The words sloped and slid and within each one there was a face or shape. Beacons flashed. Men ran. A woman with a knife loomed. Time ran forwards and sideways. Men burned. Flame spiralled.
EVER SO LONELY YOU COULD DIE
jack out
‘You’re all right now, dear.’ Ms Vrillium dabbed Gloria’s forehead with something cool. ‘Look at the state she’s in. What did you do to her?’
‘Ask her what she saw?’
‘Not now. She’s messed herself all over. Go away, can’t you?’
‘I must know, it’s important.’
‘She can’t talk now, can she?
Dan turned upon his heel and strode from Gloria’s apartment, slamming the door dramatically behind him. Gloria raised herself up on an elbow and tossed back her hair. It was speckled with vomit.
‘I’ll run you a bath dear.’ Ms Vrillium stroked Gloria’s forehead. Gloria nodded towards the door. With a knowing smile upon her far from winsome features, Ms Vrillium tiptoed across the room and dealt the afore-mentioned a thunderous blow with her fist. The ensuing cry of pain didn’t come from her. Dan limped away down the corridor, clutching his ear and muttering blasphemy. Ms Vrillium examined her knuckles and sniggered terribly.
‘Thank you.’ Gloria swung her long legs down from the bed. ‘I appreciated that.’
The Phnaargian sun, Rupert, balanced upon the horizon as if savouring the final dying moment of the day. The two moons, Elsie and Doris, were already on the up and up, electroplating the spires and cupolas of Vance. The brilliant flash of green as Rupert was swallowed away by the night failed to raise the spirits of Fergus Shaman, Fergus was a worried Phnaarg. Events had now gotten well beyond his control. The manure shovels were calling out his name. Fergus sat in his office before the shimmering window membrane. The stars were coming out. And around one of them circled a little blue planet called Earth.
Fergus made a helpless face. It wasn’t his fault. Well, some of it was. A great deal of it was, in fact. But not all of it. It was that madman Jovil Jspht who was at the back of it all. And it was Mungo Madoc who had put Jovil’s name up in the first place.
But Mungo Madoc was currently banged up in the company floatarium. No doubt presently communing with the big-nosed one himself. And it was he, Fergus, who was going to carry the watering can for the whole big mess. Garstang was piecing it all together. The board were starting to remember. But how could they? The answer to that was in the top pocket of a gold lame suit. The Time Sprout was back in the present day bringing all memories back with him. But what was Elvis doing there? And what about Jovil? Had he pressed the black button? Had he told Presley what he was supposed to? No, he couldn’t have if things hadn’t changed. But then perhaps they had changed. How was he to know?
Fergus considered the gentleman’s way out. Board members generally took the window when things got too much for them. Fergus shuddered. So it had come to this.
The office door spread in all directions and the doomed man looked up to meet the gaze of Jason Morgawr. ‘Glad to catch you,’ Jason said cheerfully. ‘There have been some developments.’
‘Oh yes?’ Fergus found his eyes wandering towards the window. Eighty floors and all of them down.
‘The virus.’
‘You’ve stopped it?’
‘Sadly no.’
Fergus visualized the ground coming up to meet him.
‘The virus is still spreading. But we seem to have discovered something more.’
‘Go on.’ Fergus went splat upon the pavement. It hurt. He considered poison.
‘There is a curious mutation in the cell banks. It doesn’t appear to be damaging the cells but it’s subtly altering their form. Sounds crazy I know, but it’s almost as if the cells are receiving new information, coming in from the early 1960s. But history can’t change, can it?’
Something fast-acting, Fergus thought, and very very toxic indeed.
‘Well, what do you make of it, Mr Shaman?’
‘Have you re-run any of the mutated cells to see if you can spot the changes?’
Jason gave Fergus a cautious glance. ‘Well, we can’t, can we? If we do we simply accelerate the spread of the virus. And even if we could, we have no other records of the period to compare. It’s certainly queer though.’
‘It certainly is. Have you mentioned this to anyone else? On the board, I mean?’
‘Not yet. I was just on my way up to tell Mr Garstang.’
‘Ah,’ said Fergus. ‘That really might not be such a good idea.’
‘Oh, and I don’t see for why.’
‘I was only thinking of you. Mr Garstang may perhaps be a little upset by this new development. He is a somewhat temperamental fellow. In fact he might even hold you directly responsible.’
‘What?’ stormed Jason Morgawr. ‘I don’t see how he could come to that conclusion.’
‘Don’t you?’ Fergus was all smiles. ‘Best leave it, eh?,’
Jason Morgawr seated himself deliberately upon Fergus Shaman’s desk. ‘I’m an ambitious man.’
‘Get your arse off my desk.’
Jason was unmoved. ‘I said that there had been further developments. That meant more than one.’
Fergus shifted uneasily, Jason continued, ‘During my investigations I visited the research labs. It must evidently have been there that Jspht constructed the virus. So I did a little probing, and what do you think I found?’ Fergus shook his head, Jason ignored him. ‘I found that large amounts of company funding had been channelled into a project under your authority. Project Sprout.’
‘Oh, dear me,’ said Fergus Shaman. ‘The game would seem to be up.’
‘You disappoint me, Mr Shaman, I thought you would want to make more of a fight of it. Denials, cries of innocence, offers of bribery.’
‘Offers of bribery?’
‘What did you have in mind?’ Jason asked.
‘Something for you in middle management perhaps?’
‘I had my sights set a little higher, as it happened.’
Fergus Shaman thought aside the poison bottle and considered the sharp young Phnaargian. ‘Such would require a great deal of mutual back scratching, I so believe.’
‘Through time?’ Ms Vrillium rinsed Gloria’s hair and sponged her back. ‘But how could that be?’
‘I don’t know, but it’s in there. In the vinyl, in the holophon. And Dan knows it too.’
‘He’ll be listening to us now, I’ll bet.’ Dan certainly was.
‘Let him listen.’ Gloria dandled her fingers in the scented water. ‘I told you something big was happening. It’s all linked together somehow, and he is getting desperate.’ She shouted the final four words toward the ceiling.
Ms Vrillium’s hands were beginning to wander. ‘I’m sorry about your brother,’ she said.
‘Don’t be. He was an irritating little tick.’
Ms Vrillium climbed from the bath and held up a warm towel to Gloria. ‘She came to your brother, didn’t she?’ Gloria ran her long fingers through her sleek wet hair. ‘She came to him. I know it. She is real.’
‘Then now is the time of the Rapture. The End Time.’
‘It would seem to be that way.’ Gloria let the towel fall from her shoulders. ‘So perhaps we should put what time yet remains to good use.’
The cultured orchids upon the bedside table broadcast the following hour’s sexual gymnastics to the receiving beds of Phnaargos, where they went down very well before an audience of some thirteen billion.
A mile beneath Gloria’s heaving bed Rex Mundi made love to a Goddess.
15
. . . where did it all go? All those millions? Into the foundation, I suppose. It was somewhere in California, although I couldn’t tell you exactly where. But the killings we made on Wall Street and all the others. Vegas, for example. All above the line profits went straight into the foundation. Laying the stones, the God says. And he never put a foot wrong. Never high profile. Always the same suit and always
drunk. I learned fast, never ask questions and never try to pull a fast one. He kept it all in his head. No written records. So when the IRS caught up with us there wasn’t a damn thing they could do. The God had it sewn up tighter than a drum. He knew when they were coming, what their names were and which of them would take the bribe. Some operator.
The Suburban Book of the Dead
‘My son. My dear boy. I don’t know what to say.’ Dan seemed genuinely lost for words. ‘Does your sister know you’re back?’
Rex shook his head. ‘I thought I had better come up to see you first, sir.’
‘Quite right. But let me just get this straight. You say that you got blown into some sewer or whatever, wandered about for hours on end and then found yourself in the sub-basements here at the bunker?’
‘That’s about the size of it.’ Dan closed his eyes and studied Rex’s aura. The lad appeared to be telling the truth. ‘Remarkable. And fortuitous.’ Dan topped up his glass. ‘Another.’
‘I don’t mind if I do.’ Rex held out his glass for a refill.
‘And you met no-one during these wanderings?’
‘No, sir.’
‘Dan,’ said Dan. ‘Call me Dan.’
‘No-one, Dan.’
‘Quite remarkable.’
‘I was wondering, Dan, if there might be any chance of me putting in for a desk job. I really don’t think I have the makings of a religious affairs person.’
‘Not a bit of it,’ Dan leaned across his desk and gave Rex shoulder pats. ‘You were born to the job. Believe me, I know these things.’
‘People keep trying to kill me,’ Rex complained. ‘This I find most upsetting.’
‘These are difficult times for us all. Come over here and let me show you something.’ Dan led Rex to an alcove and drew aside a red damask curtain. A glass panel afforded a view into an inner chamber. Here upon a bed of ample proportions two untried Lamarettes disported themselves.
‘Naked ladies,’ said Rex approvingly. ‘Why are they painted orange?’
‘Saffron, my dear boy. What do you think?’
‘Very nice.’
‘A little bonus. Call it perk of the job. Why not go in and amuse yourself for an hour. We can talk later.’
Gryphus Garstang decided to keep Rex’s performance in. But only for comic relief.
The Phnaarg in question paced the boardroom of Earthers Inc. Beneath his feet herbs released pleasing fragrances into the overcharged atmosphere. ‘It’s all coming back now,’ he stormed. ‘Is it all coming back to you, Fergus?’
‘In dribs and drabs,’ answered the unhappy one.
‘Time Sprout.’ Garstang ceased his pacing and waggled a menacing finger beneath Shaman’s nose. ‘Time Sprout, Fergus.’
‘Yes indeedy,’ crowed Diogenes. ‘Indeedy do.’
Lavinius Wisten flexed his sensitive fingers. ‘If we had gone with my original idea of love amongst the shelter folk none of this would have happened.’
‘But that is the point,’ argued Fergus. ‘Nothing has really happened. The virus will be stopped. I have Jason Morgawr’s word on that.’ Morgawr, who was sitting in on the meeting, glared him daggers. ‘I really can’t see what all the fuss is about.’
Garstang touched a module on the Goldenwood table. A frozen image of last night’s Nemesis ‘special’ filled the far wall. Fergus shrank into his leafy chair.
‘Are you absolutely sure you can’t see what all the fuss is about?’
‘Well, it looks like he dodged the draft, didn’t he?’
‘But he shouldn’t be there, should he?’
Fergus shook his head doubtfully. ‘But see,’ he went on, ‘he isn’t there any more, is he? He’s gone now and probably for good.’
‘Sure of that, are you, Fergus?’
‘Certainly,’ lied Mr Shaman. ‘The mechanics of it all are returning to me now. We won’t see him again.’
‘The ratings are up,’ said someone. Garstang glared about the table. Heads were nodding, some thoughtfully, some solemnly, although it was hard to tell at a glance which were which.
‘Up?’ Garstang reseated himself in Mungo’s chair.
‘Up.’ Lavinius Wisten prodded skyward.
‘Let me see those figures.’
Diogenes opened his briefcase and tinkered with a small technical thingamebob. A holographic image sprang up above the table. ‘All the excitement,’ Diogenes explained. ‘Rex Mundi has rather captured the public’s imagination with all his thrilling escapades. Escaping alive from the crashed air car, then the nuking of the Hotel California and Elvis turning up on the Nemesis show. It’s all good stuff.’ Graphs and pillar charts rotated before them. ‘It’s all on the up and up.’
‘The up and up.’ Garstang pinched at his nostrils.
‘A case of giving the public what they want to see. Plenty of sex, violence and intrigue. The viewers are switching back on. We are talking mega millions here.’
‘See,’ said Fergus.
Garstang made a conspiratorial face. ‘How much of it is down to us?’ he asked.
‘Ah,’ went Diogenes, ‘you mean field operatives, script advisers, that kind of thing?’
‘The kind of thing which doesn’t go beyond this boardroom,’ Garstang stared pointedly towards Jason.
Morgawr smiled his winning smile. ‘My lips are of course sealed,’ said he. ‘We are all on the same side here.’
‘Quite so. Well, Diogenes?’
Diogenes thumbed his controller and two holographic heads floated in the air to revolve slowly.
‘God’s Nose,’ cried Fergus. ‘Are they ours?’
Diogenes nodded and then tittered foolishly. ‘And the beauty of it is that neither of them knows about the other.’
‘Oh, very clever.’ Garstang laughed. ‘Very clever indeed. Isn’t that clever, Fergus?’ Fergus Shaman nodded. It certainly was very clever, but with all the loose ends kicking about, it was also potentially very dangerous indeed.
Rex Mundi lay on the bed of ample proportions, plucked a curly orange hair from his teeth and sighed deeply. The two beauties had long since departed and he was now alone with his thoughts. These were, however, in the light of recent events, somewhat confused.
He felt sure that he had lied through his unwashed molars to the Dalai regarding his wanderings beneath the Earth. But for the life of him he couldn’t recall a moment of it. His memory was quite blank. Rex gazed up into the mirrored ceiling. He dearly needed another bath.
The bedside console purred. ‘Rex,’ the Dalai’s voice was slickly sweet, ‘sorry to bother you but I dearly would like another word in your ear.’
I bet you would, you fly-pecked dump of rat’s do, thought Rex. But he was now learning to guard his thoughts so well that those the Dalai received said, Certainly sir, I’ll be right there.
‘Certainly Dan, I will be right there,’ said Rex Mundi.
Dan wore a dapper line in quilted loungewear, embroidered all over with symbols Rex neither understood nor cared about. ‘You feeling a little better now?’ the perfect master enquired.
Rex nodded and laboured with some difficulty to remove the idiot grin which was firmly plastered across his face. ‘Very much so, thank you.’
‘Good. Then on with God’s business, as it were. A little matter has come up and I would like your assistance with it. Sit yourself down.’ Dan indicated the floor. Rex seated himself, with never a wayward thought.
Dan tapped his desktop terminal and a hard photo-graphic copy peeled into his outstretched ringers. He examined it for a moment before handing it to Rex. ‘What do you know about this man?’
Rex peered at the portrait. ‘The man in the golden suit. He was at the Hotel California just before . . .’
‘Before the enemy missile struck.’
‘Enemy missile?’
‘The Fundamentalists. Out to destroy my mission of mercy.’
‘So that was it.’
‘We tried to warn you,’ Dan continued. ‘Picked up th
e missile on radar, buzzed straight through to your air car. We must have missed you. Then we picked up a trace on the air car’s monitor, assumed it was you and brought it back on automatic.’
‘Oh,’ said Rex. ‘I see.’
‘But it wasn’t you in the air car. It was him.’
‘So, who is he then?’
‘That is what I want you to find out.’
‘You want me to interrogate him? That is hardly in my line.’
‘Not interrogate, Rex. I regret that he is no longer on the premises.’
Rex shook his befuddled head. This was already beyond him.
‘He was here. In fact, he made a special guest appearance on the Nemesis show.’
‘Ah,’ Rex drew a finger across his throat. ‘Then he’s ... yes, well communication with the dead is surely more your field than mine.’
Dalai Dan gave Rex a withering look. This man is a saint, thought Rex hurriedly. Dan’s face softened. ‘Quite so,’ said he. ‘There was a slip-up. Interdepartmental. The unions plague me, Rex, they demand and demand and they cock up. This person was allowed to leave the building unchallenged. I should very much like to know his present whereabouts.’
‘I remain a little confused about this. How did he leave the building? Did he take one of the company cars?’
‘Impossible.’
‘Then he had his own transport.’
Dan shook his head.
‘Then he stole a radiation suit and walked out.’
‘No such suit has been reported missing. We have made extensive checks.’
‘Did anyone see him leave?’
Dan drummed his fingers upon the desk top. ‘Not as such.’
‘Well, with no suit and no air car, he didn’t simply walk out into the night rain. He must still be in the building.’
‘But he’s not.’
‘Am I missing something? I don’t think I quite understand.’
‘Then understand this. He escaped from the building. We don’t as yet know how. He is at large somewhere out there and I want to know where.’