“The Levantine Experiments”

Guy Hasson

Guy Hasson is an Israeli writer, playwright, and filmmaker. His fiction is predominantly written in English, whilst his stage and film work is written in Hebrew. He is the author of two books published in Israel—a short story collection and a short novel—and he wrote and directed the science fiction feature film Heart of Stone in 2008. He is also a two-time winner of the Israeli Geffen Award for science fiction short stories.

They were dangerous times, those modern times.

They were the years in which Man had become more than any man. They were the years before Man discovered his own true nature. They were a time in which that true nature was the subject of Man’s experiments.

The worst experiments were called the Levantine Experiments.

* * * *

Sarah was birthed and then left in a room with a surrogate mother. At the age of two, she was left alone in the room. Since then she had never seen another human being.

She had lived in a small room, slept on the floor, and had no furniture. In the corner there was a toilet. When she slept, food would appear in a special place, and with it came water, toilet paper, and a blanket to keep her warm. The voice of Mother spoke to her through the walls. It taught her to speak, and when Sarah was five, the voice disappeared.

She had never worn clothes, had not felt another’s breath since the age of two, had never heard of the outside. The room was her entire life. It was her universe. There was no concept of outside, of a world, of stars. She had never been taught those words.

Unseen cameras peered at her through the ceiling. The cameras recorded her every move, watched her every action, studied her.

It was a Levantine Experiment.

* * * *

No building is perfect.

Nothing is safe from chance.

No concrete is safe from time.

One day chance caused there to be the smallest of cracks in the wall.

Sarah was twelve.

* * * *

Sarah looked at the crack. There was no word for it. There was nothing to explain it.

Sarah touched the crack. Sarah looked inside. In a small place, light could peer a millimetre into the wall.

Sarah spent the entire day looking at the crack.

That night, as she slept, dreams came to her.

In her dream, she looked at the wall, and the wall was the same as always. She turned from it, and there was a crack in the wall. She turned again, and the crack was gone. Once more she turned, and the crack returned.

The crack frightened her, and she was determined to keep it from reappearing. And so, she did not turn again.

But when she closed her eyes, as everyone must, the crack returned. She blinked, again, and it vanished. But there was no comfort in this, for she knew it would come back.

Every time she blinked, the process repeated itself. In her dream, she fought herself, fought the urge to close her eyes. Each time, she succeeded in keeping her eyes open a bit more. But always she would blink. And then, when the crack returned, she would quickly blink again. Even as the crack disappeared, the fear of it only grew.

At first, she could not keep herself from blinking for more than ten seconds. Then she succeeded in not blinking for an entire minute. And then for five. And then for ten. And then for an hour. And in her dream, she experienced every second of that hour, fighting to not close her eyes, fighting her instincts, fighting her nature. And in each of these seconds she spent fighting, she knew she would eventually succumb; she knew that at some point in the future, the crack would return.

When she woke up that morning, sweaty and exhausted, the crack was still there. Blinking did not make it go away. Turning her back to it did not make it disappear.

The crack stayed in place.

* * * *

That second night, she dreamt of it again.

This time, it did not disappear.

She would blink, and it would not go away. She would turn around, and it would not vanish. She would try closing her eyes for a second, but it would always remain.

She tried closing her eyes for a few more seconds, but it was still there. She tried closing her eyes for a longer period of time. But when she opened them, it was there.

In her dream, she closed her eyes for a long, long time. With each second that passed, she thought, “Is this enough? This is not enough.” She waited more. And then she waited more. And then she waited even more.

Each time she would not resist temptation and opened her eyes, only to find that she had not waited long enough.

And so she would close her eyes, again, waiting longer, thinking the same thoughts. Longer and longer she would wait. But always, when she could not resist, she would find out that it had not been enough and that she would have to start over.

* * * *

In her dreams, in the nights that followed, she shouted at it, she hit it, she screamed at it, and it did not go away.

And one day, in her dream, another crack appeared, elsewhere in the wall. She stared at it for a long time, then collapsed and cried.

The next day, another crack appeared in her dream. And another. And another. And they all looked the same. They all had the same length, the same size, the same depth, the same shape.

The cracks surrounded her and brought weakness and helplessness to her dreams.

* * * *

As the days passed, the crack in her room became less scary. She was used to it, and although cracks appeared in her dreams, they did not frighten her as much.

Three weeks after the crack had appeared, she dreamt once more of the walls of her world filled with cracks. But this time, two cracks touched each other, and a longer crack was created. She ran her fingers from the bottom of it to the top. It was long.

And the next day, another crack joined the two cracks. And then another, and another. Until the bottom of it was at the bottom of the wall and the top of it was at the top of the wall, and the crack separated the wall. One wall became two walls. And there was darkness in between.

The next day, she dreamt that she slept. And as she slept, a crack appeared on the floor. And another. And another. And then the floor was filled with cracks. There were cracks underneath her sleeping body. And then one crack formed that joined another crack, making a bigger one. And another crack underneath her joined the other two. And soon there was a maw underneath her entire sleeping body.

And there was blackness in it, nothing but blackness.

She hung above it in her dream, and immediately woke up in reality. All day, she could not get that feeling out of her head: hovering above the blackness in the crack. The floor gone. Large blackness. Sleeping in the air.

* * * *

And now, in her dreams, she hovered.

She was always asleep when she hovered, seemingly unaware of the huge blackness underneath her. And yet, since this was a dream, she looked at herself from the outside. She watched her arms rest on mere air. She watched her legs rest above the blackness. She could not see her face, not even in a dream, because she had only seen its murky reflection in the water. Even in dream, she only saw her arms and legs and stomach as they appeared to her in a sleeping position.

Knowing that she was looking at herself sleep and knowing that she was in deep sleep, she was careful to maintain an even sleep, even though she felt the exhilaration of hovering. Each slow intake of breath moved her slowly to one side. Each time she exhaled, her body moved back to its original position.

In this manner, she enjoyed moving from one spot to another, then back again, for the entire night.

* * * *

There was elation in this.

In her waking hours, she replayed those moments, experimenting with the feeling it gave her.

Many nights passed, and through numerous dreams, her ability to move as she hovered grew incrementally larger.

And in one dream, cracks in the ceiling joined each other, separating one side of the ceiling from the other. And in between was a massive blackness.

And slowly, in her dreams, she would rise with each breath she took. As the nights continued, she rose higher and higher, halfway up the room. And then she rose even higher. And then, one day, she was almost close enough to reach the darkness.

But before she reached the crack, she woke.

She wanted to fall asleep again, to see what would happen. But sleep would not come. Her heart hammered in excitement.

But that night, the dream came to her again. And once more, she woke before reaching the ceiling.

The dream came again and again, and now she knew how to not stop the dream. The crack above her beckoned. Higher and higher she rose, though the movement was slower and slower. As she neared it, she stalled her excitement and ignored it.

One more millimetre, one more increment, one more breath of air.

She reached the height of the ceiling and dared not be excited. She knew that she should feel a wall, but she did not. There was still “above.”

One more breath, one more move, and she was above the “above.” She felt that there was something there, she felt the existence of something. Her brain seemed to explode from possibilities and wonder, and then she woke.

This dream would never be forgotten by Sarah. There was above the above.

There was above the above.

There was above the above.

She knew this to be true.

* * * *

What was above the above?

Nothing came to her mind. There could be nothing above the above, except that she had felt clearly that there was.

There could be nothing above the above. Her imagination was blank. Her mind gave no answer except “impossible.” But “impossible” was no longer true.

And now began the days in which she waited to fall asleep. She ran to and fro in her tiny world in order to exhaust herself and prepare her body for sleep.

What could be above the above?

Slowly, her dreams broke the barrier and gave answers.

There was blackness above the above. She hovered upward. Each breath took her upward. And each upward motion led to blackness. But each time she rose, she felt that there was something more above. Blackness disappointed her. And then there was another breath.

Another breath. More blackness.

Another breath. More blackness still.

Another breath.

For two weeks, she rose up through the blackness. She rose and rose. And always she felt that there was more above her.

Always she was certain that there was more than blackness above the blackness.

She spent her days imagining the blackness, remembering what it was like to rise up.

* * * *

And one day, she rose above the blackness. She saw a glimpse of bright light that blinded her, and then she woke up.

The next day, she looked for a bit longer. The light was created by the device that gave light and shadows to her room. But beside the light was another light: one familiar device beside another.

She looked aside, and saw that there were many, many lights, filling every place in sight. She was in a room, exactly like the one she knew, but it was filled with lights.

She already knew how it warmed her hands when she tried to touch it. The lights warmed her like a blanket from afar.

She enjoyed the room. She revelled in it. But still she wanted to see what was above.

She rose beyond it. And after much darkness, more light gave way. This time, there were many lights, but not as many.

And above that was darkness. And above that was light.

But in that light, something was different. She knew it, but could not place it. And then she woke up.

* * * *

The next night, she was already in the darkness, rising into the first light.

Above the light was darkness. Above it was light. Above it was darkness. Above it was light, again. And in that light, she noticed that there were joined cracks in two of the walls, creating darkness big enough to go through. As she hovered in the air, sleeping, there was, as always, darkness above her. But now, for the first time, there was darkness in the direction of her feet and darkness in the direction of her head.

She had the option of hovering not only above but aside.

She hovered there, asleep in her dream, watching herself sleep and hover, unable to decide which way she should let her breaths take her.

Eventually, she hovered in the direction of her head, only to think that she was missing something in the direction of her feet. She hovered back in the direction of her feet, then stopped, thinking that she had been right the first time.

She hovered to and fro the entire night, and thoughts of everything she would lose sight of caused her to wake in cold sweat.

* * * *

Eventually, she picked the direction of her feet. She learnt that what existed in the direction of her feet was more darkness, and beyond the darkness, another room full of light. And in this room, too, there was more darkness in the direction of her feet.

Although there was not much new in these rooms, they felt different because they were aside and not above.

She hovered through many, many rooms that night. And each was slightly different, and each gave her excitement.

The next night she was once again in the original junction, having three options. This time, she picked the direction of her head. She hovered aside into darkness. And past darkness was another room, another variation of the rooms she had seen the night before. But now she noticed that there was no crack in the floor. She had not risen from the floor of this place. If she wanted to, she could choose not to hover, but to walk.

She hovered above the floor, a long time, asleep, afraid of putting herself back on the floor, of waking up. Thus she hovered for the entire duration of the dream.

The next night, she came, again, to the room with the floor.

Slowly, her breaths brought her down to the floor. Feeling herself sleep from the outside, she felt the coldness and coarseness of the floor on her cheek and on the skin of her body. Slowly, she brought herself awake, opened her eyes. And now she looked upon the new place, upon the new room, as if she had never seen such a place before, with all its lights and blankets.

She woke up. But she would not have this. She went to sleep again and forced herself to dream once more of the waking up.

And she succeeded.

She faced a room she had never seen before in wakefulness. She looked around, in awe and excitement. There were so many lights. The world was so alien and strange. And the strangest of all was the sensation of the floor on her bare skin. The new room felt more real.

She slowly pushed herself up with her arms until she was sitting.

She slowly and carefully rose to standing and looked in all directions. Awake, standing on the solid floor, she beheld the new room. She beheld the light. She beheld the blankets. And she beheld another crack to the side, big enough to walk through.

She walked into the darkness and the room was gone.

She walked in the darkness and felt there was more around her. There was darkness to every side. And to every side there were more asides, more possibilities, more things unseen, she knew. But the great exhilaration was that she was walking, solid, in the darkness of nothing. There was nothing firmer.

And as she walked into another room full of lights, she woke up and this time could not fall back to sleep.

* * * *

And now she began to walk in her dreams, walk between the darkness and the light, walk into new places and out of new places, walk in the darkness, spin in the darkness, change directions suddenly in the darkness. The darkness gave her confidence, gave her joy. She would spin in place. She would jump. She would jump and hover for a second, only to land solidly on the ground in the darkness.

Some nights she spent only in the darkness, enjoying herself.

And one day, instead of walking, she ran.

She ran in the darkness. And ran and ran and ran endlessly and always in one direction. Always in one direction.

For weeks she ran in her dreams, ran in one direction. She ran and jumped and whenever she found a new place with more lights, she shunned it and continued on into the darkness.

* * * *

A year passed, and her dreams settled on the darkness and directions she would choose in the darkness. Only occasionally would she come to a place with light, and that place would always feel more and more like her own world of waking. She revelled in darkness, and each time she would invent something new to do in it.

And sometimes there was nothing new to invent, and she would simply run endlessly in one direction, further, ever further in that direction. And sometimes she would choose another direction and run ever further in that direction. There were so many directions, and each one felt different from the others.

* * * *

And so it continued. And so she slept every day. And the Levantine experimenters could not document this and did not know of this, for it was in her sleep.

But time, as always, brings change.

And the Levantine Experiments were discovered, the scientists jailed, the labs broken into.

Thus it happened.

* * * *

Two years and two months after the crack appeared, Sarah heard a sound from nowhere. She sat up immediately, looking around, frightened.

There were more sounds, which she could not describe, for she had never heard anything like them.

Hours passed, and the sounds assaulted her. They were loud and seemed to originate from the walls themselves. As if the walls were attempting to talk.

Sarah clung to the wall farthest from the sound. And then she noticed that the opposite wall was beginning to shake. It moved slightly with each sound. The sounds were getting harsher and clearer, and each time—bang!—they became—bang!—shorter—bang!

And then a new crack was formed in the wall.

Her breath caught.

With another sound, the crack widened, and light came through it.

Sarah straightened, her body taut, staring at the light.

Another sound, and the crack widened, and the light grew brighter.

“Don’t worry,” a voice said. Sarah knew words, because she had been taught them at an early age. But she had never heard this voice; she had not heard another’s voice in nine years. “Don’t worry,” it said again. “We’re coming for you. Stay away from the wall.”

Sarah stood there, motionless, rigid, staring at the light.

And suddenly the crack was massive, and a piece of her world fell on the floor. And where it had been, now there was light. And from the light, a face appeared and looked in. But Sarah did not recognise what a face was, not having seen any from the age of two. And Sarah did not know the distinction between male and female. A new thing simply came through the wall, and fourteen-year-old Sarah stopped breathing.

* * * *

Soon, more pieces of her world came tumbling down, and a figure emerged from the light. She stared at it, unable to run, unable to do anything, knowing that it came from the different world, that it came from the world of light and darkness.

It came close to her and its hand hung in the air next to Sarah’s head, yet she did recognise what a hand was.

She looked at the hand, so different from her own. The hand hung there and did not move. Sarah slowly brought her fingers to the vicinity of the hand. The hand did not move. Ever so slowly, she touched the hand. A feeling shot through her hand that she did not recognise. Something happened to the figure’s face, then, and it was distorted. Sarah took her hand back.

It then took a step backward, and took off an article of clothing.

Behind the figure, the light beckoned.

“Put this on,” the figure said, the article of clothing hanging on its hand.

Sarah looked at it and then looked at the light.

The figure took back the article of clothing and pointed at the blanket. “Put this on,” it said.

Sarah looked at its finger and then at the light.

She took a step toward the light. The figure moved its head and then moved its body, letting her pass.

She took another step toward the light. And now she could see something in that room. There was more than light. There was an inside. And there was another side.

She was upon the new crack in her world, and there was light beyond it, not darkness.

She bent down to fit inside the crack and walked through it into the light. And suddenly she was in a new place, a round place and not a square place. She was outside her world. She looked around and went on, for she knew that there was an outside to the outside.

She took another step, and the roundness continued. And the round walls were not smooth, but rough and edgy, for they had been broken and pummelled, although she did not know this.

Each step felt solid to her bare feet and she knew that it was real. There were lights placed in the new round place. And with every outside there was a new light. And with every outside there was another feeling beneath her feet, a feeling of realness.

And then there was a new side, as the round and close wall gave room to a massive place, square and leading in two directions. Lights hung from above in straight lines, pointing in both directions. Sarah stood there and could not decide.

The figure was beside her, she noticed. It pointed in one of the directions and took a step.

Sarah took a step in that direction.

And another step. And another step.

And she knew she could run now, for that was her dream.

She closed her eyes, to bring darkness. And then she ran and ran and ran. Behind her, the figure shouted “Hey!”

She ran and she ran and she ran, her eyes closed, running through darkness.

And then her head received a blow, and she was thrown backward and onto the ground.

She opened her eyes, and there was light above. And the figure came into view.

The figure helped her up. “Don’t run from me,” it said. “We’re the good guys.”

She was up and she looked around, and there was a vast space in one direction.

Immediately, she closed her eyes and ran.

She ran and ran and ran, and it felt almost like the dreams.

She ran.

And her entire body felt pain, and was thrown backward.

The figure helped her up, but this time it held her tightly, not letting her run or walk past it. And it walked with her through rooms of light until there was a room of light and many people.

* * * *

And thus Sarah was rescued and brought into the outside world.

As the days passed, she received supervision. It was explained to her what had happened to her. Everything was explained to her: the nature of other people, the nature of the world, the big city, the roads, the rooms, the cars, the stars, the sun. It was endlessly explained to her, and eventually she understood everything.

But that did not interest her. She searched for big spaces.

* * * *

They brought her to fields and stadiums. They brought her to the sea and to the desert. But it was never big enough.

She discovered that walking in light was not the same as walking in dark, for she could always see the limits, she could always see the end. Running in the light was not the same as running in the dark.

She spent her days looking for a truly dark place. But the nights were full of light and never really dark. And closed, empty rooms with the light off were never really dark, either. Always, she could make something out. And so it was a room of light and not a room of dark.

It was never perfect.

And the fact that there was no endless place in which she could run in the dark haunted her. She knew that there was something wrong with this world, as there was with the world she had known. This world was not right. It was an even bigger prison than the one she had left.

There was no real dark in this world and no real endlessness in this world.

She had been told of the experiments, and taught the word prison, and been told that she was free. And yet the hugeness of the world mocked her. It looked endless, but it wasn’t. It looked free, but it wasn’t. It looked like the real thing, but it wasn’t.

She yearned for endlessness. Now that she had been broken out of her world once, she yearned to break out again. This place was a jail to her, closed in and smothering. She kept waiting for more sounds from beyond, sounds that would put a crack through the walls of her current world and show her the real path to the real world.

At night, she still dreamt of running through the blackness, of choosing a direction. And the dreams were as real as ever.

She became claustrophobic in open spaces and in enclosed spaces. She could not take the falseness of this world. No-one believed her. Everyone thought this was a by-product of the experiment. Some mocked her. And the world mocked her most of all.

And one day, two years after her rescue, the pain in her head was too much. This new, claustrophobic world was too much for her, and she could not take its constant taunting. She took out her own eyes, slamming sharp things into them. The pain was too much. She had not imagined such pain. But the pain that had grown inside her for months justified the deed.

And once she had been treated and once the shock was over, she lived in a true world of darkness. There was no light, not even a little.

There was no endlessness in it, either. Not that she could find. It still seemed that she was in a room, for she would always bump into something. And even when she knew herself to be outside in a vast space, the space was limited.

And yet each step was taken in true darkness. And each next step could be the one, the true step leading her away.

She was closer to the real world now. Closer than the other people. Closer than she ever had been.

In her dreams, she would run.

And in her life, each step was in darkness.

It was close.