SOS

Chapter 3: SOS

I make my way to the hotel, up the narrow lanes of the town, open the door of my room. No sign of my companions. It's empty of furniture and my luggage. There on the wooden floorboards, on a bed of stones is a clay replica of Africa. In the centre is the monumental stump of a tree, prehistoric in form yet easily the size of the Congo. Did such a tree exist? It's been modelled as if cleanly sliced through; aeons of growth are rendered in the delicately textured clay. I lean down and poke at the surface of the land with my finger. It's still damp and falls away beneath my touch revealing tiny insects which disappear into cracks between the stones.I pick up my phone but the battery is dead. By the window is a plant. I pull it from the pot revealing, neon roots. I plug the plant by its luminous tendrils into the mains socket of the wall. It doesn't allow me to phone or send text messages but controls on the stalk allow for Morse code. Is it still in use? I begin to type SOS.