A Mind of its Own

by Martyn Ford

  The professor drove his quiet, electric car into a space on the far side, beneath a wonky tree – it stood alone, its bushy top shaking in the salty winds. Beyond it Tim could see the sea. It had taken a while to convince Dee and Eisenstone to come here. After all, a prison seemed, at least for them, a strange place to start the investigation. But Tim needed answers. And an inmate here, an old foe, might just have some.

  As they approached the entrance to this wide building, Tim took in the tall fences with curled rows of razor wire running around the perimeter, watchtowers with searchlights and armed guards on patrol. Blackbirds with black eyes shuffled and pecked high up on the edge of a nearby concrete wall – below them, CCTV cameras surveyed the lands. Hawk Peak, the professor explained, was the highest-security prison in the country, maybe the world. Tim felt a swell in his chest – a little blip of anxiety at the thought of being locked up in this place. And then he felt another, twice the strength, when he considered that he was already trapped in a far larger and far more disturbing prison.

  ‘Just, just let me do the talking,’ Eisenstone said as they went in through the front doors.

  The previous afternoon, after Tim had recreated Phil and convinced Dee and Eisenstone to take him seriously, they’d all sat in the professor’s living room, where they’d had a philosophical conversation about the nature of reality. The old man had spent most of it pacing and wildly gesturing with enthusiasm.

  ‘So, none of this is real?’ Dee asked, glancing around. She picked up a cushion and squeezed it, then banged on the coffee table. ‘It’s all someone else’s imagination?’

  ‘It’s as real as anything I’ve created,’ Tim said.

  ‘Exhibit A.’ Phil presented himself, with a bow.

  ‘Yes. Well, I, I suppose it is no more or less real than any other reality,’ Eisenstone said. ‘Indeed, there is a school of thought that suggests many worlds exist concurrently. The many worlds theory, in fact. It relates to the nature of very small things. Stuff gets pretty strange at an atomic level. It’s a bit like … a bit like, oh, yes, yes, have any of you heard of Schrödinger’s cat?’

  ‘Rings bells,’ Dee said.

  ‘Indeed, the idea goes like this: you put a cat in a sealed box along with some poison which activates randomly.’

  ‘Seems unfair on the cat,’ Phil said. The monkey had been sitting on the arm of the sofa, by Tim’s side.

  ‘It’s a thought experiment,’ Eisenstone added. ‘We don’t actually need a cat for it. Now, now, we wait a bit and, then, indeed, ask, is the cat alive or is the cat dead? It is quite impossible to know. We won’t know for sure until we look inside, correct?’

  Tim nodded. ‘If we can’t see it or hear it, yeah, we’d have to open the box to be certain.’

  ‘So, therefore, quantum mechanics dictates that the cat is both alive and dead at the same time. Only when we open the lid and look inside, only when it is observed, does reality pick either alive or dead.’

  ‘Cool,’ Dee said.

  ‘If a tree falls in the woods, and no one is there to hear it, does it make a sound?’ Phil added.

  ‘Yes, yes.’ The professor pointed at the monkey. ‘Indeed. It is a little like that. Some theorists believe when you flip a coin, the universe splits in two – in one it’s heads, in another it’s tails. Every choice, every variation, is a fork in the road. A great tree of endless possibility.’ Eisenstone paused, then stared at the wall. It seemed he was now talking only to himself. ‘Maybe consciousness is the key … Maybe reality isn’t a physical space which we live in, but rather we are simply isolated minds in a theatre of our own making. Each brain, each conscious creature is, in a sense, a universe in itself.’

  Tim and Dee exchanged a look, eyebrows lifted high.

  ‘What does this hypothetical feline torture, intriguing though it is, have to do with our current predicament?’ Phil asked.

  Eisenstone blinked and seemed back in the room. ‘Well, well, perhaps everything exists in all its possible hazy states, all at once – but on a large scale, or, rather, an infinite scale. And the imagination station allows the user to pick which reality we end up in.’

  ‘This is making me go cross-eyed,’ Tim said. ‘I like talking about consciousness and the universe, but I don’t quite understand either.’

  ‘Don’t worry,’ Eisenstone said. ‘No one does.’

  As they continued discussing this topic, Dee was sitting cross-legged on the armchair typing away on her granddad’s laptop. She hadn’t explained what she was doing but, after around ten minutes of keyboard clatter, she lifted her head and laughed.

  ‘Wow,’ she said. ‘You guys should read this.’

  Tim stood and perched on the arm of the chair. Phil scurried on to the laptop, kneeling next to the mouse mat. Tim saw the screen reflected in the monkey’s brown eyes – they were so dark and clear he reckoned if he had a magnifying glass he could probably read the website in them.

  ‘I thought I’d look online for similar theories about what Tim was saying,’ Dee explained. ‘I found this paper written by a psychiatrist. She’s been treating a patient who has “elaborate and complex delusions about Clarice Crowfield”.’ Dee did bunny ears with her fingers. ‘A lot of it sounds the same as your story.’

  ‘What’s the doctor’s name?’ Tim asked.

  ‘Joanne Reed. Heard of her?’

  ‘Nope,’ Tim said. ‘And the patient?’

  ‘He’s a convicted criminal – it says he’s locked up in Hawk Peak Prison. His name is … let me see … Fredric Wilde.’

  ‘Ding dong,’ Phil said.

  ‘You mentioned him earlier,’ Dee added. ‘The wrong’un who framed Granddad and had a network of mind-control devices.’

  Either, Dee then summarised, this indicated that there was some truth in Tim’s claims, or it was simply a remarkable coincidence that two people had identical delusions. Both options, she said, were interesting.

  Tim decided, as he and Fredric Wilde seemed to be the only people on earth who knew the truth, that they needed to meet up. However, actually having a face-to-face conversation with someone locked up in Hawk Peak was, Eisenstone said, quite tricky.

  ‘You can’t, well, you can’t just go waltzing into prisons like this one. We’d need fake IDs or something,’ he suggested. ‘An official letter from a judge or doctor or similar. We’d need it to be co-signed by his lawyer. Even if it was possible, which I stress it isn’t, it’d take weeks to arrange.’

  Tim had already put the imagination box reader on his head and pressed the button. ‘Something like these?’ he said, pulling the freshly cooked paperwork from the device.

  Now they were all walking down a narrow corridor having been checked and scanned and searched and quizzed about why they wanted to visit Fredric Wilde. All apart from Phil, who agreed to wait in the car – they were trying not to attract any unwanted attention, after all. He was given the token task of guarding the imagination box prototype, safely stowed away in Eisenstone’s car boot. The professor made up a story, said they were distant relatives and had permission from a judge. At reception he handed over forged IDs and letters, which were thoroughly inspected. Tim had a familiar wave of panic, worrying that he might have accidently imagined a mistake on the papers.

  Luckily, however, they were allowed to enter.

  ‘So this guy, why did he invent mind-control phones?’ Dee whispered as they walked.

  ‘Because he was worried about the imagination technology,’ Tim explained. ‘He was a high-flying business man, a billionaire. He was scared that if everyone had an imagination box, no one would buy anything any more. Money would become worthless. He said society would crumble.’

  ‘Yes, yes,’ Eisenstone added. ‘The device could well harm commerce and industry.’

  ‘But, you said we stopped him?’ Dee asked. ‘How?’

  Even now, after all she’d seen, there was some doubt in Dee’s voice – she still didn’t fully believe everything.

  �
�It’s a long story,’ Tim said. ‘But in a nutshell: bear-sharks.’

  As they entered the final corridor, they went through some more scanners. This one was huge, like a tunnel – a complicated-looking gizmo whizzed round on rails and fired a network of lasers down on to them.

  Eventually, however, they arrived at Fredric’s cell.

  The first thing that Tim noticed, on the back wall, was a large white sign. It had a black clef with a red line running through it. ‘No music,’ the sign read in bold letters. Tim thought that was a strange and mean rule to have.

  And behind, above, he saw a CCTV camera looking right at him. He turned back to the cell.

  Fredric was just as Tim remembered, besides seeming much older. He was wearing a baggy grey jumper and jogging bottoms – there were large shadows under his eyes and scruffy stubble on his cheeks. Earlier Tim had been worried about seeing him again, but Fredric was more a sad figure now, rather than a scary one. In fact, the guy was a mess.

  However, he still managed a smile. ‘Now, of all the people I expected to see …’ he said in his thick American accent.

  Tim asked how he was, but Fredric just shook his head.

  ‘We … we read that you remember what happened?’ Tim said.

  There was a long pause – Fredric hesitated and couldn’t find the right words.

  ‘Do … do you know the truth too?’ he finally said, his eyes wide with hope. ‘About Clarice, about everything?’

  Tim nodded.

  ‘God, my God,’ Fredric said. ‘So TRAD actually built the imagination station?’

  ‘How do you know about it?’ Dee asked.

  ‘I used to have limited access to the Internet,’ Fredric said. ‘I was reading papers, in all kinds of scientific journals – the agency adopted a policy of transparency after what happened. TRAD’s resident neuroscience geek, Rick Harris – he was writing about it. I said this technology is bad news … But I figured he’d never make it work, even if he did build it. I mean, they’d need to have abilities like yours for a start …’

  Tim squirmed. ‘I … I kinda … I made him an exact copy of my brain. I think he used that, like a relay. Sort of transmitted his thoughts through it. I guess that’s how it works.’

  ‘Oh, good job,’ Fredric said, with very obvious sarcasm. ‘I’m relieved though. I’ve been having therapy.’ Sighing, he shook his head again. ‘I thought I was crazy.’

  ‘You are crazy,’ Tim said. ‘Remember all the murders and mind control?’

  ‘No, I mean, like, besides that. Like crazy-crazy. Man, though, it’s rad that I was right. So, what’s the plan? Is this a jailbreak?’ He smiled.

  ‘Well, no,’ Tim said.

  ‘Pretty impossible anyway. You know they score prisons by how secure they are?’ Fredric stroked the concrete wall then dinged his knuckle on the metal bars that separated them. ‘Hawk Peak comes out on top. I think I’m here for the long haul – no matter which reality we’re in. So, what are you doing here?’

  ‘I just wanted to understand how, or why, you can remember everything?’ Tim said.

  ‘I think it’s a punishment.’ Fredric sat on his low bed. ‘A while back, in the old universe this is, Stephen Crowfield came to visit me.’

  Tim had always felt sorry for Stephen – he was a victim of his mother. Clarice blamed her son for all of her failings and used him as a pawn in her schemes. It made Tim sigh to think that she was doing it all over again.

  ‘Why?’ he asked. ‘What did Stephen want?’

  ‘Well, ya know, his mother was back from the dead,’ Fredric said. ‘Teleported back into the world. Anyway, she was angry and ambitious as always. I figured the Crowfields read about the imagination station too? Maybe they guessed it wasn’t just theory.’

  ‘So, she stole it,’ Tim said – he’d already thought as much. ‘But what did Stephen want from you?’

  ‘The Nevada facility. That place was quarantined after the incidents, after you guys destroyed it. They wanted access codes to get inside.’

  ‘Why?’

  ‘There were still some teleportation spheres there.’ These were like little metal golf balls – if you press the button on an orange one, you will teleport to wherever the blue one is and vice versa. They were one of Wilde Tech Inc’s better inventions. ‘Point is, an odd number were recovered,’ Fredric added. ‘Some orange ones were there, buried underground in the dirt, and at least one of their blue counterparts—’

  ‘Was in the Diamond Building,’ Tim said, nodding.

  ‘Exactly. And as you know, breaking into TRAD’s headquarters ain’t easy.’

  ‘So, hang on, this is your fault?’ Tim asked.

  ‘No, God no.’ Fredric stood up. ‘I told Stephen to get lost. I ain’t gonna go giving them access to my facility. You know me, Tim, you know I ain’t a fan of all this imagination technology. It’s dangerous. Even more dangerous than I ever feared. Just look what it’s done. Just look what you’ve done.’ Fredric glared at Tim and then at Eisenstone. The professor glanced at his feet and nodded silently to himself.

  ‘Hey, be reasonable,’ Tim said. ‘We couldn’t have predicted this.’

  ‘You helped build a device that can change the universe and you’re surprised that the universe has changed?’ Fredric clapped slowly. ‘Ten points to the brainy bunch.’

  Now he said it like that, Tim did feel a smidge responsible. Eisenstone too looked pale. The old professor had had a fairly overwhelming twenty-four hours, after all.

  ‘But … my defiance came at a cost.’ Fredric turned to the wall and pointed at the sign. ‘I told Stephen all I had left was music. It was all I could enjoy in here. So when Clarice used the imagination station, she took it away. Hell doesn’t roar ya know, it’s completely silent. Now go. The game’s over, kid. You’ve lost.’

  Chapter 8

  They left Hawk Peak Prison having confirmed many of Tim’s suspicions. On the way out, they passed a woman wearing a brown suit and thin wire glasses. Tim read her name tag: Doctor Reed – this was Fredric’s psychiatrist. And she was watching them intensely as they left, almost like she recognised them. Tim checked over his shoulder as the glass front door closed behind – the doctor, still staring, was making a phone call now.

  On the drive back, Dee was sitting in the front seat recalling everything she’d heard and, while maybe she believed Tim now, she still didn’t seem interested in his plan. ‘In fact, I’m just going to bow out of this one,’ she said. ‘You guys can go on your crazy adventure if you want. I promise I’ll keep it secret.’

  ‘We’ve got to stop Clarice,’ Tim said from the back seat. ‘Don’t you understand?’

  ‘Why though?’ Dee said, shrugging. ‘Literally why bother? Just get on with your life. It’s all fine.’

  ‘Because … because she’s … she’s bad,’ Tim said.

  Although he hadn’t explained it in the best words, this was undeniably true. Clarice was bad. Tim had seen recordings of Stephen’s childhood memories – he had seen the cruel ways Clarice used to torment her own son. As if that wasn’t enough, Tim had also seen inside her mind when she transmitted her thoughts through his. Her huge imagination box confirmed it. It created exactly what was inside her: a monster. ‘A physical manifestation of everything she was,’ Phil had noted in his comic.

  ‘Is she though?’ Dee said. ‘She used to be, but everything is different now.’

  This was a good point, Tim reasoned. ‘So … what kind of prime minister is she?’

  ‘I gather everyone loves her,’ Dee said.

  ‘Indeed, she does receive a lot of praise,’ Eisenstone added, still concentrating on the road.

  ‘Even that’s weird – people are meant to hate politicians,’ Tim said. ‘This is just because that’s how she’s imagined it. Trust me, she’s not good.’

  ‘Well, I’ve heard no complaints,’ Dee said. ‘Everyone always gets into the spirit on Crowfield Day, wearing wigs and that.’

  ‘What the hell is C
rowfield Day?’ Tim asked, frowning.

  ‘You know, it’s Crowfield Day. It’s … it’s like … it’s a bit like Christmas, but better.’

  ‘Better?!’

  ‘My point is this,’ Dee said, shuffling round in the front seat and looking directly at him now. ‘What makes you think you can imagine a better, fairer, more whatever universe than she can?’

  ‘It’s not real,’ Tim said slowly, growing angry now. ‘It’s all a lie.’

  ‘One cannot help but wonder how she ascended to such a position in your minds as it were?’ Phil said. ‘In your somewhat apocryphal memories?’

  ‘The Crowfield family dynasty goes back generations,’ the professor explained. ‘But Clarice herself, she’s been in politics since her twenties – and has always been popular. A little over fifteen years ago, she was elected into office and her first two terms went so well that everyone agreed to keep her on. And, and with no real challengers, there’s been no need for any elections.’

  This backstory Clarice had written herself made Tim shake his head. He didn’t know a great deal about politics and democracy, but he knew that people having a vote was quite an important part of it all.

  ‘So, what, she’s just the Prime Minister forever, and everyone’s cool with that?’ Tim asked.

  ‘A dictatorship is the best system, as long as the dictator is a good one,’ Dee said. ‘That’s what they taught us in school.’

  ‘That is sort of true,’ Phil said.

  ‘Whose side are you on?’ Tim frowned at the monkey. ‘It’s not the best system, because who decides what is good and what is bad?’

  ‘You, apparently,’ Dee said.

  ‘Look, whatever,’ Tim huffed. ‘All this doesn’t matter because it’s not real.’

  ‘Well, as Granddad said, it’s as real as any other reality and it’s all we’ve ever known. So, let’s just keep our heads down and make do.’