Room 2426

"Room 2426" is the fifty-sixth episode, overall (the twenty-first episode of the third season), of the television series The Twilight Zone.

Opening narration[]

Current guest in room 2426: Martin Decker, theoretical biochemist, checked in for observation a week ago. It seems he was displaying antisocial behavior, wrong thinking and other intellectual crimes against the state. Diagnosis: schizophrenia. Curable only by intense therapy sessions, followed by a full confession and disclosure of the facts. Once cured, Martin will be released...or buried.

Plot[]

In an unknown totalitarian state, a scientist named Martin Decker is locked away in a filthy, rat-infested cell. Soon, guards come to take him to an interrogation room. Hooked up to a myriad of electrodes, Martin is shocked in an effort to make him reveal the location of some mysterious notebooks, through which Martin discovered a lethal bio-weapon while looking for a way to decrease famine. The doctor, Ostroff, insists that he must reveal the answer or he'll suffer and never be freed. Martin, after being returned to his cell, is soon joined by another inmate. This new inmate Joseph is knocked around by the guards and Martin gives him some of his water. Martin asks Joseph what brought him here. He implies that he knows Martin very well, although they had never met before. He claims that he is there to help Martin escape, through his many friends on the outside.

Joseph also claims that using his mind he can transport to anywhere he wants. Martin is very skeptical and initially scoffs at Joseph's claims. Before long, Joseph shows Martin exactly how to transport and they do so; meanwhile, Ostroff steps up his assault on Martin to discover the whereabouts of the notebooks. Martin bravely keeps the information from being leaked out because he knows that it will only bring mass destruction. Later, Martin still believes that their trip was just drug-induced. They try to keep their sanity by playing virtual chess. Joseph finally convinces Martin to try doing the transporting himself.

Before long, Martin passes out and wakes up in a house and finds Joseph making him a cup of tea. Martin, still skeptical, puts his hand in the tea and burns himself making certain he's not dreaming. Joseph suddenly becomes concerned about the notebooks, about the necessity of destroying them. Martin suggests that he go get them but Joseph thinks it's a bad idea because Martin is so well known by the authorities. Martin warily goes along and tells Joseph that they are in a false wall in a university lecture hall. Joseph leaves to get them. Still skeptical, Martin goes for the window only to find speakers on a wall, blaring the street noise he thought was real. Joseph, however, has gone to Ostroff and it is apparent Joseph was betraying Martin all along. Martin, still using the method Joseph taught him, actually disappears in a brilliant flash of light. Ostroff and Joseph are mystified as to how he escaped. It was just a trick, Joseph tells Ostroff as he couldn't have actually done it. Martin is now in a field with the notebooks burning them in a campfire.

Closing narration[]

As man has progressed, up from the mud and down from the trees, his best tool has always been logical thought. That tool has taken us in a grand arc, from the first flint against steel to the apocalypse of colliding atoms. What Martin Decker, man of science, has learned is that every once in a while, we must step out of the confines of logic and take a leap of faith...into the Twilight Zone.

External links[]

• "Room 2426" at IMDb