The Chickens of Atlantis and Other Foul and Filthy Fiends

by Robert Rankin

he destruction of the capital was awful. The spaceships rained down fire and bombs, destroying all and sundry. The Martians were not employing the tactics they had used in the original War of the Worlds. They were laying waste to London even before they landed to unleash the terrible tripods.

  Death rays cleaved the streets and houses rumbled into dust. In Trafalgar Square, the fountains foamed and steamed as Nelson fell. Architectural treasures became nothing more than memories. The seat of the British Empire became a flaming Hell.

  Within the top-secret room in the Ministry of Serendipity, Mr Cameron Bell held forth. Gentlemen in Black were crowded therein, as were the surviving members of the Government (3), the Queen (1) and the royal corgis (18).

  ‘Dynamite,’ said Mr Bell, and, ‘Dynamite,’ again.

  ‘And this will get the job done?’ asked Mr Gladstone, fumbling to light a cigar with wildly trembling hands.

  Mr Bell made so-so gestures. ‘It will certainly give them something to think about,’ he said.

  ‘Something to think about,’ said the Prime Minister, and very thoughtfully, too. ‘And whilst we are giving them something to think about, what will we actually be doing to stop them?’ His voice rose terribly here and I took a nimble step back.

  ‘I will be putting my plan into operation,’ said Mr Bell.

  ‘And your plan is . . . ?’

  ‘Ah.’ Mr Bell gave his snubby nose a tap. ‘That would ruin the surprise.’

  ‘Ruin the surprise?’ The Prime Minister cast his unlit cigar aside and rose with a rush to his feet. ‘Gentlemen in Black,’ he shouted. ‘Take this Mr Pickwick fellow and toss him into a cell!’

  I was about to protest this outrage, but I was snatched up by the collar.

  ‘Yes!’ cried Mr Gladstone. ‘And his monkey, too. Sling them both in a cell and get me a large gin and tonic!’

  ‘This is really not going according to plan,’ I said to Mr Bell. ‘Pardon me for saying this, but I do recall you saying that this time you would sort everything out.’

  ‘I do not recollect being quite so specific,’ replied my friend, and he sighed a most heartfelt sigh.

  We sat side by side in a dire little cell, which I hate to say smelled of wee-wee. The cell's iron door had been slammed shut upon us and the big bolt crammed into place.

  ‘I suppose at least we are safe in here,’ I said.

  ‘Safe at least until all in the Ministry are dead and we then starve to death,’ said my friend.

  ‘Help! Let us out!’ I shouted, and I banged upon the iron door.

  ‘Darwin,’ said Mr Cameron Bell. ‘We find ourselves in extreme circumstances. Probably the most extreme circumstances we have so far found ourselves in—’

  ‘Nearly getting our heads chopped off in Fairyland was rather extreme,’ I helpfully suggested.

  ‘Quite so.’

  ‘And I can think of several more such extreme instances, if you wish.’

  ‘I do not. But I am going to have to leave you here whilst I put my plan into action.’

  ‘Leave me here?’ I said, both slowly and with care. ‘This would suggest to me that you have found a way to escape from this cell.’

  ‘There is a way,’ said my friend. ‘A possible way. But one I would never under any normal circumstances even consider trying. But I can see no other way of getting us, and indeed the world, out of this terrible mess.’

  ‘Right,’ I said, and I waggled a finger at Mr Bell. ‘Well, firstly, I have no wish to be left here all alone. Secondly, you told me when we first set off upon our adventures through time that we should always stay together. Look what happened the last time we parted company. You left me alone in Brentford and I jumped off a church spire and died. And thirdly, this cell has no windows and only a locked iron door for an exit. How could you possibly hope to escape?’

  ‘You will bring about my escape,’ said Mr Cameron Bell.

  ‘And how could I possibly do that?’

  ‘You will do it through magic.’

  I stared at my friend, and my mouth spoke a silent word: ‘Magic?’

  ‘You overheard my conversation with Aleister Crowley,’ said Mr Bell, ‘in which he identified you as the Ape of Thoth.’

  ‘The kiwi bird called me that, too,’ I said, ‘when I was dead and up there in the clouds.’

  ‘Through our travels,’ said Mr Bell, ‘and through the skills in language and the written word that you were taught by Herr Döktor, you have become unique. An ape amongst apes. And through releasing your monkeys into the far and distant past, you have become the father of all Mankind.’

  ‘I am not sure I really believe that,’ I said to my friend. ‘Although, naturally, it does hold a certain charm.’

  ‘No ape such as you has ever existed before, except –’ and Mr Bell put a very large emphasis upon the word except ‘– for the monkey Gods Hanuman and Thoth. And Thoth, as you may know, means “thought” and “time”, the Lord of the Past and the Future.’

  ‘I am only a monkey,’ I said. ‘Although I have certainly experienced more wonderful things than has the average monkey.’

  ‘You died and you rose from the dead.’

  ‘And that sounds blasphemous to me. I was born again through science.’

  ‘You are the Ape of Thoth,’ said Cameron Bell, ‘and you will release me from this cell.’

  ‘I cannot,’ I said. ‘I do not know how. Why say such things to me?’

  Mr Bell pulled something from his pocket. It looked to be a piece of parchment. It was a piece of parchment.

  ‘Before I left Crowley's room,’ said my friend, ‘he pressed this into my hand. Crowley is a shameless and immoral rogue, but he is a real magician. He recognised in you the power of Thoth and whispered that when the time was right and when all appeared lost, I should pass this to you and you should read from it.’

  ‘And it will set everything right?’

  ‘It will release me from this cell so that I can put everything right. I am responsible for this tragedy, Darwin, my overconfidence, my foolishness . . . This Martian attack – it is all my fault. I must put it right. You must aid me in this.’

  ‘And I read the words and you will be magicked from this cell?’

  ‘In a word, yes,’ said my friend.

  ‘Well, isn't that convenient!’

  ‘Ahem,’ said Mr Bell. ‘Do you want to escape or do you not?’

  ‘You said only you could escape,’

  ‘Darwin, trust me,’ said Cameron Bell.

  ‘I do,’ I said, ‘but—’

  ‘But me no buts. You will magic me from this cell so that I can put my plan into operation, stop Arthur Knapton and defeat the Martians. You will leave this cell at three o'clock sharp this afternoon.’

  ‘Three?’ I said. ‘Why three?’

  ‘Darwin,’ said Mr Bell, ‘this is the British Empire. What happens at three o'clock every day in the British Empire?’

  ‘Everything stops for tea,’ I said.

  ‘Precisely. And so at three o'clock, a Gentleman in Black will bring a tray of tea and crumpets to this cell. It is the British way of doing things. Ultimately it is what we are all fighting for.’

  ‘Tea?’ I said.

  ‘And crumpets. The Gentleman in Black will enter the cell with his tray. He will be shocked to find I am gone. Whilst he is gaping about the cell with a stupefied expression on his face, you will quietly slip away. Agreed?’

  I nodded without conviction.

  ‘Follow the Underground Railway System to Woking and make your way to the sandpits at Horsell Common. I will meet you there at nine o'clock tomorrow morning and there we will conclude our business.’

  ‘Well, firstly,’ I said, as I had seen the flaw in this, ‘I would like to draw your attention to the fact that there is no—’

  ‘Darwin!’ said Mr Bell. ‘Just do as I say.’

  I folded my arms and made a foul face.

  ‘All will be well, I promise you, Darwin.’

  ‘We wil
l see about that.’

  Mr Bell unfolded his parchment and placed it into my hands. It was printed with Egyptian hieroglyphics and these meant absolutely nothing to me.

  ‘There you are,’ I said. ‘I cannot read this.’

  ‘You can,’ said Mr Bell. ‘Look very hard.’

  ‘This is quite absurd,’ I said. ‘I am not a God, I am Darwin.’

  ‘Read the parchment,’ said Mr Bell, ‘or I will give you a smack.’ My friend made a very fearsome face and I gazed at the parchment.

  And would not you know it, or would not you not, the hieroglyphics began to change. Not into English, but into something. Something that somehow I could understand. And the more I gazed, the clearer it all became.

  All of it.

  The truth, if you will.

  About everything.

  It was a magical moment and a profound one, too, and I only wish that there was time for me to enlighten you all by describing it in detail here.

  But there is not.*

  So I took a deep breath and read the words aloud.

  A sudden and intense silence formed in that cell as a physical thing and then the world appeared to fold in upon itself, to vanish away and then to expand and return.

  And I found myself all alone in that cell.

  * This will probably be the last time I say ‘outrageous’. So, ‘OUTRAGEOUS!’ (R. R.)

  41

  sat all alone and had a little cry.

  I was, frankly, fed up with all this. When Mr Bell and I first set off upon our journey through time, I had been of the opinion that it was going to be an enjoyable experience. That we would see and hear wonderful things.

  Like Beethoven conducting the Ninth, for example.

  But it had been nothing of the sort. We had chased and chased after the Pearly Emperor, Arthur Knapton, who time and again had outsmarted my friend Mr Bell. He had always been one step ahead of the great detective and in truth I had no real reason to believe that this time would be any different. And this time the fate of the whole world rested upon Mr Bell defeating Mr Knapton. That was a very big responsibility, and much as I admired my friend's extraordinary skills in the field of crime detection, and loved him in a way that one might love one's own brother, and trusted him, too – yes, I did! – I worried that perhaps he had this time met his match and that nothing his remarkable mind could come up with would foil this terrible villain. So I sat and I snivelled and I felt very sorry for myself.

  At three o'clock sharp, the cell door opened and a Gentleman in Black brought in the tea. He was, as Mr Bell predicted, shocked to find that my friend had gone, and whilst he was gaping about the cell with a stupefied expression upon his face, I quietly slipped away.

  An air shaft took me to Mornington Crescent Underground Station, and from there I began my journey to Woking.

  I know that there will be those readers who have been intently studying my narrative to content themselves that all the details I provide are scrupulously accurate. For, after all, if I had not actually done the things I claim to have done within the pages of this book, then how, I hear you ask, would I know all I know? And be able to write with such historical exactitude and precision?

  Clearly, I would not. And so, when I attempted to take issue with Mr Bell in the previous chapter regarding the means by which I would travel to Woking, the more scrupulous readers will certainly have reached for their maps of the London Underground and cried, ‘Aha – the London Underground does not run to Woking.’

  Bravo!

  Good for you!

  Well done.

  So, naturally I did not follow the course of the London Underground System to Woking.

  I followed it to Horsell Common Underground Station.

  Which was somewhat closer to the sandpits.

  And there I spent what was truly the most miserable night of my life.

  The sky that night glowed hideous red as tripods stalked from the Martian spaceships, wreaking havoc across the countryside. London was ablaze, Old London Town, of many memories, all gone to ruination as the mighty armoured war machines picked their three-legged way above the streets, ray guns showering down destruction. Poor Old London Town.

  With dawn came refugees, thousands fleeing destruction. I had settled myself into a tree for the night and watched the sorry hordes of broken people struggling with meagre belongings away from the engines of death. There was, it appeared, no hope left. Nothing remaining but sadness.

  I shook my head and shivered for I was rather cold, and having had no sleep at all, most tired, too, was I.

  ‘It is all too awful,’ I said as thousands passed beneath my tree.

  I had dreamed a terrible dream of a blackened landscape and Martian tripods, a dream that now was becoming reality. I had a little blubber and then I heard the call.

  ‘Darwin,’ came this call to me. ‘Darwin, where are you?’

  ‘I am here,’ I cried and dropped down from the tree into my best friend's arms.

  Mr Bell smiled upon me. ‘You look all in,’ he said.

  Folk tramped by to either side, caring naught for us.

  ‘I have brought a picnic,’ said Mr Cameron Bell.

  ‘You have brought a picnic?’ I said. ‘At a time like this?’

  ‘You are hungry, are you not?’

  ‘And footsore, too,’ I told him.

  ‘Then let us hasten away to one of the sandpits and enjoy breakfast beyond the eyes of the refugees.’

  I stared at my friend and shook my head. ‘Have you any idea how utterly insane that sounds?’ I asked him.

  ‘I have quail's eggs, croissants, Swiss cheese and Château Doveston.’

  ‘Ah,’ said I, and, ‘Ah,’ once more.

  ‘And Treacle Sponge Bastard for pudding.’

  ‘Breakfast with pudding,’ I said. ‘What could be less insane than that?’

  ‘Always best to go into battle on a full stomach,’ said my friend, and he placed me onto his shoulders and took up the picnic basket.

  And so we picnicked. In the sandpits on Horsell Common with Martian tripods moving ever nearer and thousands fleeing in terror just out of sight.

  I tucked into croissants and marmalade. ‘How goes your plan?’ I enquired between munchings. ‘I suppose you are aware that London is now utterly destroyed.’

  ‘We can put that right,’ said Mr Bell.

  ‘Oh, can we?’ I replied.

  Mr Bell poured two glasses of bubbly. ‘All will be well,’ said he.

  ‘You do look rather chipper for a fellow who has wrought destruction upon the planet.’

  ‘Now now, Darwin,’ said my friend. ‘Have a little faith.’

  ‘A little faith?’ I smiled as I said it. ‘The world as we know it is coming to an end. We are sat drinking champagne as the Martians lay waste to southern England. And if all of that is not bad enough, I had to spend an entire night up in a tree!’

  Mr Bell looked at me.

  I looked at him.

  And then we began to laugh.

  ‘It is not funny,’ I said, when we had quite finished laughing and refilled our glasses with champers. ‘I saw regiments of soldiers marching into battle against the Martians last night. I have seen two or three sorry survivors making a retreat this morning. All is gone, Mr Bell. All is lost. All is doom.’

  ‘But looking on the bright side—’

  ‘There is no bright side.’

  ‘I have it all under control.’

  I sighed deeply and shook my head. Distant explosions were growing ever less distant. ‘They are coming this way. You know that?’

  ‘Of course I know that,’ said my friend. ‘And I am sure that Arthur Knapton will know that I know that. Seeing as how he has always been one step ahead.’

  ‘So what are we going to do – just sit here and wait for him to arrive?’

  ‘Unless you have a better plan.’

  I was sipping champagne, but now I spat it. ‘A better plan?’ I spluttered. ‘Than sit here
and wait for death? I think I can come up with something better than that.’

  ‘It is all under control.’

  ‘No, Mr Bell, it is not.’

  We heard yet more distant explosions.

  ‘I love the sound of dynamite in the morning,’ said Mr Bell. ‘Sounds like . . . victory.’

  ‘Give me more champagne,’ I said. ‘If I am to die, I would prefer to do so whilst drunk.’ I gave myself a thorough scratching. ‘And my fleas would prefer to do likewise,’ I said. ‘More champagne.’

  ‘What do you know about Martians?’ asked my friend, possibly by way of conversation.

  ‘Well, according to one now apparently inaccurate Eternal Verity, they are vulnerable to Earthly bacteria.’

  ‘What else?’

  ‘That they are tentacly and horrid.’

  ‘Anything else?’

  I scratched at my head. ‘I recall reading that Sir Frederick Treves performed a post-mortem upon a Martian. It was described as the first “alien autopsy”.’

  ‘And?’ asked my friend.

  I ceased to scratch and just shrugged.

  ‘Martians have no vocal cords,’ said Mr Bell. ‘They do not communicate by speech. They are telepathic.’

  ‘And why would you mention this now?’

  ‘Because it is significant. You will remember from history that all the Martians died from Earthly bacteria. All of them, Darwin.’

  ‘And how is this significant?’

  ‘Because not every single one of them actually came out of their war machines to breathe Earthly air, did they?’

  ‘I do not know,’ I said. ‘But I suppose they must have done – they all died, after all.’

  ‘They died through, you might say, a psychic plague. The King of all the Martians stepped down from his tripod to view the destruction he had brought about. He gained the fatal infection of Earthly bacteria and passed it on telepathically to all other Martians then upon the Earth.’

  ‘Sounds like far-fetched fiction,’ I said.

  ‘Yet I believe it is true.’

  ‘And so, and here let me see if I can get ahead of you . . .’ I located a banana in the picnic basket and with some small pleasure began to unpeel it. ‘You are hoping to somehow infect the King of all the Martians and by doing so telepathically infect all the rest.’