chapter x: in the depth of a mind everything is absolutely black but it's moving like scribbles.

I was walking forward. Everywhere I turned was darkness. I couldn’t see in front or beside me. Yet the darkness as if it was moving around me.

I sigh and pant, but continue forward.

„I’m going to find you, Mina,“ I say firmly, “I am.”

„Oh are you now?“ comes out from the dark walls.

I startle.

„who’s that?“

„You want to rescue someone from the horrors of their own mind,” a piece of black cloud jumps from one wall and to the other right in front of me. “when you have just the same mess in your own,” it continues.

I startle. “no…?” I say but my voice is wobbly, “what are you talking about?”

“what a noble journey,” I hear from behind me. “You hope to reach your friend, but tell me,” something jumps on my shoulder and whispers to my ear “who are you actually doing this for?”

the ground caves in under my feet. I cover my eyes and head and fall into another black space, identical to the one I dropped from. But now a weird slimy shadow stands in front of me, with bright, yellow, eyes and mouth wide open in a unsettling grin. This doesn’t feel real…

“It’s true, I haven’t seen many come this far,” says the shadow looking at me, “you must be really desperate to appeal.”

“Aaagh, I’m not doing this for that!” I shout “I just want to hel…” a piece of the darkness flies into my mouth in a split second. It stuffs my throat and for moment, I can’t breathe. Its disgusting vapour fills my lungs and I fall on knees.

“Oh please…” says the shadow and gently strokes me on my head while I choke on the dark cloth, “you yourself don’t believe that.”

I cough it out and inhale greatly.

“I am not dying here!” I say firmly.

“Oh,” says the shadow maliciously, “no, there are far worse things than death.”

The ground under my feet caves in again and I find myself surrounded in a shadowy court-like room. All the furniture, walls and light are cold and covered in hues of dark cyan, as if someone took a picture of a grey room and put green filter on it. I look around. I don’t like this. What is this place? Why does it look like a court? More importantly, why am I sitting on the defendant’s dock?

Then, a sleazy, shadow cloth starts to grow from the ground beneath me. It grabs my feet, my knees, and slowly twines up my body. I try to wrench free, but its clench only drags me down, it presses my arms against my body, twists around my chest and neck until everything including my mouth isn’t completely wrapped in its firm grip.

“Let’s play a game” says the shadow monster and sits down on the place of the judge, which is 10 feet higher than me. “I’ll give you few questions,” it grins, “and if you answer them truthfully, I’ll let you go,” I writhe on the chair desperately trying to break free. “However, within those questions,” continues the shadow “you’ll have to also convince me you deserve to be let go. If you don’t, or if you lie,” total darkness starts growing from the floor as a climbing vine, all the walls become covered in black emitting roots and then it suddenly stops as the shadow leans over from the very peak of the jury’s seat and smiles straight up to my frightened face “you’ll stay with me.” The shadow quietly laughs as it constricts its body back to a smaller shape sitting on the high judge’s seat.

What is this place? What is happening? I have to set myself free!

I start wriggling and moving even more, eagerly mumbling, trying to utter a word. Not that anyone could hear it anyway…

Shadow watches it for a while with an entertaining pleasure.

“I’ll take that as a yes,” it says and snaps its fingers. As I hear the snap, I realise I am no longer tied up in the dark cloud which as a fog disperses right in front of me. Only then I look down. My body’s free to move, but my right leg stays connected to the seat by a newly-formed black chain. I can sit and stand up, but can feel the grip holding me in tightly. I am not able to leave.

“Who in the world are you?” I get out of myself, only to find out how much I am panting from all the wiggling.

“Who, me? Someone with more personality than you it seems,” sneers the shadow. “Now then, first question…”

“How many are there?!” I shout desperately.

“That depends on you,” comments dryly. Then it creates and puts on a pair of absolutely useless glasses of the same shadow texture, and conjures a case file with my very own name on it, “the trial in the case of miss Alessia Currie, to determine whether she is or is not worthy of leaving - under the circumstances of the defendant being informed of the stakes and conditions coming to effect immediately after a verdict, the accused hereby swears to…” I wasn’t listening. Recklessly, I twitched my leg multiple times, trying to free it from a chain. Unfortunately, the shadow saw it.

“We may now proceed to the very first question…” finished the shadow. In a blink of an eye, it laid down the file, put down glasses, grinned from ear to ear and looked at me with  glowing, piercing eyes.

“Who are you?”

“E…excuse me?” I asked and noticed I was shivering.

“Hmm, is that your answer?”

“No! no…” I said quickly. What in the world is this question? Aaagh, it wasn’t a good thing to stop listening… Think, myself, what did it say…? I can’t just answer truthfully, it needs to convince this thing I can continue… Whatever this thing is…

The shadow looked bored and started tapping with his conjured hand on the table.

“Maybe I should have put a timer onto this…”

“No, no, no need,” I say startled. “I am… I am a friend,” I puff out from myself in the end. “A friend,” I repeat carefully, “and I need to find her.”

The shadow smiles amused, I feel the chills on my body as I shiver and my sweat glistening on my head.

“A friend?” it repeats. “More like a fiend.”

Suddenly a wall left to me changes its colour in a split second. No, not only it changed a colour, it changed the way it looks like, it looks as if it was moving, there are hues of colours and silhouettes. I swear my heart skipped a beat in that moment when I finally realised what happened next to me. It was my memory… As if an invisible projector was showcasing the deepest chambers of my brain, this was private! How the hell did this thing get into this??

I was unable to utter a word. The room, the sun, it burned my eyes just like on that day. And that day was right in front of me.

“Weren’t you and your sister also friends?” asks the shadow mischievously as it jumps down to get closer to the canvas. “The bestest of friends even…?” it continues. “Oh but what a friend calls their own sibling the worse sister, haha, not only that, she compares her to another one, haha. A sister of different friend,” the shadow laughs amused. I can’t even pay attention to it, I stare at the wall even after it long ago turned blank. I re-live the scene again and again. I see my sister asking me who is a better sibling. She waits on me with anticipation. Stares at me as I remain completely silent. I don’t say a word and just stand there. Right in front of her face! And I say nothing!!! The eyes, the look! I already forgot the scenery from this memory, I forgot how desperately her eyes looked at me, asked me for support, for back-up. I was the only one who could back her up. I was supposed to be the support!!

And I stood silent. Watched her eyes slowly tear up staring at my face. I watched a kid slowly lose their faith…

We were kids back then. I broke a tear now too. But not then. Not when it happened…

“Well, gotta say that was true,” says the shadow joyfully and slams the gavel,  “you certainly prefer some friends over others. So you must have some.”

I slowly wake up from my trans.

“What was that?!” I shout at the judge’s seat. “How dare you rummage in someone else’s memories?! What is this place?! Who are you?! Why am I here?!” My whole body feels like flame! My heart slams to my ribs, lungs continuously feel like they burst and crack open by every inhale, I start to move on my place and want to run, or climb or jump or do anything, but the chain on my leg holds me tight. The shadow watches me wriggle in an amusement.

That provokes me! Why the hell am I trapped in here? What is this place?!

I try to calm down, this thinking won’t get me anywhere and I need to answer the questions truthfully, I need to convince it I can continue.

It takes all the strength of my body to stop shivering and sit down straight. Heart hits me on my chest with every beat, lungs still desperately fight for space and it causes me to wet my eyes again but no matter the pain, I sit straight. Okay, I think to myself, this thing wants to play dirty, it caught me off guard, now I’ll be more ready…

 

Shadow watches me with a piercing interest as if it was analysing what I am doing. I didn’t have the confidence to believe I acted the calmness realistically, but my actions seemed to surprise the shadow nevertheless. Staring into its eyes was still however above my abilities. Just one glance and I felt it saw straight into my soul.

“Now then, since you are such a good friend,” said the shadow viciously, and the wall started changing colours again.

Don’t tremble...don’t tremble…

“Why won’t you tell me,” continued the shadow, once again jumping off its seat and delightedly walking and stroking the walls surface, “how exactly did you feel when someone asked you for a help the last time?”

Breathe in, breathe out…

“You can’t compare just one instance,” I utter from myself in the best steady voice I can. To my very concern however, the wall starts to shift into a specific scene.

“Oh,” says the shadow in such a pleasure, “I have far more than one.”

The screen splits into sections and sections of sceneries and silhouettes. There are memories in front of me, memories gathering up only to frighten me to a bone.

One by one I could see all the moments I selfishly thought of myself, my friends crying and I could not tear up a drop of sympathy, my family mourning and me not seeing it, people who act happy and I don’t realise they are not, people who ask for help and I can’t say I understand where they’re coming from. And the shadow cheerfully jumping around and addressing each one it lands on.

“Oh here, tell me how you felt when Mina texted you in an emergency, oh that’s right, you felt annoyed.”

this is a trap…

“Wait, how did you feel here!” the shadow jumps on another part, “Mina called you again, uuuu and it was in the very moment of true psychological crisis, but wait, you didn’t even notice! Your phone was off, wooow, brilliantly handled!”

no…

“Let’s see… here!” shadow jumps again. “A friend in school asks for help, damn, you start to brag about your notes, genius!”

no…

“Uuu do you remember this one? it took you half a day to get over the death of your relative! Now that’s a skill!”

stop…

“Oh and this is my favourite!” the screen widens and for a minute it only displays the last memory the shadow touched. Once again, I see my sister, she was crying to a phone. I am home, she is not. And she hates the place she’s in.

“stop…” I speak desperately, shivering.

“Oh but this is truly my favourite!” says the shadow.

“No, no, stop!” I say more firmly. “Don’t do this, don’t make me re-live this!” The shadow cloth ties my mouth again, the chain on my leg shortens, and drags me down to sit. I can’t stand up or look back but I close my eyes and try to ignore the cry of my sister from the phone, my dry comments about the fact she must be strong and that she can do it.

“Why can’t I come home?” asks my sister desperately. “I just don’t understand it, it feels horrible, I have nowhere to go! Even if I come home, I’m scared it won’t feel like it anymore. I’m so scared!”

“No, no, but that’s exactly why you have to stay there at least until the summer, just a bit more,” I say to the phone. “We want you home, we love you!”

“Do you know how it feels knowing everyone just keeps telling you, you can’t come home?!” cried my sister. “It’s horrible, I lost everything, everything I had, nothing will be the same anymore, nothing…”

I listen to the conversation with closed eyes. No, I knew bullshit about how it must have felt, bullshit about how hard it must have been.

Yet listening to the conversation was never as painful as the question that inevitably followed.

“How did you feel during this conversation?” asked the shadow.

The chackles were released, my mouth was free again and the screen dissolved.

“I felt…” I took gulps of air as if it could satiate my restlessness. “…annoyed.” I finished.

The shadow grins, in a split of a second jumps back at its seat and slams the gavel, “Correct!” it shouts. “So, let’s sum this up.”

The walls of the courtroom shift colours and now there’s a memory playing on each wall. I sit silently, trying desperately to inhale more air. I need more air! I NEED TO BREATHE! I can’t think straight anymore, I can’t move, not an inch. And I feel the pictures surround me and the voice of the shadow echoing in the room, to which there is no escape.

Think myself, think! You are not giving up yet…

“You don’t feel the pain of your friends ,” says the shadow, “you don’t feel the need to mourn.”

inhale

“you can’t feel grief,”

exhale

“and you have no idea how it feels to miss somebody,”

breathe…

“yet you act like its other’s responsibility to go through their pain,”

breathe!

“even though you have no idea how hard it actually is,”

calm!

“can you deny anything from what I’ve just said?”

I grasp the last pieces of my strength, “didn’t you admit I was a friend?” I ask in a heavy trembling voice. “You agreed I was a friend…”

The shadow pierces its eyes through my soul, there is a sheer pleasure coming out of that surprised look.

I immediately feel the incoming wave of cold darkness that starts surrounding the room.

“Even villains can have friends.” grins shadow quietly.

I freeze. “no…!”

“and you know what’s the best part?”

“No! No! Stop it!” I cover my ears with my hands.

“The best part on all the situations when you let - somebody - down?!”

I see the eyes of my small sister, the missed call, the funeral..

“Aaagh,”, I scream. my head is splitting in pain, everything is shaking, “stop! please!”

“They’ve been left scarred,” continues the shadow, “far more than YOU!”

Everything becomes covered in swirling darkness; hurricane of black cloud fills the room and starts to suck everything in.

“No, I it’s not like that, it’s not…” I tear up.

“Oh, can you say it’s not true?” grins the shadow, “can you say you experienced the pain as strong as them? Can you say your first thought wasn’t yourself? Can you say you tried to help solely for the sake of helping?!”

I start breathing heavily with my mouth, I can’t see anything, the tears blur my view, the black surrounds me.

“No,” I wheep quietly, “no, I can’t say that…”

“And yet you want me, to let you go to her?!”

In that moment the tornado stops, we are no longer in a courtroom, no longer in a room for that matter. We are outside in a fog, but in some weird bubble that prevents the fog to come to us and prevents us to interact with the outer world. We are still in a mind, that’s certain. And the shadow points its sharp finger black at a person on their knees, crying softly on the bottom of this place.

Oh my god…

my heart stops, eyelids tremble. That’s Mina!

A figure hunched up to the front, hair falling forward and hiding her face. Doesn’t seem she can hear or see us. Doesn’t seem like we are here. It’s just an illusion, a bubble… But what we see is so real.

My eyes wet at the view. It’s Mina, it’s really her! My family!

There isn’t a shadow around her, only a black fog, hazing everything around, I can’t recognize a thing. As if on purpose, the whole scenery makes one focus only on the figure in the centre. In the foreground. There, shattered, broken, breathed heavily, but breathed a human being. I couldn’t look at it. Out of strength and out of a melody. In a suffocating cold, numb carpet of fog. The air was simply…dead.

“Mina…”

her hands in black blood. drop. drop. dropping. A puddle at her knees. slowly. running from her wrists. I can’t look at this anymore. I avert my eyes. No, no Mina, don’t do this!

“you deserve the world” I whisper.

Then a strong yet quiet sound wave hits our bubble. what was that?! Like a pulse…

I startle on place! The bubble gets pushed further, lost in this dull fog. And just now I realise walls of stones and rigid soil all around, lurking from the haze, in the darkness, as a standing ground, or as crushing point that one runs into unable to see it. A huge root grows on one stone pillar like this, the one far in Mina’s fog, as if a tree grew above her. We’re underground. A canyon…

Both of us keep staring to the blackness. Without a word. Without a breath.

“You want me to let you go to her?” repeats the shadow chillingly. There is no amusement or entertainment in its voice anymore. Its look is as heavy and emotionless, tone as deadly serious, as anyone’s who had seen what we’ve seen. Even the shadow was affected. Or maybe, it has been all along. 

“Yes,” I whisper.

The shadow looks at me caught out by my answer, “What?”

I begin to feel the blood starting to flow again in my body, a strength coming back to me.

“You asked a question,” I explain calmly, “and I need to answer truthfully,” I smile, “the answer is, yes.”

the shadow glovers and in a single wave of a hand, changes the whole scenery back to the dark courtroom.

“Oh I like this turn of events,” says the shadow creepily. “In that case let me ask one particular question again,” it grins “who are you doing this for?”

panting, I straighten up: “I don’t know…”

“Is that so?”

“I don’t know and I don’t care anymore!” I shout. “You just saw what I saw! She’s alone! However useless I am, it’s better than being alone!”

Mina in the canyon, crying, grieving, surrounded by a darkness far denser than this courtroom…I can’t see anything else, I don’t listen, I don’t talk anymore…She needs me, she needs somebody, she needs anybody, but she mustn’t be alone!

My hands and knees start trembling again but this time not from fear or rage, it’s from anticipation. I am ready, I’m ready to leave this place, the more I’m here, the further away I’m from Mina. Whatever it takes!

“Ask me one last question!” I shout. My voice is shaking, lungs keep panting, I keep standing. “One that ends this game.”

The shadow stretches its body to be even higher above me than before.

“One last question ey…?” It looks at me with another set of the soul-piercing interest. I don’t avoid it.

“Why should I stop now?” it asks, heavy and dark. All the previous cheerfulness of the tone disappears. The whole room, voice and eyes of the shadow turn awfully cold. It’s angry. For the first time, I stare at its eyes, full of despair and anger.

“Why should I comply with someone so smug, selfish, arrogant, egocentric, and manipulative as you!  Someone who helps only to look good in the eyes of others?! Someone who acts and plays and gets adored by everyone else?! Well guess what Alessia Currie, I won’t adore you! You can’t lie to me! So tell me, ‘oh miss with a noble mission’, are you even capable of helping your friend?!”

 “YES!” I shout through tears so hard I bend down. With no hesitation, this is my last question! “Yes I am!” I scream out top of my lungs, can’t see anything than a ground and tears, but I continue, “if I don’t say yes, you will never leave me, so who cares?! “Whatever my intention is, it helps more than getting stuck here! So WHO CARES?!” heavy cry breaks through my body, all the bottled feelings, all fears, all guilt, everything comes back to haunt me but I let it go. “Who cares if I do it for myself, I can never find that for sure! Who cares if I feel annoyed or emotionless when I do so, how can I subdue that?! At least I was there!! At least I chose to do something! Because if your best friend disappears, you do everything you can to find them again!"

I shout so loudly the words shake up the whole room. “Yes, I am capable! If I leave from here, I am capable!”

I give in to the tears and break down on the spot. There is complete silence, only the sounds of my weeping echo on the walls.

Only then I slowly realise the shadow stopped rising above me and hasn’t spoken out a word. I gather strength to raise my head. It’s indeed, still sitting on its seat, holding its typical grin on its face. But I can no longer feel intimidated or scared, the only fear I feel is on the thought of Mina.

The shadow lifts its eyebrow, bares its teeth in broad smile and vigorously jumps into the air above itself. But it doesn’t fall in the air, instead, it starts swirling around as a huge wind turbine right above the judge’s seat. The swirling becomes faster, faster, and stronger… It begins to suck in all the darkness around me, all the black, prying cloud. I look on my body with amazement, I feel lighter. The walls, the floor, the seats, everything covered in shadowy cloud is now becoming clear. Until my very own chain dissolves and is taken by the pull of the wind.

Unable to say a word I look into the rising shadow turbine that laughs at me for one last time.

“indeed,” says the shadow satisfyingly, “who cares?”

 

At that moment the turbine disappears with every dark cloth it collected. It’s only me in the empty courtroom. I remain sitting on my chair. I am alone.

I look at the left wall with my memories, come to them and touch them, let them play freely. There aren’t just screams and cry and pain. I could hear laughter, hugs and texts I shared with Mina full of encouragement and love.

“If your friend disappears, you’ll do everything to find them again.”

I carefully come to the tall judge’s seat and observe. No sign of the old dark cloth. But just as I was walking around it, a ray of light blinds my eye.

The light comes out of a doorsill. Right behind the judge’s desk, there was a door all along. It was impossible to see from my seat and surrounded by the dark cloth.

I slowly come closer. Place my hand on the doorknob, breathe in; and out.

I open the door.

In front of me is a cold, dimmed canyon maze.

I exhale my warm breath.

I will find you Mina! I will find you!