by Sean Platt
Jim laughed and looked at John, trying to draw him into friendly conversation, but he may as well have been alone. John just stared out the window, casting an occasional glance at Jim, more curious than irritated, though laced with something else Jim couldn’t place.
He’d seen the look before, mostly exaggerated on the expressions of bad guys in cheesy B-movies. Same look on John’s face, but it didn’t fit, like a turtle shell on a cat. The guy may have been anal with a capital A, and a bit of a douche the past few days, but he didn’t have a mean bone in his body.
“You know,” Jim said, “I’m not even really sure this is Jade. Wally always gets these cool names from his brother: Mace Windu, Blue Dream, Hippie Crippler, but hell, how would we know? I think his brother probably buys crap weed and changes the names. You really should give this a try,” he offered the pipe to John. “I bet it makes you feel a lot better than you’re expecting in less time than you imagine it could. And without the hangover.” Jim smiled. “Temporary, but nice while it lasts.”
Jim flicked his lighter. The quiet crackle of curling leaves sent a thin plume of bitter smoke swirling through the air. He drew the smoke into his lungs with a double barrel inhale, then held his breath for an impossibly long time, partly showing off, then blew the smoke in a frothy jet that settled against the glass like frost.
“Good ... shit.” Jim said, pounding his chest. “Come on, man, lighten up. Give it a try. You’ve got no idea what you’re missing. And seriously, this is the last of my stash. I should get a blue ribbon or medal for even offering.”
John narrowed his eyes and held his gaze, long enough to make Jim think he was about to get a lecture. Finally, John held out his hand, palm open.
“What do I do?”
Jim grinned ear to ear. He should have handed John the pipe and pot right there, but that wasn’t his style under the best of circumstances, and certainly wouldn’t do when delivering the details of such an important process to a weed virgin.
“Believe it or not,” Jim said, “there’s a science to smoking. You want to get as high as you can with the smallest amount possible. Forget what you’ve been told by The Man; marijuana is a fucking miracle plant. You can grow it, chop it, make paper, wood, fabric or whatever. Plus, of course, you can smoke it, cook it, even simmer it in oil or steep it in alcohol to prime it for ingestion.” Jim looked at John with professorial authority. “Now, it’s not water soluble, so if you eat it raw, you’ll only end up scrubbing your insides with a loofah you have to pay for by the ounce. Believe me, bro; a bran muffin is way cheaper. You ever smoke a regular cigarette?”
John took a second to think, then shook his head no.
“Too bad, because it’s pretty much the same thing, except when you’re done smoking ganja, you feel happy and creative, instead of swearing you'll quit tomorrow. I don’t have rolling papers so I’m using this.” Jim held the pipe between two fingers, then refilled the bowl with a few more dried leaves.
“Light it, then inhale. Like this.” Jim drew on the pipe’s stem, pulling the smoke into his lungs with another bottomless breath, then blew it out, turning his head and sending the plume into the hallway behind them. “Hold it in as long as you like, then let it out. When your mind starts swimming, it’s time to stop smoking. Keep going, and it’s just a waste of weed, especially when it comes to the hydroponic shit. Of course, there are a million theories about the ideal length of time to hold your smoke, how big a hit you should take, whether you should stand or sit, and just about any variable you can think of. But I like to keep it simple — breathe in, breathe out, and be merry.”
If that wasn’t a bumper sticker already, Jim thought it should be. Breathe in, breathe out, be merry.
Jim sprinkled a few more fresh leaves into the basin, then handed John the pipe and lighter. John put it to his lips, flicked the lighter and lit the leaves as Jim had done.
“Since you’re not used to smoking, you’re probably gonna hack a bit, no big,” Jim said. “Just hold it in as long as you can.”
Jim was enjoying the look on John’s face, somewhere in the middle of ignorance and intrigue, when the bones beneath his face suddenly shifted.
What the fuck? Jim was startled, and jumped back, unable to hide his reaction.
This is weed, not ‘shrooms. I have to be imagining things.
John blew a stream of smoke into the air, then placed the stem to his lips and lit the basin again, ignoring Jim’s reaction. John was holding his breath for a few seconds when the bones in his face started to move in a wave beneath the surface of his skin a second time.
“Dude, what the fuck? Your face just ... ”
Jim took a step back, staring at John.
“What ... the?” he stammered.
John’s eyes widened, but his lips were sealed in a rising smile.
Jim fell back toward the hotel room door behind him, then turned and put his hand on the handle. He turned the knob, then heard a voice from behind him.
“Dude, what the fuck? Your face just ...What ... the?”
It was Jim’s voice, as if the thing that wasn’t John was trying it on for size.
Jim tried to scream, but the attempt died inside him as the thing grabbed him by the back of his neck so hard, he thought it would rip his spine right out of his body like in Mortal Combat or something.
Jim whimpered as the John the monster spun him around and pushed him into the hotel room, threw him to the ground, and fell atop him, hand crushing Jim’s throat as Jim squirmed and struggled to break free.
“No escape,” the thing that wasn’t John said as it put a hand over Jim’s head and sent a sharp pain through his whole body.
Jim wanted to scream, beg for his life, say something! But he was paralyzed, unable to move, breathe, or even swallow. Panic coursed through him like fire, lighting his entire body with a million messages to run, flee, escape, fight, breathe, but his body ignored them all.
His open eyes began to dry out as the thing that wasn’t John bent down, picked him up, and threw him over his shoulders like a sack of laundry. Jim’s face bounced off of John’s back as he carried him into another room, then slung him into a tub. Jim’s head slammed into the bottom of the tub with a loud echo. He couldn’t feel the pain, but imagined there had to be a lot of blood.
He was fading.
As the world dimmed at the edges, the last thing he saw was the thing that was not John look down at him and close the shower curtain.
Seventy-Five
Edward Keenan
Ed’s headache worsened while he sat and waited for the “answer guy.”
His head pounded, and his memories continued to grow fuzzy. Mostly small things, like the street he lived on, the car he drove, his favorite brand of toothpaste. He could see them in his mind, but had to focus to draw them forth. However, the harder he focused, the more intense his headache grew. And the more his vision blurred.
He was beginning to wonder if he’d suffered some sort of head trauma in the plane crash. Unlike movies, where people were hit on the head and knocked out on a routine basis, with little to no lingering side effects, actual head trauma was different. A blow to the head could be initially dismissed while internal bleeding caused swelling in the skull, which could kill you.
I don’t wanna die like this.
I want to see Jade. And Teagan.
Ed decided that no matter who came into the room to see him next, he would demand to see Jade. He had to know she was okay. And if Teagan wasn’t nearby, he would demand to know where she was, too. And he wanted proof.
Of course, he was hardly in a position to make demands. But he’d make them anyway. He could tell by how they handled his interrogation, that he was better trained than these people were. Given time, he could win them over through persuasion. The only question was whether his touch would be gentle or firm.
Assuming, of course, that the killer headache went away. And that he had enough time to work his magic.
Alone
time with the mirror had forced Ed to ponder some of the shit he’d done over the past few years. How he’d neglected his family. How he’d been ruthless in executing orders. How he’d let so much of his life pass him by with barely a memory set aside for posterity. And the worst part was, if anyone were to have asked Ed what things meant the most to him in life, he would never have said The Agency. Not if he were answering honestly.
The list would have comprised of his daughter, his wife, and living a normal family life. Not this shit.
He had no real past with Jade. He wasn’t about to miss his opportunity to build a future.
If they could get out of this place.
The door opened, and Sullivan entered.
“Are you ready, Mr. Keenan?”
“Yes,” Ed said.
Footsteps outside the door grew louder.
A man entered the room.
Ed’s heart nearly stopped beating.
He stared in confusion, unable to look away.
In front of Ed was a man who could have been his identical twin, looking exactly the same, except for much nicer fabric that hung from his frame.
Sullivan spoke, “Edward Keenan, meet Dr. Edward Keenan.”
To Be Continued
In YESTERDAY’S GONE: SEASON TWO
AUTHOR’S NOTE: DAVID WRIGHT
When I was a child in 1979, there was a TV show on NBC called Cliffhangers. Each week brought you three 20 minute segments of ongoing serials. One story was a horror tale about a vampire, the other was a sci-fi/western hybrid, and the last one, a mystery. I don’t remember the particulars of the stories. But I do remember how excited I got each week when the show was about to come on.
And how frustrated I got at the end of each segment when the announcer would tell you that the adventure would be continued next week.
“Arggghh!”
God, how I loved being teased and tormented by that show.
Of course, the network had the last laugh when after just 10 episodes, they cancelled Cliffhangers — before the series was even finished!
The ultimate, “ARGGGHH,” but not a good one.
THE GOOD “ARGGGHH”
Anyway, we’ve all had those “Arggghh!” moments when our favorite shows leave us hanging another week to see what happened. Or, in the case of a season ending cliffhanger, we’d have to wait a whole summer!
“ARRRRGGGGHHHH!!”
Sean and I love shows like these.
I’m guessing you love shows like these.
Whether we’re entrenched in The Wire, Breaking Bad, Battlestar Galactica, LOST, X-Files, Game of Thrones, Dexter, Deadwood, Mad Men, The Walking Dead, or any of the other great shows on TV, there’s nothing better than serials and their cliffhangers.
In 1996, Stephen King released The Green Mile as six monthly chap books, each of them around 100 pages, the first five ending with cliffhangers. King had me hooked from book one. I remember going to my local bookstore the minute it opened on the release date of each new edition. Then I raced home to devour the story like a bag of chips or cookies!
And it was so awesome as I tore through the pages. But then, once I reached the end, I felt the same kind of guilt as when I’d eaten a whole sleeve of cookies in one sitting.
That’s it? It’s over? No!! I knew I should’ve taken my time.
And the wait would begin for next month.
While writers have been doing serialized fiction forever, and I’d read a few serialized stories in magazines (and comic books), The Green Mile was my first experience with serialized storytelling in book form.
You never forget your first.
As a writer many years later, I loved the concept so much that I wanted to write a serial. But the odds of Sean and I selling a serial to a publisher seemed next to impossible. Big publishers weren’t publishing many serials from known writers. There was no way they’d take a shot on a couple of unknown authors.
SO WE WOULD HAVE TO FIND ANOTHER WAY…
Sean and I attempted to release our vampire thriller Available Darkness as serialized web fiction in 2008, posting chapters weekly on our blog. We drew a few readers, but most people emailed us saying the same thing:
“I hate reading on the web. When are you going to come out with a book?”
This was also the exact moment that we were drowning in work, trying to pay our bills. Putting a book out was not going to happen. So we reluctantly put Available Darkness on hold until we could finish it properly and release it as a book.
And then in 2010, eBooks and Print On Demand took off. Suddenly writers didn’t have to wait to be picked up by a publisher — they could reach out and find their readers. In 2011, we decided that we had to finish Available Darkness and get it out to the few loyal people we left hanging.
But we released it as a book, not a true serial.
Then, as we looked around at the self-publishing landscape, we saw an opportunity to do what we really wanted to do — write serialized fiction. Not many people were doing it with e-books at the time, and we read from many people saying the format wouldn’t work with the format.
We disagreed.
We saw e-books as the perfect vehicle for serials!
So we took a chance, and in the summer of 2011, we started writing Yesterday’s Gone: Season One.
And unlike 1996, you don’t have to drive to a bookstore to get the next copy. Instant downloads to your e-reader.
Our main inspiration in the page length and format was definitely Stephen King’s The Green Mile. But we were also taking direction from another source — TV.
We approach serialized fiction just like our favorite TV networks — delivering weekly character-driven serials that bring you to the edge of your seat and leave you hanging, week in and week out. We wrote “episodes” ranging from 14,000 - 25,000 words and collected six episodes into “season” compilations.
Fortunately, our gamble has paid off so far. We’ve found enough readers who like what we’re doing and are helping us keep our dream of writing serials alive.
NOW…
As I edit this introduction, it is now October 2013, and we’ve written six serials (with four seasons of Yesterday’s Gone alone, so far) and released more than 18 Dark Crossings short stories.
The publishing world has changed so much in just two years, that now mainstream publishers are starting to take serials seriously again. In fact, based on reader response to Yesterday’s Gone, Sean and I were signed to a book deal by 47North for two of our serials, Z 2134 and Monstrous!
So, thank you, Dear Reader, for taking a chance on our serials. While the publishing world may continue to change, we believe that things like character driven storytelling and thrilling stories will always have an audience.
We’re humbled and honored to have you with us on this journey.
Thank you for reading,
David W. Wright & Sean Platt
October 2013
AUTHOR’S NOTE: SEAN PLATT
The first book I remember reading was The Hobbit. Not that Grover’s, There’s a Monster at the End of This Book isn’t a real book, but The Hobbit lasted longer than a sneeze, I could feel its weight in my hand, and it left plenty of cool to ponder in the reader’s afterglow.
I was six. My mom had gone on and on about Tolkien’s masterpiece for as long as I could remember. She used words like magic, trolls, dragon, and elves, then insisted I’d love it when I “got older.” She may as well have said:
“Hey Seanie, you should really read The Hobbit right now if you want to understand all those snake in the grass jokes your older sisters are always laughing about.”
I found The Hobbit in our garage. My parents were in the house, my mom experimenting with new ways to flavor grease, my dad warming his hands in his pants in front of a ball game. I’d gone treasure hunting in the garage many times before, but this time was special.
I found two treasures: a hatchet minus its sheath, leaning against the rotting wall, and an old paperback copy
of The Hobbit, wearing a thin sweater of filth.
Pretending I was He-Man was fun, taking the hatchet and swinging it into the trunk of the peach tree in our backyard, knowing that if I was caught, I’d be in a high heap of trouble. My adventures with the blade only lasted a few minutes. Though it wasn’t because I was scared of getting in trouble. I’d been in trouble before, plenty, and I’d be in trouble again. But I couldn’t stop thinking about the magic, trolls, dragons and elves waiting for me.
I tore through The Hobbit, understanding maybe half. I was used to this level of comprehension; it was a lot like listening to my parents argue. I read the book several times until finally setting it down two years later, where it lay untouched for two decades until I first heard that the director of Heavenly Creatures was adapting The Lord of the Rings.
I was eight the year I discovered Stephen King and became a different sort of reader.
My mom was an avid reader before I was born. That changed soon, though. Maybe it was the constant wiping of my ass which stripped her of the energy to tear through pages by the thousands as she once had, but she still saw herself as the reader she once was, or imagined a return to the good old days, so she bought the books to fit the image.
Though few were read, I believe in the early days, she never missed a single Stephen King. She started with Carrie and kept right on going.
I was around seven, laying on the floor in my sleeping bag beside my sister the first time I remember hearing the name Stephen King. Our parents were on the couch, our father flipping channels. Channel surfing was still new and therefore fun for the whole family. My father paused on a macabre scene of a woman, swimming in blood, being chased down a stairwell by another woman, obviously older.