Sara crouches low, the toes of her bare feet pressing into the dirt. It is cold outside, and her skin goosebumps as she watches the flashlight beams bounce up and down as they approach her.
She is hiding in a thicket of trees on common land in front of the house. Lionel and Penny are less than a hundred yards away from her now, and she can hear his voice cutting through the darkness.
‘You were meant to check every window. You know the dangers. Seeing me could have triggered a memory. It could all come back at any time. Even without your machine.’
He is talking to Penny. His tone is both calm and threatening, and he walks slowly, as if he knows Sara has nowhere to go.
‘I thought you meant the windows on the ground floor,’ replies Penny. Sara can hear the stress in her voice.
‘Losing her is not an option. Not after losing the mother. Wait here. You might scare her off,’ says Dobbs.
The second flashlight stops, its beam directed down, lighting up Penny’s trouser legs.
The mention of her mother trips something deep inside Sara, disconnecting what had been a reflex reach for abstract parents. An orphan’s desire to be reclaimed. Now something more tangible tugs at her. Her mother. That is who she craves. ‘Mother’ is still just a word, the image it conjures just a hollow in space in her mind’s eye, but Sara’s yearning is now visceral, urgent. She needs to reunite with her mother like a beached, dying fish needs to return to the sea.
Dobbs is getting closer to Sara now. The trees are too thinly leaved to protect her from the light if he shines it directly at her. He is less than ten feet away, and she can hear his breathing.
‘I know you’re here, Sara.’
The flashlight trains on the thicket ten feet to the left of Sara, the spotlight washing the darkness from the space and illuminating it with a ghostly glow. The beam then swings to the right, lighting up the area just next to her. The next move of the flashlight will expose her.
‘There’s nowhere for you to go. So, there’s no point in running. I know you are scared. But I promise you I am not going to hurt you. I wish you remembered me. You would know I could never do that. What we’re doing here … it’s to help you.’
‘I want to see my mother,’ shouts Sara.
It’s too dark for her to see Lionel’s reaction, but she can hear the injured tone that creeps into his voice.
‘I don’t know what, if anything, you remember about your mother, Sara. It was always me that kept you safe.’
‘My mother!’ shouts Sara, so loudly her throat becomes momentarily hoarse.
‘OK,’ replies Dobbs. ‘If you come back now, I’ll take you to your mother.’
Sara holds her breath. And then the thicket plunges back into darkness as he switches the flashlight off.
She hears the sound of his shoes brushing against the wet grass, retreating. Penny switches off her light as well, and soon they are nothing more than two silhouettes.
Sara waits for several minutes, not daring to move. Waiting to see if it is a trap. She is dressed only in a thin t-shirt and trousers. It’s too cold to stay and too cold to run. Besides, she has no idea where she is. And she has nowhere to go.
Around her, the night begins to animate. A branch cracks, and in the distance an owl hoots. The sounds feel ancient, as if the night is formally reclaiming its territory.
Lionel and Penny are not coming back.
A sense of emptiness washes over her, and she feels defeated. Lionel is right: there is nowhere else she can go.
She touches her locket and pats her trouser pocket where the photograph is folded. The things that her mother left her are still with her. The thought of her mother makes her think about Lionel’s promise. Her desire to see her mother is so primal it is overpowering.
Sara stares at the house while trying to control the shivering, her small form pulsing with what feels like periodic electric shocks.
The house stares back at her, the windows in the white frame upstairs resembling closed eyelids, ready to pop open if disturbed, the open front door, a gaping mouth.
Minutes later, she is tiptoeing along the alleyway to the window of the room from which she jumped. The top of it is ajar. Not by much, just a few millimetres.
She is not going to walk through that open front door. She is fearful of what might be lying in wait just past the ink-black threshold.
There is a trowel lying discarded by the garden fence, and she picks it up. A drainpipe running down the side of the house serves as a useful prop to help her clamber back up to the window ledge. She slips the tip of the trowel into the gap in the window, jemmies it open and climbs inside.
Sara puts her hand on the bathroom door handle and tips it downwards, slowly enough to avoid a click when the catch gives out. The door releases, and Sara pushes it open in a long arc.
The corridor is silent, and she steps out, allowing her eyes to adjust to the darkness. For the first time, she wishes the voices would appear. It would be nice not to feel alone. But it is quiet, and she stands barefoot on the carpet, alone in the stillness.
The kitchen is downstairs and on her left, and she creeps towards it. The door is half closed, obscuring the room within. She pushes it open, with infinite care.
She sees him the moment she sets foot inside.
He sits on the kitchen chair. There is no sign of Penny.
‘Where’s my mother?’
‘You tell me, Sara.’
Sara looks at him in confusion.
‘What do you mean?’
Lionel folds his arms. He is not speaking to her like a child any more.
‘You’re the only one who knows.’
Sara shakes her head.
‘I don’t remember anything.’
A noise in the corner causes her to turn. Penny is standing there. She has finished whatever she was assembling and stands aside for Sara to get a better look. It is an inclined chair, its armrests crisscrossed with restraints. A spherical cage the size of a football is fixed to the top.
Penny opens a small compact and pulls out a syringe.
‘This won’t hurt. Pull up your sleeve.’
Sara eyes Penny as the young woman approaches her.
She can feel her heart rate spiking, and around her the air seems to warp, making her feel light-headed. Her blood thrums in her ears, and she feels as if she is about to pass out.
‘Be careful,’ says Lionel, his voice suddenly sharp. ‘You’re exposed.’
Penny looks down, seeing that Sara is in reach of her face and neck, which are uncovered. She flinches in fear, taking her eyes off Sara for a crucial second, moving backwards with a faltering step.
A blurred hand swipes the syringe from Penny and drives it downwards. The movements are so fast that Penny does not react until the plunger has sunk down and delivered its payload into her leg.
Penny gasps and looks in shock at Sara. Her eyes then roll up into her head, and she falls like a sack to the ground.
Lionel rushes towards Sara, his hands outstretched. But he never reaches her. Instead, he drops to the ground, screaming in pain. She doesn’t realize what she has done until she sees he is clutching his thigh, where the trowel she was holding is buried into the flesh.
He stares at her, his eyes widening in fear. He scrambles backwards on two arms and one leg, like an injured crab, leaving greasy smears of blood on the floor behind him, until he is pressed into the corner of the kitchen. He clamps down his eyes in fear and waits. Then … nothing.
When he finally opens his eyes, the kitchen is empty.
The sounds of small footsteps can be heard crunching on the gravel outside.