by Jack Martin
“No,” he argued, “no, it’s not the fact. It’s the meaning. It’s—it’s just me—telling myself . . .”
His mirror self did not comment.
Never get any help out of that son of a bitch, he thought. Look at him. He never shaves, he hasn’t had a haircut in three months, his fingernails are getting long—and his skin. Is that skin or is it wax? He hasn’t seen the sun in how long?
He reached out and poked himself in the chest for emphasis.
The medicine cabinet door swung closed, shifting the view in the mirror by a few degrees. As the mirror moved it took in the rest of the bathroom, the tub and shower, the door to the hall and the living room beyond.
Beyond the open door, a dark shadow moved away swiftly and silently between the sofa and television set.
Max gripped the sides of the basin and steeled himself. His heart began to thump in his throat, the veins on the sides of his neck standing out. He tried, but he could not make himself let go and turn around. He clenched his eyes shut and counted his heartbeats.
When he opened his eyes, the mirror view of that part of his living room was utterly motionless.
“There’s no one here,” he told himself. “My head’s playing tricks on me again. Checked the front door. It’s double-locked. Only—only Masha. Poor, darling, dead Masha . . .”
The dead don’t walk. They don’t just put down their legs and walk. Do they? No. Of course not. A dead woman in your bed means—there’s a dead woman in your bed. That’s what it means. Dead.
Wasn’t that right?
Call the police, he thought. Call someone.
“I called Harlan,” he said. “He’ll be here soon. He’ll know what it means. He knows how to decode anything.”
I’ll stay right here until he comes.
Right here in the goddamn bathroom. Right? Right. Lock the door. This door has got to have a lock on it.
Turn around. Check it out. Do it.
That’s it, kick the door shut. Now slide the end table under the doorknob. You got it.
Now you wait.
What if Harlan never comes?
Well, you’ll have to live out as much of your remaining existence as you can bear right here. You’ve got water—you don’t need food, do you? No. Not for a long time. You can breathe through the vent in the ceiling, entertain yourself by making up a TV show in the mirror, you can carry on conversations to your heart’s content with the guy in the striped bathrobe who’s on right now, he’ll keep you on your toes, and you know you can never be sure what he’ll say or do next.
Until Harlan comes.
He’ll be here. He hasn’t let you down yet, has he? Good old Harlan.
Till then, do yourself a favor. How about a bath?
That ought to be easy enough. Why not? Be good to yourself for once. Do it right. Nobody else is exactly pampering you at the moment. You owe it to him, to the guy in the mirror. Give him a break. Go all the way.
Max reached for the plastic bottle of Algemarin bubble bath that a one-nighter had left here more months ago than he could remember. He got the water hot enough to take his mind off of anything and everything.
He squirted the bubble bath into the swirling whirlpool. The water whipped up into a blue spume. He stood watching it through the rising mist.
He still did not care for the mound of whirlpool aeration. He shut it off, waited for the waters to subside.
The mirror was steamed up so there was no longer anyone to talk to. He was on his own. Maybe he always had been without knowing it. The people around him during the day, his staff, helpers, lovers—maybe they were all illusions, extensions of himself, fantasy wish-fulfillment projections.
If so, then so be it. Get a grip on yourself, he thought, and take charge. Shape and control your world from now on. No one else is going to do it for you. Should have been done long ago. If Harlan doesn’t show, that will only confirm it. You can’t rely on anyone but yourself. So get ready. You’ve got a lot ahead of you.
He stepped to the tub, opened his robe.
There was a sound in the other room.
A pounding. It transmitted through the thin walls, vibrating the bathroom door, the knob—
Harlan! It had to be. Old reliable Harlan.
Maybe he can’t clean up any of your messes for you—no one can. But he can give you independent verification, so you’ll know whether or not you’re crazy. He can give you proof.
He opened the door.
A great cloud of steam billowed into the hall, obliterating the view of the living room.
Just as well.
He unlatched the front door and swung it wide.
For a moment he couldn’t see anything. Then the steam cleared and a young man in a red plaid shirt and peaked hair was standing there, hands in pockets.
“Well, here I am, patrón,” said Harlan.
He crossed the threshold, a 35mm. and BC unit dangling from the strap around his neck, wisps of steam catching in his clothes. He plucked his glasses off and wiped them. His eyes were crusted with sleep.
“Come on in,” said Max, pulling him inside.
“Camera,” said Harlan. “Flashgun. What’s up? You wanna be a centerfold?”
Max said, “I want you to go into my bedroom and I want you to take a look at what’s in my bed. Uncover it. Don’t be shy. I want pictures.”
Harlan put his glasses back on, magnifying the skepticism in his eyes. “Pictures of—of what’s in your bed?”
“Yeah. Do it.” Max stood aside and ushered him into the living room.
“Sure. Ah, okay.”
Harlan hesitated, wiped his hands on his cords, then trudged across the living room.
Max watched him disappear into the bedroom.
The living room was scattered with the usual disorder. There were still shadows hanging from the ceiling, but dawn was breaking outside and the first light of morning projected a clear blue patina over the furniture. Max could see his way around now and there was definitely no one lurking alongside the sofa or television set. He retied his robe and left the hallway.
He heard Harlan moving around. He could see the end of the bed from here, the covers hanging away from the edge of the mattress. He did not see the flashgun go off. He waited.
Harlan came back out. His head was down and he looked troubled.
“Well?”
“Ah, Max,” said Harlan sadly. “I—I don’t see anything.”
Max stared at him.
“Ah, you didn’t just want me to shoot your bed, pillows, sheets . . . did you?” He stood there zipping the f-stop ring on his camera back and forth.
Max tore past him.
The bed was as he had left it. Sheets, pillows, bunched-up quilt. He ripped them away.
Nothing.
It was impossible. Max searched the floor, the space beneath the bed, the side against the wall . . .
“Max,” said Harlan from the doorway, “are you in some kind of drug warp? I’ve got friends who can help. Bridey told me she came by a few days ago and you were—”
Max rose from his hands and knees. “Did you tape VIDEODROME last night?”
“Yeah.” Harlan was taken aback by the question. “If it was transmitted,” he said pleasantly, “the machine would have caught it. Especially since nothing was left to chance. I noticed that you—”
“I’ll meet you in the lab in one hour. I want to see it.”
“Jeez, Max . . .” Harlan scratched his head. Specks of dandruff settled on his shoulders like blue snow. “It’s not even seven a.m. I’ve got a couple of things I gotta—”
Max rose to his full height and screamed, “Harlan, I’m not just fucking around, do you understand me?”
“Yeah? Well, fuck you!” Harlan’s eyes bugged out against his glasses and he snarled, “I’m not just some fucking servo-mechanism you can switch on and off! You want me to—to fall outa bed and run around like an asshole, you tell me what I’m doing it for! Otherwise, I’ll see you dur
ing office hours, patrón.” He all but spat the last word.
Max rubbed his face, nodded, took a breath, another, forced himself to walk over to his friend of so long and put his arm around him.
“Yeah,” he said reasonably. “No. Harlan, you’re right. It’s momentum. I—I’m running like an express train here. I don’t know how to stop . . .”
He coaxed Harlan back out to the hallway.
“Look. I’ll meet you in the lab in one hour, okay? And then we’ll see if we pulled in any VIDEODROME last night. And I’ll tell you what’s going on. Everything. I promise. Okay?”
Max opened the front door.
Harlan closed his camera case and reconsidered. He said, “Hey, I’m sorry I freaked out on you, patrón. I don’t work with you for the money. You know that.”
“I know that,” said Max lightly, patronizingly. “With pirates it’s never just the money, is it?” He concocted a tired laugh. “You want a cup of coffee?”
Harlan wavered.
Max rattled the doorknob. “No, look, I’ll meet you in the lab in one hour. Got it?”
Max locked the door and returned to the bathroom.
He splashed cold water on his face and stared into the mirror. He hardly recognized himself. His pupils were dilated like portholes into some other world.
The corners of the mirror were blurred with webs of cold steam, and beyond his own dripping face the edges of the bathroom were out-of-focus. He thought he saw steel loops mounted on a soft, sweating wall, a squat cabinet with knobs—
He whirled around.
The silver rings on the wall held only long white towels. The cabinet was an overflowing clothes hamper.
He grabbed a towel and mopped his face.
The foam in the tub had gone flat. He dipped his hand into the water. Tepid. He decided to forget the bath and reached in to pull the plug. He inserted his arm up to the elbow.
And froze.
There was something under the surface.
Something alive and yet not alive.
He yanked his arm out with a whoosh and slammed back against the sink. The porcelain edge caught him across the kidneys. He grunted in pain.
A bubbling sound filled the room and echoed off the tiles.
As he watched in disbelief, a TeleRanger console TV set rose up out of the water, out of the blue Algemarin foam like a hulking electronic Venus on the half-shell. The set swelled, breathing and snorkling as befitted a marine creature of its substantial size.
On its screen was a close-up of a woman, an anguished expression wracking her features, a leather strap tight around her wrinkled neck.
Masha.
“They killed me, Maxie,” she choked as crackling blue foam dripped down, distorting the screen. “They killed me! I wasn’t supposed to tell you about Brian O’Blivion . . .”
Max stood his ground. “Fuck off, will you?” he yelled. “Just fuck off! You’re a hallucinatory self-projection. I know you! You’re nothing!”
“I didn’t lie to you, Maxie. VIDEODROME is death.”
“Shut up!”
“VIDEODROME is death . . .” She fought her bonds. “I didn’t lie to you. They killed me. They killed me . . .”
Max fell to his knees at the side of the tub and battered the set with his fists. Each blow sank deeper into the flesh of the TV, into the screen, the speaker grille, the cabinetry itself. With each blow Masha screamed.
He gave up and collapsed, sobbing wretchedly, he reached out blindly and held tightly, desperately to the set as though adrift at sea, Ishmael clinging to a floating coffin.
Masha gazed down at him. She said comfortingly, “That’s better. So much better. It will be all right, Maxie. Listen to me, Max. Look at me. LOOK AT ME.”
Max let go and fell back.
Masha’s face beamed from the picture tube, no longer bruised and beaten but beatific now. The bonds that held her to the physical plane ceased to exist. Her visage floated in limbo against a blank background, loving, angelic.
“You’re living in a new world now. Things are different here. And in this new world, you must listen to me. I’m the video word made flesh, Maxie.”
Her face dissolved into the ether and was transformed into the face of Brian O’Blivion, also floating in timeless space.
“I’m the video word made flesh . . .”
Max’s own face was illuminated by the growing brightness of the screen. He felt its cool, blissful radiance drying the tears on his cheeks.
He climbed to his feet as the set ascended out of the foam. It bumped the cracked ceiling. Max, naked, bathed in its benign glow, gazed up at it longingly as at a great mountain stretching into the clouds. He felt that if he tried hard enough, if he could make himself pure enough, he might continue to rise with it, leaving the room and this petty world behind.
As if in a trance, he mouthed the words, repeating after them:
“I’m the video word made flesh.”
Part Five:
The New Flesh
Chapter Thirteen
Max paused in front of the Civic TV building long enough to light a cigarette.
The wick of his Zippo incandesced into a brilliant, blinding glare. He averted his eyes in pain.
He was not used to it yet.
The plate glass window was streaked with dew. But in its dark, reflective plane he saw a representation of himself standing with one hand in the pocket of his leather jacket, the other holding the silver lighter, its blazing orange-and-blue flame as bright as a torch.
And on his shoulders, the mantis-head skull-piece of the image accumulator.
At this hour of the morning there were no pedestrians on the sidewalk and very few automobiles. That made it easier. In his present condition he resembled an escapee from a grade-B science fiction movie. Somebody would probably holler cop.
He panned up to take in the building. The upper stories captured the rising sun in its fierceness, the flaming wafer of it resurrected once more in the sky. It was too much so soon. He spread his hand over his eyes.
His hand went through the visor.
There was no visor, no helmet.
In the plate glass he saw now only the reflection of his bare head. At the same time the glare subsided to a normal level. His own eyes stared back at him like dark bullet holes burned into his face.
He threw away the cigarette, sorted through his keys, found the one to the main entrance and let himself in.
Virtually no one was here yet. The night technician would be in Master Control, still riding the STL for the graveyard shift. But if Max avoided the hall . . .
He got to the stairway using a circuitous route and descended to the lab.
The padlocks were unlatched.
Max’s ace engineer was resting his buttocks against the bench, waiting. The lab had the stony chill of a crypt. The ancient furnace hadn’t had time to do its work.
“Come on in.”
The main videocorder was open behind Harlan’s head, but its reels were empty.
“You looked at the tape already?”
“No. But I’m sure last night’s performance would be my favorite episode. The one starring Max Renn.”
“What? Did you bring it in on the dish or not?”
“Not exactly. After all, I wouldn’t have recognized you in that kinky outfit you were wearing, now would I?”
“Harlan, cut the crap. I want to see the transmission. You got all of it?”
Harlan sighed. He said sadly, “There was no tape.”
There was a quality to his voice which Max had not heard before. Gone was any semblance of snappy repartee or the jaunty, beleagured determination that went with his pirate’s role. His defenses were down and there was no longer any attempt at charm. The mask was off.
Max looked at him as if for the first time. Who is this guy I’ve been working with for so long? he wondered.
“There was no VIDEODROME transmission last night?”
“Not last night,” said Harl
an soberly. “Not ever.”
“What are you talking about?”
There was a knock on the door.
Harlan looked up joylessly.
“I’m out of my depth now, patrón.” He slumped from the workbench and crossed to the door, stretching it out as long as he could. “I had to bring in the reinforcements.”
The door opened.
“Max,” said Barry Convex. In a three-piece suit. Even at this hour.
Lift the scales from my eyes, thought Max. He planted his feet firmly, set his weight and nodded with a bitter smirk.
“An intriguing combination.” He flicked his eyes between Harlan and Convex, an unlikely duo if ever there was one. “Very interesting.”
Your move, fuckers, he thought. I’m here. I’ve always been here. I always will be here. You think you can say the same?
Convex, ever the personable salesman, said, “Don’t let me interrupt.”
Max affected bemused detachment. “I think I was saying something like, ‘What are you talking about?’ ”
Harlan withdrew to his workbench and reconnected with his VTR, his security blanket.
“I was playing you tapes, Max. Pre-recorded cassettes.”
“The show wasn’t transmitted? You didn’t track it and lock onto it?”
Harlan shuffled his feet.
“It wasn’t an accident that I got to see VIDEODROME,” Max volunteered. “You made it happen. They sent you to me. You’ve been with them all along.”
Harlan said, “It was coming from an Accumicon playback module we installed in the furnace room next to the lab. It’s too dangerous to transmit. VIDEODROME has never been transmitted on an open broadcast circuit. Not yet.”
“But why? Why go through all that?”
“We needed a guinea pig. Somebody who would respond to VIDEODROME. And we want Channel 83. It’s small, but it’s a start.”
Harlan knew; all along he knew.
Max turned to the salesman, who was standing by on the sidelines where he couldn’t get hurt. Letting Harlan do his dirty work for him. Watching us both battle it out so he can pick up the spoils. We’ve both been manipulated. Does Harlan realize that?
“I guess Barry sent you here, what? Two years ago? It has been two years, hasn’t it, Harlan?”