by M. Suddain
‘Don’t call me Ginger. It’s not your job to deliver beds.’
Massimo’s shoulders had slumped like a schoolboy’s; he looked smirking at her from under his brow, then at me, then back at her. Said, ‘We just want to talk.’
‘Oh, you want to talk for once? Why don’t you go back to your bunk and polish something?’
Massimo pointed with his wrench to a spot just down the hall. ‘We wait over there instead.’ The three skulked off a dozen yards to linger.
‘I’m so sorry, Mr Tamberlain, I hope he didn’t frighten you.’
I could see her trying not to notice that I wore no trousers. ‘Not at all. They’re being laundered.’
‘… You asked to see me urgently?’
‘It’s nine past, Boss.’
‘Yes, Beast.’ The coward was back at my shoulder He handed me a fresh drink, I gave him my empty glass. ‘Look, Ms Zhivast, I’m so sorry to drag you from your bed at this hour. I’m having trouble locating my friend, Ms Green.’
‘Oh.’
‘Yes. I think she might be in danger. I think she’s up to something, and I think Management know.’
She gazed up at me. ‘She’s so strong and so beautiful. All the girls want to be just like her.’
‘What a world that would be.’
‘It makes sense now.’
‘What does?’
‘Here, I brought you something I wrote. You said you’d like to read my work.’
‘Oh? Well, of course.’ I took the small, string-bound sheaf of paper she handed me. The title-page said: The Zombie Inside, by Mavis Zhivast.
‘Nearly time, Boss.’
‘I’m sorry if I’ve caused any trouble, Ms Zhivast. It’s all a misunderstanding.’
‘I could find out where your friend went tonight. But telling tales is –’
She suddenly froze, swooned and fell; we watched her go. She sprawled on the carpet. ‘Telling tales is WHAT? The only thing you people seem to bloody do?’
‘NAP time, Boss.’
‘Perfect. Just great. Get her purse, will you?’
‘Steal her purse? That’s no good, Boss.’
‘I’m not going to steal it, you fucking tool. We just can’t leave her lying in the hall.’ I slung the girl over my shoulder, and then onto the sofa in our living room with hardly a thought for how much more complicated my every decision seemed to make things.
The trio of thugs who’d knocked on our door was passed out, too. We stepped over them as we went off towards the elevators. I considered Massimo’s peaceful sleeping face. I considered that this strange artificial monster had once had a real living breathing mother. Then I drew a penis on his forehead in boot polish.
The halls were dark and silent. No staff around. The whole place rested. The dead rested. The silence was broken only by Woodbine, who walked so close behind me I could smell his cologne, Academy for Men, and who used me as a kind of shield, peering round me so his face was inches from my ear, and his heavy breathing sounded like the rising and falling cheers of a slathering crowd at a gladiatorial contest in some distant stadium.
‘Beast-man.’
‘Yes?’
‘Stop breathing in my ear.’
‘Sorry, but we should move faster. Those boys will wake up soon, and we have no Gladys.’
‘Well, walk in front if you want to go faster.’
‘I don’t want to walk in front.’
I’m no fool. I know when I’m being played. She’d figured out Hunter was still alive, and she’d gone to rescue him. She wasn’t creating a diversion, she was using us as one, leaving us to our own devices, knowing full well we’d blunder around and create chaos. Well, fine. If she wanted chaos, I’d give her chaos. We found Elevator 3 open. The pale giant Sam was slumped on his stool and snoring loudly. The eyes of the dead he wore were open and the way they twinkled in the low light endowed them with a kind of blinking spirit. His own were open a slit: the unnerving way an infant sleeps. ‘We’ll take the stairs to the lobby.’ I’d had to go out in my shorts, since all my trousers were missing in action, and in my socks, since my shoes had vanished too. I wore a hotel gown, and my last pair of socks. Even the hush-hush-hush they made on the floor seemed loud. I froze at the top of the Grand Staircase.
‘Boss? What is it?’
I could only raise a finger and use it to point across the lobby to the lake of blood in which Franz still knelt in prayer. ‘Lord, why have you put me in this place? Why have you given me this incomprehensible purpose? Do you expect me to gaze up at the sky forever?’ His mop had left sweeping figures in the drying blood. Had they been there the whole time?
We love you. We’ll kill you if you try to leave.
‘Fuck, Boss.’
The Countess Hemples still waited patiently, too, on the banquette by the elevators. I could see that the door to the registrar’s mezzanine office was open a crack. I could hear a ticking like the sound of a cat with long claws stalking its way across the marble. Sclick. Sclock. Sclick. Sclock.
‘Boss? Are we going to the pod?’
I had to force my throbbing head to focus. This all seemed too simple. There’s always more to this place. It never ends. They were fucking with me for a purpose, surely. No life without purpose. I had been systematically taken apart. Here I was, in this grand space, in my underwear, in my socks, in my faded skin. For what? So I could see the truth: that I was born under a bad sign. There was a higher purpose in this temple. They were fucking with me for a purpose much higher than I could ever fathom.
‘Beast?’
‘Boss?’
‘You’d tell me if you weren’t really you, wouldn’t you?’
‘Boss?’
‘I mean, shoes are one thing …’
‘Don’t go strange on me, Boss. I can’t handle this shit alone.’
‘OK. Come on. Let’s go.’
‘Wait, where are we going?’
‘To get my fucking contract.’
‘We have to get to the pod, Boss!’
‘She won’t be at the pod, Beast. I know her.’
The only illumination in the registrar’s office was the dim red glow of the ‘standby’ light on Ms Zhivast’s type-machine. And someone else’s familiar scent. ‘She’s been here.’
‘Who?’
‘Gladys.’
She’d been there an hour ago. Maybe longer. I could smell Grandmama’s expired perfume. She’d probably come to get her girly journal back. Maybe she’d already escaped without us. Wouldn’t that be the icing? Her and Hunter going off together, laughing as their pod drifted up towards the world, leaving us here to rot and die. The rhythmic cat-claw sound I’d heard outside was the ticking of the clock on the wall of the office. Glowing hands were edging 12.15.
‘What are we doing, Boss? We have to get to the pod.’
‘There’s no escape plan, Beast. Not for us, anyway. We’ve been played. She played us. This was a distraction. We’re the distraction.’
‘She wouldn’t do that.’
I could see the safe standing open, the space where our books used to be. ‘Well, it looks like she took all our books. So that’s something. Come on, let’s get my contract and get back to the apartment before they –’
The clock struck chimes which smashed against our ears, shimmered and died.
‘Fuck. That’s a quarter past already.’
‘This is it, Boss. They’ll be awake now, they’ll be … What was that!’
‘Be calm, Beast.’
‘Something’s out there, Boss. I heard something.’
‘Quiet, there’s nothing out there. They can’t hurt me. I have a contract.’
‘They can hurt me.’
‘That’s possibly true. Come on, let’s move. Stay close to me.’
‘No. Where are we going?’
‘Back to our apartment to shout at G.’ We slipped out the door and onto the mezzanine.
‘But G said to meet us at the pod, Boss!’ Beast had stopped at
the top of the Grand Staircase. He faced me as he pointed back behind him. ‘Down there is where we should be going.’
‘Ahhhhh, Beast?’ There was movement in the lobby below. A dead shadow was waking in the gloom.
‘No, Boss, I’m tired of taking all the orders. I have a say in this, too. It’s my life, too. We need to get to the … … the fuck?’ He’d heard the sounds from the lobby, turned slowly. In the distance, a shadow was shuffling forward on its knees through a slick of blood, then slowly rising. First one foot on the bloody marble. It made a loud, wet slap. Then the other foot. Slap. Stooped and swaying to keep his balance, the shape toppled back two steps, regathered. The mop, still engorged with blood, swayed heavy from his head, and looked like a hideous organic protrusion. The creature looked like the result of an ungodly experimental splicing of man and unicorn. He flung both pale hands around the stick and steadied himself. Then he pulled down hard. Once … Twice. The handle gave a few inches at a time. Three times … Four. Each time a wet squawk echoed through the lobby. ‘We should probably … Beast?’ Gone. I heard the door to the registrar’s office slam. Fucker. Five pulls … Six. That excruciating squawk. Now Franz stood on the mop-head with his dripping shoes to give one last pull, and with a final gush of blood he wrenched it free. ‘Beast! Open this motherfucking door!’ The boy jerked up at the sound of my shouts, my hammering on the door, straightened. His bucket full of bloody water gleamed. Brandishing the blood-soaked spear, he slowly turned his head towards me.
‘OK. OK. Let’s not panic. This door is locked. Let’s just hold tight in here a few minutes, until we know the coast is clear.’
‘The coast? What coast? We’re stuck in here. He’s out there. They’re all out there.’
‘Beast, take a breath. Do you want to die like a man, or a coward?’
‘You know it’ll be coward, Boss. You know.’
‘I know. Let’s sit tight for now. This’ll blow over.’
‘Fuck this. I don’t know why I came. This stuff always happens when it’s you and G.’
‘You came to stop us killing each other, remember?’
‘He’s out there. He’s coming up the stairs.’
‘He’s not coming up the stairs, Beast.’ Was pretty sure I’d heard slow, wet footsteps on the marble, maybe a scraping at the door. Wasn’t going to tell him that. ‘We’ll ride things out here till morning, then go back to our rooms. They’ll let us past.’
‘You drew a dick on him, Boss!’
‘I know, Beast. This will all blow over. We’re safe in here.’
‘In here? For how long? With no food or booze?’
‘There’s booze, Beast, relax.’ I gestured to the veneered cocktail table with its chromium drinks tray holding a lonely bottle of sherry, a red enamel-and-brass soda siphon, and two glasses.
‘Sherry and soda, Boss? Are we teenage girls?!’
We stooped in the darkness. Listening. Madness. The weight of the darkness bore down on me. All harmony is contained in this darkness. At that moment, strangely, something Doctor Rubin had written came back to me, and finally made sense: that a mind in darkness was no mind at all. Thought cannot live outside the kingdom of the senses. It was dark, but I could hear, and smell. Sounds from beyond the door crawled over my skin.
‘Boss, maybe we should GEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEE EEEEEEEEE!’
Beast let out a quasi-tribal shriek as the wooden spike, still slick with blood, punched through the door, and through the four-inch-wide space between our heads, then withdrew. We stumbled back across the room as the spike punched through again, and again, and again, each time on a different angle, leaving the wood riddled with oval puncture wounds dripping with blood.
‘I DON’T WANT TO BE KILLED WITH A MOP! THAT’S NOT HOW I WANT TO GO OUT!’
‘Quiet, Beast!’
The assault on the door had stopped. We crouched in the darkness, waiting for the next attack. But it didn’t come. And then suddenly the darkness vanished. The world materialised. A blaze of brilliant light came through the holes in the door, and we heard an amplified voice.
‘THIS IS COLONEL BRONT FROM THE MARINE PATROL SERVICE. THIS FACILITY IS UNDER OUR PROTECTION. ALL GUESTS AND STAFF ARE TO DISARM IMMEDIATELY AND COME INTO THE LOBBY WITH YOUR HANDS ON YOUR HEAD.’
‘Great. Just brilliant.’
‘What do we do?’
I thought for a minute. It could be a trap to lure us out. ‘We stay put.’
‘YOU IN THE MEZZANINE OFFICE. VACATE WITH YOUR HANDS ON YOUR HEADS OR WE WILL GAS YOU.’
‘How did they know we’re in here?’
‘They heard you screaming, Beast. Let’s just do what they say.’ We moved out onto the Grand Staircase, hands above our heads, descended into the burning haze of military floodlamps. Franz had vanished. He’d left his bucket.
‘KEEP YOUR HANDS ABOVE YOUR HEADS AND DO AS INSTRUCTED,’ said the godlike voice. ‘DO NOT MOVE FROM YOUR POSITION.’
‘Who are these guys – Navy?’
‘Just the Coast Guard, Beast. Sea Crows.’
‘Yes, sir, that’s them all right.’ Sam the elevator man had roused himself and was standing at my shoulder.
‘DO NOT MOVE! WE ARE AGENTS FROM THE MPS TERRORISM RESPONSE UNIT.’
‘Must have got a lucky tag on us. Well, not so lucky.’
‘YOU THERE. PUT YOUR HANDS BEHIND YOUR HEAD OR YOU WILL BE ELIMINATED.’
‘Well, suppose we should be getting on with this.’ Sam stepped forward, lifted his palms, and was irradiated by the lamps. ‘We don’t want any hoo-hah!’ he called. ‘You people need to get in your little boats and leave!’
‘THIS IS YOUR FINAL WARNING! PUT YOUR HANDS BEHIND YOUR HEAD!’
‘Well, OK then.’ Sam stepped back to us and put his hands behind his head. We saw a squad of shadows move forward, the green laser targets from their weapons tracked over our faces, over Sam’s bald dome, over the Countess Hemples and the statues of well-endowed lions, and up over the wonderful dome above. A murder of black shadows in helmets and gas masks flew down the right side of the lobby, past the desks, and we heard their heavy boots clatter up the staircase. ‘This isn’t going to end well, is it, Sam?’
‘You mean for them, or you?’
Ungodly screams came back from above and bounced around the lobby vaults. Then came the trill of spring pipes, and the place was suddenly bathed in a honey light.
… Imagine life in one of those small villages, so many thousands of years ago, when people lived from the land.
‘Oh fuck, seriously? The Tour again?’
… It is Harvest Eve, and the young girls of the village have gathered at the river to cleanse themselves …
‘You folks should follow me into Elevator 2. If you want to … I don’t know … live.’ We skipped into the car as the women in white dresses appeared, flesh pale and fresh from the cool river water.
‘CEASE DANCING IMMEDIATELY OR YOU WILL BE SHOT!’
… After cleansing they would flow up in a line through the trees and dance the Dance of Abduction.
They bobbed past in rows; the sound of pipes and bees drowned out the godlike voice on the megaphone.
‘SOMETHING SOMETHING WARNING SOMETH—!’
Bront’s voice stopped. We heard the screams of men. The screams of men, as I’d learned from my brief stay in a Kaukassian prison, are not a lot unlike the screams of women. From our framed vantage we caught rapid snapshots: a helmeted head removed from a pair of shoulders with a single sweep of a scythe; two girls advancing with golden smiles and golden sickles upon a wounded soldier. Giant white bees shot through the frame. Bullets pinged off ancient marble. Have I mentioned that the marble in the lobby is genuine Terrestrial marble from Arcturus, not synthetic? Madness. We saw a soldier stumble past, his black uniform dressed in black hornets who ripped red gashes in him with their stingers, tore his face mask away with their terrible mandibles as he screamed and fell. Someone opened up with a flame-thrower. A jet of fire roared past the o
pen elevator, turned a statue of a sea god black, left a river of fat insectoid bodies spinning on the floor, before dying to the tune of a scream which trilled its way up two octaves, and back down again to silence. Sam reached for the golden button near the door.
‘Floor one, friends? Or do you want to see some more sights?’
He set us moving.
‘You know we’re at Stealth Five? We’re supposed to be running silent.’
‘Well, I came out in my socks.’
The giant smiled. ‘Sure. But it doesn’t take much. The chiming of a clock’ll do it.’
‘We didn’t make that clock chime, Sam.’
‘It wouldn’t’ve chimed if you weren’t there. If you’d stayed in your rooms like you were told to, they wouldn’t have heard it. Their little boat would’ve sailed on by.’
‘Is this bad, Sam?’
‘Well, that depends what you think of as bad, and how you define “this”. Certain things will probably happen now, and if they do they won’t be pleasant things.’
‘What about Gladys?’
‘Forget about her. If she’s lucky she’ll have had time to … well.’
‘I don’t understand this place, Sam.’
‘Who does? Hard to understand a storm while you’re standing in it.’
‘All this murdering. What could it possibly be for?’
He rubbed his bristly face with a massive hand. ‘It’s just life, I suppose. Kill and be killed. Anyway, murder is a lot like a big storm, friend. It really is kind of beautiful until you have to go out in it.’
The lift chimed, the doors slid open. In our corridor, outside every door, there was a shoeshine seat, and sitting watch on each shoeshine seat outside each door was a soldier from the good old MPS. The Sea Crows. Each with their weapon at their side, each with their own head resting on their lap.
NOTES FROM A CONFINEMENT
Which brings us almost up to date. I’ve had ample time to catch up on my notes. To set down this story so that if what I think will happen in the next few hours does, there’s a slim chance you or someone else will read it. We’re prisoners. Hours have passed, from simulated night to simulated morning. Hidden lights have flooded the butterfly cave with a brassy dawn glow. Our room is smaller than ever. Our door is locked from the outside by some secret force. The handle will not move even the fraction expected by the gaps within its mechanism. And of course we know what’s out there. Darkness, emptiness, guarded in silence by a small legion of soldiers whose necks glimmer bright as the stumps of just-cut trees. Still no sign of my trousers. But Gladys was there when we got back. She was dressed in a maid’s uniform. Her left cheek was bruised, her left arm was wrapped in a bloody bandage. And I have never been so happy and unhappy to see someone.
