I
What the Hell have you done with your life?
Saffron gasped as she jumped awake, stumbling onto her feet.
“Hello?” she shouted. She swore she had been woken by someone.
But only silence responded.
She was in a small room with a bed, sink, and toilet crammed into the space. It was like her cell room but much wider, with a large mirror spanning the length of a wall and a door that didn’t have a handle.
I felt her heartbeat crash against her chest. “Hello?” she said again, angrier. She went up to the door and pushed it, but it was locked. She banged her fists on it. THUD. Then again. THUD. Then again. THUD.
Still only silence surrounded her.
She turned to the large mirror. She didn’t need to put her finger on it to know it was two-way. She was being watched, like always. Her reflection stared back at her, pointing out how much of a broken mess she was. The bags under her eyes had grown, if that was possible. The curls of hair had tangled themselves, and the colourful strands were now completely green. But mud was no longer trapped within the curls. And she was now wearing new clothes that smelt like bleach. They felt more like a hospital outfit than the Detention uniform. Then she noticed the plain white tennis shoes on her feet. She looked around the room again, but her own muddy boots were nowhere to be seen. She automatically went to grab her shoelace bracelet, but that was missing too. They had taken everything from her.
Sweat dripped down her face, onto the back of her neck. She wiped it off with her sleeves, feeling how hot she was. Her whole body felt like it was on fire. And each breath she took twisted like a noose around her throat.
THUD. She banged her fists on the mirror, hoping to get someone’s attention. THUD. Hoping someone would let her out of this room. THUD. Hoping she wouldn’t be trapped here like a guinea pig being experimented on.
But again there was no response. Instead a strange quietness filled the space. An eerie silence of nothingness. Total nothingness. It was a noiseless vacuum Saffron wasn’t used to. It felt like she was trapped in a blackhole and no longer could claw her way back to her lost reality. Her mind was racing yet it felt so quiet. It felt like it wasn’t her own mind anymore.
She closed her eyes and took one long deep breath in. Then held it. Still no sound was around her. No movement. No shadow. Nothing. Then she let her breath out in a deep sigh. Everything remained calm and quiet. Too quiet. She took another breath in. She held it. She held it for longer. And longer. Then she opened her eyes to look in the mirror—
But it wasn’t her reflection looking back. It was me. She looked at the caliginent beast at last.
A frozen chill crawled over her neck. A choke of breath strangled her lungs. She stumbled backwards until she hit the opposite wall, losing her balance as her legs shook through her panic. But her eyes remained on the mirror as she stared at the beast before her.
I stood a few feet taller than she did, dominating my space in the mirror. I wore a cloak of darkness that extended over me with tendrils of coiling shadows. My hands bore the silhouette of knives, while my teeth were made of fangs. Yet as my twists of darkness sucked out the light of the room, she couldn’t make out any of my features. She couldn’t properly see me, as I was lost in the shadows of her world. My form blurred together in a pool of darkness, forming some sort of barely humanoid shape. It was all so fuzzy and inconsistent, hardly even a shape at all. But the one thing she could see was my glowing red eyes. They were staring back at her, watching her every move. Just. Watching.
What the Hell have you done with your life? I said again.
Saffron jumped upon hearing my words. It was the first time she had properly heard them, even though I had been inside her mind for a long time. Part of her had always known this, as my words brought a strange familiarness with them. She knew I had been getting closer to her over these past few weeks, few months, over this past year. But she had never truly admitted it. She had never wanted to see the beast within. Yet now, for once, she was finally hearing them. For once she could make them out. For once she listened to every. single. word.
She jumped again as each word echoed in her mind. They reverberated again and again, growing stronger each time. They emanated from my monstrous figure but also from her own head. It was as though the reflection, the caliginent—as though I had seized control of her mind. I was swimming in her brain. I was part of her inner thoughts. I was part of her.
What the Hell is wrong with you?
My words made her shudder. She wasn’t used to the loudness, the volume, the depth of them. They bounced around her mind, cutting through her own thoughts, if she even had any of her own. She had forgotten to breathe as she listened to them, staring at my shadowy figure of incoherent nothingness, unable to rip her gaze away. She tried to speak but couldn’t find her voice as my words rang throughout her head, getting louder with every. single. syll-a-ble.
You’re a broken mess.
I moved closer towards her, to the edge of the mirror. Then closer again. But she could barely make out my movements as they were lost in the incomprehensible shapes of my shadow. She couldn’t see what I really looked like beneath this darkness. She could only watch the glowing red dots of my eyes, looking into hers.
Get yourself together.
I reached out what looked to be a hand of claws within my empty pool of darkness. Then I used the long point of my scimitar fingers to tap on the glass of the mirror…
THUD.
Saffron didn’t react; she couldn’t. It was as though I had imprisoned her in my presence, trapping her in my void of Tartarus oblivion. She was frozen in position, as stiff as a dead body. And her gaze was lost in my eyes of blazing flames. She couldn’t do anything. So I tapped again…
THUD.
And then I tapped once more.
THUD. The mirror shattered. Shards of glass shot out, flying across the room. They cut into Saffron’s body, slicing her skin and ripping at her flesh in a burst of pain. Then they scattered across the floor in a loud crash of noise. She tried to shout out in agony, but no sound came out. Only the drip of blood as it trickled along her arm.
Stop crying.
Her body shook as my words cut deeper into her mind like the stroke of a guillotine. She hadn’t even noticed the tears falling down her face as she stared at this creature, this nothingness. And I stared back. I looked into her soul and I felt her look back into mine.
I’ve been chasing you for so long. And now, finally, you’re trapped in a prison. You have nowhere left to run. You have to look at me.
Fearless unfeared, the devil entered. I stepped out of the mirror and into her world, further into her thoughts, deeper into her mind. My long shadowy limbs seemed to lengthen, stretching out like pythons coiling around the air. Then they crashed onto the floor, crushing the broken glass underneath. Finally I stood to my full height, then taller still as I loomed over her weak, failing body.
You deserve to feel like this. You deserve to feel alone, lost and frightened. You’re the reason Ray died, after all. You can only blame yourself.
The words took control of her mind. She couldn’t think for herself anymore, as my voice dominated her head. And as it did, I grew even taller, until my twists of darkness reached the ceiling and my impenetrable shadow flooded the room.
I stepped closer to her. Then closer again. Then even closer still. She felt my cold breath beat against her body. Yet even this close she couldn’t make out any distinct features, only pure shadowy nothingness. A desolate abyss of lethal poison that was waiting to swallow her.
“What is happening?” she finally said, croaking through the harshness of her dying voice. She went to grab her shoelace bracelet but realised it was missing—everything was missing. “This is just a delusion, isn’t it?” She fought back against my words, trying to push them out. “It’s just my mind, isn’t it?” She feared I would hurt her and devour her mind. She feared this was what had happened to Ray.
Of course it’s just your mind. That’s what makes it so dangerous.
“What did the drug do to me?” She pulled her eyes away from mine, tearing them back with all her strength. Then she looked through my shadows and towards the shattered mirror. “Is anyone there? Can anyone help me?”
Why would anyone ever help you?
“Anyone? Please? The caliginent is here. It’s here!” Her voice broke as she burned through the remainder of her breath. “Hello? Can anyone hear me?”
They can hear you. They’re listening. They’re even watching. But they’re not going to help.
“Please!”
And you know you don’t even deserve their help. My claws of pernicious darkness coiled around her feet.
“Get off!”
You don’t deserve anything. I twisted her legs together, bounding them into one. Then I slithered farther around her limbs, freezing her body with my touch. I felt the dying beats of her heart as it became mine.
“Help!”
But it’s okay because I’m here now so you can rest. I wrapped around her arms, her legs, her shoulders. You can let me in. Then my visible darkness tightened its grip like a noose around her neck. I strangled her throat as I wrapped around her again and again and—
“Get off me!” she said with her final breath through a strained, crushed voice.
You can let all my darkness become yours once more.
She couldn’t find any more air as I choked her neck with tight circles of hellish shadows. Then my coils of darkness moved into her mouth and through her nose, drowning her in venom, pulling her further into my gulf of infernal fear as I finally took back what was mine.
It’s time to let me back in. It’s time to give me back my body—
Suddenly the door burst open.
“Saffron?” A figure walked into the room with a beaming glow of light, forcing my darkness to scuttle away and scurry back into the shadowy corners.
Ray’s Dad? It was Ray’s Dad.
II
“Saffron. What’s going on?”
She gasped for air as I let her go, spluttering and coughing in a mess of choking breaths, fighting for her life again.
“Are you okay? What happened?” Ray’s Dad had a calming, soft voice and his usual omnibenevolent smile.
“I’m so glad you’re here,” she whispered through sharp pants of breath. “It’s the caliginent. It’s here.”
“The caliginent? What do you mean?”
“It was just-just here. It had me. But then you came and it-it—”
She looked around the room. The dark white walls loomed over her like prison bars. The sharp, never-ending light glistened against the mirror’s glass. The glass—it was all intact. It wasn’t broken or shattered. Only one small crack stood in the centre. It seemed normal?
But it’s not normal, is it? It hasn’t been normal in a long time.
She jumped back as my words shook through her body. “It’s still here.” Her dying voice croaked with fear. “Where are you? I can hear you!”
“You can hear it? Is it saying anything?”
“Yes, it’s-it’s speaking to me.” She wiped her forehead, pushing the sweat onto her hair. “It’s hiding somewhere in here.” She looked to the corners where shadows hid from sight, but nothing was there. “Where is it? It was just here!”
“How’s it speaking to you, Saffron?”
“What?” She turned back to him, trying to concentrate on his tired eyes. “In my mind. That’s how they work, right? They take over minds? Until they turn you into a caliginent yourself?”
“You mean like Raymond’s plays?”
“Yes, but it’s real. His plays are real. It was really here.”
“That’s okay, it’s gone now.” He smiled as though he didn’t believe her.
“It was! I swear it—”
Stop talking to him and think. Why is he here?
She shivered as my words reverberated around her mind. She wanted to ignore them, but she couldn’t. Why. Is. He. Here? “Wait. Why are you here? Was it another favour with the guards?”
“I told you I’m here for you.”
Here for you? No one is here for you.
“Stop it. Stop it!” she shouted at my words, but her voice broke with every syllable.
“Saffron?”
“Can you use one of those favours to get me out of this room? Can you get me away from here? Away from it?” Stop it. Think. Look at him. “Shut up!”
“Saffron?”
She tried ignoring my words, tried pushing them out—but they kept going. And going. And— Look. At. Him. Until her eyes looked down to his neck. He was wearing a lanyard that had the letters HELIOS in bold print around it.
“Helios? What… Why… Why are you wearing a Helios lanyard?”
“What do you mean?” Ray’s Dad stepped closer towards her, reaching out a merciful hand.
Saffron shrank away from it.
“I’m here to help,” Ray’s Dad said in his soft, thoughtful tone. He was carrying a clipboard with a stack of paper fixed on it in his other hand.
The papers. Look at the papers. Look. At. Them. She saw the papers had Ray’s handwriting over them. His writings about the caliginent. The papers she had stolen from Helios. He had stolen them back.
“What-what are you doing here?” Her mind raced, rushing against the speed of her beating heart. He works for Helios. “You work for Helios?”
“What? Yes, Saffron. I’m with Helios,” Ray’s Dad continued with a warming yet omnipotent presence. He stepped closer towards her.
She shrank away again. “No, you’re a politician. You work for the mayor.”
“Helios is part of the mayor’s work. You should know this. We’re all helping you.”
“Helping me? Does it look like it’s helping me? No. No, this isn’t right.” She shook her head. “No. Helios? You can’t be working for Helios,” she repeated, twisting her mind around the truth. “Why would you be working for Helios after what it did to Ray?” Unless. “Unless…”
“Just calm down. I think you’re getting a little confused—”
“Were you working for them when Ray was there? Did you…did you give the drug to Ray?”
“Saffron, please—”
“Did you hurt Ray? Did you hurt Ashiya? Are you going to hurt me too?”
“Just calm—”
“So you’re the one who got Ray to take the drug to hurt him, to-to….” She couldn’t say it. “You sacrificed your own son for an experiment?”
“Calm down.” He stepped closer again with his omnibenevolent smile, his golden scales of justice, and his condescending kindness.
She stepped away once more, until her back pressed against the dark corner of the room. “No, this doesn’t make any sense. The world doesn’t make any sense. How could you do this?”
“I’m here to help—”
“That’s bullshit!”
“Just tell me what’s going on. You said a caliginent was talking to you, didn’t you?” He flipped to another page on his clipboard that had more scribbled messy handwriting all over it. “Tell me what it’s saying.” He clicked a pen into life, holding it ready.
She stopped. She frowned. “What are you doing?” She looked at the notes he already had written down, reading words like PARTICIPANT, DELUSIONAL, HALLUCINATIONS, FEVER, HIGH TEMPERATURE.
He doesn’t believe a word you’re saying. You’re only here for an experiment, remember? You don’t mean anything to him. You don’t mean anything to anyone.
“You don’t believe anything I’m saying, do you?” She tightened her fist as anger boiled within her.
Don’t trust him. My voice rattled through her mind, making her body shudder and shake as it reverberated against her thoughts again and again and again—
Don’t. Trust. Anyone.
“Get away from me!” She shouted, covering her ears, hoping that would stop my words. But it didn’t. If anything, it made them even louder—
DON’T. TRUST. ANYONE.
“Saffron?”
She looked at his exhausted face, his greying hair, his overgrown beard, his HELIOS lanyard– He works for Helios. He’s experimenting on you. Just like he experimented on Ray. Just like he killed Ray.
“Shut up!” She pushed her hands harder against her ears, yet still my words only grew louder and louder and—
I know you don’t want to hear it, but it’s true. Ray is dead. He is dead because of him. Because of you. Because of everyone—
“Have you been rehearsing Raymond’s play with Indigo? The one with the caliginent?” He had a warmth to his voice, but it stung Saffron like a patronising toxin. “Do you think that’s why you may be experiencing this?”
“No—it’s the thing Helios created. The Caliginent Trial. This is what you do, isn’t it? You torture people with these things, don’t you?” She pushed the dripping sweat off her forehead again.
“You’re experiencing some intense delusions—”
“I am far from delusional,” she panted as her breath ran out. “Unless that’s what you want. You want me to seem unreliable so no one will ever know what you did to-to—” To Ray.
“These effects will pass—you just have to give it time. Your body will adjust.”
He’s lying. He’s always lying. Just like everyone else is. Just like you are. You’re even lying to yourself, aren’t you? You’ve been lying to yourself for such a long time.
“No. You’re lying!”
“Saffron, you’re safe here. We have people watching you all the time.” Always watching you. “We also have had some visits by experts and other politicians, even the mayor—”
“The mayor? Your boss? So you’re all trying to kill anyone who steps out of line? Just like-like…” Like Ray. Her voice was weakening with every croak of heresy.
“Did you hurt yourself?” He looked down at her arm. There was a small cut where the glass had sliced through her when I had entered. It was dripping with blood.
“Wait. It really hurt me?” She wiped the blood against her sleeve, but it still kept dripping.
“We can clean that up if—”
“Did you make this thing so that it would hurt me? So that it would kill me? Just like-like—” Like Ray.
“Sssshh,” he hushed. “Okay. I can see you’re having a difficult time and having trouble processing what’s going on. So I’m going to leave you to get some rest.” Everyone always leaves you. “But you’re in good hands. And remember, these effects will wear off soon, so don’t worry. Get some sleep.”
Just calm down and stay here with me.
“No!” Saffron’s heart ran faster as my words slithered through her mind. “Wait, no. No, don’t leave.” You can’t stop him from leaving. “Please don’t leave.” Everyone leaves you. “I don’t want it to hurt me again.” Even Ray didn’t want to stay with you. “Shut up!”
“Get some rest and I promise this will all wear off. Soon it’ll just seem almost like a nightmare.” Ray’s Dad smiled as he walked back towards the door.
Almost like a nightmare. Almost.
“No. Please. I can be calm.” She pushed her hair back. She tried to steady her breathing. “I can answer all your questions. I can do whatever you want me to do. Just please don’t leave me here with it.”
He’s not going to listen to you.
“Get some rest, and then you’ll be out of here before you know it.” He smiled once more, opening the door.
Saffron didn’t stop to think as she ran up towards him, putting her hand on the door, stopping it. “Please don’t leave. You can’t.”
“Saffron, step away from the door, please.” Ray’s Dad still spoke in a calm, nurturing tone. “You’ll be fine.”
Fine? Isn’t that your favourite word?
“No, I won’t be.”
You won’t be? But you’re always fine, aren’t you?
“Stop speaking!”
“It’s just a fever,” he said. “All these effects, these delusions and paranoia, it will pass.”
You know more than anyone that I’m not just a feverous side effect. I’m so much more than that.
“Get out of my mind!” Saffron was shouting louder at my words as she clung onto the door, not wanting to be trapped here alone with me.
“Step back, sir,” a low, commanding voice began. “We can handle her from here.”
Now look at what you’ve done. Saffron glanced behind Ray’s Dad. She saw teachers and Shade officers huddled in the shadows of the dark, narrow corridor outside. They’re here to hurt you.
“Leave me alone!” Air burst through her lungs like a bullet. She let go of the door and put her hands over her ears, trying to drown me out. But you cannot stop me. I’m already inside your mind. I’m already a part of you. A part you have to let back in.
“Be gentle,” Ray’s Dad said to the silhouettes outside her room. “She’s experiencing major side effects. She’s in a very vulnerable position right now.”
“Vulnerable?” she said, letting her ears go as she pushed more sweat off her forehead. “I’m not vulnerable. I’m being eaten alive. You’ve poisoned me!”
“Stand back, sir! Now!”
Suddenly a hive of teachers and Shade officers swarmed into the room.
“You need to calm down, missy,” Mr Woods began, as his new trench coat walked in front of her. “Step back towards the bed.”
She tried to focus on him, on what was going on, but it all blurred into one. Her mind couldn’t focus on the images, on reality, on anything. It’s all far too much for your broken mind. So why don’t you let me in and we can piece it back together?
Arms grabbed her, yanking her off her feet, pulling her in every direction, tearing at her limbs, twisting her apart. I felt her struggle against them, trying to slither away, to scurry back into the shadows, but as soon as she broke away from one hand, another one grabbed her, then another. And another. They felt like adamantine claws, digging into her, ensnaring her, not letting her escape, not letting her get away. And it hurt. It really hurt.
“Get off me!”
She felt herself being carried, pulled, twisted as the teachers encircled her, trapping her, clawing at her. They placed her on the bed, holding down each of her limbs like they were taming a great dragon. She tried to struggle free, but she could barely move. There were too many of them. Far too many.
See? They only want to hurt you. And they’re right. They should be hurting you. Everyone should be hurting you after what you did to Ray.
She felt the hands move off her as they were replaced by ropes, tying her down like an animal ready to be killed.
“There,” Mr Woods’ trench coat said, nodding at the other figures in the room. “Let’s leave her here while she sleeps this off.”
“What? Wait, wait no!” Saffron tried to pull her hands free or kick out her legs, but she couldn’t move them. Every limb had been strapped down. “Don’t leave me here! It will get me. It’s coming. It’s here—”
“Saffie. It’s okay,” a calmer voice whispered by her side.
Sylver? He’s here. She couldn’t see where. Everything in her vision felt unfocused with undefined shapes and colours spotting over her eyes. He wants to hurt you again. She couldn’t see his face. His hidden blue strands of hair. His dark trench coat. He’s already made you take the drug—who knows what he’ll do next?
“Sylver. Help me. Please. Don’t leave me alone with that-that-that monster.”
“Just breathe. Okay? Focus on your breaths. That’s all you can do right now. And that’s enough. Okay? That’s enough.” His face was somewhere in front of her, but she couldn’t make it out. The whole world blurred around her. “Just. Breathe.”
The door shut with a loud THUD. And she was left with only silence once more.
A drop of sweat ran along her forehead then dripped onto the bed. She watched it fall through gasps and pants of breath she couldn’t control. Then her eyes moved to the far corner of the room. The corner where blades of shadow distorted themselves around a mask of my figure. As I felt her eyes meet mine, I stood up. My crumpled, decapitated limbs pieced themselves together as I grew taller. Then taller still. A crooked smile formed in my tendrils of darkness as I patiently waited for her fear to tear her into pieces now that we were alone at last.
Are you ready to listen to me now?
“This isn’t real,” she muttered to herself. But that didn’t stop her fear. “It’s not.” She turned her head away from mine and took a deep breath in. Then she let it out. Then another in. And out. Then in—
You know I’ve been real for a long time now…for at least a year, right?
“It’s. Not. Real.” Her body tensed as the taste of blood pooled in her mouth. She looked at her arm strapped to the bed. The shoelace bracelet was still missing; she was still missing. But she could just about make out the faint outline of the words she’d written the other day. No, other week? No, other life. “Nausea, vomiting, loss of appetite,” she read to herself. “Sweating, tiredness, insomnia, delusions, paranoia, mania, seizures, hallucinations.”
Convincing yourself that I’m not real won’t stop me.
She took another breath in. And out. In. And out. Out. And in. “This is a delusion, a hallucination. It’s not real.”
Not real? But I’m right here.
“There is nothing there and there is nothing to worry about. There is nothing—”
I’m. Right. Here.
From the corner of her eyes, she saw my shadow move. “It’s just my eyes playing tricks on me. It’s not here. It’s not.” She tried to take another breath in. And out. In. And out. In. And in. And in. “Nothing there. Nothing to worry about. There is nothing there and—”
There is everything to worry about.
I coiled my darkness through the air, moving, growing, slithering. Then I flooded the room again with my never-ending shadow. My fangs and claws and knives crashed back into the space in a burst of movement. I still had no real shape. I was barely even humanoid, only a mess of nothingness, a misshapen pit of crooked limbs. It was as though all the shadows in the room were conjoined and stitched together to create one large beast.
Ray’s death was the hardest day you’ve ever had to face.
She shut her eyes, refusing to look at me, refusing to acknowledge my existence like she always did. “There is nothing there…” She carried on, attempting to take a breath In. And out. In. And out. In. And in. And. In. And—
Just let me back in. Don’t you want to remember me? Don’t you want to remember Ray? His plays, his stories, his memories? Do you even remember him?
In. And in. And. In. And…
Even with her eyes shut, she felt the room turning darker as the world—no, the stage—turned off the lights.
In. And in. In. And. And. And—
Her body convulsed in a sudden onset of movement she couldn’t contain. Her limbs jerked out as though they were acting on their own. Her entire body was out of her control.
“Phire? Phire! Are you okay?”
Just let me back in.
“Phire!”
Let me in.
“What’s going on? Are you okay? Phire!”
Now.