Ruins of the Mind

by Jason Stadtlander

  Mark could now see a group of enormous buildings in the distance, all built from some multicolored stone. The buildings resembled castle-like structures but were unlike the castles he had seen in photos. Two extraordinarily high, jagged mountains loomed behind the buildings in the distance, creating a spectacular, panoramic visual.

  Ranash was still. “This is Gaia,” she said softly. “It has not looked like this for nearly two hundred thousand years. I was not yet in existence when this memory was created.”

  “So then—how are you able to show me all of this?”

  “Because,” she answered, “we all share the same memories, passed down through every generation.”

  “Tell me—how old is your civilization?”

  “The ter’roc are nearing two-and-a-half billion years by your terms.”

  “Two-and-a-half billion years old?” Mark responded, reluctant to believe what he’d just heard.

  “Your civilization will be around for a very long time as well…we hope. Your people are in their infancy at the present time,” she said.

  Ranash paused as if contemplating whether or not to continue further and then said, “We have been…concealing something from you.”

  Mark was only half listening. He stood, levitating peacefully above a field of grass that seemed to be pulsating as if it had an energy all its own. He felt hypnotized. His mind flooded with colorful, active images—stars flying past, groups of people moving across desert plains in the Middle East. And then there was the Chinese warring violently with swords on horses and the Aborigines sprinting through fields, hunting herds of emu.

  Abruptly, Ranash caused the images to vanish and all that remained was a bright, perfectly round moon.

  No—not a moon. Something else. What is that? Mark thought.

  A feeling of foreboding overcame him. “Oh my god,” he said. “That’s an asteroid, isn’t it?”

  Ranash simply replied, “No. It is not. Look closer.”

  Mark studied the flying sphere before him in outer space and arrived at a sudden conclusion. The massive ball of light was soaring toward a blue sphere…it was headed for Earth.

  Mark’s voice was edged in fear. “What is that thing? Ranash, please—tell me what that is.”

  “That,” she said, “is our mutual problem. It is a species known as draklor. The draklor are a nomadic race from light-years away. They have been watching this world and planning to colonize it for a very long time—since long before humans existed.”

  Mark didn’t like the sound of that. “Colonize? What exactly do you mean?” he asked, the fear spreading to his gut.

  Ranash responded with a voice that sounded old, weathered and weary. “Upon arrival, the draklor plan to eradicate the entire population of our planet and consume all of its earthly resources…and you should know that there is nothing humans can do to defend themselves against this pending demise.”

  Mark stood silently for a moment, stunned by this declaration. “There’s nothing we can do? Nothing at all? We have great numbers, sophisticated weaponry, and a common enemy now—surely the earth will unite to fight them off…”

  Ranash interrupted. “You alone will not. They have the power to destroy entire continents in only a few minutes from space without ever landing—before you could even sense their presence. You simply do not have the defensive weaponry. Your technology at present is…considerably less advanced.”

  Mark responded with unbridled fear in his voice. “So why are you telling me all of this?”

  “You are our children. We do not wish for you to perish. We will help you defend this planet. With our help, you will stop this invasion.”

  Mark flinched in reaction to this disturbing news, blinked hard twice and was instantly sitting at the table with his sister Heidi again. Sam’loc sat to his right and the three other ter’roc looked at them from across the table.

  “Heidi,” Mark warned, a coldness to his tone. “We are in deep shit.”

  “What are you talking about? Why? Why are we in deep shit?” Heidi asked, a nervous edge to her voice.

  “Please don’t tell me you saw none of what I just saw—heard none of what I heard. You honestly didn’t see any of that?”

  “See any of what?” Heidi asked, her voice elevated with frustration. “All you said was ‘okay.’” Heidi reconsidered what she’d seen for another few seconds, wanting to be sure. “That’s it—that’s all you said. Nothing other than ‘okay.’”

  The wise, soft voice of Ranash was heard clearly in their minds. “As I said, your understanding of time is not…complete.”

  Mark turned to his sister, grabbing her forcefully by the shoulders. Locking his eyes with hers, he said, “Heidi, there is something horrible about to happen to Earth. We have work to do, little sister, and we’re going to need the ter’roc to help.”

  Mark straightened up, letting go of Heidi’s shoulders. “Ranash just showed me an enormous spaceship—it’s the size of the moon. That spaceship is carrying a species that is planning to attack Earth and annihilate anyone that’s on it.”

  Mark turned and looked hard at Ranash. “How long do we have?”

  “They will be here in approximately four years,” she replied.

  “How can we possibly defend ourselves against an invasion like that?” Heidi asked.

  “We can do it together. We will help you defend the planet, but we must work together.”

  Heidi looked down at the table, attempting to grasp the gravity of the situation. “Mark and I will do anything we can to help—but not everyone will be willing to do the same.”

  “If you are willing to help, that is what matters most. You are the chosen one…”

  Heidi looked at Mark and then back at Ranash. “Okay,” she said, not hesitating for even a second. “Let’s get the ball rolling, then.”

  Stress levels had been running high for the past three weeks at Hubert Insurance Liquidators. Back in February, Shanks Mutual Insurance out of Topsfield had been liquidated, and calls had been flooding in as a result. Last week alone, fifteen thousand claims were shipped to the office, and Sheppard Chance felt as if they were all being directed to his desk.

  Shep worked continuously as piles of incoming cases with folders full of barely legible examiners’ notes piled higher and higher on his desk. In the seven stacks of files currently topping his desk, he had only sorted through half of one pile. It was beyond his comprehension how he could ever sort through this work, much less the excess boxes sitting on the floor staring back at him, waiting to be opened. One more file read, one more file worked, one more file completed—he repeated this to himself in a somewhat futile attempt to keep his sanity. It could be worse, of course. Workers’ comp claims take forever and fortunately, most of these claims were automotive. Lucky him.

  The phone to Shep’s right rang again. It had been ringing nonstop all morning. He glanced down at the telephone but didn’t recognize the number and glanced back at the file he was working on. If it’s important enough, they’ll leave a voice mail, he thought.

  Thirty seconds later, his message light blinked. Another voice mail. Wonderful—I don’t get nearly enough voice mail these days. Shep breathed a heavy sigh, picked up the phone, and connected to receive his message. After listening for a few minutes, his jaw went slack. He grabbed his pad and began writing furiously, backed up the voice mail and listened again.

  Shep then lifted the phone and placed it to his ear, dialing the number the caller had left in his message. After just one ring, an overly cheerful woman answered. “Good morning! Medical examiner’s office. Rita speaking.”

  Shep was taken aback by the woman’s over-the-top excitement. “Uh, hi—this is Sheppard Chance from Hubert Insurance Liquidators. I’m handling the policies for Shanks Mutual. A man just left me a message regarding a case involving…” Shep took a second to scan his pad, continuing with, “a Mister Jeffery Parker?”

  The cheerful woman paused, trying to recall the necessary in
formation, then responded in something close to a sing-song tone. “Oh, yes—the decapitations. I think it’s best if you come to our office, Mr. Chance.”

  Shep contemplated the tone of her voice as she spoke the word “decapitations.” What was wrong with this woman? How could anyone possibly speak of such a thing with so much jocularity? He held the phone away from his ear momentarily, looking at the receiver as if the phone itself had uttered the bizarre comment. He placed the phone back to his ear.

  It was highly unusual for a claims examiner to be asked to go to the medical examiner’s office to discuss an accident victim. “Your office? Why would you need to see me at your office?” Shep asked.

  The woman’s cheer continued. “Well, I don’t have any other information, just that Doctor Braxton said he wants to see you right away—at his office,” she stated with a heavy emphasis on the word “at.” In his mind’s eye, he could see a fifteen-inch smile spread across her happy little face. She giggled again. Despite himself, Shep cracked a grin, although he wasn’t sure if it was due to the idiotic sound of her voice or the fact that silliness tends to be contagious.

  He regained his serious demeanor. After all, these were gruesome deaths they were discussing here. Seeing humor in such demise was inappropriate. He agreed reluctantly to come to the office. “Of course, but…”

  “Trust me, you’ll want to see this one,” she said, giggling again. She continued, “Our office is located at 441 Fenton Street next to the Piccadilly Pub.” Jeez. Even reciting an address over the phone made her happy.

  Shep was growing annoyed. “Yes. I know right where you are. I’ll be down within the hour.” He was incredulous. Shep hung up the phone and sat staring at it for a moment, shaking his head. Then he stood up, grabbed his coat and headed out the door.

  THE EBULLIENT WOMAN easily weighed three hundred pounds but was quite agile. Shep noticed that she nearly leaped from her desk to meet him the moment he arrived at the door of the morgue. Encompassing his hand in both of hers, she shook it rapidly. “So nice to meet you. I’m Rita,” she said, smiling. Rita sounded as if she had been waiting her entire life to meet him, and her long-awaited dream had finally come true.

  Shep couldn’t help but smile back. “Nice to meet you, too,” he said, hesitating, wondering what came next. There was something about Rita that was just unsettling. The woman acted as if she had been inhaling copious amounts of laughing gas.

  “Come with me, please. Doctor Braxton wants to see you right away. He has some pretty amazing news.” Rita paused, her smiling eyes locking with Shep’s for a second. Then she laughed again, turned and headed pertly in the direction of the examiner’s room.

  Sheppard followed her down the long white corridor of the morgue. The hallway had scrubbed vinyl floors, spotless walls and perfectly geometric acoustic ceiling tiles—all in a pure, pristine white.

  Since the overhead lights were off, it struck him as odd that the corridor still looked so clean and bright, considering the only natural light in the hallway came from a window at the end of the hall. Approaching the window, he saw that it read:

  Massachusetts State Police

  Medical Examiner

  AUTHORIZED PERSONNEL ONLY

  The two walked through the large wooden swinging door that opened into what looked like an operating room. There were four metal tables spaced along one wall with a bright light shining over each. One of them had a body covered with a blue sheet while the other three sat empty. The empty tables had drains on one end with a cart of instruments parked beside them.

  Shep’s attention was immediately drawn to the table in the middle of the room that held a second body, illuminated by a bright halogen light. The cover sheet on the body was pulled back, exposing the top half of the deceased, and an academic-looking man leaned over the corpse. Shep’s angle was such that he couldn’t make out any details.

  “Doctor Braxton?” the happy woman said. “Mr. Chance is here!” Lord, but this woman’s demeanor felt ten steps off.

  Perhaps the doctor found her annoying as well. Without looking at her, the man named Dr. Braxton replied in a controlled monotone, “Thank you, Rita. That’ll be all.”

  “But Doctor Braxton, don’t you want to…” she started and then stopped.

  The medical examiner looked up at her. He was a balding man in his mid-sixties with a chiseled face, and he wore magnifying glasses, making his green eyes appear enormous and distorted. Doctor Braxton peered scornfully over his spectacles directly at Rita and repeated his words of dismissal in an authoritative tone not to be misunderstood by the queen of good cheer. “Rita—thank you. That will be all.”

  Rita’s reaction reminded Shep of a scolded dog. She lowered her chin, turned around and walked submissively but quickly out the door.

  Already focusing again on the body before him, the doctor began to speak without looking up. “You’ll have to excuse Rita. She has good intentions, but she is a bit over the top,” he said, not sounding like he was concentrating on what he was saying.

  Shep felt compelled to satisfy his curiosity about the woman. “If you don’t mind my asking, what is so humorous about decapitated bodies? Rita chuckled on the phone when she brought it up, and quite frankly, I can’t imagine any humor in such a gruesome visual.”

  Quite suddenly, a loud pop escaped the body the examiner was working on. Shep flinched. “There, that’s better,” the doctor said, looking up at Shep and removing his gloves. Responding to Shep’s question, Braxton said, “I haven’t a clue. The woman acts as if she inhaled too much nitrous oxide at the dentist—she finds everything amusing…but she’s a good secretary and finding someone so upbeat in the death industry is a bit of a challenge. So I tolerate it.”

  Belatedly, Doctor Braxton walked over and extended his hand to Shep. “Doctor Braxton—Chief Medical Examiner. You must be Sheppard Chance.”

  “I am. Nice to meet you, Doctor. Tell me, just why is it you requested my presence here?”

  Braxton realized an explanation was clearly in order. “Of course. Let me explain. Believe it or not, there is a chance the accident itself didn’t kill the victims, and I thought your office would want to know immediately in order to check into it. So I called you—I take it you are the agent now handling claims for Shanks Mutual?”

  “Yes. And getting back to what you just said—what do you mean by victims? I thought there was only one victim.”

  “Oh no. There were three victims plus one person who actually survived the crash—the driver, your policy holder. Please, follow me into my office for a moment.”

  The doctor’s office was connected to the operating room. As they entered, Doctor Braxton flipped a switch to his right, illuminating a wall on the left. The doctor walked over to his desk and picked up a large envelope, pulling out three X-ray films. He examined them briefly and then slapped them into position with clips on the lighted wall. The doctor looked over at Shep, who was already searching the X-rays for anything out of the ordinary.

  Braxton could tell by the look on Shep’s face that he was pondering something. “You see it too, don’t you? Strange, isn’t it?”

  Sheppard paused, staring at the films, comparing them carefully.

  “Make any sense to you?” the doctor probed.

  “Uh—you mean the fact that they are all missing their heads?” Sheppard asked. He couldn’t imagine anything more notable than that.

  “No. No—the strange part is this…” Braxton pointed to several vertebrae that were three vertebrae down from where the heads were severed.

  Oddly, there were breaks in several places. Sheppard looked closer, beginning to see what the doctor was referring to. The lower vertebrae were shattered, but the upper vertebrae close to where the head was severed were completely intact.

  “But how can that be?” Shep murmured to himself.

  “Exactly,” the doctor replied, satisfied that they were both seeing the same thing.

  Dr. Braxton went on to clarify, inform
ing Shep that not only were the necks of all three victims shattered and severed but that Jeffery Parker, the driver and Shep’s policy holder, was unscathed except for some bruising and a broken radius in his arm.

  Shep stood quietly, still studying the films. He then asked the doctor, “Is there any chance the seats themselves could have caused the broken vertebrae—or even the seat belts?”

  “Anything’s possible, of course, but that’s highly unlikely. I do plan to run some tests with a forensics specialist I know out of Medford, but here’s what we know so far. As best we can figure, the car was driving down Lynnway in Lynn when a truck carrying a container—the kind ferried overseas—pulled out from across the street. Mr. Parker either didn’t see the truck or wasn’t paying attention to the light—maybe he simply thought he could outrun it. There were no skid marks from his car: he drove right under the container. Traveling at sixty miles per hour, the speed calculated by the officer on duty, the lip of the container acted like a razor-sharp can opener, shearing off the top of the Camry and taking the heads of the passengers right along with it.”

  “Good god,” Shep exclaimed, looking back at the films. He avoided eye contact with the doctor, not wanting him to see his visceral reaction at the thought of such a grotesque scene.

  Braxton continued matter-of-factly. “The state trooper in charge has more details on the case. Here—this is his card,” he stated, handing it to Shep. The doctor then gave Shep a CD containing the images of the X-Rays, thanked him for coming, and ushered him to the door. “Let me know what you find out,” he said curtly, feeling no need to say a goodbye or a “thank you for coming.”

  BACK AT THE office, Shep reviewed the photographic images again. He was studying the fractured vertebrae when his phone suddenly rang. Lost in thought and without looking up, he reached for the phone, bringing it torpidly to his ear. “Sheppard Chance,” he said distractedly.