The Intangible - Double Crossed

The Intangible is a limited series anthology of audio literature that explores that fleshy veil which we must all one day pierce. We're happy to have you here, and even happier to keep you. The pleasure is all mine. It's an honor,

I know. Yes, I know you. You know me, even if you don't believe it yet. I know everyone. Who am I? Who am I to ignore the fourth and every wall? I often disregard rules. I rather enjoy it, in fact. Rules exist only for those who choose to adhere. Me, I do not adhere well to rules. Not at all. I know what you're thinking. Could I be him? Followed by the slither of uncertainty and a taste of dread. Like discovering a hair in your mouth as you swallow. A persistent irritation.

Like a lash lost in your eye. Like something lurking in the dark. An unpleasant thing. A shiver dances down your spine. Like the cool tips of a lover's fingers. Playing children's games across the skin of your back. Yes. I enjoy those thoughts of yours. Am I deceptive? Some would have you believe that. Do I lie? Never. I'll tell you who I am, and you won't believe me. Not until the time comes when you do. But by then, it will be too late. Do you know me now? Yes, you do.

I am the devil. Yes, I enjoy the flavor of your reeking doubt, and I swallow it whole. Ask yourself, to whom do you answer? Not to me, and I'm intrigued by your internet search history. So we both know it isn't. You know who. If not me, and if not you know who, then someone else perhaps. You must know. You do. Yes, that's right. You know who. You answer to yourself. Ooh, that left me feeling a little funny inside. Seems like a nice enough guy, or gal. Just like a certain old vaudevillian

who goes by the name of Larry. Larry was once the star performer of the illustrious Jack Davis Troupe and became widely known for his act, which was billed as the dizzying, daring, dazzling, death -defying high wire act. Larry will tell you all about it right now. Presenting! high

over Manhattan. Year after year. This. Chirping children in costumes and the timbre of wary parents. I keep hoping they'll finally get rid of me and this old bag of bones they call a body. But every year it's the same dance and the same song. It's demeaning. Don't they know I'm an old vaudevillian? They ought to tear up that contract. They should toss me in the tepid water. Let me finally sink. Throw us all three out the window. The bathwater, the baby, and me. Why can't they understand?

I was set up, see? Just an easy Connie's mock. A skinny duck pin too busy keeping my coattails tucked beneath my backside to watch for that third ball rolling right at me, coming down the alley. I'm a sincere fellow. I feel bad about what happened. I do. Still, this is cruel. You can't go and do something like this to a man and go around thinking it's right, because it ain't right, I'll tell you that right now. I was a master of my craft, and that deserves respect.

I had done that routine hundreds of times, with or without the baby. Somebody greased that girder on purpose, I tell you. Probably that stingy, sniveling agent of mine, looking to squeeze another shilling out of me at any cost. Well, Mr. Jack Davis, now we know, don't we? You told folks all over town you were sterling. Bonafide, you said. Ha! A bonafide skunk you are, sir. Two lives for two pence, I suppose. May that little girl rest in peace. You saw to it. We were both

sent to pieces. Now look at me. I'm the one who's bonafide. And you? You're slicker than a greased -up tub of greased -up butter. No trouble at all for you, was it, Mr. Davis? Must have been the talent's fault, right? Isn't that what you told them? Isn't that what you said, Jack? That it was me? Me? I am a pure professional. Always have been. That's right, you heard me. You were the one who gave me the gin that night. I couldn't be rude and decline. Now could I? What do you

take me for? Low class? It would have been ungentlemanly. A man has got to have some manners. Especially a man like me. A man about town. What with being bright in the people's eye. Oh, you let it happen. Insisted even. Fourteen stories high and a baby, Jack. A baby! You were there. You could have stopped it. This was your fault, Jack. You should have known better. Some shows on some nights, on some bills, well, they get scratched. And that's just the way it is. You, of all people,

ought to know that. Sometimes an act is, well, they ought to be left off the bill altogether, if you catch my meaning. And if you were bona fide, as you claimed yourself to be, you would catch it fine, I'll say. You should be here, Jack. Not me. You. You should be the one hanging. Now here I am, doing this same routine, the same song, the same dance, year after year. Will they ever toss me out with the rest of the rubbish? Oh, I should be so lucky. They... Here they come.

Excuse me a moment, if you would be so kind. Yes, a quick act, thank you. I won't be long. No, no, not at all. Creepy greetings and good evening. How do you do? I'm Larry. A skeleton they forgot to bury. Cha -cha -cha! I sing and I dance and I chatter and clatter to entertain and terrify you. Boo! Happy Halloween. Look, pal, you don't gotta say it. I already know, in case you couldn't tell. Just imagine it. This, year after year, barely two lines. Not even that

if my juice gets low. It's demeaning, I say. There's no heart in it, no soul, and I'm worn out. These old bones of mine, they're heavy, and I'm weary. Please put me in the bathwater. Let me finally sink and someone hold the baby. Please promise me you'll keep her warm. Then just toss me out. Well, some people never get it, do they? If only he could have somehow gone back in time and changed the outcome. Speaking of time travel, allow me to introduce our next

story. Searching Somewhere That's it! I got it!

I couldn't tell you half of what Enzo said, but that was the only part that mattered. He had figured out something. See, when he worked, Enzo was like a different person, technical and precise about everything he did or said. I spent half my time with him trying to decipher his intellect and the other half doing what I could to help. After he was done, he would resume his normal life again and talk like a normal man talks, eventually explaining to me what had gone down

that day in terms even I could understand. Sort of. Enzo had found a way to send objects through time, but the hitch was, in his words, Time is a fickle little rat. I can send the apple through time, but due to the infinite nature of paradoxes, it goes, well, I don't know where exactly, but it goes somewhere. Enzo thought he might have a solution using the same principles which were somehow related to quantum entanglement. That

much I could understand. Sort of. His plan was to manipulate the test object, an apple in most cases, through time while simultaneously moving it through space. Essentially, Enzo was attempting to account for both universal expansion and the Earth's orbital rotation. He planned to use a wormhole in conjunction with time travel to jettison the object into the space where he wanted it.

Here, in the shed behind his house. The trouble was, the theory he had put together was primarily focused on the time element, and although he knew both could be affected by the device he'd built, he really didn't know what he would need to alter in order to teleport the apple. Essentially, he said. That's what we're doing. We're teleporting the apple while simultaneously causing time to slip off of it. Like a sort of cosmic lubrication. Nothing like some good old cosmic lubrication

to keep the apple on schedule. I laughed a little too loudly and held my can of beer high, proud of my toast. Enzo was not impressed. Weeks went on with him tinkering around. Then one day, he muttered some scientific jargon I didn't understand, followed by... That's it! I got it! He was right, I suppose, because when he showed me how it worked, the apple did change locations. And it did appear in the second box he had built as a target. I couldn't tell where it went in between the two

boxes, of course. But I believed Enzo when he said he had it all figured out. Honestly, you'd think it would be more amazing than it was. But really, it was just an apple over there instead of over here. Nothing spectacular. Besides, the apple couldn't report anything about its experience. So yeah, it was cool, I guess. I was just happy to see Enzo so excited. I know how this next part is going to sound, but hear me out before you judge us. We needed a human test subject.

Enzo had already tested a bunch of animals with it by that time. And even his dog, Briar, who seemed fine. Enzo had got the idea that maybe he could create a loop in the wormhole and make it double back on itself. He showed me what he meant by making a circle with a piece of clothesline and pinching the clothes. Where he pinched, he told me, would be a single point in spacetime.

If he started with one apple here, and then increased the cosmic lube, he believed he could force an object to slip forward through time, controlling it until it doubled back and landed where the other apple had been. So then, he hypothesized, there would be an original apple, plus a copy of the original apple from a different point in time. I must have looked confused, because Enzo explained it again. What's your favorite cartoon? He asked. Um, Old Rapscallion, I guess?

Okay, let's say you wanted to see Old Rapscallion knock himself into a pile of bones. You could cut a frame of film from a different place in the movie while the film is still rolling, and then lay the frame on top of a new frame that hasn't played yet. Now you would see two of the same character on screen. He said it wouldn't matter if the old frame of film was missing, because that part of the movie had already played. It wouldn't be missed, and it might even resolve

the paradox issue. Well, it sounded good to me. Sort of. Enzo worked on it another month. Then he called me on the phone one day. You gotta come see this! I'm not even mad anymore, but I still feel jumpy when I remember. Enzo had it all worked out, but he couldn't test the machine himself because he needed to operate it. Since he knew I wasn't keen to risk being turned into applesauce, he pushed me. Took me by surprise, too. We hadn't even finished saying hello, and

he had the beam lit up already. Bam! Pushed me right into the light. I can't say I felt much. Some tingling. Like when your foot went to sleep and is waking back up. but it only lasted a second. Then, I was looking straight at myself. Almost immediately, the machine Enzo had built began whining like an alarm was going off. Stay calm, Enzo told us. I figured this might happen. It's okay. Then he lunged at us. Hard to say which one he was going for, since I suppose to him,

we were one and the same. Not to us, though. We both guessed what he was up to, and I went for the other me, the paradox, trying to get the jump on her. We wrestled for a few seconds, and then Enzo was in the fray, tugging and yelling at us that nobody knows the consequences and something about something blowing up. I think it was either the machine or the universe, but even that wasn't going to convince either one of us to get in the light again. Enzo was smart

enough to know that. Hands up! He coerced us instead. He cocked his pistol and made us turn around. The last thing I heard was Enzo. Nobody said this was going to be easy. Then a sharp shove, center of my back, tingling. I've been here for a while now. Somewhere. When a worm eats an apple, it leaves a wormhole. And according to my calculations, when a wormhole eats an apple with a wormhole, the wormhole has eaten itself. That much I can deduce, but it leaves me with

one question. What happened to the worm? Does he also eat himself? Yet another instance of Ouroboros? What's one thing you wish you could

say to someone but you can't because they're gone? Could be a question, apology, and I love you. Anything at all as long as it's for somebody you knew in life who's gone now. An old friend of mine told me about her breakup. That's not a great time in my life to, you know, give ear, lend an ear to someone else in my life. And she talked to me about that breaking up with someone and completely having that person disappear from your life is just the same as having that person

dead. And I have so many people that is no longer part of my life that's essentially dead. That friend of mine, I lost her too. I was a bad friend and I wish I could come back and tell her, Hey, I'm sorry. You caught me at a bad time, but... Given that I am your friend, I wish I could have done better. For you, and for myself. Pardon

me. My diligence is due, and an honest man's wages won't pay themselves. So please forgive, I plea. My soliciting is solely with the intent to impress upon you the validity and veracity of Angels Alive, our most extraordinary, essential, excellent elixir. Have you not heard? Angels Alive Extraordinary Elixir is indeed extraordinary,

but it is also much, much more. Not only is Angels Alive extraordinary elixir, a robust and rotund elixir, it is an excellent, exceptional, efficacious, effectual, potent, powerful, marvelous, magnificent one, and is, as always, an utterly edible, enjoyable, potent, potable, pleasantly piquant and palatable, desirable, delicious, delectable, mouth -watering, and yet... morally respectable the elixir of the finest quality of the most refined purity developed under the sharpest eye of scrutiny

safely and scientifically circulated carefully crafted and combined by the bright and the brilliant the astute and acute the clever and keen shaman of the sheik a mystifying medicine man from a mysterious perplexing peculiar part of pawang located deep deep down in the far southwest of the east For an elixir so unusually useful, Angels Alive Extraordinary Elixir is, for a time too temporary to tell, uncommonly priced. Every extraordinary bottle of Angels Alive Extraordinary Elixir must

go. And remember, folks, a bottle bought is always a bottle sold. Blaze Bentley stood ready, zap

gun in his right hand, a shimmering sack in his left. It was Corporal Bentley's sworn duty to protect the Quantonium Crystal with his life. You there, he shouted in a deep, bellowing voice. Stop in the name of the Republic of the New Milky Way! A rocket launched in the distance, streaking a blue -green flame across the black starlit sky. The alien hissed and clicked in sinister tones at Blaze as it crept closer. The tips of its insect legs ticked and scraped across the

dusty ground. One leg was already injured and left a crooked trail behind the creature. Blaze was ready to fire, but he had to issue one more warning in order to comply with the code. Stop right there, you disgusting bug! I will blast you if I have to! The monster's scaly mandibles scraped open, then closed. Scraped open, then closed. Blaze knew the behemoth was preparing to spit its venomous acid, but the hero leapt into action. He yelled, pew, pew, pew, pew, pew!

The giant alien insect screeched and crashed over to its side, making a great ruckus and sending a giant plume of moon dust into the sky. Blaze approached cautiously and towed the thing's greenish -brown exoskeleton with his white space boot. Corporal Blaze Bentley suddenly found himself on his back, staring up at the ceiling, unable to move. He was once again just a simple plastic toy. Nathan! Dinner! Coming! Nathan tramped downstairs. What's for dinner, Mom? Can we have pizza? Welcome

to Colony 7 -2. How often do you get let into a moon colony, Will? This is history in the making. New vaccine. Supposed to protect you from the zombie virus. Just a precaution. The name's Hen. I'm one of the local radio hosts, and you have been assigned as my co -host. Oh my god, are you okay? You're not looking too good. Are you... Shit! Someone just turned! I... Oh, shit. What? Will, what do you mean? Do you think this is a scratch? Or a bite. Hey, it's only three days.

Two. You know. Either he turns or he doesn't. Simple as that. Listen to Apocalypse Radio wherever you get your podcasts. You've been listening to The Intangible, an audio literature program of weird fiction. This was not a fever dream. It's real bad. Thing is, it keeps getting worse till one day you die. Does it get worse after that? I don't know, kid. I sure hope so.