Appear

By Lucus Anthony Ren

It wasn’t anything out of the ordinary Jane recalled the simply garble where varying the frequency and squelch dials establish a stronger gain signal to no avail, drew her chair closer to the Gonset listening intently ‘feeling’ more than knowing something deeper lay within that atmospheric static.

Having spent hours with the shortwave Jane knew the static heard that early morning was something different, different in the way she’d it’s softer-than-normal pitch along with what could only be explained a single trumpet note played, for static often carried a ‘ssshing’ sound without much tonal variance, Jane faintly distinguished several voices heard along different frequencies, certain they were directions from a strange language spoken, of which she’d not heard before from the Gonset her link in searching that ‘between’ where the man with steel blue colored eyes and the woman with the snake necklace held answers in her grandfather’s mystery, but also a power beyond governments command though fought for desperately knowing its control crucial.

Somewhere in a 1956 desert community to whoever found those directions, discovered what really lay halfway from here and then.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Lucus Anthony Ren
• Release date: Sep 27, 2018
• ISBN: 9780463851265

Book preview

PREFACE

The 1950’s being a turbulent time in not only North America but the world due to various factors none of which more prominent than that of the Cold War and Civil Rights, capitalizing both as they singled out then, where we are today.

With ‘Appear’ I asked myself questions along the writing as to what in all of this, has really changed since then; what was bad and good, and what extent they actually were in the context of evil and angel; and time, being so critical how would it change in our world if it itself, was altered, and how?

The idea of ‘markers’ are from an earlier short story of the same title I wrote expanding somewhat of that, just as ‘between’ has from Mr E written last year wanting to link both with ‘Appear’ directly, being open yet following certain paths my sanity wandered those late nights and mornings using their quietness.

I enjoyed Charlie’s character most. He was simple, but with a good heart, had seen more than enough tragedy yet continued with courage though at times faltered, especially with Jane whose simply beauty might have been too much.

Of course, we’re visited by the common antagonist threading through the past couple of stories I’ve written, always in the background, and I loved the nature of Minnesota, the people though my time was short there. The wilderness simply astounding where a person can easily achieve in their souls what they may lack in their hands by simply believing. It’s what I did while on long walks and often revisit in my thoughts while roaming the woods here with my German Shepard.

The desert, of course, would be the main character here. It was in my life growing up there and in the cold of the North now, I enjoy recalling moments otherwise forgotten when I write about its features and the small community of people trying their best.

This is a straightforward story with only a couple of characters, about elements questioned here, and how though we face great challenges in each of our lives that may seem impossible to overcome, could just as well appear another way.

PROLOGUE

Noise. Relentless. Harmful. Unwilling.

As in so many nearing a ritual beyond even death, Jane sat at her once enchanting outlet to the world where reality and not, mixed to a point, no telling the two apart being possible for that was the idea often told herself more feeling now than watching that array of boxes their soft glowing light now invisible to her only deciphered through touch, smell, their particular humming, and of course the occasional squawking and static from airwaves depositing signals into her lap as she waited for just the right sequence, that one she’d heard only twice, but distinct above all others for in her mind wasn’t from ‘here’, in the seven to fifteen-hundred-mile radius her receiver could pick-up, nor was it anything she knew to be from even further out from California, but there was that odd chance it being foreign. Another country. Eastern maybe.

It wasn’t anything out of the ordinary Jane recalled the simply garble where varying the frequency and squelch dials establish a stronger gain signal to no avail, drew her chair closer to the Gonset listening intently ‘feeling’ more than knowing something deeper lay within that atmospheric static, and having spent hours with the shortwave knew the static heard that early morning was something different, different in the way its softer-than-normal pitch along with what could only be explained as a single trumpet note played, for static often carried a ‘ssshing’ sound without much tonal variance, Jane faintly distinguished several voices heard along different frequencies, certain they were directions from a strange language spoken, of which she’d not heard before from the Gonset her link in searching that ‘between’ where the man with steel blue colored eyes and the woman with the snake necklace not only held answers in her grandfather’s mystery but also a power beyond governments command though fought for desperately knowing its control crucial.

Somewhere in a 1956 desert community to whoever found those directions, discovered what really lay halfway from here and then.

For Those Who Don’t Give Up

CHAPTER 1: THE TRANSMISSION

Jane let herself go with the arriving results of her diagnosed diseases as if the two were twins inasmuch they had the same appetite devouring one another. Her youthful Cherokee appearance faded as with most finding such a life without anchors, on that edge where balance itself really never existed in the first place giving way to the real ‘sight’ that soon took over the original leaving her permanently blind.

The doctors said it's genetic, stemmed from one parent, or both, but in Jane’s case neither unraveled an already strained ten year old searching for independent nature within a small mountain town, admitting she’d been adopted left an inevitable option that would later prove the only element able to sustain her mind from insanity the night twelve years later in 1956 when others contacted her.

As in so many nearing a ritual beyond even death, Jane sat at her once enchanting outlet to the world where reality and not, mixed to a point, no telling the two apart being possible for that was the idea often told herself more feeling now than watching that array of boxes their soft glowing light now invisible to her only deciphered through touch, smell, their particular humming, and of course the occasional squawking and static from airwaves depositing signals into her lap as she waited for just the right sequence, that one she’d heard only twice, but distinct above all others for in her mind wasn’t from ‘here’, in the seven to fifteen-hundred-mile radius her receiver could pick-up, nor was it anything she knew to be from even further out from California, but there was that odd chance it being foreign. Another country. Eastern maybe.

The cold nights in her small one-room wooden shack, only the huge half German Shepard half whatever for here anything was possible which indeed proved its point the animal simply showing up on the porch one morning in the then already blistering heat for summers ranging well over the one-hundred and twenty degrees mark with relative ease before noon hit its highest, fur matted with burs and thin as a skeleton, Jane reckoned the poor animal home she befriended calling ‘Waya’ the Cherokee for wolf must have traveled far, was near dead landing early before the sun broke soon melting anything left outside that morning, that ‘particular’ morning in fact where just two nights before she’d heard the first transmission come over her shortwave radio, twisted and hissing some chained wild creature which of course wasn’t from these parts, when indeed she recalled later having heard ‘something’ on the porch that early morning but didn’t bother seeing her interests laid directly in front gargling consonants and vowels.

‘Russian…,’ Jane said aloud as terminals hummed then suddenly spitting some language out from its speaker she’d not heard before her face any more than a foot from, eyes closed concentrating while fingers gently slide across the slightly raised Gonset Communicator ii-B six-meter transceiver logo used a year since moving to Mesquite Springs in the high desert of California from Big Valley northern Minnesota where since she could remember was home till the assured dispute appeared between the stepfather about whom she should and should not date being the case she wasn’t full Native American Jane felt neither interested what the color of the suiters skin was as long as he was both somewhat educated, polite and at least sober most of the time but in these parts that's a tall order. Jane’s father announced take what you can get, and get she did right out of the house along with earnings from odd jobs sine her fourteenth birthday until entering college where obtaining her teaching degree became exhausted from the insanities of higher education with constant partying in her dormitory to the senseless conversations with inept individuals where she marveled at how they survived this long without having been killed or killed themselves, headed southwest hoping to find warmer climate both in the weather and disposition, the two sorely lacked from any stand point in Big Valley, and hadn’t looked back since although she often wrote her stepmother keeping the woman abreast of comings and goings in her life being few and far between as most abused a half-blind half-Indian or simply paid no notice of, either case those first months were the hardest till settling on the outskirts of a small community in the Mojave desert where excepted at half the salary as part-time English teacher in the local high school, promptly allowed her passing the Technicians licensing examination and subsequent purchase of the Gonset with external amplifier and antenna all nicely connected one or the other to the electrical power grid of Mesquite Springs or car battery instantly developed a strong fascination in the far reaches that later would destroy half the community.

Then the transmission arrived.

It wasn’t anything out of the ordinary Jane recalled thinking at first simply garbled static where she varied the frequency and squelch dials trying to establish a stronger gain signal to no avail, drew her chair closer to the Gonset listening intently ‘feeling’ more than knowing something deeper lay within that white noise apart from having equal intensity at different frequencies, that in the mathematical sequencing resides its signal source, but where exactly seeing the white noise frequency created consisted of literally over twenty-thousand tones because the sound of white noise heard and the brain perceives is the sound of all frequencies between twenty and twenty-thousand hertz.

At first, it was difficult to comprehend in science class her freshman year but the teacher Mr. Lindgroe explained it in a way she understood, ‘Imagine sitting in a quiet restaurant where you’re able to picket the different conversations. Now, see yourself in a crowded football game with thousands of others all yelling and talking at the same time. It all sounds like a blurred noise. Also in nature such as wind and rain, the ocean, and waterfalls all producing this ‘white noise’.

This caused Jane to wonder even at that time in her freshman year hearing just the one raindrop is enough, a return with only one sound, what happens when increased just one megahertz, or one million hertz? Now in her small wooden desert shack, she worked with fifty megahertz. Fifty million tones!

Fortunately, the brain hasn’t the ability understanding such complex signals. Perhaps through evolution, Jane thought there grew a self-protection element within ourselves allowing only what we could endure. Even then, some elements faltered resulting in insanity and suicides. At least these were her opinions concerning why a person becomes mentally unstable and why we murder ourselves such in a way becoming almost common without much if any questions as to the reason and at the very least, prevention.

Static became typical caused by nighttime interference, receiver overloads, even weak signals brought about through trees, tall buildings, hills, mountains, atmospheric, and malfunctioning antennas. All taken into account when listening to the first transmission, yet none were the cause Jane experienced at three-fifteen AM that early morning.

Having spent hours with the shortwave both talking but more listening to others for that was the real reason of interest in the first place, able to participate without inhibition Jane knew directly the static heard that early morning was something different, different in the way firstly she’d never heard it’s softer-than-normal pitch along with what could only be explained a single trumpet note being played, for static often carried a ‘Sssh’ sound without much tonal variance, and secondly several voices were heard along different frequencies all sounding the same insofar Jane was certain Russian spoken and all female or children but none masculine.

Aware also her receiver sensitivity is usually specified at a level of the signal which particularly needed in producing a certain level of audio output, Jane adjusted controls within the amplifier compensating the effect with its only soft bizarre expression yet tranquil as if someone whispered using only ’S’ and ‘H’ consonants.

Perhaps it was that causing Jane’s reaction not unsettled as she’d imagined most might deal with hearing something of this nature, but in her eyes though poor as they were and soon practically useless for the degeneration of the illness only heightened her interest in nearly everything since complaining brought her to the doctor where ‘retinitis pigmentosa’ diagnosed as having no cure and total failure in sight within the next ten to twelve years only further illustrated an overwhelming importance no matter size nor significance; everything had its purpose.

Naturally none at the school where she taught afternoons to the freshman class and Friday mornings to the seniors were aware of this condition, her sight still good except the peripheral vision now nearly gone, from where the year before at the same time she was a solid fifty percent, left her feeling at times how quickly elements around a person can change, and even with productive thinking had a tendency to pull, the weight at times much to bare. Should she be tested Jane would be surprised to find her sight not as she’d believed, but rather poor losing more of the visual field, developed a further pronounced tunnel vision as photoreceptors, namely rods and cones continued to die.

Even with the brightest of lights Jane was careful and moved slow taking her time so as not to trip for as the peripheral decreasing meant the entire vision field looked nothing more than gazing down an empty tube no wider than three inches with everything around that tube having the color of a blackness beyond what most thought being black, which caused Jane to smile thinking she had her very own ‘Black Holes’ where no light escaped, for all that never spoke of only to her parents for if she had the school would dismiss her and most likely the state lock her away thinking her eyes in such an ‘unhealthy’ manner claimed she was mad, until the transmission happened.

CHAPTER 2: THE TOPEKA CROWN

It wasn’t difficult understanding, most simply unable from laziness and bad genes reading anything longer than one sentence and stood as a wonder any became teachers at all. But here they were. All twenty-seven.

Only a few at Mesquite Springs high school paid Jane a good day greeting should they pass her in the hall, most looking the other way, some however gazed directly at her moreover still wouldn’t give the time of day noticing the markings of high cheekbones and stronger nose features that somehow softened through mixed blood, but none interested enough wanted in knowing anything further. And of the teachers, they were somewhat polite just enough so as not to call attention to themselves for fear of losing face, always distant meaning they could only be trusted as far as throwing one of Jane’s grandfather’s expressions her stepmother recounted, locating him just before he died slipped a small note reading ‘Degotoga’ and 'Grave Creek Okie' into the woman's hand stating proudly, 'For Jane' then walked away

At first, it made little sense but as Jane stood staring at the note the stepmother presented before leaving now waiting for her bus out of Big Valley this slowly came clear ‘Okie’ being slang for Oklahoma, Grave Creek probably a town in the state, but for Degotoga she had no idea. Big Valley had no decent library of which anything could be referenced from, she’d have to wait till reaching Kansas the destination of the ticket purchased seeing it was the center state geographically and seemed sensible to start in the middle working your way out. As long as it wasn’t north.

Getting off the bus with her one small backpack in Topeka Jane headed straight for the city library which from her college days learned swiftly locating reference material. Within fifteen minutes of entering the building, she established indeed there was small town Hitchita in the state of Oklahoma, which Grave Creek was near just north of Lake Eufaula. Drawing a rough map shown from the book she returned to the bus station and bought a one-way ticket to Oklahoma City from there the ticket office said it would be best waiting for a local bus as here at the Topeka station had sketchy details for the trip onward toward Hitchita which might, or might not be true seeing her complexion cast her as Mexican yet speaking perfect English without the slightest trace of accent something of a little ‘difference’ in Kansas causing the rise from several eyebrows, would arrive in the capital at two in the morning.

Having slept little on the first leg of her trip from Minnesota Jane knew she had to stay awake not wanting to fall asleep and miss her bus, decided to wait outside in the near-freezing temperatures but for her having been raised in climate where folks from this area shuddered thinking of, for most springs in Big Valley were near these very same conditions, and winter well below this mark freezing exposed flesh in little time, Jane whiled away the four hours simply standing with her back against the main bus station wall eyes trying to rest themselves looking no more then a few feet from her own at no particular thing except the cracks in the sidewalk wondering if she’d meet someone from her actual family would they want to or even remember, for if it was indeed her blood-related grandfather was he from her mother or father’s, and did it really matter she thought of it in such a way.

Sometimes people spat at her sticking to her clothes, sometimes the sidewalk in front of her those cold hours waiting, was it really that different looking back while waiting for the local bus in Mesquite Springs taking her to work where she knew four other teachers also waiting for the bus, yet never spoke even though they were ‘colleagues’ especially one who herself taught English to the junior class Jane thought recalling that moment. Was it? As far as she knew very little progressed and probably wouldn’t show significance for years, wouldn’t because of fear primarily of losing their positions and fear through stubbornness both very dangerous and when mixed extremely flammable. She knew her position where she alone had to clean the floors of the class before classes while other teachers never picked up so much as a broom let alone mop and bucket. She also knew she had to keep the fires in the class burning as when the students’ arrived at least the night’s chill would have been removed, and in doing so meant sometimes arriving before even the principle. It also meant some of the teachers weren’t even certified even though Jane had four years and college degree she was still treated with cold shoulders from staff either due to jealousy, hatred, or fear. Probably all and what could Jane do while teachers presented with their lifelong licenses for teaching mumbling low in corners watching her pass; would they have started a fire to warm the school rooms and clean the schoolhouse regularly?

Wandering over those first weeks of her new job at Mesquite Springs as the bus for work neared, brought her back watching the ‘Topeka Crown’ itself roll-up to the sidewalk no more than twenty feet from where she’d stood four hours invisible as possible, when its doors hissed open followed with a steady stream of passengers let off then finally the driver being last who quickly closed the door behind him, stopped bent with a grunt as he was a big man around the middle locking the bright red and silver bus doors Jane wanted to enter escaping from the relentless cold biting any exposed feet, arms, legs practical every place chill could enter a person's clothes from lack of movement for she was certain had she the bus might have passed without her knowledge and the next not till another sixteen hours, called out to the driver now