Elements of Calza - The Darkened Mind

Chapter 1 - it was him

He bounded down the stairs still tying his tie. He was late again and he knew he couldn't miss the bus. Theo was, on the surface, a normal 10 year old boy. His blonde hair and grey eyes didn't exactly leave you wondering "who the hell was that peculiar fellow" but if you were to stop him moving for more than 5 seconds and maintain decent eye contact then you would see something unusual trapped inside him. Something distinctly familiar and yet also so alien. An almost, longing for something to just happen. But this morning you weren't getting him still for 2 seconds. He hopped past his mother who was walking out of the kitchen with a slice of toast. He quickly grabbed cheerios, milk and a spoon and threw them into a bowl. This he practically hovered out the bowl before grabbing a Brioche and stuffing it in his mouth. A sprint upstairs, grab bag, sprint downstairs grab lunchbox, throw lunch box in bag, check you have pencil case, grab P.E. kit and it's 8:00. He opened the door and started running out before his mum caught him by the bag's handle. "That tie is awful" she adjusted it quickly and then sent them out. A brisk sprint up the road to get to his old primary school. He waited for a short while until the silver mini bus appeared around the corner. Chriss was driving today, ever since reading Alex Rider - scorpia Chriss had made Theo slightly nervous with the scorpion tattoo on his bald head but he trusted Chriss as much as his uncle on their dads side who they don't really talk to, and it's not like he doesn't have other tattoos that weren't the symbol for a fictional criminal organisation.

He headed up to the back seats as he did every other morning as agreed with the girls. Josh joined shortly after with one of his maths books. He gave a slight nod in their direction. A voice from outside, *thirsty* What the hell was that? He looked out the window no one was there, just the rather sad looking ivy growing on the red brick wall. It had merely been his imagination, or maybe a prankster who had tiptoed out of sight. The former seemed more likely considering his past. His mum always talked about how much he said he heard voices when he was younger, sometimes she would walk in and he was just sitting there and when she asked what he was doing he said talking to the voices, you would have thought he was insane or something. They didn't make themselves known much these days. The minibus door slammed shut, waking him up from the tangent. He grabbed the seat belt and clicked it in place.

The bus began after a few minutes stopping at a few other locations to collect the rest of the students until finally stopping at school. Theo got off, laughing at a joke one of his friends had made, and joined the crowd wandering over to the main building. Eventually he made his way to his classroom. Mrs Hosac greeted him as he entered. He sat down and pulled his book out as the last of the children filtered in. Mr. Casim walked in eventually and told them loudly to head to the changing rooms for P.E. and that today they were going to look at frisbees. The class stood up and filed to the boys and girls changing rooms respectively. Once changed they head out to the field. *Hello boy*. He shook his head. So long with nothing and then two in one day. Was he going crazy? Mr. Casim started talking about the fist exercise and handed out frisbees, one between two. They threw them however they saw fit to one another. *Boy, you hear*
What was wrong with him? Mr. Casim blew the whistle and asked a few people to show some of their methods and then he showed them all how to do it right.
*Hello Boy, you hear yes?*
This was getting ridiculous. He threw the frisbee. He caught the frisbee. He threw the frisbee. He caught the frisbee. He threw the frisbee.
*Don't ignore me boy*
He lost focus and was hit in the stomach by a frisbee. Their partner chuckled to themselves slightly but no one else seemed to notice.

After an hour the whistle went and the class went back inside to the main classroom, after getting changed, where Miss Hosac was.
"Okay welcome back guys hope you all had a nice weekend. Did anyone get up too much?"
A few people put up their hands and Miss went round them all quickly.
"Wow that sounds well fun. I hope you enjoyed it. Now it's a monday we're doing science today so George and Steph can you hand out the books please."
They both got up and started passing them around. *Sun!* The message was loud in Theo's head and echoed around for a few seconds. *Sun!* He looked over at the teacher's desk and there was a plant, some kind of flower, sitting in the shade of the computer screen."It is rather droopy isn't it?" He thought to himself. *Droopy, yes droopy dying* He hadn't had this in ages. Why now? It wasn't actually the plant of course his subconscious was just aware of it.
A book slammed down in front of him waking him up from the spiral he was descending down. He muttered a thanks and opened the book. *You hear boy, you hear. help* He pushed the thought out of his mind. It was his imagination. The plant was droopy sure but it wasn't crying out for help. He had heard voices before, this one was no different.
Miss started talking, something about Mrs Green, but Theo was barely paying attention. He was staring at the plant. *Boy you hear. Sun! Sun! Droopy and dying. Sun. Help boy* It had to be his imagination getting carried away with itself. That was the only rational explanation. *Help* He pushed it aside and tried to pay attention to Mrs Hosac. "...and R stands respiration so breathing basically although in a few years you'll learn about it properly. S means sensitivity..."
*Help, boy. You hear. Help*
"Just your imagination" he told himself repeatedly.
*No not imagination*
"...fly trap. G here stands for growth which is obviously getting bigger. So you do it plants do it fungus does it..."
A pulse came in *Need fungus*
*You needed sun earlier* Theo retorted instinctively.
*Yes. Both. Sun and fungus.*
"Just your imagination" he told himself. "...producing children, think seeds, babies eggs..."
*I need sun boy sun. You...*
"SHUT UP!" He hadn't met to say it outloud but he couldn't control himself. The entire class turned to look at him slightly shell shocked.
"Something to say there, Theo?" Miss asked inquisitively, in that peculiar state of not angry yet but a few wrong words away from a complete explosion.
"No miss... I um, I... was just... Um, eh uh, N-N-No. Um, your plant is looking droopy, by the way." She smiled in bewilderment and turned to follow his gaze that fell on the plant upon the desk. "I would rather you didn't interrupt the class next time but thank you Theo I'll get rid of it."
*No boy, not get rid, I live*
"No!" He blurted. She turned to look at him "I mean, I think it's still alive, miss."
She furrowed her brow and closely inspected the plant. "Hmm, maybe, but it'll be easier to buy a new one. Roses aren't exactly hard to find and this one specifically isn't important to me"
He tried to tell himself it was his imagination and this plant wasn't talking but he couldn't let this happen his instinct told him this was wrong.
"Price inflation." He found himself saying.
"What?" Miss Hosac was beside herself with confusion. Theo tried to recall what his mother had said about it. "Prices are going up because liss truss is a bum hole so buying a new one is a bad idea."
A ripple of giggles came from the rest of the class. "Okay that's quite enough now Theo." She walked over to the bin.
"You can't."
"Theo is everything okay, this is most unlike you."
"Yes everything is okay, just please don't throw the rose away."
"Theo if you don't stop, I'm going to have to give you an official verbal warning."
*Boy I give you praise if you ignore her. Help please*
"Please," Desperation rose in his voice.
"Theo." Miss was clearly irritated now. "This is your last chance"
*Please no help Boy. Help. Boy, I live, I live."
Theo felt his vision go blurry as panic rose in the back of his throat. *Help boy help praise remember I reward you with praise* Miss walked over to the bin. No this couldn't happen.
"Miss, you can't"
She sighed "I'm sorry to say that's a... ah" She looked down at her finger as a small bead of blood formed on its tip, "Excuse me a moment while I get a plaster. I managed to prick myself on the rose thorns. Chat amongst yourselves."
She put the plant down on a table and walked out the room. The rest of the class obeyed and talked amongst themselves but Theo got up and grabbed the rose.
*Thank you boy thank you*
*I did this because I like roses not because you asked for help. You didn't ask for help, you're a flower. I'm talking to myself right now.*
*I do speak boy* He ignored it and placed the flower up on the windowsill. A few of his pears watched him do this but no one said anything. Eventually Miss Hosac walked back in, a plaster raped around her finger. She looked at the plant on the windowsill and then at Theo. Her mouth opened as if to say something but then closed again as if thinking better of it and shaking her head she went back to the lesson. "Where were we, E? Yes that seems right. So E stands for excretion..."

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"You did what?"
Theo's mum had received an email from school telling her of the events that unfolded in his second lesson. Suffice to say she was not happy.
"I put a plant on a windowsill"
"No not that"
"What part do you mean then?"
"The, 'telling the teacher to shut up' part"
"If you heard the first time then why ask me to repeat it"
She sighed and shook her head.
"Why, dare I ask, did you do it?"
"I didn't"
"So the email is lying then?"
"No I said shut up just not to the teacher"
"Realy, who were you telling to shut up."
"Voices, in my head"
His mother stared at him for a second before saying.
"Do I need to take you to an insane asylum"
"What is an insane asylum?"
"Where they send crazy people"
"No," He considered whether or not to tell her it seemed like the plant was talking to him. " I just have a big imagination I can't control."
His mum sighed and shook her head again.
"What are we going to do with you?"
Theo didn't say anything.
"Well go and do your homework, or, something... dear god"
He ran up the stairs but instead of heading into his room he went into the bathroom. A plant sat on the side where it always did. Not believing what he was doing, he tried to send a message to the plant. *Hello?*
Nothing, he tried again. *Can you hear me?*
Silence, once more he tried,
*Hello* Still no response
He turned around and walked to his room. Usually he would do his homework but today he needed to do something. His bookshelf lay waiting where it was when he left this morning, not that he was expecting it to move. He walked over and scanned the books pulling out 5: 'the magic of communication', 'plant anatomy ks2', 'soul?', 'talking with animals' and 'exploring superpowers and the likelihood of their existence'.

He skimmed through the books reading the relative parts. Stigma, oval, Telepathy, astral projections, algorithms, pollen, dinner, hand gestures, psychedelics, dinner, X Ray vision, dinner, grunts, roots, dinner, mycelium, dinner, networks, dinner, dinner...
"THEO! Dinner!" His mum screamed from the bottom of the stairs. He placed down his book and walked down to the kitchen. His mum was their spooning pees onto a plate. "What took you so long?"
"Reading"
He grabbed a plate of food and walked into the living room and sat down at the table. HIs Mum and Howard sat down with him. They all talked but Theo was hardly paying attention, it was possible. Improbable but possible. It couldn't be the case of course and he didn't even think it was he, was just curious, but yes a person could hypothetically, hypothetically have a very small chance, to maybe communicate with plants if we took some large leaps and assumptions. Again he obviously wasn't. How could he? It was possible but it isn't happening. He was just letting his imagination run away with itself. *Not imagination, no* It wasn't the plants. It was him. It wasn't the plants. It was him. It was him, right?