Chapter Nine: Every Dog Has Its Day

“What I can’t understand is why you? How did you attract their attention? What do they want with you? What were they looking for in your apartment?”

The woman’s tone of hushed outrage roused Iben to the extent that he felt his intestines shrivel a little when he realized she’d turned her ire directly on his prone figure.

“Søren, perhaps you should slap him; he’s fainted again.”

Iben opened his eyes one at a time, focusing first on the fiercely Nordic bellboy doing the driving, and then bringing the woman’s face into focus just as she pulled the brown pageboy wig off her head and a mass of blonde locks tumbled free. Iben quickly squeezed his open eye shut. She actually looked scarier as a blonde. He wouldn’t have been surprised if she decided to try waking him up herself - with a tire iron.

“Now, now, children, no need to resort to violence,” Iben heard Hamish intervene on his behalf and was emboldened enough to speak.

“Sorry. It happened again, didn’t it? I passed out?” Iben spoke the words haltingly. “Hamish, can you tell me what the heck’s going on here?”

“’Fraid not,” Hamish said.

“Can you at least explain how you got here?”

Hamish shook his head. “I know as much or as little about it as you do. I tried to find you at your apartment. It seems impossible, but that must have been only a couple of days ago. I remember I had a Christmas present for you. It feels like it happened a lifetime ago,” the agent said wistfully. “I saw from the street that your window was boarded up.

The doorman said someone had taken a shot at you and the police had been there, and that some time later an ambulance had arrived and taken you away. You were unconscious. I got him to let me into your apartment and that’s when I met Hansel and Gretel here. They appeared to be dismantling your digs, brother. After that I don’t remember too much, but they say they required my assistance in their urgent attempt to rescue you from a pack of hell hounds in sheep-like disguise,” Hamish stopped there, but Iben sensed his agent didn’t believe that story. “And here I am. Here we are.”

The truck was rocketing forward at a great rate of speed, so it seemed where they were was on the run.

“That’s what they told me, too,” Iben said, trying to find a handhold in order to stay upright in the bouncing box. “By the way,” Iben directed his comment to the blonde. “How did you do that? How come they couldn’t see you holding up the cards on the TV screen? It was …way more than creepy.”

“We were right, though, weren’t we? I’ve been watching these people very closely” Søren responded with what Iben later would characterize as psycho pride. “I watch their every move.”
“I watch, too,” the blonde seethed.

“So, Søren, why the hate on my mom and dad?” Iben asked.

“They are not who you think they are,” Søren spat back. “I have been working to fight their evil around the globe. Then, on October 6th of last year, my comrades were all killed in the explosion at the Hanso Foundation headquarters.”

“You’re a lucky dog,” Hamish said. “Living to fight another day, and all.”

“Yes, that was lucky,” Søren said, swerving to force a school bus into the ditch.

Iben turned to the woman. “Are you a survivor, too?’

“I am Rachel Blake, you fool,” she said. “What do they see in you? You can’t figure out the most blatantly obvious…”

“Excuse me; it’s just that you look nothing like…” Iben said.

“Do you believe everything you see on You-Tube?” she scoffed.

“You must know that they are not like us from the fact that they could not see what was on the TV,” Søren said in a voice filled with lucid lunacy. “The best way to explain it is by referring you to Lost. The scene when Juliet asks Jack if he wants to see To Kill A Mockingbird but instead it’s a videotape of her holding up cards asking Jack to kill Ben.”

“Right,” Hamish said, egging him on. “I never got that. If Ben is always watching what Jack’s doing in his cell, why didn’t he see Juliet’s message?”

“That’s what we wondered too and it gave us and idea that their eyes are not like ours - they being Ben and the other Others, or in your case, “Dr. Apollo” and “Dr. Valenzetti.” Søren took both hands off the wheel to supply the air quotes. “After careful scrutiny we devised many tests to prove our hypothesis. We were able to determine that what humans see as a normal television image appears to be nothing more than flickering light to them.”

Humans? Iben and Hamish didn’t need words to communicate their mutual concern, “If Søren doesn’t think the Others were human, what kind of crazy might he be?”

“We’ve determined this difference is due to the frequency at which rapidly flickering light appears to fuse into a constantly illuminated light. Technically, it’s called "flicker fusion." In most humans, flicker fusion occurs at around 50 to 60 Hertz, or cycles per second. However, the flicker fusion rate for Ben and friends is higher, 70 to 80 Hertz. This is why they can’t see what’s on the television. The refresh rate on televisions is about 60 Hertz. So, you saw a picture; Dr. Apollo and Dr. Valenzetti saw a flashing light.”

“Does that mean they’re aliens?” Iben asked. “Or robots with mechanical eyes?”

“No,” Søren answered. “At least we don’t know that for a fact. But they are definitely a different breed. They also have better night vision - substantially better - than do we. And they seem to be more or less color blind. Their visual spectrum is divided into two hues, basically blue and yellow. But they are able to see the difference between subtle shades of gray better than we can.”

Iben was agog. What should they make of a person who made such a thorough investigation of so esoteric a topic as the Other’s eyesight? The TV thing seemed important, but color blindness? Was Søren on the right track or off his rocker?

“Is that why when the man with the patch showed up on the hatch monitor his image was all streaky?” Hamish asked, clearly intrigued by the theory. “Are those monitors set at a “flicker fusion” level that Ben and the Others can see? How extremely clever of you to figure that out, Søren.”

Rachel nodded her head and beamed adoringly at the darkly handsome driver.
“Think about it, all the hatch monitors are black and white,” she added. “Søren doesn’t think it has anything to do with old technology. He believes they’re specially designed for Others’ eyes.”

“We have a theory about that eye-patch, too,” Søren said, shrieking past an Audi that must have been doing 110.

“That’s right,” Rachel agreed. “We don’t think the eye-patch means he’s missing an eye. We think the eye-patch helps keep one of the patch man’s eyes dark-adapted.”

“Brilliant!” Hamish exclaimed. “I saw that on the “Mythbusters” pirate episode: Adam and Jaime proved that if you keep one eye covered with an eye patch, that eye’s rods are always prepared to see better in the dark than the eye that has been ‘washed’ with light. So you think Patchy wears one so that he can see as well, or almost as well, as the Other’s see in the dark? It’s his defense against The Dark Side.”

“Shut up,” Rachel snapped like an arctic wind chill, “What we need you to talk about is what they want from you. Why is this man so important to them?” she beseeched an indifferent universe.

“This is a matter of your life or death,” Søren said, turning his eyes away from the road to face his backseat passengers. Iben couldn’t help but notice that he had the longest eyelashes he’d ever seen on a guy, and then reflected on the weirdness of that thought. Iben believed that thoughts were not really random, so he must have noticed the eyelashes for a reason. “What are you doing in Copenhagen?”

“Okay. Just take it easy,” Iben suggested. “I want you to know I really appreciate your helping me escape and really wish I could help you out but, I’m sorry, I don’t have any answers to your questions. I don’t know who those people back at the hotel are. I don’t know what they want with me. All I know is that the trouble started with the writing assignment: The Apocalypse Equation.”

“No. It can’t be that,” Søren said, “We watch their every move and their surveillance of you started weeks before you got the job.”

Iben thought a moment. “When did you send ABC my writing samples, Hamish?”
“Oh, months ago. God, was it as early as June?”

“Writing samples? What kind of writing samples?” Rachel demanded.

“Well, let’s see. I sent them your novelization of the Sci-Fi Original about the Irish crocodile,” Hamish said.

“Erin Go BRRRAAAGGGG!” Iben added.

“Yes. And that one from the alien-conspiracy docu-drama: The Hillenkotter Conjecture, and the synopsis of your doomsday trilogy.”

“Really? Under Wormwood? I thought you said that was a non-starter?”

“Dear boy, I couldn’t sell it, but it is the only piece of your writing that isn’t a re-do of someone else’s work.”

“What’s this thing about?” she barked impatiently.

“It’s a three-parter; a potential mini-series. The first part is called Ogdy’s Lodge Pole; part two, At the Monastery of Sarov and part three is the Snowmen of Chernobyl.”

The woman and Søren exchanged less-than-stealthy glances.

“Chernobyl?” Søren said feigning only mild interest in the subject. Then he and Rachel whispered between themselves and Rachel searched through the glove compartment and withdrew a crumpled piece of paper.

“Look at this,” the Titian-eyelashed Søren ordered.


“This was on the Valenzetti Foundation website,” he said while Iben studied the list of elements.
After several seconds of solemn consideration Iben said, “So this is it? The Apocalypse Equation?”

“Idiot! That is not an equation!” Rachel said with such contempt Iben thought she might flunk him or crack his knuckles with a ruler.

“Hey, take it easy,” Iben shot back.

“Look, I never claimed to know anything about either the apocalypse or the equation. My dad—if he is my dad—may be a mathematical genius, but me, I coasted through high school science classes. In college I took Carl Sagan’s Cosmos on TV for credit. I’m a total noob on the subject of science.”

“You’re lying. And you’re as bad a liar as you are a writer. If you know nothing about this then how is it that when you put together the chemical names for these elements they spell Chernobog Assassin? Your script is about Chernobyl, isn’t it. And you know what they call Søren? They call him the Snowman. Coincidence? I don’t believe in coincidences.” Rachel blasted back like Geraldo hard on the scent of a satanic cultist or, worse, Jon Stewart.

“No kidding,” Iben said, instantly fascinated. “I guess I’d have to ask how you got that nickname, but I already know about Chernobog. In Russian mythology, he’s the god of Darkness and Belobog is the God of Light. Chernobyl is a combination of those two names. I use that as a metaphor in “Under Wormwood.” Iben had never admitted it even to himself, but nothing stirred his blood more than the opportunity to discuss “Under Wormwood.” It was a secret passion that he’d put aside for more sensible pursuits like paying the rent.

“Something you might not know,” Iben teased like a magician about to pull a rabbit out of a hat, seeming not to notice that his audience might be inclined to shoot the bunny on sight before drawing a bead on him.

“In Ukrainian, Chernobyl is the name of a grass, wormwood.” Iben paused for dramatic effect then play-acted a spastic-looking shiver “Whoa, did the temperature in here just drop to spooky?”

“No, dear boy, it just rose to blush. Do get on with it, you’re making me quite embarrassed for you,” Hamish begged with a nervous laugh.

“This word wormwood scares the holy bejesus out of people,” Iben continued undeterred. “And do you know why?”

He had no takers.

“Tough crowd,” he observed. “Wormwood is mentioned in the book of the Revelations foretelling the end of the world.”

The pair in the front seats froze and Iben the storyteller reveled in his achievement, “Got’um eatin’ outta my hand,” he thought, until they spoke, that is.
“Revelations 8:10 And the third angel sounded, and there fell a great star from heaven, burning as it were a lamp, and it fell upon the third part of the rivers, and upon the fountains of waters,” Søren recited without emotion.

“And the name of the star is called Wormwood: and the third part of the waters became wormwood; and many men died of the waters, because they were made bitter. Revelations 8:11,” Rachel finished the quote in a flat, monotone.

“That’s it! Chernobyl: double the metaphor; double the fun!” Iben said uncertainly. These guys were so not fun. “Do you think someone from ABC read my synopsis and used it on this Valenzetti website?” Despite Søren and Rachel’s pathological Bible spouting, Iben had to admit he was tickled. He’d never written anything good enough to be stolen before.

“This is not about you” a semi re-animated Søren said, his knuckles white on the wheel, his raven hair making a stark contrast to the color rising along the crest of his sculpted cheekbones. He looked a little like a Viking god springing to mortal life, Iben thought novelistically.

“That’s funny, I thought you said it was all about me,” Iben said.

“Don’t you understand that this is proof of their diabolical plan to bring about the end of the world?” Søren lamented. “This formula was on the website before June. More likely they saw your synopsis and thought you knew too much, that their secrets had been leaked and that you were taunting them. No wonder they’re out to kill you.”

“Now, now, let’s not get carried away,” Hamish said.

“I agree, but truth be told, Søren’s got a point,” Iben said. “However, I think he might have it backwards. From a storytelling point of view, the fact that this code reads Chernobog Assassin actually seems to indicate that the author is trying to warn us that someone is trying to assassinate Chernbog, the dark god. So wouldn’t that make the assassin Belobog? The good god? God of light? Wouldn’t that make the code writers the good guys?”

Hamish instantly recognized the danger in this line of conversation. “I for one think you’re reading way too much into this Chernobog thing. Lighten up, guys. Sometimes the play’s the thing…and that’s all there is to it.”

“You think we’re making this up in our heads?” Rachel demanded. “Was I making too much of that very real bullet I dodged on Thanksgiving? Would you be telling me to lighten up if you were standing next to my open grave?”

“But, see, you didn’t die,” Hamish said calmly. “My point is not to scold you, but simply give you something to think about. It all puts me in mind of a story I once read, one of those avant-garde things that never get published in the States. It was called Ptosis' Dog and it was a cautionary tale about trying to impose too much meaning where none actually exists.”

“What are you talking about dogs? Are you saying I’m a bitch?” Rachel raged. Beside her, Søren’s eyelashes bristled.

“No, nothing of the kind,” Hamish responded.

“Anyway, the story is about this post-apocalyptic world where imagination has been eradicated. Every manifestation of culture had been wiped out in the wars and creativity is dead. Then someone found a single movie still in existence, “Bombay Love Nights,” and the people watched the movie over and over again, cataloguing every detail, analyzing every word said, every piece of scenery, silverware, drapery, every single frame was carefully and painstakingly recorded in the Great Encyclopedia of Bombay Nights of Love.”

“He may not be calling me a bitch; but I will call him a fool. Fool!” Rachel sneered.

“Go on,” Søren encouraged Hamish. “I won’t let her kill you until I know how this insult ends.”

Hamish cleared his throat, struggled a bit to form words, then pushed on valiantly, “Ptosis was a citizen that wanted to become someone important, he watched the movie ten hours a day for thirty years to discover something in it no one else had seen. One day he saw something through the holes of a basket, which he concluded was a fox-terrier. His discovery made him famous and celebrated until a rival discovered it was simply a shadow. Ptosis was deleted from history books but lived on as a popular saying; ‘Lest we discover another Ptosis' dog.’”
“Huh? I don’t think I get it,” Iben admitted.

“I get it perfectly. He says we’re dupes. He says that our hands are being guided by those who think we’re morons. What he’s saying is that Lost is a TV show and that we’re idiots who think it’s all real. But it is just the shadow of a fox terrier,” Rachel seethed.

“I don’t know if that’s what he’s saying,” Iben said. “Of course, I’ve never read it, but who’s to say Ptosis’ rival had the right answer? Why did the crowd side with the other guy? Ptosis saw things from a different point of view—a better one, and maybe he saw the truth. Maybe the fools were the ones who didn’t see, who didn’t believe their own eyes.

“Nicely put,” Hamish said.

“And what’s more,” Iben continued. “This world without imagination business and the search for meaning. Doesn’t that kind of remind you of the Others and all of the book and movie references they’re so fond of making? What’s that all about? Are they searching for meaning in those stories? Or do they just need to hire a good writer to help them tell their story in their own words?”

“Do do do do doo do. Do do do do doo do.”

“There it is,” Iben sat up quickly, bumping his head on the roof of the panel trucklette. “That’s the music-box tune.”

“Do do do do doo do.”

“Where’s that coming from?” Iben peered out the back window.

“Sorry, it’s just my beeper,” Hamish said, and pushed the button that quieted the sound and signaled he’d received the page.

DO DO DO DO DOO DO. DO DO DO DO DOO DO.

Instantly the small sound had been replaced by a much louder one that definitely came from outside the vehicle. Iben looked out the back window and saw three Apollo candy trucks boxing in the clown car and forcing Søren to a stop.

“You?” Iben said to Hamish, as he watched slack-jawed as Dr. Apollo and Dr. Valenzetti and a white Labrador retriever emerge from the cab of the heavenly blue truck.

“That’s alright, brother,” Hamish said, slapping him on the back.

“You can thank me later.”

******

A Dharma beach ball hit the ground and sand peppered his open, staring eye like nano-buckshot.

“Sorry, Dude.” He heard as he tried to blink the blinding grains away. The sun was beating down on him and he wondered how long he’d been passed out on this beach? He brushed at his cheek where sweat had glued the gritty sand to his face and the slightest touch made his skin feel like it was covered with fire ants. Sunburn he surmised. Oww. Somewhere in the back of his mind it occurred to him that he should be cold? He remembered snow, but the heat of the sun convinced him it must have been a wish fulfillment dream that he hadn’t quite come out of.

He pulled himself up to his elbows, and when his itchy eyes focused he saw Charlie and Hurley practicing their golf swings, whacking mangoes into the blue-green surf. Buffoons, he thought. As if there weren’t more important things that needed doing, but what were those things?

He was on a mission. Or he was supposed to be. With Hurley and Charlie and Locke! That seemed right. They were supposed to find Sawyer, Kate and Jack. At least they hadn’t left without him. Just thinking about being left behind sort of pissed him off. For weeks, actually more like three months, he’d been kept out of all the action, left behind with the water carriers and wood fetchers while these incompetent clowns did everything in their power to get them all killed .

“Hey, Hurley,” he called out. “Shouldn’t the search party have left already?”
Hurley turned to him with an expression of deep unknowing.

Christ, he doesn’t even know my name. What is my name? For one throat-tightening moment, he didn’t know it himself.

“Dude,” Hurley shouted across the sand, “You’ll have to ask Locke. It’s his mission and he seems to be taking his own sweet time about it.”

“I think he’s on hiatus,” Charlie chirped. “He never calls; he never writes.”

“He’s probably tripping. Loco weed. What kind of hero lets his mind go gaga like that?” The sandy man was just getting fired up about the unfairness of the island pecking order when two ice cold hands seized his red hot shoulders and began to rub. Unbidden tears sprung to his eyes.

“Assholes,” the blonde whispered into his ear. “Locke’s not leaving without us this time. Don’t worry, Nikki’s got your back, baby” she said before digging her nails into his blistered flesh until he whimpered. Nikki instantly withdrew her cold comfort, which stopped the physical pain, but brought on a new punishment.

“Wah, wah, wah,” she whined, mocking his agony.

“Jesus wept for good reason, what’s your excuse, Paulo. Be a man.”

* * * *

“Now cue Nikki to roll her eyes and stomp away,” Iben directed, leaning back in his Aeron chair peering over the tips of his Bruno Magli loafers propped up on the ledge of the view course from which he observed the ant-sized actors on the island sound stage far below. He wondered with some embarrassment if this view was similar to the one God enjoyed, unseen but all-seeing.

“You are a bad boy,” his mother admonished. “But a good writer.”

“More than good. Our boy’s a genius!” Valenzetti said, beaming with paternal pride. “The storyline makes a lot more sense and moves along at a much better pace since you accepted the position of head writer.”

“Not to mention, you’re the best paid scribe in all the lands,” Hamish said as he entered Iben’s elegant offices at Cognisent, Inc.’s ultra-high-tech, super-secret studios. “Didn’t I tell you, you’d thank me later?”

“Every day, bro, I sing your praises.” Iben gave Hamish the high-five.

“This has turned out to be a win, win, win, win all the way around,” Hamish said. “You get the job of a lifetime…of several lifetimes. I get the commission that allows me to concentrate solely on my star client’s career endeavors; your parents get their son back; you get a mom and dad, and,” Hamish reached down to pat the head of the white lab lying at Iben’s feet, “I arrive bearing more good tidings. Because of your great big talent these poor Lost souls will finally be found. ABC has agreed to set an ending date. The mystery will be solved by the end of season five.
“Yeah, I know,” Iben responded, pushing his Prada glasses up the bridge of his nose, “I wrote it into their script. Lost has the biggest audience share of any of Cognisent’s infomercials, but in order to keep ‘em watching, they’ve got to get to the point pretty darn soon.”

“Well, whatever you’re doing, it’s working. ABC particularly wanted to commend you on what you’ve done with the Nikki and Paulo storyline. Fans are loving it!”

“That’s why I invited you all here this morning,” Iben said. “That story’s coming to a climax today that I thought you’d all want to witness.”

Iben turned his attention back to the scene on the beach where the formerly formidable Søren now struggled through Paulo’s trials including the rejection of the once adoring Rachel now surviving on the island as the indomitable Nikki.
“Okay, cue the monster,” Iben whispered into his mic.

Suddenly a thundering mechanical beast awakened in the jungle…

“And action,” Iben ordered his unseen production assistants on the ground.
One by one the palm trees crashed to the ground as the monster approached the beach. Paulo turned from the receding figure of his lost love Nikki, and toward the terrible sound.

“Time for his close up,” Iben said.

Paulo’s face loomed large. His raven locks matted with sand, his Viking cheekbones lined with sweat and tears, his once-lush eyelashes mere stubs surrounding sodden red sockets, his growing horror revealed with each monstrous footstep until just before the monster emerges Paulo paralyzed with terror begins screaming like a little girl.

“Cut,” Iben said. “That’s a wrap.”

“What? We don’t get to watch the monster eat him,” Hamish said despondently, with murmurs of dismay coming from Candace, Enzo and Tarelton, too.

“Nah, in the next scene it turns to smoke and fades away,” Iben explained. “Hey, guys, I’m not a killer. You’re not killers.”

“He’s a killer! He laid a trap for his own team at the Hanso Foundation,” Dr. Apollo reminded him.

“Maybe so; maybe no. Nonetheless, Iben Powned is one of the good guys, and even though he may not know my name, deep in his own heart of hearts Søren will know what Iben Powned means.”

“Iben Powned,” Hamish muttered.

“Iben Powned,” his parents repeated.

Then Tarelton rose to his four feet and spoke, “Iben Powned.”

Far below on the sun drenched sands, Paulo looked up into the smoky eye of the island, and what he saw was beautiful, and the voices in his head spoke nothing but the truth: “Iben Powned. Iben Powned. Iben Powned.”