by Femi Fadugba
A bolt of lightning strikes a hundred metres or so in front of me with a flash so bright I have to turn away. The light hangs in the air for a few seconds after landing, and I take the chance to look around.
I put my hand to the ashy ground as the light slowly fades. It’s blacker than volcano skin and filled with cracks as wide as rope. Staring up, I sense a frantic busy-ness to the place, even though it’s empty and flat in every direction. Well, almost every direction. I haven’t looked behind me. I haven’t wanted to. Because, from the moment I entered this place, I’ve known something was there.
Tensed up, I ball my hands into fists before turning around.
I’ve never been to Victoria Falls or the Burj Khalifa or the Great Wall of China, but none of them could fill me with anywhere near the sense of insignificance this … thing … does. It’s like nothing man or nature could have built. I can only describe it as a kind of massive thread floating above the ground and stretching further than I can see. It weaves back and forth and round itself, starting from ground level and stacking up so high the top is scraping space. And, even though the flash of light is long gone, I can still see all of it clearly, like it’s supplying its own faint glow.
I’m urged on by the same ‘why the hell not’ curiosity that pushes us forward in dreams. Because my first instinct isn’t to run or panic but to walk towards it. I think back to the first time I put my eye to a TV and realized that the Power Rangers I’d just spent twenty minutes drooling over were just a line of pixels changing colour on the screen. In a similar way, this thing isn’t a single thread at all. Close up, I see it’s made up of objects hanging near enough together that they look connected, but they aren’t.
Things get even weirder as I eat up the metres and realize the object closest to me looks almost like … a person? Whatever it is, it has on the same chequered boxers I wore to bed last night.
I stop dead, hoping that when I reopen my eyes I’ll be seeing and thinking straight again. But the next three objects I see are all wearing my favourite charcoal tracksuit. And each one has the same dark skin and height: my dark skin and height.
‘That. Is. Mad,’ I whisper as my eyes widen. ‘It’s me.’
Floating above me is another row of objects, one hanging low enough that I could probably touch the heel with a running jump. I squint to get a better look at the features. He has crow’s feet around his eyes, but there’s enough resemblance to think this could be me fifteen or twenty years on – at least, what I imagine I might look like then. Wrapped round the ears of older me is a pair of headphones straight out of Star Trek, and the logo on the side seems to say … Cantor’s? As in the chicken restaurant? This has to be a dream, I think.
Either way, playing it safe won’t get me out. Everyone knows that the only way to escape a nightmare is to get so close to the boogie monster that your mind has no choice but to wake you up.
Another ground-level shape catches my eye. It – He? I? – is wearing my Penny Hill blazer and the same mismatched socks as me. He’s hunched over and, for some reason, has a tent-shaped bulge at the zip. I start giggling, then laughing. Soon I have tears in my eyes and I’m holding my knees for support.
I extend a finger towards my clone’s crotch, slowly enough that I can pull back if anything weird happens. But instead of feeling four and a half inches of hot steel, my hand passes through thin air. It’s a projection: a high-definition, self-illuminating, sick projection. The light pulsing inside it is dim and grainy, like a hologram living on low battery.
But where’s the energy coming from? Where’s this whole thing coming from?
There’s only one way to find out.
I angle my front foot into the same spot it’s placed in the projection and immediately feel a tingling in my toes. What I’m doing feels risky, but no one’s here to save me from myself.
I slide my legs and arms in place and feel the tingling get tighter, almost like the projection is winding itself round me. Finally I inch my head forward, gasping for whatever surprise is coming.
Sparkling red light fills my vision, then –
I hear cheering and laughing from behind classroom doors. I’m standing in the school hallway and it reeks of Dettol like it always does.
I can’t see if anyone else is nearby because I’m too busy staring down into Nadia’s big brown eyes, one arm cradled round her back, my free hand forming a cup round her right bum cheek. As if I’ve just caught her.
‘I see you got a nice handful there, E,’ she says.
I grin back at her and –
The projection kicks me out after a handful of seconds and I find myself on the dirt again, scorching wind brushing ash into my eyes and whipping my back.
I guess that explains the boner. Another lightning bolt crackles on the horizon as I stand, smiling. It feels a lot less like a nightmare now. My first dip in the bag was a sweet one, and I wonder if all the projections are the same.
There are at least a thousand projections around me, and those are only the ones close enough to see. I jog to one a few metres along, hoping it’ll let me skip to the steamy ending of the scene I just left.
It’s night. This time the air comes with a light scent of … fried chicken?
Filling one corner of my vision is the orange surfboard that sits on top of Peckham Library. I’m in a narrow alleyway – it feels weirdly familiar, but I can’t place it; it’s too dark.
A hailstone bounces off my cheek and cracks in two on the concrete, and I look up to a sky brimming with them. Bigger ones crash down, faster by the second.
Through the white mess, I make out a face: D’s.
He’s got a plaster across his cheekbone. He’s pressing forward. He looks destroyed, ready to destroy. I catch Bloodshed jogging in behind him.
They’re cornering me.
After falling out of this hologram, I land hard on my back. OK, that one definitely felt more like a nightmare.
While lying in the dirt, I struggle to fit together the pieces. The BBC weather lady did mention a ‘massive hailstorm’ would be hitting London on Friday. That, at least, explains why my subconscious dropped hail into my dreams. And my ongoing beef with D and Bloodshed obviously explains why they’ve shown up. But why here? Why now?
Staring at the shimmering Essos floating around me, I’m not sure I even want to see more.
But I have to. How could anyone resist? Plus, while dunked in the last projection, I noticed something – the milky coating that usually helps me tell a dream from reality was missing. I could feel everything that was happening with my whole body, like I was actually there and then.
I start to walk forward. However itchy the next experience might get, it will feel safer and more familiar than the bleak and blazing-hot desert I’m standing in.
Black.
Weird. But I step into another projection right after and it’s the same.
In the end, I try eight more projections, counting how long the trip lasts on the final two runs. Each one gives the same result: seven seconds of pure black. A few had faint sounds in the background, but there was nothing to stare at but darkness.
I jog back towards the projection with Nadia, and notice a figure behind it. It’s me on my feet, but curled up in a ball with that ugly flinch-face I make when I’m shook.
‘The car crash,’ I whisper, trying to figure out what role the order of the holograms might play.
Then I step in.
I’m staring at thick zebra markings on the concrete. Then someone – a woman? – who I can’t see screams.
‘Preston! No!!!!!’
Tendons snap, bones crunch. The sounds make me nauseous and my mouth fills with bile. When I look up to see where the screams came from, I see the chaperone lady frozen on the roadside – her face and blouse covered with specks of blood.
I run out of that projection so fast, I have to sidestep the next one to make sure I don’t fall straight into another nightmare. A shiver prickles up my spine. I thought I
didn’t dodge the car in time, and, if the vision I’ve just seen is true, now I know the little boy didn’t either.
It’s not real, I remind myself. It’s definitely not real. But I can’t stop replaying the moments before the crash, seeing that ghostly look on his face before impact.
Suddenly it feels like the heat’s been cranked up two notches, to the point where I wonder if I might suffocate in the hot air. If death exists in this place, it’s on its way. I notice I’m thinking about everyone I left behind. Rob, Kato, Nadia. Mum. Even with the whole D situation waiting for me at school, it’s enough to make me miss the warm familiarity of a place like Penny Hill.
‘It’s just a dream; it has to be,’ I shout while sprinting as far away from this impossible thing as I can. My legs struggle to keep up as I imagine some giant bat sweeping in to claw me back.
‘Remember,’ I say, panting, ‘it’s just a dream.’ But inside, I’m screaming, praying I wake up soon.
CHAPTER 8
Rhia · 15 Years Later
I went through the notes I’d jotted down before the tutorial in my head. Firstly (and unlike what the new Daredevil comic would have you believe), blind people didn’t have enhanced smell or super-hearing; they just listened to their other senses a bit more. Secondly, blind people did blink, which meant I’d have to time my scan just right. If at all possible, I’d try to take two. Finally, and most importantly, of all the people who were certified blind, the majority weren’t actually fully blind. So only after I put the iris scanner to Dr Esso’s eyeball would I know whether he’d see it.
He came in wearing the 2033 edition of the Cantor’s-Kinetic headphones and, with a magician’s finesse, slid them into the front compartment of his rucksack. I couldn’t leave that kit room without his biometrics in my pocket. I had a plan, but the riskiest part was holding my nerve till it finally came time to execute it.
‘I see you got your eyebrows done again.’ I laid on an extra-casual tone. ‘Don’t get me wrong, I trim mine pretty often. But, mate – you’re dedicated.’
Olivia and I had agreed I couldn’t be any less snarky than I’d been in our first tutorial. I admit it brought me some comfort to know he couldn’t diss me back based on my own looks. With the pea-sized pimple on my forehead and the girls at school crowning me ‘president of the itty-bitty-titty committee’, I’d never seen myself as bulletproof.
‘Thanks for the encouragement,’ he replied deadpan. ‘Make sure you bring that same positive energy when you’re cheering on your team-mates from the bench this weekend.’
Wow, he’d been keeping tabs. I had to force a gulp down my throat before I could answer. ‘If our midfield weren’t a bunch of hoggers, I’d have a lot more goals by now.’
‘Right,’ he said. ‘And if my bank was a bit more generous, I’d be rocking a Rolex.’
‘Yeah, but … I mean … You know …’
After waiting for me to break the two-word barrier without success, he waved at the open chair opposite his, then said: ‘Shall we?’
Fifteen minutes left and I still hadn’t been able to segue into the discussion I needed to have. His face was a foot too far away for me to stretch over and take the scan from my seat. I had to get much closer, which meant I had to be smart. Be patient, I kept reminding myself. You’ve got a plan, just be patient.
My homework was open and, as usual, he made me read it out loud. ‘No matter how slow or fast you’re going,’ I said, ‘light will always be going 300,000 kilometres per second faster than you. No matter what. PLEASE DISCUSS.’
I’d actually spent a decent amount of time on it the night before, but, after an hour of staring at the sheet, I still hadn’t come close to a satisfying answer. I also knew there was much less chance of Dr Esso raising one of his scraggly eyebrows if I showed interest in his mid-lesson monologues. It worked in my favour to have him believe I gave half a shit. Showing any sort of curiosity about an adult’s interests was the easiest way to have them eating from your palm.
‘And?’ He leaned in for my response.
‘And it doesn’t make any sense.’
‘Don’t it?’ he asked.
‘I literally spent all night wondering why you’d put me through this torture.’
He chuckled to himself. ‘I know it sounds crazy, but it’s important you proper get this one.’ He started tapping his foot. ‘That way, you’ll understand everything else I need to tell you.’
I felt my chest tighten, my neck getting so tense that I couldn’t move it. Mum, I thought, wondering if that was where he was leading me. Maybe Dr Esso had found me on purpose. Maybe she was why he was here.
No. I had to focus. I couldn’t afford to hold those hopes too long or let one shady comment dismantle the trap I’d planned.
After some time rummaging, he placed his Caster-5 on the table, smiling like a rich kid on Christmas. I still couldn’t understand why he was so fanatical about this physics stuff, but I knew I had to pree everything he said, regardless of the topic.
‘OK.’ I took a quiet breath in, reminding myself to use the same kind of words he liked using. ‘So, I actually came up with my own “thought experiment”. Just to prove how ridiculous the statement in your assignment is.’
‘Let’s go,’ he said with the same overexcitement he’d had from the start.
‘All right – so, imagine it’s just me, you and my sister, Olivia, in Dangote stadium. Olivia’s sitting up in the stands, while you and I are down at the halfway mark on the pitch. You’ve got a torch in your hand and decide to turn it on and point it at goal. And, for some reason, I decide to chase after the light beam that comes out of it.’
A hologram appeared above the table, a near-perfect rendering of the scene I’d been imagining.
‘Safe,’ he added. ‘I’m following.’
If he says the word ‘safe’ one more time, I’m going to shoot myself in the face, I thought, but out loud, continued: ‘Now, imagine Olivia has this device that can measure the speed of the light coming out your torch. There’s no reason she wouldn’t get the bog-standard speed for light when she measures it, right?’
‘Right. So around 300,000 kilometres per second.’
‘Exactly,’ I confirmed. ‘All right, bom. Now let’s say I’m carrying my own light-speed-measuring device as well. And, I know it’s stupidly far-fetched, but let’s just say that by some miracle, maybe with a jetpack or something, I’m able to reach a super-fast speed while I’m running after the light beam … as in, almost light-speed fast, so, like, 298,000 kilometres per second, instead of around 300,000.’
‘I’m digging it still,’ he confirmed. ‘Keep going.’
‘Well, this is where it all goes pear-shaped: if I’m running fast enough to almost catch up with the light beam, I should measure the light beam as only going a tiny bit faster than me, right? Like 2,000 kilometres per hour faster?
‘Don’t get me wrong,’ he replied. ‘Your logic makes sense for pretty much everything in the universe. Except light. Here, your gadget would say that the light beam is still going 300,000 kilometres faster than you. And it would be right.’
He smirked. I should have been happy as well; I was executing my plan perfectly, convincing him physics was all I had on my mind. But I still felt like chucking my textbook at him.
‘So, let me get this straight,’ I demanded. ‘On one hand, Olivia is sitting completely still, and she measures the light beam as going 300,000 kilometres per second faster than her towards the net. On the other hand, I’m running at a whopping 298,000 kilometres per second, and my device says the same thing? That the light beam is going 300,000 kilometres faster than me as well?’
‘Correct.’
‘But that makes no bloody sense!’
‘Like chasing after a sunset, innit,’ he added, grinning. ‘Or like tryna fill up a bucket with a hole in it. And the faster you dump water in it, the faster it leaks out.’ He stopped himself from coming up with a third comparison when he realized I wasn’t la
ughing.
‘I can’t tell if you’re just lying, or if you got your PhD from a pawnshop and don’t actually know what you’re on about.’
‘Well, let’s do one more thought experiment to find out.’ He was rubbing his beard, probably thinking what he had to say next was so deep. ‘Imagine it’s a decade in the future,’ he said. ‘And by some train-smash of luck, you find yourself on the Henry Kyle talk show.’
Bloody hell, I thought, realizing we only had five minutes of the lesson left. I just needed to find a subtle way of shutting down his story and redirecting the conversation to one that justified me standing next to him with a gadget in his face.
‘Sorry, mate, but I’ll pass on that story. I’ve got enough problems in my life without you jinxing that kind of energy into it. But I do have a question from school I needed to ask you –’
‘Why do you hate fun so much?’ His shoulders dropped and the sparkle left his eyes. ‘I feel like I’ve been proper trying … and nothing’s working.’
Maybe I’d taken my mean-girl act a step too far.
‘I’m sorry, mate.’ It wasn’t until the words came out that I realized I almost meant them. ‘I was just messing about.’
‘Is it cancer?’ he asked, looking even more serious and concerned.
‘Excuse me?’
‘Cancer of your fun glands?’
‘Jeez,’ I said, shaking my head. ‘That joke was terrible.’
‘Or is it fun-givitis?’
‘Yep, that’s the one, doc,’ I responded. ‘You got me there.’
‘Or maybe you fractured your funny bone. I heard that injury ain’t a joke.’
‘OK, OK, I get it – you can carry on with your Henry Kyle story. Anything to end these bloody dad jokes.’ A weird, prickly feeling came up with the word ‘dad’, which I managed to push aside. ‘Just please be quick.’
