Billy replaced the receiver, then he fished a rather gory-looking remote controller from his pocket and pointed it at the monitor screen. ‘Why don’t we see how he gets on?’ Billy said.
Blazer Dyke watched the young man cross the lounge. Saw him open the big cupboard. Heard his voice as he spoke into his mobile phone, relayed to the monitor by bugs in the apartment. ‘I’m at the cupboard, sir, opening it, looking inside. It’s dark in here, sir, there’s no light.’
Blazer looked on as the young man stepped into the cupboard and was lost to view on the screen.
‘I can’t see any files, sir. There’s an odd smell. Rotten, it is. Hang on, there’s something here. Something white. It’s a...no...wait. What is this, it’s moving. It’s—’
And then, ‘Aaaaaaaaaaaaagh!’
And then silence.
‘Oh dear,’ said Billy. ‘He seems to have met with a tragic accident.’
Blazer Dyke’s hand moved slowly beneath his desk.
‘No,’ said Billy. ‘Hands up. No touching of alarm buttons.’
‘Can’t we talk about this?’ Blazer Dyke had a sweat on now. ‘Promotion, a rise in salary—’
‘No,’ said Billy. ‘I do believe that you cannot be trusted. I tried out your chair six months ago. It suited me then, it will suit me now.’
‘Are you going to’ – Blazer Dyke’s voice was a whisper – ‘download me?’
‘You must have heard me say that.’
‘I did,’ said Blazer Dyke. ‘You said it to your chauffeur, before you—’
He glanced at the remote control.
‘I’m a control freak,’ said Billy. ‘And I just can’t be trusted, either. It’s the Necronet for you, yes.’
‘Thanks at least for that,’ said Blazer Dyke.
‘I hardly think thanks are in order. You will be despatched directly to the hospital facility.’
‘No!’ Blazer shook his head. ‘I altered the programme. It’s a gas chamber now.’
‘Bummer,’ said Billy, as he clubbed down Blazer Dyke. ‘But he that liveth by the sword of technology, shall die by that very sword.’
Poets On Holiday
Where the beach meets the sea,
And the family tree,
Gets a little bit wet about the roots,
The poets skip round,
And lie on the ground,
Spoiling their sensible suits.
Where the pier-head flag,
Is beginning to drag,
And winter is coming to town,
The poets in flats,
Sit huddled with cats,
Their jaws going up and down.
Where the old Channel ferry,
In shades of white and cherry,
And its funnels in a dirty coloured green,
Comes sailing into port,
With the rations running short.
And the poets on the decks,
With the lifebelts round their necks,
Moaning about facilities,
There’s no paper in the utilities,
While the meat was under-cooked,
And the cabins over-booked,
And generally making a frigging nuisance of themselves.
Then it’s time to set sail on your own,
Go forth,
Strike out,
And so on.
19
A violent man will respond poorly to a gift of flowers.
REG MOMBASSA
Lazlo Woodbine replaced his telephone receiver, made final notes upon a sheet of paper, then pushed it across his desk to the young man in the bowler hat.
‘What’s this?’ the young man asked.
‘I’ve called in a lot of favours for you, kid,’ said the great detective. ‘These are the directions to your ancient mariner. He lives in a seaport called Arkham.’
The young man read the directions aloud.
‘Go through office door. Turn left, down stairway into street. Turn right. Turn right again into alleyway beside Fangio’s bar. At end of alleyway enter the Desert of No Return, cross desert until you reach the Mountains of Madness, go through the Cave of Ultimate Horrors to the Land of the Screaming Skulls. Then ask directions from there.’
There was a pause.
Brief, but pregnant.
‘What is this rubbish?’ the young man asked.
Lazlo Woodbine smiled a certain smile. ‘It’s your genre, kid, not mine. Like I say, I’m strictly “mean streets”. I wouldn’t go in for all that Mountains of Madness fol-de-rol.’
‘Nor me. Arkham, did you say? I’ll think my way there at once.’
Lazlo put up a hand. ‘It won’t work.’
‘Why not?’
‘Because you’ve never been to Arkham. You have no memory to call up in order to create the place. In order to get to Arkham you’ll just have to travel through all those ludicrous places. There’s no way round it, kid.’
‘There has to be some way round it.’
‘Kid, consider what you’ve already learned. This Necronet of yours occupies the same hypothetical space occupied by dreams, right? The dream space, the weird space, the mundus magicus. This is the place where ideas come from, where they originate. I’m a fictitious detective, I came from the dreaming mind of an author. That’s the world I inhabit. And I enter the world of my reader’s imagination. Each reader sees me a little differently, visualizes my surroundings a little differently, creates a slightly different world for me to inhabit. But all in here,’ Lazlo tapped his temple. ‘And it’s all one world, really.’
‘I don’t understand what you’re trying to say.’
‘I’m trying to say that you shouldn’t be here, kid. What Billy Barnes and Necrosoft are doing is wrong. I’m not saying that technology is wrong. But to bridge the two worlds, the outside world and the inner, the physical and the metaphysical, that’s gonna blow all the circuits.’
‘I still don’t get it.’
‘Okay. I’ll say it once more, and I’ll say it plain. You got downloaded, right? You’re no longer inside your own head, right?’
‘Right.’
‘So whose head do you think you’re in now?’
‘I’m not in anybody’s head. I’m in cyberspace. Inside the Necronet.’
‘And where is that, exactly?’
‘I don’t know, exactly.’
‘Then I’ll tell you where it is.’
‘Go on.’
‘Buddy, you’re now inside God’s head.’
I must confess that I was rattled. Severely rattled. When I bade farewell to Lazlo, left his office, turned left, went down the stairway, turned right into the street and right again into the alleyway by Fangio’s bar, I was severely rattled.
Sure, I knew, as we all know, that without our dreams and our imaginings, mankind wouldn’t be mankind. But to think that when we dream, we actually enter the mind of God, that was a new one on me. And that was one big number.
So what was I doing now? I looked down at my feet. Walking around inside God’s head?
And for that matter, why was I wearing wellington boots?
I plucked at my apparel.
And an evening suit!
I felt at my head.
And a bowler hat!
I’d never thought that lot up.
‘Oh dear,’ I said, ‘perhaps I’m beginning to lose it. Perhaps I’m going mad. That won’t do, a mad thought inside God’s head.’
And then it hit me. As it would. About what Lazlo had meant when he talked about blowing all the circuits. If Billy and his cohorts at Necrosoft were downloading people into the Necronet, they were unwittingly downloading them into the mind of God. It would be like God having multiple personality disorder, or being possessed by demons. God would become a paranoid schizophrenic.
God would eventually go mad.
I looked up the alleyway and down it. Behind me, the streets of Manhattan, before me the Desert of No Return. There was no-one around, so I dropped to my knees.
‘Dear God,??
? I said, putting my hands together. ‘Now I know in the past it’s always been me asking you for things. But I’ve been learning a lot of lessons recently, about give and take, and stuff like that. So I don’t want to ask you for anything now. The reason I’m praying like this is to tell you that Mr Woodbine has put me in the picture, about me being in your mind, and everything. And I just wanted to say that I’m going to get out. And when I do, I’ll get everyone else out as well and leave your mind at peace. Peace of mind, right? Well, that’s all I’m saying, I’m not asking for anything, I’m just volunteering my services. I’ll do my best. Okay?
Love Robert.
Amen.’
I crossed myself, stood up and dusted down the trousers of my evening suit. ‘Right,’ I said. ‘If it has to be the Desert of No Return, then it has to be. But watch out, Billy Barnes, because I’m coming to get you.’
If Billy Barnes was worried by the prospect of a man in a bowler hat, evening suit and wellington boots attempting to cross the Desert of No Return inside the mind of God in order to come and get him, he was hiding it well.
Billy sat in the office of Blazer Dyke. The office that now had the name of Billy Barnes on the door. The intercom buzzed and Billy said, ‘Yes?’
‘The Secretary of State to see you, sir.’
‘The Secretary of State? I thought the Prime Minister was coming in person.’
‘Some pressing business of an international nature has come up.’
‘Business elsewhere,’ said Billy.
‘Pardon, sir?’
‘Never mind, send in the Secretary of State.’
‘Certainly, sir.’
The office door opened and Billy’s new secretary, a woman of remarkable beauty but for the haunted look in her eyes, ushered in a man of unremarkable character.
‘Giles Grimpin,’ said the Secretary of State, extending his hand. ‘Very pleased to meet you.’
Billy Barnes shook the proffered hand. Its palm was sweaty. He smiled at the Secretary of State. A very sweaty individual. He was plump and somewhat shabby. He had dandruff on the shoulders of his ill-fitting suit.
‘Be seated,’ said Billy, and the Secretary sat. ‘Coffee?’ asked Billy. ‘Or would you prefer something stronger?’
‘Well, the sun is over the yard arm. Perhaps a small Scotch.’
‘Indeed.’ Billy crossed to the drinks cabinet. Poured a large Scotch and a Perrier water for himself.
‘Thank you,’ said Giles Grimpin, accepting his glass.
Billy reseated himself. ‘I assume that your department have read through all the documentation I sent them.’
Giles Grimpin nodded. ‘All the technical stuff, yes.’
‘And does my proposal meet with your approval?’
Giles Grimpin turned his glass between his podgy fingers. ‘It’s all somewhat radical,’ he said.
‘Radical, yes, but you see the economic benefits. These are very large.’
‘They are,’ said Giles. ‘Very profitable, in fact, but—’
‘But?’ said Billy.
‘But compulsory downloading at the age of sixty-five: that in essence is what you’re suggesting.’
‘We have all the technology in place. Thousands have already been downloaded voluntarily.’
‘Ah,’ said Giles Grimpin. ‘You use the word voluntarily. This is not altogether accurate, is it? In essence people are now paying you one thousand pounds a head to download their unwanted dependants.’
‘In essence,’ said Billy. ‘Do you have any objection to that?’
‘None at all, in fact—’
‘In fact,’ said Billy, ‘we downloaded your aunt just last week.’
‘The poor creature,’ said Giles Grimpin. ‘She was beyond medical help. It was an act of human kindness.’
‘Exactly,’ said Billy. ‘Although whether being a grumpy old woman who kept turning up at your house unannounced to complain about the bypass going through next to her garden actually qualifies as “beyond medical help”...’
‘She was very ill,’ said Giles Grimpin. ‘Mentally.’
‘An act of human kindness,’ said Billy. ‘As they are all acts of human kindness. Sending the dear ones off to paradise; what greater act of kindness could there be?’
‘None,’ said Giles. ‘Might I have another Scotch?’
‘Indeed you might.’
‘So,’ said Giles, his glass refreshed, ‘all this said, compulsory downloading at sixty-five, we’d never swing that through the House of Commons.’
‘You are in government with a very large majority. Surely it is only a matter of the PM giving it the go-ahead.’
‘Wheels within wheels,’ said Giles. ‘I suppose if the PM’s advisors were to stress the economic advantages.’
‘Which are great,’ said Billy. ‘No more paying out of old-age pensions, no more care for the elderly. More housing made available to the young.’
‘It’s very tempting,’ said Giles. ‘Very tempting indeed. But the public, the man in the street—’
‘The herd,’ said Billy. ‘You mean the herd.’
‘The general population.’
‘The herd.’
‘Not an expression we in government like to use. But nevertheless, in essence—’
‘In essence,’ said Billy. ‘They will do what you tell them to do. As long as it’s made to look as if you’re not telling them. As long as it’s something to aspire to, rather than something compulsory. I have an advertising campaign already worked out.’
‘You’re very thorough.’
‘I have to be. And so, can I rely on your support?’
‘I don’t know.’ Giles Grimpin mopped at his brow with an oversized red gingham handkerchief. ‘Something doesn’t gel. Something makes me feel uneasy.’
‘In essence,’ said Billy, ‘the Necronet offers eternal life. No death, no pain, only everlasting pleasure. Your fantasies brought to life. Do whatever you want for as long as you want. Heaven on earth. Who could want more than that?’
‘Not me,’ said Giles. ‘But all the same, it amounts to euthanasia on a national scale.’
‘Britain leads the way,’ said Billy. ‘Today Britain, tomorrow the world.’
‘I really don’t know.’
Billy shook his head. ‘I do wish I could count on your support.’
‘I’ll have to think about it. Weigh up the pros and cons.’
‘Of course,’ said Billy. ‘But if you did agree, do you think you could persuade the PM?’
‘Absolutely. I hold his ear. If I advised him to go for it, he would.’
‘That’s fine, then.’ Billy turned up his palms. What more could I ask?’
‘Good,’ said Giles. ‘Well, I have to be off.’
Billy rose to shake his hand. ‘Oh, just one more thing,’ he said.
‘What’s that?’
‘I have something for you. A gift.’
‘A gift? For me?’
‘For you,’ said Billy. ‘I’m sure you’ll like it. It’s called a pleaser.’
There was nothing too pleasing about the Desert of No Return. It looked hot and dry and forbidding. How far can a man walk into a desert? That was a famous question. How far can a man walk into a desert of no return? That was another.
Well, I said to myself. What I need here is a guide. Who is good with deserts? Lawrence of Arabia? No, I’d had him fed into a leaf shredder. I could think him up again, but he probably wouldn’t be too good with a desert like this. How about Conan the Barbarian, he’d done a lot of desert work. And places like the Swamp of Eternal Doom were right up his street. No, stuff Conan, what I really needed was some transportation. A halftrack, or a Land Rover. Yeah, that was it, a Land Rover. One of those trans-continental exploration jobbies with all the extras. I pictured one that I’d seen in the May 1963 edition of National Geographic while sitting in the dentist’s waiting room.
And then I stood back from it and smiled.
It was a beauty. Exactly as I
remembered it.
This would get me across any desert.
I put my foot on the running board and opened the driver’s door.
And found myself staring in at nothing. Now what did the interior of a Land Rover look like? I’d never been in one.
And—
I stepped down and upped the bonnet.
I’d never seen the engine either. And for that matter I didn’t actually know how the internal combustion engine functioned. I don’t know how that one slipped by me. I probably hadn’t been paying attention when it was explained.
I sighed as I perused the empty bonnet space.
Mind you, I did know how a leaf shredder worked. I wondered whether I could convert one to run this Land Rover. They were plug-in, so it would need a few miles of cable.
‘Oh, sod it,’ I said. ‘I’ll just have to walk.’ And so I did.
It was dull in that desert. Hot and dry and dull. And the thought that I was actually walking about inside God’s head did nothing to alleviate this dullness. I couldn’t imagine why God would have a place like this inside his head anyway. But then I suppose that if God is everywhere and every-when he has everything in his head. I made a mental note to look up Hugo Rune at some future time and put him right about his Universal Creation Solution. It seemed probable that the entire universe was nothing more than a thought in God’s head. Possibly even a passing thought. Could that be right?
I shook my head. ‘God knows,’ I said.
I don’t know how far I walked into the desert before I found myself walking out of it again. Half way would be my guess. But it certainly didn’t take too long, so halfway couldn’t have been that far.
I stood amongst the foothills of a lofty mountain range. ‘That was a very small desert,’ I said to myself. ‘I wonder why it’s called the Desert of No Return? Probably because I have no intention of returning through it.’
And I perked right up at this. The places I had to pass through might have silly fantasy names, but that didn’t mean they had to be a problem.
They were probably just symbols, or metaphors, or something. Freudian stuff to do with rites of passage and exploring the inner self. A journey into me, perhaps.