Instance Ch. 01

"Fuck!"

He let her go and the shoes and the stink moved away. She opened one eye to a slit and saw her attacker pulling back the curtains to look down into the garden. It was the heavyset man who'd followed her in his car. He had on the same stained, white singlet, his gut hanging over his belt.

"Fuck! Fuck! Who called the cops?" His voice was higher than seemed right for a man his size, a child's voice in a man's body.

He pulled away from the window and threw open the front door, lumbering down the stairs, the wooden railing shaking as he gripped it to pull himself forward.

The second he was gone, Brooke got to her feet and slammed the door behind him, locking it with shaking hands. She pulled back the curtains to watch, and blue and red lights strobed across her face, painting the darkened lounge walls.

The fat man did his best to get past them, stumbling left and right. But his clumsy attempts were too slow, and he was soon caught and cuffed.

She took a sobbing breath of relief, then stilled herself, forcing herself to stay calm. She was alive. Everything was okay.

She watched from inside as two police officers pushed the man into the back seat of their car and started up the steps to talk to her.

Jackson

Jackson followed the GPS on his phone, stuck behind some irritating knob driving a blue hatchback, the driver taking every speed bump as slowly as possible, crawling down to thirty.

Your car isn't lowered arsehole, you could drive faster!

Although the GPS said he should go straight ahead, he saw there was a ring-road he could take. If the hatchback went straight ahead, he could take that and get to the house faster.

But as he prepared to spin the car into the turn, the hatchback turned without warning. No signal, just pulled to the right like a slot car following its track.

He cursed and jammed on his brakes, getting ready to speed past as soon as the car moved its arse out of the way.

And then it vanished. Completely vanished, as if he'd imagined it.

Jackson sat in stunned silence for a moment, then remembered why he was there. He put the car into gear and gunned the engine.

*

A police cruiser was parked outside when he pulled up at the end of her driveway. He sat in his car, unsure if he should go up to the house or not. In the end, he decided after the police left, she might want a friend... assuming she was okay. He hoped she was okay.

He got out and walked past the police car, and could see a guy cuffed in the back seat. Round face, hair thinning on top. Stubble on its way to being a beard. Crazy eyes.

An officer stopped him before he could head up the stairs.

"I'm the one who called you. Is she okay?"

The officer reassured him that she was, and sent him on up.

Another officer met him in at the top of the stairs and let him in.

He sat on a chair in Brooke's lounge while they questioned her, and after they left, made her a cup of cocoa using a sachet he found in her pantry.

He brought the cocoa back to the couch.

"What do you think he wanted?"

Shivering under a blanket, Brooke took the steaming mug he offered her.

"He wanted the 'controller to the portal'. Apparently this is something I have. He's a complete fucking nutcase."

Jackson sat next to her and she shuffled closer. He put his arm around her.

"Did he say anything else?"

"No. Just went through the house looking for it. Oh, no, he did say something else, but it sounded like nonsense."

"What was he saying?"

"It sounded as though he was repeating 'D, C, Q, E' over and over again."

Jackson frowned. "Does it mean anything?"

"Not to me."

"The controller to the portal." Jackson rubbed his thumb against her shoulder through the blanket while he thought on this. He was a gamer. He had an imagination. He'd seen strange things.

He remembered the car.

"This is going to sound mental, but... something odd happened on my way over here."

She glanced up at him.

"I was following this blue hatchback, and it turned into a side street and—"

Brooke knew what he'd going to say. "It disappeared."

He gave her a stunned look. "Has that happened to you too?"

"Yeah," she said softly. "The first night he stalked me."

Jackson pulled his phone out of his pocket. Keeping his arm around Brooke, he typed 'DCQE' into the search engine.

He scrolled down, then read aloud; "Is DCQE erasing information or resetting the system?"

Brooke shifted and he held his phone out to her. "Delayed Choice Quantum Erasure. Do you think that's what your boy was mumbling about?"

Brooke blinked hard. "You know what, could we look at this in the morning? I have a splitting headache and I just want to take some painkillers and go to bed."

Jackson pushed his phone back into his coat. "Yeah, of course." He squeezed her shoulders. "Will you be okay? Here, tonight, on your own?"

She shook her head slowly. "No." She gave him a hopeful look. "Would you stay?"

"Nah." He feigned an Aussie accent, as he pulled his arm from around her shoulders. "Nah, I need to go get pissed."

He started to stand, then glanced back at her with a grin.

"You fucker!" she said as he dropped back down beside her. "I thought you were serious!"

He put his arm around her again. "As if I'm going to turn down an invitation to sleep in a pretty girl's bed."

Brooke raised an eyebrow.

Jackson shrugged. "I'm told I'm warm, friendly, and incredibly comforting."

"Just like a Golden Retriever."

He grinned. "If you like."

"Well, as long as you keep your clothes on, I don't mind you sleeping on the bed."

"Generous," he said.

She took his hand, her tone serious now. "Thank you. You probably saved my life tonight."

That gave him pause. Saved her life. Had he actually done something right for a change?

"Come on." She patted his leg. "I'm exhausted. Let's get some sleep."

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