Cracks (8 page)

I go cold inside. ‘Yeah,’ I lie. ‘Why?’

‘Just checking. I’ll be back later, OK?’ He practically runs out of the room and I hear it lock again.

I prowl the room, feeling like a caged animal. Something feels wrong here. I think Cavendish knows more than he’s letting on. I start pulling open the drawers in the bedside cabinet,
although I don’t really know what I’m looking for. It’s just something to do while I try to think. He was very keen for me to be taking those pills, but what was in them? I think
they were stopping me from being alert. I need my wits about me.

I pull out another drawer. The first two were empty but the bottom one contains a pad of lined paper and an old pencil. I stare at them for a minute then sit down on the bed. I rest the pad
against my drawn up knees and my hand starts sketching before my brain even registers what I’m doing. It’s just something to stop me from climbing the walls until I can get some
answers. I liked drawing in that old world. I quickly realise I’m pretty good in this one too. The movement of my hand as the pencil crosses the page, quick and fluid, makes me feel calmer
inside. I draw the house on the hill as I remember it, filling in all the details like the old tyres and Des’s precious shed. Then I draw the school but with a cartoon curvy version of Miss
Lovett standing outside it, hand on her hip and blowing a kiss. This makes me smile for what must be the first time since I came round.

Then I draw the newsagent’s that Amil’s mum and dad owned, crammed with magazines and newspapers and rows and rows of sweets. There’s a distinctive sign with swirly writing
that says
The Sweet Stop
. It’s so clear in my mind, I can picture it exactly. It’s so weird to think I’ve never been there. How can this be someone else’s memory and
not mine? It’s insane. Then something else comes to me. The shop is called that because it’s right next to a train station! I close my eyes for a minute and a whole series of images
flit across my mind. I can see a war memorial in the shape of a cross. And then a sign appears as vividly as though someone has shown me a photograph.

It says,
Welcome to Brinkley Cross
.

My heart starts to pound and I swallow hard. This is it, this is where the boy came from and where all my fake memories were made. Maybe I can go back there and find out who he was. And that
might be a step towards finding out who I am too. I think about Cavendish saying it would be dangerous. Would it be too risky to try?

The light bleeds out of the room but I sit there for ages, just thinking.

After a while, I lie down on the bed, letting my thoughts drift. I still feel really tired, even though I’m not taking the dodgy pills. But I feel as though there’s some vague plan
inside me now. I curl up and start imagining all sorts of daft things, like Amil’s mum and dad adopting me. I can almost taste those yummy pink sweets. I drift into sleep, dreaming about a
new life and starting again with real friends and a real family who love me. It’s warm and safe and I sigh deeply. Sunshine is sprinkling my face. I hear that little kid laughing again and a
woman with red hair is smiling up at me, her eyes full of love.

But then the dream shifts. Something’s wrong.

Pigface is here.

He’s a silhouette that slips across the walls and ceilings, sliding long and tall and then short and wide. The shape morphs and becomes huge on the wall, covering it in darkness. Something
glints and I see a knife.

Then a hand closes over my mouth. I wake up and open my eyes wide in shock. He’s really here. And he’s come to get me.

‘C
ome on, Cal,’ he says and slaps my cheek lightly. But it’s not Pigface. It’s Beardy.

I immediately struggle and try to throw him off, but he touches a small piece of paper under my nose and my limbs go feathery light. I can’t speak or move anything but I’m yelling
inside. He drags me into an upright position.

Another nurse I vaguely recognise comes in with a laundry trolley. Between them, they crumple me awkwardly inside it and cover me with sheets. It smells of sweat and something rotten in here. I
feel vibrations through the bottom of the trolley. I’m moving. There’s a metallic clanging sound and everything rumbles. Sounds like an engine. I must be in the back of a van or lorry.
‘Let me out! Let me out!’ The shouts are inside my own mind. My lips are numb, and so is every other part of me. No one can hear me. Whatever was on that paper has immobilised me, just
as if I were tied up.

After a few minutes though, painful pins and needles jab like knives into my arms and legs. The feeling’s slowly coming back into limbs. Soon I’m able to haul myself out of the
trolley. I land with a painful crash onto a metal floor. It’s dark but I can make out that I’m in some kind of van. I crawl towards what should be the driver’s end and bang on the
wall, yelling until I’m hoarse and my knuckles ache, but no one responds.

I curl up on the floor, arms around my legs, watching the doors. As soon as the van stops I’m going to be ready for them. A couple of times I roll back and lift both my legs in a position
ready to strike but we’re obviously just at traffic lights because we soon move on again.

After a lifetime, I feel the van go over bumpy ground and come to a stop, then hear the doors opening at the front. There are urgent voices.

I get right behind the doors and wait . . .

There’s a clunk of someone turning the handle and, as a sliver of light dazzles me, I kick the door with both legs as hard as I can. I hear a crunch and a high cry of pain and I’m
straight out of the doors. Before I know it, two strong pairs of arms take hold of me. I’m outnumbered.

Beardy is bending forwards, holding his nose. There are bright drops of blood falling between his fingers onto the wet earth. He looks up, eyes full of fury. The two men on either side of me
start dragging me towards a pool of bright light coming from what looks like a low, long farmhouse.

A small woman in her twenties with short black hair is at the door.

‘Easy now, Cal,’ she says. ‘It’s OK, you’re safe.’

I try to wrench myself free of the two blokes holding me but their grip is firm. I twist to look at them. One is black and heavily muscled with his hair in cornrows and a tiny earring glinting
in his ear lobe. He ignores me. The other is white with cropped dark hair. He gives what looks like an apologetic smile as he drags me inside.

I’m inside a country kitchen that should have homemade cake being cut by a jolly farmer’s wife. Instead, a handful of people are standing around and looking at me. There’s no
Victoria sponge on the table. Instead, there’s what looks like a couple of AK47 guns. A middle-aged woman with glasses and blond hair is standing in the middle of the room. Her face softens
into a smile and she approaches me, then she gasps as Beardy comes into the room holding a blood-sodden hankie over his face. He mumbles something and disappears through another door, throwing
death beams at me with his eyes.

The blond woman looks to the men with a questioning eyebrow.

The dark-haired one who smiled shrugs. ‘The boy was a bit too keen to get out. Nathan copped it in the face.’ He crosses his arms and his lips twitch as though he’s trying not
to laugh. ‘He’ll be all right, he’s a big boy.’

‘What the hell is going on?’ I’m standing with my hands balled into fists. I could quite easily break someone else’s nose at this precise moment.

‘Please sit,’ says the woman, gesturing to one of the chairs.

I slam it hard against the table instead. ‘Just tell me where I am!’ I shout. ‘Who are you?!’

The woman raises her hands like I’m a dangerous animal. ‘You’re right to be upset, Cal, I completely understand,’ she says. ‘The last few days must have been deeply
unsettling for you. But you’re safe. For now, at least.’ She pulls out the nearest chair and sits down, folding her hands on the table. ‘My name is Helen Bonaparte,’ she
continues. ‘My colleagues and I belong to an organisation called Torch and we have been trying to get into the Facility for some time to get you out. It has taken months of our people working
there covertly to organise your escape today. And it wasn’t a moment too soon.’

I find myself sliding into a chair, despite still wanting to run away. ‘Look, just start speaking English because I don’t know what you’re going on about.’

Helen Bonaparte sits back in her chair, studying me. ‘What did they tell you about the coma state you were in, Cal?’

‘They told me I’d been there for twelve years,’ I say slowly. ‘That there was an accident when I was little.’ I swallow. ‘And that there was a boy who donated
. . . tissue.’

She nods. ‘That’s all true. But did they tell you that they kept you in that coma? Deliberately? And basically stole twelve years of your life? And did they explain why you were
given that donated brain tissue?’

I catch my breath. There’s a dull pounding in my chest that vibrates right up to my ears. I don’t know where all the words have gone because I can’t seem to find any to say
right now.

Helen leans forward and clasps her hands in front of her. Her voice is gentle when she speaks again. ‘None of this is easy to hear. I’m sorry. But they did something to you, Cal.
Something wrong. They inserted a chip into your brain, entirely for their own purposes’.

I can’t do anything but stare numbly. I sniff hard and swipe my eyes with my arm. ‘I don’t believe you,’ I say in a shaky voice. ‘That’s sick. I think
you’re sick.’

Helen sighs. ‘I think we’re going to have to show you what this is all about. It’s the only way. I’m sorry, Cal. This is going to be a bit distressing.’ She nods to
a man in a baseball hat standing by the sink.

He reaches for a long white tube and unrolls it. I realise it’s a screen, a computer screen that’s as thin and soft as paper. I don’t have time to be impressed because he
spreads it out on the table and the next moment, I see an image of a room in the Facility – my room. Cavendish and some other people are standing around watching something and the view pans
to take in the pod. I’m in it, eyes closed and I flush hot because I’m moving around like I’m walking along with my hands in my pockets. Thank God I’m not starkers. The
camera pans round to show a computer screen just next to the pod. It’s on top of a black box with blinking lights that the people are monitoring closely. There are pictures moving across the
screen and I can see them perfectly. But they don’t make any sense.

‘Hang on,’ I say, ‘that’s —’

I’m watching an image of the house on the hill. There’s the hated shed and the old car out the front. Then there’s the school playground. A game of football is going on with
Amil and other friends, who come in close, laughing. Amil’s making a loser sign with his hand against his forehead. In the pod, I kick my foot out and then turn around with my arms in the
air, like I’ve scored a goal.

Just as fast, the picture switches again to one of Miss Lovett, my art teacher. But she isn’t teaching a lesson. Oh no. She’s getting out of a bath, soap bubbles slipping down her
naked body and she’s blowing a kiss at me.

I slam my hand down on the paper, face on fire, and the whole image disappears instantly.

‘What was THAT?’

Helen Bonaparte moves towards me, but I step back. If she touches me, I’ll kill her. I’m buzzing all over with shame and confusion.

‘That was a secret film taken inside the Facility,’ she says quietly. ‘It showed you inside the suspension pod and it showed why you were in there. It’s what that place
is all about. They implanted something into your brain that allowed them to view your thoughts when you were inside that suspension pod. It’s known as a Revealer Chip. The full name of the
programme is the Cerebral Revealer Chip Study, CRCS or, as it’s nicknamed, The Cracks Programme.’ She looks down for a moment and I see her swallow.

I’m still at ‘they’ve implanted something in your brain’.

I get the urge to scratch my head violently and my hands twitch. Got to stay calm. ‘Why?’ I say, voice breaking. I will not freak out. I will not freak out.
Breathe, Cal, breathe
. . .

‘Well,’ says the woman slowly, ‘it started as a way to help people with severe disabilities communicate by computer. It was important work to begin with. But they wanted to see
how far they could go and you, unfortunately, were their human guinea pig. They are trying to recreate the programme for mass use by testing it on others but it hasn’t . . . gone
well.’

My stomach, already heaving, goes into an icy spasm. ‘What do you mean?’

She swallows again. ‘All cases so far have demonstrated severe mental distress and sometimes a total psychological breakdown. That’s the rather cruel side of the nickname for the
programme. As in “cracking up”.’

I’m struggling to get air into my lungs now. I can’t imagine how I’ve ever done this without thinking. Each breath must be heaved in and out with a huge effort. Dots dance in
front of my eyes.

‘Cal? Cal? Are you all right?’

I clench my fists so hard, my knuckles strain white in front of on the table. ‘Never been better.’ My voice seems to come from the end of a long, long tunnel.