“Yeah, that’s right!” Clement hurried on. “My birthday’s ... uh, week after next. Sixteenth—uh, my sixteenth. May Eleventh. Today’s only—what? April Thirtieth? May First?”
There was a long silence, like the head was running some kind of check on some data storage Clement couldn’t see or hear.
At last the voice thundered, “You dared come into the lower reaches and enter a contract with us while still in your minority?”
“Uh ... Well, actually, I just agreed to talk about it, and ... uh, you were the ones who decided where—”
The head gave a great shriek of rage and the hand gave Clement a slap that started spinning him round and round, up and down through the pool too fast to ...
* * * *
He came to halfway across the cinder lot, with Omar supporting him back to the Rattletrap.
“What happened?”
“You tell me,” Omar grunted. “They said you just passed out on the Nightmare Wheel. Must’ve had one too many. First all that trouble about Ted—just got him back to the car ten minutes ago—and now you. Well, never again! You can bet I’ll never lug babies along anywhere with me ever again.”
Clement didn’t protest. The thing worrying him most, now that it was all over, was one of the things that had worried him almost the least at the time. Crosses didn’t usually hurt him unless he was sinning. But he’d been trying his darndest not to sin when the crosspiece in the window stung him. Why? Maybe because he’d broken some other rule? Some rule that hadn’t been made for breaking? “Omar,” he said at last, about the time they reached Ted sleeping it off in the car, “I think I understand why the Old Count never drank wine. In fact, I think I’d better go on the wagon myself. Starting right now. Alcohol doesn’t seem to be any good for us vampires.”
It wasn’t the only resolution that came out of that ... Great Dream, Jung might have called it. Great Nightmare. If it had been a dream. But it was the only resolution he felt like sharing just then.
* * * *
Weird things happen in Hellmouth Park. As witness with a vengeance the short novel that ends this section.
A strange little novel. I began it June 8, 1991, feeling desperate to sell something, trying to set my own instincts and wishes aside in the effort to produce what I thought popular authors advised as “good” writing and what all my observations led me to believe the editors really wanted (no matter what they said they wanted—nor was I the only interested party to receive this impression; a magazine cartoon of about that time showed an editorial board sitting around asking, “Is all this plot really essential to the sex and violence?”). E.g., the popular writing gurus cautioned against ever letting dialogue go on longer than three or four speeches before breaking it up with “action,” and my observations led me to believe that by “action” editors meant violence, sex, or both. So, resolutely smothering my own strong preference for letting characters go on conversing until they ran out of good things to say and/or reached what struck me as a likely place to end the segment, I punctuated the opening chapter with all the suggestiveness and scrappiness I could think of.
During the months I worked on this, I hated it, and hated myself for playing, as it seemed to me, a prostitute with my talent. The disastrous climax came October 8, 1991, when I received my agency’s response to my first chapter and proposal: it was bad and they could not possibly sell it. So much for trying to follow the advice of popular fictioneers and observe editorial wishes! I have avoided that particular mistake ever since. The bleak letter reached me about midday at a certain point in Chapter 5, and for an hour or so I agonized over whether or not to drop the despised work at once. But, though I hated the story, I liked my central character too much to leave him forever in hellish limbo, so went on and added a much shorter and tidier ending than I had originally contemplated. I no longer remember what that longer ending might have entailed, but am grateful for doing the shorter ending when I did.
Almost the only things that mark this one as belonging to the fanciers/realizers cycle are the system of personal nomenclature and Hellmouth Theme Park itself. Otherwise, in my desperation to produce something that would sell, I played down the fantasy-perceivers theme completely, which might be as well, considering the crucial thing that happens to the “Hellmouth Seven.” All of whom are presumably registered reality perceivers.
What happens to them owes its origin to The Ozplayers, with which project I have always felt warmly satisfied, and which I hope to include in a megapack of my Oz writings. I tried consciously to reproduce the effect I liked so much in The Ozplayers in a more commercially viable work, but was coldly dissatisfied.
When, in 2013, I decided to try gathering my original R.S.A. cycle as completely as possible, I happened upon the holograph notebook for the work then called”Seven Against Hellmouth” (after the Classical example of “Seven Against Thebes”), and decided to transcribe it, too. No earlier typed transcription has yet surfaced; I am not entirely sure that I ever made one, feeling as I did at that time about this work. Finding to my surprise upon finally typing it that, after all, I disagree with my agents’ judgment, rather like the thing—now—and no longer feel ashamed for having written it. Perhaps of recent years I have been suckered into sitting through a few too many of those made-for-TV movies that turn out to be nothing but excuses for killing off all the protagonists one by one, as hideously as possible, leaving no survivors. The only time I have ever seen this trick work effectively is in Agatha Christie’s And Then There Were None (a.k.a. Ten Little Indians); and Dame Agatha herself changed that and left two survivors in the stage version of her novel.
Whatever the reasons, more than two decades after writing it, I felt favorably enough inclined to incorporate it in the backstory of The Deathguards. Hellmouth Park and what happens therein strike me as working equally well in the re-imagined as in the original fanciers/realizers R.S.A. world, and this story in particular requires very little beyond minor alterations to a few personal surnames and some details of common everyday appurtenances.
THE HELLMOUTH SEVEN
Chapter I
Private Party Room number 7D echoed the aging gaudiness of Hellmouth Park itself. Pinky orange neon lamps shaped like tiny demons turning tinier damned souls on filament-thin pitchforks sent out a halfhearted glow that got stuck in the iridescent streamers draping ceiling and walls. When the park employee ushered October Bradley into 7D, three other guests were already present.
One, covered head to thighs in a grotesque rubber body mask which depicted the remains of a screaming face above a torso laid open by accident or vivisection, lounged in a longchair with splitting crimson cushions on a framework of imitation bones. The second, costumed as a Spanish inquisitor with graying hair, stood above the first, holding a plastic cup in one hand and gesticulating with the other. The third guest hovered behind the refreshments table as if picking and choosing. Hers was the only costume present clearly designed to show off the wearer’s gender, but October could not immediately identify what else it might represent—skintight white leotard worn, apparently, over no undercothing, with purplish stars or spiders covering the tips of the breasts, costume ruby flashing in the navel, and an inverted triangle of some reflective fabric that suggested flames beneath. The same kind of fabric sheathed her feet, gloved her hands, and formed suggestions of webbed vestigial gills and wings or fins on her neck and back.
Whatever it was supposed to be, it was effective. And looked as though neither the designer nor the wearer had heard about morals tightening up again…but wasn’t that what kept this old theme park going?
“Good!” said the inquisitor, looking up. “They finally brought us somebody else. A vampire, by the look of it.”
“A pretty cheap one.” October gave them a self-deprecating grin. “I came here tonight on a dare. Tomorrow I turn forty, and—”
“Watch out!” Speaking in a voice on the borderline between the av
erage male and female ranges, the vivisection victim waved one hand languidly at the inquisitor. “He doesn’t like people answering questions before he asks them.”
The woman in skintights giggled. “Not half as much as he hates people refusing to answer questions when he asks them!”
The inquisitor snorted.
October turned back to him, spreading both palms. “Well, ask away. I don’t have anything to hide.”
“Everyone has a shameful secret to hide,” the inquisitor shot back. “Most people have many.”
“What’re yours, then?” Skintights teased him.
“Answer my questions, woman, and maybe I’ll consider answering yours!”
Ducking gracefully underneath the table, she popped up on their side of it, stretched her arms, and bounced everything in front of the inquisitor’s eyes, laughing the whole time.
The inquisitor turned red and made obvious efforts not to leer appreciatively. The woman wriggled on and on, turning slowly so that everyone could see everything. It wasn’t quite a belly dance, not quite a stag-party burleykew as October understood them to be, and it could hardly be called a striptease when she started out nuder than naked and never offered to take off the effectively less than nothing she had on. But it seemed to grab the most exciting features from all styles of exotic dancing, mix them up with new twists and inventions of the teaser’s own, and bundle it all together in an invention that would have put Salome of the Seven Veils to the blush. She kept all other eyes in the room on her, even the pair belonging to the vivisection victim (who might have been another woman), from the moment she began her turns until the moment the plastic cup in the inquisitor’s hand exploded with a startling crack, spewing its contents over him and the victim.
At that, the woman in tights abruptly stopped dancing and laughed again. If it had been a low, throaty laugh, it could have bridged the accident and kept the spell going. But that didn’t seem to strike her fancy. Instead, she broke the mood with a childish giggle, high-pitched to the point of nerve-scraping, and skipped back behind the table for another scrutiny of the refreshments.
“Blasted cheap, flimsy cups,” the inquisitor muttered, wiping at his costume. “Does coffee stain?”
“Not on black, I wouldn’t think,” the vivisection victim replied with a shrug. “Anyway, it’s the park’s fault for providing the flimsy cups, so they shouldn’t charge you extra for accidents.”
“What would you care?” the inquisitor demanded. “You didn’t rent your costume from the park, did you?”
“No,” the victim confessed cheerfully, “and anything you spilled on it would probably wipe right off. Hotter than Hades, though, so excuse me if I don’t exert myself much. Skipper Harrison,” he or she went on, offering October one hand by pivoting the forearm outward without moving elbow from chair arm. “Pleased to meet you.”
Still woozy from the dancer’s performance, October shook Skipper’s hand briefly and got the impression of lazy health. “October Bradley,” he answered. “Don’t get the wrong idea. My first name’s the only unusual thing about me. I could have posed for Jacky Average.”
“Oh, I wouldn’t be too sure about that, fella,” the dancer said, this time pitching her voice low, with a husky chuckle to match.
The inquisitor coughed and made an obvious effort to regain dominance. “If you were an average specimen, why would you have been awarded a Private Party ticket?”
“I don’t know. It couldn’t have been for the costume. Straight out of a box—a pretty cheap box at that. Actually, I got it free, but it would’ve been cheap to a customer. Mattie—my boss—unloaded it on me because they weren’t selling, even at a thirty percent markdown.”
“Yeah?” Skipper’s eyes seemed to open a little wider behind the grotesque mask. “We could be onto something there. This stupid thing I’m wearing was a gift, too. From the gang who dragged me out here tonight. I think they’re pulling a practical joke on me, but it’s always easiest to play along and let them have their little laugh. Anyway, this time the laugh’s on them. Far as I know, I’m the only one of the bunch who got a red ticket.”
“All right, so neither of you paid for your costumes,” said the inquisitor. “That doesn’t mean a thing. I didn’t even come in costume. The park rented me one after slipping me the red ticket.”
The woman chuckled again, then picked a doll-shaped cookie from one of the refreshment trays, and delicately bit its lower legs off. Filling oozed out—dark red jelly.
Whipping around, the inquisitor reached across the table and seized her wrist. A gleeful expression flooding her face, she pulled back, forcing him to exert more and more pressure, until all at once she thrust forward, grinding the cookie into his face.
He lost his grip, spluttering, and started to grope around in his costume as if looking for a handkerchief. Giggling, the woman skipped to the far end of the table, from where she launched an hors-d’oeuvre. With his eyes still shut, the inquisitor never knew how close it came to splatting his forehead. Grinning, the woman bent to select another missile.
Before she could take better aim, October joined her. “Looks ... interesting,” he observed, deliberating leaning over to inspect the tidbit in her hand: a round cracker heavily smeared with some red substance like lumpy jelly, on which rings of cut olives made two staring green eyes and an O-shaped black mouth. “That’s red caviar!”
“Caviar?” she asked. “I thought caviar was little, tiny black stuff.”
“I’ve had that kind. Always wanted to try the big, red stuff.”
“Is that so? Well, looks like you’re about to get your wish. Open wide.”
Eagerly, he opened his mouth. Thrusting the entire cracker into it, she simultaneously nudged his jaw up with the heel of her other hand. Less in obedience than in mild desperation not to choke, he chewed and swallowed hastily. “Um.”
“Salty?” She giggled. “They say it’s like pure salt, but they’re wrong. Have you ever had a fistful of pure salt stuffed in your mouth?” She winked up at him. “In some circles, that’s a favorite technique. If you ever have the experience, you’ll understand why. Caviar’s more like popcorn and pretzels. Just a friendly little trick to make you drink more. Except with popcorn and pretzels, they’re usually pushing beer. With caviar, it’s champagne.” Gesturing at the open bottles that waited in ice wells built around the table like pool pockets, she chose another of the round red faces and bit it neatly in half between its black mouth and green eyes.
October glanced back across the table and saw the inquisitor squatting to let Skipper wipe his face with a napkin. Hoping that might keep him quiet a few more minutes, October acted on the woman’s hint and poured champagne for them both. It flowed pale gold from the bottle and turned crimson in the plastic glasses.
Food coloring in the hollow stems, of course. Working in a games shop had taught him a little about party tricks. Lifting his plastic glass, he tapped it gently to hers and said, “Sounds like you could set yourself up in competition with our Grand Inquisitor there.”
“Rodney?” She sniffed. “He’s an amateur.”
“Rodney? Is that his name?”
She nodded. “Rodney Paynter, the would-be artist. Never heard of him? Of course not. He was a rank amateur as an artist, and he’s a rank amateur as an interrogator.”
“Rodney Paynter. Thanks. Well, now that I’ve got a caller for everybody else, and you all know my name, mind if I hint around for yours?”
“Hey, Dracula, is it my fault if you volunteered personal data before the needles were even under your fingernails?” Giggling, she ducked under the table and expertly tweaked a tiny pinch of his ankle with fingernails that dug right through the sock.
Jumping back, he heard Skipper say, “Nice try, October. My theory is, she’s our hostess—park employee.”
“I’m a professional, anyway,” the woman sang up
at them, popping halfway into sight and almost immediately vanishing again.
“You’re a dirty, rotten tease!” The inquisitor—Rodney—strode around the table and stooped, grabbing for her.
She laughed, and did something that resulted in a thud. Rodney cried out in pain and rolled away from the table, hugging one knee and whimpering.
“Are you all right?” October began, starting toward him.
“Get her! Get her!” the hurt man responded with a gesture of rage.
October turned and saw the woman had slipped out on the other side of the table to dance in the middle of the floor, against a backdrop—he suddenly noticed—of shapes resembling medieval rack, brazier, irons, and so on, only partially curtained by the streamers. If he’d glimpsed them earlier, they must have registered as theme decorations—stage dressing. Now, in light of the emotions that seemed to be flying around this room, they didn’t look quite so much like a cartoon joke.
“Catch her!” Rodney shrieked, staggering to his feet and leaning on the table.
Something black hurtled past October and seized her while she was busy making faces at the inquisitor. Screaming in her turn, she pummeled with both fists. Her captor only grunted as he swung her around. A husky hulk of a man, almost broader than he was tall and most of it muscle, he had to have come in while the woman was monopolizing everybody else’s attention. October glanced back at the door. Already the newcomer’s park escort had vanished, leaving it closed.
“All right,” the newcomer growled, presenting his captive to the man she had called an amateur. “What d’ you want to do to her?”
“Hurt her!” Rodney screamed, quivering all over. “Hurt her till she starts answering questions like a civilized human being!”
“Now, wait a minute—” October began, stepping forward, not sure what he could hope to do against someone built like a pro tackle, but aware he had to try.
“Nobody move!” snapped the newcomer. “Everybody just simmer down and let me get myself orientated here.”
The Fanciers & Realizers MEGAPACK Page 103
