by Heide Goody
“What is it?!”
Ben shut up and held the cardboard box aloft. It was matt black. Across the front were written two words in a heavy no-nonsense font: The Game.
“Why’s it called The Game?” asked a man.
“Er, because it is a game,” said Ben.
“How will a game tell us what to do with our lives?”
“Yeah,” said Clovenhoof. “They think you’ve lost your marbles, Kitchen, and I’m inclined to agree with them.”
“No, not at all,” said Ben. “It just came together. All the times we were playing The Game, trying to replicate the cut and thrust of the property market. And what’s the Bible but a collection of rules and sayings and teachings which we’re meant to interpret and use as the rules for living our own lives?”
“So, is it the Bible or not?” said Nerys.
“It’s the Bible and The Game and all those tweets and comments and edits and…” He held up the boxed game to the congregation. “You’ve got to play it to understand it. The standard version is available to order now. It comes with playing pieces and a board and cards to tell you what to do.”
“But what are the rules?” shouted a man.
Ben put down the box, removed the lid and took out the War & Peace-thick rule book. “There’s a free open source version of the rules available on-line,” he said, “but…” He licked his thumb and flicked to the first page. “Rule number one! No one is allowed to know all the rules of The Game!”
“True dat!” came a shout.
“Rule number two! No one is allowed to know if they’re winning or not until The Game ends!”
“Sounds about right!”
“Rule number three! The Game ends when you are dead!”
There were nods in the crowd.
“Rule number four! The first player is the player who goes first! Start!”
Ben calmly put the rule book back in the box, sealed it up and handed it to the nearest member of the congregation.
“Your turn,” he said.
There was a long silence and then the room erupted into cries of “I want one!” and “Tell me what to do!” There were cheers and there was applause and a fair few ‘Hallelujah’s.
Ben stepped back between Clovenhoof and Nerys. “To be honest, I thought I’d lost my marbles too. But what do you think?”
Clovenhoof watched the massed congregation, the chattering, smiling people of Sutton Coldfield and beyond. He watched them clamouring peaceably to touch The Game. He watched the phones appearing, people searching the internet to buy their own copies.
“It’s the strangest thing…” he said.
“It’s bloody Scientology all over again,” said Nerys, equally amazed.
A figure at the front, tried awkwardly to climb onto the stage. Clovenhoof’s natural instinct was to boot them off before they could get any purchase but then he saw who it was. He went forward and helped Festering Ken up.
“You’d find it easier to get up if you didn’t carry that sodding trowel everywhere.”
“And what would I use then to dig for devils in the earth, eh?” said the stinky old man.
“You don’t have to dig to find devils round here,” said Nerys with a pointed glare for Clovenhoof.
The former bishop of Birmingham was smiling. He looked round at the people and then patted Clovenhoof on the arm. He leaned in to whisper conspiratorially.
“Even if you don’t want it, you bad lad, I forgive you.” Before Clovenhoof could do anything to stop him, the man had placed his hand on Clovenhoof’s forehead and mumbled a prayer.
Clovenhoof flinched. “Not sure that’s a good idea.”
“Eh?”
“Forgiving Satan. That sounds like an invitation to blow up creation. Or worse, me.”
Ken chuckled. “Now, give us a quid.”
Clovenhoof put a hand in his pocket to see what loose change he had in this magnificent outfit. As he did, the stage beneath them began to rumble and vibrate.
“Earthquake?” said Nerys.
“Shoddy building materials?” said Ben.
Clovenhoof touched his blessed head. “Ken? What have you done?”
The whole church began to shake and soon even the most religiously distracted realised that something was amiss. Many turned to the exits. Some had started running.
And then the stage ripped apart, the altar exploded and a giant, reeking mass of raw and uncontrolled sin burst from the ground.
Ken stared at his trowel.
In the Infernal Innovations creativity hub, Rutspud stared at the now empty shunting chamber. Little Boris turned away from the controls with a smug smile, and Rutspud knew that Big Boris had been unleashed on earth.
Rutspud wriggled out from the grip of the sin-infected Joan and lunged for the workbench.
“Hey, munchkin! What you gonna do now your daddy’s gone?”
“Get rid of the damned roast beef!”
“Not you, Joan,” said Rutspud.
Little Boris gave a quizzical grunt and moved towards Rutspud.
“I am evil personified,” said Little Boris in a voice that was pitched somewhat higher than the original monster. To the extent that a sin monster might worry about its credibility (probably not at all, in Rutspud’s estimation) it definitely had more gravitas when it kept its mouth shut.
“You’re just an iddy biddy sin monster,” said Rutspud, feeling around on the bench behind him. “Not as big and tough as your old man, no. Not by a long way.” He held up the box that his groping hand had finally located. “No guts, no intelligence, no curiosity.”
He tossed the box to Little Boris. The pint-sized monster looked at it with interest and pressed the shiny button.
“PERSONAL TORTURE SEQUENCE INITIATED. SCANNING…”
Joan’s hands found Rutspud again. There was a wonderful crazed look in the Frenchwoman’s eyes that Rutspud would have enjoyed more if it wasn’t fixed on him.
“VICTIM HAS 0% FUNCTIONALITY IN NERVE FUNCTION. PAIN-BASED TORTURE DEEMED INEFFECTUAL FOR THIS VICTIM. INITIATING KNIFE FLAIL TO DISSECT AND RENDER VICTIM INOPERABLE.”
“Ah, you hear that?” said Belphegor, rolling back into the lab. “Fascinating. We could learn from this, so be sure to observe carefully.”
Rutspud was concentrating hard on not being crushed by the iron-clad fist of Joan of Arc, who had grabbed his head on both sides and was squeezing, while muttering all the time about the boiling of cabbages.
The rotors and cutting arms burst forth from the torture box and it buzzed briefly around Little Boris before starting work with its knives. Tiny chunks of sin splattered onto the floor as Boris lost an arm to the rapid cross-cutting effect of the device.
“Right, we must make sure that this doesn’t spawn any more mini-monsters,” said Belphegor and came forward with one of the liposuction pumps they were building for the Pit of Gluttons. “Give a hand, Rutspud!” he tutted.
“Need a little hand myself,” grunted Rutspud.
The Archangel Gabriel stepped forward promptly and lifted Joan of Arc away from Rutspud. The demon staggered upright, checking that his head was in one piece and that he still had the right number of ears.
Belphegor was already vacuuming up the last squealing bits of Boris. The personal torture device, its job done, snapped its eviscerating arms back into their seamless sockets and fell still.
“Boris has gone to earth,” Rutspud said.
“An unfortunate turn of events,” agreed Belphegor.
“Unfortunate?” said Gabriel, struggling to hold the kicking and flailing Joan in his grip. “You wanted to dump it all there anyway.”
“In proper storage!”
“Whatever,” said Rutspud. “I suspect we might need to intervene.” He waved Gabriel towards the shunter. “Help me get her inside.”
“She is a bit… fighty,” said the angel.
“She’s my partner,” said Rutspud. “She was never perfect, but I’ve got used to her.” He opened the shunte
r door. “The rest of you angels going to tag along?” he asked.
The finest warriors the Celestial City had to offer looked a little unwilling.
“Fine,” said Rutspud and helped Gabriel man-handle Joan into the shunter. “Come on then, Joan. Let’s go sort out the roast beef, eh?”
CHAPTER FIFTY-NINE
Clovenhoof was transfixed by the sight before him. On the one hand it was a serious bummer that his gobsmackingly brilliant church had suffered so much damage. He was becoming used to the killjoy pessimism of builders, and he knew that gaping holes in the roof, wrecked walls and a giant chasm in the earth would probably take some fixing. On the other hand, it was a spectacle of destruction on an epic scale, and he always enjoyed those. A fascinating addition to this particular scene was the jet-black monster that had risen from the earth and climbed out of the dark pit. It scanned the fleeing crowds and sniffed the air, as if it was searching for something.
“What the fuck is that?” whispered Archbishop Nerys.
“Devils from the earth!” declared Festering Ken. He almost sounded pleased.
“Which one of you ridiculous specimens is Satan?” the monster demanded, in a voice so deep that it could have made a decent career recording movie trailers.
Clovenhoof pointed at Ben, but Nerys kicked him in the shins. He sighed and straightened his smoking jacket.
He stepped forward, spreading his arms wide. “I no longer go by that name,” he said. “People here call me Jeremy Clovenhoof. Or, you know, Big Boy, depending on how well they know me.”
The creature crashed across to take a closer look, stomping down its feet on furniture and shattering flooring tiles as it went. The congregation was fleeing to the emergency exits, even the ones that were just artfully painted onto the walls so that the building could pass the health and safety checks.
The creature was a very deep shade of black, Clovenhoof realised. It was even darker than his space-tech, light-sucking black smoking jacket. Whatever this thing was, he had already decided to have it skinned and made into a suit.
The black thing loomed over Clovenhoof, as high as a house, and then bent to sniff at him.
“Bwahaha!” The monster rocked back in mirth and pointed at Clovenhoof. “No sin at all. Most of these humans smell of more sin than you.”
He waved a hand round at the remains of the congregation, including those less-than-bright specimens who were clawing at the painted-on exits with their fingernails.
“They told me that you were the ultimate adversary,” gloated the creature.
“They?”
“I am wasting my time with you, old man.”
Clovenhoof grinned. “I see you are still wet behind the ears, whatever you are. I mean that literally by the way. Did you know you’re oozing?”
The monster frowned in puzzlement and put a hand to its ear.
“You foolish excuse for a special effect,” said Clovenhoof. “I mean, seriously, what are you supposed to be?”
“Boris.”
“What?”
“I am the accumulation of all the sins in Hell.”
“Ooh, evil black sin-monster, so very scary.” Clovenhoof used one of his favourite voices to mock the monster. He called this one Derek Zoolander on helium. “I have forgotten more about sin than you’ve seen in your lifetime, sonny.”
“Why’s he antagonising it?” whispered Ben. “Why’s he doing that?”
“Why are we still standing here?” Nerys whispered back.
“Don’t know about you but I’m rooted to the spot with utter terror.”
“There is nothing you can tell me about evil,” Clovenhoof said to the Boris-thing. “Nothing at all. I’m all for bringing along new talent in the industry, but you need to learn subtlety. I’m afraid you’re just going to burn out with all this sabre-rattling nonsense. Now go back where you came from and think about what I’ve said. We’ll talk again when you’ve grown up a bit.”
Boris crouched at the edge of the stage to better regard Clovenhoof. “You have indeed forgotten what sin is, old man. When did you last commit an act of pure evil?”
“Eight a.m. this morning in the presidential toilet,” said Nerys to no one in particular.
“When did you last squeeze the life from another living soul, just to revel in the majesty of sin?”
“Easy tiger,” said Clovenhoof, "you’re trying too hard. Makes you look like a trashy wannabee. Post-sin is what the cool cats are doing now. It’s where you’ve been there, done that and quite honestly it’s all just too much effort.”
“I see that you have assimilated the human condition. You are full of pompous wind and petty emotions. You are enfeebled and I despise you.”
“Do they know each other?” said Ben.
“It’s complicated,” said Nerys, “you see –” But she got no further as, with a roar, Boris reached past Clovenhoof and plucked her in its huge fist.
“Hey!” she screamed, halfway between indignation and fear. “That’s unwanted touching!”
“Put her down!” yelled Clovenhoof. “There are better ways to show us all what a badass you are. You’re in England now. Queue jumping would probably do it.”
Boris sniffed again.
“You… care for these mortals?”
Clovenhoof stuck two fingers in his mouth and pretended to throw up.
“Oh, for the love of my big fat lady-pleaser! No!” he yelled. “Who writes your script? I’m not the earth’s protector! I am not Superman! You are not the Joker!”
“The Joker is Batman,” said Ben, who was apparently such a geek, even fear couldn’t overcome his need to get the nerd-stuff right.
“Fine. Darth Vader.”
“That’s Star Wars.”
“Well, whoever then!”
“Zod.”
“What?”
“Zod. You’re thinking of General Zod,” said Ben.
“That’s not even a proper name!”
“Off topic!” shouted Nerys, who was trying and failing to lever open Boris’s hand with her episcopal hook-a-duck.
“You care,” said Boris, “and that is your weakness.”
“I don’t care!” yelled Clovenhoof. “I don’t give a flying butt-fuck about these pathetic humans.” He turned and punched Ben.
Kitchen reeled in shock and pain, a hand to his jaw.
“See?” said Clovenhoof. “They mean nothing to me!”
He punched Ben again.
“Aagh! Stop it!”
Clovenhoof grabbed Ben by the collar to stop him falling down.
“What are you doing?” wailed the injured man.
Clovenhoof pulled him close. “Saving Nerys by showing him she’s unimportant,” he whispered.
“Oh?”
“Just play along.”
“Okay.”
Clovenhoof pulled his arm back for another punch. “Also, this is fun,” he added.
There was a flash of brilliant white light.
Rutspud hardly registered the feeling of being pulled inside-out. They emerged onto the altar of the Hooflandian church. Or at least the remains of it.
There had been some changes to the interior of the church since they were last here. It looked like Clovenhoof had decided to redecorate in demolition chic. Rutspud didn’t dwell on this for too long, as he had a high priority task to tackle first.
“I think I see some over-boiled vegetables. Over here Joan, come on.”
Joan stumbled almost drunkenly at him, swiping at the smashed altar with her sword as she went past. Rutspud led her forward and then shoved her for all he was worth. She toppled onto the plastic Christening slide and down into the font where she landed with a hefty splash. She was under the water for a moment and then she emerged, gasping and dripping.
“Gagh!” she shouted, spitting holy water as she climbed out of the font.
Streamers of the black filth writhed angrily, like worms in a boiling pan.
Rutspud grinned. “You okay, Joan?”
<
br /> “That was seriously unpleasant,” she said.
“You want to get some payback?” he asked.
Let’s take it down, Rutspud.”
Rutspud grinned. “We’re a team again.”
She gave him a grateful look and led the charge. Rutspud (who would gladly tell anyone who asked that he was definitely not part of the charge but simply keeping the charge company) followed her along the trail of destruction that ran from the stage, through the church and out the front door.
Some distance away, Boris stood atop the rubble of the Hooflandia Log Flume and Waterboarding Centre. Soldiers scrambled into position along the moat/wall and atop the concrete-embedded presidential yacht, but Boris appeared too engaged in conversation with the tiny figure of Clovenhoof to notice them. It looked like an animated conversation.
“Ah, good, some help,” said Nerys, who was tending to an injured Ben with the help of Bishop Ken. “Or maybe even someone who can tell us what the Hell is going on.”
“What happened to him?” said Joan, looking at the livid bruising on Ben’s face. “Boris?”
“Is that what it’s called?” said Nerys. “No, Jeremy did this, but his plan worked.”
She spread her hands like a magician’s assistant to indicate herself as though that explained how and why Clovenhoof’s plan worked.
“Uh hepped wi’ uh pwan,” mumbled the semi-delirious Ben through swollen lips.
“Boris is the result of a slight problem that Hell has created,” explained Joan.
“Heaven and Hell,” Rutspud corrected cheerfully.
“Rutspud has the technical details but it’s basically an unstoppable sin monster.”
“That’s it, in a nutshell. Also, it wants some sort of showdown with Clovenhoof, as he’s the, um, traditional poster boy for sin.”
“Whatever,” said Nerys. “He’s managed to keep him busy for a few minutes. And now you’re here, you can carry out your plan to get rid of him. Yeah?”
Rutspud looked at Joan and they both glanced up at Boris. They both nodded, but Rutspud knew that his all-too-expressive face had already betrayed his complete and utter lack of a plan.
