‘Splendid, splendid, splendid,’ said Rune, clapping his mighty hands together. ‘Then I shall reschedule. Midnight tomorrow night. Quite splendid.’
And up, or wherever, at The Universal Reincarnation Company, had anyone now chosen to pull out a cabinet drawer and examine the files within, that anyone would have been most surprised to observe that the expiry dates on the lives of all those listed within was no longer calculated at midnight Friday next.
It was now midnight tomorrow night.
Quite un-splendid really.
32
Old Claude tinkered merrily away with the Karmascope affair attached to the single functioning big sky nozzle. He had been most pleased by the sudden appearance of the drenched Mr Rune and had attributed this sudden appearance to immediate success on the part of young Norman.
‘You just keep sending the bastards up, sonny,’ crowed Old Claude. ‘And I’ll keep sending them down as maggots, we’ll soon get the job jobbed. And then I’ll fix the bastard up here. You see if I don’t.’
The bastard-up-here had now drawn the bolts on the unappealing door to the abandoned lift shaft. He fanned his nose against the fetor that rose from within. ‘Claude,’ he called. ‘Dear Claude, are you down there?’
His voice echo-echoed. No reply echoed back.
‘I’ve come to set you free,’ called the large controller. ‘Just say the word and I’ll lower a rope.
Echo-echo, but still no reply.
‘He’s got out, hasn’t he?’ said Jack Bradshaw.
‘It is a very strong possibility, but we must make sure.’
‘Do you want me to get a volunteer to go down then, sir?’
The large controller stared at Jack.
And Jack stared back at the large controller.
‘Oh no,’ said Jack. ‘Not me please.’
‘All in a good cause,’ said the large one, snatching Jack by the collar and hefting him through the open doorway. ‘Let me know what you find.’
‘Aaaaagh!’ went Jack Bradshaw, heading on down.
‘Aaaaagh!’ went Tuppe. ‘Stop hitting me with that truncheon.’
‘Sorry,’ replied the policeman. ‘My hand slipped, I aimed at your mate.’
‘Oh, that’s all right then.’
‘No it isn’t,’ Cornelius levelled a foot at the constable’s kneecap.
‘Ouch,’ said the constable, welting the tall boy on the head.
‘Ouch too,’ said Cornelius.
‘That’s enough now,’ said a superior officer (superior to what eh?). ‘Shut the cell door on these two villains and let’s go up to the canteen for a cup of tea.’
‘Could you send down one with two sugars?’ Tuppe asked.
‘And some aspirins?’ said Cornelius.
Slam went the cell door.
Clunk and click, the key in the lock.
Tuppe slumped down on his bottom on the floor.
Cornelius slumped down beside him.
‘I’m hungry,’ said Tuppe. ‘We haven’t had breakfast.’
‘As soon as I get us out of here we’ll have some.
‘Ever the optimist, you will be paying for it, with what?’
‘Ah,’ said Cornelius.
‘Ah indeed,’ said Tuppe. ‘Trying to bribe the superior officer with all your money didn’t seem to work too well, did it?’
‘Easy come, easy go?’ Cornelius suggested. ‘Exactly where are we now, anyway?’
‘Bramfield,’ said Tuppe. ‘Delightful little country village, fifteen miles north-east of Skelington Bay. I saw the road sign while we were coming up in the police van. You had your head down, policemen were striking it with sticks, I recall.’
‘Ah,’ said Cornelius. ‘Well, delightful as it may be, I think we should be leaving it. So if you’d like to favour me with the way you’d do it, we’ll up and out, OK?’
‘I thought you’d never ask,’ said Tuppe.
‘I must ask you to keep moving,’ bellowed the loud hailer atop a military vehicle of dubious origin. ‘Single file along the lanes, please. You will soon be at Bramfield where food, drink and shelter will be provided.’
‘This is inhuman.’ Thelma drummed her fists on the vehicle’s armoured side. ‘You’re driving women and children along like cattle. It’s a violation of human rights. The court at Strasburg will hear about this.’
The steely snout of a machine pistol appeared through a gun port and fixed its aim on a point between Thelma’s eyes. ‘Just keep moving, you,’ barked a voice from within.
‘Leave it,’ said Louise. ‘You can’t argue with a man who has a gun for a dick.’
Thelma spat onto the vehicle as it continued on, issuing orders through its loud hailer. She was very upset about all this.
Hugo Rune was far from upset. He sat in the lead car of the half a convoy that was not evacuating people for their own safety. His half comprised big bulldozers to the number four and superannuated, though still serviceable, Sherman tanks to the number three. And his own vehicle, which made, er, eight altogether.
‘About these cars on the rampage, Rune?’ blustered Chunky Wilberforce. ‘All very successful in clearing the town, I grant you, but how do you switch the blighters off?’
‘Mr Rodway?’ asked Hugo Rune. ‘Your thoughts on this please.’
Mr Rodway shrugged and made a foolish grinning face. ‘Wait until they run out of petrol?’ he suggested.
‘Sound enough thinking,’ said Rune. ‘But if, as you have told us, this is some infectious automotive disease, we do not wish our own wheeled conveyances to come down with the sickness.’
Mr Rodway glanced out of the slatted armoured window. ‘I’ll bet those tanks you have there could make a real mess of them,’ he said, with no small degree of malice in his voice.
Chunky looked at Rune.
And Rune looked at Chunky.
‘Gung ho, Chunky,’ said Hugo Rune.
‘Hello-ho,’ echoed the voice of the large controller. ‘What news there, Mr Bradshaw?’
‘You bastard,’ muttered Jack Bradshaw, which echoed quite well back up the shaft.
‘Pardon?’ enquired the large controller.
‘The bastard isn’t here,’ called Jack. ‘There’s what looks like some kind of hot-air balloon down here. He must have escaped in it. Throw down a rope and hoist me out.’
‘Don’t seem to have one on me at the moment, Jack.’ The large controller slammed shut the nasty door and secured the bolts.
‘You bastard,’ shrieked Jack Bradshaw. ‘Let me out of here, you bastard!’
‘Let me out of here,’ cried Cornelius Murphy. ‘Let me out, I say.’ He turned back to Tuppe. ‘Is that all right for you?’
‘That’s fine,’ said Tuppe. ‘The more you cry out in a police cell, the more you’ll be ignored. Just keep shouting and I’ll get on with getting us out.’
‘I’m innocent!’ cried Cornelius. ‘Let me out! Let me out!’
‘Let me out!’ raged Jack Bradshaw, but the large controller didn’t hear him. The large controller was now back in his office. It was a palatial office. It had the lush, pile carpeting. It had that marble bath-tub. It had a wall safe.
The large controller turned the combination lock of this. ‘Interference all round,’ said he, in a large voice. ‘Time to put a stop to all this, I think.’ He opened the safe door. He crossed to his great big desk, pulled open a draw and took out a pair of padded gloves.
He put on these padded gloves.
He returned to the wall safe.
He delved into the wall safe.
He drew out a square, black box.
It was a very very cold, square, black box. That sort of whispery white mist that rises from chest freezers rose from it. A horrid smell too.
‘Hello, boys,’ said the large controller, stroking the lid of the box. ‘It’s been a long time, hasn’t it? And the big G did think you’d all been disposed of when He closed Hell down, didn’t He? But I’ve looked after you here and now it’s t
ime to release you from your confinement and get you on the go once more.’
Murmer, murmer and evil growl, went the contents of the cold, black box.
‘My sentiments entirely,’ whispered the large controller. ‘We enjoyed ourselves while we were running Hell, and we will enjoy ourselves again. When you and I, and the others that are me, are running everything. Oh what jolly good times we will have. But for now there is something you must do. My brother is proceeding with his plan to take absolute control of Earth, but there’s a little fly or two in the ointment and you must seek them out and wipe them out. As horribly as you please, of course. After all, you’ve waited oh so long, haven’t you?’
Darkly growl and murmer.
‘Yes, you have. Well, no longer. I will instruct you on who you must seek and destroy. The rest is up to you. Just get it done and quickly, you know what I mean?’
‘Damn and blast!’ whispered Old Claude who was skulking outside the door. ‘I know just what you mean.’
‘I should have stayed with Cornelius,’ said Norman to Louise. ‘You know what I mean? But I went skulking off as soon as I saw those policemen. What is it about the arrival of policemen that makes you feel guilty even when you aren’t?’
‘Their helmets,’ said Louise.
‘Oh,’ said Norman.
‘I think we should be doing some more skulking off right now,’ said Thelma. ‘That’s Bramfield up ahead and it looks like they’ve erected some kind of compound to march everyone into. I’m not having that. They’ll be tattooing our wrists next; this is really all very wrong.’
‘We need to get back to Skelington Bay,’ said Norman. ‘And we need Cornelius and his pal with us.’
‘Any ideas?’ Thelma asked.
‘Of course,’ said Norman. ‘Plenty.’
‘Tuppe, I’m banjoed,’ said Cornelius. ‘I’ve done plenty of screaming for help, I’ve been ignored aplenty and now I’m banjoed. Tuppe? Where are you Tuppe?’
‘Where do you think you’re off to?’ asked the driver of the final Jeep in the military convoy that was chivvying along the refugee column, swerving to a halt.
‘I have to take a leak behind the hedge,’ said Thelma. ‘Do you want to watch, or what?’
‘Not really my thing,’ said the driver. ‘What about you, Clive?’ he asked his companion.
‘Oh yeah, I love all that, I’ll go and watch.’
‘Clive will watch,’ said the driver. ‘I’ll wait here in the Jeep.’
‘Fine,’ said Thelma, clambering through a hole in the roadside hedge, closely followed by Clive.
‘Do you need a wee-wee too?’ the driver asked Louise.
‘No, I went before I came out. That’s a really sharp uniform you have there. ‘What rank is that?’
‘Oh it’s not really any rank at all, I bought it from a militaria shop in Brighton. It’s a genuine Second World War uniform not a fake.’
‘It really suits you,’ said Louise. ‘I get really turned on by men in uniform.’
‘Really?’
‘Oh yeah,’ Louise climbed into the Jeep beside the driver and began to tinker with his trouser-wear.
‘Golly,’ said the driver.
‘Yeah,’ said Clive, the other side of the hedge. ‘I’m into all kinds of stuff other than urolagnia. I’m an amorist, you see. I enjoy anililagnia, cataglottism, any form of deupareunia, cypripareunia—’
‘Emeronaria?’ Thelma asked.
‘Yeah, when I’m on my own. But endytolagnia, frotteurism, lots of matutolagnia, neanirosis, sarmassotion—’
‘Tachorgasmia?’ Thelma asked.
‘Yeah, but I prefer synorgasmia.’
‘Who doesn’t?’
‘Yeah, right. You’re a bit of a spheropygian, aren’t you?’
Thelma headbutted Clive in the face and knocked him unconscious. ‘You’re a bit of a prat,’ said she.
‘Would you object if I asked to sniff your instep?’ enquired the driver. ‘Your shoes look ever so tight and I’m really into podoalgolagnia.’
‘I’d be thrilled,’ said Louise.
The driver’s head went down.
Louise’s knee came up.
‘I think we now have use of a Jeep,’ said Louise, as Thelma made her lone reappearance through the hole in the hedge. ‘Where is Norman?’
‘I’m back,’ said Norman. ‘All went according to my plan I see. Cornelius is in a police cell up ahead. I suggest we whip over there and pick him up.’
‘Just like that?’
‘No, we’ll give him a few minutes, Tuppe appears to be “on the case” as it were. But I have a very funny feeling, as if something terribly bad is about to happen.’
‘That’s encouraging,’ said Thelma.
‘It’s quite oppressive,’ said Norman. ‘Can’t you feel it too?’
‘No,’ said Thelma.
‘Perhaps,’ Louise shivered. ‘Is it getting suddenly cold, or what?’
‘Or what!’ said Thelma. ‘Look at that.’
Dark clouds were beginning to roll across the sun-lit sky. A storm was brewing up from nowhere.
Ahead, the refugees got their heads down and hastened their pace. To where? Who knew?
‘I don’t like it,’ said Norman. ‘It’s something bad.’
‘Summer storm,’ said Thelma, dumping the unconscious driver onto the roadside and climbing into the Jeep.
‘No, it’s something more than that.’ Norman was in the back of the Jeep now. ‘Let’s get going.’
‘As you wish.’ Thelma revved the engine. ‘Across country?’ she asked.
‘That’s what Jeeps are for.’
And across country they now went.
‘Let’s go,’ said Tuppe, straining open the cell door.
‘How did you do that?’ Cornelius asked.
‘Boring solution yet again I’m afraid. I squeezed through the bars of the cell window and crept back into the police station and nicked the keys.’
‘There really is something to be said for your boring solutions,’ said Cornelius. ‘They do seem to get the job done.’
‘Let’s away quick,’ said Tuppe. ‘Looks like a thunderstorm’s coming.’
Crackle, crackle, went bolts of lightning.
But they weren’t bolts of lightning.
‘Ha ha! Ha ha!’ went unsavoury demonic things, bucketing down to Earth.
‘Let’s run like hell,’ advised Tuppe.
‘What’s going on out there?’ asked the policemen in the canteen, springing to those oversized feet that all policemen have.
‘Up this way,’ called Norman. ‘Knock right through that fence, I know the short cut.’
‘Rock ‘n’ roll,’ cried Thelma, steering through the fence.
Cornelius streaked past the reception desk of the police station with Tuppe under his arm and out into the village high street.
‘Hang about,’ called the duty sergeant. ‘You can’t do that. Alert, Alert!’ He pushed a sort of ALERT PANIC BUTTON.
Bells began to ring.
‘Ha ha! Ha ha!’ went further demonic nasty things, bumping and careering into the high street.
‘Urgh!’ went Cornelius, drawing to a sudden halt. ‘I don’t like the look of those.’
‘Halt in the name of the law!’ cried various policemen, issuing from the police station.
‘Run,’ hollered Tuppe. ‘Just run and run.’
‘I’m running.’ And the tall boy ran.
‘Get him. Get him!’ Demonic things, all black as tread and vile as a septic tank came bowling and tumbling up the high street.
‘Back to the canteen, lads,’ advised the superior policeman.
‘Run,’ instructed Tuppe. ‘This would be the best thing, believe you me.’
‘I’m still running.’
Black and horrid, on they came. Many and plenteous. All very bad. Dark clouds rolled across the sky. Thunder roared and lightning zigger-zagged.
‘Bit of a turn in the weather,’ said Tuppe. ‘
And I was hoping to get a tan going.’
‘Oh damn!’ Something hideous slammed down before them. Cornelius ducked around it, ran on.
The things came bounding after him, some on two legs, others on four. Others on six or eight.
Cornelius skidded to a halt.
‘What?’ asked Tuppe.
‘Surrounded,’ said Cornelius. ‘There’s some of whatever they are up ahead. And many behind.’
‘Not good,’ said Tuppe. ‘Not good.’
‘Any ideas?’ Cornelius asked.
‘None spring immediately to mind.’
‘Then things don’t look too promising.’
‘Close your eyes and pray,’ said Tuppe. ‘There’s an idea for you.’
‘I think we could do with something a little more radical.’
‘Better make it quick then.’
Things were closing around them. They carried with them their own darkness. It came in little dark blots, like Hell’s Angels picnicking on a beach. Very worrying. Very dangerous. Very very bad.
These things smelled bad. They were bad.
‘I’ve run out of places to run,’ said Cornelius.
‘Go for places to hide,’ advised Tuppe.
‘There aren’t any.’
And there weren’t.
‘Help!’ cried Tuppe, as black things closed in about him and Cornelius. ‘We’re not supposed to end like this. Help! Help! HELP!’
33
An explosion rocked the high street, rending Tarmac towards the sky and casting paving slabs through plate-glass windows.
Shells whistled down to wreak havoc amongst the screaming, growling things that raged beyond control.
But sadly not in Bramfield.
‘Renault Five at four o’clock,’ bawled Chunky Wilberforce.
‘I read you, Chunky.’ Rune despatched a heat-seeker from the turret of his tank. The Reverend Cheesefoot’s Renault took it in the boot. But not like a man.
‘It’s raining handbags,’ Chunky observed.