The Annihilation of Foreverland

by Tony Bertauski

  He let Zin drag him a couple steps and pulled. “No.”

  The second rock sunk a dent as deep as the first and not more than six inches to the left. He was reaching for a third when Zin knocked him down.

  “I’m not letting you commit suicide.”

  Zin was on his knees, chucking the rocks into the underbrush. They were going to get caught, but two rocks looked a lot different if there wasn’t ten more waiting to be fired. He had just enough time to grab the two that rebounded off the door. The last one rolled out of sight just as the door opened.

  The Director appeared in the doorway, wearing some kind of desert scouting outfit. His left hand rested on the hilt of a small sword. A fat old man pushed past him, followed by more.

  “JUST KILL HIM!” Danny screamed. “He’s not going to take the needle, so just go ahead and kill him, already! Put us all out of misery!”

  Danny started up the steps. Zin caught him on the third one. He wasn’t going to slip away again.

  “I know what you’re doing to us,” Danny shouted. “You’re a bunch of fat, selfish bastards!”

  “What are you doing?” Zin hissed in his ear.

  “If you don’t want to just kill us, I will! I’ll throw all of the boys over the cliffs.” Danny jabbed at them. “We’re all going over, anyway. We’ll do it on our own!”

  “DANNY BOY!” Mr. Jones stumbled down the steps. “Stop this foolishness, right this second. What has gotten into you?”

  Another ten Investors were out the door, exchanging knowing glances. The Director’s steely gaze never wavered.

  “I’ll tell you what got into me, go see Reed. Mr. Smith knows, he’s doing it to him. He’s breaking him. He doesn’t want to take the needle, all right? Are you so desperate that you’re going to kill him slowly for it?”

  “He’s just trying to help him, Danny Boy.” Mr. Jones helped Zin restrain him. “You don’t understand what’s happening, you must trust us.”

  “Trust you?” Danny turned on Mr. Jones. Constantino was on the tip of his tongue. Acquired, too. He was about to spit them like darts. Had he, it would’ve changed everything. The Investors would’ve known their privacy had been breached. They would’ve condemned the Director without question. The program would have failed. Nobody would escape, ever.

  But the Director’s hand gently fell on Danny’s shoulder.

  “It’s all right, son,” he said.

  Danny stopped struggling. Everyone said son. But the Director said it differently. It wasn’t an expression, it meant something. And it fell quietly on Danny.

  “Mr. Jones.” The Director turned to him. “Let me have a word with Danny Boy.”

  All three of them – Zin, Mr. Jones and the Director – kept their hands on him, slowly letting go. Danny stared at the Director. He wanted to hate him, but there was calm in his expression.

  “Gentlemen.” The Director turned to the crowd inside the doorway. “We will proceed as usual. Remember why we’ve come together.”

  He turned to Danny.

  “We’re here to help,” he said to the others. “Let’s remember that.”

  No one moved.

  The program teetered on that moment.

  And then the Director led Danny away from the Mansion.

  A man doesn’t achieve that level of power without knowing how to handle pressure.

  50

  It was a narrow path. An overgrown one.

  Danny trampled on leaves and fronds sheared cleanly by the Director’s blade. The Director didn’t turn around when Danny caught up to him. He was grabbing with the left hand and swinging the machete with the right. The jungle bent to his will as they made their way through it.

  Sweat drenched the back of his shirt. Danny could hear his breathing between each swing. When they reach a small clearing where a tree had uprooted – its roots bare and dead. The Director wiped his head with a handkerchief and leaned against the massive trunk.

  “Whew!” he said. “This trail hasn’t been used in awhile, wouldn’t you say, Danny Boy?”

  Danny kept a healthy ten feet between them.

  “It reminds me of the time I first discovered this place. Nothing but trees in this part of the island, nature taking back what mankind put in its way. Can you believe that was 30 years ago?” The Director looked up, shaking his head. “Goes by in a flash, Danny Boy. Cherish that youth, my boy, while you can. One day you’re going to be fat and out of shape like me, son.”

  The Director pulled a drink from the canteen on his hip. He wiped his mouth with his sleeve and offered it to Danny. He didn’t even bother shaking his head. He just stared.

  The Director screwed the lid back in place and smacked his lips.

  “Yes, sir,” he said. “Thirty years ago, this was a dying resort for the super wealthy when I got here. I was going to resurrect it, turn it into an extreme vacation island resort with hiking and meditation and snorkeling. Maybe import some animals so it had a real jungle feel.” He slowly moved his hand as if reading a banner. “Discover Your Inner Tarzan.”

  He laughed.

  “Wouldn’t have worked, Danny Boy. Stupid idea. The rich don’t want anything to do with Tarzan and that’s when I heard a higher calling. That’s when I decided to help the world, to heal it one person at a time. This is a revolutionary program, Danny Boy. We’re on the verge of taking mankind to another level in its evolution…”

  He stared at Danny.

  “But you’ve heard the pitch, I’m sure. I don’t need to tell you. Right?”

  The Director wiped his whole face, again, tucked the handkerchief in the upper pocket of his shirt. He leaned back and waited.

  “That’s hard to believe,” Danny finally said, “after what you’ve done to Reed.”

  “I see.” The Director nodded, thinking.

  Danny clearly didn’t understand what was going on. He was a kid. He needed an adult to explain the world to him.

  “The brain operates like a computer, wouldn’t you say?” the Director said. “It’s got connections and information that form concepts and ideas. And computers are susceptible to corruption, like malicious code. Something that will disrupt its ability to operate normally.”

  “I’ve never fixed a computer with torture, Director.”

  “No, but you have reformatted one. Am I right? Of course, I am. You are a computer genius, there’s no denying that, Danny Boy. You know that when an operating system is corrupt, sometimes it needs to be erased and reprogrammed from the beginning. It needs to relearn the right way to operate.”

  “There’s nothing wrong with me.”

  “You don’t know that, Danny Boy. You can’t change and stay the same. In order to heal, you have to be willing to let go of the past. Be willing to let go of the programming that corrupted your soul to begin with. All you boys have a chance to be new again.”

  “Reed’s almost crippled. He’s broken. You’re destroying him.”

  “Some are more damaged than others. I can only offer him salvation, Danny Boy. Only offer the healing, he has to take it.”

  “So you torture him?”

  “It sometimes takes a strong hand to get people to let go of their past. People aren’t willing to give up what tortures him. Every time Reed goes to the Haystack, he has the power to heal himself but refuses. I can’t make him, I can only encourage him. He’s got to trust what I’m doing for him, you see. Trust, Danny Boy.”

  “I don’t trust you, Director. I don’t know you.”

  “How do you know?” He raised his eyebrows, questioningly. “I could be the father you need to forget.”

  “No one on this island trusts.” Danny tapped the back of his neck. “That’s why everyone has a tracker, just in case. Including you.”

  “We’re dealing with the human condition here, Danny Boy. Corruption, sin. People cheat if given the opportunity. These little things in the neck take that away. Makes everyone feel a little better. Good thing Sid had one, wouldn’t you say?”
r />   The Director smiled.

  They walked for a long time, in silence. Their path was serpentine. The Director seemed to go out of his way to cut giant leaves when he could’ve just ducked under them. Eventually, the trees began to thin out. The soil turned to stone. A breeze howled down the path, rustling the leaves above them.

  They stepped onto the barren ledge of a cliff. The ground was gray with granite and green with lichens growing in the cracks like whiskers and fuzz. It was the highest Danny had ever been on the island. None of the paths led to this spot. He figured if they continued to the right, they would eventually descend until they reached the beach on the north end.

  The horizon was flat in both directions. The water deep, dark and blue. The Director wedged his hands on his hips and closed his eyes. He inhaled the ocean’s scent.

  “Don’t you wish you could just be that, Danny Boy?”

  He inhaled, again.

  “The ocean, my boy. The smell, the sight… the life it contains. All of it, don’t you want to be that?”

  “How would I know?”

  “What do you want, Danny Boy? If you could have anything in the world, what would you ask for?”

  “I’d start with knowing who I am, but you took that away.”

  “I didn’t take anything away, you didn’t have it.”

  “Only I would know that.”

  The Director stepped closer to the edge. A half-step forward and he’d go a hundred feet to the bottom. He walked along the edge to a boulder that jutted up from the ground – flat like a table.

  “This is where I had the epiphany, Danny Boy. I would come up here to sit every morning and this is where I received the calling. I knew what mankind needed. We needed to harness the power of the mind, the most powerful weapon a man possesses. If we can control the mind, Danny Boy, we get what we want. That’s your answer, son. If you could have anything in the world, it should be the power of the mind.”

  The mind is a weapon.

  “How can you torture us and call that healing?”

  “Your body is a prison, my boy. You need to understand that through experiencing its misery. The Haystack is the best teacher you’ll ever have. It forces you to face the body’s desire, and the suffering that results. You take the needle, you see the freedom of the mind. That’s all we’re doing, son. Setting you free.”

  Danny wanted to flee. Everything about the island was wrong, but in the presence of the Director, it all made sense. The body was a prison. The mind was freedom. When he was inside the needle, there was nothing he couldn’t do. Why was that less real than his flesh? He was still Danny Boy.

  The Director picked up a handful of rocks and pitched them one at a time over the edge. “You went out into the Nowhere with the girl. She’s been teaching you to be bad, Danny Boy. She gave you access to our mainframe and you escaped.”

  He peeked back.

  “Didn’t you, son?”

  Danny didn’t answer. There was no need to make it any worse. Now for the punishment.

  “You’re a true pioneer, Danny Boy.” He threw the last rock as far as he could, grunting. “I tell all the boys they’re a pioneer, but you are true-blue, Danny Boy. Amazing.”

  The Director smiled and laughed.

  “You did something I never knew possible. You transformed yourself into pure mind. You became data without losing your identity. You were still Danny Boy. And I never thought that was possible, son. Always, I believed, the mind was rooted in the brain, it needed the physical body or it dispersed into random thoughts.”

  “The Nowhere. Is that what became of the boys before me?”

  “Some of them. But you, Danny Boy. You went into the Nowhere and remained Danny Boy. She knew, didn’t she? She knew you’d survive being out there, and once you did, you embraced it. You became it. And you were set free.”

  “How do you know her?”

  “I know everything.” He nodded, slowly. “Everything.”

  Danny walked back to the scrawny shade of trees and leaned against one, bending it with his weight. The waves crashed far below.

  It’s over.

  “Is that why you brought me here? To throw me over the edge? Is that what you do with people like me and Reed, throw them in the ocean?”

  Laughter. “Son, you don’t understand what you’ve done. You’ve created an inner reality beyond the needle. Until now, all the boys were limited to Foreverland. Danny Boy, you created a new reality. A new dimension. I want to follow you out of the flesh. I want you to lead us to a new dimension of existence. Show us Nirvana, son. Bring us to the world of pure mind.”

  “You’re wrong,” Danny said. “I’m just a hacker. I just created an illusion, no different than a video game.”

  “We make our own reality.” The Director touched his head. “With our minds.”

  “The reality you create with your mind, Director… that’s the definition of delusion.”

  The Director shook the handkerchief out of his pocket and wiped his forehead, wiped his mouth. He went back to the ledge and put his hands on hips, losing himself in the view.

  The cloudless blue sky.

  Deep blue water.

  Violent collisions on the boulders.

  “They want you out, Danny Boy.” The Director didn’t turn around but said it loud enough for him to hear it. “You, Reed and Zin… you know what that means, don’t you?”

  Danny didn’t want to answer. A lump swelled in his throat. Despite the anger burning his spine, fear had the trump card when it came to survival.

  “The program is a delicate thing, Danny Boy. It has balance. When a candidate is rebellious, it tips the scales. These men have a lot invested in you boys. A lot of time, a lot of money. They don’t want to see the program come down, a lot of people will get hurt. And sometimes it makes sense to sacrifice a few to save many.”

  Danny was sure that he had thrown people from the cliff. There was no doubt. It was neat and clean to crush them on the rocks and let the fish destroy the evidence. Not that anyone would find a body even if it was staked to the side of the cliff. This was the Director’s island. He was judge and jury.

  The Director strode away from the ledge in a meandering sort of way, head down with his fingers buried in his beard, scratching the hidden chin. He knelt at the edge of the trees and broke off a branch, twirled it.

  “But I see something in you and Reed.” He looked up. “Something this program needs, Danny Boy.”

  He walked over, looked down.

  “I need you to show us what it can become.”

  The stem spun between his fingers like a helicopter stick with green blades. He plucked one of the leaves and crushed it in his palm, cupped it over his nose and inhaled with his eyes closed, savoring the fragrance.

  “Take this.” He put the leaves in Danny’s hand and closed it. “Steep it in hot water for five minutes and give it to Reed. It’ll relieve his suffering. He’ll find peace.”

  “How do I know it won’t kill him?”

  The Director bit the tip off one of the leaves and chewed. “If I wanted him dead, I wouldn’t send you to do it.”

  Danny put the leaves in his pocket.

  The Director went back to the tabletop stone where he had his epiphany and leaped up. He stretched back with his hands on his hips, once again gazing at the view.

  “This is your last chance to get Reed inside the needle, Danny Boy. The Investors are powerful men. I can only do so much.”

  He sat down and crossed his legs into a pretzel. His back was straight, his hands in his lap, he closed his eyes. Breathing, in and out.

  Danny left him there so he could become one with the view. He had some tea to make.

  51

  Danny sat at the picnic table. A plastic cup was in front of him. The water had turned light green with shredded foliage floating on top. He fished them out – one by one – with a stick, steam wafting out. Occasionally, he’d look at the door at the end of the dormitory where an empt
y golf cart was parked parallel with the building.

  The tea smelled like diluted turpentine. He put the cup to his lips, not too hot to drink. The aroma made his eyes water. He didn’t sip. He wanted to save all of it.

  The dormitory door opened. Mr. Smith limped to his cart and slid on the seat. Danny waited a few minutes before going inside, taking the cup with him.

  The door was locked.

  He should’ve known it. Mr. Smith knew he was coming back. Danny tried the door knob again, turning it with both hands, then put his shoulder into it. There was nothing in the hall, nothing like a fire extinguisher or a baseball bat to bash the knob off.

  He went back to his room, looking for something heavy. The only thing was the sink. He could get that off the wall and drive a hole through the door big enough to crawl through. But that was only going to make things worse. Reed would be locked away in vault. Danny would never see him again. Maybe a rock on the doorknob could get it open without too much notice. There would be something at the beach.

  He left his room—

  Zin was on his knees, poking wires into the lock. It clicked. The door swung open.

  “I told you I remembered everything,” he said.

  The room smelled like dirty socks rolled in bacon. The lights were out. There was a lump on the bed.

  At least it wasn’t convulsing.

  Danny closed the door, quietly. He knelt next to the bed and put his hand on the lump.

  “Reed.” He shook him. “I need you to drink this.”

  No response. He shook him harder. Maybe he was finally sleeping and Danny was messing him all up. But he shook, anyway.

  “Come on, man. Wake up.”

  On the fourth try – one more and he would quit – Reed rolled over. His hair, matted to the side of his face. His face, caved beneath the cheekbones.

  “It’s Danny Boy,” Danny said. “Drink this, man. It’ll make you feel better.”

  The tea was still warm. Reed tried to lift his head.

  Danny reached under the pillow and picked his head up. Reed’s hands were somewhere under the blankets. Danny lifted the cup to his lips. Reed was on the edge of convulsions. He winced and tried to pull away. Danny wouldn’t let him, pouring the astringent water into his parted lips. It spilled down his chin but he swallowed – against his will – until it was all gone.