The Clown Service

by Guy Adams

  ‘And you’re going to go back and kill him?’

  ‘Not exactly. The machine needs a specific focus. Usually an area of space, but in this case we’re going to use Krishnin himself. We’ll see moments from his life, significant events. I’ll be waiting for one in particular – the time he should have died – when I intend to give history a helping hand.’

  ‘I think you are all very mad. But I hope it works.’

  Her and me both.

  I asked Derek to pull over so that I could get out and join him at the front; I was sick of rolling backwards and forwards in the rear and not being able to see where we were going. Besides, if things got difficult he might be in need of a supportive co-driver.

  I caught my first sight of the sleepers just past Brent Cross. A small group of them were attacking one another as the van drove by. Checking in the wing mirror, I could see them abandon their own squabbling in favour of trying to catch up with us.

  ‘Do they do anything but fight?’ I asked.

  ‘Not that I’ve seen,’ Derek replied. ‘They’re violence personified. Like a raging mob, fighting each other, smashing up cars, buildings … all they want to do is attack.’

  ‘I wonder what it is inside them that makes them that way …’ I told him about Gavrill, about his old colleague who had decided the reanimated corpse knew it shouldn’t exist and wanted nothing more than to hit back at the world it had woken up into.

  ‘That all sounds a bit spiritual to me,’ Derek said. ‘It’s probably more a case of falling back on instinct. The body is being attacked internally so the endorphins kick off: fight or flight.’

  ‘Maybe.’

  ‘Still, what do I know? I’m a physicist and ex-wrestler. My experience of biology is pretty much limited to bruises, fractures and groupies.’

  I could see a large bonfire in the distance, over towards Regent’s Park.

  ‘You get a lot of those,’ said Derek. ‘People have been building them in the open spaces. Burning the bodies. Someone built a pyre twenty-foot high in Hampstead Cemetery – they were digging up all the bodies and throwing them into the flames, just in case that might stop them.’

  As we crossed Tower Bridge it was beginning to grow dark. I looked over the edge of the bridge at a rough line of bodies thrashing their way through the water.

  ‘The river’s full of them,’ I said.

  ‘They fall in and then the current carries them. It’s not as if they can drown, after all.’

  We reached the warehouse a few minutes later and Derek parked the van right outside.

  ‘Looks like the coast is clear,’ he said, checking the mirrors. ‘Be on your guard though; they’re pretty quiet so they can sneak up on you if you’re not careful.’

  We got out and he moved around the back to let everyone out and collect the few pieces of equipment he needed.

  Jamie showed he had recovered some of his old sharpness as he climbed out. ‘I am seriously considering defection,’ he said, sneering at what remained of Krishnin. ‘I don’t like being a spy anymore.’

  It was disgusting pulling Krishnin’s body out. It flailed at us, trying to fight back.

  ‘It makes me think of flatworms,’ said Jamie. ‘Cut bits off them and they all keep wriggling. If you think I’m touching that, you’re sadly mistaken.’

  ‘Sod it,’ said Derek, grabbing it by its arms and slinging it over his back like a sack of potatoes. ‘After the last couple of days you become numb to the horrible stuff. Bring my kit, would you?’

  I picked up the single plastic storage box and stepped back as Tamar closed the doors.

  ‘We are not alone,’ she said, looking past the van.

  A large group of sleepers was running towards us. This was the first time I had seen them up close. They moved quickly but chaotically, limbs flinging about as they fought to get at us. Their faces were solid and expressionless. They were like ambulatory shop window dummies, human dolls.

  ‘The gun,’ I said to Tamar, shoving the box at Jamie.

  After shooting Krishnin with it, Tamar had returned the gun to her waist band. I had let her keep it, more to show that I forgave her using it than anything else. Now, unarmed and reliant on her, I wished I’d taken it back.

  ‘Stand back, children,’ instructed a voice behind us and April appeared carrying a shotgun. It looked utterly ridiculous in her hands, but she quickly put it to use, sending a couple of shots into the advancing group, cutting several pairs of legs from beneath them.

  ‘Get inside,’ said Derek, ‘or we’ll be attracting more of them!’

  Tamar took a couple of shots as April reloaded. We all ran inside the warehouse as the shotgun barked again.

  April came through the doors last, Derek and Jamie slamming them shut behind her.

  ‘That was as close to orgasm as I’ve been for years,’ she said, handing me the gun. ‘Say what you like about the impending apocalypse but it certainly knows how to show a girl a good time.’

  The sleepers began banging on the doors, Derek and Jamie only just managing to hold them back as they dropped a bar across them.

  ‘I don’t know if it’s going to hold,’ said Derek.

  ‘Tamar,’ I said, ‘help Jamie secure those doors. Derek, get everything up and running as quickly as you can. We’re not going to have long to do this.’

  Derek nodded, picked up the plastic box and hoisted it over to the desk where the rest of his equipment still lay.

  ‘I need you to drag the projectors further in,’ he said, gesturing towards the four things that looked like speakers. ‘We want them all pointing towards the body, keeping the focus as narrow as possible.’

  ‘This the bastard that shot my brother?’ April asked, looking down at Krishnin.

  I nodded, starting to pull one of the projectors across from the corner of the room.

  She stared at him for a moment, watching the body writhe. Then kicked it, hard. She said nothing, just walked over towards one of the other projectors. I noticed the dampness in her eyes, even in the low light. She had loved her brother dearly.

  Derek switched on a pair of arc lamps, one aimed at his equipment, the other pointing towards Krishnin’s body.

  ‘I need a couple of minutes,’ he said, ‘that’s all.’

  ‘Pleased to hear it,’ I admitted.

  The banging at the doors seemed to be increasing.

  ‘I think they’re drawing a crowd,’ said Jamie. ‘The doors are in decent nick. They’ll hold for a while, but the more of them that throw their weight into them, the sooner they’ll buckle.’

  ‘That is obvious,’ retorted Tamar. ‘Help me find more things to make a barricade.’

  Jamie pulled a face at her back but began gathering the empty cases of Derek’s equipment and the few pallets that littered the place.

  ‘How long have we got before they send the missiles?’ I asked April. I still couldn’t believe it had descended to such a situation, the capital to be wiped out in a flash.

  ‘They weren’t being entirely open with me about it,’ she said. ‘Once everyone realised what was going on I was smartly put on the sidelines. You know what men are like – only too happy to have you help you out in the beginning, but soon passing you over when it comes to the important stuff. I hate to say it, but it could be any time. They kicked up a fuss to begin with, but as soon as the Americans put the pressure on you could hear the resistance crumble.’ She moved over to the small window and glanced out at the gathering crowd of sleepers. ‘If only they’d organised themselves quicker. When did we get so good at rolling over at the first sign of panic?’

  ‘We are not rolling over,’ I said, putting a hand on her shoulder.

  She nodded, turned around and gave me a hug. I felt awkward to begin with but then decided that was pointless and stupid. If you can’t hug someone without embarrassment at the end of the world, then when can you?

  ‘OK,’ said Derek, ‘I’m ready. Most of you are going to need to step back. Charlie,
you understand I don’t really know what I’m doing here, yes? Krishnin’s body is the trigger, rather than the room around us. We will see him change rather than the environment. I can create the state of temporal flux, but what we see then is beyond my control. I also don’t know how it might affect you, standing so close to it all.’

  ‘We’re winging it,’ I said. ‘It’s OK. I get that. We’re beyond planning here, I’ll take my chances.’

  I picked up April’s shotgun, checked it was loaded and then turned to Derek. ‘Right. Let’s do it.’

  He turned on the machine and the projectors hummed into life. Krishnin’s body, still writhing on the dirty concrete, stiffened. I was reminded of the Ghost Population, the way their physical presence had seemed unstable and easily distorted.

  Suddenly, the body vanished and I found myself looking at a young boy. Krishnin as a child. His face was smudged with dirt and a thin trickle of blood crept from one nostril. It looked as if there were tears in his eyes. What incident was this, I wondered? Had he been bullied at school? Beaten by a parent? I tried to feel something for him, for the child that could have been something else, something better. I couldn’t. I raised my shotgun, not ready to fire yet – if I killed him when he was a child then who knew what future events might change? I had to bide my time. But I wanted to be ready. I needed to be able to pull the trigger quickly.

  He changed again and I recognised this version of him only too well. The gun in his hand, the dead expression. He had just shot August Shining and I knew he was only too happy about it.

  And again. A young man, dancing with a girl, their extended arms vanishing as they stretched beyond the influence of the projector. Was this his first love? Was someone like him even capable of the emotion?

  ‘Ten seconds!’ Derek shouted. ‘Everything’s working fine.’

  There was a loud crack from the main doors as the sleepers pressed against it. They would be through any moment.

  ‘We haven’t got long!’ said Jamie. ‘That barricade isn’t going to stop them.’

  Krishnin altered once more, older, dressed in a long black coat, a drink in his hand. He raised the glass in a toast and took a large mouthful.

  And again: a similar age but he was a mess, his hair dishevelled, his shirt undone. Sweat was visible on his forehead and throat. He held up a fork, its tines coated in thick blood. I remembered the story Shining had told me, about how he had had to listen to this man as he tortured someone. Was that what I was seeing? Had that moment been important because he had found it hard to bear or because he had enjoyed it?

  And again: the child returned, dressed for a funeral. He looked up and smiled.

  ‘Oh God …’ I turned to see April still looking out of the window. A point of light flaring in the distance. ‘We’re too late!’ she cried. ‘They’ve done it! The stupid bastards have done it!’

  My finger tightened on the trigger, I had to take the shot …

  The boy vanished and here was my moment … Krishnin dressed in his military clothes, a spray of blood erupting from his chest as a .44 bullet entered it.

  The sound of wind. The shockwave. The flash of light.

  I fired the shotgun into the past. Saw Krishnin’s face become nothing but red mist.

  And then there was nothing but heat and noise and dust.

  SUPPLEMENTARY FILE: SHAD THAMES, 1963

  ‘My God, lad,’ said O’Dale, ‘you might have tried to wound him.’

  August Shining stared at the body lying on the floor in front of him.

  ‘He was … didn’t you see? It was like he was disappearing, vanishing right in front of us.’

  ‘I thought that,’ agreed Cyril. ‘He was just fading away.’

  O’Dale scoffed. ‘Well, he’s certainly faded away from above the neck. You took his head clean off.’

  Shining began to shake, the gun falling from his hands. ‘His chest,’ he said. ‘I aimed for his chest.’

  Then he turned and threw up all over the floor. Out of the corner of his eye he thought he saw someone run out of the front door, but he was hardly in a position to do anything about it.

  ‘You bagged him in the chest as well,’ O’Dale was saying, still looking at Krishnin’s body.

  ‘There was only one shot though,’ said Cyril. ‘At least I think there was … wasn’t there?’

  ‘Don’t you worry your little civil servant’s head about it,’ said O’Dale, tutting at Shining who was still retching. ‘You going to be all right?’

  Shining nodded, though he was by no means sure that was true.

  Only time would tell.

  CHAPTER TWENTY-ONE: POTENTIAL

  ‘He’s new!’ said Shining, looking at Jamie. ‘Isn’t it wonderful?’

  ‘I give him a week before he defects,’ Goss replied.

  ‘Oh no,’ insisted Shining, ‘not this one; he’s got potential.’

  I felt detached. Not quite able to focus. I sat there on Jamie Goss’ sofa and held my hands out in front of me. They were solid now. This was the real world. Yes. Not that strange dreamlike place we had just been in. This was solid … I am the Insubstantial Man, I suddenly thought, with no idea as to why.

  ‘Glad you think so,’ said Jamie. ‘He seems dead from the neck up to me.’

  Eventually, Shining and I left, taking the Tube back to the office. For the whole journey, he talked to me in a calm, matter-of-fact tone about the work that Section 37 undertook. He discussed previous cases; nothing concrete, just a line here and there, little jewels of madness scattered all over the conversation as if I were supposed to be able to make sense of them. In a way I did.

  I couldn’t quite understand why the things he told me seemed acceptable. Because they weren’t. They were ridiculous … The Haunting of Black Rod, his time in China fighting a dragon god … Rubbish. Fantastical tales that I would dismiss in a novel let alone in real life. And yet somehow I didn’t dismiss them. I just nodded, overwhelmed but wholly credulous. I believed every single word.

  ‘You know,’ he said as we climbed out of Wood Green station onto High Road, ‘it’s so refreshing to be able to tell you all these things and not just have you laugh. Or call the emergency services. My career has tended to lack receptive audiences.’

  He went into the mobile phone shop beneath the office. Apparently his phone kept ringing at four in the morning; I got the impression he was trying to decide whether it was a malfunction or whether it was actually possessed. I decided to leave him to it. I wanted a moment of silence, to try to take in everything that had happened.

  I wasn’t to get it.

  ‘I suppose you think that was clever,’ said an elderly lady who had just left the shop.

  ‘I’m sorry?’ I had never met her before in my life. Shining had just ushered her out of the door and right into me. Was it some form of test? Was this another of his strange agents?

  ‘It wasn’t clever you know,’ she continued. ‘Not one bit of it. It may have solved the immediate problem but you’ll never believe the price.’

  ‘I really don’t have the first idea what you’re talking about,’ I said, looking over her shoulder and through the shop window. Shining was talking to the owner who was waving his arms around as if besieged by the most unreasonable man in the world.

  ‘You don’t remember, of course,’ she said. ‘But I can change that. Would you like me to change that?’

  ‘I think you have the wrong person,’ I replied.

  She gripped me by the arm and suddenly my head was spinning. I stumbled slightly, toppling back against the street railings, the old woman’s grip remaining utterly firm.

  ‘Feel it now?’ she said. ‘Remember?’

  And I did. I remembered everything, the numbers station, Krishnin, Operation Black Earth … everything that had just happened and the desperate, stupid thing I had done to avoid it all.

  ‘There is no simple reset button in this universe,’ she continued. ‘You might think so. You might think you’ve done a
good thing here today. And maybe you have. A lot of lives have been spared after all, a lot of people saved … But the cost!’

  ‘It’s fine,’ I said, finding it hard to catch my breath. ‘It worked. Krishnin’s gone. It’s all gone. Job done.’

  ‘For now. But one day … one day you will learn that everything we do in life has consequences. And the consequences of what you’ve done today will break you and all your friends. Time doesn’t like being pushed, boy. It pushes back. And when it does, you’re going to come crawling to me, because that’s the day that only I’ll be able to help you.’

  ‘Yeah? Well, leave me your card and I’ll give you a call.’

  She chuckled at that, or the thing inside her did.

  ‘Oh, we’ll keep in touch young man, don’t worry about that. We’re going to become good friends, you and I. When the fallout descends, I’m going to be the best friend you’ve got, the only one that will be able to keep you alive. Remember that. The girl? She’s only the tip of the iceberg.’

  She let go of my arm and wandered off. After a couple of steps she seemed to become unsteady on her feet, turned around, looked at me in confusion and then meandered on.

  What girl? I wondered. What had she … it … meant?

  ‘Making friends?’ said Shining, having come back out of the shop.

  ‘Apparently.’

  I looked at him with new – or perhaps that should be old eyes – remembering everything I had experienced over the last few days. ‘In the Clown Service I think you need all the friends you can get.’

  ‘The what?’

  ‘That’s what my old section head called Section 37, the Clown Service.’

  He laughed. ‘I rather like that! Embrace the insults they throw at you, Ludwig – that’s my advice. Come on, let’s see what the rest of the day brings. One thing you’ll learn soon enough, life in the Clown Service is many things, but it’ll never be quiet.’

  I knew that only too well.

  He opened the door and began to climb the stairs to the office. I followed on behind, suddenly struck by an urge.