My Arch Enemy Is a Brain in a Jar by David Solomons

Author:David Solomons [David Solomons]
Language: eng
Format: epub
ISBN: 9781788001144
Publisher: Nosy Crow
Published: 2018-12-15T00:00:00+00:00

14

IN TWO MINDS

The world was a blur. My vision was filled with a confusing haze of grey dotted with blocks of primary colours. I wasn’t sure what just happened, but I had a bad feeling. Make that two bad feelings. One, Lor-Ayn had hijacked Star Lad’s telekinetic power to blast her prison, and now she was free. And two, I could no longer feel any superpowers inside me. I wanted to scream and shout and write a letter of complaint. Write a million billion letters. It. Was. So. Unfair! I’d been so close to becoming a superhero but I had missed my chance. I was gutted. I could have raged about the injustice forever – and I made a mental note to revisit my displeasure at a later date – but there was no time to mope. I sensed someone close by. At least it wasn’t Lor-Ayn. She’d poked around enough inside my head that I would have recognised her touch.

“Hello?” I said.

No answer.

“I know you’re there. Show yourself.”

There was a sound of shuffling feet.

“Luke, is that you?”

It was Zack’s voice. My last request to Serge and Lara had been to find my brother. They’d come through for me, yet again. “Yes, it’s me. Are Lara and Serge with you?”

“Nope. Should they be?”

Strange question. I squinted through the haze. “I can’t see you.”

“I can’t see you either,” he replied, puzzled. “Oh wait, are you using my telepathic power to communicate?”

“I doubt it,” I said. “Wave at me.”

“I can’t wave,” he replied. “I’ll fall off.”

That was a bit odd. “OK then, I’ll wave at you.” I raised a hand.

And fell.

“Aaaaah!” I cried.

“Aaaaah!” cried Zack.

There was the sound of a rope zipping through a pulley. My vision returned just in time to see a hard floor rising to meet me. A safety harness bit, arresting my fall with a jolt a couple of metres above the floor.

It took me a second to recognise my new surroundings. I was no longer on the command bridge beneath the resort. Instead, I dangled off Mount Cleverest, suspended by a gently swinging rope. I didn’t need a mirror to confirm my new reality.

I was me again. Plain old Luke Parker. At least I wouldn’t have to put up with Zack moaning about being me any longer.

“Luke, I still can’t see you.”

I could tell from Zack’s voice that he was growing concerned. “Are you near the climbing wall?” I asked.

“Yes.”

“Then look up. I’m the one swinging on the end of a rope.”

“You can’t be,” said Zack.

“Why not?”

“Because so am I.”

There was a long pause as we each processed this information and, like two jets on a collision course, came to the same terrible, fiery conclusion.

“Luke, I think we’re in…”

“…the same body.”

In the silence that followed the only sounds were the creaking of the rope that now held up both Parker brothers in a single body, and my stunned breathing. I could feel Zack’s invisible presence. It was like having someone hovering at your shoulder, but never being able to turn around fast enough to see them.

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