The Dangeryak Manifesto

A weekly challange to create something.

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A WOUNDED FAWN premiers tomorrow December 1st on SHUDDER!

I co-wrote this movie and it’s absolutely crazy that tomorrow it premieres. Unreal.

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Coming December 1st on Shudder. I co-wrote this movie!

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The Evaporated Man

An excerpt from “An Evaporated World: The Fairport Incident

Sean Harvester is wondering when the Evaporated Man stopped being a fictional character.  The idea sticks in his head like something stuck in his eye.  As long as he doesn’t think about it, it doesn’t bother him.  But, not thinking about it, thinking about anything else, is not as easy as he had hoped.  So, he reaches for a beer and stares at his fries with gravy.  

 A spring from his seat in the booth is digging into his leg.  That’s probably good; something to distract himself.  He can feel the insistent pressure of the exposed wire digging into his thigh through the canvas of his cargo shorts.  The spot had been covered before with duct tape.  But, just like an idea, the point kept coming through.  Just like the Evaporated Man, it kept sticking into him.  

 He glances around the Sub Shop and Family Restaurant to distract himself.  It’s Tuesday afternoon, so things are relatively quiet. The mish mash décor of sailing knick knacks and generic prints of landscapes is almost comforting.  Jenny is back behind the counter, at the grill. Which can mean one of two things. If she is in a good mood, the food is an amazing twist on diner classics.  If she is hung over, then the food is a barely edible pile of grease that somewhat resembles something that you might call food in your nightmares. Looks, like she is hung over today he thinks as he watches the gravy congeal on top of the cold French fries. He reaches for one thinking that they can’t possibly be as bad as they look.  He is wrong.  The grease coats the roof of his mouth and makes sure that any taste from the gravy does not reach his tongue.  The carbonation from the beer removes a layer of the grease, but he thinks that he might need to use a butter knife to remove the rest.  As he picks up the knife and seriously contemplates it, he notices something move out of the corner of his eye.  He glances across the almost empty dining room and sees nothing but battered tables with napkin dispensers and old Tom, the local grease monkey having his mid afternoon coffee break.

 He realizes that he has a pen in his hand.  He’s not sure where it came from, but he notices the note on the napkin.

 You are dreamed.

 He throws the pen away as if he had been holding a dead thing.  His skin crawls and a wave of revulsion crashes over him drowning him in disgust.  He can almost feel a twitching aliveness coming from the pen, like feeling a cold damp breeze on a warm day.  It is a note from the Evaporated Man.

 It had started a week ago. He was working on his book.  His book, the great American Novel and the reason that he had come back home to Fairport, was a coming of age story about an awkward young writer living in the fictional town of Fair Haven.  A touching drama about self discovery and young love, except the apocalypse kept happening.  No matter what he wrote, people started dying, and not in a dramatic ways that furthered the plot.  The characters died in random and bizarre ways.  Madness kept creeping in to the book, always preceded and personified by the Evaporated Man, a ghostly haze in the shape of a man.  Every time he was glimpsed by one of the characters something awful was sure to happen.  He would raise his shimmering mist like hand and point, and utter the dread phrase, “You are dreamed”, and madness followed.  

 Try as he might, Sean could not stop him from showing up on the page.  He would finish writing, what he was sure was a touching story about a boy and his tree house, and he would go back and read it and the Evaporated Man would be there and a triple homicide.  A wonderful story about the innocence of youth would be interrupted with the madness and horror of life.  But, what kind of life?

 He grabs his coat and leaves the booth, but not before finishing his beer.  He leaves the fries behind like the road kill that they are. He steps up to the register to pay as Jenny walks  over from the grill.  

 “How you feelin’ today, Jenny.”

“Like I didn’t survive a terrorist attack.”, she grumbles.

Sean, makes a show of looking through his wallet so that he doesn’t have to look her in the blood shot eyes. Something moves in the corner of his eye.  He turns, nothing.

 “You, OK?”, she asks.

“Yeah.  I think so.”

“How’s the writing coming?”

He stares at her blankly, not really sure how to respond.  How does he tell her that his book has been hijacked by a fictional character?  How does he tell her that he might be afraid that he’s a fictional character?  How does he tell her that he’s afraid that he is being written by the Evaporated Man?  How does he tell her that he thinks they’re all going to die?

 “good.”, is what he says instead.

 She stares at him from her tired red eyes.  She nods, like she might understand.

 “$6.50”, is what she says.

 He pays.

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The Fairport Incident

The following is from the introduction to “An Evaporated World: The Fairport Incident”

When you first drive up the hill leading into Fairport, you notice two things, the ever present ash cloud and the military blockade.  It’s been five years since the events of August 16th, but this scar on the face of the world still bleeds.

Like everyone else, I sat glued to my television on that day, watching as the perfect example of the American small town, went mad and then burned; watching the blockades rise and the people of the town cut down by automatic gun fire and finally the ground itself exploding with sufficient force to launch a large chunk of earth that the town stood on into the cold emptiness of space.

The Senate hearings came to many conclusions, but the pervading wisdom to explain the events was an explosive venting of poisonous gasses followed by a volcanic eruption. But, how could a region with no fault lines and no subterranean fissures produce such a violent geographic event? A freak confluence of geological pressure is what they said.  They moved on quickly to speeches and memorials, hoping to cover the fact that they had absolutely no idea what had happened.  Soon after the blockades became more permanent and the powers that be moved on to the next crisis.  

But the earth still burns. The cloud of smoke and ash refuses to be swept under the carpet.

And what about the survivor. What about Sean Gallows, the last survivor of this hell on earth?  He sits in the maximum security wing of the Beagin County Institute for the Criminally Insane. He sits in a small room where he writes every day, over and over again, “I am unwritten, the Evaporated Man.”  The Evaporated Man, an appropriate description for this poor broken soul. But why is he there?  Of course, he is in need of serious treatment, but why a hospital for the criminally insane? Why the maximum security wing? Sean Gallows is just one more piece of the puzzle that has been locked away from sight. The hope is that no one will look too closely and let the incident fade away.

But the homemade memorials still stand on the lonely stretch of State Route 107. The chunk of earth that Fairport stood on still makes it’s way further into space, nearing the asteroid belt at last sighting.

So, why write this? Why dig up old wounds that literally have not healed? Like any project that I’ve worked on over the past few years, the Fairport Incident settled into a part of my brain that refused to let it die.  The more I look, the more questions I find.  And as I dig further, I find that I am just now starting to see the connections.  I’ve interviewed Sean Gallows. I’ve combed through the social media and any online records that I have for the residents. I’ve interviewed surviving relatives. These stories are the most accurate supposition that I can make.  How do they end? We all know the answer to that. They end in madness, flames and horror. But how did they get there and what might we be able to piece together from their accounts? That is the point of this. I will post new stories as I come upon them and maybe, just maybe, we can arrive at some answers together.

The residents of Fairport are gone, but they will not, must not, be forgotten.  Their stories are the surest way to accomplish that.

And at night, you can see the orange glow on the clouds as the earth still burns where Fairport stood.

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Squirrely Dave and the Vampire Peacock from Hell

Squirrely Dave, is not fooled by the peacock; he knows a vampire when he sees one.  He immediately freezes with his hand halfway to the Pepsi machine.  The crumpled dollar bill waves in the light breeze as the peacock takes a tentative step around the corner of the Big M Grocery and Gas Station.  The radioactive pale lights of the neon sign dance on the dark wet pavement and are drawn in to the dark blot of the peacock as it freezes, looking at him.  Vampires can be notoriously unpredictable and he’s not sure what one would be doing in the form of a peacock.  He just knows that he is in trouble.

He is suddenly very angry with himself.  Why hadn’t he seen this coming?  He had already spent most of the night outlining his personal survival plan for the Zombie Apocalypse, and now he’s facing a vampire.  Oh, what a cruel trick of fate, that he was much more prepared for a re-animated corpse than a vampire peacock.  Ah, well, best get to the task.

The peacock twists it’s head as it contemplates him.  He idly wonders what’s going through it’s head, and then how best to decapitate it. Oh, wait, that’s zombies.  Damn, his preparation is all off.  What to do?  

Ok, we break it down.

Where are we?  

We are in the parking lot of the Big M Grocery and Gas at 3am in front of the Pepsi machine.  There is no one around to help us.  We are confronted by a vampire disguised as a peacock.

Why are we here?  

We are here because we have spooked ourselves with all of our planning for the Zombie Apocalypse. We could not sleep.  We decided to take a walk to clear our head maybe get a bottle of Sierra Mist from the Pepsi machine.  We love Sierra Mist.  It is light and refreshing.  We drink it all the time.  It does not have any caffeine in it, which is good, because we routinely cannot sleep. Oh, and we need to work in the morning and we cannot be late, because Thad can be a real douche bag, especially when we are late.  “Everyone else may have to wait for the cable guy, but I do not.  Because the cable guy, that’s you, works for me.”  We don’t like Thad all that much, but we really need the free cable and internet access to make our plans.

Wait, stop we need to get back on task.

The peacock.  It takes another step toward him.  It’s head slides side to side like an Egyptian. Wait, that’s not right…  It’s more like an Indian.  Like from India.  Wait, is that racist?  The head moves side to side, that’s the important part.  It looks like it’s eyeing him, sizing him up.  He slowly lowers the dollar bill from the Pepsi machine and doesn’t really know what to do with it.  

Ok, back to task. Break it down.  

What do we know about Vampires?  

Nocturnal blood suckers. Ok, that’s good.  Wait, Dracula could go out in the sun, right?  Ok, just blood suckers.  That can transform into Bats or Wolves...

And peacocks

Right, and peacocks... and can fly and turn into mist and can use html really well, and usually they know Kung Fu or Ninjitsu.  

Wait, are Ninjas the same thing as Vampires?  

His head is really starting to ache as the peacock takes another step toward him, and he’s really wishing that he had just put the dollar in the Pepsi machine and got his damn Sierra Mist.  The light citrus flavor would have cleared some of the confusion away.  It would have allowed him to come at this from a new angle.  Think outside the box.  

Screw this.

He raises his hand with the dollar bill in it toward the machine again.  What’s it gonna do kill him for wanting a Sierra Mist?  The crest on top of it’s head springs up, snapping into place like the wings on an x-wing fighter as it goes into attack mode… Wait, attack mode…  Crap.

He freezes.

Time for a pep talk.

Ok, we can do this. We are a really smart guy.  We know that the 9/11 commission was bullshit. We know that  wi/fi is definitely a mind control device.  We are working on the truth about the alien colonization plans and how Scientology is involved.  We are having a hard time focusing.  We are referring to ourselves in the third person and we were just about to give up our lives to a Vampire Peacock for a nice, cold, tasty Sierra Mist.

For the second time, Squirrely Dave, slowly lowers the fluttering dollar bill.  The peacock turns it’s head to the side to give a full look from one of it’s golden eyes.  He is struck by how much it looks like a snake.  It lowers it’s crest and then raises it again, in a pulsating way. Pulsating, that’s an odd choice of words, but it fits.  The crest pulsates, throbs even.  That is when he notices  the whole bird is pulsating.

Focus, focus, focus.

What do we have that could be used as a weapon?

We have the crumpled up dollar bill in our hand.  It probably wouldn’t have even worked in the Pepsi machine.  We have our keys.  Lots of keys strung on a chain with a Superman dog tag.  That might be useful.  We also have some Altoids in our back pocket; curiously strong, but essentially useless.  We are screwed.

He is starting to get angry now.  

Is it anger or frustration?  

We’ve got some more work to do now; that is if we don’t get killed by the vampire peacock.  We’ve definitely got to expand our plans for the Zombie Apocalypse to include vampires.  Maybe, we should expand it to include all manner of attack.  A Comprehensive Apocalypse Plan, the C.A.P; we like the sound of that.

The peacock snaps it’s head around and gives him a vicious look.  It looks as if it has made a decision; a decision that Squirrely Dave will not be happy with.  It hisses a guttural sound that vaguely reminds him of a snake in a garbage disposal. He takes a slow step back raising the crumpled dollar bill in front of him like a crucifix.  The light from the Pepsi machine shines dully off the peacock’s beak, and he watches in fascination as two large fangs descend from the top bill.  The tail feathers leap open in a fan of horrible splendor.  The green and blue feathers spread out wider than he thinks might be possible.

What do we do?

We definitely do not look at the feathers.  We definitely do not see the eye like patterns at the top of each of them.  And we most definitely do not see each of those eye patterns flicker and ogle us.  Each of them blinks and focuses on us with a horrible certainty.  We must react, and we must react without thinking.

He throws the crumpled up dollar bill at the staring thing that was once a peacock.  Just for a second it blinks.  Which is just enough time for him to get his keys.  He whirls them around on the chain from the Superman dog tags.  

Who’s super now, bitch?

Do we want to remember what comes next?  Do we want to know?  Or, shall we tell ourselves a little story about it?  Shall we remember how the great beast leapt into the air?  Shall we remember how we raised the side of our coat like a shield against the awful flames that shot from the demon seed’s mouth.

Did we know that vampires could breath fire?  

Do we care?  

Not a bit, for we are the protector of this realm.  We stand between the good citizens of this world and the creatures of foul darkness, and we say, “No.  You Shall Not Pass!!!”  Then will we remember as we take the key weapon and weald it with terrible and mighty ferocity, striking at the fiend.  And the terrible claws and the horrible fanged beak as it struck at us and tried to pluck our eyes out.  Shall we remember when times were at their darkest hour and we swung the key sword around the demon things long neck and the heroic  yank that we gave.  The straining of our mighty arms as we drove the life from the dark one, will be remembered. Oh, and we will definitely remember the great and powerful challenge to the lords of the dark realm.  We are victorious!

Victorious!

Squirrely Dave sits back.  He is on the pavement. Idly he spits a bloody feather from his mouth. The ruin of the bird looks like a Rorschach.  He does not see his mother in the blot…  but he does see his destiny.

What do we do now?

We return home to begin preparation for the great challenge ahead.  We must complete the C.A.P… and we must wash our mouth out.  We probably didn’t need to eat the vampire/peacock’s heart.

Squirrely Dave picks up the bloody dollar bill from the pavement and feeds it into the Pepsi machine. It spits the dollar bill back at him. He stares at it for a moment, before snatching it away. Defeated by the dread Pepsi machine he walks over to his bicycle leaning against the store.  Exhausted, he mounts his trusty Schwinn and looks at the dead thing on the pavement.  He then turns to glance out over the town of Fairport and the bay that it cradles.  

That’s when he notices the rolling fog bank, and nestled in the fog he can hear the screams of the damned as hell’s own Ghost Ship sails into the harbor.

Squirrely Dave pulls his bloody keys from his pocket as he starts to pedal his way toward the bay.

Ok, so what do we do?

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Howl

God, I’m never going to die am I?

That is the thought that keeps playing through Jake’s head as he stands on the edge of the viewing platform. He looks down at the city spread before him and just wishes that he would for once have the guts to jump.

A gust of wind sneaks up the side of the building like a bitchy cheerleader and ruffles his hair. 

That’s going to need fixing he thinks and licks his fingers to attempt to finger comb his hair back into place. That’s when the bitch wind grabs his tie and flings it into his face. The tip of the fabric slaps into his eye, with just enough force to sting and introduce the flavors of a headache.  

Well, that’s that for today. One last longing look and he turns back to the cold white patio leading to the elevator door. That’s when he hears the howl.

At first, he thinks it’s a wolf or a coyote, but that would never happen in downtown Syracuse. Lots of things would never happen in downtown Syracuse. Lots and lots of things. And somewhere near the top of that list would be a wolf howling. So, it couldn’t be that.

At first the howl leaps toward the sky in a mournful way, full of sadness. The ultimate cry of loneliness. And after it’s crescendo, it falls to a growl.  The next one, is filled with rage. And that rage, is something that resonates deeply inside him. That primal howl of unfairness. At the anger.

He walks back to the edge of the viewing platform and looks to see if he can find the source of the noise. He looks around and sees nothing but the same, the same and then over to the west a little bit more of the same.

He waits to hear the next volley of howls and knows secretly deep inside, that it’s not going to happen again. That it will never happen again, and that the brief howl of pain and sorrow will disappear, just like that bitch wind. And he will not be able to jump again.

So, he does the next logical thing. Or illogical thing as far as his life is concerned. The next thing that is not a part of his life. The next thing that is terrifying to him.

He howls.

He howls and the rage and fear and loneliness and discontent sings. The howl is now a different thing. It is a living thing. It is an animal that is cornered.

And he howls.

And the howl lives through him and fills him inside. Fills him in a way that he has not felt filled before. Fills him in a way that he is not sure that he was ever really the inhabitant of his own skin. Jake sits back and let’s the howl drive for a while.

And he howls.

Tears stream down his face from the force of it. From the terror of it, and the freedom and the hope of it. Tears stream down in pain as he strains to purge his system of this thing inside.

And he howls.

The beast inside tears at it’s skin prison.

And he howls.

Jake reaches for his tie and rips it off. He throws it into the bitch wind’s face.

And he howls.

And just as suddenly as it came, it passes. He is spent. There is no more for him to give. There is no more beast. There is no more fear. There is no more anger. There is no more pressure or schedule or skin or Jake. He collapses to his knees and looks over the edge, with an idle fascination. 

Hunh, look at that. A minute ago, I wanted to jump from here. Hunh.

The wind runs her fingers through his hair and he doesn’t really care that it’s messed up.

He takes a deep breath and gets to his feet, and just for a second, he wishes that he hadn’t thrown the tie. He looks around the city and sighs as he turns back to his life.

And then he hears it.

Somewhere, another howl answers him.

He smiles and walks back to the elevator.