Imprisoned

This idea has been at the back of my mind for a while now and I thought it time to finally write it down. This is maybe the second(?) thing I've wrote and took seriously, so criticism is rlly helpful.

Day 1: I am alone. There’s nothing around me but darkness. Well, darkness and the (incredibly rusty) bars of a cage. It’s considerably large, large enough for me to pace around (which believe me, is a feature that I came to love) but the fact that the ceiling is only located about half an inch from the top of my head when I’m standing creates a sense of claustrophobia. There are no exits, no doors, no windows. Just bars. Rusty bars.

Day 2: I awoke to the chilling touch of a winter’s breeze on my face. Strange, because if I remember correctly, it’s the middle of July. I spent most of today peering into the darkness, trying to see if there is anything out there. But no. There’s just me. Me and my cage.

Day 3: Weirdly, today was the first day in which I began to actually wonder why I was trapped in a cage in the middle of oblivion in the first place. For some reason, I didn’t question it until now. This is when the fear began to set in, because as I attempted to cast my mind back to where I was before I was in the cage, there’s nothing. No memories. As if I’ve been here all my life. Which can’t be true. At least, I don’t think…

Day 13: I can hear something. A faint tapping, coming from…well…everywhere. Whenever I turn to face the sound, it seems to move to behind me, above me, to my sides and even underneath me. Which doesn’t seem right since below me is (what I can only assume to be) solid stone with nothing but more stone underneath it.

Day 14: The tapping is getting louder…

Day 15: And louder…

Day 16: And louder…

Day 17: I CAN’T TAKE IT ANYMORE! It’s everywhere, in the floor, in the bars, in my mind! Just constant, methodical banging drilling itself into my subconscious!

Day 23: I awoke today with the figure of a man outside my cage. I can only assume that the tapping that I'd been hearing over the last 10 days was his footsteps. My reaction to him was…interesting to say the least. Well, that is if you consider interesting to be screaming at the top of your lungs for 10 minutes straight and trying to force your entire body through a 2-inch hole between some rusty bars. I don’t know why I did this, looking back at it. Something about that figure just…wasn’t right. It made no sound, didn’t move except when it’s head tracked me around the cage and when I finally mustered up the courage to try to touch it, it just…vanished.

Day 26: So today was…interesting. After I woke up, and went through my usual routine: bang on my cage, cry until there are no tears left, the usual, I turned to face the figure, whom I decided to call Nicholas for no specific reason but to entertain myself (I have to entertain myself with something, being trapped in a cage, for over 3 weeks is surprisingly boring, you know?) but he wasn’t there. Instead, he was stood about 5 feet from the cage, seeming floating in the blackness. After I stared at him for about a minute, he raised his arms and his hands began to flow with a dark purple light. I looked at him in anticipation, waiting to see if he moved again, but that was it.

Day 28: Nicholas created feet. I know that sounds weird, but that’s the only way it can be explained. In front of Nicholas is a pair of human feet, the ankles of which are glowing the same colour as the energy floating around Nicholas’ hands. I can’t explain why, but looking at those feet filled me with that same feeling of dread that I experienced the first time that Nicholas turned up, so I looked away.

Day 37: There are legs now.

Day 45: A torso.

Day 48: Left arm

Day 49: Right arm

Day 52: I am anxious now. By this point, it’s pretty obvious that Nicholas is making a person. But the question is, who? That’s the question I ask myself as I stare at the neck of this mystery person, glowing with purple energy.

Day 53: He made me. It’s me.

Day 54: It’s me.

Day 55: It’s me.

Day 56: It’s me.

Day 57: It’s me.

Day 58: It’s me.

Day 59: It’s me.

Day 60: It’s me.

Day 66: ‘I’ am just standing there. Eyes closed. Deathly still. The unrelenting terror I previously experienced from looking at this copy of myself has subsided now, it’s just been replaced with curiosity.

Day 67: It dawned on me that today that in the 67 days I have been here in my rusty cage, I haven’t spoken (aside from the screaming in terror at the presence of Nicholas, and then again at the presence of ‘me’) The reason that I bring this up is because today, after me being awake for a few hours, Nicholas’ copy of me opened his eyes. Then he screamed. The exact same scream I made when he was first created.

Day 68: Today, at first, was a routine day. I marked how many days I’d been in the cage, paced around a bit and sat down and counted the stone tiles that comprise the floor. 594, by the way, if you were wondering. Then I said ‘aardvark’. This surprised me in a couple of ways. First, I was surprised at how my voice sounded as I realised that I had forgotten what it sounded like until that moment. Second, why was I saying ‘aardvark’? So, I sat for a few seconds, in disbelief that I was spontaneously naming mammals against my will, when Nicholas’ copy of me said…” aardvark.”

Day 69: After chuckling to myself about the day’s number, I thought back to yesterday. How the copy of me repeated ‘aardvark’ in the exact same way that I said it. I only thought about this for a few seconds though, as, without warning, I said the word “aback,” A few seconds later, my copy opened his eyes and said “aback.” It then occurred to me that, for some reason, I was involuntary saying every word in the dictionary, in order.

Day 74: “Clairvoyance”

“Clairvoyance”

“Clam”

“Clam”

“Clamber”

“Clamber…”

Day 96: “Horizontal”

“Horizontal”

“Hormone”

“Hormone”

Day 144: “Polyglot”

“Polyglot”

“Polygon”

“Polygon”

Day 192: …

…

“Zygote”

“Zygote”

Day 193: It’s over. Finally, it’s over.

Day 194: He’s looking at me. I don’t know why. To be honest I’m too exhausted to care. I stand up, he stands up. I walk around, he walks around. I walk up to the bars, he walks up to the bars. A perfect copy, down to every last minute detail.

Day 195: I tend to not move now, as my clone moving around as I do just…creeps me out.

Day 196: He spoke to me today. I walked up the bars, so did he. I looked him in the eyes, he looked me in the eyes. And then he said “Have fun in there,” But something was…off, about how he was talking. I then understood why, presumably the hooded figure, forced me to say the ENTIRE dictionary: to teach this thing to speak. He no longer looked me in the eyes, he stuttered and his face flushed red. He stood awkwardly, as if he didn’t understand how to look natural. His hands and fingers were constantly moving, as if they didn’t know where to go. Then, suddenly, the darkness vanished. I was in my bedroom, still in my cage, but he wasn’t. I watched him as he took my school uniform off a hook on the back of my door, put it on and picked up my bag. Before he left, he turned to me, still not making eye contact. “Have fun in there,” I rammed against the cage, trying everything I could to break free. I screamed for help, but my voice wasn’t there. I frantically pulled at the rusty bars in the hope that now would be the time they would finally break, so I can be free. But it’s hopeless. I turned around, and saw the hooded figure staring at me. A figure who trapped me in a cage, took away my voice and made a copy of me. A copy that…wasn’t right. It wasn’t me. This hooded figure is keeping me captive as this imperfect copy is out there, pretending to be me, interacting with the world in ways that I would never. I look again at the hooded figure, a mix of anger and sadness in my eyes as the darkness envelops my cage again. This hooded figure, or, as I like to call him: social anxiety.