When there were no more excuses or thoughts to hide behind, one option remained.

Action.

Thomas knew this. If he found another reason to not drink one of the vials, he would be unable to fool both her and himself. Unable to choose a particular one over the others, he reached out and picked up the closest. They all, supposedly did the same thing anyway. Whatever the side effects or taste were, it was the end product that mattered. A new, improved Thomas. Outcast no more.

"Are you sure you want to do this?" Bren asked.

Of course he was sure. The rest of his life depended on it and the fact that he could feel himself shaking didn't change that. He nodded.

"Yes. I have to."

"You'll never be you anymore."

"I know. Like I said, that's the point."

"And blue is the one you're going with?"

Thomas looked at it. He liked the way the fluid, apparently just water, more or less, moved. The black dots were hypnotic. Blue was like vomiting for an hour, or however long it took to be absorbed, without actually puking. It didn't sound pleasant, but none of them did. No pain, no gain.

"It is."

The phrase's tone went up slightly at the end, as if he was asking a question. Maybe he was. He would appreciate help deciding on the right one to take. There wasn't a right one, however. There was just one. Any one.

Or...

Thomas put the bottle down, then proceeded to unscrew all four caps. He arranged the vials into a two by two square, one that, given their small sizes, could be picked up in one go.

Why count on just one? They might all work or only one could. Bren wasn't being forthcoming, so he had only guesswork to go on. Oscar hadn't given any real warnings other than, if Thomas was caught in possession of the vials, he was to say that he'd found them. He had no idea what they did, he was simply fascinated by the way the liquids moved in their containers. He was taking them home to show his father.

"What are you doing?"

"Deciding," Thomas said. He wasn't. His decision was already made.

He took a deep breath, held it, then let it seep out through his clenched teeth.

Here we go.

He raised his hand as if to pick one up, putting the other out to the edge of the coffee table for balance. He didn't want Bren to realise what he was going to do and try to stop him. Perhaps it had been a good job he'd put this off until that moment. It had given him, the darkest part of him that needed to ruminate while the outer, brighter parts made their excuses, time.

He leaned forward quickly, grabbed all four bottles and downed their contents in two large, swift gulps.

Bren's eyes went wide. Her arm went up in a too late attempt to stop him.

"No!" she shouted.

The bottles flew across the room, knocked from Thomas's hand. The shattered pieces of them, broken before contact with the wall, dropped to the floor like a hundred dried tears.

Thomas was thrown to the side, over the arm of the sofa and onto the floor. He hit his head on the floorboards but barely noticed. His stomach and throat and, well, all of him, was simultaneously on fire and freezing and desperately needing to throw up. His mouth was parched and he could somehow feel every one of his teeth, as if they were intruders in his gums and he needed to evict them. His eyes felt too big for their sockets. The impact of every shard of glass onto the floor was a drum beat trampling on the inside of his head.

He might have screamed, but he'd never know. His ears were filled with the noise from every movement and voice and heartbeat in the entire world. And every one of those was the heel of a shoe stamping against the side of his head.

He opened his eyes to Bren crouching over him. She had a hold of his jacket and was shaking him. He saw her mouth moving but couldn't hear anything above the sound of everything. He did recognise the shape her mouth was making. It was repeating something. His name.

The recognition of what she was saying seemed to enable his senses to focus and hang on to the sound of her voice.

"Thomas! Thomas! Are you OK? I'm sorry! You fool! You fucking idiot! Are you OK?"

He didn't know. He didn't even care. He'd done it! He had manned up and changed everything about his life. His entire life.

He managed the smallest of movements of his head. He hoped it was a nod. Bren seemed to be satisfied, though she wasn't happy. She kept repeating the work 'idiot', tagging it occasionally with the prefix 'fucking'. He probably was, but he felt good about being one. He was struggling to think coherently. He wasn't sure if he was still Thomas or if there was another version of himself occupying the same space. He felt disjointed. Was this what it was like? Did the new you fight with the old one to see who would have residency in the shell of your body? Or was there still only one, but it was torn in two then rammed back together after being filled with the fire of newly unleashed power?

He tried to move, but the split parts of him were unable to move in sync with each other. He felt as if his arm was lifting but, when he managed to loll his head to the side in order to look, it hadn't moved.

Bren was still shaking him, trying to rouse him from whatever stupor he was engulfed by. He could tell she was being energetic. He just couldn't feel it. She was manhandling someone else's body. One that looked like his and shared his skin, organs and skeleton.

This was it! It was happening! He was rising!

The room and Bren swam out of focus, swirling like the liquids in their smashed bottle. Colours blended. He could see parts of himself, the table, the sofa and the girl all mixed together to the point it became difficult to tell them apart. The interflow speeded up, whirlpooling and closing in on him. He tried, and failed, to back away. The wall and his lack of control prevented him. Spinning wildly, the colours merged into one, a diseased yellow, then a hole, filled with so many black spots they, too merged, opened up in the centre.

Thomas couldn't tell if it was drawing him in or swallowing him. Either way, the result was the same.

Everything, sound and sensation, disappeared. Was he floating? Still stationary on Bren's floor? Dead? Thomas couldn't tell. The only sound was that of his thoughts, booming in the darkness. Except, darkness was black. This was... nothing.

"THOMAS!"

He felt a slap, hard and stinging against his cheek and light exploded, dragging with it the world.

"Bren?"

"Shit, kiddo! You OK? Back with me?"

"I... I don't know. A... Am I?"

"You had me scared, ya fucker. What the hell was you thinking? Where did you go?"

"Go?"

"You were... I don't know... phasing. You kind of disappeared, but not... not quite. "

"I don't know. Everything sort of went together. Then it went."

"Went?"

"Yeah. Just went. Like, away."

"How do you feel?"

Thomas was feeling less disoriented, but he didn't feel quite right.

"I'm not sure."

He blinked, trying to rub his eyes but finding he still couldn't lift his arms.

"You look like shit."

"Thanks. I feel it," he admitted.

"So... has it worked?"

"I... How do I know?"

Bren opened her mouth to answer. The words didn't get the chance to be heard. Above them, the limply hanging bulb started flashing bright red. From unseen speakers, an alarm, loud enough to be heard but not loud enough for it to extend beyond the walls, sounded.

Bren closed her mouth. There was no more time for words and any spoken would steal precious seconds from them. She gripped the arm of the sofa and pulled. It slid easily forward, revealing a low but wide hole. She spun on her hands and backed into it, reaching for the sofa, but stopping.

"Fuck it."

With a strength that had no place in her small, just teenage frame, she grabbed the collar of Thomas's jacket and pulled. Once they were both inside the wall, she reached again and pulled the sofa back into place, leaving them both in darkness.