The man woke up this morning in a maze. Ten foot high shrubs surrounded him. He couldn’t see his way through the dense brush. When he looked above him there were no clouds, only a vast expanse of what could be best described as a void. There was no path behind him either. The only exit was forward. Slowly he crept around the first corner. Nothing. Just more overgrown vegetation, with a path to the left and right. He thought about which way to go, and if it mattered.
Closing his eyes, he decided to listen to the woods. A voice disguised as a premonition told him to go to the right. Slowly but surefootedly he meandered down the trail. Light was emanating from somewhere in the distance. A torch illuminated a small wooden sign. The carving read ‘HOW?’. What in the hell did that mean, he thought to himself. Apparently he was lost in a philosophic as well as a literal maze. Looking outward from the signpost he had noticed a tunnel that had been cut away from the maze ahead of him. He ran towards the opening when suddenly, the ground beneath him gave way. The man opened his eyes. Darkness was everywhere.
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He had no idea how long he had lost consciousness. He felt around the ground, searching for clues to where he was. There was nothing to indicate where he was. Something tasted funny. A metallic, salty fluid filled his mouth. While reaching for his wallet to grab a bandage (he always had tried being prepared for anything) he stumbled upon a lighter. That’s strange, he never carried a lighter. Why was one there now? He flicked his thumb down and light filled the room. The room was huge and oddly reflective. He looked down and saw his face in a floor made of mirrors. The
ceilings were mirrored as well. Things had gone from strange to surreal. He yelled out “Hello.” The echoing seemed to indicate how vast the room was before him. It was the first sound he had heard since waking up in the maze.
He walked a solid hour. In the far distance there was a glowing orb. Finally the man could discern a break from the mirrored pattern all around him. A cavern was dead ahead, illuminated by an incandescent ball that seemed unexplainably suspended. The rocky edges of the cavern extended at least 60 feet high and forty feet wide. There was another wooden sign on the ground beneath the orb. A solitary beckoning word was present again ‘WHY?’ He wondered if he should continue ahead into the cave or head back the way he came. Even if he did make it back there’d likely be no way back up he thought, he couldn’t even see the place that he fell from anyhow. Going straight
was the only option. Forward and down.
Peering deep into the cavern yielded little insight as to where it went. The cave was
preternaturally silent, only his soft footfalls could be heard. Twenty yards further and the light from the orb was fading away. Oddly, the darker it got the more the man could notice a faint trail of glowing paint on the rocky floor. The paint formed a trail with small arrows pointing downward to the left and right of the line. The man decided to follow the arrows. Within minutes the only thing that was visible was the painted lines and arrows. Peering into the distance ahead, the man noticed the trail abruptly stopped. He cautiously approached the end of the trail. Nothing, just a line going to……….nowhere. He extended his arms in front of him. Ice. He reached for his lighter and flicked it
on. In front of him was a gargantuan ice wall. He scanned the barrier, searching for a way around. Ten feet above him he found a third marker, this one had a single word carved into the ice. WHERE ? He hadn’t really thought about that. Where was he? Why was he here? How did he end up here in the first place?
Somehow he hadn’t even thought about where he was when he entered the maze. Where was he the last night? He struggled to remember the faintest details. Was he dreaming? The thought had occurred to him more than once. A dream couldn’t be this lucid, he told himself silently. After all, he had lost consciousness. But still, something was amiss. He took a second to collect his thoughts, not just of the night before, but of his life. What was his name? Again, he drew another blank. For the first time since entering the maze, he was scared. Hard work was certainly in store for him. Without knowledge of who he was, where he came from or what he was good at he hadn’t a fighting chance at the mysteries in front of him. Was there a way to jog his memory? Suddenly he remembered that he had seen mirrors back before the cavern had started. Maybe seeing his own face would be enough to bring it all back. Quickly the amnesiac ran back towards the entrance of the cavern. Maybe there was hope after all.
Up and out of the cave he went. The orb above the cave had gotten brighter. That was useful as it had provided enough light for him to make his way to the mirrored wall. He took out his lighter and shined it before him. The man in the mirror was middle aged, tan and fit. Pale blue eyes stared back from beneath a flock of raven black hair. He had no facial hair and straight teeth. The reflection might as well been that of a stranger. This was no familiar countenance. Instead of an epiphany he had found an enigma. He knew no more of his past than of his self. He was tan. He obviously had been in the sun. Maybe it was summer, but he couldn’t be certain. His teeth and shape probably meant that he had come from a background of some money. He likely played sports or worked out, but his smooth hands told him that he wasn’t a manual laborer. Still, he was no more than making educated guesses and nothing lent him any meaningful insight. He decided to double back and check the perimeter of the mirrored room.
The room was large and circular. There were no breaks at all minus the cave entrance. Another dead end. He had a vague recollection of a joke about someone being in a room with no corners. Another glimpse of a thought had yielded a nursery rhyme about Little Jack Horner. Little Jack Horner sat in a corner…Jack…Jack…Jack. Anonymous man was now Jack something. Better than Horner he thought, with a faint smile on his face. He had no choice but to go back to the cave. Maybe he could find something hidden near the ice wall. No one in their right mind would construct a gigantic mirrored room beneath a maze. But why would anyone that would design such a thing be sane? Maybe logic didn’t apply here. Regardless, he had to check. What else could he do? Sit down and starve to death? There was no hope in that. He had to keep searching. Back at the ice wall he felt along the wall for a hidden door. Nothing. Again he looked at the carving. ‘WHERE?’
He looked the word closely. He looked at the word ‘HERE’ contained within the word ‘WHERE’. He needed to find a way to reach the carving. Along the cavern wall he found a few smaller rocks. Eventually he was able to assemble them into a stack about two feet high. The carving was still out of reach. Jumping from atop a pile of loosely gathered rocks seemed stupid, even dangerous. Nonetheless, he had to follow his intuition. Jack jumped as high as he could and slammed his hand into the carving. Something shifted. A loud grinding sound like something heavy being dragged
began echoing. A rectangular part of the ice wall moved backwards. A door was visible. But where did it lead?
_
The man peered through the doorway in the ice wall. There was light on the other side. It appeared that the cave opened up into the outside world in just a few hundred yards. Jack squinted as his eyes began adjusting to the light. Near the end of the cave he could make out what appeared to be a valley. He walked to the precipice of a sheer cliff overlooking a forest than ran beside a flowing brook. On the far side of the trees there was a small enclave of villages. Scattered farms and gardens ran beside the thatch hut buildings. There was a narrow trail that ran down from the cave to the stream below. He made his way over the loose rocks and looked back at from where he came. The cavern was set near the middle left of a giant sculpture. The chiseled form of a monolithic wizard was larger than any man-made creation he had ever seen. The cave entrance formed the empty sleeve of its left arm. He had never imagined it possible to carve something on this scale. Maybe the colossus was dedicated to a religious figure of some sort? And while Jack didn’t believe in wizards and sorcery, before yesterday he hadn’t believed in mysterious mazes, circular rooms of glass, floating orbs and caves with cryptic exits either. He hoped to find answers in the village below.
Jack walked through muddy streets, past animal pens, and straw. He went from hut to hut, looking for any signs of intelligent life. Each hovel, like the ones before it were empty. Sure there were clothes, bed linens, pots and pans, but no people. It was as if the entire village had vanished overnight. How were the animals still alive he wondered? Maybe there was just enough grain left over from before the disappearance? Maybe the villagers all had set off on a journey of some sort?
Things were strange in this place, wherever he was. After checking all of the huts Jack headed to the last place he hadn’t checked. A strangely shaped building resembling a geodesic dome was located at the far end of the village. It was sheltered by huge trees and couldn’t be seen from the colossus above. Light was coming from inside. Jack knocked on the door, heard nothing and went inside. He wasn’t prepared for what he saw next.
Apparently, this was a church of some sorts, but it was unlike any he had ever encountered. On the back wall of the church there was another statue of a wizard, albeit smaller. Its arms were held out in the welcoming posture of a hug. At its feet there was a pool of dark crimson blood with several floating skulls. But the skulls weren’t human. In fact, they weren’t from any species Jack had ever known. They were long, flat and cone shaped with giant eye sockets. But they were the skulls of children. The hair of Jack’s arms and neck were standing at full attention. His hands were
clammy and his heart was beating rapidly. Fear coursed through his veins like a runaway flood from a broken dam. He had a powerful urge to retreat. His intuition was screaming for him to run. He bolted out the door and ran out of the village as fast as humanly possible. He found a path off the river that trailed into the dark woods. Upon collapsing from exhaustion Jack had a horrifying realization. His reality had reversed. His dreams were more familiar than his waking nightmare.
_
He woke to an eerie electronic sound. It was as if he could hear a voice, one made from electronic keyboards. The noises were shrill and piercing, frantic and menacing. The specifics were indiscernible, yet clearly had purpose. He suspected ‘IT’ was looking for him. Jack had no reason to know that whatever was chasing him was an IT, but at some level he knew it was true. The wind picked up through the woods. He began to shiver. Something was near him but he couldn’t see it.
Suddenly through the trees he saw it. He struggled to make sense of it. It was a cloud. A cloud made up of static energy. There were several ambient and neutral colors mixed. It vibrated with intention. It wanted him. This electronic vortex was the first form of sentience he had seen. He knew he was in great danger. He picked up a rock from the ground and tossed it as far as he could in the opposite direction, back towards the village. The vortex screamed electronically and charged after it. Jack seized the moment and ran as fast as could away from the village. He was at a dead end. A staggering cliff face stood before him and stretched as far as he could see to the left and
right. The only break in the cliff was the towering waterfall that came thundering down from above.
He couldn’t turn around and go the other way. He wondered if the electrical entity could survive the water. Surely it would dissipate. Maybe, maybe not. Jack had no choice. It was back. The whirlwind rushed after him unbelievably fast. Jack dove in the river and headed straight for the waterfall. Holding his breath for what seemed like forever he came up in a pool on the other side of the waterfall. Jack had found a way out. Looking through the distorted view of the water Jack could see the pissed off electrical tempest sputtering in anger on the shore. His surprise and finding the cave was trumped by what he saw next. A brick wall with a door. Above the door hung a sign with the word ‘WHEN?’.
__
Jack opened the door and found himself inside a dingy and dark room with wooden floors and brick walls. Several oak barrels were lying on their sides with spigots near the floor. It was a storage room of some sort. He got up and surveyed the room. There was a set of stairs behind a row of casks. As Jack climbed the stairs he could smell alcohol and stale cigar smoke. Apart from the lingering odors, Jack could see no one. All of the bar stools lined up against the counter were empty. Somehow the place felt oddly familiar. Had he been here some other time? Jack decided to explore the upper levels of the pub. On the third floor Jack had noticed one of the doors to the
adjoining rooms was open. A startling feeling of Déjà vu overcame him. He felt compelled to open a drawer on the nightstand. There was a long, serrated blade and a calendar inside. Maybe the calendar would yield a clue. It was set in the month of September in the year 1888. That was odd. He didn’t think he come from this era. He took the knife and looked out the window. Directly across the street was a church. It was a long and elegant white cathedral. The white Portland stone construction glowed in the moonlight. Near the top of the steeple he noticed that the clock read 9:55. Jack knew that something in the cathedral would help unlock the mystery of who he was. He
descended the stairs and crossed the street.
Jack ran up the stairs and between the giant Tuscan pillars of the church. The place was lit by candles along each side of the building. A centuries old pipe organ sat in the back of the room. The vaulted ceilings and ornate tile work of floor were astonishing. For the first time since his odd journey began he saw someone. A young lady was praying at the back of the church. Jack called to her and she wouldn’t respond. Something was wrong. As soon as he approached her he got cold.
A thundering set of peals reverberated from the bells of the church.
Dong….dong….dong….dong…dong….dong....dong….dong….dong….DONG. Ten Bells. Just like the name of the pub across the street. A flood of memories came back to him. Girls on the street. Prostitutes. He had killed so many. The people were afraid of him. But they didn’t understand. They couldn’t understand his need. They thought he was merely a madman. But he needed their blood to perform the ritual. He heard a desperate command in his head, “Rip her! Rip her! On the tenth ring the woman turned to Jack and stabbed her in the face. Blood spattered everywhere. Jack gleefully gutted the woman. This was no mere evisceration, this was a sacrifice. He tore out her
entrails and played with them. He removed her still beating heart from her chest and sunk his teeth into it and he....... disappeared.
He remembered now. He was Jack, Jack the Ripper. But he was
so much more. He was the vanishing wizard.
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