Drysdale noted that the heavy rain has stopped. He takes the car into the city, allowing himself plenty of time. He parks about half a mile away from that huge, pristine, structure; a true temple of law enforcement, that is the South Side Area Station. Drysdale wanted to walk, so that he will come upon the building that would surely be his new home, orientating himself slowly and gradually to his new surroundings.
22
Jimmy and Semo's attempted scare on Clint didn't quite go as planned. As they parked in waiting across the road, Clint was nowhere to be seen. Instead, Jimmy's anger rose as he saw Shelley and Sarah go into the garage shop and disappear into the back shop with Alan Devlin.
— That Devlin cunt . . . Jimmy hissed.
— Hud on the now, Semo smiled,— we'll show that fucker.
Alan Devlin was fucking Sarah across the table, and Shelley was watching them, thinking how uncomfortable it looked compared to how it actually felt when she was in the same position.
Devlin was well into his stride when a loud, repetitive car horn blasted from the forecourt. — Fuck! Marshall! He snarled, aggrieved at having to pull out of a tense Sarah, who tugged her dress down and her knickers on in almost one movement. Devlin janked on his trousers and ran into the front shop. Jimmy and Semo were in the car, with the window wound down. They were waving bags of crisps and some other stock they had taken from the shop while Devlin had been on the job.
— YOUSE UR FUCKIN DEID, YA WEE CUNTS! Alan yelled, charging towards the car, but the boys sped off down the road.
At this point Clint came across the forecourt, licking an icecream cone.
— Whair the fuck've you been? Devlin hissed.
— Ah jist goat a cone . . . fae the van . . . Clint gasped weakly, as Shelley and Sarah giggled in the shop doorway.
— Ah fuckin well telt ye tae keep shoatie! Devlin snapped, and in a swiping movement knocked Clint's cone from his hand onto the oily forecourt.
The younger man's face flushed red and his eyes watered as he registered the chuckles emanating from the girls.
Jimmy and Semo had decided to keep the car and go into town to score more drugs. They had managed to successfully punt the acid to a posse of travellers. The stolen car, a white Nissan Micra, was, by coincidence, exactly the same colour and year as that driven by Allister Farmer, a member of the local police promotion board for the South Side of Edinburgh. The coincidence became a cruel one as Farmer, heading up to the South Side Area Station to conduct some promotion interviews, was overtaken by Jimmy and Semo's car as they sped up into town to head down to Alec Murphy's at Leith.
They ripped past Farmer along St Leonard's Street, Jimmy giving the outraged plain-clothed cop a languid V-sign. As Trevor Drysdale was walking along the pavement, thinking of his responses to the questions that would be asked at the interview, he was unaware that he was passing a huge, murky, oily puddle, which spilled onto the road from a blocked drain. Drysdale had little time to react as a white Nissan Micra sent a sheet of filthy liquid flying over him. In an instant Drysdale's quiff was plastered to his cranium, and one side of light grey suit had turned a wet black.
Drysdale could only look himself up and down. He let out an anguished, primal scream from the depths of his sickened soul: — YA BASTARD! YA FUCKEN BASTARD! as he looked up to see the back of the white Nissan Micra recede up the street.
The police promotional applicant was unaware, however, that there were two white Nissan Micras, and that the offending one had got through the lights at the top of the road. But the second one, containing the innocent Allister Farmer, had stopped at red. For his part, Farmer had been so full of anger at the careless driving from the car ahead, he'd failed to notice what had happened to the unfortunate pedestrian on St Leonard's Street.
On noticing that the lights had changed to red and that the Nissan Micra had halted, Drysdale embarked on a lung-bursting run towards the stationary car. On catching up to it, he tapped the side window. Allister Farmer rolled it down, only to be met with a choking throaty roar of: — YOU FUCKIN BASTARD! and a clenched fist, which crashed into him, bursting his nose.
Drysdale was off. He had extracted his revenge, now he had to save the situation. He still had ten minutes left. He ran into a pub and attempted to clean himself up as best he could. He looked at himself in the mirror. He was a mess, an absolute fucking mess. All he could do was to try and explain to Cowan, and hope that the chairman of the promotion board would accept his story and turn a blind eye to his appearance.
Allister Farmer stemmed the blood with a hanky. The police inspector was shaken. He had investigated many such arbitrary assaults, but had never, ever conceived of himself as the victim of one, particularly in broad daylight, on a busy road, near a main police station. Farmer had been too stunned to see where the culprit had escaped to. He shakily started up his car, passed through the lights and parked outside the area station.
— Allister! What happened? Are you okay? a concerned Tom Cowan asked, as a first-aider treated Farmer's nosebleed. A couple of investigating officers were straight onto the street, looking for the culprit.
— God, Tom, I was assaulted, in my own car, just outside the bloody station, by some fucking community-care jakey who tapped on my window . . . Anyway . . . we've got our interviews. The show must go on.
— What did the guy look like?
— Later, Tom, later. Let's not keep the interviewees waiting.
Cowan gestured affirmatively, ushering Farmer and Des Thorpe from personnel into the interview room. They had another quick look at the forms they had already studied in detail. In terms of experience, background and lodge membership, they agreed that Trevor Drysdale was an excellent candidate for one of the posts. — I know Drysdale, Cowan said, brushing a distasteful white thread off his jacket sleeve. — A Craft stalwart and a damn fine polisman.
They sent for Drysdale who trooped timidly in. Cowan's jaw fell, but not as far as Farmer's.
Drysdale just covered his eyes and burst into tears. Another decade at the substation loomed.
23
Gezra, the Appropriate Behaviour Compliance Elder, found it hard to fathom today's youngsters. He had, perhaps, been around too long, he considered again, but what satisfaction they got from going to backward places like Earth in their beat-up spacecrafts and kidnapping hapless aliens and sticking anal probes into them was beyond his understanding. It was just one of these things that youths did, he supposed. Once it got into the culture and the telepathic media got a hold of it, it spread like a bush fire. These kids were harmless really, but the animals on Earth had rights too, something it was difficult for youngsters nowadays to grasp.
His people had learned all about Earth culture from a native of the planet called Mikey Devlin, whom they had kidnapped for cultural study five years ago. He opted to stay with them rather than undergo memory wipe, provided they could supply him with young Earthwomen, the dangerous and highly addictive substance called snout and the odd takeaway. Several top Hollywood actresses and international models, Sun Page Three girls and females who frequented Buster Brown's nightclub in Edinburgh had claimed that aliens had come for them in the night, but nobody made the connection or took the complaints seriously. They all said that one of the creatures looked human. Well, that was Devlin, thought the Appropriate Behaviour Compliance Elder: a fanny merchant of the first order.
Mikey had been okay when he stuck to the official tours. He was sound, a plausible cunt, and they liked having him around. But, Gezra reflected, the Earthman had fallen in with a crowd of rebellious youngsters and they took him on illicit trips back home. They weren't bad really, but they were silly. Once they entered the procreative years, this behaviour would cease. But, for now, the Earthman was with them. Gezra was concerned that Mikey might try to tempt them to make contact with his old friends on Earth; this was strictly forbidden without a memory wipe. But then there would be the imperative that Tazak and Mikey would need to replenish their supplies of the drug sno
ut! Gezra would go now, and to avoid being detected, he would travel by technology rather than by the Will. With thin, trembling fingers, he set his controls.
24
Jimmy and Semo were unable to score anything from Alec other than some temazapam capsules and a little bit of hash. They were pretty disappointed as they drove back out from the city.
25
And all the people who had converged on the fields near the old mine works, spreading out from as far as the eye could see, were listening to the music, the sweet music, which filled the air. As the sky darkened, the exhilarated rushes were intensified by the awesome sight of the spacecraft coming down to Earth. It was like a giant white seashell, as if it was composed of other, smaller shells, and it hovered silently some seventy feet above the site.
Some who weren't religious crossed themselves; others who were quickly renounced everything they'd been taught.
The ship, in its magnificent splendour, did not move. It just stayed put. This was it, this was the moment all the travellers had been waiting for.
26
Jimmy and Semo first noticed delays at the Newcraighall roundabout. Then the police were turning everyone back. — But we live ower thaire, Semo pleaded, suddenly realising that they were in a stolen car. But the cop had other things on his mind. He pointed to the huge disc that hung in the sky over the other side of the bypass.
Semo turned to Jimmy. — Thaire's a fuckin flying saucer oan toap ay ma hoose!
27
At the hastily convened conference in Washington, the world's leaders were finding it difficult to understand the alien spokespersons. They had enlisted some of the CCS top boys, who had the confidence of the aliens, to help with the translation.
— We could fuckin run youse like that. Tazak snapped his fingers. — Aw yir fuckin weapons, thir fuckin nowt against us, eh.
The world leaders looked far more concerned than the impassive, square-jawed security men from the federal forces, who surrounded them.
— Fuckin shitein cunts, another alien sneered, picking up on the psychic vibe of fear.
— I don't see that this – the British Prime Minister started.
— You shut yir fuckin mooth, ya specky cunt! Tazak snapped. — Nae cunt's fuckin talkin tae you! Right! Fuckin wide-o!
The PM looked nervously at his feet. The Special Air Services officer who flanked him tensed up.
— What ah wis fuckin sayin before this cunt started wis – Tazak looked at the PM who was silent, — we could fuckin annihilate youse in a swedge. Nae fuckin problem. We've goat the fuckin technology, eh. And the fuckin willpower. So the wey we see it is, youse cunts dae as yis ur fuckin well telt and that's it. Endy fuckin story.
Ally from the CCS stood up. For all that they spoke the same language, the aliens' arrogance still jarred. If only he could get that cunt with his force field down. — No in a square go yis couldnae.
— Eh? What's this cunt sayin? one alien asked Tazak.
The American President put his hand on Ally's shoulders to force him to sit down. — Sit on your goddamn ass, will you, they got us over a barrel!
Ally's head crashed into the leader of the Western World's nose. The President fell back into his chair, dazed, pulling a handkerchief from his inside pocket to stem blood and tears. Two security men from the FBI moved swiftly forward as Masters sneered, bracing himself for a straightener, but the alien raised his hand and the President ushered his guards to stop.
— Nae cunt fuckin pills me up, Ally said.
— Boy's right enough, Tazak considered. — Ah'm hearin a loat ay talk fae youse cunts aboot this n that, but these boys are the only ones that huv stuck up fir thumselves. He looked at Ally.— Yir no tryin tae tell me thit youse cunts ur feart ay they cunts, his large almond eyes sweeping over the world's leaders.
— That'll be fuckin right, Ally said, looking challengingly at the late-middle-aged posse of suits who led the world.
— Bit these cunts are the top boys, they tell every cunt what tae dae but, Tazak said.
The Chancellor of Germany cut in. — But ziss in a democracy. Ze process of choosing leaders is not based on physical fighting abilities but on ze vill of all ze people.
— Is it fuck, Ally said, quickly putting the cunt right. — If that's right, he said, pointing at the British Prime Minister,— how is it that nae cunt in Scotland voted for these bastards and we git thaim rulin us? Answer ays that! If ye fuckin well kin!
— Right enough, said Bri. Then he turned to the German Chancellor. — You keep yir fuckin nose oot ay things ye ken nowt aboot, right?
There followed a series of loud arguments. At one stage, it looked as if it was going to go off between the top boys of the Capital City Service and the security forces of the FBI.
— Fuckin shut it! Tazak, the alien leader, shouted, pointing at the world's leaders. — Listen, ah cannae handle they radge cunts nippin ma heid. — Fae now oan, he nodded over to the casuals, — youse cunts are in charge here. The alien leader threw a transmitter over to Ally. The startled football thug jumped back, letting the device drop on the floor.— It's only a fuckin mobby, ya radge! Pick it up!
Ally tentatively picked up the transmitter.
— Wi that yis kin bell us at any time, day or night. See, if these cunts – he swept his hand contemptuously around at the world's leaders, — if they fuckin well gie yis any grief, just bell us and we'll sort the cunts right oot. Fuckin surein wi will. Sort the cunts oot fir good, eh?
— Sound, Ally smiled. — Listen though . . . youse cunts say thit yis kin destroy anything on Earth fae space wi yir weapons?
— Aye . . . yis ur welcome tae come aboard n huv a shot, eh.
28
From the alien ship, Mikey Devlin looked down on the thousands of ravers making their excited pilgrimage below. He willed the monitor to pan out, across the green and brown hills of the Pentlands, and over the cityscape.
Something had twinged in a corner of Mikey's psyche. He retraced, focusing on the bypass, almost directly underneath them. He could see the garage. Closing in, Mikey was elated to spy his brother, Alan, operating the car wash.
Alan wanted to get rid of the driver, a PC Drysdale, as soon as possible. He had a young woman called Abigail Ford in a state of semi-undress in the back shop. Drysdale seemed away with it though. Probably this space thing had freaked him. Loads of them were like that. He had to concede that it was pretty mind-blowing. Then, at the corner of his eye, Alan saw something move in the front shop. He was concerned that Abby was getting ready to go. It wasn't her though, it was those wee wide cunts Jimmy Mulgrew and Semo!
— These cunts are fuckin well robbin us blind, ya useless tube! he shouted at Drysdale, who wouldn't react. Alan ran towards the shop, and Semo got out just in time, but he cornered Jimmy Mulgrew. The younger man tried to swing at him, but he was overpowered by the senior thug, who dragged him outside and proceded to boot him all over the forecourt. Semo jumped on Alan's back, but he was thrown off, and had to frantically scramble to his feet and swiftly retreat in order to escape a similar fate to his now semi-conscious friend.
Alan raked the battered young man's pockets and found only some change and a handful of jellies, which he confiscated. Drysdale drove out without making an arrest.
From his vessel, Mikey watched approvingly as his brother fucked the young girl in the back shop, as Jimmy Mulgrew stood up and staggered along the street. He waited until his brother had finished and the girl had departed, before freezing local time and carrying him onto the craft.
Alan was delighted to see his brother again. — Mikey! Ah dinnae believe it! You're behind aw this shite! Ah knew it! Ah'm no jokin, man, somethin telt ays tae come tae this fuckin place! That was how ah couldnae leave here! It wis you, man! He studied his older brother. — Fuck sake, man, ye look younger thin me!
— Clean livin, Mikey smiled, — no like you, ya cunt! It was useless to try to explain the concept of controlling cellular elasticity and form thr
ough the use of the Will.
— No goat any blaw, huv ye? Mikey asked.
— Naw, ah took some jellies oaf this wee cunt.
— What are they? Mikey asked. As Alan explained, Mikey's eyes grew wider. He took some of the capsules from Alan.— Jist ma fuckin ticket these, eh.
29
The day after the conference in Washington had effectively installed the Casual Administration as the new unitary Earth Government, there followed a series of disasters unprecedented in British sporting history. The board of directors of Heart of Midlothian FC were devastated to find that the stadium, which boasted three brand-new stands, had been completely vaporised by a beam from outer space. In Glasgow, Ibrox, so long Scotland's showcase arena, suffered a similar fate. The next horror was the destruction of Wembley Stadium and its famous twin towers. Then, sequentially, all the football grounds in the country, with the exception of Easter Road in Edinburgh, were obliterated. Ally and his mates made their centre for Earth Government at the stadium, using the funds of various Earth nation states to completely refurbish the stadium and embark on a massively expensive team-building programme.
In several Leith pubs a few terracing diehards whinged on about 'these fuckin casual cunts' in charge of the club, but the new regime was generally welcomed. The outgoing board had been even less happy than the international heads of state in standing down in favour of the top boys, but had little option in the face of the power the hoolies now wielded.
— Cool gig this, eh? Tazak said, as Mikey watched on the monitor. They still had made no contact with the dancing crowds below the craft. However, the time was nearly right.
— Aye, and it hus tae be said that they've done a better joab wi the club than the cunts they hud in charge. It's aw doon tae resources though, the eighties top boy sagely conceded.