I was born in the darkness and the only light I had ever known was the faint glow of the orb. It spoke to me in muffled voices—fragments of conversations from some far away place, a place I could only imagine. That room was the only place I had ever known.
The voices were faint, like whispers leaking through a crack, audible only when I sat still in the room’s silence. They spoke of strange things—lions, schools, taxes—words that painted pictures I couldn’t see. But I learned over time, the same as any other kid, I suppose. Funnily enough, the first word I ever uttered was “Mom”, the same as any other kid. Of course, I wasn’t saying that to my actual mother. No, it was the orb that captured my affection. Aside from the hardwood floors and four metal walls, there was nothing else.
When I was young, the room felt large. The orb floated in one corner, and I had plenty of space to play. I’d run and jump and do cartwheels across the floor. But over time, I grew taller, and the same twenty-foot by twenty-foot playpen shrank to a mere holding cell. One cartwheel bashed my head against the metal wall, leaving a bruise and swelling that lasted for days. It was my last cartwheel. After that, I contented myself with sitting and listening to the voices, only occasionally walking or stretching.
I listened to the voices very intently. It was my main form of entertainment afterall. At times I wondered if the voices were just in my head, but that was impossible. They spoke about things that were so foreign to me, they had to come from somewhere else—someone else.
There were different voices, too. Two voices came most often: a deep one, steady and low, and a soft one, warm but distant. And everyday they talked about something different. They spoke of picnics in the meadow, hard days at work, trips to the beach, and love. Some days it was just quiet. Those were the worst days.
There was a lot of talk about more serious matters, too. War, history, rising depression and anxiety, computers taking over the world. These “computer” things were doing the thinking for people. Entire generations were raised on “screens”. There was still a lot that I didn’t understand, but I could tell there was still hope for a different future. The voice that spoke about all this was different—stark and dry—and he always finished his discussions with “I’m Dan Faulkin. Good luck, and good night.” I really felt like he was speaking to me. He wasn’t, though, because as much as I called out to him, he never replied to me. He just kept talking. They all did.
Sometimes when I called out to the other voices, they would pause. That was the closest to a response I ever got. I’d call out louder, begging for an answer…for a friend…but I got nothing. When I listened close, I could hear the deeper voice whisper, “This is how they learn.”
Then, silence would fall, leaving me alone with the cold, dim light of the orb.
I learned hygiene through trial-and-error. There was a showerhead in one corner of the room, flush against the ceiling, and a knob below. It only ever gave cold water, and it all went down a grate beneath the showerhead that fixed solid in the floor. I know. I tried to remove it. Food appeared in the middle of the room every morning, like it arrived while I was sleeping. It was a modest pile of bread or meat—always enough, never more. I had everything I needed to survive, but surviving and thriving are vastly different.
I came to learn this room was a cage. The voices never called it that, but they spoke of “prisons” in their world, places where people were trapped, and I knew this qualified. There was no door, no window, no way out. And above all, I was there against my will.
My body was trapped, but my mind was free. When I wasn’t listening to the voices, I was daydreaming. Their words fueled my imagination, letting me build cities of stone and glass, fight battles with swords I’d never seen, or sit in rooms filled with people whose faces I crafted from my own, which I glimpsed faintly in the metal wall’s reflection. No matter where I went in my fantasies, I always had other people there with me. I’d lie on the floor, tracing the wood’s grain, imagining it as rivers or roads from the voices’ tales. But my fantasies always ended, leaving me back in the cage, the orb’s glow mocking my confinement.
I tried to keep my mind busy, but the sameness of the room gnawed at me. The orb hung in one corner, unchanging, its light both comfort and torment. It seemed to pulse when I stared too long, teasing me. That was probably just my imagination running wild.
One day, after shouting at the voices and hearing silence in return, I broke. Tears filled my eyes, blurring the room. My hands looked warped and the walls twisted, and the orb. I didn’t think crying would change anything, but it felt good to let it out. When I looked up at the orb, it too was warped. Through my teary eyes, it lost its glow, and I could see it wasn’t an object, but a ripple in the air. It reflected my face and the room’s edges, in a shimmering haze. I stepped closer, heart pounding, cheeks rosy. I’d always feared its light would burn, but now it looked different, softer, like an invitation. I reached out, feeling a strange pressure, and pushed my hand through. It vanished into a cloud of reflections, hidden but whole. I blinked in awe, stared with curiosity, sniffled, and wiped my eyes with my other hand. But the orb’s glow returned and I pulled back my hand, trembling, falling onto the floor.
“What is this thing?” I screamed, raw. “Tell me!” The voices didn’t answer. In a surge of anger, I punched the wall, and pain exploded in my hand. Blood dripped from my knuckles, and I crumpled, sobbing myself to sleep.
Anger became my companion. I avoided the orb’s corner, rotating between the others, but my eyes stayed locked on it, like a predator watching its prey. The voices’ tales now felt like cruel taunts. I tried to tune them out, focusing instead on the orb’s faint pulse. Days blended into nights; I ate, slept, and stared, determined to unravel its secret. I didn’t learn much—except maybe patience.
Even in my bitter misery, I found some solace in the things the voices said. Dan Faulkin often said, “What doesn’t kill you makes you stronger.” I liked that. And then he would remind me that they needed strength to overcome the computers that were everywhere, and I wasn’t sure what that meant.
There was one day—night, I suppose—where I fought hard to stay awake so I could stare at the orb just a little longer. There was nothing to be gained from doing that, but, well, ideas have a way of taking hold of a person, and I had my mind set on staring at the orb for as long as I could. My eyes drooped, and my head bounced, but I snapped back to attention. It was then that the orb glowed brighter and bubbled and a steak flew out from the side and landed on the floor a few feet away. I had never seen that before.
I walked toward the orb and examined as it flitted back to its typical soft glow. But something had just come out of it. My food had been coming out of the orb for years. I reached out a hand and once more pressed it into the orb. I paused and held it there for a while. My hand was warm, and safe, but I couldn’t bring myself to go any further. Until I felt something.
Another hand? I reached in further, shoulder deep in the orb. Then, I plunged through.
Warm light flooded my senses. I stood in a room of wood, not metal, its walls soft with colors I had heard about but had never seen before. Four people faced me. They were no longer distant voices, or imaginary faces. They weren’t words or shadows that existed in my head alone. They were real people. I stiffened, uneasy under their gaze.
A woman stepped forward with a warm smile and glistening eyes, and said in a familiar voice, “You’ve grown so big.” Before I could do anything, she came to me and wrapped her arms around me.
I stood, frozen, staring over her shoulder at the others. I didn’t know why she was holding me, but it was nice.
In a muddled voice, I squeaked out a hesitant but hopeful, “Mom?”
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Brian J Mundell 