by Martyn Ford
Tim panicked, shuffling back. He was completely vulnerable again. His brain was jumbled—he felt like running, but there was nowhere to go. Now the situation was out of his grasp, and a uniquely hopeless dread, usually found only in the darkest of nightmares, drove through him.
“Now you freeze,” Fredric said, spitting out his gum and facing Tim. “Where were we? Oh yeah, I was gonna do this.”
In a desperate surge of raw horror, Tim watched Fredric lift his aim and shoot the zapper at his chest. Tim was aware of the hot beam hitting his sternum, his flesh, bone, and blood disconnecting, spreading away from the center of his torso. The clean destruction zipped toward his face, down to his legs, to his fingers and toes.
A short screaming sound, maybe the howl of wind or the crack of a whip, and then Tim’s very thoughts were gone.
No white light, no flare of life.
There was simply nothing.
Now there was a lot of noise in the control room. Phil had ended up on the floor, standing beside the wheel of a swivel chair. The monkey saw Dee had taken cover and was crouched behind a workstation in the corner, her knees tucked to her chest. Fredric was on the other side, taking pot shots with the zapper. Objects above Dee’s head—a lamp, a computer monitor, a mug—disappeared, one by one, with a crack.
Samantha had also ducked down near the door. She was shouting, telling Dee to run, or something like that. It was all a haze—a surreal, incandescent flurry.
All these sounds, but Phil couldn’t hear a thing. There was nothing but a haunting wail in his ears, his vision jittering; he was gripped by the shock of what Fredric had done. How quickly and callously he had shot Tim. How, without a flicker of regret, he had taken his best friend, his creator, away.
When he’d been captured, Phil had seen the restricted areas in the belly of this complex—the computers, the readers, and the huge mind board, exactly like TRAD’s prototype, only larger. Now, calming down, he nodded to himself, watching the carnage unfold. The anger and grief and outrage motivated him. All at once, he knew what he had to do: Fredric and this entire place simply had to go.
Tim had been right, the monkey thought—perhaps creativity was the best therapy. So he scurried up the leg of the swivel chair, up onto the cushioned fabric, and then leapt to the desk above. At his side, out of focus, Fredric strolled casually toward Dee, about to finish the job. Phil stepped in the other direction, across the table, approaching the reader. He wrestled it upright, then carefully pulled the thin metal legs apart and gently bent the ends onto his temples.
Phil looked across the control room, through the viewing window, into the vast Imagination Space—the pseudo sun still glowed orange, warm on his skin. To date, of course, only Tim had been able to use the technology. Now that he thought about it, Phil was surprised no one had considered letting him have a go. After all, Tim had imagined the monkey. It wasn’t unthinkable that he’d possess the requisite attributes.
In fact, Phil thought to himself, it was jolly likely.
His head made contact with the small plastic pads on the reader. There was a tingling on his fur as he closed his eyes and pictured, as vividly as Tim always did, something that could appear in the space next door and sort out this whole fiasco. Yes, he had something suitable in mind.
Phil scrunched his face and imagined. A second later there was a low, loud THHWHUUUM, and in an instant, the control room was filled with a dim blue light.
Fredric stopped dead, lowering his zapper and turning to the window. The Imagination Space was full, floor to ceiling, wall to wall, with water. Cascading patterns painted everything around Phil. It felt like they were looking through the porthole of a submarine. Fredric’s head whipped to the side and he stared down at the monkey.
“My goodness,” he said, wrapped in astonishment. “You…you can use it too?”
He stepped closer, seeming to forget about Dee and Samantha. Phil scurried to the edge of the desk. The huge space looked like a forgotten city—the tops of trees, pathways, roller coaster, and plains were eerie and still beneath the water. It was crystal clear, like the ocean surrounding a Caribbean island, and yet the castle at the far side was barely visible, a mere darkened shape now—because, Phil realized, even the clearest liquid becomes opaque at such distances.
“I mean, well done, Phil,” Fredric said. “Sadly, I doubt this is gonna save you. While this is impressive, I think you could have been a little more imaginative than just water.”
“Poppycock,” the monkey replied, smiling. “I am afraid, good sir, it is not just water.”
There was a deep, ominous rumble as a vast presence, just a shadow at first, then a mass of something, swam past the window. “W-what? What was that?”
“I have conjured up what I suspect is the deadliest predator on earth,” Phil said, unable to hide his pride. “I have created…bear-sharks.”
Unsure exactly how many he’d made, Phil stared into the immense aquarium: he counted two, no three, no five, whale-sized monsters. Maybe more. They had the broad muzzles of bears, with the sleek length of a great white shark. Large, substantial legs were tucked flat to their bodies as the creatures swam—their brown fur rippled almost beautifully.
“Bear-sharks?” Fredric said, frowning.
“Bear-sharks,” Phil confirmed.
“Still,” Fredric added, hypnotized by the sight of them. “They’re in there and we’re in here. I’m afraid to say, little monkey dude, that this is still the end of the road for you.”
He turned and pointed the zapper at Phil, the marine patterns flowing across them both, but, behind him, one of the mammoth creations came swimming at an astonishing speed toward the window. The entire control room shook—like an earthquake—from the impact. Fredric lost his balance, swaying, as a few thin streams of water spurted through fresh cracks in the glass.
The second time one of them attacked, a large triangular shard fell out and a torrent came bursting into the room. It swept Fredric from his feet, and picked up chairs and tables, washing them to the wall. He tried again to fire the zapper but, now wet, it wouldn’t work. Realizing what was happening, Fredric seemed to panic and made for the exit. The moment he was outside, the two mechanical doors to the control room slammed shut, sealing Phil, Dee, and Samantha inside.
Dee had clambered out from her hiding place, now wading, the cold water rising to her waist.
“Phil,” she said, letting the monkey climb from the desk, up her arm, and onto her shoulder. The strip light above them had become a strobe, flickering madly.
Samantha was at the door, yanking at the switch and elbowing the handle. It was no use.
“It’s locked,” she said, barging with her shoulder.
Again there was a loud impact somewhere nearby. Although Phil couldn’t see it, he could feel that those huge beasts were destroying the place. Luckily, they’d given up on breaking through the window, for now.
However, the rough water—like a choppy ocean for the tiny monkey—was still rising fast, now near Dee’s armpits.
“What are we going to do?” Samantha yelled, turning, striding.
“I suspect we are going to die,” Dee replied. Her voice was slower than normal—she was clearly in shock, stunned by what she’d seen.
As Samantha got to the other side of the room, there was a whack on the door, making her flinch. Then another. And another. It was rhythmic. Something on the other side was bashing, again and again, trying to break in.
“Yep,” Dee added, calm as a cucumber. “We’re either going to drown or be eaten by bear-sharks. Not sure which.” The banging on the metal continued. “It sounds like the latter probably, which I suppose is the lesser of two evils. Phil, why are your bear-sharks so hostile?”
“I needed to imagine the most deadly and destructive animal on the planet,” the monkey replied, clinging onto her neck for balance. “If I am entirely honest, I did it quite quickly and with perhaps less than an ideal amount of forethought. So if this decision does
precede our demise, then I wholeheartedly apologize.”
Her warm skin was comforting—a far cry from the chilled spray in the air. He looked up and noticed her cheeks were glistening with tears. It was a bewildering sight—he’d assumed Dee was too tough, too hard to cry, even at a time like this. And yet she spoke as though this were just another day, betrayed only by her body’s reaction to the loss of her best friend.
“You should have created them to be friendly to us,” she said.
“Yes, perhaps next time I will.”
The water had just passed her shoulders, splashing to Phil’s knees, so she stepped onto a chair. It was perhaps another thirty seconds before the level would be at the ceiling. “I don’t think there will be a next time,” Dee said, “as it sounds like one of them is about to come through there.”
With one final thump, the door came off its hinges, and some, but not all, of the water sloshed out, tugging them along.
Holding on to the fixed desk, Dee and Samantha yelled, and Phil did too, expecting imminent death. But in the doorway, instead of a giant bear-shark there was a person, clutching a fire axe. He was wearing a red-checkered shirt and a black backpack. He lifted his head.
“T-Timothy?” Phil said. “What…what the devil is going on here?”
“Tim!” Dee yelled, scrambling, tripping, swimming to hug him. She arrived and squeezed. “What’s happening? Fredric…he shot you. He zapped you.”
“Yes,” Tim said. “He did.”
There was a pause. Samantha, Dee, and Phil were all staring at him. “Well, explain yourself,” Dee snapped.
“I was worried he’d zap me away once he’d confessed. What I needed was to transmit a video of everything he told me, via the facility’s internal network, to this.” Tim held up a small USB memory stick, containing the incriminating footage. “It meant I had to be in two places at the same time.”
“But that is surely not possible,” Phil said.
Tim glanced across the rising water, to the window.
“You…you imagined yourself?” Samantha asked, shaking her head. “So there were two Tims? Like a clone?”
“Bingo,” Tim said. “Old Cloney’s gone now, though, which is a shame because he was all right. Handsome.”
“By anyone’s estimations, it is good to see you, sir,” Phil said, before finding his way into Tim’s top pocket. “Terrific hustle. Telling us could have spared some distress, however.”
“It was a last-minute plan. All’s well that ends well.” It was a relieving moment for Tim, being reunited with the others. Even though they were far from safe, he still felt lightly satisfied with this limited success. He also silently hoped that his clone’s disappearance wasn’t too traumatic for him. Poor guy.
“Now just the small matter of escaping and getting that confession online,” Samantha said.
Nodding, Tim asked, “What is going on with all this water?”
“It is not just water,” Phil said.
The monkey explained what had happened, that he too was able to use the technology.
“That’s…cool,” Tim said.
But Tim felt something fundamental change. A shift in tides. He’d always taken quiet pride in his abilities, but now he wasn’t the only one. He wasn’t special.
“I would not wish you to feel at all besmirched by this revelation,” Phil said. “I am, after all, a creation of yours. Credit where it is due.”
Although that was a strange thought, the monkey was right. All this was ultimately Tim’s doing.
However, like the others, he also felt that Phil’s first creations were somewhat lacking in practicality. “Yeah, anyway, about these bear-sharks,” Tim said. “I am impressed, well done and everything. It’s just…as awesome as they are…I can’t see how they’re going to help.”
“Will you all stop rustling my fur about the bear-sharks?” Phil said. “Fredric has gone, has he not? They have bought us some time, at the very least.”
“Can we get out that way?” Dee asked, looking over Tim’s shoulder. The light above was fizzing, flickering now faster than ever, the cold water rising again.
“Nope,” Tim said. “Fredric sealed all the doors. Hence the axe.”
“So you came in here so we can drown together?” Dee said. “That’s sweet.”
“No.” Tim grabbed the metal crown reader from the table, then waded across the control room to the main console. “I’ve got a plan.”
He shook his head at all the complex dials and buttons. Half of them were submerged. Near the top was a protruding section with a few wires sticking out. It was labeled READER CALIBRATION STATION.
“Heh,” Phil said. “Rhymes.”
“What are you doing?” Samantha asked.
“The reader won’t work because it’s wet,” Tim said, placing it on his head, remembering when Fredric had explained all this. He then tugged the cable toward his ear. “If I plug it in, and press this switch, I think it’ll reset it. Recalibrate it. Then I can imagine something to get rid of all this water.”
“Superb,” Phil said.
Tim clicked in the plug, then flicked two switches, hearing it power up. The final part of the process was a red button, beneath one of those safety covers. With a wet finger, he reached out and pressed it, hoping that—
Thud.
Sparks and a terrible sound. The reader roared on his head, sending shards of razor agony down his spine. A guttural scream, which Tim realized was his, echoed around him.
The next thing he knew, he was on his back, floating in the water, staring up at the flashing light above, his vision rotating like a fairground tunnel. And a moment later he was sinking into sleep, having the most vivid dream about home.
Concerned voices faded in over the static hiss in the flooded control room. “…hear us? Tim?” Loud and clear now. “Tim, wake up. Can you hear us?”
With a flinch, Tim sat up, his feet hitting the floor. He checked over his shoulder, confused. “What happened?”
“The control station, it exploded,” Samantha said. “The reader is fried.”
A hollow pain behind Tim’s eyes, like a sore tooth, eased, and he composed himself.
“Are you okay?” Dee asked.
“Yeah, I…I think so.” He rubbed his temples. “I feel a bit sick, but I’m all right.”
This was only half true—Tim could tell that something was wrong with his body. He could feel it in his bones.
“Another plan, perhaps?” Phil said.
The water was still rising as Tim waded to the window—it glowed blue, and a thick stream continued to pump through the hole. He was shivering. “There’s a…a service hatch on the ceiling of the Imagination Space.”
Dee looked up through the cracked glass, narrowing her eyes. “I can’t see it.”
“Trust me,” Tim said. “It’s there, it’s just a long way away.”
“So…,” Dee said.
“We’re going to have to swim,” Samantha put in, removing her jacket.
Phil then suggested, with a tone of fear in his voice, that Tim use his Imagination Box, which he still had strapped to his back, to make breathing apparatuses for everyone. Or, even better, some teleportation spheres. However, like the metal reader, Tim’s hat was soaking wet and would be useless until it dried.
Everyone prepared themselves as best they could. Samantha took the axe.
“Ready?” she asked, looking at Tim and Dee. They both nodded, holding on to the desk. “All right…three, two, one.”
Grunting, she swung it into the glass, smashing it completely. The room flooded—right to the ceiling—in two seconds flat. After getting thrashed around in the loud rapids, they took their last gasps of air from the lighting recesses and then dived down. Everything became quiet, muffled. A blunt ache arrived in Tim’s ears from the pressure.
Samantha went first, followed by Dee. Then Tim grabbed the viewing-window frame and pulled himself through. Above, below, and ahead of him was cold, sea-deep water—
so much that he couldn’t see the edges of the Imagination Space. As he swam a clumsy breaststroke, he looked down at all he’d created—castle, forest, roller coaster, and more—now sunken, like a shipwreck. He pictured all those rooms, the thousands of items, desires, floating now, drowned and broken.
Up ahead, there was a high-pitched scream. Light silvery bubbles flowed quickly from Samantha’s mouth and rose.
A mammoth shadow passed below. Tim’s stomach sank. He kept kicking and kicking upward as another huge shape moved to his right. Swimming in a line, heading diagonally toward the center of the high ceiling, they were being circled.
Tim’s legs were burning and his heart pounded, tightening his ribs, as his vision started to blur.
He was swimming so hard that only when he bashed his head on the metal did he realize they had arrived. Feeling absurdly vulnerable, Tim ducked down again and shimmied over to the door, his body dangling below him, like bait from a hook. The hatch had a large circular handle, which he grabbed onto. It was stuck.
Samantha and Dee joined in, all tugging, wide-eyed, desperate for air, seconds from death, tugging, tugging, tugging. Finally, it squeaked and scraped around, then lifted away. They poked their heads out above the rippling surface, heaving and gasping. Tim raised his chest so Phil too could take a few urgent breaths.
He swam aside and let Dee and Samantha through to the service ladder, which led up a narrow shaft connecting the Imagination Space to the desert above.
The last thing Tim saw as he pulled himself up from the dark water was one of the monsters rising and snapping for his feet. With a splash and a yelp, he got out just in time, feeling the spray from its roar lurch up, echoing through the service tunnel. Above them was a perfect circle of daylight, like the rim of a well.
On the surface, atop the underground facility below them, they got their bearings. Tim leaned forward, catching his breath, the blazing desert already starting to dry him. Wet dirt and sand muddied his hands and jeans. The sky was the deepest blue, and a couple of vultures circled up ahead of them. Sunshine split and flared through his stinging eyes. Jutting high behind was a large metal tower, covered in satellite antennas and other equipment, taller than the biggest pylon Tim had ever seen. It’s obviously what sends the signals to IcoRama phones, he thought.
