Journal entries of the Wolf-man

Ded Moone’s Peregrination

Introduce yourself, I guess, Night 1:

A frenzied, radical move of lunacy during a moment of lucidity, but friends and family miss the dark for their best interest. With a track record of putrid half-measures focused on the financial debacles I can’t be blamed for despite the epic effort, I must say to that and all this, fuck’em. They are long aware of the cost/savings benefits of avoiding the lifetime hardship of holding firm against the disruptive acts they’ve given up trying to explain to first responders, friends, in-laws. This is respecting my cousin’s shrug and smile when I was last wheeled to the psych ward from the main lobby during some one-man natural disaster while trying to keep me away from your lives. I appreciate her silent candor, nestled in a refusal to respond to the question vocally once I pleaded my case, not a one-for-one; is it worth the gas money anymore? Nurse Jackie genuinely means well with ‘come back soon,’ layered with overbearing subtext for her devotion to patients, avoiding the sobering alternative, like, for instance, that my legs are delightfully, currently dangling over, so we had a good last run. No more power-ups after Black-Hawk-Downs at terminal velocity if I miss the other freeways. It’s, in a fashion, an attempt to fight the very notion of wind in favor of landing in the shadowiest section of an unlit road leading under Pocahontas Parkway. I saw it one trip heading to the Tar Heel State for a lecture. Can't say it wasn't gaudy, reaching out over that Potomac, I think, but I took note of it all the same on the drive back north. What a beautiful view, last or otherwise. A powerful end, one splat to resend all wasted energies to a greedy Earth with fallen angelic wings of flaming middle fingers—wait, wait, what am I doing—why the hell am I doing it this way?! I’m a god damn stamp on this putrid State rationality of what widens our perspectives naturally in regard to death and its role in the human psyche. I’m a fucking explorer of the damned, the feared unknown--I’m a god damn MAN! I gotta go, that's certain. This is the experiment of a lifetime, and I’m wasting it on a bridge jump in the dark alone? Symbolism over the race to see the unknowable—Geez, Fuck these nightmares! I might’ve missed the synchronized opportunity of my…

I know I didn’t need to scream in elation, but I think it helped break those certain thought patterns just in time. Just a hollow admission that I feel that something belongs here, and it’s how every lover feels in the grasp of a thousand little deaths; it kept The Voice down a second. It wasn’t their attentiveness; it was the defused empathy toward my claim, with there being no more ailments to ‘j’accuse’ for the fire on the pull-out bed that exhausted me the most. I had forgotten what strong wind, rustling through the feebled steel plating of the made-on-the-cheap, St. Petersburg sign, clapping against the exit warning in the distance, did to my lungs. Almost freeing; almost. Strange, very empty.

In twelve hours, I sold everything to anyone and even sublet my room for the first and last month’s rent plus deposit. Roommate works so much they may not know for weeks. The eternally under-prescribed Lithium/Zoloft/Ambian cocktail sold surprisingly quickly, and none of them could believe it; one of them winked. They called them a wasted human for taking his meds for granted; I’d hate to meet him. A bit unnecessary but... Letting it wear off for the kick of it, the very notion. I think too much about facial expressions. By the end of the purge, I had traded the ’94 Porsche to a cheap eighties-era former racing project of a BMW enthusiast who suddenly realized it was a ‘mechanic’s special' dream get. Setting aside eating and gas money was a genuine crucible of an achievement of my middle school math skills to limp to not starving, in theory. It was only to earn about eighty percent of the way toward the Gulf of Mexico. Maybe less if I don’t skip Alabama. I found myself in odd predicaments where the motivation of rabid hunger yanked an opportunity to become a thief swiftly on my way to the car, with the dropped wallet from the next stall, a small job that ends in blood, that I can honestly give half an alibi for. At least enough to get out of town. I crawled into the driver’s seat through the roadblocks and undesired company, with gripes against my performance of duties due to ‘all too vague’ instructions on teach existentialism. I’ve never been this quick to crazy. My one connection to lower-income neighborhoods was useless at best, yet I carried on the demeanor, wore the overcoat atop the loner vibe, ready with a pen and pad on my way to oblivion.

My time—my last stint at Sheperd Skatriz put me in touch with a brother/sister dizzy duo vomiting ideas more out there than, you know, out there. They wouldn’t have been far off my radar, or should I say The Voice, if theirs wasn’t more Lovecraftian than mine, with a drizzle of Veve of Legba when it dances with Alchemy. Personal religions act as a wet band-aid on a gash that only exists if you let it, or so it makes sense to believe. Mystics, spirits in the like hit me in the dopamine enough, but coming to an end with a hangover to die for on infinite repeat could play off the loss of faculties at a needle in the Everglades level. A smelly bloating for the casket, too wet to cremate. I don’t get the appeal of these groups. However, they left before me with a grand or grandiose destination in South Louisiana to commit to the inner sanctum of Ded Moone’s Divine Peregrination. The Voice didn’t seem to mind this decision. “How odd...especially since the jump was their idea too.”

The first thing I heard from every Joe Schmo or rogue hitchhiker about my final destination was the most dragging heat metaphors from the land of the true swamp; breathe easy through your clogged-up lungs of sticky paradise. However, a waitress at the diner where I got the airboat guy’s number was adamant that it didn’t exist despite recognizing the pamphlet enough to tell me about it. That and the clichés can’t be understated except for the bravest people they've ever seen, swimming in the morass coastline with that southern fearlessness. Didn't seem different to my eyes. A town with a place on the map that has to be located based on references surrounding landmarks, like what the fuck happened to street signs? According to the flyer, she snuck past the scrubbed bouncers under her cleavage like a fail-safe way to track her by scent; I’d have to find a section of an abandoned pipeline without passing an Island of Perpetual Hanging west of the Veve’s Oak. Other than the red flag of that massive bastard not being an oak tree, and why it said in brackets, if you’re looking, you missed it, was probably why it came to me when it did. As far as the State was concerned, these were unsafe, unkempt open waters of a lake open to the Gulf of Mexico, and to be frank, for a few laps, I would swear we were drifting deeper into some poisoned section of the River Styx.

When I’m gone, I’ve planned for someone to be able to save the little BMW. It fought hard for me; plus, if prison were the pathway out, Vikki would be waiting on dry enough land. Tags not visible, the brown exterior sits naturally in the tree line and has an abandoned shed as a marker; no point in being in some crime Expose. All that to explain why the walk to the Airboat rental "agency" took quite a while before I could acquire an airboat with a similar park job to mine. Since I came across it fair and square, paid for, and everything. I took this trip into the musty recesses with a new co-pilot who, despite doing his diligence and taking me around the mulberry bush a few times, didn’t want me to know his profession. Too bad his sense of direction was worse than mine. I’m a potential interviewee, not a good start. The airboat owner would have to eat the second half of the fuel fee. The other soul, destined to meet the ‘dead moon,’ continued the whole time on the prowess of his navigational skills, probably earned in his years as a journalist in the desert. Gazing at the distances, then on the hand-drawn map amid the oversaturated trees, all a blunder of mush, brownish green tree limbs hanging from the tops, too dark to view, and that was barely half of it. Ancient vines like aerated roots stopped the book dead, so much for the air of airboat. I would’ve circled the island first, taking advantage of the space, and let him open her up as Ron was so inclined to do. I wanted to explain how he really leaned into the character flaw, but didn’t see it – I mean, we should’ve seen it twice, I saw it once.

I believe—and this is freaky Occurrence #.5 —that we cut hard to dive into the tree trunk cove, aligned with the former Rosco’s Petroleum site to our backs, but weaved through brush that may eventually be wide enough for commercial boat travel someday. We took the whipping of a lifetime. To escape it, we avoided a girthy root system far off the tree if the sketched map was correct. Truly, it’s a failed attempt at an electrical grid for some offshore ambitions. Even the proof of concept was a lost cause, leaving a half-built sky-scraper powerline pole. If we had missed it one more time, we would’ve been stuck out there all night. Alone, I’d do it. This bastard on board, however… This time, having determined about ¾ a mile surrounding open water of the alleged location, which we agreed were approximate figures of the four and a half-mile circumference the island was in, we returned in sight of the pipes further away, and I swear to the puke that function checked my gag reflex that night, there was a freshly vivid carcass with every sway in the breeze. The subtle sway awakened my instincts, whether a sleep-deprived hallucination or a new corpse welcome mat, through a glimmer of intense vivid detail that faded back to my shitty twenty-twenty vision, causing a cartoonish involuntary gulp. Ron stopped us from running aground in exuberant fashion, proving a one-eighth reveal through the dense fog skimming the water top that continued onto the shore on this budding night.

“How did you know? We missed it so many times?” Ron asked me.

“Is that what you’re focused on? Why are you looking for this place again?”

“I—I,” his wired eyes fell to a calm, not sure he believed the look he put off. The light appeared to be draped in circular veins at the base of the jagged-looking hill. Lights that seemed to hold the brightness necessary to be seen, never overbearing, no matter our distance along the path, now, they were clear. In this, his words melted to garble. “Why are you here?”

“For a ridiculous obituary. The more descriptive, the better. The more gruesome, the better.” I chuckled aloud. There he goes with those wide eyes again.

My suggestion was taken from me before I could speak it. We slowed our approach over an ominous vibe that cutting the engine only intensified. A creaking of wood planks that Ron thought for a second were bows being drawn proved the wake may have been our snitch. The beach was a rocky plain of mossy carpet, and my thin shoes weren’t going to help me cope. It opened up at the top of the hill, gapping upward to an end we couldn‘t see. It’s much steeper in person, a sudden mountain in the center of still waters. The light that crests its top, where the sunken area becomes the mountain again, the seeping yellow glow felt delayed in our trek to the opening of light streams that jutted out of the fixtures. “We must’ve missed the pier in the, ah, fog.” Ron brings my attention to the fall beyond the chasm that would streak an array of colors, but the mist would be alive if it continued to block our view at every turn. There were noises down there. There was no telling how long I had been craving a moment to sit still. And a patch of moss amongst the coral-esk concrete is great to rest the ass on until a worm or cricket finds its way up a pant leg to give my naughty bits a surprise. Ron was trying to explain this shock, but his nautical talk was too dense for me. It appears we were in the rear.

“The tides can’t be that epic. It doesn’t sound like it’s just water down there, right? But the water line on those trees—how, and above the roots?” I was looking at the railing that just had to be there at the shifting edge of the clouds, barely getting by with a half-dead flashlight of our greeters, and I saw we were being greeted from the pier coming around again. Under scrutiny, five or six floating islands were corralled between moist wooden posts, roped to a row of bamboo trees and flaking particle wood, the slimy ones, grossly slippery to the touch. Classy, I was expecting all particle board. “They were waiting for us?” The waving beckoned to the stairs that led to the dock and got us up the hike in half the effort. A bit tough for Ron, but he managed. For those greeters, they were silent on the walk up. Even as we proved that we weren’t as armed as they were, and by they, I’m saying, one lone armed woman became four others real quick on the way toward the massive cauldron sporting a lava orange hue as a beacon on the beach. Ron’s complaints about the splinters gave me the vibe of removed sympathy, so I helped him up to keep the peace, although they could’ve been fighting back laughter from his inadvertent pratfall continued through wobbly railings. He wanted to inquire about the map on the pamphlet during his earned rest. It bluntly enamored him with a peculiar sensation; a foreboding need to skip to step seven from two of his bailout plans. Ron didn’t find the ground beneath strong enough for a spontaneous death roll, leaving me some stillness to, oh—let me try, I whispered— “We’ve come to Raise the Dead Moone to its deserved pinnacle. May we aid you, ah—sirs and madams?”

“Welcome, travelers. Now that you’re here, finally, your journeys may begin. Don’t let me spoil this for you, but I’m getting great energy from you two,” Corn-man Wendall said, leading us further.

Don’t ask me to explain because I can’t, but I strolled past Ron on the thin walkway. “Thanks for the help,” I said, pushing the map back into his chest and nearly into the swamp. With open arms, Hayman Jerith guides us onto this dream, already re-skewing this story’s events and guiding us into the cavern. Once I let his nerves calm down to a decent collection, I waved at the two archers who watched Ron hold up the rear. They were on a shelf with a chest-high wall facing out into the swamp behind the spotlights, where an archer maintained a bead on my temple. “What a holy awakening!?” At this point, I had to conclude his eyes were just meant to be that wide. On the shore, calling it a beach was a radical revisioning of what the dull halogens were supposed to illuminate. The stairs in here were steel-grated types off of some construction site, bolted securely into the cave rock. Hayman Jerith led us in, and the guardians followed with their bows. I greeted them. While they seemed pleased, a quick look from Jerith and their mouths snapped shut, with giggles breaking through their perceived decorum. I decided, unlike Ron, to revel in where we were heading.

Several meters of dripping onto the steps kept them slippery when you add the dirt to the humidity, turning the air into pudding, very gamy pudding. Stepping into the view of this stretched-out catacomb of drastic, self-destructive human ingenuity, carved out floor to floor in laminated material from a Beverly Hills open house, I had to marvel. Envisioning what I imagined when I was first handed the term ‘hollowed-out mountain lounge’ has been thoroughly erased, replaced with how far they would need to bring the cranes for the generators. Research lab-like safety signs with warnings, hinting at what was in development inside the rocky pockets, possibly blasted out with dynamite. Highest levels were saved for the living quarters, smart, so we were heading to the basement, where the birth of that ideology radiated from every attempt to decorate, yet somehow felt under-furnished for a lounge area and the first indication of staff. The cave not being a pit of mud from high-tide spillage every three hours was the miracle I kept referring to, despite the solidity in their confident living. Now, an insult to hardwood floors, freshly buffed supporting sofas, and a bar, facing a large viewing area embedded in the boulders. What a movie night!

This level, for the most part, is Persian carpeted, where the fold-out chairs would go during such an event. A few members sat on the sofa together, conversing, slightly put off by our arrival. I realized what it felt like to be clueless on the opposite side of an unexpected disruption to the status quo, or being a guest lecturer. One entered from the door behind the bar as a couple more followed us, preparing to add to the colorful tapestries that hung from the upper railing and pillars, naturally decorated with vine life. And they were right; the supports are a good place to hang laundry; who am I to judge? Poles jammed into the spaces between the boulders that held flags that were littered with Alchemy tattoo ideas. The tacky use of Christmas lights seemed to be done with a flagrant disregard for tangles, electrical currents, or color variety, both lost and earned my respect for its bombastically amber/brown glow bounced off the floor, wax coat for a surreal, radiating feel to the walk through the awkward stares to the rocky pocket at the end of the lounge. It’s where the intense glow from above got its multiplier. My Compliment fell on disinterested ears as Hayman Jerith smiled before the first stop. His silent vetting duty, I gather, was done.

A cave within a cave, and now I could feel a racing heart somewhere buried in my chest, barely enough to notice; I remembered the first time The Voice took control, been since then since I had an inkling of terror nudge the needle. It was an exciting day, the first of the last ones I was happy to be surprised by. No more art than you’d see get rejected from a coffee shop; this reeked of ancient ruins scholars will never have the balls to learn about. No Christian/Judeo, Native American references. A Mercedes with its own in the crosshairs of the investigative one. This story is unyielding, with a case that has too many moving parts to make sense, as their wall-length slow-motion flipbook was out of order. Only written in blood shall it remain was the line that alerted me to what wafted in my face, well, the smell of fresh dried blood. Sheer hypocrisy in the chalk Kodak, chalk images that were spread everywhere. The journey we had to take alone, apparently, left us to follow the trail with a candle every four yards. Too far apart to appreciate all the artwork. It purposely left portions of the writing and pictures unseeable, fading into dark obscurity near the floor or across the ceiling. Seeing all of it was all Ron was slowing us down for, mixing up moisture streams with the white frames around each picture. It didn’t help that he missed all the English ones. Got to respect the effort in leaving some warnings from those who have explored only to become failures, out of place, but not erased by this new form of researchers. The tunnel went from testing Ron’s weight and claustrophobia to a circular sign advising us that we had reached D.C.S., the hovel of Wolfman Patrick. The pampering of clean floors is dropped for a dry, dirty hexagonal pad where the six figures of their research/faith on stone plinths, but that would have to wait.

“Ah, yes, Shawna said she saw a bit of The Blue in you, but in person, I have to say, you’re Wolf if I’ve ever seen one.” He barked a bit to sell the point.

“Right, and how do you know this?” Ron asked.

“Not you; there’s a line, sir. And since I know you have the same questions, I will give you what Shawna promised you.”

I unfolded the paper. For a hot second, I caught Wolfman Patrick’s perversion creeping out of his smile, which I thought would curl into a swirl around his ears if his anticipation grew any further. “Holy shit—she’s good. I remember that day.” Shawna’s attitude toward authority rang similar to mine. Not that my last stint was against my will, technically; instead, more of a backed-into-a-corner path of least resistance. Giving the peanut throwers what they ask for, if you will. Calling her brother overbearing and not on the spectrum, and a touch of obsessive-compulsive disorder, would be cruel. That said, after what he did with a DVD of Full Tilt and that one orderly's scrub bottoms, I’m stunned he left before me. They were a pair befriending all the newcomers and wouldn’t let me ignore them to the reading I use these stints for. The entry speech sounds chaotic enough to pass an hour, and how and why she smuggles the rolled pamphlet in--it looks more official, I'll give it that. I remember hating that I fit their recruitment requirements so goddamn well, but that’s what a long drive will do.

She started drawing me after a night of genuine conversation piqued by lunacy, like the wrong meds were given out after dinner, one down on the dispenser’s list. Everyone seemed off kilter but them. I snuck her a pencil after hours, about a day beyond the seventy-two-hour hold. I gather losing that pencil is why the last details are done in test-grading blue ink. A pow-wow with the doctor caused me to miss the final product. Like a planned strategy, everything below the hairline was at war with the paper, softened by thumbprint shading around the bearded jawline. She highlighted my scowl but naturally flashy eyelashes, flaring them with blue ink, as did my wild, unkempt, nappy fro that took up the entire top of the lined notebook page. Below it, my name, or at least how she thought it was spelled. “Can’t wait to thank her.”

“She’ll really appreciate that, but not now. She needs time. I’m Wolfman Patrick; the names are a bit unorthodox, yes, for fellows like yourself, I’m sure. However, if you do intend to get to know my teachings and our people, this discovery of a place the World is not ready to appreciate, acclimation is key to surviving. Unless, however, you have other activities in mind, Ron C. S. Lazaro.”

Wide-eyed again, he responded, “Guess the boat guy is one of yours.”

“Oh, you didn’t steal Mike’s airboat, did you?” I said, without acknowledging the betrayal on his face.

“Nice to see the hermits staying informed,” Ron said. Wolfman Patrick pulled a folded sheet of paper from his black and white striped slacks. “I wonder who you got to draw me, huh?” he asked. There was something wrapped inside. Pulling out his press badge, last seen in his hotel room six miles away in Estell, if you only count the car travel. He mentioned where he crashed on that long ass boat ride, and I passed it on its way. “What? How the hell—”

“Now, this goes for both of you, especially your unfortunate states as of late; I promise my research is yours to aid your healing with the tools at our disposal. I don’t mean to insult your profession, but I must conclude this is a physical observation laboratory only. No film, no photo, and only approved audio recorders, including the tape in your bag on the boat you both stole. They’ll be staying in the boat for our safety.”

“It’s not what you think—”

“Ron, please, it’s quite all right; it won’t be the first time we’ve returned property to Cletus’ Air Boat Rental.” I hoped for a little more shock and awe, but his approval felt equally disturbing as it set in. “It’s not only for privacy or experiments beyond the fabric of the visual spectrum, but for a safe atmosphere. We can do a tour, or we could find you a bunk for the night.” Wolfman Patrick clapped and did a little jig in place, waiting for answers. I figured very quickly which one he'd rather do.

“If your creepy bow and arrow gal to my seven o’clock keeps staring—I might just—go.” Ron jumped when he turned to look at me, and they greeted him with a glowing stare. That is what he said, although I didn’t know whether he referred to before or genuinely felt her distrust from fifteen yards standing on the second level.

“Nonsense. This is the second-best part of a journey. A meal to revitalize the mind with the best—You know, I’d rather let you be surprised.”

“What do you know about why I’m here?” I asked.

“Of course, no assumptions,” Wolfman Patrick reassured.

“Less tour, more preview,” Ron said.

“Absolutely.”

“I get that point; long trips and whatnot. Hey, what about the hanging—” I started to ask.

“What an unfortunate place. The reputation is a tragic blessing to us. Outside of the curse, the area has already been classified as, geographically speaking, hazardous. A local tourist attraction for the macabre types of ghost hunter-twats promoting the continuance of the legend in the form of hurt—just hurt souls.”

“How often are there people out there?” Ron asked.

“Since 95 in total, give or take certain dialects and retellings, each a different reason. Ours goes,” Wolfman Patrick began to lead through to what they called D.C.S. Atrium to the basement bar. Almost like the wall writings and paintings mattered to what he was saying, just to avoid explaining the numbers, I assume. “On a day with fog thick as margarine, a woman known throughout New Orleans as a Gypse, possibly a harlot, when in fact she was a purveyor of unknown voodoo rituals of the most powerful kind, went on the run. Can’t imagine the title mattering when your life is forfeited as a punishment, and whatever her title, it’s as if she were that on that brisk August night. Running through every avenue—oh, sorry, channeled passage through the thicker swamp, her persistent pursuers would not forgive what she’d done with the Governor’s limbs or what was unjustly added to the charges. Authorities had the shores up and down the Bayou covered, leaving nothing but vacant islands to survive on for four days and four nights of long fleeing. But each day, she came by the same island, no matter where in the Bayou she attempted to hide, trapped in an unforeseeable loop. Closer and closer, her passes became until day five, when her arms were too weak to row, not only from the State but also from its strange draw. On the fifth night, three hunters happened upon an island that turned out to be a quarter of a mile from this one. Only one set foot on the island to navigate the mist. Very suddenly, they lost sight of them. No more than three minutes after he vanished in the trees, a wind cleared the fog to reveal their man replacing the one that drew them in, dangling dead, eyes popped from the sockets from the force around his throat.”

“Looked pretty fresh today,” I said.

“Those whose lives end there do so as the patron saint of the wrongfully accused and the sheer exhaustion that removes any and all recognition of oneself. Where their quest ends in the silence of the swamp—wait, you said—how fresh?”

“I think there were Nikes, new ones—had the jewel swoosh.”

“Damn.”

Say what you will about him; he doesn’t know the difference between a preview and an all-encompassing tour centered around the cave’s mouth. Break dancing below sea level and ceiling throwing rocks at the party on occasion is a hell of a thing to make boring. Stalactites, no matter how few, weren’t enjoying their position above for now. Sometimes, they were moss-covered types that held their moisture after being rediscovered years prior. Sixteen years and three months, because what tour is complete without droning fun facts? He was guiding with a magician’s flourish of the hands up until we all ran into Blue Moon June, practically pulling her hair out, looking for her wits’ end. I could tell Wolfman Patrick held a bitter contempt for her, and the scientist following behind brought a trail of smoke with every waft of his greenish lab coat. He promised that this was not the norm and that we weren’t to blame. “Here, right here—” We were leaving the ground through a rocky slope that took them closer to the entrance. At the top of the mouth’s opening, they stood below the edge to view up and out, framing a deep blue night brightened by a crescent moon that I wanted to believe cleared the fog for Shawna’s mental image to thoroughly confirm I had arrived. He sprawled his tale under the slowly receding, creeping splattering of clouds.

“—The beginning of a brand-new way.” Yadda, yadda, they were camping there after their last setup, which went, in some fashion, kablooey; they discovered this place, waiting for the heat to die down. Got it. They found some wealth or regained access to it and hired an expert team that was paid heavily for their silence as well as their immense skills. Journalist boy seemed smitten all the same, if not for the Pulitzer he imagined for the credit. On the second level, with access extended into low-ceiling areas and difficult for strategy’s sake, we finally start softening the ridiculous titles. Harvest-woman April gave me a warm handshake and kissed my hand. It almost worried me that she was introduced as the collective’s medical expert. Cold-man Jason and Corn-man Wendall passed us by as we passed caves blown out into rooms of various sizes, blissfully renovated, one or two as offices. Cornman Wendall was also a fresh recruit. Mead-woman Mary carried fuel to the three generators at the furthest corner of the back wall’s configuration. Whether natural or intentional planning, the offset cubby hole had a hole channeling the sound and smoke through a makeshift chimney into the shrubbery at the top. All stayed full, but only one was necessary at a time unless a test required the boost. That’s when Ron perked up.

“Events make it sound like a good time.”

“I warn you,” Wolfman Patrick stated, “Without a focus on the study required to rise to this level, your fear will both elate and destroy. Act first, write later, or you’ll end up where I am.” He chuckled.

“A little more than meditation and crystals, huh?” Cornman Ron asked.

“As I can imagine, you’ve probably heard the cult-like devotion,” Wolfman Patrick focused most of Ron’s answers towards me. “But this is no religion, and besides the geographical issues, no one is trapped. We are, in layman's terms, scientific explorers discovering a new field of study.”

“I gather the secrecy is to preserve accuracy,” I added while poking a stack of pages on a plinth between two labs.

“Among other facets, yes,” he responded gleefully. I waved at all that I could and didn’t care much about the staff, as they were more accurately attired. In their similarities, I began to wonder if everyone was deemed for extensive testing, no matter their rank. His admittance to the third level was as cozy as collapsible beds and wool comforters could look. He skipped a couple of labs, which wasn’t a concern; however, Ron took offense at being left out. I thought he was tired. “Whether your humble demeanor lets you admit it, I’m a fan of your writing—the wording you use is delightful as well as strikingly morbid for the grimmest of life motivators.” He showed me a sample of my grief-stricken Dayroom group work, which I assumed was thrown out by the orderlies. Odd, I will admit. “Our undertaking has monumental potential with you on board. We hope you find what you’re looking for,” he said with a moist hand on my shoulder.

“He’s the journalist—” I started.

“But I can see you’re a thinker; it hurts to fill your senses with information as the world around grows silent as you express your disenfranchised discomfort with the coloring book they give you to occupy your time. You’re greedy for the verse inside you—or what travels within you. You earned it by pulling the black bags off your collective heads, and what more do you think you can do with that? Be damned the reactions, the fear, and the anxiety stifling the motion of the earth. Why hide from what is meant to be seen? Never faltering over the semantics of bull shit morality, us humans devised and have forgotten its malleability. God as the problem, sort of speak. We’ll be happy to listen to it, but until then, we hunt, we discover, we fuck up, and by Ded Moone, we create and create and create some more.”

A younger me would’ve needed a speech like that to know this was a terrible place to slumber for the night. Bunking up wouldn’t have been an option, but praying they hadn’t hidden or taken the airboat out of my reach. At worst, I would have left first thing in the morning. Now, it just felt like an unnecessary upsell with a vague preview of the torturous shrugging off of moral black areas reaching closer toward me. I had to get Ron involved, if he’s still determined to do his job. He survives my death; my memory gets a documentary feel. This couldn’t work out any better, fingers crossed. I figured it would help him relax. A team was sent to remove the body from the island, all the same.

“What, no catered welcome speech?” Ron chimed.

“You have your motivations. Not everyone is special.”