Humanitarium

“Wake up, sleepyhead!” Mom sang from downstairs.

Ethan groaned. He cracked open his eyelids and groped through the action figures and knick-knacks on his nightstand until he found his glasses and phone. He put his glasses on, looked at his phone, groaned again, and sat up.

“Sorry, Mom! My alarm didn’t go off.”

Ethan stumbled from bedroom to bathroom and back again until he was dressed and ready, then made his way to the kitchen. Sunlight filtered through the venetian blinds. His mom stood by the microwave and his dad sat at the table reading a newspaper.

“No breakfast today. I’m late.”

“A healthy breakfast is the most important meal of the day.” His mom responded, shutting the microwave.

Ethan sighed and slumped into a seat. His mom set a bowl of cereal and a small plate of scrambled eggs in front of him. The cereal was soggy and the eggs were cold. After draining a glass of water, he started to feel more awake and noticed the paper his dad was reading.

“Where’d we get the newspaper?” He asked, but his dad didn’t seem to hear. Ethan shrugged and pulled out his phone to check for messages from his friends. “What the freak? My phone isn’t getting service.”

“Wake up, sleepyhead!” His mom said.

He rolled his eyes, then slipped on his shoes and started looking for his backpack. “Hey, since I’m running late, can I get a ride?”

He waited for an answer, but his mom just turned back to the microwave. His dad said nothing.

“Fine, but don’t get mad if I’m late.”

It was late by the time he got to school, yet there were still kids on the playground. All of them were younger, except for Liam Thompsen who was flinging himself dangerously fast on a spinner. He spun until he fell laughing in the wood chips.

People always referred to Liam Thompsen by his full name, but they never said it to his face. He was that kind of kid. He happened to be in the same grade as Ethan. Their parents scheduled playdates and sleepovers for much of their childhood. At least, they did until Liam somehow acquired a machete.

“Hey, Liam. Did the bell ring?”

“Hey, Snoozy. Nah. It ain’t rang yet.”

Ethan looked at the door. “It’s past time.”

“Yep.”

“Shouldn’t we go in?”

“I’m not wasting my time sitting in no classroom if I don’t have to. And I’m not getting in trouble for their screw-up neither.”

“I think you’d still get in trouble.”

“You sound like Weenus.” Liam said, referring to a younger kid in their neighborhood. Liam called the poor kid Weenus so often that Ethan forgot his real name. “He said the same thing before going in.”

“Did he come back out?”

“Nope.”

“Doesn’t that mean class started?”

“Maybe. But no teachers have come out to get me. Go on in if you want. It’ll be Snoozy and Weenus sitting all alone in class, kissing the teacher’s ass.”

“Whatever.” Ethan turned and walked away. 

As soon as he stepped through the school doors, he stopped. Instead of the hallway to his class, there was a wall. It was made from the same dark red brick the rest of the school. It wasn’t there the day before. He looked around in confusion. There was a single classroom to one side but no way around or through the wall.

“What the hell?” Liam’s voice came from behind.

 Ethan turned to see Liam’s equally confused face. “Did we come in through the wrong door?”

“What door opens to an eff’n wall?”

Ethan shrugged and stepped into the only classroom. Half the desks were empty. A few kids hunched over their papers, others stared forward. The kid Liam called Weenus sat at a desk near the front of the room. The teacher was at the whiteboard, writing frantically. 

“Excuse me, Miss…” He looked for some indication of the teacher’s name but didn’t find one, “Sorry. But, uh, what’s up with the hall?”

She didn't respond.

“I mean, there's a wall--a new wall--and I’m not sure how to get to my class.”

The teacher continued writing on the whiteboard. He looked back at Liam who was watching from the doorway. They shrugged to each other.

“I think I’m late. It’s already…” Ethan pulled out his phone to check the time. He paused, noticing that the time on his phone was followed by a “PM” instead of an “AM”. He looked for a clock on the wall, but this classroom didn’t have one.

The teacher continued writing, so he wandered to an empty desk next to Weenus and sat. “Hey, what’s going on?” Then he noticed tears lining the smaller kid’s cheek. “You okay?”

Weenus pointed around at the teacher and the other students. The kids were a range of ages.. A few sat in miniature desks and looked like they should be in kindergarten, others were Ethan’s age, some were older. The teacher continued to write on the whiteboard. There were complex equations, sentences in foreign languages, and scientific drawings. 

Ethan groaned when he saw Liam put on his tough-guy face and enter the room with a gangster glide. 

“Hey, Missus Teacher. What’s going on?”

She didn’t respond to Liam either.

“What’cha writing?” Liam moved uncomfortably close to the teacher and stuck his face next to the whiteboard. 

“What the hell? You ain’t writing nothing!” He pushed the teacher who teetered slightly but didn’t stop writing. 

“What’s going on? Why won’t you look at me?” Liam shoved the teacher hard this time. She fell, hitting the floor with a soft thud. Ethan stood, his mouth open almost as wide as his eyes. 

“Hell,” Liam whispered.

Ethan stumbled through the desks to get where he could see the teacher, her hand still outstretched making writing motions. Her body shifted. Then turned. Then stood. She didn’t stand the way that a person normally gets up, but the way a rake pops up when a cartoon character steps on it. She wobbled back and forth on stiff legs until she faced the board again.

One of the boys yelped. Both ran. The next thing Ethan knew, they were running in the middle of an empty street, Liam in front. 

“Hey!” Ethan called, “Hold up!”

“Like hell!”

“What happened?”

“I don’t know!”

“You were right there. You pushed her.”

Liam stopped and leaned over, hands on his knees, breathing hard. “I don’t think…” he gasped, “I don’t think it was a ‘her.’”

“What do you mean?”

Liam suddenly lunged at Ethan. Ethan instinctively held up his arms to block the blow. Liam made contact with Ethan’s forearms and pushed him back several feet.

Ethan skid to a stop. “What was that for?!”

“Don’t you see? I pushed you, harder than I pushed her, but you didn’t fall over. You blocked it and caught yourself. That’s what people do when I push them.”

Liam paced, then sat on the pavement. 

“Hey, don’t just sit in the middle of the street.”

“Do you see any cars?” Liam’s glared. Ethan didn’t respond. “When I pushed her, she didn’t do any of that stuff you did. It was like pushing over a mannequin.” Liam stood and started walking. The tough-guy pose and gangster walk were gone. 

“Hey! Where are you going?”

“I don’t know. Home, I guess.”

Ethan walked after him. He saw Liam hesitate before going to his house, but he sped up to get to his own house. His hands shook, fumbling at the doorknob.

His dad still sat at the table with the newspaper, and his mom stood by the microwave. She turned as he entered.

“Ah, honey. How was your day?”

Ethan mouthed some words, but nothing came out. Then his eyes got bleary, and he rushed to his mother, wrapping his arms around her. Her body was stiff and cool. Ethan’s embrace weakened, then released. He stepped back and looked into his mom’s pleasant face.

“Mom?” He wiped the tears away as a different emotion took hold. She didn’t respond. He looked from her to his dad, but his face was still behind the newspaper. “Dad…”

Ethan pulled the paper down. The person behind the paper was not his father. The hair color was the same, but that’s where similarities ended. Its face was different and there was a pipe in his mouth like a generic father from an old TV show.

The thing that was supposed to be his father didn’t even move, its eyes stared straight ahead. But his mother moved, and Ethan lept away, knocking a chair over.

She turned slightly and leaned forward, then put her open hand to the side of her mouth and called up the stairs, “Wake up sleepy head!”

Ethan ran from the house. Liam was already in the middle of the intersection, pacing.

“My mom…” Ethan stammered, “my mom…” but he couldn’t finish.

“It ain’t her?”

Ethan nodded.

“Yeah. It wasn’t my dad, neither. But it sure sounded like him. He was already yelling at me before I even got through the door. It was the same stuff he said this morning, you know? Like, the same words and everything. So I punched the bastard.”

Liam wandering down the street. Ethan followed after a moment.

“And?”

“And what?”

“You hit your dad. What happened?”

“Nothing. God-damn-nothing happened. I was going to wail on him, but… but it’s not satisfying, you know? With him not being real.”

“You’re real, right?”

Liam swung around, his fist connected with Ethan’s cheek.

“Damn right I’m real!” Liam turned and stormed down the street.

Ethan held his cheek and adjusted his glasses. “What the heck?”

Liam stopped but didn’t turn around. “Hey, look, I’m sorry. It’s just… everything’s messed up. I don’t know what to do. But, uh, thanks.”

“Thanks for what?”

Liam turned his head and grinned. “For the punch. It felt right, you know? It’s the first thing that felt right this whole damn day.” Then he turned away and started walking again.

“Hey, wait up. Where’re you going now?”

“Back to school. I figure that Weenus kid seemed pretty real. And I’m wondering about that wall. The school looked the same from the outside. What’s in the rest of it?”

The same kids were on the playground. Liam shoved one off the monkey bars as he walked past. He didn’t look back to see it fall, but Ethan paused to watch. The kid lay in the wood chips, hands still raised above its head as if it was still holding onto one of the bars, its legs moving back and forth.

When Ethan got to the classroom, Liam was hard at work relieving his anger. Dripping with sweat, he lifted a desk and threw it at the window. The window didn’t break, and the desk clattered into the pile of other desks and chairs. The students who had been in those desks were on the floor, their limbs frozen. The kid Liam called Weenus was also on the floor, curled up into a ball in the far corner, his eyes squeezed shut, fingers in his ears. 

Ethan crouched next to him and tried to pull a finger out of the boy’s ear. “Hey there, don’t worry about Liam Thompsen. Hey, can you listen for a second?” 

The boy finally let Ethan pull one of his hands away.

“I know things are… well, they’re scary. I know it’s scary, but I’m here. We’re in the same boat. I don’t know what’s going on. Liam Thompsen doesn’t know what’s going on. That’s why he’s acting nuts.”

Liam rushed the teacher with a roar, knocking her to the ground. With a stream of profanity, he dragged her into the hall.

“Hey, I can’t remember your name. What is it? Mine’s Ethan.”

No answer.

“I’m scared too. It’s not just school. My mom and dad… something happened to them.”

The voice that came from the boy was barely a whisper. “My mom…”

“Yeah?” Ethan perked up. “Did something happen to your mom too?”

The boy nodded, eyes still squeezed shut.

Ethan leaned closer. “What happened?”

“My mom has my dad’s voice.”

“Your mom... has your dad’s voice?”

The boy nodded.

From out in the hall came scratching noises as something scootched across the carpet. The teacher, lying on her back, jerkily slid into the classroom. Her hand was still moving as if she was writing, but without the marker. Her body popped back into place, wobbling until she faced the board. 

The marker flew from the hallway and bounced off her head.

“Fuck this!” Liam leaned in. “I’m going outside. Going to try another door.”

Ethan patted the boy on his shoulder. “I’ll be back. Okay?” Then he ran after Liam.

He was only a few feet behind when Liam rounded the corner of the building then abruptly fell backwards to the ground. He rolled around, cursing, and clutching his face. 

“What happened?” Ethan asked.

Liam kicked the air in response. 

“I don’t get it.”

“Listen, you idiot!” His kicks made a sound, like someone stomping on concrete.

“What…” Ethan walked forward to get a better look at Liam’s feet and bonked his forehead against something hard. “Ow!”

“You see?”

“No. No, I don’t!” Ethan lifted his hand and carefully moved it forward until it connected with something solid and smooth. His eyes told him that he wasn’t touching anything, that he was just holding it in the air. But the nerve endings on his fingertips and palm sent a different message. “What is this?”

Liam was back on his feet, his nose bleeding and a bruise forming on his brow. “Oh my god.” Shock washed the anger from his face. “Oh my god, it’s a wall.”

“A glass wall?” Using both hands, Ethan felt along the invisible wall. It went all the way to the school. Ethan ran his finger along the seam where the school’s bricks met the invisible wall.

“Hey, Liam. Check this out.”

“I already did, remember? I checked it out with my face.” Yet Liam still came, keeping one hand in front of him.

“Do these bricks feel right to you?”

Liam put his palm on the brick wall. “Uh, yeah. It feels like bricks.”

“No. Move your fingers across the bricks. It’s not... it’s not gritty. It’s too smooth.”

“What’re you getting at?”

“I don’t know.” Ethan put his finger in one of the grooves of mortar between the bricks and ran it horizontally along the groove until his finger stopped at the invisible wall. “Look at this line. How straight is it?”

Liam’s brow creased. “It’s a line, isn’t it?”

“Look right at this spot, where it hits the glass wall. Can you see the line bend right there? It’s just a little bend. Like when something goes right up next to a mirror, but the mirror isn’t exactly a right angle.”

Liam stared for a bit more than a moment, then his eyes popped. “Holy shit.”

Ethan pointed up and down the brick wall. You can see the bend, right? You can see where the wall is.”

Liam nodded. “How far does this thing go?”

The boys felt their way along the invisible wall across the parking lot, the lawn, and the street. The wall went through fences and houses, streets and shrubs, and even through trees. The trees were where it was most notable. On the boy’s side of the wall, leaves moved to a small breeze. But there was no movement on the other side.

One cedar fence didn’t have an opening, so they climbed it. First Liam, then Ethan. Ethan paused at the top of the fence, and looked around.

“Hold on. I live next door.” He kicked his leg over the fence and dropped to the ground. “The wall curves. It goes all the way around the neighborhood. I bet it does.” He looked at the sky. “You know how weird the trees are? Well, I just realized... there aren’t any birds. And everything feels wrong.”

“Damn right.”

“No, I mean the texture’s wrong. The bricks, the wood fences,” he reached down and tried to pull up some grass, but it wouldn’t come out, “the grass… even the people. It’s like they’re all props.”

The boys looked at each other, neither talking. Other than the breeze ruffling the leaves, there were no sounds. Then, from the other side of the fence, from Ethan’s house, they heard his mother’s voice. 

“Wake up sleepy head!”

*

“Look how curious they are! You have the cutest humans.” One of the beings exclaimed, her amorphous body floated around the human vivarium. 

The other being's eye spurs flare with pride. “The environment is even a reproduction of their natural habitat. My parent scanned it before collecting the humans.”

“Everything is replicated? That must have been expensive!”

“Well, no. Just the topography and domiciles. Everything else is from the ‘Human Suburban Kit’. But there are a few fine-detailed reproductions. The three human’s primary caregivers are exact replicas. My parent even recorded their calls. It improves the survival rate.”

“Three humans? I only see two.” The being skimmed through the dome looking for the third.

“It’s in this building.” The other being's fillium reach into the classroom. “It’s a runt, and probably won’t survive.”

“How sad.”

“It’s perfectly normal. They’re social creatures that thrive best when they have a friend. But some die in captivity, so my parent got an extra.”

“Poor little guy.” It turned it’s attention to Ethan and Liam. “These two seem to be fine.”

“Yes. I think they like their new home.”