Dark Night of the Soul

Chapter 12

Mist rises over the sleepy river and drifts under the bridge, swirling around the stalactites dripping from the roof. As the sun reflects off the water a door slams, left ajar from the previous night.

Inside, a tall, elegant man opens his mouth to speak. Nothing comes out at first. He shakes his head and finally addresses the three figures skulking in the shadows. 'I have spoken to our leader and told him that everything is going to plan so far. We have seeded fear amongst the humans. Now we can watch the fear grow.' He pauses, staring intensely at them.

'I still don't understand why we need to kill the young humans,' says one. 'It seems unnecessary. Their young brains are so malleable that surely they could be persuaded to follow our orders. Why don't we just kill the big humans?'

The tall man speaks again, his voice edged with frustration as he smoothes down his kaftan. 'Silence!' he spits. 'We are not to ask questions of our beloved leaders. We are to trust them. Have they failed us yet? We are bricks in the wall. We do not need to see the whole wall. You know what the plan is so let us continue.'

With a contemptuous flick of his wrist he beckons towards the three chairs where the previous night Seamus, Anna and Dave had seen their fates. 'Sit.'

As the other three men dutifully take their seats, he extracts a device from his pocket and hands it to the nearest one. 'Now. Show me.' A few taps projects images of the park onto the wall. Through the mist, chestnut trees flutter gently in the morning breeze. More taps and the image rewinds... the sky darkening to black. 'Good. Good. It is so convenient of the humans to set up cameras for us to observe through,' smirks the tall man. 'Keep rewinding. We must see the event with our own eyes.' Gradually the flickering picture lightens again. 'There. Good. Now play.'

The juddering images reveal a childrens' playground. A group of teenagers dominates the scene, spinning the roundabout and leaping from the swings. All at once, they spot something in the distance. They jump up and down, clapping their hands. The boys burst with excitement and race down the grassy slope, arms outstretched. They keep running until they disappear into thin air. 'As our leaders promised,' rebukes the tall man, 'the Pinky Ponk is invisible to these human cameras.'

A girl and boy sit on a wall by the lake, staring into the distance.

'Fast forward,' screams the tall man. He fumbles with the device in his hand and frantically whizzes through the images until the sky darkens again. He presses pause and zooms in. The girl and boy are still sitting on the wall. Fast forward again and they stiffly stand up and shuffle out of sight.

'Why didn't they move?' he shrieks. 'Are they human? We must find out who they are. They could ruin our plans.' He rewinds and plays again, in slow motion. 'This cannot be. The leaders assured us. All human children who hear that music will be hypnotized by it.'

'Could they be deaf?' asks one of the other three men, ashen-faced.

The tall man clenches his jaw and calmly turns off the projections. 'We will find them. We must ascertain if they observed the incident last night. And then, we all know what must be done.'