The Timeservers

Chapter 54

New York City, New York

The Peccadillo Circus

December 21, 227 P.F.E

0012 hours

 
It takes Via a few minutes to figure out how to get Tatiana out of the tear. She has to be careful to get through the space between tears and then look over the pipe there. Wheels for cutting off the gas are at every opening. Via has to push to turn the wheel, it's stuck from years, maybe centuries of lack of use.
When the wheel finally turns Via's not sure what she thinks will happen. It might make the tear worse. It could engul fVia. It might not even work.
Whatever is supplying the tear must not have long effects. Only a few seconds after turning it off the tear lets out a flash of light as it pops. Everything slows down for a second as it dissipates. It's almost like the whole world is honey for a moment; slow, golden, and has a strange ability to capture light like nothing else.
Tatiana finishes her jump, landing on her feet, but is unable to stick it. She collapses to the ground, twisting her ankle. She cries out, scared and in pain. The note crumples in her hand, getting smeared with dirt. Tatiana curls herself into a ball and starts sweeping. "No, no, no, no, no! Why?! Why!"
"Tatiana," Via whispers.
Tatiana turns on her, looking like a wild animal. Tears track down her cheeks and her breathing is rapid. "Who are you? Why did you let me out?"
Tatiana launches herself at Via, but Via's been training for too long now. She counters the attack, knocking Tatiana back to the ground. She starts crawling towards another tear but collapses to the ground.
The former candidate starts crying again, shaking. Her sobs shake her whole body and seem closer to demented laughter than something that should indicate sadness. It's the epitome of pain and the utter loss of sanity as a result.
"Why did you let me out?" Tatiana manages, after several tries.
"I had to. You couldn't stay in there."
"What time is it?"
"It's been almost a week since you came here."
"Just a week? No, no! They told me that some of these people have been here for decades, centuries! I can't go back! I have to keep living my life and I just destroyed it!" Tatiana screams.
"Tatiana, calm down," Via tries.
"Tatiana? How do you know my name? Shouldn't even know my name! That tear was supposed to make me forget! I could have forgotten everything, but it's all still here!" Tatiana starts beating her skull with her open hands, clawing at her hair, and hitting her temples. "Why didn't it work?"
"Tatiana, stop it! Stop it!" Via rushes forward and struggles with Tatiana for a second. She forces her arms down and to her sides so she can't inflict any more damage on herself. Tatiana just starts clawing at Via, cutting into her bare arms with impressively sharp nails. "Tatiana, Tatiana, it's me! I'm Via! It's okay! You're going to be okay!"
"No! It'll never be okay! I've destroyed everything! My whole life! You have no idea-," Tatiana stops fighting. Her grip on Via loosens and her nails stop digging into Via's arm, leaving behind red gashes. "Via?"
Via risks letting go of Tatiana to take off her mask. It seems dangerous, even though they're alone, to remove the mask. Via hadn't understood how precious identity is until it had been removed from her, or until it became something that she didn't want anyone to know. She pushes the mask up and then steps closer to a tear so that it illuminates her face.
"Via! Wh-what are you doing here? Do you know what this place is?" Tatiana hisses.
"Not really, until I stepped through the door. I'm here for you, Tatiana. I'm here to get you out," Via answers, pulling her mask back down.
Tatiana starts into that crazy laugh-cry that she had done earlier. "Oh, here to get me out? I thought you were done ruining my life."
"Tat, that's not fair and you know it. I never did anything to hurt you."
Tatiana's eyes gleam with a manic light. She starts shaking and the tears streaming down her face come faster."Never hurt me? You hurt me every day! You were better than me since we went to that school! You were perfect! Compared to you we all looked tarnished. Second best was never so far of a fall! Everyone wondered why I wasn't good enough to be top student! Everyone wondered what horrible thing I'd done to get knocked down to second place! That hurt every day! Then you had the audacity to leave and become a chancellor. You got what we all wanted and left me to take your place. Everyone knew I got it just because you left! Do you know what that like? To get something only because of the person who deserves it wasn't there anymore? I had to be more than perfect! I had to be utterly flawless, I had to be you but better! I was hated and everyone was rooting against me. You used to take that. Then you passed it on to me without even thinking. You hurt me in ways that you can't even begin to understand."
Via crosses her arms and glares at Tatiana. She wishes she had a bit more height so she could look down on her too."You did most of that to yourself. You hurt me too. You also didn't have to worry about 'living up to my example.' I'm not a chancellor. I never was. You were trying to fill the role of someone who's just as bad as you, maybe worse now."
"What do you mean, you weren't a chancellor? You left! Everyone said you had gone to be the chancellor of some town up north!"
"A cover, set up by a friend of mine. I left, I got out, sort of."
"How did you do it?"
"I got recruited into the Guardians."
Tatiana laughs, less manic than before, but still cruel. "We were candidates. You don't just get 'recruited' into the Guardians. They aren't allowed to touch us. It doesn't matter how well you score on any of their tests."
"They're allowed to recruit us if we show spectral tendencies."
"You're a spectre. Only you."
"Are you mad about this?"
Tatiana tilts her head, considering. "I don think so. I don't know. You've always been so... everything always works out for you. I think they called it karma."
"Not everything's worked out for me. My parents abandoned me when I was eight. They abandoned me again this year. Everyone I love betrays me. I'm not even sure I've actually ever been loved or really loved someone else. I'm not perfect. I've never been perfect. I'm sorry you ever thought I was. The Ivory Tower didn't teach us to be good people. It taught us how to be great actors."
Tatiana doesn't look at Via. She looks at the wall instead. "I didn't know."
"I thought it would make me weak. I thought it would make me look vulnerable and that everyone would exploit that."
"You thought I would exploit that."
"There were second students before you. I was brought in young. I wasn't first at the time, I was too young and they thought I would commit at least one offence. They don't talk about it, but that first student didn't become a chancellor either. He was a good man before they pushed him too far. He was smuggling high-strikers out and using the Ivory Tower to do it. An elite found him out one night. He took things too far. They broke him and twisted him until he was capable of doing that. They have tortured thousands using this system, and it just keeps replicating itself. The second student then was cruel to him, and the second student before him was cruel to the first. We all think we'll be strong enough and break the chain, but all of us fall. One way or another, we fall to a place we can't crawl back from. No one is strong enough."
"How many- you know?"
"Not even I have clearance for that. It's this country's best-kept secret because they can't admit that the system is broken and that it breaks us too. Everyone knows it. They just don't admit it to themselves. We all know everything. We see everything going downhill from miles away, but the trick is to admit it. We don't like it when things go wrong."
"Did you ever think about running away? Ending it some way or another?"
"Every day. But I couldn't do it. I couldn't leave because if I left-," Via takes a breath. "If I left they wouldn't know where to find me. If they came back. My parents. It's pitiful. I know it is. I can't help it though."
"I'm sorry. We could have helped each other. We could have been friends. Okay, friends is a stretch. We could have supported each other, and survived together. We could have been like war buddies. Do you think that if we were able to open up we would have survived?"
It takes Via a moment to realize that Tatiana had asked a question. She's still stuck on the 'I'm sorry.' She'd never understood the importance of an apology before. Having it though, having it from someone who had tormented her for so long makes the whole world seem different. It shatters everything.
"I think so. Come on, I'm going to get you out of here."
"No, no! I can't go back there. Please don't make me go back!" Tatiana sobs.
Via grabs hold of Tatiana, maybe intending to shake her or something, but it ends up as a hug. "It's okay, it's okay. I promise. You don't have to go back. I can get you out of the country. I can have my friends take you to Historian territory, or somewhere else. You don't have to live like that ever again."
"Why can't you just make me like you? A spectre or something?"
"It doesn't work like that. You have to have special abilities. All I can do is get you out of this place. It might take a while but my friends know people who can hide you. You don't have to pretend to be perfect anymore. We just have to get out of here."
"You came back for me? Why?"
"I needed to feel like I accomplished something." It's not an answer that a good person would give, but it's the only answer Via has.
"That's not it, not all of it. You're a spy. You accomplish stuff every day. You're supposed to protect us from ourselves. You might just be one of the only good people that I know. Why so long though? You must have the resources to track this place down, right?"
"I didn't know until yesterday."
"How did you find out?"
"Tat, now is not the time. Come on, we've got to go. Someone is looking for me and I can't let him find me. He's a bad guy and he will stop us from escaping, this place or the country." Viapulls Tatiana to her feet and slings one of her arms across the back of her neck so Tatiana has her support. She starts to walk but Tatiana acts like a dead weight. "You can move faster than that."
"What's going on? What won't you tell me?"
"Not now!" Via growls as she grits her teeth.
"Tell me!"
Via rounds the corner to lead onto the main tracks. Her heart starts beating faster as she sees the light at the end of the tunnel. It might as well be daylight after all this darkness and stings her eyes so much she has to squint.
Then she doesn't have to squint. A shadow steps in front of the light, blocking Via's path. Via's blood goes cold in her veins and her heart sinks. Barkley. "Yes, Via. Tell her."