Entropy in Bloom

by Jeremy Robert Johnson

  You crept in, found it surprisingly plush. Call it delirium, but you swore the west wall had an on-switch for a tiny A/C unit. Even the dogs up in the hills were living easy.

  You leaned against the rear wall, set your CamelBak on your belly. Unzipped the pack. Pulled out your accidental insurance policy.

  You’d broken in to Ava’s place on Thursday night, knowing she was working at Devil’s Point, to bring her underwear back. Ever since you’d stolen them you’d felt weird about it. They turned you on, but you wanted to move past connecting to people through their things. You had a chance to be with the flesh-and-blood girl. Starting out psychotic felt wrong.

  But once you were in her place you couldn’t help exploring. You rifled the bag she’d packed, wanting to see what kind of swimsuits she’d be wearing to the beach.

  You’d been living with compulsion so long you didn’t even question it when you pocketed the thing. She was going to need it with her. This way you’d be certain she wouldn’t forget it.

  But you could have left it in the bag. It was already packed. She wasn’t going to forget it. Maybe, deep down in the recesses of your memory, you were thinking of Mary Ashford and Sarah Miller, and that twinge of pain kept her passport in your pocket.

  Your second call was to Information. They automatically connected you through to a Customs agent at PDX.

  You noticed silver sparkles in your vision that couldn’t mean anything good. Zoning on the passport photo helped you focus.

  God, she was easy on the eyes. Too bad she was murder on the rest of you.

  You told the man on the phone what she looked like, what kind of uniquely contraband baby she was carrying. You told him that the woman’s birth name was Jean Christenson, but that she preferred to be called Ava, which was short for Avarice.

  He noted that the name seemed appropriate.

  “More than you’ll ever know, pal.” You closed the cell, thinking of her last words to you.

  Good luck.

  Your chest began to shake.

  You were still laughing when your Uncle Joshua arrived and spotted your running shoes sticking out of the tiny house in the stranger’s yard.

  He crouched down, looked you over.

  “Jesus! Are you okay?”

  In between gusts of mad laughter you managed to say, “Nope. I’m in a bad place. I’m going to have to run.”

  “Okay, we’ll get to that. First let’s get you out of that fucking dog house.”

  He managed to get you upright, with your arm around his shoulder and as much weight as you could bear on your dog-mauled leg.

  Once he started the car he looked over at you, seemingly relieved that you’d stopped laughing. The pain of moving had killed the chuckles.

  Your Uncle had a hundred questions on his face. He asked one.

  “The girl?”

  You nodded in the affirmative then, over and over, guessing he would understand: Yes I was a sucker I thought it was love and yes I’m still remembering her kiss and the worst part is that if you ask me if I am still in love with Ava gorgeous terrible amazing vicious Ava I might say yes despite it all Yes.

  You began to shake, nodding, mumbling, “OhGodohGodohGod . . . .”

  “Okay, okay. Take it easy. Trust me, you’ve just hit the wall. You know that’s as bad as it gets. I’m with you. You’re gonna get fixed up. You’ve got to tell me enough to keep you safe, but that’s it. We’ll go where we need to. And soon as you can foot it, soon as you get past this wall, the morning runs are back. And this time there’s no dropping it. No goddamn way. Whatever’s got itself inside of you, kiddo, we’re going to hit the streets and clear it the fuck out.”

  He twisted his grip on the steering wheel, gunned his car down slender curving roads on the way to the hospital. Dawn was approaching. It was likely to be another beautiful gray-green morning in Portland. Could your Uncle really be willing to leave his home behind just to protect your mangled carcass?

  You wondered at your luck, knowing this man.

  He approached a red light, started to hesitate, took one look at you, and then pushed right through.

  And you, you love-sick bastard, you finally let shock take hold.

  The Oarsman

  The same space that envelops my craft surrounds Colony 1, its emptiness floating heavy around two corrupted cells.

  A forgotten man in a metal membrane, inevitable death as the nucleus.

  Far below—a planet heavy with viral load, perhaps too pregnant to prevent collapse.

  Monitor light brings it to me LIVE: The monks on the side of the mountain are still singing, still swaying. But their low-throated hum is tapering. New angles are forming under their red robes, sharp jaunts of bone. A few have collapsed forward, toppled out of lotus position, the metal devices strapped around their necks now useless.

  They aren’t eating. If they’re drinking, I’ve never caught them. The bastards are starving out, but not fast enough for my liking.

  And I just can’t stop watching them—the greatest mass murderers of all time, singing themselves to a slow death.

  KURYLENKO IS FLOATING OUTSIDE of the station. With some despair I noted that his corpse does not spontaneously ignite even when we rotate into the full face of the sun. I pray for a spark.

  Shakyamuni. That was the last thing he said, before he shut down.

  We were in Sector C, nibbling vacu-packed peas, watching the news, our respective headphones feeding English and Russian language audio.

  Everyone was waiting. Me, Kurylenko, the news cameras, the world—we were waiting to watch someone die.

  If you would have asked anybody, they would have laid odds on the monks catching bullets. And that’s how it would have gone down, if those cameras hadn’t been there. Blame China’s new media relations policy, promoting cultural events even in disputed territory. Check out our beautiful history—monks balancing on thumbs, fireworks shows leaving days of smoky haze—and don’t worry so much about human rights.

  They promised a beautiful display—the Yang-style chanting of a sacred text invoking empathy and oneness, courtesy of the Pan-Chinese Open Hand Festival, live from the base of the snowy mountains. News helicopters hovered close. Military helicopters hovered just behind them.

  I suppose that, to most aside from the Chinese, the assumption was that the circle of white stones and the two great metallic cylinders flanking the monks were part of tradition, perhaps glossed up for the global stage. But when the monitors happened across Chinese soldiers their faces held shimmers of stress and confusion. Tight knit brows. Sweaty foreheads. Something looked wrong, but it didn’t seem there was any viable order to set things right.

  Media speculation filled pre-performance air.

  “The purpose of the necklaces is unknown, but they appear to be modern technology, perhaps reflecting China’s merger of cutting-edge science and ancient culture.”

  “ . . . those columns, though un-decorated, do lend a certain regal air to today’s proceedings.”

  “We’ve been asked, for the duration of the performance, to stay beyond the ring of decorative stones.”

  “Our best guess is this is all part of the sound design, a way to ensure these beautiful voices are heard both here at the foot of these majestic mountains, and around the world.”

  This may have all been B-roll station filler if a BBC sound tech hadn’t accidentally stumbled across those stones.

  Just before it happened, you could see him on a few of the other stations’ cameras, barely maintaining his footing over the crumbling shale of the mountainside, body hanging with sound gear ballast, trying to get as close to the white-rocked periphery as possible.

  Then his left foot slipped, throwing him into a clumsy shuffle, trying not to drop the boom mic. Two steps to the side and he was in their circle.

  His hand raised in apology—Sorry, guys.

  That same hand ignited like phosphorous, sending out white light. Arcs of radiance flashed down on the sound tech�
��s body from the two silver columns. The tech’s mouth opened in a scream, his last breath consumed in the fire that swallowed him whole.

  Then there were close-ups of the monks, still seated and ready to sing, their faces flashing something . . .

  Regret?

  Did it matter?

  Chaos after that. Chinese military tucking ready rifles into their shoulders. News feeds jumping from B-roll to the Global Now. The charcoal husk of a clumsy man sending off smoke from inside the stone circle. Martin Vilkus spotted among the monks, dressed as one of them, the shaggy hair from his FBI photos shaved clean off.

  You could have tried to absorb it, to piece together the feed and find a rational response. But Vilkus was barely on the national radar anymore, his history as the Feds’ least favorite virologist-turned-ter-rorist old news. The guy hadn’t issued a manifesto in years, and the Boston Subway Massacre, though leaving over seven hundred dead and internally liquefied to the consistency of fast food milkshakes, was long-forgotten in the wake of more popular atrocities.

  Even if you knew what was about to happen, from what I’ve figured, you’d still be dead.

  The monks reached up, each one flipping a switch on the tiny box that sat at the hollow of his throat. Blinking LED’s registered “On” status.

  Kurylenko had sensed it then. He yelled in Russian, the veins popping on his neck, like his urgency might carry the scream through the vacuum of space.

  “Fucking shoot them.”

  His order yielded no response. And why I couldn’t stop laughing at him, at his panicked face, I’ll never know.

  Then the song began. The monks’ mouths were open wide, the tone unified and low. It pulled me into a vertiginous state, as if a door had just opened beneath me in the craft and I was flipping back through empty space.

  I started to lose my sight, static spreading across my vision. Reaching up through atmospheric quicksand, I tried an old orientation technique. My fingers found purchase on the soft connective tissue and veins under my tongue, and I clasped down as hard as I could.

  As it had so many times before, pain brought me into the present. And I was back in the station, and Kurylenko was collapsed on the ground and whispering something. I crouched and leaned in close.

  Shakyamuni.

  I would have appreciated less obscure last words. He could have told me I was a good friend. He could have told me where he stashed his best pornos.

  Nope—fucking “Shakyamuni” was all I got.

  Then nothing. His chest shifted slightly, and I could register condensation on a mirror if I held it to his nose. But that breathing and his heartbeat were already slowing and growing fainter.

  The look on his face was the worst. His eyes flooded with tears. The corners of his mouth slightly upturned. If I was reading him right, I’d swear he was smiling.

  I put his body in Bay 2 after his bowels voided. I considered trying some kind of resuscitation, but by then I’d seen enough news feed to know better.

  Helicopters, news and otherwise, were earthbound and aflame. The monks’ song echoed off the mountain walls and piles of collapsed bodies. Even Martin Vilkus was on the ground, the first red robe to drop. Whatever part he’d had in this, it hadn’t guaranteed immunity. At least he looked happy.

  A reporter from CNN had fallen right in front of her camera. The channel, for hours, was just her profile, tears running ravines through her beige foundation.

  Flipping stations gave me scores of pre-programmed sitcoms and infomercials but I couldn’t find any shows that would require a live human being.

  No news. No response. Dead air.

  There was a certain and lovely sense of permanence to this.

  Kurylenko wasn’t coming back. I knew that.

  Should I have made sure he was actually dead before I tethered his body to the outside of the station? Some would say so.

  But rest assured, that son of a bitch was still smiling at nothing when I pushed him into space.

  REGULAR TELEVISION BROADCASTS ENDED days ago, but I’ve still got my Chinese friends pulled up on the monitor. I suppose this is the saving grace of my job.

  Ostensibly this is a way station between Earth—now optimistically referred to as Colony 1—and future homes with nicer things like top-soil and potable water. But if much of the ship’s funding came from certain parties in the east and the US that traffic in information, well you might have a better understanding of what we really do. Or did, I suppose.

  So, for most of my day I tune our cameras in on the monks, watching them sway and starve.

  Which contestant is next to be voted out here on Tibetan Idol?

  The rest of the time I jerk off, half-sleep, and wonder—Why am I still alive?

  The broadcast tried to claim me, but it couldn’t. It barely effects me, watching it now.

  What makes me different? I’ve been trying hard, so hard for years now, to act like everyone else.

  When I was a child Dr. Chodron told me about emulation. I saw him for a few weeks, after the incident with Tommy’s cat. Question after question, test after test, hushed conversations with my mother. In the end he sat down with me, wringing his hands, and asked me if I could be a good boy.

  The right answer seemed to be, “Yes.”

  Then he told me I would have less trouble with the other boys if I could learn to make faces like theirs.

  Somebody tells you about a naked lady and her dog Free-show; you cough up a few laughs and crinkle your eyes.

  Somebody tells you their mom died; you put your arms around them and pat them on the back. Keep your lower lip pushed up.

  I’ve only gotten better at it since then.

  But I’ve never felt much of anything behind the face.

  Two other doctors have tried to label me since, but I shook the name. Fighting, fucking—everybody needs a little of that to stay alive. Doesn’t mean some quack can tag me.

  One thing you can call me—survivor.

  But . . . I’m starting to think I might have to shake that name too.

  There are no transport ships coming. My transmissions are reaching exactly no one.

  The monk’s broadcast couldn’t have reached the whole planet, unless it didn’t require the television signal as a medium for transmission. Maybe that was just a catalyst. A bonus, zapping Kurylenko up here in the ether, speeding along the process. Maybe those nasty electric columns were sending the song out in worldwide waves.

  Whatever those monks did, whatever sonic virus they used to fuck up the human race, it wasn’t going to get un-fucked. And, really, I’m okay with that. They sped up the inevitable, and left us all with a song and a smile. It’s a downright kind extinction compared to what we’ve unleashed in the past.

  But I’m not okay with the position they’ve left me in. Shitty, slow death in this metal coffin, watching my murderers slide softly into nirvana.

  I’ve got fourteen hours until the station is directly over their territory.

  With the proper use of the ship’s boosters, and a sizable chunk of luck, I’m hoping I can ride this thing all the way down. All the way home. And maybe, just for one moment, they’ll look up to the sky.

  They will see me then, a terrible and fiery God, and I will descend upon them and ram their bad karma right down their fucking low murdering throats.

  That is how this song ends.

  The Gravity of Benham Falls

  He’s taking me to the place where we lost Michael.

  This thought, more than the speed of the car and the sight of barely illuminated trees blurring past, cemented Laura’s unease. She hadn’t been up this way since the day her little brother disappeared, and never planned on returning. Now this “date” with Tony was dragging her back.

  Laura silently cursed herself for not coming up with a better way to make money. Her current plan wasn’t getting any smarter, or easier. Could she even call it a plan? How many small town drug dealers could she seduce and steal from, before one of them caught
on and decided to hurt her, or worse? Word would travel; she’d be in danger. Tony, the guy driving, seemed like the type that would own a gun.

  When the headlights of the car cut through the wispy road fog ahead of them and illuminated the sign reading “Benham Falls-Fourteen Miles” she realized that this was not where she wanted to be. Anywhere else would be better. Then she forced herself to remember her dad, lying in bed at home, under thin sheets, lungs barely pulling oxygen while he dozed in and out of a Vicodin stupor.

  He probably still wishes he had a cigarette right now. Well, we can’t afford any, damn it. I can barely afford the doctor’s appointments, so we’re just going to have to disappoint the Marlboro man.

  The thought of her freshly divorced dad—mom bailed when the diagnosis dropped—and of his mounting bills at St. Peter’s Hospital, re-focused her on the task at hand. The guy in the seat next to her had to fall in love, or at least lust. The faster, the better. The last chump, he was stupid with love after just two days. Love earned trust, and trust earned secrets, like where the guy kept his cash, and that Rolex he wore only on special occasions.

  A shoebox. These guys, they all want to think they’re Scarface, and they all end up keeping rolls of cash in a little cardboard shoebox.

  Laura tried not to enjoy her cleverness, but failed. A smile was spreading across her face, helping to ease the piano-wire anxiety that was sinking into her chest.

  She shifted in the tan leather bucket seat of the ‘68 Camaro, giving Tony an eyeful of leg as her short skirt hiked up her left thigh. Tony glanced over quickly, caught the flash of skin, and turned his eyes back to the road. He grinned.

  “Almost there, babe.”

  It was the first thing he’d said since he picked her up earlier that evening. Laura was fine with that. She didn’t want words. She might start talking and mention the wrong thing. Draw suspicion. Or she might start talking about the time her family visited this same forest and came back missing one person. She might mention how they never even found Michael’s body