Masks

Chapter 51

The sound of the door unlocking made me tense up. Tim had left to go to work a few minutes ago, which meant it wasn't him. I thought back to what he'd said about Skully and needing to change the locks just as the front door opened to reveal the masked man slipping into the apartment. We stared at each other as he quietly shut the door behind him and made his way closer.

"What do you want?" My eyes fell to the phone next to me as I debated whether or not to alert Tim to the intrusion.

Skully sat the camera on the table and took a seat on the floor with a grunt of pain as he rubbed his side. For a few minutes he didn't speak and he seemed to observe the room uneasily. I was about to ask again when his darkened gaze snapped back to me. "What are you?"

The question threw me off guard. His voice initially sounded agitated and aggressive but I could hear the tremor of fear run through it. "W-what? What do you mean?"

"You're not... I don't know." He shook his head. "You're one of them."

"I'm not a proxy." A defensive tone gave a dangerous edge to my voice.

"No... you're like those... things." He picked up his camera and stared at the screen as he murmured the barely audible answer.

"Is there a reason you're always filming? I don't really like having pictures taken let alone videos of me."

He sat the camera down and angled it away from where I sat. "How did you do it?"

"Do what?"

"Get us out of the tunnel."

I was silent for a moment, a chill going through me. "I... I thought you got us out- maybe Hoodie."

"Ash, I saw you. After Hoodie left I was trying to think of how to get us out of there... then you woke up and- and you just..." He trailed off as if trying to remember exactly what had occured. "We went back to the entrance of the ARK... but instead of entering it we ended up here."

"Why would that be my doing?" I coughed, tasting bile and azoth in the back of my throat.

"It's never done that before. That tunnel is his way of manipulating our location in that area. We were the only ones there."

"That doesn't mean anything."

He shifted and held a hand over his injured side. "You weren't... you. I tried to talk to you, to stop you from going back into the ARK... but you didn't listen. You didn't speak. I... I remember Tim did that once after I... after I had to leave him behind with The Operator. He got out before I did, but the look on his face- in that moment I tried asking him what happened he didn't even seem to recognize me."

"Wait..." I shivered, trying to recall doing anything he said I'd done. "I... Pawn isn't a separate part of me. I should remember this..."

"She isn't- wasn't- her own personality before. Pawn was just their name for me... Did- did that change? Would I be able to tell? Maybe it was just the azoth kicking in again, they injected a lot into me..."

"You passed out after getting here so I can't be sure that you weren't just under the influence of those things."

"...You're Jay, aren't you?" I ignored his last response as I pieced together the strange filming obsession and the comparison he'd made. "Tim said you were dead."

"He is... For Tim it'll stay that way." Skully shifted uncomfortably at the mention of the name. "He can't find out."

Well, that explains why he wouldn't speak to Tim. "How do I know you didn't have something to do with this- given you're back from the dead and all."