Chapter 4

Sunday, February 25th, 2029

JOHN

"Hm?"

"What?"

"Are you sure?"

"Hm?"

Voices whisper and drag on around me. I hear them and then they're gone. Circling me. Above me. Inside me. Below me. I turn my head to try and find the source, but only see the parts of me leaking on the ground. They're coming from every direction, faster, faster. I try to stand, but nearly fall over.

I keep pressure on my head and wince when I make contact. It stings. I can't even imagine what it looks like. I bend over to grab Sarah's notebook and I immediately regret it. I fall to my knees and my vision goes blotchy. Blood spills in and I cough up a red patch.

I take another deep breath and reach my arm down. I grasp the spiraled binding of the notebook and pick it up, grinding my teeth through the pain. I get back to my feet and begin running for home.

I don't remember the run. It just...happened. Shapes came into view and then my eyes widened as I stepped onto the front porch. If I wasn't running off of pure adrenaline I'm not sure if I could have even moved at all.

I toss open the front door and run through the living room—not caring about how much noise I'm making or if someone's looking for me or not.

I need to find bandages.

I'm in the kitchen and throwing open the cupboards. In the first I don't find anything. I'm rushing over to the second while my mind is racing at a million miles a minute. I find some medical gauze and begin wrapping it around my head.

I'll admit that I have no idea what I'm doing. I look at my watch and see that it's almost four in the morning. Wait...it was just showing nine...at night. What's going on? It still says it's Sunday. Was I really out that long? Gosh what am I supposed to do about this? What do I tell them. Telling the truth would do jack squat except get maybe another bruise from dad. Telling a bad lie would do just the same.

I decide to just keep today's happenings to myself. I don't know how I'm going to hide my wound from my father, but I guess I'll cross that bridge when I come to it. After I clean up the wound and wrap it up fully I head up to my room and I sit staring at my ceiling.

I do know you're not supposed to sleep with a head wound, but my body must not have counted my time out by the boardwalk as sleep. It crashes and I can't help as my mind turns off, the notebook is sprawled out across my chest—the picture of the city marking my body as if claiming it. I feel myself losing reality and succumbing to dreams.

~...~

I see the three towers in the distance and it's as if I'm back at the boardwalk again. Ugh...of all places to go back to...It's night out as I can see the moon perched high up above me. I know better this time to not step near the towers. I hear a sort of chant in the background, it is not unlike the whispers I had heard when I was here the first time.

"Hm?"

"Yes."

"Who?"

"You."

"Johnny...Johnny...Johnny"

A man appears from the darkness—he's taller than I am. I see the silver moonlight bouncing off his golden hair. I see a piercing white light through the theatrical mask on his face. The mask is white and has a crooked grin carved like a jack-o-lantern. Through the eye holes I can see the burning light in his eyes, although it is much stronger than it was in Sarah's and Iris's.

He cocks his head as soon as we make eye contact. "FOUND YOU." He leaps toward me and I'm throwing my arms up to defend myself...only I do it too hard and knock myself awake.

My eyes open and I'm staring at my ceiling. I look at my watch and it says it is about noon. I sit up, my head still hurts, but it is a lot better than it was. Tolerable. This light that I'm seeing in people's eyes...there's gotta be something behind it. That's three now, and not just in my dreams. I stand up and grab my coat. Something falls out of my pocket, a slip of paper. I open it up to find a phone number written down.

It takes me a moment to remember my dream where Sarah put the light into my pocket. There's no way this could actually be happening. I don't dare call it. Not yet, at least. I need to find out more about what all of this means. I see Sarah's notebook has fallen off of my bed onto the floor. I pick it up and hold it in my hands. My curiosity getting the better of me. I flip through the pages.

I start from the beginning and the first sketch is a self-portrait. The detail in her hair is phenomenal and her smile looks just as it did when I saw her and her blue eyes seem to pop off of the page. It's dated in the corner "01/22/2028."

So, she started this more than a year ago. I flip to the next page and see a sketch of a beautiful sky. The clouds edge along the edge of the paper and it almost looks like they're skating across the paper. It's dated for "01/29/2028."

I turn the page and drop the book at the third drawing. My jaw nearly drops to the floor and I look at it with disbelief. It's not a finished drawing, but I can get enough out of it. It's of me. Looking at the face alone is like I'm looking into some sort of mirror. I look down to the corner of the paper and see that it's dated "02/05/2028." I put on my coat and head out the door without another thought. I need some answers and maybe this phone number might give me some.

My father is standing next to his chair, staring at me when I make it down the stairs. "Where were you last night, Jonathan?" His voice is stern.

"I was over at a friend's house."

"Friend? You don't have any friends."

"And what's with those wrapped around your head?"

"Oh…it was just an accident, sir."

"Git here and lemme look at it," he motions over.

I step over as he undoes the gauze around my head. He looks at it for a moment and then casts them aside onto the ground. "Nothing more than a bump, and you're wasting our first aid equipment for a bump?

He shakes his head and curls his lips tight. "Pick that shit up and get going or else you might just have another accident."

"Y-Yessir," I say, picking up the gauze and rushing to the bathroom. I check over my head in the mirror above the sink and notice that not only does it not hurt as much, but it's as if it was never even cut open. Looks like I just bumped my head against the wall or something. I don't know what to say. I definitely felt and saw blood, and lots of it. There was definitely surface damage.

I won't argue with it. It's not like I'd win that argument anyway. I slip out of the bathroom and find that the living room is empty by the time I re-enter. Thankfully I can avoid another confrontation. I slide out of the front door—locking it behind me—and find that it isn't as chilly outside as it was the past few days. My watch says it's about forty degrees outside. I'm glad that I brought my coat, but I feel that it might be a little too warm by the time the sun comes out a bit more.

I'm still contemplating on whether I should call that number. I mean, if it's Sarah's then what would she think? Some creep she just met somehow found out her phone number. Yeah, that'll blow over well. Then again, it could have some answers. I mean, maybe she knows something. After some more internal debate I pull out my phone and dial the number. It rings for a few seconds—the longest seconds of my life—and I hear a familiar voice pick up.

"Hello? Who is this?" Sarah answers.

I'm shaking. What do I say? How do I explain this?

"H-Hello Sarah." I slap my side for how stupid I sound.

"John? Is that you?"

I tense up. I don't know what to do, I'm sweating.

"That means...you got my note?" she asks.

"How did you know...?"

"Meet me in the park in and I'll explain. Fifteen minutes good?" She hangs up.

I...yeah. That's good...is it possible that we...did we actually...? No, of course not. We couldn't have had the same dream, could we? Those kinds of things just don't happen in real life. I put my phone away and wipe my forehead—I'm sweating bullets. I turn back to the house and unlock the door—running inside. I snatch the notebook off of my floor and head back outside, jogging to the park. I can make it there quicker if I sprint, but my body is still aching a bit too much to keep that up. Whatever answers await me in the park I'll be ready for them. It's better than no answers at all.

Sarah is already there when I arrive. She's looking as beautiful as the day before, yet a worried look paints her face as I come closer. "John...what happened?"

I'm confused, but then I realize she must have seen the bump.

"Oh, must have just slammed into a wall somewhere. I'm fine."

"You sure?"

Would she treat any bump as seriously...or does she somehow know it was more than a bump?

"Yeah...I'm okay." I look around, now more aware than ever how big the bump must look. "Would you like to sit?"

"Oh, sure," she says, not fully smiling, but no longer frowning.

"So, what is with this?" I grasp for the slip of paper out of my pocket and hand it to her. She takes it and just stares at it for a second. "You know something about how I have it, do you?

"Well, of course this is only a theory as I have no actual proof…" She begins.

"Go on."

"I have these strange dreams every so often. Most of the time it's just nightmare-level stuff, but sometimes I see this city—that city that you saw yesterday in my notebook—which I seemed to have lost somewhere..." she trails off, just then realizing it.

I pull it out, "Not lost, just uh, momentarily misplaced. I found it on the bench yesterday."

"Ah, yes, sorry, I'm a bit scatterbrained sometimes."

"You were talking about a dream?"

"Right. So I never see the city when it's like, hustling and bustling. It's usually near the end—I'm going to assume you know what I mean by that."

I nod. "I've had dreams of that too, but only recently. I mean I do sleep terribly normally, but recently it's been toned up. I saw that same city on Friday. Everyone was dying...or already dead, there was total chaos."

"Well, last night I saw you in that city. Something in the back of my mind said hand it to him."

"I'm assuming it being the note? Because to me it looked like light."

She nods, her lips are pursed. Ever since I've arrived she's been on edge—I can tell that easily. She must be worrying about this as much as I am. As horrible as it sounds, I feel a little better knowing it isn't just me here alone.

"Do you have any idea why?"

"Nothing past what I remember hearing."

I look down to the notebook and lay my fingers across one another, "There's...one more thing I need to ask you about," I say.

She looks toward me, at me—through me—cocking her head.

"I...I kind of peeked at your early drawings. Now, I'm sorry, but I couldn't help but notice that the one dated January 29th of last year..."

She goes from embarrassed to angry to confused in the matter of seconds. She flips through the notebook and stops on the drawing. "I…that looks just like you," she says.

"Is this new for you?"

She shakes her head, "I don't look back on old drawings. This is so strange...I didn't think anything of it when I drew it." she says.

"What does this mean?" I ask. "That city is the same, that's a near perfect drawing of me, and now I have this," I hold up the note. "I have to ask, are you stalking me?"

"What?"

"I have to ask," I say, guilty for even doing it.

"Of course not. I just moved here. I wasn't even in this state a month ago."

"Sorry," I say, letting out a breath. "Things just have gotten so weird around here. Is this real?"

"Do you believe it?"

"I don't know, maybe? I mean, it sounds crazy, but how else can you explain something like this?" I ask. "I mean, you even got the details on that one building right," I say, flipping to the drawing of the city, pointing to one that says "One Bush Plaza" on the front. I'm staring at the ground and I sigh. Looking back up into her eyes, the same light convulsing back at me. It's almost disgraceful, like a stain on an otherwise perfect picture.

"Have you seen the news lately?" She asks.

"That's a bit of a weird...wait a second, are you talking about when the station was hacked?"

"Yeah, the guy behind the hackings all over the country."

"Country? I only saw the one here."

"It's in the newspapers. The East Coast has been hit again and again with his messages—his name's Micah."

"Talk about a mad nut," I say. "What do you think he has to do with any of this?"

"I mean I have no idea, but he's been spouting his latest end of the world theory. Maybe...maybe he knows something?"

"Sounds crazy," I say.

"All of this does."

"True. What is his latest theory?" I ask.

"I don't know all of the specifics, but apparently he's talking about it happening sometime next month."

"Next month...would it possibly be March 18th?"

"That does sound familiar, you seen it?"

"The article? No, I just remembered hearing a voice in my dream that spoke about...something happening three days past the ides of march."

"Ides of March?"

"It's the fifteenth, supposed to be the day that Caesar was stabbed."

"Yikes."

I nod my head. "It's that date. There's something about that date."

"You can't seriously think the world is going to end in March though...do you?" She asks.

I let out a breath I hadn't realized I'd been holding. "I honestly don't know. This can't all be coincidence."

"That's a dreadful thought," she says.

"You can say that again."

"We can't go to the police with this," she says.

"Yeah, they'll probably lock us up for being two nutcase kids."

"Or think we're somehow in league with Micah."

I just remembered seeing that name scrawled on the ground near those three towers by the boardwalk. I don't bring it up, but it is definitely something to remember.

She looks up at the sky and whispers something I can barely catch, "It's just…how something like this just ends…can it even?"

I sigh and lay back on the bench. I can't imagine that my first real conversation with Sarah would have been like this...I feel like we need a change of subject.

"So, how're things here? Parents move in easy enough?" I ask, asking the first thing that comes to mind, but I realize it sounds totally stupid. There is a tense silence for a minute or two. I think she thinks it's just as jarring, but she seems to play along.

"It's just my mom and I, yeah. I've had to help her around because she's paralyzed from the waist down. She still works from home, but I help around when I can." she explains.

"I'm so sorry. It must have been hard."

"It was, but time passed. Time heals all wounds. That's what my mother used to say to me to help. I feel it's what every parent says, but it's true." she turns to me and I can't stand looking in her eyes, all I see is the bursting light. I don't want to see it.

"So, what about you? Lived here long?" She turns to me.

"My whole life," I say. "I...I don't talk to my parents much." Part of me didn't want to say it, but the large part of me couldn't ignore it. "They don't...talk to me much." She only looks at me, a sad look on her face. "I didn't mean that to come out so weird."

"If you say so…" She calmly says.

"I read a lot," I say. "They like that, but everything else seems to only be just barely enough. I'm...sorry," I say, regretting instantly going to this topic. This is a train-wreck.

"Sorry? What for?"

"I guess...I say too much because I'm not used to talking about it."

"Well, I'm sorry you feel that way. I guess it isn't any easier," she said.

"I wouldn't say that..." I mean they're..." well they're not all that healthy really. They're not that well off with each other anymore either. "...they're..."

"It's okay," she nods, "I get it."

I close my eyes and just let everything soak in—the air around us and everything going on with these dreams. Everything and anything just melds into one complete being—that being is Sarah.

"John?" I open my eyes, my trance smashed. "You okay?" She asks.

"Yeah, I'm just fine," I take a deep breath and get up off of the rock. "Well, I think it's time for me to go. I guess we both have to prepare for school tomorrow, right?"

Sarah nods her head.

She says she has to go help her mom out with something anyway. I don't really have to prepare or anything, I just don't want to piss of my father any more than he is at this point. Plus, I can tell I had nothing else good to speak about and didn't want to make myself as more of a loser than I already did. We go to head our separate ways, but she stops and turns to me.

The wind begins to pick up. I feel a force behind me—she's hugging me from behind, tight.

"I'm sorry." she says.

"Sorry?" I say, confused.

She shudders against me and lets go. I turn to her and she's walking away.

I'm sorry he hits you.

It passes by like the wind. Only once, but clear as day. I'm standing there watching her leave and disappear into a group of people until I lose sight of her. I haven't moved. All at once it returns to me and I feel like a train knocked me down. I take in a deep breath as I begin jogging home. I pass by several other people who seem to stop and stare at me as I pass them. For a second I almost confuse them for someone I know. I must have hit my head a little harder than I originally thought.

I exit the park through the same thorned gate that I had used to get in. I turn the corner and keep my pace. I hear fragments of a second voice in my mind.

Stay away from her.

I'm not going to listen. I need to find out what this all means, now that I know it is something. Snow begins to fall and blankets of the powdered ice cover the streets as I pass by them. I finally make it to my front porch. I open the door and walk inside.

Surprisingly, I am not met with some vulgar gesture or anything of the sort from my father. This is because he is passed out in his chair, most likely drunk.

I make my way to the kitchen to grab a bite, quietly of course.

I open the cupboards and grab out some ramen. Didn't say it was going to be a super expensive bite.

As I'm eating I swear out of the corner of my eye I see the masked man from my dream peering into the window. Once I look to confirm my suspicions there is absolutely nothing and no one there. I definitely need to just calm down.

I think to do some research on that date still, but if I'm seeing things, that must be a sign that I should get some sleep. I take a look at my phone and it is only ten in the morning. I could do with a small nap. Small, brain, you hear that?

I quietly move to my room and lie down on my bed. Within moments I'm nodding off.

~...~

I open my eyes and I'm standing in a lush forest, the sun shines through the tree tops. The browns of the trees are accentuated by the vivid greens from the leaves. I'm not really used to seeing this much greenery in my dreams. I see the man out of the corner of my eye. He's here and he's wearing a white pinstripe suit with matching slacks. I see a bit more of his blondish hair that peeks out from the sides of the mask. He walks up to me and looks me up and down with his hands in his pockets.

I cannot move, my body is not responding. I seem to be a puppet to the dream. He laughs and then plucks a note out of his pocket and drops it in my hand. What's everyone's fascination with notes here? He looks at me expectantly, waiting for me to read the note. I can see the creepy jack-o-lantern smile creep through behind the mask. It takes me an extra second to realize that I have control of my body once more. I unfold the piece of paper and begin reading:

I want to learn about you, Jonathan. When the time comes I'll have to borrow you. It is only because Reinhardt has an interest in you, so nothing personal, okay? March 18th is approaching.

~Micah

All of this seems a little too perfect. His connection in this seems fuzzy at best, but why am I seeing him in my dreams? And who the hell is this Reinhardt? Also…what did he mean about borrowing me? It's strange that he'd say that he's going to do such a thing before he does it.

I refold the paper and place it into my right pocket. Just then, I look up and freeze in terror. The beautiful landscape I was just in is now smeared with reds and browns as fire catches to the nearby plant life. Micah is gone, but animals of varying species take his place, trembling and succumbing to the fire. Tremors and explosions rock the ground and I see the animals around me trying to escape. Most of them are too late. I look away. I don't want anything to do with this. I begin running away from it. It is futile, you can't run away from a dream.

~...~

I'm forced awake and I sit up nearly screaming. I'm sweating profusely and breathing heavily. I put my hand on my forehead and realize my wound had reopened and was spilling fresh blood onto my sheets. The pain from the other night rears back and I scream as I cannot bear it any longer. There's a tumbling noise downstairs which transitions quickly to a bump-thumping up the stairs—that could be only one person. The door slams open and my father bursts into the room, night robe and all. I glance at watch and see that it is three in the morning. Fuck.

"What the hell are you screaming about?!" my father yells.

"I…I" I begin.

"What the hell did you to yourself, boy?" he snarls.

"Dad, I'm-"

My father walks over to the glass I had lying on the table and takes it in his hand—his face is as red as a plump tomato. He shouts and whips the glass straight at me. "If I've told you once I've told you a thousand fucking times, take care of your shit!"

The glass sails through the air and before I can react it crashes against my skull and I can feel it shatter. It hurts immensely as it hits just to the right of my other open wound and I scream out in pain.

"Grow a pair, will ya? Your mother is trying to get some fucking sleep!" He growls.

I hold my hands onto the top of my hair, trying to keep pressure on the now openly bleeding wound. I'm breathing short breaths to keep from screaming out anymore and getting another dose. I fall back onto my bed and cry silently.

I keep pressure on my head and a few moments later I can feel my consciousness slipping away. I don't want to go. I don't want to die. It's pulling me under. Pulling me like a thousand hands of darkness. I'm drowning. Please someone save me.

Sarah.

~...~

I dream of something different for once. It isn't of the end of the world or burning forests. It's pitch black except for two rings of light illuminating the bodies of two guys older than me. Not as old as my dad...probably around Mr. Conte's age. They're partially cloaked in shadow, but I can see their faces. The one on the right has jet black hair and glowing green eyes. He's the older of the two. The one on the left has messy dirty blond hair and differently colored eyes, one hazel and the other a bright blue. He looks to be only twenty or twenty-one.

"Are you sure he's the one?" black hair asks.

"I don't know, but Jay said it's him. As much as he had to do with this, I trust him," the dirty blond haired man puts his hand to his head and breathes heavily.

"I'm not saying that I don't. It's just that there's a lot riding on this. If it's not then we're endangering an innocent, possibly killing them." the one with black hair cocks his head.

"I know that. I know exactly what is at stake. That's why we need to find him and fast," the one with the dirty blond hair says.

"Jay said that he has an unusual connection with dreams."

"Hm, I wonder how useful that'll be in the end,"

"There could be plenty of uses for things that we know little about. I think you know that better than anyone, Gavin."

Just then I see a woman enter the frame. She looks to be the same age as the black haired man. She has almost equally as black hair, but it drops down much farther and her eyes are a shining dark blue. Her face is calm and I can see when she looks at the black haired man that there're signs of affection.

"Come on, are you two ready to head out? The car is all gassed up," she says.

"Right, sorry. We were just talking about him." he says.

"They say that if you speak of the demon they begin to listen to you—waiting for you to utter their name again." The woman says. "Maybe if you call out his name you'll summon him," she winks.

"He's not a demon," Gavin says.

"So uptight," she shakes her head.

"I hate the idea of someone always watching me. Gives me the shivers," the one called Gavin says, shuddering.

"Yeah, figures," the black haired one says. "We can't afford to get paranoid now. Come on, let's go."

~...~

The dream fades slowly and I can hear muffled voices and then a horrible scream. I can't tell if it's real or part of the dream. Everything is blurry now like I'm in some in-between state. The dream spills into the real world and I can't tell where I am anymore. My vision shifts from my bedroom, the dark void, the broken city, and the burning forest. It shifts faster and faster each time it happens. I hear a scream and then a loud boom.

When I can see my room I see that some figures are moving about me and then I am moving. I try to run, but my body is motionless. All is black.