Comeback Tour

by Jack Yeovil

  “These visions, am I… what?… fighting? Dying?”

  Krokodil smiled again, a tight and quiet little smile. Her remaining eye twinkled. “No, Elvis. You’re singing, playing the guitar. What the hag said last night was true. That’s your magic.”

  “I can’t figure this. It’s just plumb crazy.”

  “I’ve had to live with it since I was seventeen. You can get used to anything.”

  “You must have had some life, sister.”

  “Yeah, I must, mustn’t I?”

  “Well, if it’s the Lord’s will, I guess we gotta go with it.” He looked up at the skies, but only saw a ceiling of fog. “Jesse Garon,” he said, “sometimes I wonder if it wouldn’t have been better if I’d died, and you’d lived…”

  Gently, Krokodil kissed his lips. He put his hand in her hair. She tasted like a real woman. He opened his eye, and saw her patch pressed near his cheek. They clung to each other, trying to shake off the fear.

  She pushed him away, alert. She had sensed something. The Moulinex was in her hand, her thumb on the safety. The boat rocked gently. Elvis put out a hand to steady himself.

  A figure slipped out of the mists. It was ’Ti-Mouche, her face newly painted. She was carrying the guitar Elvis had played last night.

  The witch woman looked at the pair in the boat. Krokodil returned her gaze confidently, refusing to be spooked.

  Elvis wondered about the demon inside his employer. Whatever it was, he couldn’t imagine it being worse than the things that had inhabited Donny and Marie Walton. And he knew there were worse things ahead, at the Cape.

  ’Ti-Mouche knelt by the water’s edge and gave him the instrument.

  “Cadeaux,” she said, “a present.”

  “Thank you kindly ma’am, thank you.”

  He laid the guitar on his lap, feeling the music vibrating sub-audially through the wood and wire.

  “Sorciere, use the magic…”

  She stepped back into the fog, and became indistinct. Elvis had the impression she was not alone. A manshape stood by her, and he recognized the dreamshadow of himself he knew to be Jesse Garon.

  “Elvis,” said Krokodil, “what is it?”

  “A ghost, ma’am.”

  “There are lots of ghosts here, you know that.”

  “Yes.”

  He ran his fingers across the strings. The chords rung in the air, dissipating in the mists.

  The figures—’Ti-Mouche and Jesse Garon—were gone. The chill was being burned off the swamp.

  The sun broke through.

  XIII

  Simone knew that the mad old man could see the ghosts too. They were the spirits of all the astronauts who had died in space, or on the ground, or under the sea. They were the original sacrifices that had given the space program its brief burst of power. Now, Roger was recharging the voodoo batteries. She understood more than she told. Her aunt had been the mama-loa of the community. She knew all about the spilling of blood, the making of images, the establishment of power.

  She wondered if she should tell Roger about the ghosts. She owed him something for taking her out of New Orleans. She was still a ’denty, but now she was a ’denty in three-hundred-dollar dresses, and treated like the First Lady.

  The Josephites didn’t approve her. She didn’t mind that, but she would have to make sure it didn’t get in the way. If she paraded herself too much, even Roger couldn’t protect her. She knew how small she was in whatever Grand Design was being worked out here at the Cape.

  For the most part, while Roger and the mad old man were working in the bunker, she was left to her own devices.

  She didn’t dare wander too far. The patrols reported that there were a lot of the Suitcase People beyond the perimeter. One of the parties hadn’t come back. She was fascinated by the creatures who had been captured and sacrificed. If you looked at them from certain angles, you could see only the reptile. But then, if you shifted your head, you could see the person they had been.

  Her life had changed a lot since she hit on Roger in Fat Pierre’s. But she was still a ’denty, still a slave.

  Her great-great-great grandparents had mainly been slaves, she knew, and now she was following in the tradition. American history seemed to have hit a peak in 1930, and now it was rolling backwards. Eventually, everyone should pack up and set sail on the Mayflower for Plymouth. Or the slave ship for Africa.

  The shift changed in the bunker, and Roger came up with the morning crew. She could tell from his face that they hadn’t got the Needlepoint System working yet. She had only a vague notion about the System, but she gathered it was a way of channelling the lightning, to smite from above like God.

  The black-clad Josephites trooped off in a glum bunch towards the chapel to pray for the success of the project. Roger saw her, and trotted over, trying to smile. He really was quite handsome in a foreign, whitey sort of way.

  He kissed her on the lips, and she responded professionally. He used her two or three times a day, always carefully. It wasn’t unpleasant.

  Without telling her how the work was going, he walked her to the bungalow.

  There was a stick figure, oxygen mask welded to its skull, standing by the bungalow. It waved at her, and she shuddered…

  “What is it, Simone?”

  She couldn’t tell him. She couldn’t risk being rejected just yet.

  “Someone walked over my grave.”

  The dead astronaut leaned against the whitewashed wall, depressed at failing to make contact. It had a bulky pack burned to its back, and thick, blackened boots. It was still smoking.

  Inside the bungalow, Simone took off her dress and lay on the bed.

  Roger paused. She said nothing, neither inviting nor forbidding. It was safest to remain neutral. Some of them liked to think you loved it, loved them; others needed your hatred, your resentment, your disgust. She hadn’t worked Roger Duroc out yet. She probably never would. He was too cool.

  He pulled off his shirt. She had never worked out how old he was, but his body was hard, tough. He had scars, but didn’t appear to have any bio-implants.

  He bent over her, and stuck his tongue in her tiny navel, pulling at her panties. She ran a hand through his hair, and thought of the ghosts. They were converging on the place. There were more of them now than there had been when they arrived.

  Roger was on the bed with her now, his hands kneading away, his mouth pressing on hers. She moaned ambiguously.

  The Suitcase People were more active, too. Everyone knew things were coming to a head.

  She gasped as they joined.

  On the opposite wall was a framed religious picture. Elder Seth entering Salt Lake City at the head of his multitude. Simone loathed it, but couldn’t understand why. It was something about the Elder’s thin face and beetle-black glasses.

  Roger was finished. They broke apart and lay still for a minute. Sweat dried on her body. She listened to the whirring of the fan, and the beating of her own heart.

  Roger sprang off the bed, and walked into the bathroom. He always showered afterwards. He was as clean about himself as he was about his precious weapons.

  Simone opened the wardrobe, and picked a dress she had never worn before. They had gone mad with cashplastic in the New Orleans boutiques. She chose a violent orange-and-turquoise sheath, with a matching headscarf. With barely enough material for a pillowcase, the dress had cost more than a contract killing.

  The phone rang. She picked it up.

  “Elder Duroc’s bungalow,” she said.

  “Get him,” snapped a voice. Simone recognized Sister Bethany Addams, and felt the hostility oozing over the line.

  “I’ll see if he’s available. Roger…”

  She held out the phone.

  Dressing as he talked, Roger propped the phone between shoulder and cheek.

  “Fine,” he said, ending the conversation.

  Simone had poured out some iced tea.

  “They’re nearly ready for another tes
t-run,” he said. “Fonvielle says he’s sure.”

  Roger took a deep swig of his tea.

  “I don’t know, Simone. I think he’s cracked. This is a bad business.”

  She was not required to say anything.

  “And the Suitcase People are swarming out there. I’m having some heavy firepower imported. We need to get those lizards flushed out.”

  Simone agreed with that.

  “I’ve got hunter-killer teams out there, but we can’t divert enough personnel.”

  “It’s bad gris-gris,” she said.

  He knew what she meant.

  “Yes, that’s it exactly.”

  He set his hat on his head, and left her.

  She spilled a little tea on her chest, and let the cold soak through the dress, enjoying the sensation…

  Po’ little ’denty, she thought.

  XIV

  They were making good progress. The guitar sat in the stern, and Elvis imagined it was singing at him, reprimanding him like a long-neglected lover.

  Krokodil was different today. She would never be communicative, but by comparison with her previous form, she was almost chatty, almost nervous. It was nice to know that she had human parts, but also a little frightening. He conceded that there was something attractive in the idea of putting all your trust in a cyborg fighting machine while staying in the bushes and laying down cover fire. He could see the gang-girl coming through now.

  She told him things in bits and pieces. She told him about her meeting with Elder Seth, and the spectacles that had changed the way she saw the world.[1] She told him that she had spent time wandering in the desert, living like an animal, barely clinging to her sanity. And then she had been worked over by Dr Simon Threadneedle, a world-class bio-surgeon who had made her the Frankensteinian thing she was. After that, there had been many battles, many casualties. Armies had been sent for her, and formidable assassins. She had remade herself spiritually, she said, with the help of Hawk-That-Settles and a channel had been opened up to the beyond, through which had come a powerful manitou that had nestled inside her. It was dormant now, but it could be summoned up. There had been a monster at Santa de Nogueira, a monster she was unable to describe. It had been vast and devastating, and it was banished now, by the slightest of miracles [2] Elder Seth had been around for centuries, and sometimes they spoke inside each other’s heads. He had to get rid of her, and she had to stop him before he ended the world.

  In a way, Elvis wished he didn’t know all this. He had seen enough to make him believe her, but he wished it were three weeks ago and all he had to worry about was the Good Ole Boys trying to yank his license or coming home some night to find a hoodhead bomb rigged inside his fridge.

  “One thing, lady?”

  “What?”

  “That million dollars? It ain’t enough.”

  Krokodil laughed. “You want more. Ten million? We’ve got it. Gold bullion, cashplastic, jewels, negotiable information…”

  “How did you get it?”

  “I’m Frankenstein’s Daughter, remember? Hawk and I stole it from corp convoys. GenTech and Winter can spare it. After all, it’s in a good cause.”

  “I suppose so, if saving the world is a good cause.”

  “Don’t think I haven’t thought about it.”

  They were winding between islands, not pushing the boat too much. Elvis had been aware for an hour or so that there were creatures out there in the swamp. They might be human, they might not. They didn’t want to be seen, and that meant he didn’t want to see them. Last night, the Cajuns had told him about the babies lost to the local spooks, the Suitcase People.

  “Maybe the Prezz will drop all the charges if you pull it off.”

  “No chance. I don’t expect gratitude.”

  “What do you expect?”

  “Honestly? To be dead.”

  “But what if you come through?”

  “Then I just want peace and quiet.”

  A roaring split the air, and the boat started rocking violently. The waters up ahead broke and a huge head loomed out of the swamp, mud pouring from its mouth.

  It was a dinosaur with a headband.

  Krokodil had the Moulinex up, but something struck the bottom of the boat. The gun went off, bullets spraying the cypresses.

  The dinosaur strode forwards. It was smarter than an animal.

  Krokodil was off-balance. Elvis reached out, but she went over, splashing as she hit the swamp.

  Green arms went around her, and she was dragged under.

  “Hey,” the dinosaur said, “leetle maan, behave, okeh?”

  Elvis was trying not to be tipped out of the wildly shifting boat. He didn’t make it.

  “I tol’ you so, maaan.”

  He was struggling in the filthy water with something rough-skinned and cold.

  He was pulled under, and took a lungful of ghastly-tasting liquid. He fought for the surface and tried to cough it all out. Clawed hands held him fast.

  He elbowed his assailant where the kidneys would have been if he were a man, and was rewarded with a satisfying grunt of pain.

  Jaws snapped by his head and, holding his breath, he dived under the water.

  He had lost track of Krokodil.

  There was gunfire. He recognized the distinctive burp of the Moulinex, even distorted by the water. Krokodil was up and fighting.

  He tried to find bottom, and just found the swamp getting thicker. His lungs were straining now, and he could only see blurred shapes in the murk.

  “Where ees the maan, Frankie?”

  Frankie growled in answer. He didn’t know.

  Elvis kicked, and swam away from the shapes. He would have to surface soon, or die.

  He pushed upwards, exhaling steadily. His head above the water, he breathed again.

  He could hear the Suitcase People, but not see them. They made a lot of noise as they crashed through the swamp.

  Something took a bite out of the flesh of his arm, and he swallowed a yelp of pain.

  He turned, his knife drawn, and stabbed out. He was worried that he’d have to face another one of the man monsters.

  The knife speared a trilobite against the bole of a tree. The big louse wriggled and died.

  “Prehistoric bastard,” he whispered, pulling his knife free.

  There wasn’t any more gunfire. Had Krokodil got away?

  He wanted to get some solid, dry-ish soil under him. He pulled on the lower branches of the tree, and found himself an island.

  The mud dried on his pants and jacket. He hated looking and feeling like this. He had been dirty enough as a kid, always running around in ragged blue jeans. He wished he had left all that behind.

  Something moved in the water, and Elvis gripped his knife-hilt harder.

  It bobbed into view, and he let out his breath. He fished the guitar out of the swamp. It didn’t even have any water in it.

  He cradled the instrument in his lap like a baby. It was silly, but he felt better with ’Ti-Mouche’s gift.

  A huge shadow fell over him.

  “Hey, Guitar Maaan, how about givin’ us a song?”

  Part Three: All My Trials

  I

  Jay-Zeuss, Mary and Joseph, Lola Stechkin thought, this Gavin Mantle character is an A-One A-Hole! She wished she was in Greater Rhodesia with the serious newshawks, covering the Taabazimbi disaster. That had been some fry-up, a fireball enveloping the town where the Broederbond were holding a mass rally to commemorate the Battle of Blood River. This was peanuts.

  “It’s like this, Lola-baby,” Mantle sleazed, scratching his ballooning gut with an American Excess goldcard, “I figure it’s not right to take the two kids out of their school and their old neighbourhood. I have to think this whole thing out, you know sweetbutt. ’Cause I don’t want them to grow up with a warped sense of values because they’re rich, y’know. So I figure Tish and Reggie can stay with their mommy. I’ll still sec them on weekends and National Holidays, but, you know, my
lifestyle now is, like, very alien to what they have come to expect. So, like I said, I thought the fairest thing was to leave them out of it…”

  Gavin Mantle was floating on an aircushion in his private swimming pool. He was wearing immodest Ballsac swimtrunks that showed off the first of the GenTech-financed bio-amendments he had demanded. She understood that his initial request had been anatomically unfeasible.

  The bottom of the doughnut-shaped pool was scattered with gems, inset into the concrete. They sparkled as the sunlight filtered down to them. Tropical fish swam between the beams, perpetually high from the trace stimulants the household system pumped into the water.

  She focused on the autoprompt chip in her contact lens, and moved onto the next question.

  “And what about Clodagh, Gavin?”

  Mantle made a great show of sighing with regret as he poured himself a tureen-sized cocktail of creme de menthe, zooper-blast, Shochaiku Double-Blend, Beluga caviar and Sta-Hard drops.

  “Clodagh doesn’t understand the demands that wealth visits upon you, Lola-honey,” he winked. “She’s moved back in with her mother.”

  One of Mantle’s sexclones swam past in a lazy backstroke, her lithe body breaking the surface of the vitamin-enriched water, her unwieldy breasts floating like cherry-topped islands. The sexclones were vat-grown human bodies, perfect in every detail, but with artificially limited brains. The rumour was that they used hormone-dosed rabbit’s cerebella for the most successful models. Lola, who had never wanted for willing sexual partners, found the whole notion of screwing a flesh-product nauseating, and she was especially disturbed whenever she encountered one of the creatures encoded with her own genetic structure. Mantle, of course, had ordered one of those. She wished now she hadn’t licensed her likeness, but the corp had offered her an enormous commission.

  The Lola sexclone was on the patio now, switched off. Lola wondered if her revulsion for the thing had anything to do with the fact that it was modelled on her as she had been five years ago. She dreaded the day they thought one could anchor the show better than her. At twenty-two, she was already one of the oldest newscastresses on the networks.