Time Without Tide

Discover more about our Time Without Tide campaign.

CHIBI:
“Woooooooo! I’m a ghost!”

MARA:
“You’re wearing a bedsheet.”

CHIBI:
“A very scary bedsheet!”

MARA:
“Careful with the candles.”

CHIBI:
“Oh. Right.”

Chibi removes the sheet and examines an old alphabet board.

CHIBI:
“Can we call a real ghost?”

MARA:
“Victorian spiritualists believed they could communicate with the dead. They held séances, sometimes using knocks, moving tables, automatic writing, or mediums who delivered messages.”

CHIBI:
“Did the ghosts answer?”

MARA:
“People certainly believed they did. But investigators also exposed tricks, and some strange movements had perfectly ordinary explanations.”

CHIBI:
“Like what?”

MARA:
“People could move a table without realising they were doing it.”

Chibi pushes the table.

CHIBI:
“My hands are sneaky!”

MARA:
“Your hands are very obvious.”

CHIBI:
“What about ghost photographs?”

MARA:
“Some photographers used double exposures to create ghostly figures. They weren’t necessarily photographing spirits.”

CHIBI:
“I could put myself in every photograph!”

MARA:
“Please don’t.”

CHIBI:
“But why did people want to talk to ghosts?”

MARA:
“Because they missed someone. Imagine losing a person you love, then being told you might hear their voice again.”

CHIBI:
“I’d want to try.”

MARA:
“So would many people. But wanting something to be true doesn’t prove that it is.”

CHIBI:
“And in Time Without Tide?”

MARA:
“Imagine a sailor disappears beyond Saltport. Months later, a stranger claims to speak with him.”

CHIBI:
“Then his family can ask where he is!”

MARA:
“Perhaps. But what if the stranger is lying?”

CHIBI:
“That’s mean.”

MARA:
“And what if something really answers?”

CHIBI:
“Then it’s the sailor!”

MARA:
“How would you know? What if something else knew his name, his memories, and everything his family wanted to hear?”

Chibi slowly pushes the alphabet board away.

CHIBI:
“Then maybe we shouldn’t call it.”

MARA:
“Perhaps not.”

Three knocks come from the empty chair.

CHIBI:
“Mara?”

MARA:
“Yes?”

CHIBI:
“That wasn’t me.”

The candle flickers.

MARA:
“Then we’re leaving.”

CHIBI:
“Can I take the biscuits?”

MARA:
“Quickly!”

They hurry out. On the table, beneath Chibi’s drawing of a ghost, three unfamiliar words appear.

I remember you.

Would you answer a voice from the darkness? Join our campaign, Times Without Tide: Still Turning.