Christmas on a Rational Planet

by Lawrence Miles

  ‘No,’ said Christopher Cwej.

  The Carnival Queen looked surprised, and the look revealed entire lifetimes of experience.

  ‘No,’ Chris said again. ‘I don’t swallow it. What you told me doesn’t make sense. How could anyone just reach into themselves and pull out their irrational bits? I mean, let alone a whole species...’

  – Is there a problem, Christopher?

  ‘It doesn’t make sense! Magic and everything. It’s not real. It’s just superstition.’ That’s what the Doctor said, anyway, he thought. But he didn’t say it.

  – Superstition. The Carnival Queen laughed. – Haven’t you ever wished that someone would call you, and believed that it was your doing when they did? Haven’t you ever crossed your fingers for good luck? Or believed, just for a moment, that when you cheered on your favourite sub-quantum-para-football team, your wish was what made them score the winning goal?

  Chris shrugged. ‘Well, yeah. Everyone does that, though.’

  – That’s superstition, Christopher. And in that moment, she sounded exactly like Marielle Duquesne. – No, don’t think about that, Christopher, please.

  ‘But that’s silly.’

  – No. That belief, that every little coincidence means something, that somehow you’re in touch with everyone and everything, that you know the universe and the universe knows you... that belief is what keeps your entire species alive. It’s what lets you carry on, in the face of the random, senseless pain of reality. Do you have a sense of justice? A sense that somehow, sometime, there has to be a happy ending and a way of tying up all the loose ends?

  ‘Well... yeah.’

  – Superstitions. Superstitions that make civilization possible. Superstition... the Watchmakers say it as if it’s a dirty word. They forget, or try to forget, that everything becomes meaningless without it. Hopes. Loves. Faiths. Little superstitions. Little necessities. Your race isn’t a creation of the Watchmakers, Christopher. Your people aren’t people of clockwork. And even the Doctor could never think of a rational reason why murder is wrong. Try asking him about Zebulon Pryce some time. See how long it takes him to change the subject.

  ‘No. No, I still don’t trust you.’ She was smiling at him still, and Chris felt like blushing. Whenever she spoke, something tickled the insides of his head. It reminded him of the moments of psychic lucidity he’d had on Yemaya 4, but SLEEPY had spoken the language of telepathy, and the Carnival Queen spoke without any need for language at all. ‘Look, I did this off-world tour of duty when I was training with the Adjudicators, okay? There was this planet called Jallafillia. The whole place was run by a church, the Church of Saint Thoth or something. I saw what they did there. They used to kill kids, just because they had red hair. They said it was the mark of the Evil One.’

  She kept looking at him. Chris turned away. ‘We couldn’t even arrest them for doing it, just because of a clause in the Colonies Cultural Identities Act. And they killed kids. Babies, even. That’s superstition. That’s what superstition does.’

  – That’s religion, not superstition. It’s got more to do with politics than belief. You should see what’s happening down in Woodwicke. The town’s preacher is on the streets, siding with the rationalists. The local Renewal Society is busy turning itself into the Spanish Inquisition. Not my doing. They make their own madnesses, these little children of the Age of Reason. Unlike myself, they build their own Hells. This planet you mentioned... who owned it?

  ‘Er, not sure. One of the Spiral Corporations, I think.’

  – I rest my case.

  ‘So, what are you saying? Order is bad? Reasons are bad? You couldn’t have a civilization without reasons, could you?’

  The Carnival Queen paused.

  – It’s not my place to say, she admitted. – I do what I do, and I am what I am. I’m not going to take the universe apart out of some sense of cosmic balance. I’m going to do it because I can. Because that’s what I do.

  There was a long silence.

  ‘What did you just say?’ said Chris.

  – Oh, didn’t I mention that before? She shrugged, and it was like a waterfall of collapsing wave-forms. – I’m going to make an irrational universe. Change everything. Take apart the Watchmakers’ clockwork. It’s already starting in Woodwicke. Now that Marielle has allowed me to, ah, interface...

  ‘But you can’t...’

  – Yes I can, yes I can, yes I can. Could Chris hear her thinking? – All that time. All that time I’ve been trapped here, shut off from the universe outside. Ohh, I’ve managed to influence things a little. Pushing a few irrational ideas out into the Majestic Clockwork. Little spanners in the works. A sorceress here, an alchemaître there, a pocket universe somewhere else. I’ve whispered words into the occasional ear. I’ve even managed to nurture a few, ah, special powers. Latent abilities, waiting to be triggered, wrapped in little genetic parcels marked ‘Do Not Open Till Xmas’...

  – But I could never venture out into the rational universe. Not without an invitation. That’s what I have to thank Marielle for, Christopher. Chris. I have my avatar. I have all I need.

  There was a flash of black lightning on the horizon.

  – Nothing in the world can stop me now, said the Carnival Queen.

  – I’m sorry, I just had a sudden irrational urge to say that. And she started to giggle.

  He tried using the buttons and the switches, but they melted beneath his fingers. NOT RATIONAL. He tried willing the room to do what he wanted, but the room just laughed. NOT REASONABLE.

  The images dripped from the screen like melted wax, forming puddles full of pictures on the floor. There was Paris Street. There was Eastern Walk. There were the docks, and the woodlands, and the storefronts. Everywhere it was the same; the darkness blanketed the whole of Woodwicke, giving birth to monsters and bad dreams. Catcher stared into the dark. The Watchmakers were there, somewhere. WE ARE NOT THERE. Hiding. Yes, hiding. Waiting for their moment. WE ARE NOT THERE. All he had to do was find them.

  He stared.

  And stared.

  And stared.

  But there was only darkness, and the darkness had no Reason. Matheson Catcher screamed, his first scream since he was a child, since the CLEAN IT UP! tugging and CLEAN IT UP! shredding and CLEAN IT ALL UP! tearing in the garden. The scream rang out across the whole wide world.

  10

  Obligatory Chapter Named After Pop Song

  The creature – nobody could have called it a man, surely – was dressed in the shredded remnants of a dark blue jacket and pantaloons, the scraps pinned to its body with tiny nails. Its chest was a skeletal cage filled with rubble, and its face was a single layer of skin pulled across a broken skull.

  Its face...

  ‘Penley,’ Erskine gurgled. ‘Isaac Penley.’

  The other Renewalists looked at each other, confused eyes concealed by sackcloth masks. Walter Monroe cleared his throat.

  ‘Obviously, a creature of Cacophony,’ he spluttered. ‘We must do the only rational thing and –’

  ‘Rational?’ thundered the Doctor, and Erskine suddenly found the little man’s finger pointing directly at him. ‘You don’t even remember the meaning of the word. This man, for example. What is his crime?’

  ‘He bears the mark of Cacophony,’ harrumphed Monroe.

  ‘You mean the little dragon-shaped birth-mark on his forehead? Personally, I think it’s quite fetching. I had a tattoo a lot like it, a few lifetimes ago.’ The Doctor faced Monroe, and sniffed disapprovingly. ‘I certainly find it more appealing than that extra finger of yours.’

  Monroe’s hand darted into his pocket. The other Renewalists began to murmur, and some of those at the back of the crowd seemed to melt away into the shadows.

  ‘Mr Penley,’ said the Doctor, pointing to the monstrosity with the end of his walking-cane. ‘Perhaps you’d tell these gentlemen who did this to you?’

  ‘Who... did wha’ to me?’

  ‘This.’ The cane touched
Isaac’s left leg, and it clanged like a bell. ‘This . "surgery".’

  Isaac swallowed. Erskine heard rusted nails scrape together in the creature’s throat.

  ‘Ca,’ he grunted.

  ‘Cacophony!’ exclaimed Monroe, pointing an accusing finger and having ten others spare. ‘As I thought! Creature of havoc!’

  ‘Oh, do shut up,’ said the Doctor.

  ‘Ca,’ Isaac groaned. ‘Catcher.’

  A muted cry of alarm ran through the crowd.

  ‘Catcher,’ nodded the Doctor. ‘Interesting, wouldn’t you say? Bearing in mind the man’s apparent dedication to reason.’

  ‘Reason!’ snapped Monroe.

  ‘Oh, very well, Reason. The figure-head of your society may be suffering from a touch of woodworm.’ Erskine never saw the Doctor turn, but the next thing he knew, he was looking down into a pair of eyes that seemed to contain whole worlds. ‘I don’t think we’ve been introduced.’

  ‘Morris,’ Erskine said formally, only remembering that he was tied to a trellis when he tried to shake the Doctor’s hand. ‘Erskine Morris.’

  ‘Hmmm. Tell me something, Mr Morris. Answer me a simple question.’ The eyes were staring. Oh, God, they were staring. ‘What is it you believe in?’

  ‘Reason,’ said Erskine, automatically. Walter Monroe opened his mouth to speak, but the Doctor – without even turning around – raised a hand to silence him.

  ‘No, Mr Morris. What do you really believe in?’

  ‘I...’

  Erskine’s jaw froze. Monroe, at the bottom of the unlit bonfire, was staring up at him with expectant eyes. Expectant slits, anyway. The surviving Renewalists were clustered behind him, waiting for instructions. Beyond that...

  ... beyond that, Woodwicke was burning. Burning in the rain.

  Erskine met the Doctor’s gaze.

  ‘Freedom, alcohol, and security,’ he declared. ‘Sitting out on the street on a Sunday morning, pretending to read a book. Waiting for the damned priests to walk past and knocking their bloody hats off with pebbles.’

  It was his voice. His voice. The first time he’d really heard it since he’d been in Catcher’s labyrinth. The Doctor raised an eyebrow.

  ‘Then let that be your purpose,’ he said.

  Around them, the madness seemed to shrink back a little. On the nearest trellis to Erskine’s, the owner of the third eye found the organ sinking back into his forehead. The six-armed man’s new appendages began to pull themselves into his body. The Doctor turned to a speechless Walter Monroe, and smiled.

  ‘It’s a strange kind of sanity,’ he said. ‘But it works.’

  Roz leapt under the stone canopy and behind the row of columns that fronted the bank, pushing Daniel ahead of her. An energy wave shredded the front of the building, stripping away the top layer of marbling. Flensers could rip the skin off a human target in a second, and they weren’t too kind to architecture, either.

  ‘He should have let me keep the gun,’ she grunted.

  ‘What?’ Daniel was crouched behind the next pillar, about six feet in front of the building’s front door. His eyes were wide and wet. Roz knew the effects of shock when she saw them.

  ‘The Doctor. He took the gun off me when I tried to kill...’

  She tailed off. A loose memory; a public information poster that had been stapled to the wall of her Adjudicator lodge, twelve hundred years into the future. A faceless cartoon shadow clutching a vibroknife, the blade stained a dramatic red. Above it, the words: STAY ALERT AT ALL TIMES. MOST MURDERS ARE COMMITTED BY SOMEONE YOU KNOW.

  And underneath, some joker had scrawled: YES. HIS NAME’S PHIL.

  A slither-cap plinked against the front of the bank, detonated, and covered the building in a vomit-coloured bionetic soup that slid across the brickwork looking for living tissue to consume. Roz saw a small family of woodlice dissolving in the sludge. She reckoned she was out of the gunk’s range, but she could hear boots clunking above the sound of the storm. Forrester-2 was getting closer.

  ‘This is your last chance,’ said a voice much like Roz’s, and she found herself thinking how funny it sounded. ‘Surrender now and I’ll go easy on you.’

  Roz remembered the poster again.

  YES. HER NAME’S ROZ FORRESTER.

  Something moved in her pouch. ‘Hell!’

  She saw Daniel glance in her direction. ‘The amaranth,’ she said. ‘It’s started again. It must be the storm. It probably wants to rebuild everything this time.’ She nodded up at the sky. There wasn’t any single word that could properly describe what was happening to the town, but ‘storm’ came closest.

  Daniel looked blank. ‘Can it do that?’

  ‘No. Not all at once, anyway. But it’s giving it a damn good try. Where’s it getting its information from this time?’

  ‘Well, I tried to be nice,’ said Forrester-2. There was a burst of gunfire, the front of the bank buckling under flenser waves and slither-goop. Roz glanced at the door of the building. Too far away, and it was probably locked anyhow. She’d be skinned before she could make it inside.

  ‘What do we do now?’ asked Daniel, flatly.

  ‘You have the standard six-second opportunity for prayer and reflection,’ called Forrester-2 as the columns began to give way. The amaranth started to howl. Roz clenched her teeth.

  ‘It never rains...’ she said. And then everything changed.

  We wish you a merry Christmas, we wish you a merry Christmas, we wish you a merry Christmas, and a happy New... oh, sod it.

  The Carnival Queen was standing on top of a needle-sharp promontory that had, only seconds earlier, been a low sand-dune. Long and angular shadows – shadows of yellow light – streaked across the desert, each one showing her in a different pose. Some made Chris feel strangely excited.

  From down on the ground, she looked almost... godlike?

  No.

  Demonic?

  Possibly.

  He’d tried asking her about her fiendish plan to turn the universe inside-out, but most of what she’d told him had been vague and ambiguous. Yeah, no kidding. Apparently, it was the Age of Reason that had let her break down the barriers between her little shadow-world and the rest of creation. Earth stood poised ‘between Cacophony and Reason’, or something like that, and the accumulated fear and angst of the human race had acted like a kind of prayer, weakening the walls of her prison.

  Was ‘prayer’ the word she’d used? Chris could have sworn he’d heard another word, spoken at the same time but with a different voice, and it had sounded like ‘seance’.

  So her prison was opening up, forming crukking great cracks throughout Earth history. Holes into the darkness. New York in 1799, Canberra in 1926, Arizona in 2012 (which explained what had happened to Roz, Chris had realized, though he hadn’t yet worked up the courage to ask where she was now).

  ‘I still don’t get it,’ he’d said. ‘Why Earth? I know, because it was the Age of Reason that let you get out. But there must have been other ages of reason on other planets, right? Earth can’t be so special. Why here?’

  It wasn’t the first time in his travels with the Doctor that Chris had wanted to ask that question. Again and again, Earth had turned out to be where the action was. Some places, the Doctor once said, were special. Some places just attracted things. Like Loch Ness, which had been home to a thousand different monsters since the world was formed – or so the Doctor claimed – from the first primeval weed-monster in the days of the dinosaurs to a near-mythical spiny-headed sea-serpent in Chris’ own time. It was as if monsters and anomalies found their way there, like salmon swimming upstream to spawn. Maybe Earth was like that. Special.

  But the Carnival Queen had just shrugged. In technicolour.

  – I’m not bound by your rules of linear time, Christopher. If I make myself known on Earth during its Age of Reason, I make myself known on every other planet during every other Age of Reason. In different times, simultaneously. A universe of unreason. Forever and ever. Is
n’t that nice?

  Well, so much for the ‘special’ theory.

  – Any rational planet would do, she’d continued, but Earth is... vulnerable, shall we say? So many visitations. So many alterations. No wonder the Shadow Directory is kept so busy.

  He hadn’t asked about that, for some reason.

  So now he watched her, up on the high peak, making gestures with arms that moved through more dimensions than the human eye could see. It looked like some kind of summoning ritual, like she was beckoning to the shadows around them. Chris sighed. Whatever she was doing, he had a duty to try and stop her, that much was clear. She was threatening the universe. Wasn’t she?

  – You don’t look happy.

  Chris jumped. She was right beside him, and the promontory had vanished. There was a look of genuine concern on her face.

  On Marielle’s face.

  ‘Marielle,’ he blurted.

  ‘No,’ she said, with one voice. Then made a sound like the clearing of a throat.

  – No.

  The Carnival Queen gestured at the desert around her. From behind every dune, from within every fissure, the shapes were emerging. Gynoids. Hundreds of them. Thousands.

  – My children. I’ve been letting them out into the clockwork universe, letting them get a taste for their new home. Some of them have suffered, the poor things. Poisoned by the noxious influence of Reason. The body you found... please, Chris, try to relax. They don’t bite.

  One of the creatures sidled up to Chris, wrapped something vaguely limb-like around him, and let its flesh splash over his shoulder. Chris tried, very very hard, not to wince.

  New York unfolded before their eyes. The towns prospered and grew, linking together to form one enormous city, the streets knotting themselves into something grey and ghastly. Roz caught sight of Daniel, trying to swim against the tides of garbage that were spewing out of the alleyways, and she saw more in his face than she would have thought possible. I know this place, he was thinking. This is where the Revolutions are made.

  A flenser wave rippled towards Roz, but by the time it reached the spot where she’d been standing, she was a decade into the future. Forrester-2 in front of her, being dragged away on a current of passing years. Roz suddenly realized where the amaranth had to be getting its information from.