The Plot Calls #18 : "Shimmering Soil part 1 of 2"

Disclaimer: This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, businesses, and incidents are products of the author’s imagination and/or Ai-assisted-content-generation. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, or actual events is purely coincidental.

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Sam Erriden didn’t consider himself paranoid. Cautious? Sure. Conspiracy-aware? Obviously. But lately? Lately, it was harder to tell the difference.

He sat at his desk, scrolling through messages from anonymous sources. Survivors. Whistleblowers. Victims. People who claimed to have seen the Plot, or nearly brushed against it.

Behind the glowing screen, his apartment felt small. Exposed. The kind of exposed that made your skin itch—like being watched by more than cameras. Something deeper. Something sideways.

He called Marcus.

“Do you know anything about Faraday cages?” Sam asked.

Marcus appeared in the apartment seconds later, materializing in a disorienting, sideways tilt that made reality feel like a dream.

Sam jumped. “Warn me next time.”

Marcus brushed invisible dust off his coat. “There’s a lunatic who owns a storefront app collecting every keystroke you’ve ever made. You were right to be concerned.”

Sam blinked. “So… that’s a yes on the Faraday cage?”

Marcus nodded. “I asked a friend for help. Your entire apartment is a Faraday Cage with a metaphysical link to the internet in a manner that renders you untraceable by anyone or anything, unless they know what we know—which they don't and can't.”

Sam exhaled.

“Luckily, we aren't even a blip on their radar,” Marcus added, his mind somewhere else. “A being that can see through our dimension, at any time, in any space, traced the emitted frequency of our communication across the times we've had them. No record was captured anywhere. Must have been fate we were safe until now, and you asked about Faraday Caging your space. Strange.”

Sam smiled, taking a deep breath. “I was afraid something might have flagged the Pallid Tear, Nozoma, Farcebook, InstantGrat, and TimeBomb networks. Sociopathic, narcissistic, transhumanist, eugenicist psychopaths are worse than Plot People. As long as we're safe from Eugene Thaddeus, Noel Skum, Peter Thance, and Dolan Frump, I’m good.”

Marcus gave a humorless smile. “Safe from them… and other things.”

Sam dropped into his desk chair, rubbing his face. “That's a relief. Well, I’ve been talking to people, and from what I've gathered, the Plot is a portal to a place in the realm that runs sideways.”

Marcus tilted his head. “You mean the Sideways. The entities who live there even call it that.”

“Semantics, Marcus, but whatever, I’ll acquiesce. The Sideways, it is,” Sam responded, shrugging. “Anyway, the Plot… from the stories I’ve gotten, it appears to people who wanted something bad from a place within. A place motivated by malicious, negative intent like greed, insecurity, narcissism, and so on. After reviewing everything, I think the Plot is a portal. Its particles of energy look like grains of dirt. Soil. It only opens a certain amount, hence the size of the appearance of a Plot. It’s a window to the Sideways just big enough for something to stick its hand through it.”

Marcus contemplated. “Seems to make sense. If we're dealing with something from the Sideways, then there's a reason it appears, and a method that allows it to do so. Energy imprints on physical items. It gets an offering with a spiritual imprint. Then, there’s a pact.”

Sam’s voice went quiet. “We might be on to something. Maybe how it works, Marcus. Imagine that though. Bad vibes attract. The entity on the other side opens the portal, calls that person in a way they understand. They offer. It eats. They serve it. It somehow eats their motive. Their will. They become hollow. Idle,” Sam said. “If that’s the case, how do we stop it?”

Marcus leaned against the wall, arms crossed. “We aren’t. Stopping it or changing someone is a vibe thing. They have to decide, make the consistent effort, and re-align. No one can change anyone, except by fear. You can’t love someone into being more lovable, but you can threaten them to lower their vibration.”

“Seems to be the case, but we can try,” Sam said. “If my content does its job, people will realize who, what, and where might be manipulating them for the worst—from within or from the outside—and they might say, ‘Oh, that sounds like me. I might call the Plot. I’m a candidate for going idle. Maybe I should let go of that thing I only want because I’m in the wrong environment.’”

Marcus shrugged. “I guess, Sam. But there's people who are just bad,” he said, sighing.

“No way. No one’s just bad, Marcus. That’s like saying even when you know better you’d do it anyway because it's not only easy and fun, but because you want the power and the thing you know without a doubt comes from an evil place. No one is that stupid. Maybe Peter Thance is. Maybe Dolan Frump is. But not even the people around them are that absent-minded,” Sam asserted, certain.

“Look, Sam. If narcissists are going to admit they're narcissists, they probably have something to gain. Evil exists. There are people whose souls are putrid, whose hearts are hatred, and their minds are malice. It’s just who they are. It’s their natural frequency. Their sound. Evil defines the what behind the who that shapes their identity.”

“Crap. That was deep, Marcus,” Sam said, pensive. “I bet you’ve seen some stuff in the Sideways.”

Marcus smiled, crestfallen. “Sort of.”

“Ah, my guy, come on. Spill it,” Sam demanded, eager, curious, and excited. “You know something. You know something people don’t. That’s why you’re you. I knew it when we met, and I can tell other people feel it. You unnerve people. You walk your vibe. The rest of us are trying to figure it out. Tell me, what do you know? I’m dyin’, man!”

Marcus glanced around the room, self-conscious.

“We’re in a metaphysical Faraday Cage. I went idle. We both have families that worked for the old Encrypt Corp. Even if I judge, it’s not genuine. It’s insecurity. Like trying to prove I know something you don’t because I have an inheritance,” Sam said, awkwardly but from a genuine place. “My inheritance should be something I can talk about freely because it’s a thing and not a means of our difference, like your superiority over me. It’s a thing. Not a means of our difference. Just fact… I’m Sam. You’re Marcus. Sam writes. Marcus does. Sam learns. Marcus knows. It’s simple. It’s true.”

Marcus rolled his eyes. He sighed. “You’re overthinking it, Sam.”

Sam laughed. “I watched myself die over and over. I can be honest with myself about where I’m at in terms of the people around me. I’m secure in myself enough to admit it.”

“I feel sounds in my soul,” Marcus said. “Frequencies. My energy hears other energies, and I understand things people can’t, don’t, or won’t express.”

Sam grinned in awe. “Sounds? Like what?”

“Truths. Lies. Thoughts. Emotions. Intentions. Motivations…”

Sam laughed. He sat up and grinned, then rubbed his hands. “Dating is probably incredible. You always know what women want.”

Marcus sighed. “Or when their minds and emotions change. Momentary truths, fleeting thoughts, lies by omission. Things they aren’t aware of, and then avoid.”

Sam paused. He thought about something.

“Yes, even in bed,” Marcus said. “It’s not prestigious knowledge. I can use and abuse people if I want to, easily. But I hear the sound of my own truth too. It’s the loudest.”

Sam frowned. “Oh.” Sam sunk into his seat. He wanted to ask Marcus if he was alright.

“What does being alright mean?” Marcus asked, frightening Sam. “Sounds, Sam. Don’t worry. It’s limited. I can’t hear you from this distance,” Marcus explained, moving toward the window.

Sam gasped. “That’s why you sit there or move the desk toward the other end of the room.”

Marcus smiled.

Sam blushed. “Do you hear my thoughts or my sounds when I think of my girlfriend?”

Marcus laughed for the first time in months.

“Marcus! What do you know? Seriously, what do you know?” Sam asked.

“I’m not sure. There’s no real way to test what I know or don’t. Don’t assume I know everything. I’m still a person. I make mistakes. The only person who knows might be my grandmother, but she doesn’t know I can hear energy. She doesn’t know that I know she’s clairvoyant,” Marcus revealed.

Sam had a thought and cringed.

Marcus sighed. “Everyone, Sam.”

Sam frowned. “All the time?”

Marcus frowned. He sighed and stared beyond the horizon. Somewhere that shouldn't exist… but did.

There was a long silence. The glow from Sam’s laptop flickered.

Sam shrugged, breaking the awkward pause. “Well, I guess we just do what we can with whatever the Plot is.”

“It’s all we can do,” Marcus replied, trying not to intrude on Sam’s frequency and intent. “If we warn people about the Monkey's Paw and hide it,” Marcus continued, “Some people would still kill us to get it and use it. The best thing we can do is your content and my Sideways intervention.”

Sam nodded. “Makes sense. You know… I just had a thought, Marcus. Completely unrelated, but if there are people who want all the answers to things all the time, and to know the nature of existence—or worse, become God—do they know what it entails?”

“No one who wants to be supernatural comprehends they'll become responsible for what they know, Sam. Becoming a God makes you responsible for godly things, like the fabric of existence. You’ll implode with everyone and everything if you mess up. So, the person who wants it and gets it learns they have to keep something running. Responsibility for systems that couldn’t be known prior to that level of power.”

“I never considered that. That’s terrifying to think about,” Sam said. “I can’t fathom the extent of the implications.”

Marcus shrugged. “We don’t need to. Just be honest and stay in authentic alignment. Anyway, Gunn and Alvarez are coming. Concerned.”

Sam paused. His eyes widened. “The first time they came. You knew! You knew didn’t you? You—”

The knock came before Sam could finish speaking.

Two sharp, precise taps. Too familiar now.

Marcus opened the door.

Officers Gunn and Alvarez stood there, unease radiating off both of them.

Gunn cleared his throat. “Have you heard Celeste Halloway’s final, soundless song?”

Sam looked at Marcus, studying his superficial surprise.

“What’s it called?” Marcus asked, convincing.

Gunn glanced at Alvarez, who nodded as though shrugging and approving simultaneously. Gunn inhaled, and then exhaled. He locked eyes with Marcus and said:

“The Plot Thickens.”

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