by James Sperl
Why indeed.
The incident intrigued Clarissa. She had always fashioned herself a devotee of the unexplained, someone who had been fond of enigmatic stories that could sweep her up in a cloud of mystery, but even she was unprepared for Professor Freuxer’s follow-up, which utterly captivated her and cranked up her heart rate another few notches.
Lake Anjikuni had been an Inuit fishing village in Alaska up until 1930 when a local trapper, a man named Labelle, who visited the village frequently, returned from a hunting expedition to discover it abandoned. Population estimates, Freuxer said, fluctuated wildly from as few as 30 people to as many as 2000, perhaps even upwards of 3000. The disproportionately high number was astounding and, if it were accurate, dwarfed Hoer Verde’s misplaced populace by a landslide margin. But Professor Freuxer hadn’t gotten to the good part yet, the relevant part.
According to legend, Labelle found excavated graves and starved sled dogs, even though they apparently had plenty of food. Rumor also had it that food sat uneaten on the tables of some of the dwellings and personal items left. Most curiously of all, however, was that Labelle found no tracks beating a path away from the village. In a land of ice and snow, so many people trudging away from their homes en masse would have almost certainly gouged a trail in the frozen landscape. But he saw nothing. The evidence seemed to point to the conclusion that the inhabitants of Lake Anjikuni had not only disappeared but had also been plucked straight from the earth.
Items left behind? No trace of the individual? Thousands of people gone? The similarities between the incident at Lake Anjikuni and what was currently going on around the world were striking.
Clarissa wanted the professor to provide some insight as to the fates of all the men, women, and children, who had lived in the village one day only to be gone from it the next. But Freuxer had already begun a version of a backpedal, acknowledging to the six-person MSNBC panel that his two accounts “held a high degree of skepticism” and some “wiggle room as pertained to the facts.”
But Clarissa didn’t care. Even if the numbers of the missing were off and some of the details surrounding the events skewed, there were just too many parallels to dismiss the events outright. Something was happening, and if either of Professor Freuxer’s two narratives held water, it could very well be something that has happened before.
Clarissa's mind suffered from information overload. She needed a break.
Dragging herself off the couch, she slogged into the kitchen to prepare dinner. She pulled open the freezer and discovered her meat options consisted of chicken or pork chops, both of which would require thawing time she didn’t have. She had a pizza and two frozen dinners, but neither looked particularly appetizing. It was a culinary crisis. In times such as this, she resorted to meals that required the least amount of preparation, which often meant breakfast food. The idea sparked like a lit match to gas.
Waffles it was.
She had just started to hunt for the Aunt Jemima mix when her doorbell rang.
Clarissa scowled curiously. She wasn’t expecting anyone, and after a night like last night, she praised herself for having not made any plans. She walked swiftly to the door and opened it.
“Oh, my God,” Valentina blurted, storming in before Clarissa could invite her. “I am so freaked out right now.”
Clarissa followed her into the living room, snatching up her phone along the way.
“Hey, Val. What’s up? You all right?”
Valentina plopped down on the sofa and immediately fixated on the TV. Clarissa navigated to her phone’s messaging feature to check for missed texts. There weren’t any.
“Did you try to call or text me?” she said, holding up the phone.
Valentina glanced at her, distracted, before she glued her eyes back on the screen “Huh? No…No, I just came over. I needed to be around someone.”
Clarissa nodded and set her phone down. She walked around the coffee table to sit beside her friend, her eyes trailing to the television where a newswoman wearing too much makeup and sporting flat-ironed, sandy-blond hair presented the latest missing person’s data out of Southeast Asia.
“I know,” she said, patting Valentina’s leg, “it’s got me pretty weirded out too. I haven’t been able to pry myself away from this room long enough to even eat, for God’s sake.” She forced a grin.
But Valentina, instead of returning it, sat up and thrust an arm at the TV. “I mean, how can no one know where any of them are? No one’s seen anyone? And it’s happening all over the world? How can that…That’s just not possible, is it?” Clarissa slipped her hand from Valentina’s knee to place it around her frightened friend’s shoulders. “What’s going on, Clar? Why’s this happening?”
“I have no clue,” Clarissa said, “But I would bet everything I own that there are teams of people out there trying to get to the bottom of it.”
Valentina pulled away from Clarissa to look at her.
“Everyone’s saying the noise had something to do with it. That it made people go crazy or something.”
Clarissa winced. “Yeah, I’ve heard that.”
“You don’t believe it?”
“I don’t know what I believe just yet. I want to keep an open mind about all this. Maxwell may still be onto something.”
Valentina’s brows shot to arcs. “What, that people got scared and just left? I would’ve bought into that too if what we’re hearing had only happened to a few people. But now we’re talking about tens of thousands from around the world, Clar. Tens of thousands. Thousands who are just up and gone with no note or phone call to let people know where they went. This shit is getting real.”
Clarissa pulled Valentina’s head to her shoulder. She’d be lying if she said she didn’t share her friend's concerns. The reports were frightening. How could this be happening? Where had everyone gone? She could accept that the sound had affected some people on a neurological or psychological level, and she could even allow for the unlikely possibility that these same affected folks had wandered off somewhere to commit suicide. But show her some bodies already. She wasn’t trying to be morbid or insensitive, but the lack of evidence verifying a large deceased population didn’t do much to support the theory. And yet, the planet was in the midst of the greatest mass disappearance in recorded history.
Clarissa’s phone rang. The chime was a soothing rainforest waterfall, which she had chosen to replace that grating, pop single she still didn’t know why she had downloaded. She glanced at the caller’s name on the phone's face. Cocking her head inquisitively, she tapped the line open.
“Hey, Rach.”
“Uh…hey,” Rachel responded behind a desultory tone.
“You all right?” Clarissa said, earning a look from Valentina, who raised her eyebrows in a who-is-it? arch. Clarissa mouthed Rachel’s name.
“Yeah, uh…everything’s okay. I just…I was just calling…”
Clarissa stood and moved away from the TV. “You sure? You sound off.”
A pause. “No, no, I’m good…”
Another moment of silence passed between them, and in those few seconds, Clarissa swore she heard from the phone’s tiny speaker the delayed audio for the same newscast she currently watched in her living room. Rachel’s reason for calling suddenly became apparent.
“Rachel?” Clarissa said. “You want to come over? Val’s here.”
Rachel couldn’t thank Clarissa fast enough, her gratitude exploding in a burst of pent-up breath. Clarissa shushed her and assured her it was no big deal. Things were scary. Seconds later, she tapped the line dead and rejoined Valentina on the couch.
“So,” she said to Valentina, “you up for a sleepover?”
* * *
The coffee maker gurgled the last of the boiling water into the filter, the scent of fresh coffee almost more than Clarissa’s waking taste buds could bear. The sound of escaping steam was loud in the quiet room. She checked over her shoulder to make sure it hadn’t roused either of her friend
s.
Rachel lay curled in the fetal position on the couch. Valentina contorted into an uncomfortable-looking twist on Clarissa’s favorite cushy chair, a reupholstered lavender recliner she had discovered at an antiques fair five years ago. She had extended an offer for one of her friends to share her bed, the king-size more than enough to accommodate a second person, perhaps even all three, but both had declined, their consciences plagued by imposition. Clarissa couldn’t imagine anything sillier. Imposition? They were friends. Opening up one’s doors in time of need was the sort of thing friends did. And if what was going on around the world didn’t qualify as such a time, Clarissa didn’t know what did.
The closed blinds over the kitchen window split the morning sun into equispaced shafts, which cut razor-thin bands of light into the room. Everything—Rachel and Valentina included—was striped. Sleeping zebras, Clarissa thought, amused. She twisted the wand to tighten the blinds' gaps.
Her phone in one hand, she navigated to a CNN news app and opened it while simultaneously pouring a stream of milk into a porcelain coffee mug with the other. It was as she expected: individual reports regarding the missing were stacked in a digital queue and scrolled into infinity. She thumbed over several until she landed on one that captured her interest more than the others—a video report out of St. Louis where looting and rioting had apparently commenced overnight. She tapped the link.
The video buffered then filled her tiny screen. The speakers blasted with the clamorous sounds of sirens and yelling, both of which accompanied war-zone imagery of frantic people, their arms overloaded with items they had likely not paid for, as they scurried out of stores sporting damaged entrances. Clarissa scrambled for the volume button and thumbed it down. She peeked at her friends; each stirred at the sudden introduction of cacophonous noise into the dead-quiet room but immediately settled back into undisturbed slumber. Padding to the front door, Clarissa slipped outside and resumed the video.
It saddened her to admit that she wasn't surprised by the violence and vandalism she saw in the broadcast. Why fear—and sometimes celebration, for that matter—seemed always to translate into criminal behavior baffled her. She realized the fight-or-flight individual didn’t consider anyone outside of his or her own private bubble, but it felt a bit premature to rampage after only a day of upsetting statistics and questionable information. What did anyone truly know? The details regarding the missing people were disconcerting, but Clarissa still held firm in her belief that a logical explanation was behind it. There had to be. Anything else was just too frightening.
She sipped her coffee. The deliciously bitter flavor and robust aroma rejuvenated her spirit. If she were smart, she would just put her phone away. No good would ever come from filling her mind with images of hysterical people losing their minds in the streets of major cities. She couldn’t control any of it, so what good did it do to devote time to watching the decline of—
Clarissa stared into the parking lot. She singled out a blue VW Jetta hybrid sitting placidly in its parking space. She checked the time: 7:38 a.m. Her eyes cut to the apartment down and across from hers. Something wasn’t right—Geoff’s car was still here.
Geoff’s car was never still here this late in the morning.
Though she was barefoot, Clarissa descended the stairs.
Geoff had an unstoppable work ethic, which was the result of both drive and youthful exuberance. He wanted to be an animator and had studied extensively at the Savannah College of Art and Design to achieve his goal. Clarissa had seen some of his stuff. He was talented. Very talented. She knew if he applied himself and got a foot in the door at a quality animation house, he would be well on his way to fulfilling his dream of working for Pixar.
But his aspirations took a toll on his social life. He worked two jobs—one as a part-time waiter, the other as a full-time graphic designer at Two-Bit Graphix—all so he could support his animation habit. His devotion to his craft required lots of processing power—and money. He utilized only the highest-end, industry-standard software, the costs of which were more than Clarissa could fathom. But the expenses paled in comparison to the time he spent learning the programs. If Geoff wasn’t working, he parked himself in front of two seventeen-inch monitors, both of which filled out his cramped and insufficient workspace at home. He was always adding gear and making upgrades, and on more than one occasion, she’d heard him grumble about having to wait until the following payday to make a necessary purchase. Geoff was the embodiment of commitment and the dictionary definition of perseverance, which was why seeing his car still sitting in the lot at nearly eight a.m. on a Saturday sent prickles of dread over Clarissa’s skin.
Reaching the bottom of the stairs, she crossed the twenty-plus feet over to his door. She leaned forward and listened. Maybe he was sick, she told herself but dismissed the ludicrous thought straightaway. Not only was Geoff a precision instrument, but she also didn’t think the guy ever became ill. If he did, he kept it to himself. Nothing kept him down. While historically true, Clarissa acknowledged there was always a first time for everything.
She knocked on the door.
She hoped to hear the rustle of shuffling feet followed by a jiggling knob and an open swinging door, but after fifteen seconds of silence passed, she knocked again. She waited half a minute this time. Still, no one answered.
Maybe he had carpooled, Clarissa tried to convince herself. Hell, maybe he had a girlfriend and stayed over at her house. He was certainly handsome enough to have his pick of women. It wasn’t out of the realm of possibility that he had finally succumbed to the “male urge.” It made sense, though Clarissa couldn’t deny she felt a wave of unaccountable jealousy at the thought.
Checking her immediate vicinity to assure no one was around, she gripped the doorknob and gave it a gentle twist. Locked. Of course it's locked because he isn’t home, she thought. He was off living a life somewhere, being a twenty-something entrepreneur with an enviable passion and a hot girlfriend.
Clarissa released the knob, and in so doing discovered that her bathrobe had come undone revealing a lone breast, which had escaped the confines of her Hello Kitty sleep shirt. She bundled herself up expediently and thanked the gods of good fortune that Geoff hadn’t opened the door to discover her flashing him.
She listened for a moment longer before peeling away. She returned to her apartment, though she couldn’t help herself from periodically glancing at his door as she climbed the stairs.
CHAPTER 7
Valentina chewed her thumbnail. It was a nervous habit she had acquired in high school, back when peer pressure and social status commanded her waking life. Those days had long since passed, but Valentina’s inability to conceal her anxiety persisted.
Today, however, it was more than justified.
Clarissa glimpsed her in the passenger seat out of the corner of her eye. Valentina still required the company of others, so after Clarissa hugged Rachel goodbye in her apartment complex's parking lot, she allowed her friend to ride shotgun on the way to work. They listened to an uptempo funk song on the radio from a boy band out of Australia. The teenaged quintet currently dominated the U.S. and U.K. pop charts, and their peppy, hook-heavy, and melody-rich jam was just the slice of morning cheer Clarissa and Valentina needed to shake off the previous day’s gloom. Then the song finished, and the station cut to top-of-the-hour news updates courtesy of ABC.
Good mood gone.
The first story—the only story, as far as anyone was concerned—sent their high spirits plummeting back to earth in a meteoric descent: the number of missing people had increased, and dramatically so.
The sound bites dug their hooks into Valentina. She became so engrossed in the report, Clarissa thought she might chew her thumb down to the first knuckle by the time it was over. When it finally did end, and the station cut to yet another string of irksome ads, Valentina recoiled in irritation.
“No,” she said, reaching for the radio dial, “I need to hear more.”
Valentina feverishly attacked the dial. She worked the radio panel as if it were an airplane cockpit, pushing buttons and dialing knobs until she came upon a talk show neither she nor Clarissa had ever listened to before.
Three voices competed for the microphone—two male, one female—their overlapping dialogue coming on the heels of a question Clarissa and Valentina hadn’t heard asked. Two of the voices paused momentarily, perhaps to catch their breath, which left an opening for the third to exploit.
“And I’ll tell you what else,” said the owner of the tenor-deep voice, who sounded as if he enjoyed a nightly whiskey or three, “if Homeland Security is already getting involved after only two days, you can bet this is somehow terror-related.”
Valentina shot her eyes to Clarissa. “Homeland Security? Are they talking about the disappearances?”
Clarissa shook her head vehemently and accompanied it with a slit-eyed wince that said, Shhh, I want to hear this.
“Oh, come on,” said the woman, whose voice oozed a scratchy sensuality. “Terrorists? I hope you’re kidding. How would a terror organization have pulled off such a global scheme? Let’s leave the who of it alone for the moment and get to how this fictitious group you’re suggesting would have been able to orchestrate the mass disappearance of thousands upon thousands of people within a narrow window of time and leave little to no evidence. It sounds ludicrous just saying it aloud.”
“Yeah, I’ve got to agree,” entered the third voice, whose high register and nasally delivery was the least radio-friendly of the bunch. “It’d be hard to accept that even a collective of first-world nations could pull off something of this magnitude let alone a low-rent terror organization with limited communications and resources.”