Tethered Twins

Chapter Fifty

Grace Wilkerson

The Deck drove into London through the city streets. Their convoy now consisted of a tank and two cars. Ten of them remained. It had to be enough.

They approached London from the south west side. A garden had once been located in this area and had housed some of the most beautiful flowers in the world. Now it served as a makeshift graveyard, with thousands of bodies from the 20 Day Siege filling the ground.

The remaining people had done their best to ensure respect was paid to the dead. When the city was abandoned bodies were originally left rotting in the streets. The people who returned had found those bodies and given them peace. It reminded Grace of how she and Gabe had cleaned the shopping centre above The Deck HQ of bodies.

Despite seeing so much death the garden had been brought back to life and flowers grew around the giant tombstones that marked the dead. As so many bodies had gone unclaimed – most families never came back to London – they had marked unnamed people with a single X. One tombstone was filled with nothing more than a thousand little X symbols. It was a bittersweet testament to what had happened.

“I can’t believe Tobias caused all of this,” said Grace.

“Don’t worry. He will be stopped and the world will know what he did,” said Gabe.

“How?” asked Grace. “We can’t even prove it! In fact the only reason we know he was to blame is because of your boss. A man I’ve never even met,” she hated being kept out of the loop and the boss’ secret identity was one of the things that wound her up the most.

Gabe didn’t reply. He simply walked towards the tombstones and knelt down to pay his respects. He removed the car keys from his pocket and carved an X on to a tombstone. “For my twin who never got the chance to live.”  

“We all lost someone that day,” said Grace, as she took the keys from him and marked an X on to the tombstone as well.

The other members of The Deck walked into the garden and paid their respects to the fallen people. They may not have all known someone who died here but such a senseless loss of life made them feel for the families affected.

This was just one mass grave of many. The world wasn’t prepared for so much death. Mass cremations had been carried out worldwide, regardless of the wishes of the dead. Many of the bodies that weren’t burnt were those that were lost in areas people dared not visit. Areas where the signal had been at its most concentrated.

“We have to keep moving,” said Chris. “There is nothing we can do for the dead now. If we don’t continue on then there will be a lot more bodies to pay our respects to.”

“You’re right,” said Grace. She dialled a number on her phone and put it on speakerphone. “So where do we go Jill?”

“Why don’t you ever say Hello?” asked Jill.

“Because I’m a super cool action star. We never say hello. That’s the rules.”

“Hmm,” replied Jill. “I noticed something odd whilst you were driving to London. When you were attacked by orange eyed people the new signal could be detected in the area. It was faint but it was unmistakable. I went back and looked at the footage from when Emmie was taken and the same signal occurred.”

“So the signal has something to do with the orange eyed people?”

“It has everything to do with them. I think whoever is taking control of these people is doing it via the new sound wave. Which means there’s good news and bad news.”

“Good news first please. Always good news first,” replied Grace. Gabe looked at her with raised eyebrows; she knew he would have preferred the bad news first.

“Well, the good news is we can now track the people who took Emmie. I’ve scanned for any faint instances of the signal and there’s only one. It’s coming from the old Houses of Parliament. If Emmie is still with the people who took her then it’s a good sign she is there.”

“That’s great news!” said Grace. “And the bad news?”

“If someone is controlling other people via sound waves then they could control any one at any time. Which means every person you meet could be a threat.”

“Will they still have orange eyes?”

“I think so,” replied Jill.

“Great so we can still stop them,” said March. “I’ve fitted our guns to target the frequency of those who are being controlled. It’ll stop them temporarily. It momentarily stunned one of the drivers earlier so at least we can defend ourselves.”

“That’s good. Remember they are innocent people. If someone is controlling them then they do not deserve to die,” said Jill.

“So do we know where the sound wave is coming from?” asked Gabe.

“I’m still trying to pin it down exactly but there’s something else,” said Jill. “The small bursts of sound wave that I’ve detected are not coming from the Houses of Parliament. They are passing through somewhere first and being broadcast out via a relay. If I can find the source of that I should be able to shut down the signal.”

“Great work,” said Grace and she hung up.

“Wow, not even a goodbye,” said Jill. “She is a super cool action star.”

Thanks for reading, be sure to follow me to get the latest chapters as they go live. If you enjoyed this chapter please vote or leave a comment.

- Blagman