End Vision Read online

  End Vision

  A Novel

  J. Ryan Archer

  Copyright © J. Ryan Archer, 2019

  All rights reserved. Except as permitted under the U.S. Copyright Act of 1976, no part of this publication may be reproduced, distributed, or transmitted in any for or by any means, or stored in a data base or retrieval system, without the prior written permission of the publisher.

  First Edition

  The characters and events in this book are fictitious. Any apparent similarity to real persons is not intended by the author and is either a coincidence or the product of your own troubled imagination.

  Where the names of real places, corporations, institutions, and public figures are projected onto make-up stuff, they are intended to denote only made-up stuff, not anything presently real.

  ISBN: 978-1-7923-1649-4

  ISBN: 978-1-7923-1650-0

  ISBN: 978-1-7923-1651-7

  To Mom and Amber

  “The eye through which I see God is the same eye through which God sees me; my eye and God’s eye are one eye, one seeing, one knowing, one love.”

  ~Meister Eckhart, Sermons of Meister Eckhart

  “Can you avoid knowledge? You cannot! Can you avoid technology? You cannot! Things are going to go ahead in spite of ethics, in spite of your personal beliefs, in spite of everything.”

  ~Jose Manuel Rodriguez Delgado

  “In societies dominated by modern conditions of production, life is presented as an immense accumulation of spectacles. Everything that was directly lived has receded into a representation… The spectacle is not a collection of images; it is a social relation between people that is mediated by images. The spectacle cannot be understood as a mere visual excess produced by mass-media technologies. It is a worldview that has actually been materialized, a view of a world that has become objective.”

  ~Guy Debord

  “Have you seen the bridge?!”

  ~Robert Plant, “The Crunge”

  Part I

  15, Apr. 2013

  VerMas: Department of Biotechnology and Programming

  Ramon Ramos was hopeful. Why should he be otherwise? The doctor had assured him that his pre-surgery tests were positive. Among other things, the four day video EEG allowed the doctor to map Ramon’s brain. The cameras had seen into his brain. The doctor now knew where the seizures originated (the temporal lobe), with what frequency the seizures occurred (one every twenty-eight minutes), and how his brain waves behaved before, during, and after. SPECT scans and fMRI results from the video EEG had measured blood flow in the brain. This assured the doctor with almost ninety percent certainty that the seizures were originating from in or around the temporal lobe. The MEG scan where he had placed the helmet-like electrode cap over Ramon’s razor-shaved head had reinforced this certainty of temporal lobe origination by as close to one hundred percent as the doctor was willing to give. The doctor was certain that if Ramon went forward with the trial, his speech would return. He would walk again. Would he like to proceed with the procedure?

  Ramon rocked back and forth in the seat of his wheelchair, his face frozen and contorted, as if captured by a camera in a moment of immense pain.

  “Very well,” said the doctor. “You might be thinking, ‘What comes next Dr. Facundo?’ I will tell you: surgery.” Facundo paused and looked up from notes he kept on his tablet. “I will create a trap door into your head by removing a small piece of bone from your skull. Yes… You will be asleep for this part, of course. This will allow me to access your brain. Once inside, by using the information we gained from all the tests, I can then attach a small chip to the temporal lobe.” Facundo showed Ramon how small the chip would be by creating a space between his right thumb and pointer finger. “Very small. Very powerful… Once inserted, I will wake you for fine tuning. I will ask you to perform tasks, and we will get you to where we need to be before putting you back under and closing you up. You will spend a day or two in ICU where we can watch you and monitor your progress. Then you get to go home, Ramon. Of course, we will need to watch and monitor you closely. I will need you to come in often. But you should have your life back.”

  Ramon’s rocking became violent. He shook completely. His eyes glazed and stared straight forward, his face locked in a paralysis of pain.

  Facundo rose and set aside his tablet. He ran his hand across the top of Ramon’s head as if petting a small dog. “It is O.K. I want you to remember this moment,” he whispered. “Everything will soon be O.K... Very soon, very soon, we will have you smiling in the sunshine.”

  Ramon was hopeful. What other options did he have? What other way could he be?

  27, Nov. 2017

  VerMas: Department of Vision

  Robert Morris read from a stack of notecards to projected images of board members. They gazed earnestly at Robert and Cara Carson, who sat across from him under the fluorescently-lit ceiling of VerMas Headquarters on this 27th of November, 2017 — seventeen months and three weeks to the day since the VerMas Media department in Santa Monica had scored a number one rated television program.

  “After an absence of nearly four years,” said Robert, “I find myself looked upon by those who, some of you from the earliest days of my time in this cutthroat business and some of you for the first time, have trusted me with the success of this great branch of our wide-reaching conglomerate at VerMas. I have always put the company first, and have tried to act in the best interest of VerMas and its shareholders. I understand the impact our success in this department has on the health of the company as a whole. Therefore, it is with great pride and honor that I accept the position being offered back to me here today. I will work closely with Miss Carson, whose efforts have been admirable in these past three years, to ensure that the department gets back on track and takes its place once again at the top and forefront of our great industry. Thank you.”

  The images faded from the wall. Robert placed his notecards on the long rectangular table that divided him from Cara. He exhaled deeply and raised his eyebrows. Four years ago this coming January, Robert had stepped down as Head Coordinator of the Department of Vision for the VerMas Media Group to assume a life of retirement, believing he was no longer in tune to what the younger generation wanted. Of the old guard, and an authentic visionary of television production for over thirty years, he had felt his talents waning.

  Yet Robert had more or less invented the concept of reality television, and the ensuing windfall of successes in that medium had brought billions to the VerMas conglomerate in one form or another. Robert Morris was legend in the world of entertainment: fourteen Emmys, five Golden Globes, Oscars in various platforms, Grammys. His proteges and projects had won it all. And he was now tasked with setting the Department of Vision back on track. Robert was a hype man. With enough hype, he believed, a show could be successful before it even aired. VerMas’s reach was so wide, the arterial products sold in connection to a program could more than make up for a shitty production, money-wise. And with the right amount of build-up, any show could draw enough viewers to survive one season. If the season was successful — spin-offs, new stars, slight tweaks to sell new products. Robert knew how to drag it out for years (as was evident by his thirty year marriage).

  Robert liked to point out to people — mostly colleagues, and most often while drunk at some party or other — that the word ‘television’ was a combination of two words: ‘tele’ (distant; far; transmitting over distance) and ‘vision’ (being able to see; seeing into the future), so that the word itself traditionally meant ‘far sight.” But, he would also point out, ‘tele’ could also mean ‘end’ or ‘complete.’ End Vision. Complete Vision. Robert liked this. He envisioned the word itself, television, as meaning both things at the same time.

&nbs
p; He had thought, in retirement, to begin a life of leisure, unencumbered by the day-to-day stresses and responsibilities that had occupied so much of his time as Head Coordinator. However, life away from the business had been dull and uneventful. In effect, Robert had found that a retired man in his sixties who used-to-be-a-big-deal-in-television could not get laid by the type of women he wanted to get laid by — the drop-dead gorgeous and often desperate and washed-up actresses and wannabes from whom, as department head, he had always had his pick.

  Cara sat and watched as Robert composed himself, setting down his notecards and regaining his breath in short, hyperventilated bursts. Remarkable changes had occurred since his departure, visionary changes. But, they had amounted to little or no immediate monetary success. Cara Carson, newly turned forty, had been their instigator, and, thus, according to the Board, must be held responsible for the department’s diminishing returns. And so the Board brought Robert back to assume Cara’s position — his prior one — in the Department of Vision, pushing Cara down to second in command. The Board had failed to see, or, more to Cara’s frustration, had failed to support, her vision of what the future could and should be. They had pulled the plug just as her plans were taking shape, retreating back to Robert’s antiquated way of programming. She had pleaded with the Board to give her one more month, two, tops. By then she would be able to show them what she had been working on in conjunction with the Department of Biotechnology and Programming. But they had balked and called on Robert. Maybe she just needed a little guidance, they told her. A little shove back in the right direction. Cara knew this to be short sighted; it was they who needed guidance.

  Robert stared out the westward-facing windows of the conference room. Hazy rays of the mid-evening sun reflected low-hanging dust particles scattered throughout the space in a sparkling fog. Remarkable changes had been wrought, as well, on the once handsome man seated before Cara. His green eyes sunk deep above the jut of high cheekbones; his mouth was a long thin hash-mark framed by thick dry lips. His thinning hair was dyed black and combed in a way to ensure maximum coverage of his balding scalp.

  “I want you to know,” said Cara, breaking the silence, “that I support you. I understand that this company expects results. I have no hard feelings toward you, Robert.”

  Robert raised his eyes to meet hers. “I appreciate that,” he said.

  “I would like to know, however, what it is you are planning to do here.”

  “We will get the team together,” he said after some thought. “We will announce that we are looking to produce a new reality television show. Something that hasn’t been seen before, and then we will bounce around some ideas.”

  “But what hasn’t been done before, Robert? What else is there to do in reality t.v.?”

  “Oh. There is plenty, I’m sure. That is for our creative team to figure out.”

  “Again, I support you and I support this company. I understand that we need a hit. That it’s been awhile since we’ve had one.”

  “Thirteen months and three weeks since a number one.”

  “You think I don’t know that? I’m reminded of that every day. But is another reality program the answer?”

  “I have been in this business for a long time, Cara.”

  “You have been. That’s the point I’m trying to make. It seems to me that we are just trying to grab back on to the tail end of an idea that you created fifteen years ago. No offense, but this is the Department of Vision, and this does not sound in anyway visionary. It sounds mute. Why not try something truly visionary? What I have —”

  “This is the way,” interrupted Robert. “Yes, reality television may be on its last leg, but it’s still hot and it still draws viewers. Give the people what they want. The show is the way.”

  “What I was saying,” Cara continued, “...why does it even have to be television? What I have been working on, the system we are working on together with the Department of Biotechnology and Programming, will literally change the way we see the world, Robert. You have no idea.”

  “You’re right. I don’t. But the Board does, I’m sure. And Cara, they wouldn’t have called me back here if they were pleased with your current efforts. I know this. You know this, too. You might not want to admit it, but you know this.”

  She did.

  “This is the way,” Robert repeated. “I want you to call the team together. You tell them what we’ve discussed. I want them here tomorrow with ideas.”

  “Very well,” Cara responded. “I said I’d support you, and I will. I will tell everyone to have ideas ready for tomorrow.”

  “We need to move this thing along as quickly as possible. I want it done. We need to be in production by yesterday.”

  “I will move as quickly as I can to do what needs to be done to get this company back on track,” Cara said. “You’ll see.”

  She excused herself and left the room.

  The Texas Panhandle

  The wind blows cold from northern plains. Cattle — chewing slowly and sending rhythmic blasts from icicled noses — huddle, move together, a flock of frozen birds. Now and again the wind breaks and a thousand heads rise in unison, cynical, weary. And then she comes chugging back, pushing and pulling the bluestem like the coming of the tide; and the cattle bow back down to this invisible master and continue on, together, bovine, one giant hoof in front of another. A train locomotive in the distance lets its presence be known and rushes by, out of focus. Above, pale. A wisp of white. And above that, God himself.

  The mesquite in Texas set their roots 150 feet into the bowels of the plains and take hold, never to let go again. It is no accident that those living among these prairie glaciers who call the Great American Desert home, do the same, subconsciously, and latch on with great strength, all-the-while birthing intricate branches of their own that also burrow deeply into the land's guts, sucking them dry. Because, above ground, what can be held in spaces so vast and blown and wide-open that one becomes claustrophobic?

  It was in this land, north of the Canadian River in Hansford County, Texas, that William Harrison was born to Maude and Homer Munden on the dusty floor of the family's lean-to dugout, the last living child of ten children. Nineteen-twenty-nine. Just before the crash on Wall Street and five years before the first of the many great dust storms. A twin, his brother, was still-born and buried on the family property the next morning. William was strong and healthy, though, and many years later, would wonder if his brother had somehow given him twice the strength of a normal child.

  The Mundens had come to the Texas panhandle, more specifically Hansford County, in the late 1880s from South Carolina. William's grandfather, the son of an Irish immigrant, had married and moved west with his wife and two young children. In family lore, their covered wagon had been washed away during a river crossing, and Homer, William's father, at the time a small child of two, had been swept downstream. Thought for dead, the family later found him caught in a grove of cattails, splashing around in an eddy in the river. The Mundens thought this a sign from God and settled there, in what is now Spearman, Texas.

  Whether or not this event really occurred, William never knew. His father probably did not even know the truth, having been so young at the time. But the story was a favorite in the Munden family, and William told his children, and they theirs, and so it was swept along through the generations as fact. Over a hundred years after the myth, the Munden family told the story with great pride — a badge that they happily flashed if their loyalty to the area was questioned, or when someone with no history to the area tried to tell them what was what. They were five generations born into this land. Six counting William's father. Seven generations in the New World and six of them spent here, at the top of Texas. So what did the truth of the story matter? It was a part of them, same as the land.

  On his deathbed in 1937, William’s grandfather said to him, "A man must look properly after his memories." And William, only ten at the time, could not understand what he meant. br />
  William took his coffee sweet. Standing over the stained porcelain kitchen sink, he stirred the sandy sugar slowly with his spoon. Through the blindless window he faced, darkness. Not yet the faintest hint of sun. The late November wind was always coldest in the early hours, and the watering tanks for his few remaining head of cattle were certainly frozen. He and Victor would need to take his pickup to each of them and break the ice with a shovel or pick.

  William thought this without thinking, blowing the steam from the lip of his mug, his once white long johns now the same brown as the dirt outside. Taking slow sharp sips, he saw equally the grass swaying in the cold and the reflection of his kitchen and living room off the frosted glass. After six plus decades working this land, he no longer needed to think about what must be done each day. His body was in rhythm with the ranch. In the harshness of the Texas Panhandle one had to act on instinct. His animals depended on him, and he depended on his animals, and they were all at the mercy of the rain.

  Once dressed, he pulled on his worn leather gloves, went outside, and started his pickup. Clapping his hands to encourage circulation, he put the Ford in gear and set off toward the first of fifteen troughs where Victor would be waiting on him to begin the day's work. William could no longer swing the pick himself, but he got out for the work everyday nonetheless.

  He cracked his window to let out cigarette smoke. The frigid air in the early hours of morning smelled clean and more of the north than it did of a small Texas cattle ranch. It froze the insides of his nostrils as he drew it in. Overhead, thousands of geese honked in various bursts of crescendo, no doubt searching for their own spot of fluid water over that flat, unbroken landscape.