Afterimage

by Roderick Geiger

  “You’ve been through a lot, Tyler. It’s no wonder. Your mother and I aren’t helping much.”

  “I been havin’ more…dreams”

  The bell rang. Warren let it finish before asking: “That Doctor Deverson guy?”

  “Yeah, in the river. But now there’s others, partials crowding around me, pushin’ me…they’re kinda scary.” He started up the steps. “I’m okay, dad. Don’ worry.”

  Warren walked the long way back, up Noe Street to 34th, over to Parnassus, then back to his apartment. He was hoping to find an e-mail from Ishue when he got home, a little afraid he wouldn’t.

  There was nothing. Warren’s deception hadn’t worked.

  He watched his computer all day, refreshing it, cursing at it, even restarting it several times. But no e-mail from Ishue. After a pizza dinner, with Tyler retired to his room, Warren sprawled listlessly on the sofa, thumbing the TV remote in search of a passable distraction. On the end table, clearly visible, the stack of notes and documents – research materials for the INFX report due five hours ago, the report he had yet to begin. Ninety channels and nothing on? He found an old movie - a mid-fifties western - and dozed off.

  A knock at his door awoke him. He groped for his cellphone to check the time: 11:44. There was only one person rude enough to show up unannounced at such an hour. Louise! The knock sounded again, loud and demanding.

  He descended the single flight of stairs to his small foyer. The running lights of a yellow taxicab glowed ethereally beyond the wispy door curtains. He cracked the door cautiously.

  “Hi. So what’s all this about material for my book?” Ishue asked.

  “I am so glad to see you,” he blurted, unable to temper his delight even though he felt a need to act nonchalant. He grabbed ravenously at the suitcase resting at her side. “You’ll come in, I hope.”

  She waved off the cab and smiled, followed him up the stairs. “There is no new material for my book, is there?” she said, slipping out of her heavy coat, revealing a plain but well-fitted navy blue dress hemmed just above the knee. Understated and expensive.

  “Probably not. God, you look great.”

  “Thanks. But that was a dirty trick, baiting me here.”

  “Payback for running the Deverson story.” He tossed her coat onto the wing of his easy chair, then took her hand and spontaneously they folded together into an embrace. “I’m so sorry for the way I treated you,” he whispered into her ear.

  “Me too,” she purred, and they kissed deeply.

  Rubbing his eye with one hand, dragging his favorite stuffed gorilla with the other, Tyler in his faded Incredible Hulk PJs staggered into the living room just then.

  “Whoa, buddy, you’re supposed to be in bed,” Warren said, stumbling back a step, away from Ishue.

  “Can’t sleep, dad. They won’t let me…”

  “Who, buddy?” It would take several minutes to put Tyler back down. Not an option.

  “Then she is your girlfriend, after all. You look different Ilene.”

  “In a good way I hope,” Ishue said.

  Tyler nodded enthusiastically.

  “Can you be a big boy and put yourself back to bed?” Warren coaxed.

  He nodded again, not so enthusiastically this time, and headed down the hall, gorilla in tow.

  Warren had moved into the kitchen. “What can I get you?”

  “Glass of wine, maybe. Hmmm…when did the Weimer Clinic release him?”

  “Late last week.” He gave her a playfully suspicious look as he handed her a glass of Sauvignon Blanc. “Why do you ask?”

  “He may be your redemption for tricking me here, if you’ll allow me to interview him.”

  “Tomorrow perhaps. What do you expect to learn?”

  “I have absolutely no idea.” She plopped onto his sofa and he joined her, his left knee gently touching her right.

  “I’ve been following your stories, Ilene. You’ve become quite the jet-setter.”

  “Jet-lagger,” she corrected. “I just got in from New York, and tomorrow I’m on a Quantas flight to Perth. Which lands a day later…or is it earlier? She shrugged and took a healthy drink from her glass.

  “Australia, eh? What will Mr. Robbins have to say?”

  “That’s for you to read about in my paper.” She handed him the glass for a refill.

  “Oh come on. Give me a hint.”

  She waited for him to return from the kitchen. “I’ll find out more when I get there, but…you’re not going to believe this…but…all the scientists on that boat are convinced the energy coming out of the INFX travels faster than the speed of light.”

  Warren sat again. “You’re right. I don’t believe it.”

  “At first they didn’t believe it either, but that’s what they’re all saying now: Schiffer, Gleason, Robbins and a half-dozen others. They have two kinds of evidence: a laser interferometer in the Eugene lab, and time-coding data from a destroyed American satellite.”

  “Nothing is faster than light,” Warren stammered, his pitch rising as if asking a question.

  “A couple weeks ago, maybe. But now we’ve discovered a form of energy that moves at approximately 26.3 million miles per second, 140 times the speed of light.” She paused to let it sink in. “Of course they’ll want to run further INFXs for a more precise number.”

  Warren collapsed against the sofaback, dumbfounded. “But what about E=MC2 and all that stuff?”

  Ishue gave a wide smile. “That’s why they call it a theory, Mr. Vardell. I was pretty freaked out when I first heard it too, but now that I’ve had a chance to think about it, I’ve decided it’s actually a good thing…a very good thing. It’s like we - mankind - has been stuck in this finite universe since before I was born, but now it’s been cracked wide open. It’s like a weight off our collective shoulders. It’s like we’ve been given another chance. Does that make any sense?”

  He suddenly realized her hand was on his knee. He sat forward, their faces coming close. “Yes, I see your point,” he said softly. “It’s like the shackles are off, the sky’s the limit, the beginning of a new era.”

  “Yes,” she almost whispered, moving even closer. “Your son is well again; the aperture is closed; a new epoch is dawning…”

  He placed his fingertips on her leg, just above her knee, feeling the fine mesh of her pantyhose.

  “I’ve been wearing these damn things all day and halfway around the world,” she breathed. “Mind if I take them off?”

  Warren swallowed, his heart racing. “Yes. I mean no. I mean, may I?”

  She avoided his eyes, looking down, and gave a single, slight nod. Warren placed his hands on her hips and lifted slightly, coaxing her to stand up. Then, seated in front of her, he slid his hands up under her dress and began rolling her pantyhose down over her hips, her buttocks, down her thighs. He worked slowly, gently caressing the naked skin as it became exposed. He was like a blind man exploring the body of a woman for the first time. She turned her face upwards, eyes closed, and raised her hands to massage her own neck, savoring the sensations from below. When he reached her ankles, she slipped out of her pumps and let him roll the hose from her feet, one at a time.

  His fingertips electrified her, tiny static charges brushing up her calves, into the hollows behind her knees, up the backs of her thighs. Now his head was inside her dress, his mouth kissing it’s way up her inner thigh.

  Suddenly a crashing noise resounded from the hallway and the spell was shattered.

  “Damn,” said Warren and Ishue in unison, and they both hurried toward Tyler’s room. But Warren could not open the door. “It won’t turn,” he said, panic rising in his voice. “There’s no lock on this knob! Why won’t it open?”

  “Oh, shit,” Ishue murmured ominously.

  “Ty-ler,” Warren called, the syllables dragging out strangely. Using the hem of his t-shirt against the cold brass, he cranked harder and the door popped with a loud snap, a blast of frigid air blowing outward.


  They both faltered for a moment before Warren pushed into the darkened, icy room, Ishue inches behind, fiddling with her recorder. Tyler sat on the bed staring out the uncurtained window, his profile lit eerily by the city lights beyond. He turned slowly and spoke clearly: “Miss Ishue. We meet again.”

  “What’s the matter, Tyler,” Warren yelped. “Talk to me! Use your words!” He flipped the light switch but the bulb element popped, dousing the room in a fleeting instant of bright blue light.

  Ishue shrieked, but timidly, as if afraid of offending someone. Momentarily blinded by the flash, it took several seconds before she could make out Tyler’s expression, which seemed entirely foreign to the young face she remembered.

  “He’s having a relapse,” Warren whispered. “What should I do?”

  Tyler had turned again to face the window, glaring out at the Bay Bridge, a string of lights headed east toward Oakland and Berkeley. “It’s been so long…” he said wistfully.

  Warren approached the bed cautiously holding his hands out as if trying to capture a loose pet. “It’s going to be all right, son,” he said. “I’ll get you some help.”

  The boy ignored him. “We owe you a debt of gratitude…and we’ve come to make good on our promise.”

  “P-promise,” Ishue gulped. “How…how have you done this?”

  “Who’re you talking to?” Warren demanded.

  “We’re much more powerful than before,” Tyler said.

  Warren had a hold on Ishue’s shoulder. “Who are you talking to!”

  “It’s Deverson!”

  “Adel Deverson,” Tyler corrected.

  Ishue froze: “Then it worked?”

  “Yes Miss Ishue,” the boy said. “It worked perfectly.”

  “Warren! Tyler’s Adel Deverson. I mean she’s talking through him.”

  “What? He’s babbling nonsense! He’s having a relapse! What are you talking about?”

  “I don’t think he hears what you hear,” Tyler said. “He cannot tune it in as you can. We think it was your proximity to my INFX that makes it so.”

  Ishue pointed at the boy. “There. He just said ‘I don’t think he hears what you hear.’ Didn’t you get that?”

  “What? He grunted like an animal! How can two people hear entirely different things, Ilene?”

  “Fascinating,” Ishue said.

  Warren resumed his approach toward Tyler. “Just be calm, son. I won’t let anything happen to you.”

  Tyler flinched backwards. “Tell him it’s just temporary. We’ll only be here a moment.”

  Ishue intercepted Warren, a gentle but firm hand on his arm. “Trust me, Warren, Tyler’s fine.”

  “How can you know that?” He said defiantly. “I’ve got to help him…he’s been through so much.”

  “I know. But just trust me now…a couple minutes. I need to talk to him...her.”

  “Them,” Tyler corrected.

  “Please, Warren, sit down, please.” She maneuvered him gently into the room’s only chair. “Just a couple minutes.” She moved back to the edge of the bed, hugging herself for warmth, a dozen questions in her mind jockeying for prominence. This one won: “Why are you speaking in the third person?”

  “There are others here with me. Mark. Wayne. Thomas. Dr. Evans. And some others who are still passing.”

  Ishue glanced over her shoulder at Warren on the chair, head in hands, moaning forlornly. My only witness and he can’t hear a thing! “Warren, this is fantastic! A collective mind!” He looked up at her blankly.

  “Daddy,” Tyler yelped.

  She spun to observe the boy’s expression reverting to Tyler’s control, frightened, disoriented. “No! Not yet!”

  Warren was up in an instant, but Ishue blocked his path with her arm.

  “Tyler,” she said soothingly. “It’s okay. Adel, the others…won’t hurt you.” She took his little hand. “We need you to be brave just a bit longer, don’t we Dad?”

  Warren could see the boy was frightened but unhurt. Collective mind? He wanted to believe Ishue. “You don’t have to, son,” then added reluctantly: “But if you can, just a little longer...”

  “Can you do that…my brave young man?” Ishue coaxed.

  Tyler nodded, fighting the urge to cry.

  “Then just relax, Tyler, close your eyes, relax and let them back in.”

  The boy obeyed, and in a moment the subtle transformation recurred, his expression gaining layers of depth. “The connection is fragile, taxing, difficult to maintain…”

  Ishue’s eyes were on Warren whom she knew would not tolerate this much longer. “Is there some other way you can talk to me…other than Tyler?”

  Tyler shook his head. “We think the boy was deeply affected by his closeness to the earlier INFX, and coupled with his innocent receptivity…makes him the ideal conduit. But who can say what we will become capable of?”

  Ishue discerned a slight smirk on the boy’s face, an addition to the already complex, multifaceted expression. All those people in there…how were they interacting? She studied the face a moment and decided she had many better questions and very little time. “How…how does INFX work?”

  The little face screwed up a moment, then relaxed. “The INFX alters the ebb and flow of life passing between the dimensions…” He paused here, struggling for the right words. “…from its myriad complex and intricate pathways.”

  “Do you know what causes the explosions, the disturbances?”

  “Life must remain in balance on both sides of the dimensional membrane. In seeking that balance, many small mishaps occur, small reactions that seem massive, apocalyptic to we humans. Sometimes the earth’s magnetic field is disrupted. And sometimes bodies are converted into heat energy to restore the balance.”

  “How did you figure all this out?”

  The expression had changed again, hardened, a suggestion of discomfort. It did not answer.

  Ishue stared for a moment. Am I losing the connection? “Adel, why two subjects of opposite sex?”

  The little face softened again, as if relieved to hear the familiar name: “The balance cannot otherwise be maintained. This duality is the nature of all life on both sides of the membrane.”

  Ishue instinctively felt for the recorder in her jacket pocket, wondering what it was hearing. I hope I can remember all this. “What’s it like on the other side…of this membrane?”

  “No mind has ever traveled through the membrane and returned from it. To do so means total dissolution of self.”

  “But…but I thought that’s where you are.”

  “No. We are…we are…between…”

  The face squinted at her, the eyes closed. “We will find a way back to you…” The boy collapsed on the bed and Warren rushed to him, engulfing him in his arms. “Enough!” Warren commanded.

  “Between,” Ishue said slowly, out loud.

  Wednesday

  Outside Alford Bay,

  Henrique Islands,

  South Indian Ocean

  Two to three meter swells made for rough going as Argyle steamed east-south-east toward the now-uninhabited Henrique Island. This had not gone down well with Ishue, who was halfway through her second day of mal de mer cures including – but not limited to – acupressure bands, Benadryl, transdermal patches, chamomile, ginger and simply laying face-down, spread-eagle on her cabin floor.

  Ishue had boarded the ship at the French Naval base of La Reunion. She’d flown in from Perth just in time to join the voyage back to Henrique. Now Ishue was wishing Ed had sent Vilasik instead.

  It was no small relief to hear Devon’s excited knock on her door, followed by his announcement that the boat had come within three kilometers of Henrique’s shore. Ishue pulled herself to her feet, splashed her face with cold water and headed topside, all the while noticing a welcome reduction of the sea-sickening, side-to-side movements of the vessel.

  She made her way to Argyle’s bridge, standing room only along the back wall. She squeezed i
n between Dr. Schiffer and Emilie Toubold, anxious to learn why the ship was not heaving and yawing as badly as only minutes ago.

  But with the ship approaching dense fog, bridge protocol required observers to remain quiet. This mysterious fog bank, first identified by satellite imagery 10 days ago, had appeared during the REME. Recent French and American flybys of Henrique recorded a thick dome of fog, infrared showing some areas within the dome heating up.

  Now Argyle would be delivering the first eyes to this place, and because the Agence France-Presse reporter had missed his flight into La Reunion, Ishue was the only reporter on board.

  Other than the captain’s voice near-whispering to his radar and sonar operators, the bridge remained eerily quiet as first the bow disappeared into the mist, then the foredeck, then the bridge railing.

  “Et is like a horror movie,” Emilie whispered.

  “Helm: come right five degrees, make steerageway,” Rachete said. Then, to the crowded back row: “We’ll drop anchor in another three, four minutes.”

  “Captain, the outside temperature is rising fast,” Ravinder said. “Eighteen…eighteen-point-five…Nineteen…”

  “Burr,” Ishue whispered.

  “Celsius,” Devon whispered back.

  “Twenty-one…twenty-two…” Ravinder continued.

  As suddenly as the fog had engulfed them, it released, the foredeck coming visible again. Beyond the bow, a calm Alford Bay.

  “Eleven years I have never seen it this calm,” Professor Arnaud said. “Smooth as glass.”

  “It’s like a lake,” Doctor Schiffer added.

  Ishue had claimed a spot at a port side window: “Out there…is that a whale?”

  “Yes,” Arnaud said after a moment. “I think several, a pod of Blues!”

  And beyond, all across the expansive bay, the splashing of dolphins, seals, large fish, dozens jumping at a time.

  “Bottlenose!” Devon exclaimed. “And elephant seals!”

  Two crewmen near the bow were pointing excitedly at the rock outcropping known as the Sphinx, and as the ship passed by, an extensive rookery of fur seals came into view from the bridge.

  Arnaud was practically in tears with excitement: “This is amazing! My Henrique!”