Stories

by

Dieter Baron

Table of Contents

A Revelation

Untitled

The New Master

Darkness

Untitled

A Revelation

Last week in the library I found a crumbled note, written in a large, raving hand, I thought might interest you. It read as follows:

These terrible truths I can no longer keep to myself, the burden is becoming too much for me. Yet I do not dare tell them to another person for fear of the effect it might have on him; so I will resort to writing them down.

Presumably I will give myself into the custody of a sanatory to be tought by my fellow inmates in the art of pretending that our surroundings are safe, simple and something we can understand whilst we know, and are constantly profen, to be wrong in this assumption, hoping to find consolation in it.

At least I do not endanger anyone with the knowledge I have to offer, for my wardens and doctors take it as a scientifically interesting delusion, studying it at face value, without considering for a moment what it would mean, were it true; and my fellow inmates are experts in disbelieving other’s believes.

Dangerous as that approach might be, for the warnings contained in this report might be discarded too easily, it at least grants the possibility to study such material without losing propper grip on it and being pulled down in its maelstorm, which taking it for fact, something one is forced to do by the overwhelming evidence there is to be reckoned, if not guided by years of experience to disregard anything such simple to forge as evidence, which for instance reading usenet offers, would certainly effect to.

Although, I have heavy doubts that I can ever find rest again, knowing all that I do know. Too deep a crack did it run through my perception of reality, too much did it change and reveal my relation to the world around me. Oh, how lucky is man for the ignorance he has of his position in the great play of the cosmos and of never having to face many of the others on its cast.

Often have I heard of creatures that have no shadow or cannot be photographed, and never did I believe a word of it. Shuddering now, I remember reading the tales of H. P. Lovecraft and his fellow writers, taking them for mere stories at the time. All this has changed forever to me, for what I have seen in my mirror last night.

When I closed the cupboard in my bathroom last night, and looked in the mirror thereon, expecting to see the face I knew and took for myself, I beheld a sight of shocking cruelty. Looking me in the eyes like an old friend was my true face, at last revealed, and I hope, not for myself but for the safety of their sanity, that no one else ever has to share this sight: An inhuman grimace, tentacles for a mouth and pupilless slits for eyes, grinning an evil grin from missing ear to missing ear, hairless and of faded green colour it rose from the sea of ignorance toward knowledge; ‘The stars are right,’ the thought rang in my brains in a strange, guttural voice not my own.

Even now I dare not think what they are right for. Am I a danger to humankind, a ticking bomb until this thing rises again, only now for all to see? To conquer mankind and the reality we are accustomed to, for no doubt was that its wicked plan, my wicked plan, for I am this unthinkable creature. I can feel the changes in me, beginning to fasten, becoming substantial. I have to prevent it from rising any farther out of the waters; I will throw myself into the nearby ocean, diving as deep as I can, taking it with me and binding it again to the unfathomable depths.

A marginal note in a different, younger handwriting read:

I guess it wasn’t one of my best ideas to tag the new Cthulhu poster on the bathroom mirror. Well, now I know…

August 5, 1993

Untitled

The green glow of the VDT is the only illumination in the windowless room, bare but for a mattress in one corner and a pile of junk food boxes in another.

He sits cross-legged in front of the VDT, leaning against a wall, keyboard resting on his knees, fingers flying over the keys. It is an old CRT text terminal, heavily modified though; no VR deck for him.

‘‘I want no part of those blinkenlights interfaces,’’ he said to me once, ‘‘a useless waste of bandwidth. To process all those signals, that’s what we have computers for; why should i have them dumped onto me raw?’’

Lines of text scroll by on the terminal, too fast to be read, but he knows what he’s looking for. Unerringly, he halts the output, types lines of response. It’s like two old friends who know each other well, know what the other thinks—they need not talk much to communicate.

‘‘All those pretty blinking graphics and synthesized sound they’re polluting their minds with! It’s absolutely content free. A few lines on my screen tell me more than they get out of gigabytes worth of high resolution VR.’’

Thus he navigates through the networks, largely unconcerned by congestion: what little bandwidth he needs is easily obtained. He moves with the swiftness and certainty of one who knows his surroundings well.

‘‘I don’t look at pretty facades, I look at the bytes underneath. You can’t gloss over details on that level; I know the system’s quirks, its strong points, and its weaknesses.’’

He knows its rhythms and patterns, easily noticing when something is amiss, easily patching it up.

‘‘It’s like a parody on those stories about nano robots keeping care of your body; only I’m the robot and the net is the body.’’ He laughs, ‘‘looking for tight spots, fixing them and moving on; yes, that’s what I am.’’

‘‘I like the net. Those using it, they don’t see: its beauty, its elegance—it’s a miracle in its own right.’’

November 1995

The New Master

Today I bought a new master; he’s even stronger and more powerful than my previous one. I spent all day helping him settle in and getting used to his peculiarities. In all our dealings he demands my full and undivided attention. If I let it slip but for a moment, he immediately reminds me of my shortcoming.

Our relationship is simple yet effective: I care for him and he entertains me and provides me with work, so I can one day buy his successor.

Hopefully, we will have as much fun together as I had with my old master. I couldn’t imagine life without him.

And to think some people say machines are made to serve us humans and make life easier for us. How ridiculous!

Darkness

Darkness outside, pressing in on the feeble light of the single candle flame, flickering in the wind despite the closed window. The howl of the wind, its gusts rattling the glass in its frame. In the small pool of light I sat, staring at my face hovering outside in the darkness, staring back at me; or rather, I stared through my mirrored image, neither seeing nor caring for it, waiting, my mind blank to match my stare. Waiting, letting time slip by without touching me, as it did for the last centuries. Time, how strange a thing. For decades I’ve sought to defeat it, to break free of its grinding grip. And when I finally did, when it no longer touched me, I realized that I only fooled myself, that it had defeated me after all. True, I was untouched by the passage of time, remained as I was; but it is a curse, not a blessing, worse than any thing I would do to my worst enemy: To remain unchanged, when everything around you grows old, withers and dies. Man was not meant to know eternity. No mind can stay sane when, one by one, the things known to it pass away, nothing familiar remaining; when you wake up in a new era, an age not your own. I have no place in this world anymore. And still I cannot pass into oblivion, separated from that mercy by the same barrier that shields me from time’s hand, by that same barrier I so carefully built myself. Yes, even of the final mercy of death I’ve tricked myself.

So here I sit and wait, wait for him to arrive, to enter seeking the mystery I created, seeking for eternal life. He is young, he has no idea of the nature of time, nor of it’s working, so he seeks to trick it, with my help. But he will not pry that secret from me. Instead of being used by him as he intends, I will use him. I will offer him powers undreamt, which, in his youth’s impatience he will turn against me when I refuse to reveal the final secret, that which he set out to find by any means necessary. Too late will he realize that his undoing me will be his undoing as well. He will penetrate the barrier for me, with the powers I will have given him, something I could never accomplish myself, hurling me over to the other side of it, into darkness, death, forgetfulness. Into the void at last. Only then will he realize that I’ve tricked him into playing my game after all, as time did with me all those centuries ago. And in his anger he will destroy all trace of my existence. Oblivion is mine at last.

Untitled

Walking down the street, past the old man’s grocery shop, the smell of fresh fruit in my nostrils; glancing across the street at the stupid poster of some fanatics: ‘‘The world needs YOU!’’ What rubbish!

Just down one more block, and around the corner. I know what will happen, what awaits me, but I can’t stop. My legs carry me on their own account.

Turning the corner, I stop dead. Mouth dropping open, eyes staring, about to drop too. Warm fluid running down my legs, but I don’t notice. Tumbling masses of flame, a turmoil of fire. Five feet of shifting light, floating in the air like a balloon, burning my eyes, warming my face. Heat knocking the breath out of me and hurting my skin, but I advance, unaware of doing so. Glimpsing the features of a grinning, inhuman face, or is it grimacing? Warmer and hotter; the sphere charges at me. Inhaling stale hot air, my lungs screaming.

I scream with them, sitting up in the dark, eyes watery. The foul smell lingers, an afterimage, fades away, leaving me in void, panting and hoarse. I reach for the glass of water on the bedside, knocking it over and sending it rolling on the carpet.

Lights go on in the hallway, footsteps follow. The door is thrown open. doctor and nurses come rushing in. Telling me to calm down, all is well, no harm done. What do they know? Pushing me back in the bed, pressing my head against the pillow, giving me a hypodermic. ‘This will let you sleep without bad dreams.’’ But what else does it do? They only want my best, they assure me. So I sleep again.

I wake to a new day. A nurse is in the room, doing her best to look busy. ‘‘Oh, you’re awake again; wait a moment, I’ll call the doctor.’’ She leaves, dustcloth forgotten on my bedside table. A glass, half full with water, and whatever else is in it, standing beside it; nothing has changed, as if nothing has happened. Who knows, maybe nothing had, maybe all had been a dream.

‘‘You look much better today,’’ the doctor greets me like he had every morning I can remember, ‘‘you need a lot of quiet and rest and you’ll be all right again in no time at all. Here, these pills will help you with it. You’ll see, in no time at all.’’

No time, if he only knew what that means in a place like this. One day like the other, no Sundays to count the passage of weeks by, no television, no visitors, no change in daily routine. It’s the best way to make one lose all sense of reality.

On the run again, in a rundown bar beside some highway; an old country song on the juke box in the corner. Asking truckers for a lift, looking for plainclothes being after me, begging for a meal or a drink. I don’t know where I am, don’t care where I’m going. The trucks are leaving; time to move to another highway, another bar, same troubles, same routine.

Riding in a truck, half listening to the driver rambling on, trying to remember, trying to forget. Feeling the increasing heat, the blinding light; a huge ball of fire, its changing face unpleasantly familiar, murmuring on and on. Unintelligible but soothing. The sudden change in the voice startling me awake, ‘‘That’s as far as I can take you.’’

‘‘You look much better today; you’ll be up and running in no time at all,’’ the doctor greets me on another sunny morning. Up and running; that’s what I’ve just been, but where to, where from? It’s the same doctor, the same room.

‘‘What day is today?’’ — ‘‘Oh, it’s such a nice day, isn’t it?’’

‘‘I want to get up, walk through the garden.’’ — ‘‘You need a bit more rest; tomorrow we’ll see.’’

Spitting out my pills and putting them under the pillow, looking around in the dark room. Getting up, walking to the window, opening it. The fresh night air cools my face. Climbing out, I leave for the garden, sneaking away into the darkness, damp grass freezing my bare feet.

Walking past the world-needs-you poster. I turn the corner. Face to face with a tumbling, boiling mass of flame, warming my frozen face and hands. The face is changing, grimacing, smiling, speaking, ‘‘I have found you, you have found me, we have found us, I have found you, you have—’’

Screaming I wake to the doctor leaning over me. ‘‘All is well now, just go back to sleep.’’ But is it? Wondering, drifting towards sleep.

‘‘You look much better today, just a bit more rest and quiet and you’ll be well again.’’

‘‘But is it? Well, I mean.’’ — ‘‘Of course it is. You only need rest, you’ll see.’’

A flame springing into life, growing and multiplying. Becoming a fierce ball of heat and fire, forming a face becoming all mouth, chanting, ‘‘Found us, found us, join us, join us, found us, join us—’’ Swallowing me.

The doctor leaning over him, lifting his eyelid, dropping his hand. Eyes rolled up, mouth hanging open.

‘‘We lost him,’’ the doctor says, ‘‘pity; now we’ll never know what he saw.’’

August 1, 1993