The Annihilation of Foreverland (A Science Fiction Thriller)

by Tony Bertauski

  Sort of. Kind of.

  Strange thing, though. There was no Internet, no email, text messages or phones. There weren’t even computers. There was plenty of time for worldly things, the Investors said. Just not now.

  Occasionally, Danny would hear a bell ring three times like a gong. Then he’d see boys heading for the Haystack and sometimes leaving it. Once, someone was carted away from it. An Investor was driving a utility vehicle and another old man was on the flatbed with the boy lying down. No one said much and the Investors stared straight ahead as they drove around the dormitory toward the Chimney.

  In the first couple weeks, Danny saw the Chimney smoke three times.

  ______

  Danny sat with his camp at lunch. He didn’t know anyone else.

  He half-listened to Sid layout their next game strategy and watched people move through the line. Another group returned from the Haystack, this one Hispanic. They hardly spoke.

  One of them was a new poke. The band-aid.

  Mr. Jones took Danny’s band-aid off within the first week. He was a little more chill after the hand on the cheek incident. Danny decided if it happened again, he was swimming for it, screw the sharks. But Mr. Jones was cool. He just wanted to make sure Danny was getting everything he needed and followed his schedule. He had a knack of always finding Danny, but then he remembered the tracker in his neck. Mr. Jones could probably count the number of turds Danny dropped in the morning.

  Danny peeled the band-aid off. Beneath it was a neat little hole. It wasn’t red, wasn’t sore. Just a hole. Mr. Jones wiped it with some alcohol, said the stent was healing just fine. He sensed Danny had a question – as anyone who woke up with a hole in the head would have – and said the hole was for healing. And not to worry.

  Don’t worry, my boy. He said that a lot.

  “You listening?” Sid snapped his fingers in Danny’s face. “Come on, man, you need to pay attention. This next battle is our last before we go to the Haystack. That’s when it gets real, son. You’re good with the gloves but things change when you get inside.”

  “Danny Boy isn’t going to be any good the first round,” Zin said, swallowing the last of his milk. “He shouldn’t even be on the squad until he gets a few rounds inside the Haystack, you know that. You forget, he’s a new poke.”

  “Yeah, just in case, Zinski.”

  “That’s what we do in the Haystack?” Danny asked. “More games?”

  Long silence.

  Silence, every time the topic of the Haystack came up – and what the needle was. Danny knew what was likely to happen, it didn’t take a genius. There was a needle and there was a hole in his head. It didn’t take an engineer. Still, it was hard to imagine a needle going through his skull, so there had to be other explanations. He didn’t want to think about that.

  When everyone was on another topic, Zin leaned over. “We’re going inside the Haystack in two days. Everyone gets a little edgy, but don’t let them worry you. It’s all cool.”

  “So what happens, exactly?”

  “It’s a good time. You won’t remember much, though.”

  “What are you going to be doing?”

  “Uhhhh…” Zin looked around then smiled, mischievously. “Well, I don’t know about the rest of these war mongers, but I’ll be hooking up with my lady. If there’s time, I might join them for some shoot ‘em up, but that ain’t my priority. I promise you.”

  “Girls?”

  “Oh, yeah.” Zin looked around again but no one was paying attention. He mouthed the word with a smile.

  GIRLS.

  They were going to see girls? There had never been one on the island – coming or going from the Haystack – unless they were dropped off on the back side of the island and snuck into the back of the building. Danny thought of the possibilities. Boys were in the Haystack alone for half a day or longer. If there were girls in there, too, then all kinds of things could be happening. So far, the island was a summer camp, but the way Zin was smiling made him wonder if it had some real-life sex education.

  Just keeps getting better.

  The last people in line were grabbing their trays off the dessert table. The last one was all alone, something Danny rarely saw. Everyone travelled in packs. There were no loners on the island, except for the guy at the end of the line – the long-haired kid Danny saw his first day. He moved slowly, carefully. Occasionally, he turned his head listening to something, looking around the cafeteria. Then he slid his tray along the service line.

  “We’re going to be down three men,” Sid was saying. “Parker’s going in with us but he ain’t going to last long. He’ll be smoked, after this. Am I right, Parker?”

  Parker breathed through his mouth, holding an empty spoon over his tray. His food was untouched. He shrugged his shoulders when Sid snapped his fingers.

  “Easy money,” Sid said. “Anyway, Zin’s right about Danny Boy clumping up like a vegetable, so we’ll be short-handed. We’ll have to play some defense.”

  “Who’s the third person?” Zin asked.

  “Oh.” Sid twitched his chin at the loner in line. “Forgot to tell you, we got the freak.”

  There was a collective moan and some pissing to go along with it.

  “Who is he?” Danny asked.

  “That’s Reed,” Zin said. “Guy’s been through, like, 100 rounds or something like that without taking the needle.” Zin shook his head. “One tough dude, man. Someone said his head got all scrambled when he first got here. Ask me, I think he’s just some badass that wants to piss in the Director’s cereal.”

  “Where’s he been?”

  “He goes to the beach on the north end, stands there looking at the water all by himself. No one goes out to the beach, man. The bugs and the wind and no one’s going swimming. There are a thousand better things to do, trust me.”

  “That makes him crazy?”

  “You wait and see, no sane person would do what he’s done. He just doesn’t have any friends and no one wants to get near him, afraid his crazy will rub off. Can’t say I disagree.”

  Reed stopped at the dessert table and held still like someone hit pause on him.

  “See what I mean?” Zin said. “He’s an odd dude named Reed, the kid that bends but don’t break.”

  “What’s that mean?”

  “You’ll see.”

  Reed nodded. He was either agreeing with himself or with the voices Zin said he was hearing. Reed left his tray on the dessert table and grabbed an apple. He left the cafeteria.

  “I rest my case,” Zin said. “Whack-a-do.”

  Reed didn’t walk like he was crazy. Danny didn’t exactly know what a crazy man would walk like, but it didn’t seem like it would be confident, slow and steady. Just because someone doesn’t fly with all the birds doesn’t mean he’s nuts.

  The flock could be going in the wrong direction.

  7

  DANNY WOKE UP TWO HOURS before the sun rose. His eyes opened and refused to shut. He stared at the ceiling. The unknown was terrifying. Everyone else seemed excited. Danny rubbed his forehead, making a tiny circle around the hole. No way they stick a needle in there.

  There was a soft knock.

  Danny pulled the sheet up to his chin. Mr. Jones opened the door. Danny realized he looked pathetic, but he couldn’t will himself to get up anymore than he could make himself sleep. Besides, he was in his underwear and even though Mr. Jones wasn’t so creepy, there was no need to roll the dice.

  “Good morning,” Mr. Jones said.

  Danny didn’t answer.

  Mr. Jones, usually cheery that time of the day – usually throwing open the curtains and welcoming the morning and telling Danny it was a great day to be alive – this time he went directly to the chest of drawers and began to fold Danny’s clothes. When his shirts were organized, Mr. Jones put his hand on the desk. His cheeks moved like he was chewing on his tongue.

  He sat on the bed, sinking into the mattress and rolling Danny closer. Thankful
ly, he placed his hands on his own lap.

  “Danny Boy,” he started and let out a sigh. “Today is a big day. It’s a big day, my boy. You can’t imagine what it means to me. The journey you’re about to take will be revolutionary. You should know that, so that in your darkest hour you have something to hold onto. The Haystack is critical to what we do here on the island, you understand? We wouldn’t do anything to hurt you, but sometimes you have to go to the dentist to stay well, am I right?”

  Danny pulled the sheet just under his eyes. He wanted to pull it over his head but that wouldn’t make the bogeyman go away.

  “Here.” Mr. Jones held a pill between his finger and thumb. “Put this under your tongue, it’ll boost your immunity. I don’t want you catching cold while you’re in there, it just makes things harder.”

  Danny didn’t move.

  Mr. Jones had to pull the sheet down and put it on his lips. His fingers smelled like old leather. Danny let the pill fall into his mouth just so he’d get his hand away. It dissolved like candy.

  Mr. Jones sighed again, looked at the ceiling. His eyes looked a little wet. It was times like this Danny thought he might be regretting something. He squeezed Danny’s knee. “You’re a hero, son. A real hero.”

  And then he got up, after two attempts, and went to the door looking more hunched over than usual. He put his hand on the knob and, without turning, said, “You go on and get dressed now, you hear? I’ll be back up in an hour to escort you over to the building. No one goes into the Haystack alone, my boy.”

  The door clicked behind him. Danny stayed in bed with the sheet pulled up. He remained there for a while and only got dressed because he didn’t want Mr. Jones in the room when he did.

  All modesty was about to disappear from Danny’s life.

  ______

  Danny walked the Yard with Mr. Jones. This time he had no problem with his slow and steady gait. The others were walking with their Investors, too. They were all spread out, heading in the same direction: the multi-eyed round roof peeking above the distant trees. Their paths converged the closer they got.

  They got in line as they entered a narrow path. There was little talking. But the silence was more than that; it was the sort of intense concentration that spontaneously happened before a big game, before surgery or some other life-altering event. Even Sid, walking a few bodies ahead of Danny, was quiet.

  Suddenly, the path ended in an opening. The Haystack was at the far side. Its concrete wall was painted dark brown, stained with algae and sucker-cups that remained from vines stripped away. A man stood at the entrance with a clipboard in his folded arms. He was old, but kind of young among the old men. He had gentle gray eyes inside folds of skin. He began checking off items on his clipboard as they entered.

  A bell rang three times.

  Danny didn’t look around but once. Zin was to his left. He lifted his eyebrows in mild celebration. Just past Zin was Parker as glassy-eyed and slack as ever. He wasn’t looking around. He didn’t even look like he knew anyone else was there.

  “Welcome, young men,” the man at the door suddenly said. “My name is Mr. Clark. I’ll be supervising this round. Most of you know the drill. I know some of you are nervous, as would be expected, but I assure you that your experience will be just as exciting as the previous ones have been. For the newcomers, you will follow your Investor inside and he will orient you on what to do. But there’s nothing to worry about, things are very simple inside.”

  Mr. Clark looked at his clipboard.

  “Before we enter, are there any questions?” He looked around with the same welcoming smile. “Very well, then. Let’s begin, shall we?”

  He pushed the door open and stood to the side. Mr. Jones’s hand fell on Danny’s shoulder and squeezed reassuringly. Danny immediately tensed, but noticed every Investor was doing the same move with the hand on the shoulder, guiding their kid into the Haystack in some sort of ritual. Danny got in line. When they stepped inside, it was cold and dim.

  It was the last time he would see the sun for quite some time.

  ______

  Danny clenched up, a full-body seizure.

  His knees locked and he pushed his weight against Mr. Jones’s hand. It wasn’t the dim light coming through the skylights or the giant steel fan that waited to chop them up or the smell of urine or the dank-dungeon cells that lined both sides of the aisle that made Danny step back. It was a sense of panic, of fear, that saturated the atmosphere like an electrical current, tingling in his bowels. The boys ahead of him didn’t seize up, but they stutter-stepped. Like the end of a ship’s plank was dead ahead.

  Danny felt this type of fear spreading through his groin like cold fingers once before. A memory emerged in the soupy sea of memories inside his head. He remembered getting pulled out of the back seat of a car with his hands cuffed behind his back by someone. But then like everything he tried to remember, there were gaps.

  There were FBI shirts, and big doors—

  “It’s all right, Danny Boy.” Mr. Jones gently urged him forward.

  Danny’s knees refused to unbuckle. The cages were open and waiting. The boys ahead of him each walked inside one without resistance and their Investor closed the door.

  “Come on!” someone shouted from outside. “We’re waiting, Danny Boy!”

  “Come along, my boy.” Mr. Jones pressed forward, pushing Danny ahead. “It’s all right. It’s all right.”

  Danny walked with his weight leaning into Mr. Jones’s hand. The old man showed surprising strength. His hand was like a talon. It guided him past the open cells. No cot or toilet or window on the walls. The boys were stripping off their shirts. That’s when Danny realized the cold wasn’t just fear eating away his innards but the humid cold air dimpling his skin.

  They stopped about halfway down the aisle. Mr. Jones turned Danny to the left. He tried to squirm away but the old man’s claw shoved him inside the open cell. The door latched closed before he could turn around.

  Mr. Jones grabbed the bars.

  “Why are you doing this?” Danny suddenly wanted to be back in his bed. He didn’t mind if Mr. Jones sat on the bed and patted his knee. He would let him touch his face, if that’s what he wanted.

  “Danny Boy, trust me. Everything will be all right. It’ll be better than okay, you just trust me now, son. These boys have been through this already and they’re doing better, I promise.”

  No one else needed to be pushed inside a cell. They knew the deal and didn’t seem to mind. They didn’t look happy, but they weren’t freaking out.

  “We’re about healing the world,” Mr. Jones said, quietly. “This is the work that we ask you to do. As with any work, it is not always easy. But it will be rewarding, my boy. Richly.”

  The Haystack was silent except for the somber mutterings of a few Investors. The rest of the boys were taking off their clothes. First their shirts. Then shoes, socks and pants. And finally underwear.

  Completely naked!

  Mr. Jones held out his hands. “You need to hand me your clothes, Danny Boy. We enter the work like we enter life, completely exposed to the world. We are reborn into our flesh, revealing our humility for everyone to witness.”

  Danny backed up. The others were folding their clothes and passing them between the bars, neatly stacked. They stood unabashed with various amounts of pubic hair. The cold had shriveled most of them to embarrassing sizes, but no one seemed to care all that much. None of them were looking around like Danny.

  “No one can touch you, Danny Boy.”

  Mr. Jones was right. There was a gap between the cells on each side. Even if he reached all the way through, he wouldn’t be able to touch the person imprisoned next to him. He noticed the walls were set inside slots that could slide but it only looked like the cell could get smaller.

  “You’re safe inside the cell. No one will bother you.”

  “But… but why? Why do we have to do this?” Danny’s voice cracked with an embarrassing whine.<
br />
  “You’ll understand. You’ll just have to trust me.”

  Danny hugged himself. “I just don’t want to. You can’t just expect me to… I’m not just going to get naked because everyone else is. I’m not doing it.”

  “Stop pissing around, Danny Boy!” Sid shouted from across the aisle. His penis had shrunk into the bush of pubic hair that crawled up and around his belly button. “The longer you go on like that, the longer it takes… NOW GET NAKED, BOY!”

  Investors were already leaving. Mr. Jones stood with his hands around the bars. His expression was silent and sympathetic. Sid was growling and pacing inside his cell. But Danny couldn’t break the grip the cold hand of fear had on him. He just wasn’t going to do it. He just wanted to close his eyes and disappear. He wished this would all go away, that he could somehow escape his body and go somewhere nice and warm and safe.

  “Hey.” Zin was pulling his shirt over his head in the cell next to him. “Listen, you got to do this. I know it’s all weird, but it’s no big deal. It’s like showering in the gym. I can tell you, nothing happens.”

  “Then why do we have to do it?”

  Zin shrugged while he stepped out of his shorts. “To make the first part more uncomfortable, I guess. To humiliate us, to make us want the needle. I don’t give two craps either way. All I know is that we got to get this thing going or it’s going to suck being here even longer.”

  Zin folded his shorts and shirt into a stack and placed his flip-flops on top. His Investor gave him a nod and left.

  “Danny Boy,” Mr. Jones said. “You should understand that in life, there is joy and there is suffering. Your work includes everything. The Haystack is designed to allow you to experience suffering safely, to learn to let go of your physical body so that you may experience another level of your existence. But I can’t make you, Danny Boy. I can’t make you do it. You’ll have to do it on your own.” Mr. Jones held out his hands. “You’ll have to walk naked alone.”

  Others had joined Sid in the taunting. Danny could see there was no way to escape. And the others had been through it and they didn’t seem to mind. Zin, too.