they fade into the background once more, and I find myself asking the same questions over and over again. Will I be welcome back into his life? Do I want him back in my life? Could I give him what he wants? Will he give me what I want?

After all, we actually both want the same thing. The only difference is that he wants — wanted — it now, I want it when things are more stable. I couldn’t bring up a child in the situation we were in. It wasn’t that I didn’t want it at all, it’s that it just wouldn’t work, and it would end up tearing us apart. The ironic thing is the way I handled it all ended up tearing us apart anyway. Perhaps if I’d just talked to him, we could have worked it all out, come to a compromise.

But it’s too late to think about that now. He’s lying there, unaware of anything and everything. I don’t even know if he’s dreaming, if he’s aware of what’s going on around him, if he’ll even remember me when he comes back. His reaction showed me that he was on the edge, that his life depended on me, on us.

Do I want that? Do I want him to be dependent on me? I’m not sure I do. I can’t be responsible for the happiness of one human being so completely. Can I? It’s what I’d have to do if I was a mother, so why not–

My thoughts are cut abruptly short by the shrill, piercing ring of the ancient telephone in my flat. It used to belong to my parents and is seriously retro, but I could never bring myself to part with it. Right now its mechanical ring is echoing around my brain. It feels like the loudest sound I’ve ever heard. And it’s frightening.

Phone calls in the middle of the night are only ever bad news. But what could it be? Could it–

I don’t have time to sit around thinking about it. It’ll stop ringing in a moment and despite my fear, I have to know what it is. I leap out of bed and run to the phone in the hallway, snatching it up to my ear and breathlessly muttering “Hello?” just as the person on the other end is saying something to someone else, probably wondering where I am.

“Oh, hello,” comes a familiar voice, their conversation cutting off hastily. “Is that… Evie? Evie Anderton?”

“Yes,” I say, panting. It isn’t far from the bedroom to the hallway but I feel like I’ve just run a marathon.

“I’m sorry to disturb you so late,” says the voice. “This is Dr. Clarkson down at the hospital.”

So that’s his name.

“Hello, Doctor,” I say. “Is… everything all right?”

There’s a pause.

“I… I’m not sure over the phone is the best way to do this,” Clarkson says. “If it’s not too inconvenient for you, I think you might want to get down here quickly.”

My heart leaps into my mouth, and my gut ties itself into a knot. What does he mean? What could have happened? Why is he calling me? Why is–

“Please hurry,” says Clarkson. “I’m sorry I can’t explain more. But if you’re coming, come quickly.”

I slam the phone down without saying goodbye, hastily grabbing the keys off the table in the hallway and bursting out into the street without putting any shoes on. It’s cold outside, and it’s raining heavily. I pull my robe more tightly around myself for warmth, but it doesn’t really matter to me right now. I have to get there.

My bare feet splash through puddles on the floor, spattering the legs of my pyjamas with droplets of water, sticking them to my ankles. But it doesn’t matter. I have to get there.

I round the corner, ignoring the funny looks I get from the few people still wandering the streets at this time of night — mostly drunks and tramps, I guess — and follow the familiar route through the streets to the hospital. The rain is worsening. There’s a flash of lightning and a clap of thunder almost immediately. The storm must be right overhead. But it doesn’t matter. I have to get there.

I burst through the front doors of the hospital and charge straight past the reception area. I hear someone calling after me, then a murmured call to security. But it doesn’t matter. I have to get there.

I take the stairs two at a time — I can’t wait for the lift, I have to keep moving — until I’m on the floor I’ve been to so many times by now. I charge past a tired-looking nurse in the corridor before he can say anything, and see the door to the room I’ve been in so many times in front of me.

Clarkson is sitting on one of the uncomfortable plastic chairs outside the room. He stands at my approach, a warm, fatherly look in his eyes. I want to cry, but there’s no time. What has happened?

“Follow me,” he says solemnly, pushing open the door to the room.

I follow him, knowing nothing except one thing: for better or worse, what I’m about to see will mean the end of this particular nightmare.

As I wept, I remembered everything. I remembered Evie’s face when she told me what she’d done. I remembered that feeling like I’d been punched in the gut. I remembered bursting into tears, Evie wanting to comfort me but me wanting nothing more than to run away.

The red lights went out with a metallic “clunk” sound. When they came back on again, the bloodstained crib was gone, and in its place was Evie once again, standing in the same immobile way she had been before. After a moment, though, her head moved up and her eyes opened, looking straight at me. There was a faint red glow in them that was deeply unnerving.

The expression on her face was one of sorrow and regret.

“I’m sorry, Adam,” she said. “I’m so sorry. Please forgive me.”

I felt the sense of rage building in me and this time, I didn’t want to stop it. I felt my body tensing and tightening, and my vision clouded. I felt myself losing control of my movements, but I just watched as my hands reached out to grab Evie by the throat. I picked her up and she struggled for a moment, then was still. I raised her into the air as if she weighed no more than a rag doll, and flung her lifeless body at the wall of this horrific room.

Before her body impacted the wall, the lights went out again. The feeling of rage subsided and suddenly I was glad I hadn’t seen what would have undoubtedly happened a second later if the lights had stayed on.

“Are you sure that’s how you really feel?” came my disembodied voice in the darkness. “You’ve had plenty of time to reflect on all this, after all.”

“What do you mean?” I replied, shouting into the darkness. “That was the end of everything! With that one selfish act, she turned what should have been the beginning of the rest of our lives into the end!”

“Did she?” came my voice in response. It seemed to be coming from all around me. “This world was your creation, not hers. You were the one who ended the world, destroyed everything, turned everything to dust. You were the one who was so angry you wanted nothing more than complete and total annihilation of everything both you and she once held dear. And yet despite all that, what has the purpose of your long journey been?”

I hesitated a moment before answering, and suddenly it dawned on me what he — I — was saying.

“I’ve… been looking for her,” I said. “I’ve been trying to reunite with her.”

“And why is that?” came the response.

“I don’t know,” I said.

The lights came on again, but this time, they were not red. They were the lights in the corridor of my flat. I was watching as a passive observer, but this time I was not in my wrathful, destructive form. I was staggering around, eyes clouded with tears. I bumped into several things in the hallway before stumbling into the bedroom and collapsing onto the bed, sobbing. The tears kept coming and I felt like they’d never stop.

Shakily, I raised my head from the damp pillow and looked at the bedside cabinet. Atop it was an almost-full case of pills. I reached for them and–

“Stop,” I said. “I know all this. Don’t make me go through it again.”

The scene faded and I was back into darkness again.

“Very well,” came the reply. “Now, answer me one question.”

“Anything,” I said, my voice trembling. This was getting to be too much to take. I felt my head would explode with the pent-up emotion that these scenes and my emerging memories were provoking. “Anything. Please.”

“Why are you angry?”

I considered this for a moment, my heart still racing, my pulse thumping in my ears. It was difficult to concentrate, but I had to. I just had to.

“I was angry because she took our future,” I said, finally. “She took away something precious from me. She brought about the end. She–”

I paused. Was it her fault? Was I remembering this right?

A light came on, a single bare bulb, illuminating a table with a chair either side of it. On one side was Evie, on the other side was me. I watch the scene unfold, knowing what happens next.

“Adam, I have something important to tell you,” said Evie, looking into the eyes of the other me.

“What is it, sweetie?” the other me asked, taking her hand. “Are you all right?”

“It’s–” she paused for a moment, trying to compose herself. “It’s about the baby.”

I saw the other me tensing up across the table from her. I started to feel the familiar knot in the stomach. Suddenly, I was the one sitting across the table from her, looking into her eyes as she started to speak again.

“Adam,” she said. “I want this to work. I really do. And I want to have a family with you. But–”

“But what?” I said, a feeling of nausea rising in me. “What is it?”

There was a silence.

“I’m not ready,” she said, breaking it. “We’re not ready. You’re out of work, I’m going to be out of a job before long. I’ve still got some money from my inheritance, but that’s not going to last forever. Bringing a child into this would just be… wrong.”

I didn’t respond, waiting for her to go on. The oppressive silence descended across the table again.

“I… spoke to the doctors,” she continued. “They said it wasn’t too late to… reconsider, but that I’d have to make my mind up quickly.”

I knew what was coming next. And it suddenly dawned on me that the most important choice I’d have to make was about to come up. When the next words she was to say came out of her mouth, would I flee like I once did, starting this whole cycle of anger, depression and destruction anew? Or would I stick by her, accepting what she said and moving on with our lives until such a time as we were “ready”?

“Adam, I’m so sorry,” she said. “I… I can’t go through with it. I made a choice. I’ve… terminated the pregnancy.”

Time seemed to stand still, the fate of the world hanging on my answer.

“It’s really good to see you, Evie,” says Annie, smiling at me from across the table. “I was beginning to give up hope on ever spending time with you again.”

“I know,” I say. “And I’m sorry. Things have just been so… you know.”

“Yeah,” she says. “Well, no. Not really. I can’t imagine what must be going through your head right now. But still. It’s… No. It’s fine. I’m just glad you’re here now.”

I take a sip of the wine that Annie bought me. It’s been a long time since we had the chance to hang out together, but she remembered what I liked without prompting. She was always good at the details. I was always the sort to charge into situations blindly without paying attention to the finer points of what was going on. And I guess that was my problem that got me into this position in the first place.

“How are you feeling?” she asks, her eyes wide. She’s so beautiful. How has she been single all this time? I must look a complete wreck. That must be why she’s asking.

“I’m holding up,” I say. It’s not a complete lie. While I’m still prone to bouts of depression and uncontrollable crying, I do at least feel like I can go out into the street and face people that I want to see rather than people that I have to see.

“Hmm,” she says, running her finger around the rim of her glass, frowning at me. “I hope so. I’ve been so worried about you.”

“Sorry,” I say again. I feel like I should apologise to everyone. Of course, “everyone” now represents such a small number of people that it wouldn’t be a particularly big challenge to do so. I’ve driven everyone away, retreated into my own little world ever since all this happened.

“Stop being sorry,” she says, admonishing me in a friendly way, a gentle smile on her lips. “It’s all right. You can get through this, Evie. Whatever happens. But I think you know that.”

“Yeah, I do,” I say. “I made a choice, and I’m having to deal with the consequences. I couldn’t have predicted what those consequences could be when I made the choice, but now I’m having to deal with them. I might have another choice to make soon, or it might just be another consequence. But… I think I might be ready for it.”

“Attagirl,” says Annie. “You sound like you might be. I think that’s the most words you’ve spoken to me at once in a good long while. You sound stronger.”

“I am,” I say.

Our food arrives. Annie tucks in to her chicken and bacon salad, while I pick at the rice of my chilli con carne idly, occasionally lifting a few grains into my mouth.

“You’re not hungry?” she mumbles, her mouth full of a lump of chicken.

“No, I am,” I say. “I’m just… thinking.”

“Well stop,” she says, swallowing. “I know pub food isn’t exactly haute cuisine, but food’s food, and look at you. You look like a beanpole. Get it down you.”

I smile and laugh weakly. I’m lucky to have her, my last remaining family member. The Anderton line stops with us, unless–

I banish such thoughts from my head and take a big mouthful of the chilli. It’s spicy, but not overly so. It tastes good after the crap I’ve been eating for the last while. Cooking just hasn’t felt particularly high on my list of priorities while I’ve been living in that shithole, and besides, with the amount of times the power goes out each week, it’s unlikely I’d be able to keep the oven on for long enough to cook something interesting.

“So,” Annie says, pushing her bowl away. She’s finished already. “I’m sorry to bring this up, but… how are things?”

“You mean with Adam, right?”

“…Yeah.”

“They’re… I don’t know, Annie,” I say, swallowing another mouthful of the food. It’s good. “I keep feeling like I’m reaching him — this last time I was so convinced that he was there, that he was responding, that he was listening to me — but every time it just seems to all come crashing down again. They’re doing some ‘tests’, they say, but they won’t say what.”

“To be fair, Evie, if they told you, would you understand?” she asks, smiling that warm, gentle smile again. “They are doctors, after all.”

“You’re probably right,” I say, smiling back at her. “I know there’s nothing I can do. I just feel so… you know… responsible for this whole situation.”

She takes my hand in hers.

“Look, Evie,” she says. “I know you keep blaming yourself for all this. But you said yourself: you couldn’t have predicted these exact consequences. It’s a choice you made — a choice you had every right to make. It’s not your fault that the fallout from it was so terrible. You can’t go on blaming yourself for what others do, or what those things they do make you feel. That’s all on them.”

“I shouldn’t have lied,” I say. “I should have just been up front with him about it. He told me what he wanted. I just didn’t know how much he wanted it. I should have–”

“Coulda, shoulda, woulda,” she says mockingly. “Come on, sis. Looking back on things won’t help. The past is behind you. You can’t change it. So there’s no point dwelling on it. It’s not as if you get a ‘do over’ to try again, is it?”

“No,” I say, shaking my head sadly. “No, you don’t.”

There’s a silence for a moment. A waitress comes over and clears our table.

“Everything all right?” she asks, balancing our crockery on one hand and placing some dessert menus down with the other.

“Fine, thanks,” I say quietly. She nods and walks away.

“Let me ask you something,” Annie says, mercifully breaking the silence. “It might be a difficult question, but I think you need to consider your answer if you haven’t already.”

I take a deep breath.

“Okay,” I say. “Ask away.”

“If… if he does come back to you — and I don’t want you to get your hopes up too much — then what are you going to do? Are you going to give him what he wants?”

I ponder this for a moment. All this was caused by my own selfish desires, going against what he wanted. I resented him a bit for putting me in this position, but I felt I owed it to him to be there and be the first face he saw when he came back.

“I honestly don’t know,” I say. “I guess I’ll have to cross that bridge when I come to it.”

I remembered everything I thought there was to know about myself — who I was, who Evie was, what she meant to me. There were still some unexplained questions, however — what was I doing in this ruined, dead environment? Try as I might, I still couldn’t remember whatever cataclysmic event had plunged the world into its current state. All I remembered was that bright flash, and everything fading to black — then I’d woken up on that deserted street.

My newly-recovered memories didn’t explain that strange, rage-filled power I seemed to have, either. How was it possible for me to cause such destruction? It couldn’t be possible. And yet I’d seen it happen, I’d seen the results. It didn’t make any sense.

“No, I suppose it doesn’t,” came an unfamiliar voice, reverberating through my head in the darkness. I wasn’t sure if I was actually hearing it, or if it was a figment of my imagination.

“Wh– who are you?” I called, unsure where I should direct my voice. “What do you want?”

The lights were still off and, fumbling around in the darkness, I couldn’t seem to find any of the furniture in the bedroom that I’d previously seen. Perhaps I was just misjudging distances.

“Come,” said the voice. “There is much for you to consider. You have grown strong on your journey. Perhaps it is time for you to face your demons.”

I gasped. What was this strange voice talking about? Who was it? What demons?

There was a mechanical “clunk” sound and a dim red light came on in front of me. It was above an unassuming-looking metal door. The door didn’t give any indication of where it might lead, or even if it would be a good idea to step through it, but something about the tone in the strange voice suggested that I didn’t have many options.

I reached for the handle on the metallic door and it opened in front of me before I’d even touched it. Beyond was what looked like a long corridor, lit at periodic intervals by similar dim, red lights. The floor looked to be a shallow staircase leading downwards, though I couldn’t tell how far it led, as it disappeared into darkness before long, the illumination from the red lights only carrying so far.

I stepped over the threshold of the door and it slammed shut behind me. I jumped at the sound and instinctively turned around to try and open it again, but it was no use. This side of the door might as well have been a wall. There was no handle, no keyhole, no visible hinges — it was made for keeping whatever goes through it inside.

I had little choice but to begin walking down the eerie, silent corridor, my footsteps on the metallic floor the only sound to be heard. The voice, it seemed, had left me in peace for now, to discover what lay at the end of this hallway for myself. Its absence didn’t make me feel any better, but I was in no hurry to hear it again, either.

As I walked, the gentle slope of the staircase continually leading downwards for what felt like hours, I began to hear a sound. It was faint, distant at first, and I wasn’t sure what it was. It was a dull, regular thumping. As I walked ever deeper into the depths of whatever structure I was currently inside, the sound gradually grew louder until it occurred to me that what I was actually listening to was a heartbeat.

I’d heard my own heartbeat before, but this was amplified so much that it seemed to make the walls shake. It was as if a nightclub sound system was broadcasting nothing but a heartbeat with the volume turned up to the max. As I continued ever onward, ever downwards, I became acutely aware of my own heartbeat alongside that which I heard in the corridor. Being aware of the sound and of my own unease caused my breathing to quicken, and my pulse to rise. I wasn’t sure if I was imagining it, but it seemed like the loud heartbeat in the corridor mirrored my own pulse, increasing in speed as my nerves frayed.

The corridor had plain metal walls ever since the start, but from where I’d got to now, faint markings started to appear. I looked at them, unsure what to make of them. They were lines drawn over the walls, seemingly at random — or possibly cracks. In the faint red light of the lamps that adorned the walls it was difficult to tell, but it was plain to see that the walls were very slowly changing the deeper I went.

Further down I continued, the patterns on the walls growing in intensity and the material from which the walls were made seeming to change, too. I didn’t look too closely, as all I wanted to do right now was to get out of this corridor.

It wasn’t until I slipped on a damp patch on the floor that I realised what was happening to the walls. Reaching out to brace myself on the wall and prevent myself from falling, my hands found not metal but something altogether more fleshy and unpleasant. I looked down at the damp patch on the floor that I’d slipped in — it didn’t look like water. I couldn’t tell for sure in the red light, but it looked suspiciously like blood. And those markings on the walls — which, now I was aware of them, seemed to be pulsating and glistening with their new-found life — looked rather like veins and arteries.

I started to panic. I’d never been great with blood, and now it looked like I was descending into the innards of… what? Someone? Something?

I began to run forwards, hoping beyond hope that this corridor would end soon, leading me to an exit that offered daylight — even the dry, barren, dead wasteland was better than this terrifying place.

Then, it was there. Up ahead of me, a door. A way out. Finally I’d be able to escape this horror.

As I hastily slammed open the door and saw what was on the other side, though, I realised that the horrors were just beginning.

I’m rudely barged out of the room.

“Get her out of here,” one guy says as a woman takes my arm in a friendly but firm manner and urges me in the direction of the door. Strange sounds are all around, bleeps and beeps and sirens. I don’t know what’s going on. I feel dizzy. The world is a blur as I’m pushed out of the room and placed in one of the uncomfortable chairs in the corridor.

I close my eyes and take a deep breath. My eyes are stinging with the tears that are flowing freely down my face. I can’t breathe. I can’t focus. I can’t calm down. I’m panicking, but I’m not sure why. My mind whirls from one place to another, barely aware of my surroundings and of the fact that someone’s coming towards me and–

“Evie,” comes a familiar and kindly voice. It’s the old guy — I still don’t know his actual name — but I appreciate everything he’s done for me so far… and for him. “Evie, are you all right?”

I gulp, and gasp, and sob. My shoulders spasm with every breath, and it’s difficult to breathe, but the embarrassment of breaking down like this in front of someone else is causing my shame reflex to kick in, overriding the feelings of panic in my brain.

“Evie,” he says again, placing one of his big, leathery hands on my shoulder. “It’s all right. Calm down. Please.”

I close my eyes and breathe deeply a few times again. The feeling that I want to run and hide slowly dissipates, and I feel the power of speech returning to me, though it’s a big effort.

“I’m… I’m all right,” I say through occasional uncontrollable sobs. “I’ll… be okay.”

“Evie,” he says again. “I understand that it’s likely difficult to talk about, but would you mind telling me what happened? You were the only person in there when–”

“You… you don’t think I had anything to–” I’m mortified. Am I being accused of causing this? I guess I sort of did, but that sickening feeling of guilt rising up inside my stomach feels unjust, and I feel the sense of panic rising again.

“No,” he says, trying to calm my fears, and being mostly successful at it with that one simple word. “All I mean is that you saw what happened. Can you tell me what went on?”

I rub my face, covering it for a moment and smearing the wet tears over my cheeks. I’m glad I’m not wearing any makeup, otherwise I’d be a horrendous mess right about now. I haven’t worn makeup for a long time, ever since–

“Yes,” I say. “I was… and this will sound silly, I know… I was talking to him.”

The old guy nods, but says nothing, waiting for me to continue.

“I told him some things and, I don’t know, really — no. He heard. He heard me.” He did. I’d seen him move. He hadn’t spoken, hadn’t opened his eyes, but I knew he’d heard me. I was sure I’d seen that fingertip twitch.

“Mmhmm,” says the old guy. “What makes you think he heard you?”

I pause. I’m not sure how to explain it, so I just go for the straight facts.

“I saw his fingertip move,” I say. “I spoke to him, and I saw him move, as if it was an answer to me. He didn’t speak. Just that fingertip moved. But it was for me. I think. Maybe. I don’t know.”

The old guy nods again.

“Okay,” he says. “And what happened then? When did… things start happening?”

“I’m not sure,” I say. “I was talking to him about things… apologising for things I’d done, and…”

“You think he heard you,” the old guy finishes for me. “You think he responded to the things you’re sorry about, and his reaction caused this.”

“Yes, I guess,” I say. “I mean, you’re the expert, you tell me.”

“We’ll have to do some tests,” he says. “But thank you. That’s a big help. Now, given these… developments, I’m afraid we’ll need to keep him in strictly controlled conditions for the moment. That means–”

“I know,” I say. “You need me to stay away.”

“I’m sure you understand,” he says. “I know you want him back, but it’s not going to be an easy road, and there are no guarantees. I just don’t want you to get your hopes up too much.”

I nod. Tears come back into my eyes, and one rolls down the side of my face, leaving a wet trail over my cheek. The old guy hands me his handkerchief — who still carries an actual handkerchief? — and I gratefully accept it, dabbing my face and then blowing my nose in a very undignified manner before realising how inappropriate that probably is.

“Uh,” I say, holding the now-wet handkerchief by one corner.

“That’s okay,” he says, laughing. “You keep hold of that for now.”

He stands and turns away from me for a moment.

“I admire you, you know,” he says. “There aren’t many people left with a love as strong as yours. I envy you a bit.”

“I’m not sure I’m worthy of being envied,” I say, sniffing. “There’s more to this story than you know.”

He turns back to me.

“Perhaps there is,” he says. “But it’s none of my business. Your life — and your life together — is your own. We’re doing everything we can to reunite you.”

“I know,” I say. “I know.”

I stand and solemnly turn for the door. I start walking, slowly, staring at the ground and listening to my echoey footsteps as my feet hit the floor.

“Thank you,” I say quietly as I reach the door, pushing it open and turning my back on this place for the moment.

“You’re there,” she said, turning to me, her long hair whipping around as she span round to look at me. “You’re really there, aren’t you?”

“Yes,” I said. “I am.”

“Oh, God, Adam, I’ve missed you so much,” she said. “I’ve been waiting for this moment for so long. And now it’s here, I don’t know what to say. Just please tell me you’re not going to go away. Please tell me that.”

She’d stepped towards me, and I could see the tears in her eyes, sparkling in the dim light of the room. It was oddly beautiful.

“I’m not going to go away,” I said. “I’ve spent all this time trying to find you, and here I am.”

I reached out to touch her, but suddenly she was just out of reach. I hadn’t seen her move, but she was beyond my grasp. It was almost as if the room had extended to put some distance between us, but I knew that couldn’t be possible.

“Oh, Adam,” she said again, her voice quavering. “You have no idea how this feels. My heart is in my mouth. I don’t want to let this moment end. I don’t want to…”

She trailed off. What didn’t she want?

“What?” I asked. “What’s wrong?”

“I’m scared, Adam,” she said. “Because if you come back to me, it means I’ll have to face up to things… things that are difficult to deal with. And so will you.”

We need to talk about us, I thought grimly. But what followed those unnerving words?

“I know,” I said, trying to reach out to her once more but again finding her just out of reach. “I know, Evie. I can’t remember what’s happened, what led to this point. But it must have been something awful. But we’ll get through it, together. That’s what this has all been about, hasn’t it? Us.”

She was silent for a moment, then gives a choked sob. She bowed her head slightly, her hair casting a shadow over her face. The faint light seemed to be dimming a little. Perhaps the power was failing, or the bulb was going.

“Adam, I don’t know if you’re even aware of this, what might be going through your mind right now, but I need you to know something,” she said, her voice quavering as she said it. “I love you. I always have. I always will. I don’t expect that to mean anything after my moment of weakness, my betrayal that led to everything collapsing around us, but I needed to say it.”

Betrayal? That was a strong word. Was this something to do with her “mission”?

“What are you talking about, Evie?” I asked. “What… what did you do?”

She was silent again. It was obviously tough for her to talk about. The light flickered a little, then returned to stability. She turned away from me to face the light again. The halo around her hair was still fading as the light lost what little life it had left. But I could still see her — and she was still out of reach. I didn’t understand it. The room seemed to defy the laws of physics. She was right there, yet I couldn’t reach her to touch her, and I so longed to touch her. Fragments of memories floated through my mind, unorganised, telling me that I loved this woman deeply, that she was my everything. My world.

“Adam,” she said again. Every time she said my name I felt a shiver down my spine. “Adam, I’m so, so sorry.”

“I know you are, Evie,” I said. “But… look, this is going to sound strange but… I know you’re important to me, and I know we were together, but my memories, they…”

I stopped. She was full-on sobbing, taking big gulps of air and gasping for breath as the tears flowed freely. I wanted to take her in my arms, to hold her, to tell her everything was going to be all right, but I couldn’t. I  felt like I was rooted to the spot, like someone had stuck superglue to my shoes, or like I was trapped inside an invisible casing, too heavy to move. It was a disconcerting feeling — no, frightening. Over the course of my journey, I’d come to discover how terrifying it was to lose control of yourself and just be able to watch as a passive observer as terrible things happened. I didn’t want that to happen now. I didn’t want that to happen ever again. But I knew that terrible power lay inside me, and right now I had a feeling I was more at risk of unleashing its terrible fury than ever.

“Adam,” she said again, her words punctuated with sobs. “Please forgive me. Please, please forgive me. We can try again. Start again. It’s not… it wasn’t… it wasn’t your fault. It was me. I was weak. I couldn’t… I can’t. I don’t. I… never meant to… I…”

I felt a knot in my stomach and I hoped something terrible wasn’t going to happen again. The feeling of unease and fear was turning into dread, and I knew that I had to keep a firm grasp on my sanity, to hold on, to be strong. My heart was thumping so hard I could hear it and feel it in my chest. I breathed deeply to try and control myself, but it was getting difficult.

There was a sparking, buzzing sound and the light spluttered a few times, plunging the room into total darkness for a split second. When it came back on again, she was still standing there. It flicked off again, and stayed off this time.

“Evie,” I said. “Evie!”

There was no response. The light flickered on for a moment, and she was gone. Then it died, and I was left in silent darkness once more to contemplate what had just happened.

Something seemed to click in my mind, like a thief suddenly finding the right combination to a safe.

And I remembered.

I’d been hearing the words over and over and over again ever since they’d appeared in my mind that first time.

We need to talk, they said. It’s about… us.

The conversation — if you can call it that — never went any further. But I knew what followed in that locked memory was the key to what was going on now. But how would I access it without unleashing something terrible on the world — more terrible than what I had already done?

I didn’t know. But I had to find out, consequences or no. This was the key to everything, the door behind which lay my buried past, my memories, everything I once held dear.

I had been walking, but I stopped at this. Was this really a good idea? Right now, the concept of “everything I once held dear” was safely behind a vault door. I knew from my surroundings and from the fact that there were no other people anywhere to be seen that everyone everywhere had lost everything. Would coming to understand that which was once important to me and the fact it was all now turned to dust be too much to handle?

I wasn’t sure. I wasn’t sure if I was already going insane or not, for there was no rational explanation for some of the phenomena which had come to pass in the recent days, weeks, months? I’d lost count, and I was beginning to lose hope that I’d ever find my way to my destination.

But that evening, after several days of trudging through the empty, featureless fields, I finally came to a road. Walking along it a short distance revealed a number of mostly-intact signs — enough to get my bearings using the battered book of maps, and enough for me to tell that I was a lot closer to the address I’d seen in Annie’s phone than I thought I was.

I fished the phone out of my pocket and tried to turn it on, but there was no response from the screen. The battery had obviously given out, and I wasn’t holding out too much hope to find somewhere with power any time soon. I’d had the foresight to mark where I was headed on the map, however, so I still have a rough idea of the direction I should be going.

By nightfall, I was starting to enter what was clearly once a built-up area. The houses and other buildings lie ruined and broken, just like they were at the start of my journey. But I knew that I was nearing the end of the road. I didn’t know what I’d find when I got to that mysterious “X” I’d drawn on the map to mark where I thought the address in the phone must be, but I was getting closer to finding out.

The road in question was in the middle of a burnt-out city block, and the address I thought it was looked like a dilapidated apartment building. Unlike many of its neighbours, however, the building looked mostly intact — quite similar to the building in which I’d found Annie, in fact. My spine tingled as I recalled the image of the woman’s body crumbling to dust at my touch. Would something similar happen here?

With a sense of trepidation, I pushed the front door. It was already open, and it gave a creak as it moved inwards — a sound that broke the surrounding silence so suddenly that it made me jump.

Inside, it was dark, and the light outside had faded so much that it was almost impossible to see where I was going. I felt my way along the walls and came to a staircase. I proceeded up the wooden stairs, each of which creaked unnervingly as I trod on them as lightly as possible, and made my way to the first landing.

My eyes were starting to adjust to the dark by now, and I could just make out that I was in a corridor, with doors on either side. There was nothing to tell me which was the right door, however — or even if I was in the right building at all. I let my instinct lead the way, and found myself in front of a door on the right at the end of the corridor. In the low light, I couldn’t read the number on it.

I knocked on it. The sound echoed down the empty hallway.

I waited for a moment, but there was no response. I wasn’t expecting there to be — or was I? I could feel my heart beating quickly now. Was Evie in there? If she was, why wouldn’t she answer?

I tried the handle on the door and to my surprise it opened for me. It had been left unlocked. This door creaked almost as much as the front, and I tried to control my increasing sense of unease, but there was no mistaking this feeling: I was frightened. Anything could happen in the next few moments, and I wanted to be ready for it. The trouble was, I didn’t know what I should be getting ready for.

As it happened, I soon found my answer. Of all the possibilities of what might be about to happen to me in that pitch-dark apartment, what I’d dismissed as the least-likely option was the one which occurred.

Pushing open another creaky wooden door, I found a bedroom. Unlike the other rooms, which I’d had to stumble around in the dark, I could tell this was a bedroom, because there was a dim light at one side of the room — enough to illuminate the area in a faint and eerie glow, casting disturbing shadows on the wall.

The most disturbing shadow of all was that of a human figure who stood looking out of the windows, her back to me, her flame-red hair tumbling down her back, the dim light making a halo around her head.

“Hello, Adam,” she said.

“Hello, Evie,” I replied, my voice cracking with the first words I’d spoken for some time.