Sordid History
Childhood and the 70's
Life Begins with College, a Lasting Friendship, Mrs. Eisley #1, and the Breakout Success
Sid was born in Providence, Rhode Island in 1952, the only son of Caleb and Eileen Eisley. And as the only son, Caleb had a lot of high hopes for the man his boy would become' hopes that were dashed when Sid announced he wanted to be a writer. Worse yet, when he earned a scholarship to Harvard there was nothing to stop him from pursuing his dream.
So in 1970 Sid packed his bags for Boston, painfully aware that college was the only thing keeping his able body out of 'Nam. Of all the people he met during those four years, only one of them really lasted beyond. Donovan Myers was quiet and reserved, quite the opposite of Sid, and yet somehow they became close friends. They were kindred spirits, both destined to become substance abusers, they just didn't know it yet. When graduation day came they promised to come in touch. Come graduation night all the moderation Sid had demonstrated before went out the window. He drank so much he experienced his very first blackout, and when he woke up he found himself married to and in the bed of Faye Lauren, a fellow graduate whom he barely knew.
Sid and the new Mrs. Eisley moved to New York City to try and prove to their outraged parents that their marriage
could work. They discovered within a week of living together that they weren't that compatible, but even so they spent the next four years together even if it meant doing little more than sharing the same living space until finally acknowledging it wasn't going to work. In the end Sid was glad they broke it off when they did, as the next year- 1979, to be exact- his novel, 'The Light at Dawn' was published. The response was overwhelming and completely unexpected. The reviews hailed the book as being destined to become the next great American classic, praise which, naturally, went directly to the young author's head. Suddenly everyone wanted to talk to him, interview him, invite them to some event or another. He was Sidney Rhys Eisley, the writer, the
novelist, the voice of a generation. Sid felt he owned the world.
The 80's
The Star Fades, Mrs. Eisley #2, Briefly Clean, the Kid, the Plan, and the Reunion
Nothing ever lasts, Sid should have known this seeing as it was one of the central themes of his book. By 1981 his celebrity status had faded and the party invitations stopped coming. That left Sid feeling a kind of withdraw just as bad as any he'd ever experienced with drugs. All he had to do was write another book, one that would match, if not exceed the success of his first. It's hard to create with that kind of pressure, and Sid's assorted addictions were no help. It was in 1982, while trying to find inspiration at a bar in Manhattan, that Sid met Wendy Prichard, the future Mrs. Eisley #2.
He and Wendy talked for hours, discovering bit by bit that they had quite a lot of common. The experience should have taught Sid he didn't need celebrity status to get people to like him, but that insatiable withdraw was still nagging him. Sid surprised himself as the relationship between he and Wendy began to seem suspiciously like a normal, healthy one. Sid finally found some inspiration with that' not for a new novel, any attempts at that still led to seemingly impenetrable blocks, but he did manage to bang out a few short stories, some of which even made it to print. Everything was going great, but then, as was bound to happened sooner or later, Sid overdosed.
Lucky for him Wendy was there to get him to a hospital, as he was told by a nurse as soon as he came around. At his bedside Wendy cried and cursed him for being so stupid, and for some reason Sid chose that moment to ask her to marry him. He called her his muse, his savior, and he needed her to save him from himself. In retrospect that should have never worked, but the idea of reforming Sid indeed appealed to Wendy. Her one condition was that Sid go through rehab first, and at the time he was smitten enough to agree. Somehow, after all he was put through, when he came out he was still all-for the union. They were married early in 1983 and had a baby girl they named Emily later that same year.
Emily barely a year old when it hit Sid that he was well on his way to becoming a responsible, anchored, smothered, and absolutely square adult. Wendy may have wanted that, but he didn't, not even at 31. Sid saw no way to help his situation until 1985, when a brilliant idea occurred to him. He announced that he was going to start work on his next book, but to do that he would have to travel across the country as research. The plan was get out, see the states, get everything- drugs, girls, all that- out of his system, come back and maybe then he'd be able to properly settle down. Maybe. Wendy ruined everything in 1987 by trying to surprise him at a hotel room he was sharing with some girl he picked up off the highway in Arizona. Sid begged, he pleaded, he made the fatal mistake of trying to explain his plan to Wendy. He wasn't surprised to find she and Emily weren't home when he dragged himself back to New York.
In light of all that had gone wrong with his life Sid almost didn't attend his 15 year class Reunion, but either way he knew he'd spend the night drinking, so he went. While there he ran into Donovan, who happily told him of the wife, kid, and job and nice house he had in Seattle. He said that he was in charge of developing new drugs for a pharmaceutical company. The two of them caught up and reminisced over drinks- lots of drinks. When the night was over and they staggered off to their separate hotels, both promising to keep in touch, just as they had when they graduated.
The 90's
Dead-End Jobs, an American Treasure, a Chance Meeting, and Mrs. Eisley #3
The 90's blurred together more than any other decade, which is odd as by then Sid had cut back to make alcohol and marijuana (both perfectly harmless as far as he was concerned) his only vices. He moved around a lot, usually with each new eviction or debt, and without a wife to support him or any source of inspiration Sid was forced to find real work to keep from totally bottoming out. He flitted from one crappy job to the next, unable to hold on to any of them for more than a couple of months each. He was a bus boy, a short order cook, a roofer, a janitor, a stock boy. He took quite a few stories and negligibly useful skills from each, and he was very proud of the fact that he was fired from each of them for interesting reasons, reasons he liked to go on about in length whenever he was drunk with an audience. The best was his dismissal from a grocery store for improper use of a floor buffer. He heard very little from Wendy and Emily in all that time, as it did not help their already frosty relationship that Sid rarely made alimony and child support payments on time. Their contact was limited to birthday cards, the occasional phone call, and very rare visits.
In 1994 Sid's career experienced a brief revival as 'The Light Before Dawn' was added to college curriculums for study. Invitations came from colleges across the country to come and speak in front of their students, and sensing a chance to regain at least an ounce of fame and respect, Sid accepted. It did not go well. Even Harvard, his old Alma Mater, requested that he not set foot on campus after the little speech he gave. Videotapes of Sid's drunken/stoned rants before fascinated/horrified audiences of studio fell into public circulation just for their novelty value.
It was while still on his ill-fated college tour that Sid ran into Donovan at a hotel bar in St. Louis. Donovan was already well of head of him in drinks, so Sid was more or less sober when Donovan launched into a barely coherent rant about having his vision being compromised. The conversation. 'It's not my fault they always die,' he said, blearily addressing Sid. 'It's them. They ask for too much.' And then he passed out.
The strange conversation had almost faded from Sid's memory when he met a 22-year-old waitress named Sarah Dawson. She was a big fan, she said, his book had changed her life, and she recognized him one of the lecture tapes. They talked until Sarah's shift ended, Sid mostly agreeing with whatever harebrained theory Sarah threw at him regarding the book. She got off, followed him home, and soon after she became Mrs. Eisley #3. She was half Sid's age, and as soon as word of their union that Wendy and Emily they cut off all communication with Sid. The marriage lasted three weeks. Young Sarah, as it turned out, was a diagnosed Schizophrenic who wasn't terribly fond of taking her medications regularly. Sarah periodically decided she didn't need her pills anymore, and shortly after they moved in together she had a psychotic episode that culminated in her stabbing Sid. The doctors at the hospital told him he was very lucky she didn't hit anything vital, Sid agreed and quickly filed for divorced once he was released. He vowed never to marry again. Alone again, still broke, he fell back into the same routine he started the decade with.
2000 to Present
Revenge of the Mid-Life Crisis, Donovan's Secret, the Accident, and Goodbyes
By the turn of the century and the new millennium Sid had more or less accepted the fact that his career was over, that he was washed up and consider himself he managed to get one good book out. He was content with his life, even if his favorite ex-wife and only daughter still refused to communicate with him by any means. He still wrote on occasion, but even when he managed to complete a story he filed it away for later. He didn't care about getting his name out there anymore, and he
liked his crappy jobs even if he seemed cursed to never keep them for long. He was a free-spirit, he couldn't help that his countless bosses couldn't appreciate that.
Then he turned 50 and panicked. He was
old and he hadn't even noticed it happening, and for the first time in his life he realized that he was going to die one day. The overdose couldn't do that to him, nor could the stabbing, but suddenly that fact loomed over him. So, like countless men before him, Sid tried to recapture his youth. Or rather, he did all the things he would have done if he hadn't spent his years out of college locked in a room smoking, drinking, and pounding keys on a typewriter until exhausted set in. Having little hope left of ever producing another novel, Sid instead bought a motorcycle, sold whatever possessions he could, and moved to Seattle to try and include Donovan in his little journey of self-discovery. As soon as he had secured a place in the city- not the best area, but oh well- he called Donovan and the two of them went drinking that night. Donovan appeared to be in an even deeper rut than the last time Sid met him, and after a few drinks he launched into yet another bitter, cryptic rant about all the things he had to put up with at work- too many projects, not enough staff, the list went on and on. It was like that every time they met for drinks, and so Sid thought it best for his own sake to go back to his old habit of making temporary friends out of fellow bar patrons to drunk or meek to stop Sid from talking
at them.
And so Donovan and Sid drifted apart again despite living in the same city, and Sid saw what thankless job Seattle had to offer. He took the motorcycle out every chance he got, and slowly discovered, at long last, that he didn't really need to be drunk to make it through any given day. For the first time in his life drinking became an occasional thing, and he managed to drop marijuana altogether' Sure, with in weeks he filled the void with a new habit of drinking too much coffee and smoking too many cigarettes, but that did wonders to kill his appetite and burn away the gut that had been a problem for so many years. There was still the issue of all the people he'd done wrong in the past, Wendy and Emily especially, but for the time being he was content to keep ignoring all that until he was ready to deal with it' Which, like settling down, would more than likely be never.
And then Donovan thrust all of
his demons upon him. Early in 2006 he showed up on Sid's doorstep, looking worse than ever, with a box full of files. He said he didn't have time to explain, that he needed Sid to keep the box safe until he could come back for them. He had to go back and get something from the lab, he said, and he'd be back as soon as he had it. He said it would only take a few hours. Sid was still hesitant, but Donovan said if he was any real friend of his he'd do that one simple thing for him. Just a few hours'
The next Sid heard of Donovan was the next night, with the news report of his arrest. If he hadn't gone back to the lab, had just taken his files and run, he might have had some chance of escape what came down on his company' Instead, unbeknownst to Sid, he had to go back to try and get a test subject that he had grown far too attached to. There weren't many details to go with Donovan's arrest, just allegations of grossly illegal experiments and everything within the company ('Prometheus Labs') facilities found destroyed or- in the case of basement levels- collapsed. Donovan was the only person connected to the company to be apprehended, all the other employees seemed to have all but vanished'. Maybe that had something to do with why not long after the initial report there was an update that Donovan had committed suicide in his cell.
The news of Donovan's death shook Sid even more than the report of his arrest. A corrupt company was one thing, but what could be so bad that Donovan would kill himself before he could be made to answer for it? The question nagged Sid enough that he dug the box out of the closet he'd stuffed it in and went through some of the books. What he saw, what little of it he could comprehend, deeply disturbed him. There, in Donovan's cramped handwriting, were dispassionate notes about test subjects that started off as people and ended up as something else.
It was inevitable that his connection to Donovan would be discovered, but his mind was too full of other things to consider just how damning what he'd been given was. Sid put the files back in the closet, spent the next two days drinking steadily, and then- still nowhere near sober- decided to go out for a ride to try and gather his thoughts. What followed delivered him right into the hands of Feral Labs.
He drove too fast, neglecting to concentrate on the road, and all the while he tried to come to grips with the fact that not only was his friend now dead, he had apparently been some kind of monster all along. Sid wanted to believe Donovan's own drinking problem stemmed from guilt, but he knew from all those fractured conversations that it had much more to do with him feeling stifled and frustrated at the progress of his work. He was too preoccupied with trying reconcile that
and figure out what to do with the files to notice an upcoming curve until it was too late.
He was lucky, more so than he'd even been before. He woke up in a hospital, Wendy and a young woman he didn't recognize sitting in chairs next to his bed. They both had the same strange intermingled look of relief and anger on their faces. While Wendy explained to him exactly how many surgeries it had taken to repair his hip and leg, Sid stared at the young man until he realized it was a 23-year-old Emily whom he was looking at. He hadn't seen her since she was 10 and she'd definitely grown up a lot in that time. The realization of what he'd missed hit him harder than the knowledge that, at the very best he could hope for having to walk with a cane for the rest of his life. Wendy finished by saying she hoped what had happened had knocked some sense in him, but she was done helping him. Emily never even said a word to him. They left him alone then to think about all that he'd done, the sad state he was left in, and how badly he wanted a drink.
Shortly after Emily and Wendy left a doctor came to inform Sid of the predicament he was in' No insurance, no money, and months of physical therapy still left to go. That's when he was told about an island. The doctor told him he wouldn't have to worry about the money he owed if he signed up for their program, where his treatment could continue at no cost. Trapped in a haze of pain killers, Sid wasn't able to think too much about it, but it
did seem like the only option open to him. Sid agreed, arrangements were made for his transfer, and files would later be lost or misfiled. It never crossed Sid's mind that the miraculous offer might have something to do with what Donovan had left him. Hell, how could it?
Reply
