Helga (unedited)

Chapter 14: Manual

Our initial attempt to escape was highly unsuccessful and downright risky. If we were to escape, we had to be better the second time around: which was in less than thirty Mercurial days. Could we do it though? The team was useless; two teenagers and a minor. But somehow had taught me that through faith all things are possible and the time to put our faith into action had come. The hole in the wall made it easier for me to communicate with Ngi and Anastasia simultaneously.

‘The wall won’t give in,’ said Anastasia. You could just hear the exhaustion in her.

Ngi had a little more life in her, but she too was out of it.

‘We need another route,’ she said.

Let me mention that I am stubborn of character and prefer defeat to submission. I can just never come to terms with giving in to something.

‘No,’ I protested ‘it will give in. The trick is to keep on fighting it.’

Surely there was truth to my unfound logic. This wasn’t the strongest wall ever.

‘Breakdown your mental walls and you’ll conquer the wall in front of you,’ said someone. He sounded middle-aged. He was more encouraging than I was.

‘Oh yeah?’ I said ‘and who is it that tells me this?’

‘My name is not important,’ he said ‘my message is. Do as I tell and you shall surely live.’

I scoured for him in the darkness to no avail.

‘You will not find me in darkness,’ he said ‘now, turn on the light.’

‘What are you talking about?’ I questioned ‘there are no matches.’

‘Ye of little faith,’ he went ‘you need no matches to bring light. Have faith and the light shall surely come.’

The man was very ‘in the clouds’ with his message and made me a bit sceptic.

‘Well, then why don’t you come and light up for me?’

He laughed, ‘Give a man fish and you’ve fed him for a day. Teach him how to fish, and you’ve fed him for eternity.’

He said all of the right things and doing as he said couldn’t do more damage. I grabbed one of the candles and focused on it alight. To my surprise it really did burn a flame. The darkness of the room was pushed back and I could see clearly for the first time in a while. My eyes stung a little.

‘Wow, thanks,’ I jubilantly said ‘I’m going to call you my Manual for surviving in this dark place.’

‘I have many names,’ he returned ‘The key is not to produce the light. It is to keep the fire burning.’

‘How do I do that Manual? It’s not like I’ve got a lot to keep it burning.’

‘How do you keep alive?’ he returned.

‘Well, I eat and exercise.’

‘Then you shall give the fire its own food and exercise it. That is how it will also keep burning.’

‘Where are you?’ I questioned. My eyes just couldn’t see him.

‘I am there,’ he returned.

I pushed my eyeballs forward.

‘I really cannot see you!’

‘You fool,’ he said ‘why do you see only with your eyes? If only your eyes cause you to see then you shall never see beyond where you are eyes.’

There was a pause and I soon realised that I was now alone.

‘Who are you talking to?’ said Ngi.

‘I don’t know. He was here and made me turn on my candle,’ I retold ‘I don’t know the rest.’

With light I started to properly observe my surroundings. I started with my body. The toe was fine now. I pressed it against the floor and there was no pain. Then I moved the candle around the cell until I found a small gap at the uppermost corner of the wall; a place neither of us had seen or could reach.

‘Hey, Anastasia,’ I called ‘think you can climb up to the corner that I’m going to hit?’

I used one of the many rocks that I now saw lying about the floor and hit the corner. On their side it made a loud gong.

‘Yeah,’ she answered ‘Got it!’

She climbed up on Ngi’s shoulders and was able to dig through the cement. Initially the hole was minute, but with each minute, it grew until large chunks from the wall began to give in.

We now had a bigger problem. We had two holes that needed covering if we weren’t out on time.