Zephyr Box Set 2

by Warren Hately

  That is why I am so surprised when across to me and to the left, a Canadian mentalist known as (I think) the Cape or the Quake or something similar gives an inchoate shout it takes me moments to realize is telepathic rather than actual, his body stiffening, back arched, head thrown back, and just as swiftly his head seemingly explodes in white fireworks, and we are honored witnesses right up until I at least shake off that ridiculous inclusory feeling to fully register what appears to be a luminous fully-grown human being pull itself literally out of the Canadian dude’s skull.

  The light body turns slowly around, features forming on it not dissimilar to the image I had of Lennon inhabiting Sting’s aura, though this humanoid figure is a nearly uniform shimmering whiteness that should be harder to look at than it is, its luminescent limbs raised as if pumping the air in victory as the head-blob scans over the rest of us and I am brought back to reality by the reality that the ongoing skkweeeeeeee noise murdering the airwaves is more of that telempathic projection accompanying his liberation from his soon-to-be stinking carcass, and indirectly, and yeah maybe I have issues here, thus reminding the rest of us that we aren’t breaking free of our corporeal shells and are therefore likely to continue on crapping and sweating and eating and dying, apparently unlike him – except sadly I know better.

  Lennon-as-Sting lets out a mighty cheer and his accomplices might as well be goddamned robots for all the emotion they show, but this is overlooked by the crowd who uniformly leap from their rubber mats to punch the air and cheer and holler and basically abandon any opportunity for today that they might be joining the Cape/Quake/Queef as the newly-emancipated phantasm stares roundly at all of us, no real expression on that glowing face for me to even say his emotion’s unreadable as he continues to rise as if on thermals, drifting to the apex of the chamber. Before any of the enthusiasm abates, the glowing figure re-orients itself on that weird metallic protuberance built into the ceiling I might’ve kinda mentioned earlier, and if it was left up to just me, I’d say the figure gives a momentary vibe of not exactly being cool with this shit as he/she/it accelerates into what I’ll call the thing’s funnel and disappears.

  A tremulous chill goes down my spine, accompanied by actually breaking into a sweat as I look around, for all intents and purposes stuck on the fucking Love Boat or something as Lennon-in-Sting’s-clothing does his best used game show host performance, waving his mitts with all the cheer of the psychotically abused kidnap victim he actually is, as if a tiny amount of Sting’s internal reality has spilled out, writ upon the pained smile of that awkward face.

  “Let’s hear it for the Quotidian everyone,” Lennon says using Sting’s actual voice box, just for shits and giggles.

  The crowd continues, actually breaking into rapturous applause, and feeling disheartened and more than a little unsettled by the whole shebang, I take this as my cue to sidle out sideways from the love-in before everyone starts touching cocks.

  Almost immediately I see Twilight infringing on my copyright in the main hall, not just leaning insouciantly against the rough stone wall while watching the general populace swapping spit, but actually daring to raise one eyebrow at me above his mask.

  I notice a small blob of his speckled green ointment in the middle of his forehead.

  “How was that for you?” he asks.

  “What’s with you and your magic potion?” I reply immediately and motion. “Mine crapped out on me. Why do you have it on your forehead?”

  “I never said you had to wear it like eye shadow, you drag queen, Zeph.”

  I scowl at his practical joke and snatch the small jar as he proffers it.

  I dab a small bindi between my brows along the top of my mask and am just closing the lid and passing it back when my newly-ensorcelled eyes are drawn to more footfalls coming from outside the main hangar and heading in.

  The sight makes my stomach drop.

  Whisperer calmly advances with all the sex in her walk of a paraplegic in a Mickey Mouse costume. As the magic takes effect, I discern the outline and then the horrible reality of the towering Bug that once again co-exists with the French super as she acknowledges neither of us on her way into the main chamber.

  Twilight lifts his eyes from her ass and gives me an indifferent shrug, none the wiser to my adventures in Lennon’s labyrinth. I grab him by the shoulder and steer him like we are just two good-natured masked fuckwits clowning for the cameras as we move away from the renewed clapping coming from behind.

  Neither of us notice Whisperer’s handler turn and give one good final look.

  Zephyr 19.7 “Like Fury Incarnate”

  WE MAKE IT to the brittle daylight streaking in through the huge cavernous entrance, a tantalizing glimpse of the outside world into which I know right now it would be cowardly of me in the extreme to escape. Nonetheless, my gaze lingers over the spectral rooftops of the Afghan village and the pointillist Mercurochrome landscape beyond. Twilight at my elbow gives me a surprisingly serious look as he expels a deeply-held lungful of breath.

  “Things don’t feel right,” he says. “There’s a disturbance in the . . . you-know-what.”

  I would rebuke him for the incessant pop culture references if I didn’t know exactly what he’s talking about. I remain deeply unnerved by the spectacle of the Quotidian’s psionic rebirth and the shrieking after party, what I suspect was basically a retrospective abortion. The very air seems to vibrate with wrongness, which urges me to grab Twilight again by the arm and usher him towards the light.

  “We have to get out of here and rethink our approach,” I say.

  Instead, there’s a sun-burst that knocks us both on our asses.

  “You fuckers!”

  Cusp appears like Fury incarnate, one hand glowing with the power of a small sun, her other half – and indeed that entire shadow side of her whole body – wreathed in a darkness that seems more than just the improbable absence of the pulsing light beside it.

  “You’ve been doing it again, haven’t you?” she shrieks from midair. “Stay the hell out of my body!”

  My look switches between her, Twilight and the big passageway behind us. A dozen-odd heads turn our way as Twilight mutters an incarnation and a flaming screen erupts between Cusp and us.

  “So much for discretion,” the big guy says.

  Sting flanked by St George chooses that moment to portal right in front of us courtesy of the latter’s flashy telekinetic warping of space-time. St George remains Bug-half-full, so to say, while the religious overtones of Sting’s Lennon-shaped halo aren’t lost on me. Likewise, the gravid look on his skull face.

  A wave of telekinetic force dismisses Twilight’s fire shield, revealing Cusp with her resolve suddenly fractured at the arrival of the A-list celebs.

  “Zephyr,” Lennon-Sting intones – and it’s the very last thing he says.

  Faced with one of the world’s most powerful telepaths who clearly knows when the jig is up, there’s no clever comebacks, no last ditch maneuvers, no epic plot twists, sadly no deus ex machina, no refuge into illogical but nonetheless convenient saving graces. His mental fetters break over us like an ocean on Neptune, freezing us as solid as Lot’s wife staring back in horror at Sodom. I am only remotely aware of Twilight crashing to his knees like me and Cusp falling out of the air like a slingshot sparrow, Lennon in Sting’s guise towering over us like a statue to some lost god on one of those improbably anthropomorphic alien worlds familiar to 1950s science fiction. Yet his austere and completely ruthless expression lacks anything resembling humanity as St George stands beside him implacably awaiting the impending execution, the man he once was now faded compared to the parasite controlling him.

  *

  INVISIBLE FORCES PIN us to a rock wall. Crucified telekinetically, it is all I can do some time later to lift my head and scour the room for signs of life. We’re in another section of the retro-fitted cave network I don’t recognize and Sting sits in an oversized chair amid a chaos of cargo crates, 44-gallon drums, c
ans, boxes, shrink-wrapped palettes of supplies, a heap of discarded electronics, sacks of unused concrete, disused safety bollards, piles of bright orange netting, a few rolled-up rugs, a broken-down forklift and a flat-bed truck, his now strangely amaranthine eyes levelled at us, fingers steepled, a look on his face halfway between deep contemplation and an impending rage quit.

  Although I can barely move, I’m able to confirm Twilight and Cusp hang alongside me. Entering the chamber comes the whole gang: Shade, St George and Whisperer, each with their accompanying ass-ponies clicking intangibly on the polished floor it occurs to me was a real design flaw for a guy planning to pally-up with an interdimensional species with clawed feet. One quick survey confirms my worst fears – that we are well and truly snagged – then the effort of holding my ensnared head up exhausts me and I hang like the proverbial sack of shit that I am.

  “I didn’t want it to come to this, Joey-me-lad,” Lennon says in Sting’s not dissimilar voice. “You disappoint me.”

  “Great,” I manage to reply. “Facing my doom and now I have to face my one-time father’s disappointment too. Good thing mom’s dead.”

  “One-time?” Lennon replies. “What do you mean?”

  And it hits me hard enough that I would light up grinning broadly if the effort of retaining the contents of my bowels wasn’t taking up what little remained of my autonomous control. I lift my staggered gaze to see Sting staring back at me dual-eyed, Lennon’s swirling chromatic aura like a living bust of one of those dead composers you sometimes see in museums.

  He has no idea I’m not his son.

  *

  “LET ME DOWN from here,” I tell Lennon, visibly sagging once the request is made. “You’ve got me . . . You and I know I can’t beat your mind powers. And I can barely talk.”

  Lennon nods and I sink slowly to the base of the wall, resting my not-so-bony ass against the white polished concrete and simply drawing in breath until I have the strength to move, nervous system all shot to hell and feeling like I’ve just had an enema of the gods, my kung fu destroyed as well as my ability to stand. I manage into an upright position despite my slump, haggardly meeting Sting’s laboratory gaze.

  “What do you mean ‘one-time’?” he asks. “Are you renouncing me, Joe?”

  “You left me, remember pops?” I say. “Besides, killing me here in the middle of nowhere just ‘cos I clued onto your plan’s not exactly gonna win you any Father of the Year contests.”

  “You’re lying to me,” Lennon says calmly. “I can open your mind like a tin of spaghetti-o, Joey-me-lad. So spill, or you’ll enjoy the last moments of your life a deranged lunatic.”

  “Some might call that an improvement,” I say weakly.

  Lennon’s unmoved. I master myself upright, shaky and weak and more than a little uncomfortable with my parlous state. Hands on hips as much to steady myself as adopt the superman pose, I take a few shaky steps forward.

  “Don’t even think about attacking me,” Lennon says. “I can neutralize your synapses in a heartbeat. Or neutralize your heartbeat, come to think of it.”

  “When’d you turn so fucking nasty?” I say. “And why? You’re preaching utter horse-shit to these people out there who should know better, I know, but fuck, you can hardly blame ‘em. You’ve gone well out of your way to pull this masquerade. I guess you’re harvesting their life-forces or something. Is that it?”

  “I’m not the one who needs to do the explaining here,” Lennon says.

  “Neither am I.”

  “You will, if you value your life,” he says.

  “I value my life, pops, but I value my dignity too,” I tell him. “Two minutes ago you were about to pop my clogs and kill my friends as well. That innocent woman there doesn’t even belong here. You should leave her out of it.”

  “She’s an interesting one,” Lennon replies calmly as he eyes up Holland. “What was she doing exactly, Joe? Attacking you and your pal? Yeah, I scanned what little of her conscious mind’s left to her thanks to Twilight. He’s been very naughty and I’m not sure you’ve been much better. So much for heroics.”

  “Like father like son, then,” I say, desperately trying not to consciously think anything about him not actually being my father and, well . . . oops.

  “At least I tried to help people,” I say hurriedly. “That’s why I’m here.”

  “I didn’t think you’d come as a convert like all the others,” Lennon says. “When the G’th’kargh told me you freed the French tottie – momentarily, at least, as you see – you confirmed my paranoia, Joe. Of course, I could’ve just reamed your mind the moment you stepped foot in Afghanistan, but I guess I wanted to believe my own son an’ heir had the potential so many of my other children lacked despite our efforts.”

  “Our?”

  “Us Doomsday Men,” Lennon says simply. “My parallels and me, united in the same cause, though of course we didn’t know it, transcending humanity, mortality, the prison of our four dimensions, if you will . . . walking like gods amongst men.”

  “So a garden variety megalomaniac after all, pops,” I say, knowing insincerity leaks from my every pore. “Now I’m the one who’s disappointed.”

  An invisible force snatches me in an iron grip as he takes control of my nervous system and stands me bolt upright.

  “Enough crap,” he yells. “Now tell me what you mean every time you call me ‘father’ like that, Joe, before I venture into that fucking cesspool you call a mind and just take what I want.”

  There’s not much for it.

  I’m right about to speak my truth when he gives a startled cry and his mastery over me evaporates.

  Zephyr 19.8 “Interesting Times”

  IT TAKES A moment I don’t really have to make sense of it.

  Sting goes to his knees like a poleaxed steer as a skinny guy in a grey-and-blue costume appears from out of nowhere and instantly sprawls hard and lifeless on the floor. As he falls, radiance fills the room that barely coheres, giving just the impression of bodies within it like divers glimpsed swimming deep underwater. Sting topples just as drunkenly as the unnamed mask beside him, either deliberately leaping free of his body like so many of his unwitting disciples, or else pulled from his fleshy vessel against his will. And I might just do a victory dance if only Shade, St George and Whisperer weren’t still with us.

  “Take out the others!” I yell to my hopefully now free comrades.

  Twilight and Cusp are fast out of the blocks, familiar green fire sizzling the air at the same time Cusp releases an insanely harsh-looking bolt of pure energy that hits Shade in the middle of the chest and practically erases her from the room. St George teleports to avoid Twilight’s attack and luckily for me reappears within swinging distance, whereupon I deliver a long-awaited right hook to the side of the old Englishman’s head that snaps his neck about and sends him flipping like a rodeo clown atop where Sting lies unmoving.

  The two celestial figures now duel as intermingling energies in the middle of the air in the middle of the room and it takes me about 0.02 seconds to be sure that it’s Matrioshka who is our unexpected savior. These are interesting times, as the Chinese would say.

  But there’s no time to begrudge or even contemplate this latest turn. Whisperer streaks past me headed for Cusp, and St George, whatever his powers, rights himself as his insect instructor directs, sending a brick wall of force that flattens the three of us against the far side of the chamber with dreadful impact. Cusp slides down like eggs off a pan, but Twilight manages to gesticulate, uttering magickal phrases that sizzle and pop in the air before a veritable sphincter opens above our attacker and a thing resembling the intestines of a whale slop out and drown St George even as he flails about to meet the unexpected threat. I might add that kajillions of gallons of seawater also pour into the mix thanks to my lugheaded pal’s sorcery.

  “What the fuck is that?” I bawl at Twilight.

  “Sea elemental,” he replies. “The Persians called them daeva, or k
raken to the Norse.”

  “OK, good to know.”

  The tail end of the thing slips free of the summoning portal with a noise like gastroenteritis, and it half-fills the chamber, knocking over or just plain out squashing the various shit Lennon has accumulated in his man-cave. Squid-like in the extreme, the thing’s burping brown tentacles roll over St George and curl around him even as his insect handler wields the Englishman’s psionic powers to good intent, throwing back some of the attacking limbs and disintegrating others. From her position on the ground, Cusp growls and focuses another laser beam that rips hellishly through the conjured creature and St George alike. The Bug riding the ill-named Saint explodes in several huge insubstantial chunks and the famed ex-Beatle is knocked off his feet to writhe among the splatter, as disoriented as the daeva itself by his sudden liberation.

  I’m admiring their handiwork when a charcoal-black figure with a stylish haircut slams into me – and it takes all my weakened strength to stop from colliding yet again with the wall. Shade’s face is a black mask, her too-white teeth and eyes standing out in the killing rage possessing her. I fend off several fists that blast chunks from the stone behind me, getting a diversionary karate chop into her neck that spins us about and lets me back away into the chamber, careful of my footing on the polished floor slippery with the sea elemental’s guts, the bulk of the creature dying painfully as it emits a deep lowing I imagine similar to that of the giant cow the Vikings believed birthed creation in the Ginnungagap which preceded existence.

  Shade’s controller gives me no pause. She charges into me and we hit the deck, sliding through offal right across the chamber, swapping blows to head, shoulders and ribs the whole way. While I’m conscious of not doing my one-time lover too much harm, I also know what she’s capable of, so it’s a messy balancing act to say the least as I try not to be too emotionally scarred by the image in close-up of her controller’s giant slavering mandibles like a radiologist’s nightmare just inches from my face, dispassionate or at least composed entirely of emotions too outré for me to ever comprehend. But by this stage I’m worn down by successive fights, and let’s face it, I’ve been living pretty rough of late, and the madness-fuelled furor that is Shade’s frenzy soon has me pinned to the polished concrete as she gets a fist free and one, two, three sharp punches to my face and the world starts to dim.