Dark Woods

by Steve Voake

  ‘Underneath my photograph they wrote: The boy most likely to succeed.’

  Jefferson nodded.

  ‘And I did succeed, Cal. But that’s the trouble when you’re surrounded by idiots. They can’t see the truth even when it’s staring them in the face.’

  Cal allowed himself a sideways glance at Jefferson and saw that his eyes were bright with anger. He made up his mind that, for now at least, he would do his best not to upset him. He would take his time, work out where he stood and then do everything he could to put as much distance as he could between himself and the madness that bubbled up in Jefferson’s brain.

  ‘Now it’s important we all stay calm,’ said Jefferson. ‘I don’t want anyone freaking out, right?’

  ‘OK,’ said Cal, thinking if he was going to freak out he’d have done it when he woke up to find himself stuck with a madman. But then he guessed you couldn’t depend on mad people to make a whole lot of sense.

  ‘Are you sure you’re OK?’ asked Jefferson as they stood outside the door of what Cal assumed was another bedroom.

  ‘Sure,’ said Cal, although he was probably further from OK than he’d been in a long while. ‘Why not?’

  ‘Good,’ said Jefferson, pushing the door open.

  Although the shades on the window were down, the room was dimly lit by an eerie green glow. Underneath the window on the far side of the room was a bed, and on the bed was a body covered with a white sheet. But the face was uncovered, and Cal realised that he was looking at Eden. Attached to her temples were two circular metal plates and on each plate was a small green light which stuttered and blinked. Stacked along the wall beside the bed were rows of computer towers and on the front of each one were corresponding green lights which flickered in synch with the lights on Eden’s head. There was just one monitor, a single red light flickering on the side of it as if signalling some unseen exchange of information.

  ‘I told you not to freak out, remember?’ said Jefferson as Cal swore and took a couple of steps back.

  ‘I’m not freaking out,’ said Cal, fighting to remain calm.

  ‘Then come in and close the door.’

  Cal hesitated for a moment, then did as he was told. He was relieved to see the rise and fall of Eden’s chest beneath the sheet, but as he wiped sweat from his palms he guessed that her well-being was not Jefferson’s main concern.

  ‘Is she OK?’ he whispered, nervous of breaking the silence.

  ‘Of course she’s OK,’ said Jefferson irritably, walking across to the monitor. ‘She just drank more lemonade than you did, that’s all.’ He pushed a button on the side of the monitor and beckoned to Cal. ‘Come and look.’

  Cal stood beside Jefferson and stared at the screen. At first all he could see was a grey mass, colourless as a November sky. But as he watched, the mass became more defined, its edges glowing with colour. It began to dissolve and separate, forming into distinct images: a cot, a doll’s house, a wooden rocking horse. Cal realised they were staring into a child’s bedroom.

  As they watched, the point of view changed so that Cal felt as if he was looking down at the room from somewhere up on the ceiling. He could see into the cot and there was a small child, tucked up beneath a blue blanket. On top of the blanket was a small teddy bear.

  Cal heard a whimper and turned to see Eden reaching for something in her sleep.

  ‘Well, it’s nicer than her last dream,’ said Jefferson. Cal waited for him to explain, but he simply nudged Cal before adding, ‘OK, watch this.’

  In front of the monitor was a keyboard and mouse. Cal watched as Jefferson moved the cursor across the screen. When it was on the teddy bear, he clicked the mouse and the cursor drew a box around it. The word ENLARGE? appeared on the screen with the options YES NO beneath it. Jefferson clicked YES and an image of the teddy bear filled the screen. Cal saw that the fur on the top of its head was worn smooth and that one of its eyes was missing. Jefferson clicked on it once more and this time the options CUT & SAVE and SELECT NEW OBJECT appeared. Jefferson clicked on CUT & SAVE and the image of the bedroom returned to the screen. Only this time there was no sign of the teddy bear.

  In the corner of the room, Eden began to whimper once more.

  ‘Is she OK?’ asked Cal. He glanced at the monitor and saw what appeared to be dark shapes moving through the shadows of the child’s bedroom.

  ‘She’s fine,’ replied Jefferson, hurriedly pressing the button again so that the images shrank to a white dot and disappeared.

  ‘Maybe I should wake her,’ said Cal.

  ‘Not yet,’ said Jefferson.

  Cal looked at Eden and saw that she was quieter again. Jefferson opened the door and daylight flooded into the room.

  ‘There is something else I want to show you.’

  Cal followed him through the living room and wondered whether he should make a run for it. But then he remembered what Jefferson had said about being in the middle of nowhere and guessed he was better off waiting until he could take proper stock of the situation.

  Sooner or later the world would present him with another chance to move on.

  Then he could run away and leave it all behind, same as he always did.

  Twelve

  As they crossed the clearing, Cal felt the sun burn his neck and guessed it was probably mid-afternoon; the sky was cornflower blue and the air shimmered in the summer heat.

  When they reached the concrete building, Cal was surprised at the size of it. It reminded him of the storeroom at the back of the supermarket where one of his foster mums used to work. But that was stacked with enough groceries to feed a small town for a week. What possible use could Jefferson have for such a place?

  Jefferson took a bunch of keys from his pocket, selected one and pushed it into the lock.

  Cal remembered what he had said about never locking the doors to the house and wondered why this building should be any different.

  ‘I built it myself,’ Jefferson said, as if Cal was a prospective buyer who had asked to be shown round. ‘Took me the best part of five years.’

  The door swung open and as he stepped into the corridor Cal smelled damp, stagnant air. His T-shirt stuck to his back and he shivered as Jefferson closed the door. For a moment they stood in total darkness and Cal imagined he heard whispers from somewhere at the end of the corridor. Then Jefferson flipped a switch and a neon light flickered into life. The walls were rough, unplastered breeze-block and Cal saw that there were several doors at regular intervals along the corridor, each smooth and windowless. He looked at Jefferson, his face pale beneath the artificial light, and listened to the whispers. Was this what he did for fun? Kidnapped people and kept them locked up for months, years, maybe for ever?

  ‘What are you going to do?’ he asked, trying to keep the fear out of his voice.

  Jefferson saw the way Cal stared at the doors, wondering what lay behind them.

  ‘Don’t worry,’ he said. ‘As long as you help me, you’ll come to no harm.’ Then he unlocked the door in front of them, pushed it open and turned on the light.

  In the centre of the room was a large metal cage.

  Along the far wall was another bank of computers, their lights flickering brightly. High up in each corner were what appeared to be four satellite dishes. In the middle of each was a thin glass bulb, tapering to a point, and all four were aimed at the metal cage in the centre of the room.

  ‘What do you think?’ asked Jefferson. ‘Pretty impressive, isn’t it?’

  Cal stayed silent, wondering whether he could move fast enough to run outside and lock Jefferson in. But Jefferson had put the keys back in his pocket and as Cal looked at his muscled arms and the rough calluses on his hands, he realised he must have spent years cutting down trees and manhandling concrete blocks in order to build this place. The work had made him strong, and Cal knew he would be no match for him in a fight.

  The door of the cage was padlocked and as Jefferson unlocked it he turned to Cal and smiled.
/>   ‘Works every time,’ he said, pushing the door open. ‘Go ahead. See for yourself.’

  As Cal stood nervously at the entrance, Jefferson noticed his unease. ‘What? You think I’m going to lock you in?’ He turned and kicked the padlock across the floor into the corner.

  ‘I ain’t gonna lock you in.’

  Cal walked into the cage and picked up the small teddy bear lying in the centre of it. Its left eye was missing and there was a worn patch on the top of its head. He could see right away that it was the same as the one he had seen on the computer monitor.

  ‘I don’t understand,’ he said, handing it to Jefferson. ‘What do you want with me?’

  ‘I already told you,’ said Jefferson, ‘I need your help.’

  As he closed the door Cal thought he heard the sound again; a faint whispering, coming from the end of the corridor.

  ‘Is there someone else here?’ he asked.

  Jefferson shook his head and pushed Cal out into the sunshine.

  ‘It’s just the wind in the trees,’ he said, turning the key in the lock.

  But the air was still; there wasn’t even a breeze.

  Cal sat at the table in the middle of the clearing and saw that the sun was lower in the sky now, just above the trees.

  ‘You must be thirsty,’ said Jefferson. ‘You want something to drink?’

  Cal nodded.

  ‘Not lemonade,’ he said.

  He watched Jefferson walk back inside and wondered what he thought he was doing, bringing them out here like this. Did he really have some weird plan? Or was he just a lunatic, playing games until he grew tired of them?

  And then what?

  Cal didn’t like to think about it. If he made a break for it now, at least he’d have a chance of escape. He tried to tell himself he hadn’t known Eden that long, that it was her idea to find the dog, that it was better if at least one of them got away.

  But no matter how he looked at it, he knew he couldn’t leave her. He would just have to try to figure out a way of getting them both back to civilisation in one piece.

  And if it meant playing along with Jefferson and whatever crazy schemes he had, then that was exactly what he would have to do.

  Thirteen

  ‘Here,’ said Jefferson, sitting opposite him at the table. ‘Two glasses of iced water.’

  ‘Thank you,’ said Cal.

  Jefferson chuckled.

  ‘What’s so funny?’ asked Cal.

  ‘You English – you’re so polite.’

  Cal wasn’t feeling very polite. He leaned over and took the glass that Jefferson had placed nearest himself.

  ‘Don’t trust me, huh?’ said Jefferson, still grinning. ‘Well, I can’t say I blame you.’

  Cal tipped his head back and drank deeply. He stared at the blue sky and wondered if he would ever see Sarah and Michael again.

  ‘I used to be a research fellow at Harvard University,’ said Jefferson. ‘My subject was physics.’

  He took some papers from a brown leather satchel and pushed a black and white photograph across the table. It showed a much younger man standing on a lawn in front of a very grand looking building. He wore a suit and tie and a shirt with a button-down collar. He was fresh-faced and smiling, like a man who knew he had his whole life in front of him.

  ‘I was twenty-three,’ he said. ‘Twenty-three years old and I thought nothing could touch me.’

  ‘So what happened?’ asked Cal, partly because he was interested but mainly because he wanted to keep Jefferson talking while he decided what to do.

  ‘I was working on a new theory, working sixteen, seventeen hours a day, but I didn’t care because I felt I was on the edge of something, ready to make a breakthrough. But then, two days after that photo was taken, there was a fire at my apartment. I got off the bus that night, saw the flames above my block and knew I’d lost her.’

  ‘Lost who?’

  ‘Tansy. My dog.’

  Jefferson passed another photograph across the table.

  ‘That’s her, right there. Beautiful, isn’t she?’

  Cal looked at the picture of an Alsatian, sitting by a flowerbed in the middle of summer. Then he looked at Jefferson and was surprised to see that there were tears in his eyes.

  ‘Best dog that ever lived, was Tansy. That’s why I need your help, Cal. I want you to help me bring her back.’ He put the photograph in his shirt pocket, next to his heart.

  And at that moment, although he knew that Jefferson had done a terrible thing in bringing them here, Cal began to feel sorry for him. He knew what it was like to want something you could never have.

  Still, the man was obviously deluded. If she had been in that fire, his dog was long gone. Cal decided it was safer to play along for the time being.

  ‘But we looked for her,’ he said. ‘We looked all over and she wasn’t there.’

  ‘I know,’ said Jefferson. He stared at Cal and tapped the side of his head. ‘But that’s because she’s in here. And I want you to help me get her out.’

  Cal shook his head.

  ‘That’s impossible,’ he said.

  ‘That’s what everyone thinks. But you saw the teddy bear, right? You picked it up and held it.’

  ‘Yeah,’ Cal said slowly, ‘but I don’t see—’

  ‘All right, look.’

  Jefferson was animated now. He picked up a sketch pad and began to draw with quick, flowing lines.

  ‘You see this?’ He pointed to a rough drawing of a human brain. ‘This is where you keep all your thoughts, your memories, all your images of the things that exist outside of your body, out in the real world. You understand?’

  Cal nodded.

  ‘OK, good. You ever watch TV?’

  ‘Yeah, we have that in England.’

  ‘And d’you think there are little men and women running around inside your TV set?’

  ‘No, of course not.’

  ‘No. But the people you see are real people, right?’

  ‘I guess so.’

  ‘No, you don’t guess so. You know so. They existed in a TV studio or on a film set and then they were made into little packets of digital information. Then they were beamed into space so that they could bounce off a satellite and end up in your living room a couple of thousand miles away. Pretty incredible when you think about it, huh?’

  ‘I suppose.’

  ‘Trust me, it is. But go back a while. If I’d told people a hundred years ago that such a thing was possible, they’d have locked me up as a madman. It was too advanced for them and they weren’t ready to believe it. Whereas nowadays we just accept it as ordinary. That old thing in the corner? It’s just the TV.’

  ‘Right,’ said Cal. ‘With lots of little digital people in it.’ When Jefferson had started to tell him about his dog, he’d thought it might be the beginning of a normal conversation, but now he was just rambling.

  ‘Cal!’ Jefferson reached across the table and gripped his arm. ‘This isn’t a game. I need you to listen. It’s important that you understand this.’

  ‘I am listening,’ said Cal, pulling his arm away. He had been staring into the shadows of the forest, wondering how far he would get if he ran. ‘You were talking about TV.’

  Jefferson reached for the sketch pad and hurriedly drew a stick figure with an arrow pointing towards the brain and another pointing back again.

  ‘The images in your mind have their own reality, Cal, although they correspond to another reality in the physical world. But like anything else, they need energy for their existence. It was my belief that this could work both ways.’

  ‘What do you mean?’

  ‘I mean that if our brains can use energy to convert the reality of the physical world into an image that exists in the mind, then there had to be a way to do the opposite. To convert these images into something that exists in the physical world. Do you see?’

  ‘Turning dreams into reality, you mean?’ asked Cal.

  ‘Exactly. Or the thi
ngs in them, at any rate. No one believed it was possible, of course. But that’s because the idea is way ahead of its time. Like TV, remember? People thought it was impossible because it didn’t fit with their view of the world. The world is flat, the world is round – what you believe depends on the science of the time. But then someone comes along and discovers something so incredible that people’s views of the world are changed for ever.’

  ‘And you think that’s what you’ve done?’ asked Cal, interested now in spite of his fear.

  ‘I don’t think I’ve done it, Cal. I have done it. And what’s more, you saw me do it with your own eyes.’

  Jefferson opened his satchel, took out the small brown teddy bear and placed it on the table.

  ‘You saw this in her dreams, didn’t you? You saw me take the image from her mind and turn it into something solid, something that exists out here in the real world. Don’t you understand, Cal? We’re making history here. This is one of those things that will change the way people see the world for ever.’

  Cal looked at Jefferson and saw the way he stared at some imagined future, saw the intensity in his eyes and wondered whether the things he said could possibly be true. He knew the images on the monitor could just have been some pre-recorded piece of film, that Jefferson could have bought the bear in any one of a thousand toy shops.

  But what would be the point of that? Why would Jefferson go to all the trouble of setting everything up and bringing them out here if it was simply some elaborate trick?

  ‘Is it true?’ he asked, scratching at a splinter of wood on the tabletop. ‘Can you really do that?’

  ‘Of course,’ said Jefferson. ‘I had to bring you out here because I needed someone young, someone with an open mind who would help me do this thing. When you’ve got something so huge, so important, then the normal rules don’t apply. Do you see?’

  Cal nodded.

  ‘Kind of.’

  And that was the strangest thing. Cal realised he was starting to believe that maybe Jefferson was telling the truth after all, that maybe all he wanted was for someone to help him with his experiment. He had a pretty extreme way of going about it, that was for sure, but then maybe if he got what he wanted, he would keep his promise.