Afterlife Crisis Read online

  Afterlife Crisis

  Randal Graham

  Contents

  Dedication

  Preface

  Chapter 1

  Chapter 2

  Chapter 3

  Chapter 4

  Chapter 5

  Chapter 6

  Chapter 7

  Chapter 8

  Chapter 9

  Chapter 10

  Chapter 11

  Chapter 12

  Chapter 13

  Chapter 14

  Chapter 15

  Chapter 16

  Chapter 17

  Chapter 18

  Chapter 19

  Chapter 20

  Chapter 21

  Chapter 22

  Chapter 23

  Chapter 24

  Chapter 25

  Chapter 26

  Chapter 27

  Chapter 28

  Chapter 29

  Chapter 30

  Chapter 31

  Chapter 32

  Chapter 33

  Chapter 34

  Chapter 35

  Epilogue

  About the Author

  Copyright

  Dedication

  For S. & P.

  Preface

  It’s okay if you don’t believe in the afterlife. The people who live there don’t believe in you, either.

  Afterlife Crisis is the second story in the Beforelife universe, a world that you might think of as the afterlife. The people who live there wouldn’t think of it as the afterlife, though, because they don’t think that anything comes before it. They call their world Detroit. Almost all the people who live in that world have forgotten their pre-mortem lives, and think that people simply pop into existence by emerging from the Styx and getting on with eternal life. Anyone who remembers having lived a mortal life is shoved into an asylum and treated for Beforelife Delusion.

  This raises a question. Should you read the first story, Beforelife, before dipping into this one? A short answer is “no”. A slightly longer answer is “yes”. But another answer, and an altogether more correct one, is that it depends on what you want to get out of this book. Having read the previous paragraph you know all you need to know in order to string along with the story of Afterlife Crisis. You’ll realize that many of the characters in the book are historical figures who now live in the world of Detroit without remembering who they were in the mortal world. You’ll know why humans in Detroit are immortal — able to recover from any injury or illness — and why they cringe at the very thought of human mortality. You’ll understand that the people of Detroit fail to realize the true nature of their world, and that the people being treated for Beforelife Delusion are the only ones who get what’s going on.

  There are other mysteries, though, that you’ll have a better chance of piecing together after reading both books. Who is Abe, the all powerful leader of Detroit? Why are some people in Detroit, like Abe, able to reshape the world to suit their whims? Why does Rhinnick Feynman, the narrator of Afterlife Crisis, believe he’s a character in a novel being penned by a cosmic Author? Why do some people reincarnate? Why does Rhinnick’s pal, Zeus, seem to believe that he was a Yorkshire terrier when he lived in the mortal world? And why are there so many Napoleons cluttering up the scenery? Clues about these (and other) mysteries are liberally besprinkled throughout both books. And while you’ll be able to piece many of them together by reading Afterlife Crisis on its own, those who really enjoy detective work might have a lot more fun by sifting through two volumes filled with intersecting clues.

  For what it’s worth, my mother can’t imagine why anyone wouldn’t want The Collected Works, so she suggests that you head to the bookshop and complete the set right now.

  Randal Graham

  Chapter 1

  “Zeus,” I said, once the dust had settled, the chickens had hatched, and the chips had fallen where they may. “I don’t mind telling you that, while we were still in the thick of it, and before the happy endings were strewn about with a lavish hand, there were moments when I felt things mightn’t end so frightfully well. One might even say that Rhinnick Feynman, though no weakling, came within a whisker of despair.”

  “No kidding,” said the honest fellow.

  “I mean, one couldn’t say that peril didn’t loom. It loomed like the dickens. The tortured Napoleons, the corrupted ancients, the bone-chilling brushes with matrimony, not to mention the even graver threat of—”

  * * *

  But wait. I’ve gone off the rails. Eager to bring my public up to speed on current events, I’ve shot off the mark like a scalded cat and left the readership befogged. It’s a snag I often come up against when starting a story, viz, the dashed difficult business of where to begin. No doubt you’ve found yourself in the same sand trap. I mean, if you bung in too much explanatory chit-chat at the starting gate, establishing what is known as “atmosphere,” or sorting out who begat whom all the way back to the primordial soup, you fail to grip. You see your readers, if any, stifling yawns and reshelving the book before you can say “what ho?” Yet if you spring off the bat at a couple of hundred mph, without supplying the merest whiff of expositional whatnots, you leave your public at a loss and yelling for footnotes. And it now occurs to me that, in opening the tale of present interest with the above slice of dialogue, I have made the second of these two floaters, failing altogether to set the stage for the super-sticky affair involving Zeus, Isaac Newton, Nappy, Vera Lantz, Dr. Everard M. Peericks, and the Napoleon who had lately taken to calling himself “Jack” — a tale which my biographers will probably call “Rhinnick and the Newtonian Horror,” or possibly “Feynman Conquers Science.” But by whatever name the affair is called, after taking all in all and weighing this against that, I suppose that it’s best to begin this story at the inception of my quest, if inceptions are the things I’m thinking of, and describe events in a roughly chronological order, allowing readers to string along and draw such character-strengthening lessons as they might from their perusal of my adventures. And so we begin, as it were, at the beginning. Let me marshal my facts, weigh anchor, and shove off.

  * * *

  The thing got started at the Detroit Riviera, one of the juiciest slabs of geography to feature in any travel brochure for the well-heeled jet-setter. I had repaired to this locale, staying at the appropriately opulent Hôtel de la Lune, in order to push along my top-secret quest — the one entrusted to me by Abe, Mayor of Detroit, first-born of the Styx, and ultra-powerful ruler of all he surveys. Stated briefly, the quest required yours truly to scour the landscape for a particular chump named Isaac, a government toady who was now, according to Abe, “the most dangerous man in the world.” For some unspecified reason, this Abe, despite his highly touted omnipotence, needed the undersigned to act as his agent or right-hand man in tracking down this Isaac and laying his plans a-stymie. Why Abe couldn’t do it himself, who can say? Perhaps mayoring kept him busy, perhaps he was occupied with matters of cosmic import, or perhaps he recalled that my last adventure had been settled by a dose of Abe ex machina and he feared displeasing the Author by dishing up something unduly similar in the sequel. But whatever the reason was, the quest had been thrust at Rhinnick Feynman, and Rhinnick Feynman had acquiesced. Once I’d assented to the gig, Abe had legged it into the sunset, disappearing to parts unknown with a view to hobnobbing with Ian, Penelope, and the City Solicitor — bit players in my prior ventures whom we can leave aside for now.

  As for why the Riviera was my point de départ, as the Napoleons might describe it, well, it isn’t any of the reasons you
might expect. It wasn’t the white sands, the smiling sun, the tropical breezes, or the frolicsome co-eds engaging in what is known as “beach volleyball.” Far from it: we Rhinnicks do not idly wallow in creature comforts when entrusted with matters of globe-wobbling import. No, my choice of the Riviera as the Feynman HQ was one of those master strokes of generalship for which I am so widely known. Allow me to lay out the gist.

  The nub of my quest, as already stated, was that I should sniff out this Isaac, discover how and why he was making himself a menace to pedestrians and traffic, and promptly ensure that he cease and desist. And if you’ve dipped into my memoirs to any extent, you’ll know that I rarely saddle up for any enterprise of this nature without Zeus at my side — Zeus being my colossal gendarme and loyal retainer. But this Zeus, as you’ll recollect, had recently had his memory wiped and marbles scrambled by a previous “world’s-most-dangerous” chump and had himself toddled off to parts unknown. Well, it’s widely known that every heroic quest requires a solid B story, and in this instance my B story was the reunion of self and Zeus with a view to rejoining forces and pushing along with story A, viz, quelling whatever storms were forming on the Isaac Newton front. So both the A and B stories hinged on hunts for missing persons — I had to find Isaac; I had to find Zeus. All pretty clear so far, what?

  You may have already spotted the choice that faced me. When searching for multiple quarries, one can either charge about the landscape moving from Spot A to Spot B, and from Spot B to Spot C, and from Spot C to Spot D, if you follow me, shouting names, digging for clues, and crossing your fingers in the hope that your prey hasn’t shimmied back to an earlier bit of the alphabet by the time you’ve hit Spot E; or one can find a likely roost, settle down for the long haul, and keep an eye skinned with a view to seeing one’s quarry wander by. Perceiving that this second approach could save a good deal of trouble and expense, it was this course I adopted.

  But where to roost? That is the question, and also the point where the patented Feynman genius came in. I joggled the memory and recalled hearing assorted specimens of the cognoscenti say that anyone who is anyone takes their winters at the Detroit Riviera. Reread that sentence if you must. Anyone (mark that word) who is anyone (mark it again) takes their winters at the Detroit Riviera. And while it is beyond doubt that Zeus and Isaac are as different from one another as apricots are from zebras, it remains true that they both fall within the textbook definition of anyone. So I installed myself where anyone who is anyone was apt to be, viz, the Detroit Riviera, and waited for nature to take its course.

  QED, as the fellow wrote.

  It was while I reflected on the inspiring ingenuity of this plan, seated on a hotel balcony and enjoying a meditative martini, that a rap on my chamber door signalled someone waiting without, seeking to revel in my society.

  “Come in,” I yodelled cordially.

  He came in.

  The “he,” in this instance, was William, the hotel porter, bringer of room service, and handler of the Feynman bags; a well-groomed, balding, and officious-looking chap who brought to mind an emperor penguin that had been stuffed by an overzealous taxidermist.

  “Good afternoon, Mr. Feynman,” he said, inclining the bean.

  “Gunga Din!” I riposted, warmly.

  “Gunga Din, sir?”

  “Gunga ruddy Din,” I said, rising imperiously, for the chap’s carelessness had irked me. Circumstances involving credit checks, reservations, and other minutiae had dictated that I allow this hired retainer to penetrate my intimate circle, as the expression is, making him one to whom I had vouchsafed accurate data concerning the Feynman ID. But this information, I had explained, fell strictly within the established bounds of porter/portee privilege, and the name “Rhinnick Feynman” was not to be uttered in any venue where eavesdropping ears might overhear.

  “I’m travelling incognito,” I reminded the sieve-brained blister. “Or do I mean incommunicado? It could be one, or it could be the other. But setting that question aside for now, the name is Gunga Din. Not Feynman.”

  “Forgive me, sir,” said William. “Just as you say. ’Tis in my memory lock’d, and you yourself shall keep the key of it.”

  “Right ho,” I said.

  “Good afternoon, Gunga Din,” said William.

  “Hello, William.”

  “I have a letter addressed to Mr. Feynman,” he said.

  I well-I’ll-be-dashed. I mean to say, regardless of how assiduously a chap safeguards his identity, he can’t be said to be travelling incommunicado if communicados keep arriving via the post.

  “To whom should I have Mr. Feynman’s letter delivered, sir?” asked William, raising the brow.

  I snatched the missive and gave the servitor one of my austere looks, being too preoccupied with this mystery letter to deal with backchat from the help.

  Upon inspection the letter proved, as foreshadowed, to be a letter. More importantly, my inspection revealed that the porter had not erred. Despite the pains I’d taken to keep a lid on the Feynman ID, the missive was addressed to none other than “Rhinnick P. Feynman esq., Hôtel de la Lune, Detroit Riviera.” And while this was enough to shiver my timbers, as the expression is, you can imagine my chagrin when, flipping the envelope over, I saw that its sender was none other than Dr. E.M. Peericks, Chief of Psychiatry at Detroit Mercy Hospice.

  I well-I’ll-be-dashed once more.

  “Is there a problem, sir?” asked William.

  “I daresay there’s a problem!” I riposted. “The sender of this communiqué is Dr. Everard M. Peericks, prominent loony doctor and principal wrangler of the inmates at Detroit Mercy Hospice; a fellow who, whatever his merits, is one who both Rhinnick Feynman and Gunga Din would like to steer sedulously clear of. His possession of up-to-date information re: my whereabouts threatens to subvert my whole foreign policy.”

  “Most disturbing, sir,” said William.

  It was at this moment, with a feeling that no further suspense was called for, that I opened the letter and ran an eyeball over its contents. What I read left me nonplussed. I reproduce the letter here, in toto, so as to assist your stringing along:

  Rhinnick P. Feynman, esq.

  Hôtel de la LuneDetroit Riviera

  Dear Mr. Feynman,

  Re: Professional Favour

  My name is Dr. Everard M. Peericks, chief of psychiatry at Detroit Mercy Hospice. I am writing to ask for your help with a current patient. This patient — one who has been with the hospice for some years now — has recently experienced a series of persistent and disturbing delusions in which you appear to play a prominent role. Despite our best efforts, we have been unable to persuade the patient that these delusions are the product of mental illness, rather than accurate memories of fantastical, impossible, and apocalyptic events. Until we succeed in convincing our patient that these memories are mere figments of a disturbed imagination, I feel that any attempt to treat the underlying condition is doomed to fail. This brings me to why I’m writing to you. It is my hope that, at your earliest convenience, you could visit Detroit Mercy, meet with my patient, and assist me in demonstrating that these memories cannot be real. You could help us prove that you were not involved in any events resembling those that form the basis of the delusions and ultimately convince our patient that these “memories” are nothing more than the products of a troubled mind. The patient has repeatedly attested that you are a person in whom the utmost faith can be placed, so I believe that your assurance that these events did not occur would be convincing and therefore invaluable in my patient’s treatment and recovery.

  I understand that you are a busy man, but I sincerely hope that you can soon spare the time to assist a person in need. The hospice address and my office number can be found on the card enclosed.

  Yours faithfully,

  Dr. E.M. Peericks

  Chief of Psychiatry

  Detroit Mercy H
ospice

  I handed the letter back to William, who’d been standing there in a respectful silence, displaying all of the quiet stolidity of a stuffed moose.

  “What do you make of this?” I said, instituting a brief stage wait as he digested the contents.

  “It seems, sir,” said William, “that the doctor bids you to minister to a mind diseased, pluck from the memory a rooted sorrow, raze out the written troubles of the brain, and with some sweet oblivious antidote cleanse the stuffed bosom of that perilous stuff which weighs upon the heart.”

  “Obviously,” I said. “That much is clear. But what’s bothering me is all of this ‘Dear Mr. Feynman’ business, not to mention the phrase, ‘My name is Dr. Everard blasted Peericks,’ and this ‘my job is loony-wrangler, here’s where you’ll find me’ bilge. For this loathsome Peericks, I should explain, is no exotic stranger, but someone I’ve known for years and years. Our longish history of mutual association mightn’t justify listing Peericks on the roster of my warmest friends and boosters, but we are far from being ships that passed in the night. We’ve rubbed elbows hundreds of times, and I’ve spent hours closeted with him in his office discussing matters of mutual interest. Yet here is this letter, written in formal, introductory tones as to one who is a man of mystery.”

  “Odd,” said William, and I remember agreeing with him.

  “I mean, why would Peericks address me as a perfect stranger?”

  “I couldn’t say, sir.”

  “Of course you couldn’t. Don’t be an ass.”

  “Forgive me, sir.”

  “And then there’s all this guff about some deeply troubled patient. While it’s no great shock to hear that there are members of the public who fantasize about yours truly, spending an idle hour imagining what it would be like to hobnob with me, or even to walk in the Feynman shoes, it’s dashed unsettling to hear that some unfortunate goop has mistaken these widely shared fantasies for bona fide memories of—”