Here is a dark cave, therein lies a boy. Let’s watch him sleep awhile.
Look closely: his chest is rising, and if you wait and pay attention it will fall too. See, his eyes roll and shudder beneath pale, sealed lids. His hands are clenching into fists, and now, shaking, they are opening again. He has been lying here for years, you can tell by the length of the dark hair which sprawls over the grainy stone beneath his head. The strands have naturally fallen away from his face which is gray in the dark.
His shallow sighs don’t echo in the dense air of this cave. The walls are too close; everything is too close. There is no time for an echo. If your eyes have adjusted to the dark by now, you might see how small the cave is. You can see the curve of the walls and ceiling, which form a smooth dome. The floor is just large enough for the boy to lie across its diameter.
Stop, close your eyes, listen. Do you hear beyond the stifling quiet? Can you hear that low rumbling, like something shifting, waking up, deep below? Now-
---
My eyes slip quietly open in the dark. I’m still, staring at the ceiling, listening. My heart is beating just a little too loud. I’m listening for what woke me up, but this cave is silent. My dreams were empty too, so no hints there. I look down past my nose. My breath looks like smoke as I release it from my lungs; I hadn’t been aware that I had been holding it, but apparently that was how I listened- breathlessly.
Now that I don’t have to listen, I can move and breathe. I stretch my fingers, loosening them from their fists. They feel stiff and weighted, as if they had been closed my whole life. I continue testing my limbs, tensing the muscles from my arms to my toes. I arch my back and neck, lifting off of the rough stone which remains dimpled in the shape of my body. My muscles feel underused, but not weak. It takes some stretching before I’m ready to sit up. I settle back into my impression before hoisting my head, followed by my upper body, from the rough stone.
I scan the dark. The space around me is pitch black, yet I can still make out the walls. Curious, I search for a source of light, pivoting my head as far as it will go before I have to twist my back. Moving like this doesn’t feel unpleasant, rather, unfamiliar. When I can’t see anything from where I sit, I stand up and walk the perimeter of the cave. I feel the stone with my fingertips, looking for something, a crack or an irregularity. Finding nothing, I look closer, investigating the individual grains of stone. My scrutiny is useless, so I decide to take a different approach: I hold my hand up, inches from the surface of the wall. It’s barely discernable, but the side of my hand facing the wall is slightly brighter than the other. The glow must be coming from the walls themselves. In addition, I have concluded that the walls and ceiling are really one spherical surface.
Satisfied, I lie down in the same position as when I woke up, and I try to go back to sleep. After all, there seems to be nothing left to do. The floor is harder than I remember, the stone rough against my skin. The light, though dim, pushes through my eyelids as if they were made out of paper. Frustrated, I shut my eyes even tighter. I see dots and colors. I feel my eyelids struggle in their effort to remain sealed, but will triumphs over all, and I feel darkness seeping back into my eyes. Just as I begin to feel delirious, as if sleep is about to take me over, there’s a sound in the distance. A rumble from deep beneath me which I can feel through my whole body.
My eyes flash open and I sit up. The cave is different. The walls are still glowing and round, but now they open up into a passage to my right. I blink, and stand up. Without hesitation, I follow the passage upwards and to the left. As I climb, I notice a strange feeling on the back of my neck. I reach back to feel if something is there, but my hand only runs through my hair.
I whip around. Someone is watching me.
---
Don’t worry, he can’t see you.
Why don’t you make up a name for this boy? Just tell me the first name that comes to your head.
Okay… That’s kind of boring, but if you say so.
You can see that this boy has an intense curiosity. Or is that paranoia? His eyes dart around like he’s searching every corner of the passage. Now he’s stopping to bend down and look at the ground. His hands are searching and feeling for anything to pick up or to look at. This cave is so pristine that there’s not even dust on the floor. He won’t find anything.
Watch his hands: they don’t shake, but still they look desperate. He’s worried, but why would he be worried? This is all he’s ever known.
Hear that? That’s the third rumble. Let’s see what happens this time.
---
I stumble and sit down as the rumble passes underneath me. I’m startled and thrown off-balance. Again I look behind me. I’m convinced this time that the walls are brighter as the sound shakes them.
I stand up to keep walking, but I only turn halfway uphill before I come face to face with writing on the wall. A word stands out, glowing brighter than the rest of the wall around it, as if written years ago, whenever the cave was formed. The word hadn’t been there before the rumble. I am sure of it; I had been paying very close attention to the passage. I had been looking for anything to appear. And here it was, one word, lining the surface of the wall: “John.”
I’m confused. Why did the cave tell me this name?
“Is your name John?” I shout into the passage.
“John… John… John… John…” It replies amiably.
“I guess I should take that as a yes?” I spin on my toes; this voice seems to be coming from everywhere.
“Yes… Yes… Yes… Yes…” The reply is resoundingly positive.
I smile; this is new. I’m curious again. Do I have a name? “It’s very nice to meet you John, do you know my name?”
“...My name… John… My name… John…”
“Yes I know your name is John, do you know mine?”
“...Know mine…? Know…”
“Oh, no? You don’t… Okay, well thank you,” I say as I continue walking, eyes on the ground. At least now I have some company.

After following the passage for a short time and having a nice, though oddly one-sided, conversation with John, I reach the top of of the hill. The floor is finally flat again, and the tunnel seems to lead to an opening. I’m hopeful that maybe this opening will lead to some answers. I wonder who I am, where I am. Something in my stomach tells me that this cave isn’t my natural home.
Through the opening shines a bright light, different than the glow of the walls. As I get closer however, the light doesn’t grow. What I thought was an exit, is just a hole in the wall. My heart sinks. This hole isn’t nearly large enough for me to squeeze through, in fact it’s not even big enough for my hand.
Still, I trudge over to the opening and put my eye up to it, bracing for the blinding light.
---
He’s trying to break out. This one is insistent, and soon he might discover us. You must be careful not to stir him further or he may find another opening. It’s clear that he’s desperate to find a way out. Watch him claw away at that hole in the wall. What does he see through there? How much will he figure out? That is up to you.
Cover his eyes and move him to a quiet spot. Increase the dosage and coax him back to sleep. This has gone too far already, but if we’re cautious we can salvage this experiment.
---
The hole is barely as large as my eye, and the cave closes in towards it in the shape of a funnel. I can only get so close before the size of my head is too large to fit in the rough cone. Still I manage to see into the hole from a few inches away. My perspective is limited by the edges of the hole, but the light that enters my eyes is bright and allows me a keyhole view of the room beyond.
Through the hole I can only see a portion of the room: the top half, where the ceiling meets the wall opposite my hole. The room, the portion that I can see at least, is coated in a harsh, white-blue light which emanates from thin tubes implanted in the ceiling. The tubes glow and shimmer with cold intensity. White shades on windows and the pastel green wallpaper reflect the light dimly, as if saddened that this is the only way that they will ever be seen. Something in the middle of the wall in front of me ticks. I see it, it’s a clock.
Why do I know what a clock is?
I strain and fidget to find a better view. The shades on the windows are all closed. Windows is another word I shouldn’t know. I don’t remember ever seeing a window in my life.
I grip the walls to my left and my right, pushing my eye harder against the hole. My eyebrow is scraped by the rough stone. I push harder, there have to be more things in this room, things that I shouldn’t know. Down as far as I can see, there is a blanket covering something lumpy on a bed. I realize that the cave is cold, the floor is an uncomfortable place to sleep. To the right there is a door, which is closed, and the latch is locked. Between the door and the clock, on the wall in front of me is a photograph. Photographs are taken with cameras. Cameras run on batteries, batteries store electricity, electricity powers fluorescent lights, fluorescent lights illuminate the photograph. The photograph portrays a landscape of fields, there are a few scattered shrubs and small trees. A tall animal, a giraffe, eats from one of the trees. Clouds float low above the giraffe’s head, painted pink by a floating sun.
Something moves in front of the painting. There is a figure, a person, their face hidden by a shadow. They gesture towards me. They’ve seen the hole, they know I’m spying. I hold my breath, listening, hiding. I see a hand in front of the hole. It doesn’t belong to the first figure; there must be two people in this room. The hand moves towards me, and covers the hole.
Another rumble shakes the floor beneath my feet so violently that I am knocked to the ground. I scramble up and towards the hole, putting my eye up to it, terrified that I’ve lost my only way out. The hole is dark. I scream.
“Hey! No you can’t do this! Can you hear me? Do you know how to get me out of here? Open up the hole! I need to see outside! I’m trapped in here!” I tear at the hole and the wall around it, bloodying the tips of my fingers and shredding my fingernails. “Please!” I shout.
The rumbling continues. It grows stronger, and with thunderous effort and a shake that brings dust raining from the ceiling, it throws me backwards down the tunnel. I fly ten steps backwards, landing on my shoulder and rolling downhill. My body is moving fast, spinning, whipping, and smacking against the floor of the passage. I close my eyes and curl up as much as I can, trying to avoid any loose extremities which might hit something and end up breaking.
My body absorbs the impacts, but continues rolling. I wince every time I bounce. The passage slopes out more gradually, and my descent slows to a point when I can stick out my arms and legs and stop myself from rolling. The rolling ceases, but I slide a ways, scraping my back against the stone.
Once I’ve come to a stop, I lie motionless for a few minutes, silently. I find myself listening to the cave around me. The rumbling is constant and quiet now. It doesn’t shake the floor so much. I can hear the echoes in the cave around me. Somewhere behind me a rock falls, the first sign of debris in an otherwise empty cave. Further away still there is a trickle of water. The sound of it bounces off the walls, mixing with the rumbling and the falling stones in a sort of surreal music.
I moan and prop myself up on my elbows. This part of the cave, which is more like an intricate tunnel system as I am quickly realizing, is a large pit with steep sides. The glow of the walls has dimmed down to a faint luminescence. I’m tired. The walls stare down at me, ready to crush me. I push myself up, wary of the walls around me, wincing from the bruises and cuts that cover my body.
I take another moment to shake the shock from my nerves before peeling myself from the floor. The cracking and creaking of bones echoes off the walls. Halfway through standing up I freeze. How could I have forgotten what an echo is? My heart sinks with the realization that John was not a friend, but in fact that I had been talking to myself. The crack still lingers, resounding off of every surface around me. It was John’s final action.
In the absence of my only friend I begin to wonder who John is. The sign on the wall must have been written to someone. I doubt the likelihood that the cave is telling me its own name, seeing as it’s a cave. Assuming that I’m the only one in the cave, the name must have been written for me. Taking a leap, I guess that the name must be my own. John… The only name that I have ever heard, yet it still feels boring and overused.
“What do I do…?” I muse, looking at the steep walls surrounding me.
“Do… do… do…” the ghost of John advises.
“Where am I? Where do I go?”
“Go… Go…” he insists.
“But where? I’m stuck in this pit, and there’s no way out.”
“Way out…”
“Who were those people? I can’t believe that they just left me here.”
“Those people... left you here…”
“Come to think of it, they didn’t seem to be happy to see me. Maybe they’re trying to trap me… Oh no… I have to get out before it’s too late.”
“It’s not too late…”
“No, not yet, but I have to fi-” I falter, and listen breathlessly, wondering if I heard correctly.
“There is a way out…”
“John? Is that you?” This is no echo.
“You are John. This is John.”
“What do you mean this? I guess I’m John, but I mean, John was just my echo. He wasn’t real.”
“We have to wake up John.” The room around me begins to shift. The light emanating from the walls grows brighter to illuminate the transformation, or rather the animation, as the cave seems to come to life. The rumbling deep below has turned into a soft, repetitive thumping: twice, then pause, twice, then pause.
“What’s going on? Who are you? Where am I?”
“We are John, and we have to wake up. We are trapped inside our own brain, and if we don’t go soon, we’ll never escape. Now leave. You will find a light: go to it.”
I listen, bewildered, and take a step forward. As I move, the walls and floor react to my presence, pulsing in and out. I can hear my own heartbeat far beneath my feet, much stronger now than the rumbling ever was. I think of where I want to go as I am walking. A light appears in my mind, like the face of an old friend. As I picture the warm glow of freedom, the walls around me bend to show me the way. The cave leads into another passage, and I follow it upwards until it leads me back to the spherical room.
The room is the same size as when I left it, and is still very dim. In the center of the floor is an imprint in the shape of my body. The imprint shines with pure, white light. I lay down and feel the shimmering ethereal light of sleep take me over. The last thing I hear before I drift away is my heartbeat: twice, then pause.
---
He’s waking up- we have to act now. Inject him with the sedative. We can’t let him figure out what’s going on, or this whole experiment is ruined. We almost have what we need to find a cure, but if we lose this patient then we lose everything.
What are you doing? His eyes are opening, this is our last chance!
---
The world shifts into focus around me as I slip out of my slumber. My senses are all intact except sight. I hear a man yelling, “This is our last chance!” I feel an itchy piece of cloth covering my face. The cloth smells of detergent. My mouth is dry and tastes of plastic. I feel cuffs around my wrists, ankles, and neck.
“You’ve ruined me… do you realize that?” The voice is slightly muffled through the cloth. “You’re lucky I even hired you, and you’ve destroyed everything in a day. They’re going to shut us down now; you’ll lose your job and I’ll never get this close to a cure again.”
“Hello?” I say through the fabric. “What’s going on?”
“Now we’ve got a man, a witness on our hands- they’re going to paint him as a ‘victim,’ and he’s going to press charges. Do you realize what that means?”
I’m getting frightened, this man doesn’t want me leaving, and I’m not sure what he’s going to do to stop me.
“It means either we are ruined forever, and both of us go to jail for abduction and whatever else, or this man has to die. Now I don’t know about you, and honestly I don’t care, but I’m not going to go to jail. I didn’t want it to come to this, but you were stupid enough to just let him wake up. You can try to stop me, but keep in mind the consequences if anyone finds out about this.”
I start to yell. “Hello? What are you doing? Why am I here? Stop for a minute! If you let me go, I’ll do anything you want! Hello? Please, answer me!”
Silence. I feet almost as deaf as I am blinded by the cloth on my face. I struggle against the restraints.
A pinprick on my arm sends me into a panic. I scream nonsense and obscenities and pull violently at the restraints. I feel my right shoulder pop out of it’s socket. The pain does nothing; I can’t scream any louder or struggle any harder. The needle presses into my flesh, biting and stinging. Something passes into my blood. I feel my heart skip a beat, then another. It beats again- fast and irregular, trying to catch up and find it’s pace. Pain crushes my chest as my heart struggles to work again. I feel and hear it pump once, and pause. Twice, and pause. The pause continues. It pumps three times, faster. It stops. My body goes numb, and my thoughts fade. My shoulder has stopped hurting. No longer can I struggle against the restraints. I don’t know where I am anymore. The pain is gone, my body is numb, and I quietly wish that I could go back to the cave.