Haggopian and Other Stories

They were of a height, perhaps five-nine or ten; also of an age, say thirty-two, with Jason the elder by five or six months. Jason was a redhead, outspoken, careless in both dress and attitude, often flippant but never insulting. Lanky and jaunty if a little lopsided in his gait, he had green eyes, a long straight nose and gaunt cheeks. James was quite Jason’s opposite. Admitting to a sedentary lifestyle, he had wisps of thinning, prematurely grey hair on a bulbous skull, sharp, permanently narrow and penetrating blue eyes, a small mouth and receding chin, all set on a burly, powerful if under-utilized frame. In short, and if in the near future he did not take up some form of exercise, he could expect to go to seed. Also, where Jason was invariably plain speaking James frequently tended to more elaborate prose, perhaps to affect a semblance of personal mystery, an esoteric éclat or occult ambiance.

And why not? Since by his own admittance James was “psychically endowed”, for which reason he’d become one of our guinea pigs of course. As for Jason: at first he had seemed bewildered by the whole thing. But he had been unemployed, and we had made him an irresistible offer.

Their induction had come following various checks and controls. First: they were just two out of two and a half thousand applicants who answered our ad in national broadsheets. Second: after discarding the sad, mistaken, lying, wannabe, and lunatic two thousand four hundred, the finalists had undergone an exhaustive series of parapsychological tests, which further narrowed the field. Both James and Jason had passed with flying colours, once again to the latter’s apparent astonishment. Third: during Zener Card testing at a government establishment, they had been brought into close proximity with an “alien artefact”; this had been caused to occur while they slept in a dormitory unaware of what was happening and under close, covert observation. Both of them had experienced troubling dreams, indeed nightmares.

(Additional to my description of the cell: the “alien artefact” mentioned in the preceeding paragraph was fixed centrally in a strengthened glass sphere upon a marble pedestal in the living area, where its influence if any would be unavoidable by the two men.)

Oh, and one other factor conducive to their recruitment: they were both readers of other-worldly romances, with a penchant for the macabre; and so they were acquainted with the speculative fiction facet of matters which the Foundation had been attempting to fathom for several decades. In short, their minds would not be closed to themes, theories, and suggestions which narrower, more orthodox intellects might find unacceptable and immediately refute: they were “familiar” with notions of parallel dimensions, UFOs, alien encounters, and et cetera.

Enough: I have set the scene as clearly as possible within certain limits. So now let James and Jason speak for themselves.

One last point. While the following conversations are accurate (as covertly recorded by myself) I’ve excised and replaced certain names and references as a further security measure. For as elsewhere stated correspondence such as this—intended only for the eyes of my former Foundation colleagues—may not be as safe as their archive records.

NOTE: for easy recognition, all such altered sections will be parenthesized…

Jason, yawning: “What time do you have?”

James, showing great disinterest: “Does it really matter? After all, we’re not going anywhere.”

Jason: “I like to be regular in my habits and I’m feeling a bit hungry, so I suspect it’s time to eat.”

James: “You could regulate your habits by wearing a watch—but since I know you’ll only ask again, and since I’m already bored by this meaningless conversation…it’s six-forty. And before you ask, that’s p.m.”

Jason, grinning: “Thank you. Most gracious of you. And it seems I was right: time to eat.”

James: “I’m not hungry.”

Jason: “Then don’t eat. Me, I’m frying up mushrooms with a few slices of liver and bacon.”

James, suddenly restless: “Then perhaps I will eat, after all.”

Jason, going to the fridge: “I’ll be sure to set out equal, fresh portions for you…unless you want me to cook them for you?”

James, sighing: “Would that be such an inconvenience?”

Jason: “No more than glancing at your watch occasionally, no.”

James, changing the subject, staring fixedly at the artefact in its glass sphere, where its pedestal rose through the centre of the circular table at which he was seated: “Did you dream last night?”

Jason, frowning, and squirting a mist of olive oil into a frying pan: “Three nights, three dreams, yes.”

James: “The same dream?”

Jason, perhaps slightly troubled: “The very same: But very vague… More a set of sensations than a dream proper. Nothing clearly visual, nothing spoken out loud. Mental whispers, or—I don’t know—instinctive knowledge? Well, if you know what I mean.”