The Trilogy of the Void: The Complete Boxed Set

by Peter Meredith

  Behind her, she heard Talitha ask her father, "Why did mom say you always have to come back? Were you going somewhere?"

  "No, she was just alluding to the old Coast Guard saying and was suggesting that I shouldn't be unnecessarily slow."

  "I'm not familiar with any Coast Guard sayings, what does it mean?" Talitha asked. At that, Gayle paused in the short hallway and her body gave a little shudder.

  "The full quote is 'The Blue Book says we've got to go out; it doesn't say a damn thing about having to come back,' it means..." William hesitated and Gayle knew he was wondering if she could hear him. "It means," he began again, in almost a whisper. "When we're trying to rescue someone and it looks dangerous...we don't have the option to not try. We have to at least make the attempt. The quote comes from a Captain Etheridge and supposedly, what happened was a ship had run aground on some dangerous shoals and he was sent to the rescue site. He ordered the cutter's lifeboat in and the crew balked, saying, 'They would never make it back,' and he said, 'The Blue Book says we've got to go out and it doesn't say a damn thing about having to come back.' Basically he told them they had no choice but to go in."

  "What happened to the ship? And why are we whispering?" Talitha whispered to her father.

  "The ship? Dashed to pieces on the rocks, same with the lifeboat. But our guys had life preservers and were good swimmers so they made it out alive," William said. "We're whispering because your mother hates the saying. She always demanded that I come back no matter what the Coast Guard regulations say."

  Gayle's body gave another involuntary shudder and she reminded herself that the only boat he had a shot at now was one of the big cutters and even then, he wasn't likely going to get one.

  Two days after that conversation, Operation M-Day was carried out successfully, with very few casualties. The first casualty was a chair that went with their expensive couch set. It had become home to a family of mice, or at least that's what Gayle told herself. If it had been rats, she would've had to burn the chair on the spot. It wasn't a complete loss, but would have to be re-upholstered at some point when they had money to spare.

  The next casualty was not a total loss either, a large fruit bowl given to her by her mom, was dropped and exploded like an artillery shell into a thousand pieces. The bowl was terribly garish and ugly, but she could neither break it purposely herself, nor hide it away due to her mom's frequent visits. Now she could be rid of the ghastly thing and not have to lie about what happened.

  Due to Gayle's pre-planning, all aspects of the operation went smoothly. Each box and piece of furniture had been labeled, with a one, two, three, or B, to denote the floor of the house, followed by a letter to denote the room. For example, Talitha's room was labeled 2-T and so were all of her boxes. Gayle had been through enough moves in her time that she never again wanted to hear: "Where does this go?"

  During the actual move, Gayle's biggest issue was trying to stop Katie from being Katie.

  Every time she turned around, she saw the little blonde girl almost being stepped on, opening boxes, sliding down the banister, and turning cartwheels in front of the movers as they lugged heavy loads. Katie felt the absolutely unquenchable desire, to tell the movers exactly what was in each of the boxes.

  Gayle discovered that the only way to stop Katie was to sit on her and she did just that. That was late in the afternoon and it turned into a mistake, as Gayle was almost too tired to get back up.

  3

  At that time, she could've fallen asleep on the couch with the squirming Katie giggling underneath her, but now six hours later she felt wide-awake.

  Apart from William's light snoring the house was completely still. It was getting chillier however and she reminded herself to ask William where the thermostat for the air conditioner was. She thought they were lucky since theirs was the only home on the Row with central air conditioning. Every other house had the stubby little grey boxes hanging out of various windows. Gayle considered them ugly and thought her house looked the nicest without them.

  Just then there was a sound on the stairs, a footstep.

  Gayle realized that she had fallen asleep and was a little cross at... Willy J, by the sound of it. He normally had a huge appetite and was likely getting something to eat. Because of the tight budget they were on she would've been upset with him for sneaking food, were it not for the fact that he had been eating like a mouse since his breakup with Lisa, and so Gayle let it slide for now.

  He sure was mopey sounding. It seemed to her like he was sleepwalking going up those stairs.

  When it was quiet again, Gayle, who had begun shivering, snugged up closer to her husband. Thirty minutes later, she rolled over for what felt like the hundredth time.

  The fans!

  That's what Gayle needed. While they had been stationed in Charleston, South Carolina, their little condominium had no air conditioning at all and it would become positively sweltering in the summer. The only way any of them could sleep was if a fan were blowing right down on them. She had become addicted to the thrum of the fans at night and ever since, she fell asleep easier when they were on.

  Other than the tremendous heat, she had enjoyed Charleston. She loved the beaches of South Carolina, the white sand that was always so hot...

  Seven hours later, Gayle woke up feeling like a cat: she was warm, curled up in her sheets, and decided that sleeping was the only thing of any importance. It was light out however and that meant Katie would soon be demanding breakfast. She glanced to the right to check the time, but habit had tricked her. All she saw in that direction were boxes and the fireplace.

  A gravelly groan escaped from her as she started looking to the left, it was so much work to roll over, but she finally made it all the way to her left, 7:46 am.

  "Wow! How'd I sleep that late?" she asked aloud. She really had to get moving, but her body creaked and popped and generally fought getting out of bed. She was now feeling her forty years like never before.

  William, of course wasn't in bed. Gayle knew that he'd been up at five, regardless that yesterday had been M-Day and knowing him, had likely run his five miles already as well. Governors Island was small, only about two miles all the way around it and William would simply lap it two and a half times and use the remainder as a cool down. He was like clockwork, out the door by 6:00 am, back sweating like a pig at 6:52 am.

  If he varied this and went at all slower, Gayle would hear him berating himself for being soft and wimpy. This she didn't understand. Eight-minute miles at the age of forty-one was very good.

  The most she ever exercised was chasing around after Katie, and now the clock told her it was time for her daily constitutional. The morning felt as chilly as the night had been and her first order of business was to find her robe. She looked all around her at the stacks of cardboard boxes sitting mutely. One of them held her robe but she couldn't remember which and she was too tired to start digging through them all. Two of William's were open and peeking in, she saw that one held his workout clothes.

  Good enough she decided, and slipped on a pair of his sweatpants over her pajamas and cinched them up, just under her breasts. She then put the matching sweatshirt on as well and looked at herself in the full-length mirror.

  "Hello sexy," she purred to the pathetic looking girl in the mirror.

  Girl? Now that was funny. It felt like years since she'd been a "Girl." Though when she flapped her arms she looked a little like Katie pretending to be a penguin and that was girlish. She went to reach for her hairbrush, but this too was in the belly of one the stout little boxes and she aged a few years at the thought of unpacking all of them.

  The sound of Katie digging through her toy box reached her. It grew louder and then Gayle heard her say "MMMHHH!" It was the Katie sound for frustration. She went to her daughter's room and standing in the doorway, peeked in. Most of her little room was jumbled with half-open boxes, while mounds of toys were strewn about here and there. By all appearances, some sort of great toy
battle had been waged in the room recently.

  Katie was currently half-in and half-out of a box. Her tiny bottom was sticking out of the top, while the whole of her upper body was down inside it. With the flaps partially closed, Gayle had the disquieting notion that Katie was being eaten by the box. She shook off the weird thought, reached over and gave her youngest daughter a playful spank.

  The little bottom jumped as if stung by a bee.

  "Hey! Cut it out," Katie's cry sounded muffled and her legs gave a little irritated kick. She pulled herself out of the box and it was obvious that like her mother, Katie hadn't found a hairbrush either. Her hair went in every direction at once and there was an old Tinkerbelle sticker stuck in it, as well as some dust bunnies.

  "Oh hi, Mommy. I thought you were Tal."

  "Do we look that much alike to you?" Gayle asked as she started to pull the sticker and dust bunnies out of her daughter's hair.

  "Lots of times you do, yeah," Katie responded, however she then leaned back away from her mom and gave her an appraising eye. "But not today. You look kinda fat." Gayle looked down at herself in her two layers of clothing and had to agree. But at least she was warm. Katie continued on, "You know? You should only wear dresses, on-a-cuz that you're a girl. I like the pretty blue one you wore the time that daddy got all dressed up and had his sword on. Did you get to have a sword too?"

  Gayle knew the dress Katie meant and she loved it as well. "No I didn't get to wear a sword that night and I'm glad too. It wouldn't have looked good with my fancy dress and they're really just for boys anyway."

  "Did the boys have sword fights, like in the movies?" Katie's blue eyes widened at the thought.

  "Sorry, nope," Gayle smiled at her pretty daughter. "They're just for show and they aren't even that sharp."

  Gayle knew a secret about William and his sword that he didn't know, she knew: he sometimes played with his sword, swinging it about and stabbing at the air. She knew also that he wished it were sharp like a real sword. Once she'd seen him fingering the edge of his blade and muttering, "Pathetic." It was a ceremonial sword used by officers for parades and formal dinners, but it was still a sword however, and not only could you put an eye out easily, a man as strong as William could very well kill someone with it.

  Katie wore a hopeful look now. "They're not only supposed to be for boys, you know. Some girls in my class have swords like daddy's, so can I get one too?" Katie lied unconvincingly.

  "No, but you can have breakfast if you can tell me who these girls are, so I can call their mothers." Gayle gave her daughter a steely, 'I mean business' look.

  "I...I...there are no girls with swords, Mommy," Katie admitted in a little voice. "I didn't meant it, on-a-cuz it just came out."

  "It didn't just come out, Katie. We don't lie in this family, do you hear me?" Gayle's kids were good kids, but they weren't perfect and she had dealt with this before. Talitha had always tried to back up her lies with fanciful statistics. Katie looked properly miserable, which was good. "Ok, but you're going to have to do some chores around here to work it off. But first, breakfast!"

  "Can you help look for something first?" Katie asked. "I can't find my Halloween costume anywhere." She grabbed a chair from her hard plastic kitchen set and brought it over to the box she'd been in. Soon, Katie's bottom was back up in the air as she dove head first into the box.

  At that moment, Gayle was stuck by an intense feeling of déjà vu. It was something about the room. Not the boxes...it was that chair...and the costume. She had dreamed of Katie in a red coat, but now Gayle realized it was a costume.

  The dream started to come back to her in pieces. She had been walking around the house looking in all the rooms for something. Gayle remembered feeling anxious, but about what she didn't know. All the rooms and hallways had been dark...she had started in the kitchen and then gone up the back stairs to Talitha's room. Her room had been empty and so was Willy J's, but Katie had been in her room, playing.

  Gayle remembered sitting at the tiny table with her knees up to her chin having tea. The room wasn't as dark as the hallways had been, but it was still dim. There was a vague blue light coming in from the windows that made the light yellow carpet look like it was light green instead. Katie served real tea, but in the little plastic tea cups and Gayle remembered looking at the tea, fearing it would be cold. For some reason she was afraid of the cold. However, it was the costume that Gayle recalled most vividly, it was very red, and Katie's eyes were bright blue in her face. Sometime during their playing Gayle noticed that she too had on a red cape which brought with it a sense of alarm.

  That was the whole dream, or all of it that Gayle could remember, and for her that was a lot, since she never remembered her dreams like other people could. Thinking about the dream and the déjà vu made her feel slightly uneasy and Gayle stood looking at Katie's bottom for a moment longer, wondering why and then said, "All the costumes are in the basement boxes."

  Gayle heard a disappointed, "Oh," from the box and then Katie struggled out. "Can you get it for me, please?"

  Gayle sighed, that seemed like a lot of work and she was already tired at 8:00 am. "Maybe, we'll see how the day goes. We have a lot of unpacking still to do. But now, breakfast. Watcha want?"

  "French toast please," Katie responded in her sweet, I'm-just-too-cute-to-say-no-to, manner.

  Gayle sighed again, that seemed like a lot of work as well, and suddenly she felt even more tired at 8:01 am.

  Chapter 6

  Commander William Jern and the Ghost

  June 3rd 1980

  1

  William's pace was way off. "Come on!" he groused to himself, but it didn't have the desired effect, he only felt slightly more winded. A glance at his watch, at the four-mile mark showed him he was at thirty-four minutes. This was bad news and he pressed forward harder.

  Suddenly he developed a stitch in his side and grimaced. He couldn't remember the last time he had a stitch; it might've been in the eighth grade. However, he did remember the simple key to fighting a stitch, which was to not think about it.

  To take his mind off it he watched the passing scenery: the ferryboats, the sea gulls, the sky-scrapers in the distance, and he listened to the rhythmic pounding of the waves just below the sea wall.

  It didn't work.

  The stitch was still there and William castigated himself for being a slug. Up ahead he spied another jogger. It was a man in a grey sweat suit and he had about a three hundred yard lead on William. This is what he needed: a challenge. He stared at the man's distant back and started sucking wind. It was far too early for his final push, but this was his only chance and William forgot his stitch and found a good rhythm.

  With a half mile to go his body felt good for the first time that morning, but then the other jogger suddenly stopped. The man in the grey sweat suit doubled over with what looked like a cramp in his side.

  "Damn! Silly little wimp," William thought uncharitably.

  In less than a minute, he breezed by the jogger and pretended not to notice that it was Captain Hadley of the Dallas. Being on patrol sure did limit one's ability to exercise, he reflected.

  William finished the turn at the top of the pear-shaped island, looked down the long east side of it, and could see the Dallas at its moorings. The sweep of her lines were long and clean and William wanted her badly. He loved these runs in the morning and always tried to end them just in front of where the big Coast Guard Cutters sat moored.

  At that moment, he realized his breathing had become easier and that meant he was slacking again. He kicked it in, for his final sprint but there was just not that much left in the tank, and he came puffing up to where the Dallas lay in the water, at a time of forty-one minutes and thirty-six seconds.

  "Damn, I'm getting old."

  His breath came up in huge gusts and the sweat drained down his body as if he had just stepped from a shower. He wandered halfway up the pier, wanting to get a better look at the Dallas, but then rememb
ered that Captain Hadley would be along in moments and so turned for home, not wanting to embarrass the man.

  He could now start thinking about his day and figured it was going to be another long one. If Gayle really knew anything about the military, the day would have been referred to, as M-Day+ 1, and she would've had objectives and plans for this day as well. Part of him rejoiced that she didn't.

  Primarily, there would be unpacking, but at some point, he was definitely going to give Lieutenant James Andre another call.

  James ran the service management office for the island and he had insisted that the boiler in the house was new and in perfect condition; it was most certainly not.

  2

  When William woke up that morning, the thermostat read forty-eight degrees; it was actually warmer outside the house than in. He checked to see if the settings on the thermostat were properly set and they were. After waiting for a few moments for the sound of the boiler to kick in, he grew impatient and went to the nearest radiator, he found it almost ice cold.

  "What the hell?"

  He had gone straight down to the basement at that point and it was then that his day became...weird. Entering the room, he reached out to give the light switch a casual flick and the room blazed, brightly lit for a millisecond, like the flash from a camera and then went dark.

  Standing in the doorway with one hand on the switch and the other balled into a fist, he froze in place. He didn't believe in ghosts, he was far too rational, but in the hundredth of a second that the light was on, he thought he saw something. It had seemed to be a great black figure outlined against the boiler. William's breath caught in his throat; he waited one second, then another, his jaw clenched and set firm; he stood unmoving.