BANTERS WITH JACK

by

John W Townsend

A tongue in cheek sequel to my book

MY NAME WAS JIACK

When My Name Was Jiack ended

the characters lived on.

Chapter One

You Think I am Crazy

If I tell them, they might think I am going crazy, some maybe think I am already, who cares. It's this chatter in my head, you will not believe me if I tell you. Crazy! That is what you will think.

Let me explain. I am a writer, alright, I think I am a writer. When pen and paper meet, my brain is happy, we all join forces and we write, and we write, and we write. Every so often we create a character. Some are minor characters, like passing country pubs, full of charm and character, used once, never again. I do not disparage their importance, without them the fabric of what I write would fall apart, they are the stitching at the seams.

However, some characters become larger than life, like a man on the run. They become a paradox of a so many bespoke reasons of, guilty, innocent, the jury is out. It is of those characters that I refer as my, going crazy, let me explain.

You see some ten years ago I wrote a book, the content of which is not relevant except to say the central character was left on Mars, below the surface. I never gave thought to his plight, just a story. Never thought that Jack Thatcher would come back to into my life, it was just a story, was it not?

Now I will explain the 'nuts and bolts'. Two years ago I started getting woken in the night, I would hear a voice shouting, 'John, for gods sake get me out of here!' Not always those words, but you get the drift, someone was calling for my help. Many times my wife would ask me, 'What are you looking for in the middle of the night?' I dare not tell her, even I began to feel I was borderline out there with the fairies.

Then, maybe after about four months, the voice began to be more 'in my face', as if right there with me. Even to identify himself. 'For gods sake man, I'm Jack Thatcher, have you totally forgotten all about me?' His voice was loud, terrified.

I remember that day, when the voice said who they were. I shivered on the spot, felt cold, like I was in chill factor of minus 10c or less. I thought I should try and dismiss the nonsense, yet as I was thinking, the voice was speaking, unrelenting. I recall timidly replying to the voice, 'What can I do?' Then shocked that I received a well crafted reply. 'You help! Thats a laugh. Your dam stupid thoughts put me here, let me get out of your head.' he said, then almost instantly continued, 'Take responsibility John, you stuck me here! So what are you going to do about it?'

Now it seems that this banter with Jack has left me isolated from the real world, you just cannot say, 'Hold on a minute, I have a call in my head. At least I assume it is in my head.' Even you must be thinking at this point, he's crazy. Come on, I understand, honestly, I do understand, even I at times subscribed to that line of thought, that I must be going crazy. Well, I must be in such times as when I would be talking on my mobile, then say, 'Hold on a minute, someones calling.' See you get it, Jack's 'voice' was that clear to me, not inside my head. I would even sense his voice came from a direction, I would actually turn to address him, does that make me crazy? maybe.

Now I have explained why you may think I am crazy, at least put you in the picture, maybe I should elaborate!?

Chapter Two

Cry For Help

Sometimes you just blindly accept that the here and now are based on logic, yet logic just does not ad up. Like when your mobile bursts into whatever inspired ringtone you have given it; you answer, a voice calls you by name, thats the first barrier removed, they ask how are you, second barrier removed. They then say they are returning your call, now they have you wired in, you engage in the who, what, when. So you ask them questions. In the end it is a cold caller doing their thing. But what if you ask them what is this call about, refresh my memory, they reply and hit a spot that relates to something that resonates. Now you begin to gather the facts, so it was with this voice, it all began with these banters with Jack.

He would always sound urgent, at times disturbing. I honestly tried to keep adrift from his chatter, I really thought I was loosing the plot, you cannot imagine how this began to frighten me, realy disturb me.

Often my wife would say 'Are you alright John?' How could I reply, I had not a clue as to what was going on, except it was real to me, he had not been a cold caller, but a someone who knew me. He had now identified himself, though not easy, I began to expand on the banter, ask him questions.

He had asked me to get him out of that place! Oh easy you might say, write a squeal. Really! He is a character in a book I wrote, entirely fiction, set in the future, the book concludes in the high of, and we all live happy ever after. Wrong according to Jack!

I had created this character called Jack Thatcher, even introduced him to a Martian or two. I sent him deep underground to a world of fiction, then married him off to a Martian called Ariela R, even gave them a happy ending. Yet he tells me there was no happy ending, Ariela ceased to exist. He told me power surges on the surface of Mars disrupted the holographic units that kept these Martians alive. The already weak magnetic fields on Mars were flipped by the power surges causing most of the power to fail in the subterranean world. Ariela was never a live being, she had lived in the flesh thousands of years before Jack arrived, but her world knew it was coming to an end, as her actual existence in a physical form neared its end, and she being the last Martian alive, she did as she had done for hundreds of her fellow survivors, stored their DNA and created the basis of a hologram life form, generated to live beneath the Martian surface. Now with power gone, her hologram existence faded. Jack tells me these things because I did not write this ending. He tells me he has been living in semi darkness for over eighteen years. Now, slowly but surely, the heat generated lighting was also failing, he wants me to get him out of that place, get him out of my head.

I tell myself I am crazy even to engage in any banter with him, yet I hear his voice, begging me, calling me. Then I rationalized all that was happening, 'Of course, it's your writer side planning a sequel I tell myself. Yeah that's it! A sequel, you were right. So I told this voice, Jack, 'Alright, alright. I will get you out of there. I will write that sequel, call it, Everything will be alright Jack.'

No sooner had I suggested that idea, than all hell broke loose. Within days I started getting messages on my PC screen, no not text or email, hand written messages on a blank screen. The messages were signed off as Jack thatcher at first, then later just Jack. They would appear like an overlay to whatever was on my PC, a gray scale color page with what looked just like a real hand written message.

The first message said, 'John, it is not that simple. Whatever you did when you started my life, it was not just a story. I cannot explain to you anything, my life is exactly as you gave me, it lived on after, at least until the awful boom that rang for days around our caverns, just boom, boom, boom, slowly getting quiter. Within time the results of the boom were manifest as Ariela R and my friends started to change their appearance, they lost their solid touch and feel, they became semi transparent holograms. Then one by one they vanished. Try as we might to re-establish power to their holographic life generators, the Martian polarity had changed, as I said the magnetic fields had flipped, the magnetic flux in these generators were now running in reverse. John get me out of this place, I am cold and lonely, I dont want to die here,help.'

When I read the message I honestly thought it was a hoax, in fact all the years of hearing Jacks voice, and now this, it kind of made me feel I had been the victim of an elaborate prank.

My instant reaction was to trace the sender of the message, that was the beginning of aftershock for me.

Attached to the message was a small line of, well all I can describe as some geometric data, just a small line of seventeen digits in the top left hand corner of the message. I dragged the cursor to it, toying with random thoughts as to what it was. As soon as the cursor touched the data it became brighter, I instinctively right clicked, saying 'Gotcha' then laughed, I said 'Gotcha!!!' several times, even shouted it, honestly believing I had found the sender.

What happened next was my PC ran through a moment of madness, changing pages after pages, like scrolling data flying all over the place, then I stopped laughing, this was wrong. The screen displayed a circle that kept rotating sideways. Just a black background with a light gray revolving circle. I had never seen a page like this before. It just stayed that way, quite annoying as I had really thought I had a lead to the sender of the message, now I was locked into this.

I sat looking at this annoying, gray turning circle for twenty minutes or more. I thought about making myself a Coffee, which felt very agreeable, so I ventured away from the PC. No sooner I stood up than the screen displayed a visual image, I thought it was a still shot, maybe a night time view, fairly dull. Then I saw a bird fly past, this was a live image. Now I was captured, 'Yes!' I exclaimed, forgetting the coffee, believing I was tracking the hoaxers home webcam.

Chapter Three

The Message Box

I sat looking at the dull image, wondering if anything was going to appear, then fooled myself into believing I was actually logged into one of this zoo webcams, that it was all part of the hoax.

I say fooled because twice a white box appeared on the screen, I looked at it but avoided any interaction with it. The third time it came on screen I braved it, let the cursor touch the white box. The box doubled in size, filling the mid-section of the screen, in the left hand corner of the box some small geometric symbols, this time I left them alone. Then a red spot appeared, gently flashing in the center of the box. 'In for a penny, in for a pound.' I thought, off I go and dragged the cursor to touch the red spot. As I did I heard a voice say something like 'Kerixo soballa.' I replied to the voice in a humorous way saying 'Just black no sugar.' As I did the box disappeared and I heard a voice reply, 'Is that you John? Someone pass me a Jack Daniels please.' In the image on the screen a man appeared, he shone a torch to his face. Then he asked again, 'John is that you?' I replied, hesitatingly,

'Yes I am John, who are you?' There was laughter, whoever it was was laughing aloud, appearing to disturb birds in the background. Then they spoke. 'Of course you have never seen me, Commander Jack Thatcher at your service. Sorry about the light, it is all dying here.' I was shocked, shot down of any words to reply, just looked at the screen. 'Are you there John, I have no visual, talk for goodness sake.' The man said. I half muttered, 'I am lost for words, this does not make sense. You are Jack Thatcher?' There was a sigh then a reply, 'Look John, it is too much to explain all to do with Martian technology, you used some ancient program called Google Mars, they had left Geo-dots on the program, and I cannot explain those in a few minutes either. In short what you wrote was part their story, their history left on another worlds data base, somehow you tapped into it and added various other people from Earth, myself included. It is not your fault but you linked up to the Martian Biological Generators, not only switched them on, but sent me into them. You started a whole Martian system running underground, it is amazing, I should say was amazing, it is almost completely dead now. My Earth characteristics seem to have allowed me to roll on. I want to get off this dying planet, please.'

My mind was jabbering away, unable to believe any of this. Hoax was shouting at me loud and clear. So I decided to play dum, play along with the charade. The man calling himself Jack then tells me. ' John for goodness sake just do what I say, I have only a few days, then I will die of cold, or hunger. Apart from that I may end up in darkness very soon. I have a way of escape, I have been begging this day happen that you can set it in motion, but until today I could not Geo-dot the ancient communications you use, however I did yesterday.'

I really thought I was going to find out it was a hoax, for the more I listened, the more I was taken in. 'Alright, what can I do?' I replied. This man Jack then explained. 'In about five minutes I will put on your screen a small green bar, hit it and stand back. I have collected the data of some of my friends along with Ariela R, there will be four of us. When the green bar appears, hit it.'

It was all sounding crazy, yet was as crazy as my book, even had my mental agreement with it all. 'Alright.' I replied. The man man called Jack then said, 'The image will disappear, all I will say is, hit the green bar, and thank you.' with that the image on the screen vanished, just a black screen.

I really thought the hoaxer had run out of ideas, hopefully gone home. In fact that idea of a coffee now sounded really good. After about ten minutes I left the PC headed for the door, then laughed, but my laughed turned off instantly, a small green bar was on the PC screen.

I shook my head, then said, 'No, not anymore, Coffee break.' I left the room heading to the kitchen, there I made a mug of instant Coffee. It was nectar, seemed hours since I had a brew.

Chapter Four

Green Is For Go

I even had some biscuits with the Coffee, a celebration that the hoaxer was gone. It was nearly four pm Miriam my wife would be home in about thirty minutes, she had gone into town for a few hours. I had promised to have a light meal ready when she comes home, so my attention was now directed to the fridge.

I thought I had better shut down my PC, so amballed back into the office. The screen still had the green bar on it, I smiled and dragged the cursor to the green bar, laughing as I did. 'Green is for go.' I said aloud, adding ' Good riddance.'

Surprisingly the screen went black, the PC shut down, 'Good' I thought, well at least until what sounded like electrical arching could be heard from inside the tower unit. Smoke appeared as if from nowhere, soon the whole room was filled with this bluish smoke. 'What the hell has happened.' I exclaimed, then thinking the PC was on fire, I disconnected the unit from the power. I ran to the kitchen where we had a small extinguisher, just as I grabbed it and came running out of the kitchen, Miriam arrived home. 'Hello, sorry cant stop PC on fire.' I shouted, as I headed to the office.

Miriam hurried behind but was confused as John opened the office door with hazy blue smoke billowing out, she could hear the sound of people coughing from inside the office. 'Whose in there?' she heard me shout. Then she called out 'John who is it in there?' I sprayed the extinguisher over my PC tower base, as I did pushing past several people, 'What are you doing in here?' I asked as we all stepped out of the office.

'Allow me to introduce myself John, I am Jack Thatcher, just arrived from Mars, I thank you.' Jack then introduced the others, 'May I introduce Ariela R, my Martian wife. Glisalme and Glarfsy, and when he stops coughing, meet Hevill.'

Miriam stared in disbelief, which I must confess was my state of mind as well. 'Who are these people?' she whispered to me. I sheepishly whispered in reply, 'Visitors from Mars.' Then I dashed back into the office to check the PC was not burning.

Miriam is always quite good at times like this, so she turned to our apparent guests and said, 'I wonder if you you would all like something to eat and drink, follow me, lets get out of this smoke. I am sure John will explain to me later.'

John pulls Jack to one side, asking him, 'Is this for real?'

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THE END

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