Chronostasis (The Cole Trilogy, Part 3)

By Marshall Buckley

Tony Cole is dead. And he's not very happy about it.

But just because he's dead, doesn't mean his life is over. Or does it?

The final part of the Cole Trilogy (The Long Second, Broken) takes a different view of life-after-death and the effects on those left behind.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Marshall Buckley
• Release date: Mar 4, 2013
• ISBN: 9781301775781

Marshall Buckley

Marshall Buckley lives near London, UK and in Newfoundland, Canada. At the same time. He has a total of five children, three dogs, five cats and some small fish. These numbers change regularly. He is not as tired as you might imagine because he achieves all this by being two people. In March 2009 an innocent-looking Facebook post stated "I've an idea for a book, who wants to help me write it?" and, after a flurry of posts and emails, Marshall Buckley was born; very soon after, the result (which bears only a passing resemblance to that original idea) was The Long Second. The sequel, Broken, followed a few months later. The final part of the trilogy - Chronostasis - was published in March 2013. Playing Adam's Game is not part of the trilogy. Only Douglas Adams is allowed a trilogy of more than three parts. Work on the next book is well underway, though it has no definitive schedule. Its current title (which may change) is "The Dreams In Which I'm Dying".

Book preview

Chapter 1

My name is Tony Cole. I’m 25 years old. And I’m dead.

In the grand scheme of things, that’s not ideal. Being dead certainly didn’t, as far as I can recall, feature on my Things To Do Before I’m 26 list. It’s a bit of a shock to the system, to be honest, and that’s before you take into account the circumstances which brought me here.

There are plenty of others here, though. A real mixture, just about every age, race, colour and creed you can think of. Many, like me I assume, have a look of slight bewilderment about them; others look actually quite relieved. Some are, quite frankly, stunned to find themselves here. While it certainly wasn’t part of my plan, I’ve seen enough bizarre stuff this last year or so to make me at least able to accept that you’re not always in complete control of what happens to you and around you; even though I would still very much prefer not to be here, I can at least accept that it’s just another step along the road, another part of the big jigsaw which makes up my life, if only somebody would have the decency to show me the picture on the top of the box so I would at least have some idea of the overall plan. There are plenty of others around me, though, who hadn’t even realised that a plan existed, their own personal jigsaw puzzle is still hidden away inside a cupboard, a cupboard to which they don’t even have a key (and, what’s more, they’re not even aware of the cupboard’s existence).

We’re all sitting in what can only be described as a waiting room. How do I know? Because that’s what it looks like. Not a modern, chrome and wood waiting room like you might find at your local doctor’s surgery (assuming they’ve gone to the effort to modernise themselves somewhat) but the sort of waiting room that you would find in an old film, perhaps from the ‘50s. The waiting room of a hospital, painted white and pastel green; a faint smell of disinfectant always in the air, a staggering multitude of long corridors leading away in all directions, too many to count. I’m half-expecting to see an old-style matron, resplendent in stiff, starched uniform, striding along the corridor, barking out orders to more junior staff, keeping everyone and everything in order.

The chairs, of which there are many – this is an enormous waiting room – don’t quite fit the era, though. They are those horrible plastic things, in various faded shades that might once have been reds or blues or greens, and a few in dark grey, but they are all long past their best. They don’t look strong enough to support an adult and would be more suited to children – of which there are a small number here too, from babies to teenagers and everything in between. Oddly, perhaps, none of the children seem to be accompanied, not even the babies. Most of them are sitting wide-eyed, white-faced, hands clasped into laps. Except the babies, of course, who are blissfully unaware that anything has changed. None of them are crying, though, not even silently. And, as I look around the room, that applies to the adults too. Many of them do look genuinely stunned to be here, and you’d think that at least some would be shedding a few tears, but they aren’t, not one.

If I were to hazard a guess, I’d say that something like three-quarters of those here are in their 60s or older. That probably makes sense and fits in with some sort of statistic. Of that age group I’d guess that most died of what most of us would, somewhat euphemistically, call ‘old age’. Compare that with the younger set – those of my age or below – and you can see that many of them have clearly suffered some sort of sudden, accidental death. While the older ones are generally intact, the number of very visible injuries on the younger ones is much, much higher.

That’s a bit of a surprise, actually, being able to see what it was that happened to them in life that brought them here. Not everyone, of course, has such obvious signs of trauma, but for many of those you could make an educated guess at their final moments: there are those whose skin looks sallow, whose bodies had clearly been ravaged by vicious cancers that ate away at their insides, killing them little by little, day by day, sapping at their very life force until they had no more life left to give. Murdered not by a third-party but by their own treacherous body, turning on itself.

Their clothing, also, gives away some of the root causes. So many are in hospital gowns of various styles, or pyjamas, and I can’t help but smile inwardly at the number of grown men of all ages who are clad in striped, flannel PJs of a style I thought had been abandoned years ago, especially by anyone under 30. Certainly there are a small number of very unfortunate souls who have found themselves here completely without clothing of any sort, completely bare, naked as the day they were born. What is most peculiar about these, though, is that despite their nudity, there is nothing on show. Oh, yes, of course, I looked. I’m still a man. But, if you look straight at them, or even if you try to look from the corner of your eye, in your peripheral vision, you can see very clearly that they are totally nude, but try to catch sight of something interesting, a bit of breast, or more, and you just can’t see it. You know it’s there, but you can’t see it; it’s like some sort of modesty filter has been applied. Thankfully, the filter applies to the men as well as the women. Well, I had to check.

So, those clad in hospital gowns, and many of those in pyjamas, don’t really look surprised to be here, and it doesn’t take a genius to realise that they were all suffering from some illness or other. There are those, as I said, ravaged by cancer, but there are many others who look otherwise fit and well (considering they’re dead, that is), and their ailments are less obvious. In all likelihood, most of those are probably some sort of heart disease, but it’s not something that labels them quite as clearly as the cancerous.

Over in one section, which has a higher proportion of younger people, from about eleven up to mid-thirties (but a few older), sits a group that looks very different from the rest of the gathered hoard. Some of them have signs of external trauma of some sort, but others have no signs at all. Those that have visible wounds have, like everyone else here, no blood dripping from them. It’s not actually congealed, you can see where the blood is sitting on the surface of the broken skin, but it’s not flowing. I suppose with no heartbeat to pump it the blood just pools in place, but even where you’d think it would be dripping, from wounds where gravity would take effect, it doesn’t. But this group, regardless of the cause of their death look… well, haunted is the only way I can describe it, though that seems oddly inappropriate. Wide-eyed, like the children, but different, their faces have a mixture of guilt, dismay, anger and, most of all, sorrow.

It took me a while to work out what was different about them. Only as I studied them, tried to build up a picture of what had brought them here, did anything begin to emerge. As I said, many of them had no visible signs of trauma, nor were they displaying the gaunt, paper-thin skin of the cancer-ridden. Few were dressed in hospital gowns or pyjamas. Some were naked, or near-naked, but most were dressed normally, in day-to-day clothes. But it was the visible trauma that revealed their reasons for being here: shocking gunshot wounds, abrasions around necks, slashed wrist. These were the suicides. And the guilt and sorrow on some of the faces made it clear to me that many of these hadn’t intended to go quite so far. The classic ‘cry for help’ which never got heard, and never would, and left behind family and friends who would forever be crying Why?

I had no idea why the suicides should be grouped together, there was no obvious indication that they needed to stay together, nothing to stop them wandering amongst the rest of us, able to sit where they chose. Equally, looking around at so many other faces, I did not detect in any of the others that they were a suicide who had chosen to mingle. No, this group had simply gravitated toward each other, drawn together by a common cause, a collective guilt. It seemed even death had failed to satisfy whatever had been troubling them in life.

The suicides aside, it was interesting to see how well everybody else mixed. No post-death apartheid here; no segregation, no signs of racial or religious intolerance. Black sat next to white next to Asian next to Arabian. Sikhs mixed with Muslims, Jews with Christians. To be fair, though, there wasn’t much in the way of conversation taking place so it’s quite possible that, rather than integrating seamlessly, we were all ignoring each other equally. It didn’t feel like that were the case, however; certainly there was no tension in the air, not that I could feel, anyway.

The lack of conversation was odd. There was a faint murmur in the air, but I couldn’t actually see anyone talking. There were plenty of nods of acknowledgment as strangers caught each other’s eyes, but nobody seemed to have anything to say. You might put that down to the shock, the surprise change of circumstances, but there were plenty here that looked quite comfortable with whatever had happened to them, and would clearly have been happy to talk about it. You can well imagine the opening question: So, what brings you here?

I might have given the impression that everybody was sitting, that nobody was moving about, that everybody was just waiting their turn, whenever that might be, but there was plenty of movement, a constant to-and-fro. People were arriving and leaving all the time. The leavers headed off down one of the corridors, called by an unheard voice. The new arrivals just appeared, much like I assumed I had, and usually took a moment or two to understand what had happened, often turning back to face the way they’d come, searching for their own equivalent of the doorway that had disappeared from behind me as soon as it closed, closing the way back forever.

Without exception, though, the new arrivals quickly accepted their circumstances. I saw nobody whose silent protests lasted more than a few seconds. And they were always silent; though many times I saw them cry out in fear or anger I heard nothing. Only as they calmed down and accepted their circumstances did I hear the occasional muttered word. Usually Damn! or something similar. For some reason, many of them caught my eye. I tried to smile reassuringly, and my smile was often met with a shrug of What can you do? before they turned and found themselves a seat amongst the crowd.

So, this is death. And quite an industry it appears to be. I wondered what my dad would make of it; no doubt he’d be plotting some way of making some money out of it, if that were possible. There must be some way of turning that amount of footfall into profit, he’d be saying. Of course, Dad was still back in the land of the living, and I wasn’t trying to wish for him to be alongside me, though I’m sure he would have traded places with me in a heartbeat. I didn’t see any signs offering that as option though, and it certainly wasn’t mentioned in the guidance leaflet I held in my hand.

Chapter 2

"A loud bang which sparked a number of calls to emergency services along the south coast of England may have been a sonic boom say the police.

"The Ministry of Defence have denied that any of their aircraft were in the area at the time, but aviation enthusiasts are adamant that the sound was consistent with an aircraft breaking the sound barrier.

There was heavy, low cloud in the area at the time and no aircraft were visible. Police are advising the public that there is no cause for concern.

Chapter 3

The leaflet?

I don’t recall anyone giving me the leaflet, and I certainly didn’t bring it with me. The fact that I’m holding it in my hand means it wasn’t just dropped on me; I’ve either picked it up or somebody handed it to me. Looking around, I can see that everyone else has it too, and it’s clear that everyone has theirs in whatever language is appropriate for them – certainly I can see some Chinese script and some Urdu amongst others.

Its content is not exactly surprising. It reminds me of the little laminated sheet you’d be given if you asked for an ‘emergency’ appointment at the doctor’s (if only to ram home to you that whatever you think might be wrong with you, it’s most certainly not an emergency – otherwise you’d be sitting in an ambulance on the way to hospital – but, given the choice between claiming that or waiting over a week for the next available appointment, what are you supposed to do?). I give it a cursory glance but, despite the number of words, it doesn’t actually seem to tell me anything other than ‘Please take a seat and wait to be called.’ Well, I’m pretty sure I could have worked that out for myself.

I’ve no idea how long I’ve been sitting here. It could be five minutes, it could have been five hours. I’ve already looked around for a clock but I can’t see one anywhere, and, come to think of it, nobody seems to be wearing a watch either. You’d think they’d have one of those matrix signs somewhere; you know the ones, asking you to switch off your mobile phone, telling you they’ll see you as soon as possible, and here are the telephone numbers for various help-lines, but there’s nothing of the sort. The walls, with their ‘50s paintjob are bare; no posters, no racks of information leaflets (not even the leaflet I’m still holding, which I’m sure I put down a moment ago).

I feel the urge to take a wander around, perhaps explore one of the corridors, and, as I stand, a few vaguely interested faces look up at me, but their expressions are mainly blank, except for one or two frowns, and I realise that these belong to those who were here before me. They must be thinking I’ve been called, when it’s surely their turn.

It’s only as I stand that I get the real impression of how big this place is. From my seat I could only see a tiny fraction of it. The corridors, which seemed to be only just a few steps away while I was seated, are far, far across the massive room, which must contain thousands of people, tens of thousands even.

I start walking towards the corridors anyway, choosing