Into the Dark (And Two Other Stories)

  Into the Dark

  (and Two Other Stories)

  By Robert Kroese

  Copyright ©2013 by Robert Kroese

  All rights reserved. No portion of this book may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form or by any means – electronic, mechanical, photocopy, recording or other – except for brief quotations in reviews, without the prior permission of the author.

  This is a work of fiction. Any resemblance to actual persons is purely coincidental.

  The picture on the cover is ©David Simmer. It originally appeared in Thrice Fiction magazine. Used with permission.

  Contents

  Preface

  Don’t Stop Believing

  Into the Dark

  Still Life

  Author’s Preface

  This little book is something of an experiment. The three stories in this collection have gotten minimal exposure (“Into the Dark” and “Still Life” were published in Thrice Fiction; “Don’t Stop Believing” was not previously published), and I decided that they deserved a bigger audience. Originally I had planned on putting together a full-length book of short stories, but I seem to be writing more novels than short stories these days. So, rather than wait until I had another 50,000 or so words of material (which could easily take a couple of years at my current rate), I decided to make these three stories available as a 99 cent Ebook. I hope you’ll agree that’s a fair price.

  These stories represent my first forays into “serious fiction”; nearly everything I’ve had published up to this point has been (to one degree or other) comedic. There are elements of humor in these stories, but for the most part the irony is a bit more subtle than in my other work. I called this collection Into the Dark (and Two Other Stories) not only because “Into the Dark” is by far the longest story of the three, but also to clue you into the fact that these stories are a bit more somber than the Mercury novels or Disenchanted. I almost called it Don’t Stop Believing (and Two Other Stories) because, as you’ll see, all three stories have to do with holding onto one’s beliefs in the face of a hostile reality.

  “Don’t Stop Believing” is the closest thing to a humorous story here, and it’s not so much funny as it is darkly ironic. Or maybe darkly ridiculous. It’s a story for anyone who has ever thought, “If I hear that song one more time, my head is going to explode.”

  Like “Don’t Stop Believing,” “Into the Dark” gets its title from a song – in this case, Death Cab for Cutie’s “I Will Follow You into the Dark.” It’s about how far a man will go to keep from being alone.

  “Still Life” is the most personal of the three. It’s about a man who is imprisoned by his own memories.

  I hope you enjoy them.

  Rob Kroese, 2/19/2013

  Don’t Stop Believing

  Faraday smiled as he stepped into the bar. The place was cramped and dank, and the smell of old beer and mildew made Faraday nostalgic for the days when you could smoke in such places. But Faraday knew this place. His business brought him here with some regularity back in the day. The bar was empty except for the fat, balding old bartender and a rumpled mass of bones and overcoat warming itself over a series of shot glasses at the far end of the bar.

  “Scotch and soda,” Faraday said to the bartender, as he slid onto a stool some six seats down from the other patron. The bartender nodded absently and went about making the drink.

  “Quiet in here,” said Faraday.

  “Jukebox is broken,” replied the bartender, not looking up. “Has been for years.”

  “Too bad,” remarked Faraday, glancing about the bar. “I find that music relaxes people. Puts them at ease. That makes my job easier.”

  The bartender stopped mid-pour and looked up at Faraday. “Jesus,” he muttered. “What’s it been, Faraday? Three years?” He finished pouring the drink and slapped the glass on the bar, nearly half of the contents sloshing out.

  “Something like that,” said Faraday. “What’s the matter, Harry? You don’t look happy to see me.”

  “What do you want, Faraday?” asked Harry impatiently.

  “You’re in arrears, Harry. You haven’t kept up with your payments to Mr. Carver.”

  Harry shrugged. “You stopped coming around. Figured you didn’t care anymore. For that matter, doesn’t Carver have bigger concerns these days?”

  “I can assure you,” said Faraday, taking a sip of his drink, “that whatever Mr. Carver’s other business associations, he still runs this neighborhood, and he expects prompt payment.”

  Harry snorted. “What the hell am I supposed to do, mail you a check? Christ, Faraday. You disappear for three years and then just show up one day and expect payment in full? Or what? You going to take time out of your busy schedule to break my legs? These days I’m lucky if I can make rent. If it weren’t for Pete here, this place would be empty most days.”

  The man on the end, evidently named Pete, nodded slightly in a gesture of acknowledgement.

  Faraday smiled, studying his drink. “How about this,” he said. “I’m going to tell you a story.”

  “What, some kind of cautionary tale about a guy who didn’t pay his debts to Mr. Carver? Look, Faraday, you can take your threats and….”

  “No, no, nothing like that,” said Faraday, waving his hand. “Something much more fantastic. In fact, it’s going to be the most unbelievable story you’ve ever heard. And you’re going to believe every word of it.”

  Harry laughed derisively. “I’ve heard a lot of crazy stories.”

  “Not like this one,” said Faraday.

  Harry shrugged again. “Anybody can make up a story.”

  “Yeah, except this one is true, as you yourself will have to admit. How about a friendly wager? If I’m right, you pay your outstanding debt to Mr. Carver. If I’m wrong, you get a free ride.”

  “If you’re right about what?” asked Harry.

  “If you admit that my story is the most unbelievable story you’ve ever heard, and yet you believe it.”

  “That makes no sense,” said Harry. “Why would I believe a story that’s totally unbelievable?”

  “Then this should be an easy win for you,” said Faraday. “If you don’t believe it, or if you don’t agree that it’s the most unbelievable story you’ve ever heard, you never see me again. But if you admit that it’s the most unbelievable story you’ve ever heard, and you believe it anyway, then I come back in a week and you present payment in full. Fair enough?”

  Harry shrugged. “I suppose,” he said.

  “Wonderful,” said Faraday, finishing his drink. “Another, please. And I believe the gentleman at the end is dry as well. Pete, is it?”

  The man nodded.

  “On me,” said Faraday to the bartender, and Pete mumbled something like a thank you. Harry got them each another drink.

  “As you also know, my boss, Mr. Carver, has relationships with a number of other organizations. Mr. Carver provides certain services to these organizations that they would prefer to keep ‘off the books,’ if you understand my meaning. Mr. Carver prides himself on delivering results while allowing his business partners plausible deniability of any involvement.”

  “Yeah, I get it,” said Harry. “You’re hired thugs.”

  Faraday waved his hand dismissively. “Sometimes that’s all it amounts to. But some operations require a certain expertise and finesse. In this particular case, about three years ago, a company came to us with a rather strange request. This is a big, respectable company, by the way. One you’ve heard of, although I’m not at liberty to divulge the name. They do a lot of hush-hush stuff. Government defense contracts and the like. I’m really
not supposed to even tell you this much, but like I said, the story’s so unbelievable that if you repeat it, people will just think you’re crazy.”

  “Defense contracts?” asked Harry. “You mean like weapons? Bombs and stuff?”

  “Nothing so obvious,” replied Faraday. “They work mostly in what is called psy ops. Psychological warfare.” He took a sip of his scotch. “You ever see that movie, The Manchurian Candidate?”

  “Yeah,” Harry said. “With the black guy. Wesley Snipes.”

  “Denzel Washington. And that was the remake. The original had Frank Sinatra. Anyway, that’s the sort of stuff this company was working on. Mind control, basically.”

  Harry chuckled. “OK, this is getting pretty unbelievable,” he said. “Secret government mind control projects?”

  “But you believe me so far?” asked Faraday.

  Harry shrugged. “So what did this company need you for? Shaking down investors for cash or something?”

  Faraday shook his head. “They needed test subjects. Human test subjects. Apparently it’s difficult to get people to volunteer for dangerous mind control experiments. So they decided to skip the ‘volunteer’ part.”

  Harry said. “Shit, Faraday,” he said. “This is getting pathetic. If you think you’re going to convince me to pay with some kind of mind control mumbo-jumbo….”

  “Shut up and listen,” Faraday said. Harry was quiet.

  Faraday went on, “Like I said, the company needed test subjects, and they didn’t care how we got them. They were getting a lot of pressure from bigwigs in the government to deliver results. I guess mind control is sort of the holy grail of psychological warfare – being able to program a person to do exactly what you want them to do. Imagine if the U.S. government could reach into the brain of a hostile dictator in the Middle East and get him to act however they wanted him to. Open up the country to our oil companies, let us refuel our planes at his air bases, even remove himself from power – anything the US government wants. Real, effective mind control would be the most powerful weapon ever devised. More powerful than nuclear bombs, even. You could cause wars or prevent them on a whim.”

  Pete had emptied the shot glass and now seemed to be regarding Faraday with something like suspicion. Faraday finished his drink and motioned for another round.

  “And you’re saying that this company figured out how to do that?” asked Harry dubiously, getting two more drinks.

  “They were working on it,” replied Faraday. “The problem with the method they were using – well, there were two problems, really. The first was that it required placing a chip into the subject’s brain. Brain surgery, essentially. I’m no expert, but I’m guessing most hostile dictators won’t let you get close enough to perform brain surgery on them. The other problem… there were some undesirable side effects. I watched them work for a while, and it was… not pretty.” He got up from his stool and strolled across the bar, passing behind Pete and stopping in front of an old jukebox.

  “You see, the idea was that you could coerce someone into taking some predetermined action by subjecting them to what the scientists called a ‘sensory cue.’” Like in the movie. The Queen of Hearts is a visual cue that turns a harmless dupe into an assassin. But they used sounds instead. What do you call it, auditory cues. You sure this thing is broken?”

  “Like I said,” Harry replied. “Hasn’t worked in years.” He placed the drinks on the bar. Pete seemed to have lost interest in drinking, though. He now sat stock still, his palms spread on the bar as if he were trying to steady himself.

  “Too bad,” said Faraday quietly, flipping through the selections on the carousel. It was mostly popular music from the 70s and 80s – ABBA, Genesis, Springsteen, that sort of stuff.

  “As I was saying,” Faraday continued, “they found that auditory cues worked better than visual. A clearly distinguishable sequence of sounds, like the first few seconds of a particular song.”

  “But you said there were side effects,” Harry interjected.

  “Right,” Faraday said, breaking into a laugh. “Their scientists had a little trouble getting the chip to work right.”

  “What, you mean they actually cut somebody’s head open to put a chip in it?”

  “Yep,” said Faraday. “Dozens of times.”

  “Holy shit,” said Harry. “Where did you find people who would let you do that to them?”

  “You’re not listening, Harry. They didn’t use volunteers. That’s why they hired us. We found people for them. People from around town, who wouldn’t be missed. Homeless guys, mostly. The experiments went on for months. But the result was always the same: the subject died. Brain aneurism.”

  “Jesus Christ,” said Harry. “You’re making this up, right? This is just a story?”

  “’Fraid not,” said Faraday. “So you don’t believe it?”

  “I’m not sure…” started Harry. At the end of the bar, Pete began to surreptitiously slide off his stool.

  “Where you going, Pete?” asked Faraday, strolling toward Pete and putting his hand firmly on the man’s shoulder. “I was just getting to the good part. Have another drink!”

  Pete reluctantly got back on the stool. His hands were now clearly shaking.

  “Look, I don’t know what’s going on here,” said Harry, “but this isn’t funny anymore.”

  “Funny?” asked Faraday, bemused. “I never promised you a funny story. I said it was going to be unbelievable.” He strolled back toward Harry and picked up his drink.

  Harry nodded slowly. “Okay, so what did you do with these people? The ones you supposedly killed?”

  Faraday chuckled. “Do with them?” he said. “We didn’t do anything with them. They just died. They’re homeless. Who the fuck cares? The doctors would do the procedure and then we’d leave the subjects on the street somewhere, unconscious. These guys could drill into the brain and inject the chip without even shaving the subject’s head. The subjects never knew they’d been operated on. They included a radio transponder, so we could find them again. I guess it took about three weeks for the chip to integrate itself into the subject’s brain. So three weeks or so after the operation, we’d drive up behind them, blasting the trigger song, trying to activate the command sequence.” Faraday took a swallow of his drink.

  “Jesus,” said Harry. “And what happened?”

  “I told you what happened. They keeled over and died. All of them. Well, this one guy lived for a while, which confused us, until we realized we had the wrong song. There was a different song for each subject. That’s how they identified them. Instead of “Subject A” or “Subject B”, it was ‘Hungry Like the Wolf’ or ‘Dirty Diana.’ It had to be a song the subject had heard several times before, so that it activated certain pathways in the brain or something. They did tests to determine the best song for each subject. So we were following this dude in a van, thinking he was “Running with the Devil” when he was actually ‘Living on the Edge.’ We got all excited, thinking he was going to start doing the Macarena....”

  “Doing what?” Harry asked, bewildered.

  “Oh, that’s what they were programmed to do, supposedly. When the chip was activated, it was supposed to make them do the Macarena. It was just a test, to see if they could get them to go through a predetermined set of physical motions. Nobody ever did, though. Not even ‘Living on the Edge.’ We managed to freak him out pretty good, chasing him down in a windowless van, blasting ‘Running with the Devil.’ I think he almost died of a heart attack before we got the right song playing and he had a brain aneurism, like everybody else.” Faraday had strolled back to the jukebox and was once again surveying the available songs. “Toto!” Faraday cried. “Shit, man. Do people actually pay money to hear Toto?”

  “You deaf,” growled Pete, “or stupid? The man said it was broken. Now you gonna get to the fucking point?”

  Faraday turned around. “Oh, I’m sorry, Pete. It is Pete, right? Am I boring you?”

  “I’v
e heard this story before,” said Pete.

  “Oh, have you?” asked Faraday. “And how does it end?”

  Pete muttered something incomprehensible. Harry shot Pete a puzzled look.

  Faraday went on, undeterred. “The scientists kept assuring the suits that they were making progress, but I could tell things were getting tense. One guy swore that ‘Living on the Edge’ did the first few motions of the Macarena before he keeled over. I was there, and to me it just looked like… well, a brain aneurism. But they kept trying. Eventually people started to get suspicious about all the homeless people dropping dead, though, and one day this reporter starts nosing around the facility where they did the operations. We were going to ice him, but somebody suggested they might as well use him as another test subject. I didn’t think it was a good idea, but one of the scientists thought that maybe the problem was that most of the subjects already had some kind of brain damage or mental illness. He thought maybe if they tried it on a normal, healthy person, they’d have better luck.”

  Faraday paused for a moment, searching his pockets. Not finding what he wanted, he continued, “So we grabbed the guy and sedated him, and they did the operation. They didn’t put the transponder in him, though, because it would show up on an X-ray. The chip itself is silicon and is only about a tenth of an inch across. Unless you know where to look, it would be very difficult for anyone to find. So if our reporter friend blabbed to anyone about having a mind control chip in his head, there would be no way to prove it. People would just think he was crazy. In fact, when he woke up from the surgery, we told him everything. About the chip, the brain aneurisms, everything. We even told him what song would trigger the chip. We figured that if he knew we could literally kill him with ten seconds of a Journey song, he’d stop sniffing around. And without any evidence, he’d be just another loony barking about mind-control. Ah, here we go!” Faraday produced two quarters from his jacket pocket.