Kirk Jones - Aetherchrist

The evidence of his experiment—blood-caked surgical equipment, melted shrink tube, small mounds of flesh and lengths of vein—borders the journal.

Motion on one of the monitors draws me away from Bill’s writing. It’s that Max Headroom character, baring his ass and chuckling. On another monitor, Bill mutters inaudibly in a lackluster, self-generated transmission. On another screen, children dance happily, waiting to jump onto a slowly turning merry-go-round. Soldiers marching are eclipsed by waves lapping at the white sands of the Caribbean. An image of Bill on the center monitor looks around the room, presumably at the other monitors. It reminds me of the intro to The Brady Bunch , floating heads beholding other floating heads with wonder.

It’s obvious from the footage that his was a message of peace. Whatever he thought himself capable of—what he called “transmission”—he wanted to use it to better mankind. Maybe, in some small way, he did.

As I continue watching the multi-channel broadcast, all of the screens cut to Bill’s hollow head. I run to the garage door and watch the blood coalesce with motor oil and dirt. The monitors are broadcasting his death. Scratch that. It’s a montage, implying my guilt. In the next shot, I stand over his lifeless body.

I run to his side and pull the cables from his arm, revealing a rainbow mesh of shrink tube and vein. It doesn’t come easy, but I have to make sure the broadcast ends before someone sees anything else, at least that’s what I’m thinking as I tear through his arm to make sure every last stretch of wiring is removed from him.

That’s when I realize that, in some small way, I believe him.

After stripping the wire from his flesh, I run it into the kitchen and set it near the stacked monitors. I pore over the editing controls, looking for a dial. I need to change frequencies. I need to see those antennas again so I can figure out where Bill’s cameras are, if there are any.

I fumble across the control panel, start flicking switches. Monitors shut off and on until I hit what looks like volume control. Half of the monitors shift to new frequencies as I spin the knob. Images phase in and out. They’re all images of me. I’m worried about getting caught with blood on my hands, and that’s exactly what the images portray. It could all be camera work around town. Except, the channel with me and Lana sitting at a table in that shitty bar, the Dancing Hole. That never happened. It’s something I’m hoping will happen soon.

Maybe I am “transmitting” my fantasies to the local televisions.

I close my eyes and try to empty my head. But there’s nothing on the airwaves. Bill’s broadcast has finally died out, so I think about the images I saw on Bill’s monitors, his final broadcast. As I continue turning the knob, grainy intimations of those clear images Bill projected appear. There’s a playground, shot at ground level. The radio tower at the top of the hill, shot from a downward angle. If there was a camera there, it’d be on the tower itself. So that’s where I decide to check first. Once I know for certain there’s nothing left behind to incriminate me, I can get the hell out of here.

Ideally, I’d like to return to Bill’s after checking for surveillance around town. I can’t afford to clean up now, not with potential evidence still lingering out there on the airwaves, or being transmitted via security cameras. If I can tie up any loose ends, then Bill’s death will look like the tail end of a homicide-suicide, which aren’t all that uncommon out here in the sticks.

I pack an old knapsack I found in the kitchen closet with his journals. If the cops pull me over and ask to search the bag, I’m fucked. I can’t leave them behind, though. If Bill was telling the truth, there’s too much valuable information in these books.

I grab a change of clothes out of his dresser and stuff them in the bag as well. There are a few shirts in the closet. I take the neatest one and throw it on, leaving my old shirt in the hamper near the doorway. Getting to the top of the analog tower on the hill should give me a good indication as to how much truth he was telling, and how much value these journals actually have.

The body-machine interface requires a local anesthetic, an assortment of shrink tube, and a network of cable sheathed so each monitor transmits an isolated signal to each frequency within the VHF range. A scalpel is also required, in addition to a tourniquet to reduce bleeding. The blood should serve as a bonding agent through clotting, allowing the body to mesh with the wiring.

The interface augments transmission. That’s one of a few things it does, anyway. Traditionally, the human body is only capable of transmitting a small distance in isolation, but signals increase in power as they are shared collectively among groups. However, today, broadcast has obscured the natural frequencies of the collective unconscious, and until we can return to our natural state, transmitters must rely on the body-machine interface to harness the power of collective transmission.

Because national and community consciousness has been so strongly reinforced by media broadcast, strength of signal is only one variable in breaking down synthetic transmissions. One thing the interface cannot do is give the people what they want. The mind still plays the role of programmer.

The interface will not allow you to selectively transmit. The current engine outlined herein extends human transmission to the average geographical region of an analog antenna, a little over one hundred miles depending on interference from other sources. It does not guarantee that each person within that range will receive a transmitter’s broadcast, nor does it ensure that those who receive it will listen. The audience will construct itself around the transmissions, and will, in turn, begin to transmit the broadcast.

As bonds grow through the collective, the body atrophies and the mind fuses with the collective. As blood becomes one with the aether, so too shall thought become analog.

I’m leaving town. Bill was right. There’s not a single camera. The tower’s empty. Wayne’s house was clean. I couldn’t find anything at the motel. Of course, I could be dealing with some sort of paranoid science-fiction shit, cameras so small you could put them in someone’s eye drops. Watch what they watch. Could be cameras mounted on animals. It’s just as plausible as someone being able to transmit their thoughts across the airwaves. I’ve seen too much in my life to accept a single possibility as the definitive truth. Regardless, I can’t see myself staying to find out what the truth is. If I really am manipulating the airwaves like Bill said, I’ll be able to figure that out no matter where I go. If I’m being watched, like I initially suspected, then I’m going to get caught if I hang around here any longer. So, I head to the dive outside of town to see if Lana’s there.

I’m so tired. I’m going to have to stop soon. Is it okay to hitch a ride with a suitcase full of kitchen knives and a knapsack filled with psychotic ramblings?

According to my research so far, one car out of every twelve thinks it is okay to pick up a dirty, middle-aged man with a suitcase and a dusty knapsack.

It’s kids, of course. Or not kids, I guess, but younger-than-me adults.

Fuck. I’m getting old.

One of the girls pokes her head out the window. The only way she could be more ’80s was if she were wearing leg warmers and singing “She Bop.” She’s got a perm wider than her shoulders and teased a foot above her forehead in the front. A cotton pink wristband clings to her right forearm.