Bleak History

by John Shirley

  “Koeffel is coming,” Helman said, half whispering to Loraine. “Do not speak of this to him. He knows some things, but...very little about CCA. He is almost useless to us now. We're going into a critical new stage of the process.”

  But her mind was spinning around what he'd said a few moments before. ''You're to be our interface person. Our liaison. “

  What had he meant by that?

  And before that...

  “If it stops working, it just wight be that the huwan world will spin out of control. “ w Quite suddenly, as Dr. Helman walked away from her to intercept Koeffel, she wanted badly to leave this place.

  ***

  THAT SAME DAY, BUT far to the south. A park, late afternoon, in Brooklyn.

  Bleak and Cronin walking along the path. Muddy was running along ahead of them, barking at a maple tree full of chirping blackbirds.

  It was funny, Bleak thought, how small city parks were all pretty much the same, with a few old trees and a worn-out baseball field and whatever the fashion in playground climbing toys was—but you didn't feel “I've seen too many of those parks” the way you did about Starbucks or McDonald's. Each one had its own life; its own markings, like an old man's face. Like Cronin's face.

  “I sometimes say, 'Ach, this boy is crazy,' to you, Gabriel, but I know what you see is real,” Cronin said softly.

  Muddy was crouched under the maple tree barking at the birds; hundreds of them sang dissonantly in the tree, some perennial blackbird ritual.

  “They used to do that sort of thing, those birds, gathering that way to sing together, in the spring, but nature is all confused now,” Cronin said, shading his eyes to look up.

  “The time may come,” Bleak said, “when I have to tell you more about that world—about the Hidden.” As he said “the Hidden,” Muddy's barking persistence finally dislodged the birds from the tree, so that the whole black flock wheeled around the park, chirping wildly as it went, before returning, taking up their perches on the maple's branches again.

  Cronin chuckled sadly and shook his head. “Soon enough, I'll know all about it. I'm old, and not feeling like I hold to this world too well. People think they would want to live forever, but old age helps give us some... some appreciation of death.”

  Bleak looked at him. “Are you sick? I mean...is something...?”

  Cronin shrugged. “Nothing special.”

  Bleak suspected Cronin had chosen those words carefully. Nothing special. It wasn't exactly lying.

  “Why,” Cronin asked, “do you have to tell me more about this Hidden of yours?”

  Bleak sighed. “There are things happening—a new opening in the north. Things coming through. Danger coming down. Me, I seem to be right in the middle of it, though I don't know why. And it i could affect you. And—something else. A man told me my brother might be alive.”

  Cronin looked at him with arched brows. “Vut is dis?” His accent reappearing in his startlement.

  “He might be a kind of permanent guest of the government. And I don't mean prison. Not exactly.”

  “I see. I thoughtyou were upset.” Cronin was articulating his English carefully now. “You seemed worried. You know—I think you sometimes try too hard to hide from that hidden world. You use it—but then you turn your back on it.”

  Bleak looked at him in surprise. How did Cronin know that? He'd never talked about it that much with him. But he was a shrewd old man.

  “But when you get closer to that hidden world—as an old man does”—Cronin shrugged—”you see that things in this world mean less, because they are so temporary. The suffering here is bad, people got to try to help. But to take it too seriously? No. Because this is just between then and there. The Hidden, what you call it—that is just where the ghosts live for a while. You said that once, yes? It's not...what would you say...beyond time?”

  “No. It's kind of between time and eternity. It's where this world and the next one overlap, I guess. It stores up life energy—seems like it encourages life to find its way out of matter. The more life there is, the more it can encourage.” Bleak shrugged, a little embarrassed at explaining anything to Cronin, who was in many ways far more wise. “That's the impression I always got.” Though he'd never again managed to contact the being he'd thought of as Mike the Talking Light, he had spoken to lesser spirits, cogent enough to talk, including one that claimed to be the magician Eliphas Levi. And they had told him some things. “But it's also a kind of warehouse for spirits that aren't sorted out.”

  “So, for them, this thing, the Hidden, is a waiting room. There is great power there, but it is still a waiting room. The real thing, the eternal thing, is what is beyond your Hidden. Think on that eternal thing, Gabe, and you will find the strength to fight anything in this world with so much yetzer ra. That is what kept us going in the camps. That, and one another. But always: this too shall pass. You read tm Greeks—what is it Heraclitus says, about the river—you cannot step into the same one twice. It always changes and flows, Gabe. That makes me thirsty, saying that! Now—shall we get a glass of beer? Enough with the chutzpadik from me, talking about such things. I know a bar where they will let Muddy come in. Their beer is not as good as mine, but it is still beer.... Do you know, I've been arguing with Lev about beer, he says some is kosher, I say it is all kosher—I don't want to shock him by telling him I am not so concerned with kosher—but he says barley, if it has barley, and I say...”

  ***

  THE FOLLOWING MORNING. In a hotel in lower Manhattan.

  Bleak lay in bed, in the small room, not quite awake but aware that he was dreaming. And Isaac Preiss, Cronin's son, was speaking to him. Isaac, who had been killed.

  In the dream they were walking a patrol together, down a yellow-dirt track between rows of low clay and stone houses, both wearing Kevlar under their Rangers jackets. They were in a small town in Afghanistan, near the border with Pakistan. Isaac was a compact, dark-eyed man with heavy black brows and, usually, a taut, ironic smile—a smile that Bleak later saw in Cronin. Sergeant Bleak was carrying an M4 carbine assault rifle with grenade launcher; Lieutenant Preiss was carrying an M16A2 5.56 mm rifle: lightweight, air-cooled, gas-operated, magazine fed—simple. A desert-yellow LAV-25 trundled along ahead of them, about fifty feet, the gunner swiveling his M242 25 mm chain MG, and Bleak was thinking that it might be better if the vehicle dropped back to provide more cover, intel had Taliban operating within five miles.

  It was a cold day, almost sunless, and when you did see the sun, it was a white, heatless orb screened through cloud. The place smelled of stock animals, a smell that Isaac disliked. But Bleak liked it. He'd made friends with a mule owned by a friendly.

  Four other Rangers were on patrol, about thirty yards behind. Isaac outranked Bleak but he liked to walk with him, and talk. Mostly it was Isaac who talked, of his father, his cousin—a pretty girl he thought would be good for Bleak to meet, when they were back in the States—and how what had happened to his dad's family had led him to read about World War II as a kid, which led to his i thinking about a military career, which led to this. “And what did my dad want me to do? A German Jew, what do you think? He wanted me to study the arts, or be a doctor, one of the two. My mother was horrified, I can tell you, when I joined. My dad understood better, but...And you know, the funny thing is, I think I'd have been happier as a doctor. My mother was right. I can't stand it when my mother is right about something, God bless her yenta soul.”

  Bleak sensed someone watching him, a little behind and to the right, from a small window. He knew it was a man. The man wasn't a friendly, but that didn't mean he was Taliban.

  He looked from the man's point of view, seeing himself walking along, about forty feet away, with Isaac—and he didn't see a gun sight or crosshairs in the point of view. Which was encouraging

  but didn't prove anything. He switched back to his own point of view and thought, Still, this'd be a good place for an ambush.

  “That's right,” Isaac said, w
ith that dry chuckle of his, “it's the same place the ambush happened. You're reliving it—the part that happens about three minutes before the ambush. Us walking along talking. But I'm changing the conversation. The ambush, see, is what your mind returns to first, when you think about me-and so here we are.”

  “I'll tell the others, we'll spread out, Isaac—”

  “Gabe, you're not listening—this is a dream. You can't stop the ambush. It happened years ago. You've been tormenting yourself because your gifts enabled you to see behind you, to create fields around you to divert shrapnel from the mortar—”

  “That's right, that's it, I remember now, they're going to mortar us. Isaac, we have to call the armor back, we have to—”

  Isaac dropped his left hand from his weapon, held it loosely in his other hand. “You see, I'm not even fire-ready, here.” He put his hand on Bleak's shoulder. His touch felt real, not like a dream. “It's all right. It's just a dream. Maybe this dream is confusing—but I tried some other ways to contact you, couldn't get through. Trying to call you back, really. You keep calling me to the world of time.”

  “I'm sorry...” Bleak felt as if he might start sobbing. Isaac was dead. He didn't want to start i sobbing in front of Isaac and the men. “I didn't mean to draw you back.”

  “Don't worry about it. You're not doing it consciously.”

  “What's it like, after...1 mean—I can see into it. But I can't feel what it's like.”

  “Can't describe it to someone in the temporal world. It's...being outside of time. It's much better outside time, Gabriel, believe me. Here in the stream of time, it's like I have to try to dog-paddle in quicksand, to keep my head up.”

  “Is it really you? Or a 'dream you,' Isaac?”

  “It shouldn't be me? Look, it's me, here I am. We only got about a minute before the ambush and I can't stay here in your dream long. I got to get to the point! First, Gabriel, stop blaming yourself...for being yourself. You were issued your gifts by the supreme being, so keep them oiled and use them when under fire. Second, tell my dad I'm okay. He's gotten so he doesn't doubt you anymore, he's ready to listen. Third, I'm not permitted to tell you certain things directly, because you might misunderstand and go the wrong direction...but I can tell you that your friend is your enemy and your enemy is your friend and love is part of the whole mixture.”

  “Do you know anything about my brother? What's going on, Isaac? Is he alive? Why are they—”

  “Listen—yeah, he's alive, and that was the fourth point, you are in way over your head. There's a thing whose name I don't even want to mention. It's broken through, and your brother is—oh, shit, I took too long, there's no time—or there's too much time—I can't hang on, Gabe—”

  A familiar whine, a whistle, warning yells from behind, and Bleak instinctively reached out with his energy field, formed a shield just in time—then the mortar struck and the shrapnel that would have hit an ordinary man spun past him, but he still caught a lot of the shock wave and was thrown against the back wall of the nearest house, bounced to fall on his right side, lying on the ground with his head ringing, and heard the familiar deep-toned chatter of a Kalashnikov. He looked up and saw Isaac, Cronin's son, spinning around, the Kevlar holding, but shrapnel had sliced right through his neck, releasing a jet of dark red. Bleak forced himself to stand, glimpsed bits of Isaac's spine... caught the smell of his blood...

  “Isaac!”

  Bleak sat bolt upright, shaking, shouting the name of Cronin's son.

  And was back in the hotel room. Fully awake now. Glad to be away from that place. Relieved. And ashamed of the relief. All but one other guy in the foot patrol died that day, killed by mortar strikes and small-arms fire.

  Bleak had caught a mujahadeen running with a Kalashnikov—and Bleak shot him dead, no hesitation. Shouting about Isaac, though this man hadn't likely killed Isaac himself, he had no mortar. Bleak had started to walk away. Then someone ran from the nearest house, running up to the dead man, yelling in grief and firing a carbine wildly, one bullet creasing Bleak's side. And Bleak had shot him down too—right through the head. And a moment later he realized the second one was a teenager, probably the dead man's son.

  And Bleak had felt ashamed...that he felt nothing much about killing the kid.

  Then he'd just turned away and headed through the dirt alley, tried to catch the mortarman—and never found him. The LAV-25 found two other Taliban sniping on a roof and shot them to pieces. The house with them.

  Bleak had found what was left of his men—three of them ripped up by a direct mortar hit. Mostly just lumps of oozing flesh.

  Get up, he ordered himself. Get the hell out of bed and do something else. And do not have a drink. Don't go back to starting the day drinking.

  Hands still shaking, Bleak got dressed, drank metallic-tasting water from the tap, and went down to buy a street phone.

  They were stolen cell phones, usually. But no one would know to listen in to him, on that line, if he used a random cell phone, and he needed to make some calls. He had to earn money. He had to keep busy.

  Drinking Turkish coffee at a table near the window, in Ata-turk's Coffee Shop on the corner of Avenue B, eating a gooey baklava, blinking in the morning sunlight coming through the flyspecked window...Bleak tried to remember the dream. Tried to decide...

  “First, stop blaming yourself for being yourself. You were issued your gifts by the supreme being, so keep them oiled and use them when under fire. Second, tell my dad I'm okay. He's gotten so he doesn't doubt you anymore, he's ready to listen. Third, I'm not permitted to tell you certain things directly...but I can tell you that your friend is your enemy and your enemy is your friend and love is part of the whole mixture. “

  Was it just himself talking to himself? Was that just dream psychology—or real advice? Or had it been, actually, Isaac Preiss?

  A kind of taste, a scentless scent, a feel, went with encountering one of the spirits of the dead in this world. When he thought about it, yeah, that taste had been there. And it had all been too rational, too clearly articulated, to be like a mere dream.

  So it had really been Isaac. What had he meant about his brother? About Sean?

  “Hey, yo, blood, you wanta buya cell phone?”

  Bleak looked up at the tall, skinny black guy in a threadbare New York Knicks fan jersey. He was twitchy, missing a front tooth, had tweak marks on his face and arms, and his eyes were going yellow. Alternating, once a second, between smiling and frowning.

  Bleak surprised him by saying, “Yeah—I do wanta buy a cell phone.”

  “Uh—that right? Forty dollar.”

  “Ten.”

  “Thirty.”

  “Fifteen.”

  “Twenty lowest I go.”

  Bleak took a twenty out of a coat pocket, held it up with one hand, kept a grip on it, extending the empty hand. The turfy slapped a small cell phone in Bleak's palm and took the twenty. “You want anything else, chief? I can get you rocks, I can get you yella bag—”

  “No, thanks, bro. This cell phone better work, though.”

  “Worked a minute ago, I was using it all morning. Try it, I stay right here.”

  Bleak was tempted to try it by calling Wendy. He was lonely; still feeling hollow, after the dream. He wanted the kind of comfort a woman could offer. She might still be at that number in Queens— maybe she'd digested what had happened by now. But she was probably asleep at this hour. She was a stripper, during the summer; wouldn't be up early.

  A stripper with a BA in English, going for her master's. Sexy, good conversation. But he'd spooked her. She'd talked as if she was just fascinated with the supernatural, till he'd exposed her channeler as a charlatan. Wendy hadn't minded that so much, really—it was when he'd said, “You want to see something from the other world...” He'd reached into the Hidden—and infused the ghost of a little boy with enough energy that she could see it herself. That had scared her. She'd accused him of dosing her drink. They'd parted uneasily.
>
  Should have known better...

  He'd never really felt close, really close, to any woman. Intimate, yes, up to a point—but never deeply bonded. Never united. Something was always missing. Something he couldn't quite identify. Just the “it's not her, either” feeling. She was never quite the right one...as if he was comparing her to someone he'd never met.

  Waste of time to call Wendy. Or any other woman. Business. He had a number written down for the Second Chance Bail Bonds outfit that had offered him work. If he was careful, maybe he could get paid without the CCA tracing him. The hot cell phone was the first step.

  “You gonna try that phone? I got to go.” The turfy was fingering the twenty.

  “Hold on. Gonna test it.” Bleak called Cronin. The phone was ringing. “Yeah, seems to be working, see you later.”

  “Hey, yo, blood, you sure you don't want—”

  “I'm sure. I don't want to end up selling stolen cell phones on fucking Avenue B, man. Now do yourself a favor and fuck off.” And Bleak gave the guy a look that drove him out the door. “7a, hello?”

  “Cronin? It's me. On a phone that should be...never mind. You okay? How's Muddy?”

  “We're okay. Big thing, you contacting me two days in a row. So? There's something? I'm an old man, I got to pee every two seconds. Can't stay on this phone.”

  “I won't keep you, I just...” Should he really tell him about Isaac? “I wanted to tell you this in person but...I don't think I should come around now, until all this...stuff...is cleared up.”