《Chronic Fatigue》


 Prologue

    Time travel isn''t like you read in books you know. Not at all! Not the way you see it in films. The foolishness! Wandering backward and forward, up and down some infinitely tolerant timeline; writing, scribbling stuff out and overwriting like some great chronological palimpsest. You knew somewhere deep down in your bowel that there''s a causal wormhole in all that didn''t you? You knew¡­


    "Don''t you go changing anything! Oh no. That''ll affect your future! What about the present, you might not be there when you get back!"


    Pah! Everything changes just in the very act of turning up there in the first place doesn''t it?


    If you did happen have some personal homicidal feelings toward your poor old grandad... well can you, can''t you? Obviously, you can''t unhappen what''s happened! A story told can''t be untold. So Grandpa''s safe. Or at least one of him is... What''s happened''s happened hasn''t it? What''s not happened''s not happened already back there in the past without you turning up, hasn''t it? Hasn''t it? The minute you roll up astride some throbbing arcane mechanical anachronism, probably flickering all over with flashy blue energy, you are effectively changing a past that previously happened without you, your ''machine'' and your grand entrance. Why have time-travelling tourists from the future not swarmed all over history, gawking at the good bits, taking selfies and seeing what happens when they whack their ancestors? Because they weren''t there when it happened! That¡¯s why! It''s not like the stories. Reality is a whole other kettle of rank fishiness.Unauthorized duplication: this tale has been taken without consent. Report sightings.


    You know that philosophical theorem of monkeys and their typewriters? It''s all very, very interesting contemplating it theoretically with metaphorical monkeys and strings and no end of nice mathematical infinity at one''s disposal - Complete Works of Shakespeare! It could happen! They could write it! Improve it even! Could! What if the lucky monkey went back in time and conducted its simian simulation before the bouncing baby bard was born? Is it down to the one doing the typing or the one doing the reading? Who says old Bill made it up? Ouroboros snakes? Chickens and eggs? Our primal primate could pull it off with its monkey fingers eh, couldn''t it? But it won''t, will it?


    We all know that it won''t. And that''s important. You know they did actually try it? Course it''s all different when real crested macaques and university students get involved, they''ve got big rocks and urges; a whole different sort of random. Maybe best to look it up: Try searching Notes Toward the Complete Works of Shakespeare. Obviously, the real old Bill wasn''t half as sibilant.


    Now the reality of monkeying about with time... Butterfly wings and temporal hurricanes... Watch out for the butterflies. When you go back, where are you actually going? I say back because the future is even worse - has it happened yet? Is it there already waiting to be visited? If you know it, can you change it?


    You don''t know. Do you?


    Don''t do it!


    Don''t travel in time!

 Chapter One

    In a dark, twisting, tunnel beneath a huge Yorkshire oak tree, a version of Roan that we might think of as Roan of ten minutes past, reached for his phone and started dialling, the glow from his handset casting long shadows on the stairs spiralling away below. Gum leaned in and asked, "What are you doing?"


    "Ringing Mistletoe, she''ll be wondering where I am." Roan, frustrated and worried, groaned then as his phone confirmed what he expected: "No reception!" There was a long silence as the five paused to think about what to say or do. Holi peered downward, trying to make out the shape of her fallen Elmo who was flexing his elbow for sympathy, it clearly wasn''t broken and he seemed intent on continuing down the tunnel. Gum was running his hand back and forth through his hair trying to decide whether to bodily lug Elmo back out of this claustrophobic place or to try reasoning with him. Heather craned her neck, straining to follow the twisting curve of the wall, wondering how far down the old steps went.


    "Where you going Roan?" said Heather as he moved back up the stone stairway toward the opening.


    "Seeing if I can get reception outside," he said, climbing carefully back up. He stopped, fumbling about ahead of him, looking up and down at where they had entered only moments earlier. The staircase terminated in a tangle of thick roots, barely illuminated by his torch app. A flash from behind came as Heather photographed the place.


    "We did come from here, didn''t we? Can''t find any sign of an entrance. It seems rock solid now.


    What happened? Has it closed behind us?" He was speaking partly to himself in bewilderment and partly to the others who were slowly making their way up behind him.


    Gum came up to join Roan and began thumping at the surface aggressively before commenting, "There''s nothing here. No doorway I mean, and we definitely came in this way. I can''t even hear the rain outside. That''s all I need - trapped in a hidden bunker with rat boy here."


    "Trapped! Oh, I should¡¯ve called Mist ages ago," Roan moaned, "Now she''s really going to worry."


    "She''s not the only one!" Gum grumbled darkly.


    "When I left her happily dreaming this morning¡­"


    "Dreaming?" came a distant echo from Elmo, who had managed to pick himself up off the floor, elbow now clasped tenderly in his hand.


    "Yes! Mistletoe''s been having dreams... like yours." Roan found himself irritated by this deviation from his concern. "She was telling me earlier, but I didn¡¯t pay enough attention. Wish I had told her where I was going, I thought we¡¯d be on the way back by now." Roan looked down in regret. "The sooner I can get hold of her, the better."


    "What was she dreaming about?" Elmo pressed.


    "What does it matter right now?" Roan snapped. "They''re dreams! That¡¯s all they are! Dreams!"


    "Are they?" questioned Elmo coming up behind the others, his hands outspread to indicate their surroundings, "I think this place says otherwise."


    About then, in his search for a way out, Gum noticed a shiny object glinting at his feet.


    "What''s this? A pin?" he said as he picked it up and held it to his eyes for closer inspection.


    "Pin?" said Elmo abruptly. "Gum, did you say pin?"


    "Well, it looks like a pin.¡±


    You know, thin and pointy."


    "It can''t be. Let me see! someone has been here!" exclaimed Elmo. Scampering up and down in agitation, he ran his hands over the walls of the tunnel whilst the others gathered at the top of the steps sharing their distress over the lack of a way out. Elmo muttered about pins, dreams. His rambling and the tone of his voice caused them to wonder at the lunacy that seemed to be driving him. He paused for a moment, explaining, "See, for weeks I''ve been having strange dreams about somebody trying to stick me with... a pin, mark me in some way I think. Fortunately, I wake up each time before it happens. I know I''ve had lots of dreams but this was different."


    Roan stood, looking perplexed before saying, "They were just dreams. How can they have anything to do with this random pin. Look, you need to calm down.¡±


    "Calm down!¡± ranted Elmo, before gesturing at Holi, "I told you to lock the door and not come outside Holi, but you didn''t listen. This is a dropped pin! A dropped pin!"


    Holi interjected defensively, "When I followed you into the woods there was nobody with a pin, only those, those creatures with their strange device."


    ¡°My device, thank you very much. Which they stole from me! I told you to lock the door. But no, you had to follow! Look, I see a mechanical device in my dreams, I draw it, then I find it! I dream about dark portals and secret passages and I find one! There¡¯s someone in my dreams that looks like me, going about with a pin! So when we find a pin, forgive me for thinking that it¡¯s not just any pin!¡±Elmo, his voice reaching a crecendo, paused, relieved that Holi finally knew the truth - or at least, some of it.


    ¡°But why did you go out?" Hol i pressed in a low, level tone, ¡±We were supposed to be leaving all this behind.¡±


    ¡°I wanted to leave it all behind too. But when we got here... I felt trapped. Listen, we¡¯re all getting distracted. The midgets disappeared quickly after taking the device and I''m sure they didn''t have time to come down here. Or did they?" Elmo paused considering the possibilities.


    "Do you hear what you sound like?" Gum growled.


    Holi interjected, "No, they went pretty quickly - almost vanished. They didn''t have time."


    "That''s what I think too,¡± Elmo said excitedly.


    ¡°So how did that pin get down here? Maybe the person in my dreams that looks like me is here!¡±


    "So, now you think this is a pin from a dream?" said Gum, sounding like a prosecuting lawyer.


    Elmo paused for a moment, thinking silently. "That''s true. Maybe it isn''t the same pin. What do you do with pins? You don¡¯t keep them just for jabbing things... You pin things up with them... You mark things with them... Help me out Gum, you¡¯ve got the thing, what does it look like to you?¡±


    *****


    "Has that ever happened before?" Gum asked as Roan took a rather unsteady sip of his coffee.


    "No. Never. The whole experience was dream-like. Felt like the moon was talking to me. The man in the moon." Roan laughed wryly at that last thought.


    "And you think Elmo is lost in imagination!" Gum said, emphasising the irony.


    At that point, Heather came in with a bag of something she''d found in the shop and began showing it to Gum. Roan tried phoning Elmo, but just got his voice mail. He didn''t leave a message. Heather decided to treat herself to a hot chocolate in celebration of her find and so they all moved to a more convenient table with three chairs.


    "So now what?" she asked expectantly before she sat down, "Have you both decided what you want to do?"


    Roan and Gum looked at each other uncertainly as Heather continued, "You mean you''ve been in here all that time and you still haven''t decided?"


    "Well, I don''t think going all the way to Yorkshire is wise at this juncture," Gum said, "besides, Holi and Elmo probably need the break, let them forget about all this. It''ll do them good."


    Roan sighed, "I guess you''re right. It is a long way to go."


    "Might as well come over to our place if you''ve nothing better to do," Gum offered. "We''ve just got a couple of things to pick up on the way. I can show you my latest dahlia of the day and my fine lettuce crop. That is, if the squirrels haven''t wrecked them all."This tale has been unlawfully lifted without the author''s consent. Report any appearances on Amazon.


    On the way across London, Gum stopped at a service station for petrol and came out of the shop turning a box over in his hands. "Free virtual reality headset!" he said, waving the package triumphantly. "Cheap one I should imagine. But free with the petrol!"


    Soon they were at Gum¡¯s home where Gum provided a proud tour of the current blooms of his urban garden, then they knocked up a sandwich and settled down in the sitting room. Gum sat on the floor and unpacked his new gadget, "I wonder if this''ll connect with our health and safety project from work. Clear View are putting together a virtual training package." He put the bulky gear over his head, his face optimistically buried within the viewer.


    Roan lounged back into the sofa watching with interest, he always liked a good gadget.


    Gum huffed and grimaced; the gear clearly didn''t do what it was supposed to do. "Argh!" he wailed, "It''s wrecked my Bluetooth!" He dragged the headset off in frustration and began poking at the screen of his mobile phone, "Look at that! I can''t even access my settings now. Cheap junk! Should''ve known."


    Roan picked up the plastic viewer, "There''s not much to it, you wouldn''t think it could do much damage."


    As Gum fiddled about with his mobile, Roan tried the headset on, "You''re not going to like this," he laughed, "It seems fine with mine."


    "Typical," Gum muttered, trying different approaches to resetting his mobile.


    Roan managed to get a demonstration playing on the VR set. "You been watching Time Drift?" he asked as he absorbed the impressive graphics of a journey through the solar system. "Sci-fi series. Not bad; the usual weekly escapades bound up in a time-travel scenario. Did you ever read the sequel to The Time Machine? Not written by H. G. Wells of course."


    "Time travel isn''t like you read in books you know," Gum commented.


    "No?"


    "Not at all. It''s not the way you see it in films." It sounded like Gum had been reading up.


    As the planets swung by in large, lazy arcs, Roan found Gum''s voice taking on something of the dual, remote-yet-close-up nature that it had done earlier in the coffee shop. But the imagery was hypnotic, heavenly bodies so detailed you could almost touch them. Gum went on, his thoughts on time and the implications of time travel running into something of a diatribe. "You know that philosophical theorem of monkeys and their typewriters?"


    "I can see why people spending time in these things end up struggling with detachment when they come out," Roan commented. He wondered if he should offer Gum a turn, but Gum just ignored him and continued his rant.


    The viewpoint of the virtual camera swung around Mars, red Mars, heading for earth, the moon silvery and bright to one side, half of its form hidden in shadow. The man in the moon... Gum''s words almost made a fitting voice-over, but as Roan let them wash over him he thought he could hear a second voice, more than one thought at a time. Sometimes it shared the same words, sometimes different.


    Roan strained to hear the lower voice, although it wasn''t really so much a second voice as a reverberation of the first, something uttered beneath the rambling about time travel.


    "... tangled up... ...you might tr... ... never get back..." The moon heaved past, huge and desolate before Roan''s eyes.


    "... get... ... out of there... ...I''ll set it right if..." Fractured words. Roan was sorry to see the moon pass and begin to recede, he felt like he should hold onto it somehow, like it was important. "...worry... ...get you ou..."


    Suddenly bright light again. Not another faint! Roan blinked. Gum had pulled the headset off him. That was all.


    "Stay where you are. Might have fixed it this time," Gum mumbled. "If I can just use the device..."


    "Cybersickness," Roan observed, "you do get a little light-headed after a few minutes in there."


    "Few minutes! You were in there for about an hour, that''s why I took the thing off you. I''ve sorted my Bluetooth issue and been out in the garden, stupid squirrels have had my lettuces. Raging vandals!¡±


    ¡°Oh!¡± Roan¡¯s heart skipped, he had no sense of so much time passing. ¡°But I could hear you talking though. What time is it? Oh no, Mistletoe¡¯ll be home before I get back. Can we get going? Sorry.¡±


    *****


    Rat-Elmo was beginning to get his new body to do what he wanted, but it was a struggle to think with such a limited brain. Not only that, it was a real nuisance finding somewhere suitable to sleep, and the things he had to eat! He shuddered at the memory and instinctively gave his whiskers a quick clean. "Stop it," he thought, "Concentrate, concentrate."


    The night felt long and lonely and so he had made his way into what had previously been his bedroom to watch his past-self and Holi peacefully sleeping. How long was it now before he would go to Yorkshire to ¡®get away from it all¡¯? What a joke - get away from it all! Yorkshire was where ¡®it all¡¯ was waiting for him. Something dark and unfamiliar scrawled on the wall above the bed caught his eye.


    ¡°I didn¡¯t draw that in my timeline,¡± thought Rat-Elmo. Past-Elmo groaned in his sleep, ¡°Dreaming, poor guy.¡± Then, Rat-Elmo jumped as his inert counterpart gave an involuntary jerk, moaning loudly. Holi seemed used to it - she just turned over and carried on sleeping.


    Clambering onto a bedside chair for a better view, Rat-Elmo saw the walls were covered with huge, scribbly, mandala-like charcoal and ink sketches of the device. From his new vantage point, he also noticed the device, his device, there beside the bed, a faint, ominous glow playing around the red ring on its side. Elmo gave another sleepy jerk and suddenly the spot on the device lit up brightly. Then, with no warning, a jagged, effulgent arc of pink light zig-zagged out like miniature lightning toward the slumbering Elmo¡¯s head. Rat-Elmo started instinctively forward to help himself despite the conflicting desire to scuttle away - what could he do? The light seemed to snag on Elmo¡¯s ear and began to coruscate there on the lobe, fizzing softly. What happened next set his scuttling reflexes into overdrive, he flew backward, knocking against the arm of the chair and dived, scampering for the cover of the dressing-table, his claws scrabbling on the pile of the carpet.


    A dark form was emerging, unfurling in stuttering pulses from Elmo¡¯s ear. It began as a smudge of incoherent static, a flickering distortion in the air, expanding and increasing in resolution into something vaguely humanoid. It rapidly stretched outward, feet forming, stretching toward the floor, crooked hands rendering, like brittle blossoms of soot, suggestion of a face dark and sombre. It crouched, bent over the prone couple in their bed, breathing down on them. Rat-Elmo had no doubt that this thing was a killer, a brooding, spectral, grim thing with an equally grim purpose for sure.


    He slunk further under the furniture into the safety of the darkness, feeling a natural skittishness coming over him. The thing flickered momentarily like a bad video signal. Then it was Elmo. An exact replica of himself, still hunched over, watching, panting. Rat-Elmo suppressed a gasp as he saw something glint in the creature¡¯s fingers - a pin! As his mind wrestled the implications of this observation another flicker rippled through the form. What had been Elmo was now Holi, still bent over, raising the pin as if uncertain where to poke it, a frown on the otherwise expressionless face. Another change, now an anonymous male, as close as you could get to a blank human canvas, the kind that could be almost anyone and yet no-one, someone to lose in a crowd, grey and shady. It was wrong, the edges fractured, like a blurred memory. Would that happen to him too? Was the rat becoming him? The posture of the thing lapsed into slumped resignation - had it given up.


    ¡°It¡¯s the same thing!¡± thought Rat Elmo. ¡°I¡¯ve dreamt this thing. But I found a pin in Yorkshire. Was it this pin? Does that mean it followed me there from..." The thought turned to darkness as realisation dawned "This must have happened to me! A couple of days ago, lying in my bed, this happened. This is my past. But this creature ended up in Yorkshire in my time. It followed us! Does this mean there''s more than one? One in each time?¡±


    He thought about attacking the thing. Bite it, go for the throat like the cornered rat he was. Or maybe warn his past self. But he was just a rat skittering in the shadows. They''d hate him. He hesitated, ¡°Wait, it doesn¡¯t harm us, or we never would have got to the cottage. I found its pin there near the tree. What¡¯s it up to? What''s it doing with that pin? Did the device call it out of me? Why?¡±


    *****


    Mistletoe''s day was pretty ordinary, except she hadn''t received her usual texts from Roan. She had gone to work, dealt with irate passengers at the airport, checked her emails and driven home. She was a little surprised that Roan hadn''t answered the phone earlier, but reasoned that he was probably busy or had his phone on silent again knowing him. It had been a very normal, but tiring day and she was looking forward to getting home and putting her feet up for a while. Stepping inside, she looked around before muttering, ¡°He hasn''t washed up again! What''s his excuse this time?¡±


    Heading into the bedroom, she hung her jacket and sat on the edge of the bed. She pulled out her phone and was about to check her messages when a faint sound caught her attention. A small cupboard door was open. That wasn¡¯t unusual, but the sound? She glanced involuntarily at the wardrobe. It was shut. Just the small cupboard at the foot of the bed, barely large enough to support the small portable TV. Had the sound come from there? She waited a few moments, wondering if she had left it open earlier, but then jumped as she heard a faint shuffling sound inside. Unsure what to do, she paused, worried what might be in there. She stood, eyes fixed on the opening as she considered the possibilities. ¡°Don¡¯t be a mouse.


    Or a rat! Or¡­ or¡­ Oh, Roan! Where are you?¡±


    Those few moments seemed to last a lifetime. She wondered what to do. Kneeling, cautiously, she leaned toward the open door. The faint sound grew louder as she inched ever-so-slightly closer. She knew in her heart that she couldn¡¯t really leave it alone or wait for Roan to come home, because whatever it was could escape by then and end up under her bed or in her uniform or anywhere! No, the risk was too great, she would have to take a look - at least she would know what it was - then she would know what she was dealing with. She peered into the shadow of the cupboard and stretched her hand out, ready to slam the door shut at the first sign of anything furry, or anything with more legs than is decent.


    Mist let out a shriek. Was it a spider? A huge, shiny spider! She leapt back shuddering, onto the bed. The freakish, giant arachnid, having been detected, scurried across the room and under the bed. It was truly frightening, the biggest orb spider Mistletoe had ever seen. Spiders were worse than mice!


    She paused, motionless, trying to hear where it was going, but it was silent. ¡°Ball-shaped and shiny,¡± said a rational voice in Mistletoe¡¯s mind. ¡°It¡¯s surely mechanical, not real. Some new toy of Roan¡¯s?¡± She glanced at the bedroom door, saw it was open, knew that if she could somehow leap across and out of the room, she could escape. She heard the brisk, jagged movement of skeletal limbs scampering up onto the bed. Letting out another shriek, she sprang and hopped to the door. She was out in a flash and looked back on the room to see what was happening. The spider-thing was dashing scissor-like across the pillows and duvet. As she stared, she noticed a raised, rounded button pointed in her direction, red, hideous-looking. Was it looking at her? No, this was some gadget, some malfunctioning mechanism.

 Chapter Two

    Number 3124b gave a sudden jerk and blinked. He had fallen asleep in front of the monitor. Why was he always so tired? When was his next break? He blinked again. A red light was flashing on the screen. That wasn''t good. That was not good. What was happening? Now fully awake, 3124b rubbed his eyes in disbelief - it was gone! He sprang up, wringing his hands, the red light bathing his face in an eerie glow. Hurrying to the door, he was knocked backwards as 352 entered from the other side.


    "It¡¯s gone!" cried the first clone clutching his nose. "Gone! Ow!"


    "What has?" his superior enquired, oblivious to his obvious pain.


    "The phage! The phage software I was running on him! I looked at the screen, and it wasn''t there! It was supposed to be cleaning up his dreams, making sure he didn''t remember all the poking around, as usual. Eating the data! When I looked it wasn''t there!"


    ¡°Calm down, Elmo 3124b,¡± said 352. ¡°How can it have gone? It¡¯s AI, it must have done its job and closed down.¡±


    ¡°No!¡± came the panicky reply. ¡°It doesn''t close down. It hasn''t finished dropping marker PINs. It¡¯s not even showing up on the system. It seems to have just jumped right off the system. That thing¡¯s dangerous, it eats dreams! It swallows memories whole! It eats anything it sees fit to mark with its nasty, pointy dropped pins! Where can it be?¡±


    352 pushed forward irritably and looked at the monitor. The data indicated that a certain Elmo was still asleep in his bed, but the phage software that should be running unnoticed inside his head was nowhere to be seen - just a pulsing red spot of light indicating an incomplete dream scan.


    ¡°Sit! Find it. Find it now!¡± 352 hurried out leaving his anxious associate gazing at the screen.


    ¡°What do I do? What do I do?¡± muttered 3124b to himself as he began clicking on a series of icons appearing on the screen in front of him. He was still feeling a little sluggish and was naturally worried about the consequences of the missing software.


    Suddenly, the door burst open and 352 came running in screaming, "Has he rung? Has he rang? Has..."


    ¡°What? Who?¡± replied 3124b, scratching his head.


    ¡°No.2, of course! Who do you think? He''s found out, and he''s not happy.¡±


    They were interrupted then by the ringing sound of a bright red phone on a table in the corner of the room. It was No.2.


    *****


    Gum peered sceptically at the pin, then declared, "Well, it¡¯s a pin."


    "Yes! Obviously!" squawked Elmo, hopping quickly about on the spot, his head scanning the gloom below in a rapid weaving motion, "We''ve been compromised. We''re not alone." His words were spilling out in rapid succession. "It''s in here."


    Roan looked at the frenetic Elmo. "Well, something strange is obviously going on here. But I¡¯d say that the fact that we¡¯re trapped outweighs any pin!"


    "Are you absolutely sure?" Heather pressed. "Are you sure we can''t get out?"Stolen content alert: this content belongs on Royal Road. Report any occurrences.


    "Well, look for yourself. This is no joke," Roan replied, throwing his hands up.


    Gum gave the wall a final obligatory thump.


    "Useless!" he declared.


    Elmo walked up slowly, the exertion of the night beginning to tell a little. He patted at his arm and gasped occasionally, looking for sympathy for his elbow but found none. Roan paused before addressing him. "We don¡¯t know whether this is your pin or not..."


    "It¡¯s not my pin! It may have been here, or it may have been dropped by one of you, but it¡¯s not mine!" insisted Elmo.


    "You don¡¯t know what¡¯s what, do you?" snapped Gum in frustration, getting increasingly annoyed at the craziness of the situation. "It¡¯s just some pin. All this stuff about dreams! You know enough to lead us into this, this..." he waved his arms about him trying to encompass the whole situation, his face wearing the kind of expression that proclaimed reality isn''t like this.


    "You can''t hide the facts, Gum. Yes, look where we are," Elmo gestured, as if that explained everything.


    Gum flicked the pin into the darkness evoking a horrified gasp from Elmo. ¡°Why so defensive, Gum? Can¡¯t you just work with me?¡±


    Heather shook her head about to speak, but Holi interjected, at that point, ¡°Look, I think we might just have to follow the steps.¡±


    "That¡¯s right, Holi," Roan agreed. "Let''s walk down and find out where this passage leads. Perhaps we can get out another way. By the way Elmo, that creature you pushed into my boot isn''t going to be covered by insurance - I hope he doesn''t wreck the thing."


    There was nothing to do but go downward. When Gum suggested digging a way out, Heather sighed and said, ¡°Tum, just don¡¯t.¡±


    Deflated, he fingered his stubbly beard in silence.


    As they descended, apart from the scrape of their footsteps, an uncomfortable silence set in, barely improved by the cold light of phone torches. Apprehension and foreboding grew the further from the surface they went; Elmo''s claim that someone else might be there hung in the back of everyone''s mind. Occasionally Elmo would mutter something as he scuttled along in the darkness, his face expectant.


    Eventually, they arrived at a short, paved landing where a large, wooden door was sunk deep into the right passage wall. The tunnel of steps continued downward past the door, an archway of stones spanning the onward path. Holding phone torches high, the group peered at the heavy door then back at the arch.


    Heather scowled down the stairway, ¡°It¡¯s just blackness and shade down there, we''ll end up needing to be rescued.¡± The alternative to straying deeper and deeper below ground, did seem worth investigating.


    ¡°Tum!¡± Heather said, expectantly.


    Gum pushed suspiciously against the door before searching for a handle. There was none to be found, but with a further shove from Gum''s shoulder the door grated open and all five ventured in, stooping to avoid the low, arched frame. Heather entered last, peering back up the stairs before committing herself.


    It was dark beyond the door and Gum ran his hand around the door frame searching for a switch. Roan held his phone high, holding the door, not wanting to be trapped in the room. As their eyes grew accustomed to the shadow, the space revealed itself to be a small chamber, perhaps a guardroom or waiting room.


    "No way out?" Heather groaned.


    *****


    There was something about the ¡®spider¡¯ that Mist hadn''t been able to work out until now, but it was occurring to her that something like it had been in her dreams last night; the same, apart from the spindly legs hanging from its mechanical body. Mist looked at it and then at the bed.


    ¡°Oh, you are joking!¡± she whispered: the ovoid spider-like device had cut the pillows and duvet to shreds with its sharp metallic legs. Feathers and cotton were flying everywhere. ¡°What a mess! First, Roan spills coffee all over the bed, then wine on the carpet, now this. When will it ever end?¡±


    The thing froze, the button on its back pulsing like a bloodshot eye, as if examining her, trying to register her next move. Mist shrank back as she noticed the jointed legs extending beneath the oval body - they were growing, stretching out even further than before! In an instant, it charged across the room toward her. Mistletoe let out a scream, jumped back and quickly slammed the door shut behind her.


    ¡°Phew! Just in time!¡± She was now on the landing and holding the bedroom door shut. There was a moment of silence. Just her own heaving breaths. She was safe. But the moment was splintered by a sawing, scratching sound at the base of the door. ¡°What¡¯s that?¡± she groaned. Horrified, she realised that the mechanism was attacking the door, trying to get to her.

 Chapter Three

    The five friends gathered around the doorway to the chamber.


    ¡°Dead end,¡± Roan noted, ¡°nothing but junk here. Wait, lamps, matches.¡± Roan¡¯s face lit up as he struck a match, ¡°I didn¡¯t expect that to light!¡±


    Gum turned from scanning the broken furniture littering the place to face Elmo, ¡°Time you told me about these dreams you''ve been having,¡± he muttered. Elmo nodded and everyone gathered in the centre of the room whilst Roan burnt his fingers lighting candle stubs in a couple of rusty lamps. Gum slid a suitable box out of the shadows and Elmo sat on the floor, Holi huddling in a corner, Heather hanging back closer to the comforting space of the open doorway. "I''m having a d¨¦j¨¤ vu,¡± she said. "I''ve seen this place before."


    ¡°I¡¯ve been having such a jumble of dreams,¡± Elmo interrupted, wringing his hands, eyes darting around the group. ¡°Like the floodgates opened and my brain won¡¯t stop. Not the usual stuff: flying, falling, back in school, unprepared for exams. But feeling trapped, secret portals, dark passages; that device keeps coming up. I remember them when I wake too.¡±


    Roan chipped in as he wandered the room: ¡°Wardrobes, mirrors, deep rabbit holes, storybooks! And who¡¯s Rimgumbaldy?¡±


    ¡°Rimgumbaldy?¡± sighed Elmo, flinching at Gum''s glare. ¡°It was his device.¡±


    Heather strained to listen, her attention divided between Elmo''s ramblings and the staircase back to normality, to home. She didn¡¯t like the gloom of the staircase, but didn¡¯t like to be too far from the only route back to normality either.


    Gum asked ¡°How come you know this place? How did you find it?¡±


    ¡°I don''t know how I know,¡± said Elmo, ¡°Dreams. I told you, someone put stuff in my head! Why am I dreaming about myself wandering around waving a pin? Why does the name Rimgumbaldy sound like something I should know? He sounds like some made-up medieval inventor.¡±


    Roan scowled, recalling the phone call earlier that morning. Holi looked disappointed, ¡°Why didn¡¯t you tell me any of this?¡±


    Elmo softened. ¡°I didn¡¯t know if it was all just... just dreams, you didn¡¯t seem interested when I drew that device from my dream. I did show you. I didn¡¯t know if it was dangerous - it is pretty weird. I don¡¯t know - didn¡¯t ever feel like the time was quite right. I did want to tell you, Hol.¡± Elmo went silent for a while, deep in thought.


    Behind, Heather was fighting the urge to look up the stairs, she fancied she heard movement far above them; it was indistinct, but her deja-vu recalled it too, and she was getting a little jumpy. Hopefully, just nothing.


    ¡°Let me get this straight,¡± continued Gum, voice thick with disbelief, ¡°you had dreams of fairy-tale castles and tunnels and you lead us all down here. You get an idea that some ancient dude called Rimbimbaldi made a magical device that you just happen to find one day¡­¡±


    ¡°Got it from a rat,¡± cut in Roan. ¡°And it¡¯s Rimgumbaldy.¡±


    ¡°Got what?¡± spat Gum, throwing his hands up in the air.


    ¡°I thought you said it ¡®turned up¡¯ in your bin!¡±


    ¡°There was a possessive rat in there with it," said Roan, "We did mention it in the car, but that other rat pretty much... Wait! Where did that one go? I almost forgot about it since we got stuck in here.¡±


    Gum, though, was not to be distracted.


    As he continued, the conversation became distant to Roan, as he wandered about, peering at the detritus littering the place.


    As he continued, Roan examined the detritus littering the place.


    ¡°This is typical of you,¡± Gum was saying, ¡°You scrawl some egg you dreamt about, which conveniently ¡®turns up¡¯ in your bin. You call us all up here, and we end up stuck in a tunnel. And why Rimgumbaldy? Why did you put my name in it?¡± Gum¡¯s voice was full of bewilderment and exasperation.


    ¡°And what¡¯s that about someone else being in here?¡± joined in Holi.


    Roan stepped back out past Heather to check the route downward.


    Elmo began to say something when Gum pressed, ¡°My name! Why?¡±


    Elmo seemed reluctant to answer. Behind them, Heather''s heart began to pound. She knew she had heard something - faint, like a half forgotten memory.


    Roan, with his back to her, was oblivious; he was peering into the darkness down the stairway, knowing that they would need to continue that way since the door hadn¡¯t provided a way out. He thought of Mist at home, probably worried about him. Gum, though, was still pressing Elmo to explain Rimgumbaldy. Sighing, Elmo said to Gum, ¡°Because you¡¯ve got something to do with my dreams!¡±Reading on Amazon or a pirate site? This novel is from Royal Road. Support the author by reading it there.


    ¡°What? Something how?¡± Gum was on his feet and scowling down at Elmo. Roan shone his phone torch into the obscurity of the downward tunnel; however, a grating noise on the stairs above made him spin round to see a terrible sight.


    Outside the door, Heather felt her breath catch in her throat as her eyes met those of a figure crouched on the steps. It was Elmo - no, he was behind her. Not Elmo. Something twisted, something wrong. Her mouth opened, but the scream was stuck. Her pointing finger trembled, and she found herself utterly unable to move. The figure plunged toward her in a dislocated lunge, as if unused to the motion of its own bones.


    Gum, having heard his wife¡¯s cry, hurried to Heather''s side, Elmo and Holi close behind, but he faltered as he saw the awkward creature in Elmo¡¯s form spinning to regard him. It fixed its eyes on Gum and crouched.


    Elmo wailed, backing away into the chamber, pushing Holi along with him.


    ¡°I don¡¯t know what you are,¡± Gum growled. ¡°But, back off. I¡¯m not afraid of any scrawny Elmo knock-off.¡± He squared his shoulders, voice steady, as a bead of sweat trickled down his temple. But, before he could prevent it, the creature slapped its palm flat onto Gum¡¯s forehead. Since Heather stood in the doorway now, blocking Roan¡¯s view of this assault, Roan spun back to the downward tunnel, meaning to lead the group in that direction, when, suddenly, everything went pitch black. Each one shot out their hands, feeling for one another. ¡°You still there?¡± came Roan¡¯s voice, flat now, all echoes and reverberation of the cave, gone.


    *****


    Elmo 352 picked up the phone nervously. There was a brief pause as he listened to a series of commands before putting the receiver back down. "He wants to see you," he said to 3124b, a look of deep worry etching his face.


    "Me? Why me? What have I done? Am I in trouble? I knew this would happen one day. It wasn¡¯t my fault!"


    The anxious clone stood up, fidgeting frantically, and made quickly for the door.


    "Look, don''t worry. Just tell the truth. There''s nothing else you can do. Don''t mention me - I had nothing to do with this. Hurry now; he doesn''t like to wait." 352 edged his shaken colleague to the door with sympathy and resignation.


    "I will be alright, won''t I?" said 3124b as the door of the office was opened and he was ushered out.


    "Be strong - I''m sure you''ll be fine," said his superior. ¡°Hurry; he can get a bit ratty about time.¡±


    3124b walked down the corridor in silence, trying to decide what he should say. He, of course, had never spoken to No.2 before, but knew that very few had ever returned from a meeting with him. He worriedly took a turn past the clinic, headed for the ¡®New Ward'', he knew only top personnel and management worked there.


    The corridor was clean and clinical, like the rest of the building. It seemed to go on endlessly. It was hi-tech, in fact, rather ¡¯space-age¡¯, a dusky blue apart from the brighter blue circular floor lights that let out shafts of light at even intervals along the route. There was silence apart from 3124b''s new, black, shiny shoes, which made a hard and definite sound against the cool floor. ¡°Wish our part of the building was as nice as this,¡± he muttered to himself.


    Eventually, he arrived at a heavy black door on his right. It was curved at the top, with a large yellow sign outside saying, ¡°Security. No entry to unauthorised persons.¡± He took a deep sigh and knocked before going in. Inside the room, he was surprised to find himself in a huge auditorium with seats ascending up all around him. Again, the light was faint, and again, everything was quiet. He stood in silence for a few moments before the silence was broken by a loud, bellowing voice that seemed to come at him from all directions. He looked up and around to see where the sound came from, but it was too dark. ¡°So, you are 3124b,¡± said the voice.


    ¡°Yes, s-sir,¡± stuttered 3124b.


    ¡°Well, it looks like things are in quite a mess. I''ll make this simple for you, 3124b. If this Phage program is not located, the damage could be catastrophic. Heads will roll - starting with yours! Do I make myself clear?¡±


    ¡°Yes, sir,¡± replied 3124b, who was now fidgeting again and furtively squinting for a glimpse of No. 2.


    ¡°This task is too much for you to take on by yourself, so I am going to give you some help. Would you like that?¡±


    ¡°Oh, yes sir,¡± said 3124b, who was feeling relieved that his head was not going to roll at this moment in time. As he completed his sentence, a figure emerged from the shadows and paced to the centre of the auditorium. A slender, dark, solemn figure dressed entirely in black, looking strikingly similar to 3124b, only cooler.


    ¡°3124b, let me introduce to you Foby 1. He is going to help you locate the Phage program. He is the best of the best, an improvement.¡± The dark character walked up to the junior doctor and stood motionless.


    ¡°Foby 1? What kind of a name is that?¡± thought 3124b to himself, squinting sideways now at the help.


    ¡°You have seventy-two hours to provide me with an update. Remember - fail this assignment and there will be no second chance. Do I make myself clear 3124b?¡±


    ¡°Yes sir,¡± replied 3124b sheepishly.


    ¡°Do not fail us. The consequences will not be good. For you! Obviously. You are dismissed.¡±


    *****


    Mist stood with her back pressed against the door, the spider-mechanism still scissoring abrasively just on the other side. Her chest heaved with each breath. In the hall mirror she saw her reflection, brown eyes wide with fear, but focused.


    ¡°I have to think about this logically,¡± she thought. ¡°Yes, I¡¯m afraid of spiders,¡± she reasoned, shaking slightly, ¡°but this isn¡¯t a real spider, so what am I afraid of ?¡±


    Taking a deep breath, she slowly opened the door, readying herself. Everything was still, quiet. Mist held her breath, tensing herself. She saw one of the legs edging out from behind the door. Flinging open the door, she stepped back and let the spider come scurrying out. It paused momentarily, near her feet and that was enough.


    ¡°¡®Ave it!¡± she muttered to herself, kicking it deftly toward the far end of the landing.


    The ¡®spider¡¯ smacked against the wall and fell into a heap on the floor, making a weird whimpering sound, legs all at awkward angles. Hands on hips, Mist surveyed her victory, then frowned. ¡°Oh no. Did I just break one of Roan''s expensive things?¡±


    ¡°What is it? It¡¯s a bit like the thing in my dream. But knowing Roan, he probably ordered it from Amazon. Ugh, what a mess, my bedroom¡¯s all full of feathers. I thought we had all synthetic stuff, I¡¯m allergic to dust mites - perhaps it was the feathers all along.¡±


    She picked up the spider device and poked the dangling legs back into its body one by one until it was in its original egg-like form. She put it by the TV. ¡°Where is Roan?¡± she thought, ¡°He hasn¡¯t texted me. Where has he got to? I heard that Gum¡¯s voice this morning at the front door, I¡¯ll bet he¡¯s with him again.¡±


    Mistletoe gave the device a last scowl, put it by the TV and set about her housework, mentally drafting a list of chores Roan that Roan now owed her.

 Chapter Four

    As Elmo 3124b trudged back down the corridor behind the silent Foby 1, Elmo 679 faced a different conundrum.


    "You need to see this," 352 said to his assistant, barely pausing as he passed, obviously expecting to be followed. He continued striding purposefully out of the investigation wing, 679 jumping up and hurrying to keep pace. "We have an unexpected situation. Certain things aren''t going quite according to plan. It''s so not good!"


    "They never are," thought 679, "We''re never going to get home, it''s messed up." The thought was interrupted as they passed the I.T. department; someone there was shouting nervously, "He is trying to find it!"


    Tiny feet could be heard slapping backwards and forwards. A strangled quack echoed in the distance.


    "Don''t ask!" 352 put in, "Just don''t ask. Don''t know why we bother with this," he muttered, placing his thumb and fingers onto a scanner aside a reinforced door. "352," he said into a microphone, and then, "Equally pointless!" His disdain for the security system was obvious as he rolled his eyes during the usual retinal scan. Nevertheless, the reinforced door slid aside with an airy weightlessness and the pair strode through.


    They stopped before a glass panel. 352 gazed at the shadowy room beyond.


    "This is the cloning centre, the green room!" 679 regretted the obviousness of his statement as it came out.


    352 glowered, "Just look inside."


    A female figure within saw them, marched to the viewing window.


    "That''s Mistletoe. I didn''t think we had brought her in."


    The woman stopped and placed her palm on the glass.


    "No, it''s not. That¡¯s the form she has in the UnKnown World."


    "What''s she doing in the green room? Who brought her here? Is that wise?"


    "That''s just it," 352 whispered. "No one brought her here. She just appeared. And look." He pulled up a grainy image on his personal tablet, timestamped from two nights ago. "She¡¯s been here before."


    "This is a cloning facility," the woman growled. "Aren''t there enough of you yet?¡± She then demanded, "What is the ogre-eater? The beest that can change its shape? I know it comes from here, but why is it rampaging about the UnKnown World. What does it want?"


    She hammered a fist then on the glass, making both Elmo 352 and 679 jump and scuttle off down a corridor.


    *****


    Meanwhile, the real Mist was pacing the living room, eyes darting between the clock and the door. Roan should have been home hours ago. It was getting late and anxiety was slowly wrapping itself around her thoughts like the cobwebs she hated so much.


    ¡°Why doesn''t he ever text? Just let me know where he is.¡±


    She sat on the sofa, pulling a blanket over her legs. She turned on the electric fire and contemplated


    lighting a few of her favourite scented candles. As warmth flowed out, she looked at the device.


    ¡°Have it,¡± she giggled to herself quietly before switching on the flat wall TV. It was approaching bedtime and dark shadows collected in the room, especially over the device. It seemed menacing again now as night came on. Ignore the thing. Watch some TV. Just relax.


    Mist gradually became sleepy as she sat in the warmth. Drowsiness was gently sweeping over her like an incoming tide. Her eyelids were growing heavy. She found herself blinking, nodding. She glanced at the device, it looked hard, unforgiving. ¡°It''s not a spider.¡± She closed her eyes, moments of TV filtered into her tired mind; a news report on the risks of excessive online gaming. Ought she to fall asleep?


    ¡°Cybersickness and dissociation are just some of the...¡± the TV droned.


    "It could just creep up on me again when I''m dozing," she thought.


    ¡°...teenagers light-headed and...¡±


    She could still see the device, even with her eyes closed. It crouched there in her thoughts. She should pick it up and shut it away somewhere, somewhere safe where it couldn¡¯t get out. This seemed like a good idea. Until Roan came home. She would just rest her eyes a little longer. Mist pictured herself picking up the device with her hand. It was heavy and cold. It felt almost frozen. ¡°Smooth jazz; think of smooth jazz, nice Autumn leaves - mmm¡­¡±


    Behind her eyelids something fluttered, the TV began to flicker. "It¡¯s like a moths" she mused dreamily. ¡°Like a big, lost moth.¡± The flickering TV suddenly went silent, went black. The screen seemed watery, moving subtly, as when a leaf might land on a smooth pool, radiating, causing the whole surface to ripple, to ripple out in all directions.


    Mistletoe was standing now, gazing at all the circles. Instinctively, she held her left hand out, fingers almost touching the screen. It didn¡¯t seem like much of a surprise when her fingers went right through. In the next blink of her eye, her world turned upside down. Then it turned back again, then it lurched and flipped sideways. a tugging, flowing sensation pulled her forward. Panic welled up as the world swirled black, but before she could react, the shadows flew apart like startled crows, leaving her sprawled on the floor.


    *****


    Wherever they had gone, it was far too dark to tell. It was more than dark, it was devoid. Devoid of light. Devoid of sound. Devoid of depth. The darkness here was tangible. It had texture, it had a presence creating its own atmosphere. It was disturbingly uncomfortable. senses were stripped of all use.


    "Are you there?" The voice seemed to bellow through the devoid. With the total absence of other senses, the volume of sound appeared excessive.


    "I am," came a reply, equally thunderous.Stolen content warning: this content belongs on Royal Road. Report any occurrences.


    "Me too!¡±


    "And me!"


    Everyone felt extremely unbalanced. The devoid made it hard to decipher whose voice was whose. Their minds wrestled with the theft of sensory perception.


    "Everyone OK?" Gum softly launched his concern, almost whispering it. He had had the intention of reaching out to try and grasp Heather; she would need something physical to reassure her. He knew he had thrust out his hand, but had no assurance he had managed it physically. As he called out to Heather, he raised his hand before his face. The darkness was so dense, it prevented any sensation of his hand being anywhere near his face. The impenetrably thick blackness swallowed all kinaesthetic awareness.


    These unnatural realisations were beginning to leak out in the voices of the others in a scrabble for comprehension. Confusion came and went swiftly, even fear only surfaced fleetingly, all swept along by the imploring surge of panic.


    "Where... are...we?" Each word emerged. Sound did not carry here, words simply ¡®appeared¡¯ directly in the mind like thoughts, but louder, and somehow, distinctly with the utterer''s accent and intended tone. The whole disturbing experience was more of a series of feelings and emotions than actual sounds heard.


    "This is not a ¡®what¡¯ or a ¡®where¡¯, in fact, you should be grateful that you all still ¡®are¡¯!" A new voice! The words burst into the awareness of the group. But this new one was different: it had an image attached! Not only did the voice storm into their consciousness without warning, but also a vision of a tall, hooded figure. Like the words, the perception of the image was unsettling, flashing within, rather than entering via the senses. The figure was clear in every detail as if seen normally, but it felt like it was standing on the inside of their eyelids. The ¡®feel'' of the voice made it worse. It had an irritating familiarity, yet was alien enough to prevent recognition.


    The group hesitated, but the nothingness was unbearable. Words provided something at least. So words there were:


    "Who''s that?"


    "Who''s there?"


    "What the¡­?"


    "Tum?"


    The responses grew out of everyone, confused, alarmed, frightened. Only Heather managed to grasp the faint familiarity of tone the voice carried. it was, essentially, Gum''s voice, but did not come from him, a least, not from her Gum! "I''m here babe, but I did not say any..." Gum, as confused as the rest, began to deny ownership of the intrusion, but did not have chance to finish.


    "Yes!" The voice flashed and died like a light bulb flicked on-and-off in a dark hall. The intensity of the expression extinguished all other thoughts of enquiry. The four companions were held in expectation of further revelation.


    "But not now," it continued with a phosphoric brightness that etched its existence into their minds, "There is no Time - pun not intended," the voice flashed on, making some kind of joke that only he understood.


    "I shall retract that. There is Time, it has never been about a lack of Time, but simply a matter of Time distribution."


    "Are you me?" insisted Gum, with more than a hint of annoyance.


    "I have answered that," appeared a stoic reply, with an unmissably impassive tone.


    "What do you mean - ¡®not now¡¯?" interrogated Roan, anxiety giving his words a sharp edge.


    "The now holds relevance only to yourselves; meant only as a means for you to understand," the voice offered with phlegmatic obscurity.


    The image had not moved and they were beginning to wonder if the voice was coming from the figure, or whether it was just some kind of ¡®focal'' point to ease the unsettling nature of the whole experience. Although Heather had recognised the voice to be Gum''s, she knew that it was not ¡®her¡¯ Gum; This Gum''s voice, it had a different resonance to it. Her Gum''s voice was beside her, or at least, that is where she perceived him to be. There was no sense of orientation within the devoid, but his voice definitely ¡®appeared¡¯ more to the left of her awareness than the others. She kept telling herself to reach out and try to grasp him, and despite the belief that she had, she was not at all sure whether she really had or not.


    This uncomfortable confusion stirred up a frustration that defied containment:


    "Understand what? What has happened to us? Why can''t I see anything? What have you done?!"


    Her voice was laden with emotions, each scrambling for prominence. It escalated to an authoritative crescendo like that of a mother discovering her offspring had trashed the lounge - and planned to expand the chaos into the dining room. Gum believed that he had turned to Heather to comfort her.


    Then the image moved. Hands flowed out from under the enveloping cloak, raised, and carefully lifted the cowl from off of its head. The friends realised that the cloak was not just the black that they first thought. As it moved, it appeared to change colour; hues of midnight-blue, deep-purple, dark-maroon; each racing along the cloak''s surface, chasing and merging with each other like multi-coloured oil. The whole action was swiftly done in one flowing move, with a purposefully practised silky grace.


    "I have done nothing to you."


    These words were implanted with such tenderness, that a collective wave of compassion was felt by all of them. It did not help to ease the ¡®visual¡¯ shock though. With the hood now resting on the high, broad, shoulders of the figure, their attention was drawn to two high protrusions that stood sentinel, each side of his head; looking like long, ornate sword-handles. They were strapped to his back, deliberately positioned for immediate and quick access. The distraction was brief, however. As the head was now revealed, the identity of the mysterion could be concluded: despite the longer hair, pulled tightly back into a ponytail, and the small, circular sunglasses hiding the eyes, the figure was most certainly Gum!


    "You have¡­ " There was a distinct pause, as this Gum searched for something that would give meaning to the friends'' dilemma, without being uneconomical with the dispensation of explanation that he felt was allowed him at this meeting. He seemed to find something that worked, and continued: "slipped off the page, if you will."


    "If you are not my now Gum, then what when Gum are you?" The contortion of the sentence slipped surprisingly smoothly off of Heather''s tongue and it was only after she had said it, that she decided to think about whether or not it made sense.


    "I am a pathfinder currently perturbed at the discovery of your plight.¡±


    "WHAT DOES THAT MEAN!?" Heather''s voice had abandoned all of its former restraint, and she screamed at the ¡®Then Gum'' - wherever, or whenever he was!


    "It doesn¡¯t matter. What is of more importance for you all is this: you must return. And I must continue, must find the rat, and save him. Save the rat: save the world!"


    This last, unexpectedly clear, determinisation burned through each of their heads with an intensity that they were not expecting, not even Heather. It was the only thing he said that carried any hint of confrontation or aggression.


    "Now let the dust settle!" This was a command, given with an unchallengeable authority, it was given directly to Roan and there was, literally this Time, no Time to respond. At the very moment that Roan was told by ¡®Then Gum¡¯ to let the dust settle, his consciousness automatically obeyed. The image formed in his mind of the dust membrane, his own outstretched hand just as precise and clear as the figure of Gum had been. With his mind directed to the intention of letting the dust settle, he felt himself withdrawing his hand and perceived a physical action.


    The shift was intense. It was as if somebody had come into his bedroom, and abruptly woken him by turning a halogen spot-lamp on his face: the vivid return of his senses made him reel back on the stairway that was once more below his feet, his eyes struggling with the comparative brightness, attempting to focus on the swirl of motes hanging in the air before him. He stared at it¡­


    ¡°What the¡­?¡±


    "Where¡­?"


    "How¡­?"


    The other four were standing behind Roan now - lower down the steps, on the other side of the screen of dust. No one was conscious of having moved from the chamber, or having evaded the assault of the thing on the steps. Each looked at the other; then looked at the drifting dust; then beyond the dust. The dark, twisted figure lurked there beyond. It seemed hesitant to approach, its eyes scanning the floating particles as if seeking a hole or a flaw. Roan turned breathlessly to Gum: "That was you, wasn''t it?"


    "Yes. It was. I could¡­ feel it!" he responded, quietly, almost reluctantly. "And I have a horrible feeling that I do actually know more than I understand."


    ¡°Should we run while we can?¡± Elmo prompted. ¡°Downward? Wherever it goes, it¡¯s got to be better than me there!¡±

 Chapter Five

    Holi woke. Blinked. Wet, blurry. Soft green light. Everything green. Yellow-green. Hazy forms moved like fish in murky water. Bright murky water. Green.


    A fish form swam slowly forward. A shadow in emerald depths. Closer - not a fish. A darkness moving closer. A man, not fish. Face of a man looming from green sea. Close - peering. Holi blinked. The face smiled.


    Holi blinked again, tried to clear the blurriness. She thought that she should be afraid, but all she felt was quiescent. Not afraid, not moving. She became aware that she wasn¡¯t able to move and yet still she wasn¡¯t afraid. Maybe she had been drugged.


    Her eyes, she could move her eyes. She looked to her right, blinked and found a moment of clarity. A room of clinical modernity. A huge upright tube - that midget in it. Suspended in a big tube of green liquid. The thing just floated there, weightless.


    At the periphery of her vision, another tube. Plastic or metallic, with a glass panel curving across the front, full of yellow-green fluid. This tube was between the one with the midget and... Realisation cut through the veil of her stupor like the spasm of an electric jolt. She too floated weightless - body and mind suspended in a capsule of deepest yellow-green. ¡®Cry o-chamber¡¯ letters said on the midget¡®s tube. She was floating in one too. Should she be crying? Panicking? Yet she experienced only serenity. How was she breathing? She was breathing? Her attention was captured then by an odd sight: running across the room before her was a duck. It was pursued by a flustered man in a white coat.


    *****


    Rat-Elmo had been keeping out of the way, hiding in the shadows of what no longer felt quite like his own home. The place appeared huge to his rodent senses with all sorts of new spaces that had meant nothing to him as a human. Now, he found himself lurking under furniture, slinking along the skirting boards and lingering in dark places and corners. He had a good idea that the frightful ear-thing knew he was there. It had slunk out of the bedroom not long after materialising.


    Rat-Elmo had followed it around for a while as it surveyed the house. At one point, it had hovered over a model car that Elmo had constructed, then jabbed it with its pin, making the car vanish. Rat-Elmo remembered working on the model. Then, found he could no longer recall it. Only the memory of the memory like trying to catch smoke. Was that what it did - delete things?


    It seemed capable of fading into the shadows even better than himself. Like himself, it was waiting here, anticipating something.. Rat-Elmo formulated a plan of action: wait it out, keep an eye on it, follow it wherever it went, along with his past self and Holi, all the way to Yorkshire. Then go through the events of that day once more and then maybe he¡¯d find some answers. At least he¡¯d meet up with his idiotic future self again and sort him out - or would it be a different version of his future self?


    Time passed and the day came when the trip to Yorkshire was due to happen. He watched his past self and Holi getting ready to leave the house for some last-minute shopping before their holiday began. His chest tightened as they bustled about their mundane tasks. Little did they know what was to come. He felt sorry for his alter-ego; wondered if he should warn him, spare him the pain of being where he now found himself. But did it work that way? Wasn''t the future inevitable once it had happened?


    He wondered whether there would always be two versions of himself now. No, not two, three - there had been a version of himself from ten minutes before his own time. There were future versions too! How many was that? Five? Six? This was terrible - he was losing count. A sickening wave of anxiety swept through him as he wondered if his mind was shrinking away, becoming just a rat. No - he had to get back, undo all of this tangle. He must. Rat-Elmo took the opportunity to venture down into the vacant kitchen and was about to try scavenging around the cupboards for gnawables when an unexpected event sent him scampering into the cover of a doorway.


    From nowhere, with no warning, a figure emerged from thin air and stood looking about himself. It was Elmo; an Elmo, at least, dressed in a sleek black coat with a textured, black body-suit beneath. The rodent brain of the lurking Rat-Elmo grasped that this was surely Future-Elmo. The new arrival looked smug as he established his whereabouts; he took a chair at the kitchen table, placed a familiar, metallic, egg-shaped object before him and pulled his mobile phone from his pocket. The time traveler pressed some keys, got a connection and began a brief conversation with Roan, saying something about ¡®being compromised¡¯ and someone coming to get him.


    What was going on here? Was his future self messing about with time and causality? Had this interference with the thread of time happened previously - had it always been there? An eternal loop that could never be untied once initiated? Back in the car someone had said that he had called! Rat-Elmo was determined to find out. He darted from his hiding place, leapt onto a vacant chair and thence onto the kitchen table just as the phone conversation ended. This sudden appearance startled Future-Elmo, as did the simultaneous sound of voices from beyond the front door.


    The Elmo from this time was obviously returning. The only one who truly belonged ¡®here¡¯ or rather ¡®now¡¯.


    "Oh-no!" Future-Elmo managed, jolting forward in panic, hands flailing, feet flying in an eruption of bony arms, spindly legs and badly cut hair. He crashed into the table, sending the phone skittering off one edge and his device careening off of the other¡­ It fell top-first to the floor, impacting the floorboards with a muted ¡®supping¡¯ sound and vanished into suspicious air!


    Rat-Elmo had only just managed to scrabble onto the table and witness these occurrences, when the life force was almost crushed right out of him with almighty intensity. A colossal, yellow-and-orange clad bottom descended onto him from a similar nowhere as that from which Future-Elmo had arrived, accompanied by a weird supping sound much louder and far deeper than the first. As blackness swept in like a tsunami, Rat-Elmo heard the door open, Holi gasp, and a deep voice exclaim, "Oh! I very say! You ring a bell!" He felt the weight pressing onto him ease somewhat as Future-Elmo attempted to force the immense, anonymous posterior away - and then it was gone as quickly as it had come with a further ¡®sup¡¯.


    Through closing eyes, he caught sight of Future-Elmo leaning toward him as he began to black out, but they flicked open again in horror as their lips met. The idiot was attempting man-to-rat resuscitation. Better to die! It passed through his delirious thoughts that this hadn¡¯t happened before - he would have remembered a dead rat. But wasn¡¯t your life supposed to flash before you if it was time to die. Maybe he wasn¡¯t going to die. The last thing he heard was the voice of Elmo at the door saying, ¡°Who are you? You look like me. And what was that, that, thing? With the yellow suit and beret?¡± and lastly, ¡°Are you kissing that rat?¡± Then the blackness was complete.


    *****


    Elmo 3124b was engrossed in some serious moping. He would have liked to remain a little out of things for a while following his recent botch up with the phage programme. He really couldn''t be blamed. If they didn''t work everyone so hard, then he wouldn''t have been so tired: up at six for morning workout and breakfast, a long day of desk and computer work and then various meetings and study in the evenings.A case of theft: this story is not rightfully on Amazon; if you spot it, report the violation.


    The life of an Elmo was a hard one and truth be told he wasn''t naturally one for working all that hard, he liked an easy time of it, a nice desk and not too much responsibility. No wonder he had taken a few quick moments to rest his eyes. A power nap was what it was. They were beneficial, that was widely recognised. Amid his miserable musings he noted that Foby 1, walking purposely ahead of him, had his hair slicked back and tightly gathered into a somewhat ragged ponytail.


    "Flash jerk," he muttered, "Who does he think he is in his black leather suit and trendy, dark sunglasses?" These gripings came to an abrupt, uncomfortable end as 3124b noticed they were entering the I.T. department. Everyone knew him there! He worked with them, sat at their dinner table! Was expected to socialise with them. Now he had to take the walk of shame behind action-man here, right through the middle of them. It couldn''t be worse. He felt eyes on him although no-one made actual eye contact. He sensed the disapproval, the condemnatory down-the-nose smugness of those that hadn''t messed anything up. He began feeling hot, bothered. One minute they worked alongside you, quietly competing, the next they kept out of your way and whispered when you passed as though you were a rat with the plague. No one liked rats.


    Foby 1 strode for the data section of the department. He was a self-confident, self-assured self. 3124b hated him already. Foby 1 - where did a name like that come from anyway? "I''ll bet he loves the ''1'' bit. Foby 1, Foh-Bee-One," he said the words inside his head with the heaviest coating of sarcasm he could muster. What irked him most was that this cooler version of himself was just like him, yet so very ''not him''. "Foby 1," the sarcastic voice inside continued, "and I¡¯m 3124b - not even 3124a."


    "Look here," the object of his annoyance broke the silence in a commanding tone. He was standing before the computer system in the data section. "Find data streams for any subjects even remotely involved with your project whilst I set up the relevant interfaces and get cracking with the analysis systems."


    "Its voice is so irritating!" 3124b grumbled inwardly as he sat at the controls.


    Noticing Elmo 3124b wasn''t pressing anything, Foby 1 paused, "Problem?" he enquired.


    "No, there is not a problem," 3124b replied, adding silently, scathingly under his breath, "Just you."


    The darker, sharper one busied himself whilst the less fashionably dark, less sartorially elegant


    one tried to focus on the screens and input terminals before him. He should know this. The data streams... Had he been trained on data streams? Foby 1 seemed to notice his hesitation and remained paused, hands on hips frowning at him.


    "The left one... Put in the subject codes and bring up the main menu. Look out for marker pins."


    Boy, was he galling, look at him there with his girly fingers clamped around his hips in his red and black leather.


    "Yes, the left one - it''s this button here isn''t it?" Elmo hovered his hand loosely over a range of possible targets.


    "No the next one." The complacent jumped-up... how did the menu work then? This screen wasn''t like the one he used. Elmo tried to look like he knew what he was doing. It looked like new software. He never got new software. Not till everyone else had been saying how good it was and then gone quiet because they were using it all the time. Then he got it, when it was old software. How could he be expected to keep an eye on everything if all he had was...


    "If the gear''s a bit unfamiliar maybe you could leave that and just patch me up to the Intervention Control Room."


    "To the what was that?" 3124b enquired cringing at his own ignorance.


    Now Foby 1 turned and looked over one shoulder, an eyebrow raised as if anyone ought to be able to do that simple task.


    ¡°Tell you what,¡± he offered ¡°Why don¡¯t you grab a couple of splitter nodes from the resource bank. Can you do that?¡±


    3124b wanted to grab that la-de-dah ponytail and strangle him with it. He felt hot, his collar was tight, a vein throbbed in his temple.


    ¡°Sure,¡± was all he said, as he slouched off, muttering to himself in the direction of the resource bank.


    When he returned, Foby 1 gestured for him to sit, then placed a sensory input set on his head. Mr. Super-Efficient already had his on.


    ¡°Okay, drop the shades and we¡¯ll take a look-see.¡± Even the pitch of the voice was frustrating, deeper than everyone else¡¯s. Surely that was fake, and what was that accent? Nobody else round here had an accent like that. It had to be put on. Foby thumbed a switch.


    Instantly, the confines of the data room were replaced with the virtual freedom of the visualisation interface that Foby 1 had so deftly connected to the head set. Here you could arrange raw data into 3D representations. The efficient one had chosen to display his source material as a tangle of glowing strands. They looked like jellyfish tentacles, undulating and waving in the flow of some unseen current. Foby 1¡¯s on-screen representation of himself wandered among the strands and filaments examining each and searching for who-knows-what. Smart little oik.


    3124b pretended also to be interested in what he saw. As he gazed around at the undulating, luminous amber-orange forms, he realised that they were actually quite beautiful in a weird kind of way. They reminded him of nerve systems or drifting seaweed, tapering tubes that gently curved and flexed.


    He found himself meandering among the threads, admiring their hypnotic curling. One caught his attention with its effulgent colour. He went closer, peering at an unexpected movement inside one of the tubes. He wondered if he would be in there somewhere. Was his own tenuous thread of existence to be found within this image of tidal time?


    "Stay with me, can you do that?" The voice made 3124b start. Him!


    Foby 1 pointed at a group of threads that ran in a bunch, like a lock of red-hot fat hair or maybe more like long, thin sea anemone tentacles waving in a slow-motion rock pool, no they reminded him of spaghetti....


    "Are you listening?" the superior tone came again.


    ¡°As you know, the phage notes irregularites in dreams, it drops a marker pin then assesses. If the irregularity in question shouldn¡¯t be there it deletes it - a bit slow, but efficient. If it got out of a dream, someone helped it take a physical form, it would likely keep marking, keep deleting¡­ Here are the diverging timelines, from 2009. Your phage appears to have infected each of them."


    "My phage?" 3124b said out loud, then just to himself, "Oh now it''s my phage. That''s just great. Why isn''t it your phage? Or 2''s phage?"


    Foby 1 frowned and continued, "Yet it seems to have made a jump here in this thread..." He was leaning in close to one of the beaming spaghetti tendrils, studying a nub that had formed on one side. It was leaking slightly, a warm, amber-yellow, viscous liquid that Foby 1 took care not to touch.


    "Hmmm,¡± he pondered, narrowing his eyes, ¡°Once we catch them we''ll have to cauterise most of these."


    "Cauterise?" Elmo 3124b found himself asking audibly and as his brain hurried, stumbled to keep up, "Them? What do you mean, them?"


    "To your first question: cut off the unproductive time-lines, sever them and seal them. To your second..."


    Even this efficient way of answering his flood of questions was annoying. The Foby-Elmo-One, the wonderboy, destined for greatness...


    "...yes them. Since your phage entered the flow of time prior to the divergences you see before you; when time split into these different possibilities, different realities; your phage multiplied. There is, of course, one version in each timeline."


    "More than one!" came Elmo 3124b''s awed gasp. "But wait, we can''t interfere with other realities. That''s not possible."


    ¡°How do you think someone sent that rogue Elmo back to 2009? Someone interfered well and good there, didn¡¯t they? How were we able to get Holi in here? How do you think UnKnown World Mistletoe got herself here and that bunch of wretched, little midgets got into Yorkshire to steal our device from First-Elmo? Interfering with other realities seems to have been going on for a while.¡±


    "But sever? Cauterise? Won''t that kill off anyone living in those realities?"


    "They are all just copies, multiple versions of the same thing. If we erase the duplicates it''s not exactly killing anyone is it?"


    3124b imagined himself being erased. He probably would be wouldn''t he. They''d keep this... this... thing rather than him wouldn''t they? Well who wouldn''t? Who wouldn''t want the better version? Still, he didn''t fancy being erased.

 Chapter Six

    The scene unfolding in Elmo¡¯s home was a beguiling one. Three people remained inside: the unconscious form of Holi lay on the sofa, Elmo, whose time this was, crouched over her, trying to revive his fainted wife. There was Future-Elmo who had created the bedlam that had just occurred, he was having somewhat more success reviving an injured rat. Then, of course, there was the rat itself, not actually a rat, but Elmo from another time, from the original time, if such a thing made sense any more, trapped in a rat body. Future-Elmo had placed it on the kitchen worktop in the recovery position where it lay breathing weakly. This Rat-Elmo coughed and gasped for breath, winded and bruised, if not broken, by one of the largest buttocks imaginable. So, four people really.


    Then, all four froze as a fourth Elmo seemed to fade into existence. This most recent arrival crouched on the broken table, looked at the others, flickered just once like it had a minor electrical fault and then wasn''t any kind of Elmo anymore. It was sniffing the air where moments before, a huge yellow-suited behemoth had inexplicably appeared and vanished. This not-Elmo was shifting form, darkening and becoming hairier, turning a pin in its fingers. Rat-Elmo just knew it was the thing from Past-Elmo''s ear. It contorted and twisted, leaning forward toward the very location of the ¡®supping¡¯ sound left momentarily by the disappearance of the giant, table-shattering intruder. Snuffling and sniffing deeply, the creature''s face found the point it was seeking. Looking less human, more bovine, it appeared to sniff itself away into the very fabric of the air.


    This disappearance though was not akin to its appearance. Whilst the thing in Elmo''s form had faded easily into the room like a TV picture fading in from nothing, it didn''t so much fade out as squeeze. The thing struggled into empty air, emitting a cow-like grunt. The results of this horrific, sluggish motion were surely emerging into some other reality, somewhere unseen by the grateful eyes of those left in the kitchen. As the latter parts of the body vanished, any semblance of Elmo was utterly transmogrified; a hoof, a coarse, tufted tail were the final parting features and it was gone.


    The rat sat up and Future-Elmo rubbed his tiny shoulders with his fingers.


    "That feels good," the rat panted feebly.


    "Save the rat," muttered Future-Elmo under his breath. "Keep him safe. Not just a rat. What ever was that thing?"


    The Elmo who belonged here gazed at the space previously occupied by the not-Elmo in utter disbelief. He then gazed similarly at the pair on the work surface. They were clearly less disturbed than he was. The rat was wriggling its upper back and shoulders in circles whilst Future-Elmo poked his thumbs caringly into his lumbar muscles, working the body back to action. When he could bear it no longer, the Elmo who belonged here cut in, "I hate to disturb whatever is going on there, but would you help me with Holi?"


    Future-Elmo helped to drag Holi in the direction of the bedroom. "Careful, you''re knocking her head!" said one.


    "That wasn''t me," the second objected. One Elmo knelt beside her, touching her forehead until he was sure she was okay. The other checked her pulse. "We''d better talk," one said, realising that Holi''s lack of consciousness might be best for a short while.


    Back in the kitchen a useful discussion got underway. Each of the participants explained his position, each amazed and astounded at their differing revelations. Future-Elmo was shocked that the rodent recovering slowly before him was actually the Elmo that he had met in the woods and sent back just ten minutes, an event that was still future in this reality. Elmo who belonged here was shocked by everything, not least that the shape-shifting thing they had watched exiting via the kitchen had earlier come from his ear - summoned by his device. Rat-Elmo was seriously annoyed that his plan to secretly follow Elmo from this time to Yorkshire had been ruined. Their pooling of information, at least, was useful. They could work together. They had a device: the Elmo who belonged in this time still had his stashed safely now in a cupboard. All they needed was a plan. How could they untangle this mess?


    *****


    Meanwhile, having left the gloom of the auditorium, Number 2 sat in his private antechamber.


    His bright, piercing orange eyes stared grimly at the others gathered around him.


    "It''s time to see if we can bring the ¡®rogue¡¯ in," he intoned.


    "Yes, sir," a subservient Elmo agreed. "Bring him in."


    "He''s made enough mess. We know he vanishes. We need to find out what he knows, then mop up that moronic phage incident. Perhaps we can make some actual progress."


    His voice lingered on ''moronic'', whiskers twitching in mock approval, an unsubtle jab at the collective incompetence of those standing around him.


    "Don''t make me have to chase you on this, you know how I hate exertion!" The annoyance in his tone was undisguised, and anyone who dared to look might well notice the irate twitching of his ears and swishing side-to-side motion of his long, pink, naked tail. Number 2 rose and left. Nobody had the rank disrespect to let their eyes linger on the long snaking tail trailing from the rear of his cloak.


    *****


    In the kitchen, Elmo from this time and Rat-Elmo wanted to know what time ¡®Future-Elmo¡¯ had come from, but he seemed reluctant to offer much enlightenment. So, they turned their minds to look ahead, to plot a course for the future (or more accurately ''a'' future) when a crashing noise came from the cupboard. It sounded like someone was suddenly in there. The door was full-sized like a door to another room. Nevertheless, a cupboard was all that there was behind that door. There was a heavy stumbling sound and the door opened just a crack.


    "Who''s there?" a voice whispered through the crack.


    "We might ask the same thing," Past-Elmo returned.


    "Are there three of you? Are you together? Is the device secret, is it safe?"


    "Yes, yes, and yes - what are you doing there in my cupboard?" Elmo was on his feet and slowly edging forward to get a peep round the door.


    "Listen to me, all of you, you don''t have much time." The voice sounded familiar but the speaker clearly didn''t want to be seen.


    A further scrabbling and shuffling indicated a large person in a small space, struggling to get comfortable.


    "If I can just get this broom handle¡­"


    "Gum?" said Rat-Elmo.


    "Never mind, there''s not time," the tightly-confined visitor went on. "Events are unfolding beyond control, and we need to get that control back."


    "That''s what we were talking about," Future-Elmo added.


    "Which one of you is from the future?" the possibly Gum voice called.


    All turned to look at Future-Elmo, but he was silent, as if experiencing some sudden internal pain.Support creative writers by reading their stories on Royal Road, not stolen versions.


    "Quickly¡­" the voice from inside the cupboard urged. "Which one?"


    But Future-Elmo was fading before their eyes, vanishing away into a mist of nothingness.


    "Save the rat, save the world!" insisted the closeted stranger.


    "I did didn''t I?" came the wispy reply, then Future-Elmo was gone.


    "Too late again," the figure behind the door sighed. Then with fresh urgency, "Do you still have your device? Listen carefully. You have to get out of here and take the device to Gum''s place. Get it to him. Tell Holi she fell onto the table and hit her head. Make her believe that what she saw was simply the result of the blow. Don''t get her involved, trust me, you don''t want her knowing about rat versions of yourself and the rest of it."


    The manoeuvering with handles and plumbing stopped as swiftly as it had begun. The room returned to quietness. Elmo who belonged in this time looked at Rat Elmo and shrugged, "It''s a plan at least," he said with a grimace.


    *****


    Rogue-Elmo felt woozy after being extracted from the kitchen and returned to the clinic. He was not allowed to recover his senses before being hoisted up by two tight-suited Elmos and led off down the sterile, semi-elliptical corridor that approached the New Ward. The upward-shining blue lights at regular intervals in the floor made him squint as they went by. Barely aware of the journey, he was deposited in a chair in a room near the enigmatic Number 2''s quarters. He had never seen him up close, few had. You only got this close if it was really important.


    Questioning by the two spigot-suited Elmos was sharp and methodical. Yes, he had arrived back there in 2009. Yes, he had met the very Elmo who it all began with. No, he couldn''t say who sent him. He seemed most anxious when questioning turned to just how events had unfolded. His purpose had been to change the history of the domino-type series of events of that day - but he secretly feared that he might actually have caused them. Sounding mysterious and warning Elmo to go back had sounded like a great plan when he initially came up with it, but now they were asking him what exactly had happened. How had a rat got involved? Best to tell them some of the truth, but not all of the truth.


    ¡°I did as instructed,¡± Rogue-Elmo explained defensively, ¡°I remained concealed and used my wits to get Elmo of 2009 to go back.¡±


    The Elmo who seemed to be the senior of the two probed, ¡°And how exactly did you do that? How did you involve yourself?¡±


    ¡°I... er... I hid myself in the undergrowth and called out to go back - ¡®Go Back!¡¯ I said. I made my voice all mysterious.¡±


    The inquisitors exchanged glances. ¡°And did he go back?¡±


    Rogue was sweating - what was he to say? He had imagined that he would have plenty of time to get his story together before being questioned, but now he was having to think on his feet. Elmo of 2009 had not gone back, worse, he had come forward.


    ¡°Yes, he did,¡± he fibbed, ¡°He went back.¡± That covered one botch up, but how to handle the rat matter?


    The slight look of uncertainty on the faces of his seniors emboldened Rogue-Elmo and ideas began to jump from brain to mouth.


    ¡°He went back, but he tricked me! I watched him go - he looked all scared and he ran, I think... yes, he ran. But when I was packing up and getting ready to come back he must have sneaked up on me, because he grabbed my mechanism and tried to run off with it! I tried bravely to subdue the trickster, but he had a rat with him and he set it on me! The thing bit me! That was when he somehow activated the mechanism and he and the rat escaped. But don''t worry - he didn''t get away with the mechanism.¡± That should do it. The questioners looked at him puzzled, wondering where the device was now.


    ¡°Oh... I realised I had to hunt that Elmo down, and his pet rat, and make sure they didn''t cause further trouble. So what I did was...¡± Rogue was really struggling to extemporise, making things up on the spot was dangerous, but he had no choice - if they found out that he had sent Elmo back, that he was possibly the cause of this whole sorry mess... that he had created the whole rat lineage¡­


    ¡°I... er, er... I sent myself back in time, because I had cleverly worked out where he had gone.¡± He pointed an index finger to his right temple at this juncture and tapped it lightly, nervously indicating his own ingenuity. ¡°I followed him back in time, but he fooled me by changing places with his pet rat! He had teamed up with the Elmo from that time line by the time I got there. They overpowered me and stole my mechanism! I fought back though, I had the rat by the throat and the past Elmo in a neck hold. I demanded they return my device whilst I decide how to punish them both. I was just about to make my move when pffft!¡± He shrugged, held his palms out.


    Behind him, a voice he hadn''t heard until now spoke. ¡°So, you were told to make Elmo 2009 go back?¡±


    ¡°Yes. Don''t we all want him to go back? Wait, I¡¯m not supposed to be speaking about this.¡±


    ¡°Tell me, what number are you?¡± the big, pale Rat squeaked.


    ¡°Number Two!¡± he gasped, ¡°That is to say, I''m number 501.¡±


    *****


    "I heard the duck got away," said 679.


    "I can''t say I''m especially surprised, nothing ever seems to go according to plan," 352 grumbled, "It drives me mad! But I understand someone has a new plan for her in there."


    679 looked at the figure floating in the cryo-cylinder, suspended in glowing green gel. She gazed dreamily back at him. He couldn''t tell if she was really conscious of her surroundings or not.


    "We''ve been instructed to get her down to the green room for some reason."


    "Isn''t that where they''ve started doing those dodgy nibblin experiments?" 679 asked suspiciously.


    "Yes, it is," said 352.


    "You don''t suppose they intend to try it on her?¡± 679 asked. "Surely they wouldn''t go that far."


    At that moment, both 352 and 679 were rudely interrupted by the combined sounds of crashing metal, tumbling body parts and thick fabric being sucked into a conveyor belt, all of which was displayed on a large, wall-mounted video monitor.


    It had been caused by an ogresome creature that had lost its balance whilst running on a treadmill. The mishap had sent him sprawling head-first, down onto the moving floor of the machine.


    The treadmill in turn had flipped over beneath the great weight of the clumsy creature causing the loud crashing sound that had startled the two men. Caught up in the tangled mess was part of the ogre¡¯s trousers which were now being sucked into the still-moving treadmill belt! The ogre let out a shriek as he tried desperately to free himself from the fast-moving machinery.


    ¡°Oh - I do very say! Steady on! One is not accustomed to such frivolous happenings during a perfectly dignified workout. Ouch! Not a good turn of events.¡±


    He freed himself with one final yank that sent him rolling head over heels towards the camera which shook violently with the impact. ¡°Aargh! This feels like impact week,¡± the creature mumbled, his face appearing in extreme close-up on the screen.


    ¡°This is exactly what I¡¯ve been talking about,¡± snapped 352, staring at the giant form on the screen. He glared at his subordinate and continued, ¡°I¡¯ve told you to put some proper systems into place. I told you to get that treadmill out of here. That¡¯s the third time he¡¯s fallen off it.¡±


    The ogre creature was looking sheepishly around him. ¡°And what about that stupid simulator?¡± Number 352 stabbed an accusatory finger in the direction of a second monitor displaying a deep-yellow image, ¡°Has that helped him? We can¡¯t keep going around in circles like this!¡±


    ¡°Well, the bottomless glass cylinder cracked, causing some yellow gel to leak during emotional submergence. He was trying to eat himself out but mistakenly bit into the cylinder,¡± the junior replied with a look displaying elements of both excitement and uncertainty.


    ¡°And just how did he do that? That¡¯s not possible, is it? It¡¯s made of glass and it¡¯s curved. I don¡¯t know... I¡¯m not sure this invasive associative psychology treatment works. The inane idea that finding the bottom of a seemingly bottomless vat can somehow cause him to reveal the profound workings of his psyche sounds utterly ridiculous,¡± 352 muttered shaking his head, ¡°You¡¯re just doing any old thing in here!¡±


    The junior doctor lowered his voice so the behemoth on the screen might not hear, ¡°Yes, but Number Two agreed it would be a good treatment when we put it to him.¡±


    ¡°I¡¯m not questioning his judgment. All I¡¯m saying is that Grimmbros cannot get to the bottom of his own subconscious by finding the bottom of something else - even if he does seem to like that stuff. How can less bottom equal more bottom?¡±


    The spluttering Number 352 was floundering. He was aware that the subject on the monitor had undergone a traumatic experience in his own world, having fallen to a beest that he should never have met. This would inevitably stir some very deep emotions. The ordeal of the once-confident champion finding himself ignominiously bested was already developing into a creeping despondency that was in danger of becoming a sullen negativity, potentially rendering him worthless. And right now, he was the best hope for catching up with the beest and preventing it from doing the inevitable. But subjecting him to a series of bizarre exercises to help him retain his self-esteem and foster self-respect? The theory was that if he could experience a series of successes here, under carefully controlled conditions whilst his body slept in his own world... It was altogether preposterous! This wasn¡¯t science it was lunacy!


    The junior 679 cut in enthusiastically, ¡°He needs to find a bottom where there is none. The idea of the treatment is for him to realise that the cylinder must somewhere have a bottom even though he believes it, for now, to be bottomless. Once he discovers the bottom, he will embrace it, even celebrate it. In fact, the whole idea of the thick, custard-like yellow gel is ...¡±


    The senior doctor had a look of disgust on his face and interjected, ¡°I think we should change the subject.¡±