by Nev Fountain
‘You?’
‘Yep.’
‘And they fell for it?’ Mervyn remembered the horrors of his own medical—all that coughing and grabbing and standing there trouserless—and wished he could have found a similarly crumpled writer to have stood in for him.
‘Mervyn mate, there are some advantages to being like me and Sheldon. If someone three foot tall walks into your surgery and says they’re Sheldon the Midget, you don’t ask for their bloody driving licence. Anyway, spin forward a few years, and he’s got a bit full of himself, a bit, y’know…’
‘Big for his boots?’
A tobacco-stained chuckle came from within. ‘That’s a pretty nasty insult for us dwarves. We don’t do big in boots. Anyway, he started dropping hints to Nicholas about me keeping booze in my Styrax. I mean! God, it was just one tiny bottle of whisky because it was so bloody cold in that quarry, but that bastard looked like he was going to shop me. Anyway, I thought, if he’s prepared to do that, I’d better get in there first. It was him or me. So I grassed him up, and he got sacked. I got let off with a reprimand, cos Nicholas pleaded on my behalf, cos when it came to midgets to work the Styrax Sentinels, Nick was a bit short. Short, get it? In fact, I was the only midget he had left when Sheldon got the boot—he couldn’t afford to lose both of us. So I stayed and he went. Sheldon would have understood. Him being a Tory. Survival of the fittest and all that…’ There was another faint chuckle from knee height. ‘Silly old Merv. Who’d want to murder him? Bloody hell, who’s been fiddling with this? Why is my seat so low?’
Helen sighed impatiently. There was a hideous noise as Smurf began adjusting his seat. SQUEAKsquee. SQUEAKsquee. SQUEAKsquee. The lights of the Styrax switched on, and one of the clamps on the front extended and flexed itself.
‘Did the claws wiggle just then?’
‘Just the left one,’ rumbled Morris.
‘Bollocks. I thought as much.’
SQUEAKsquee. SQUEAKsquee. SQUEAKsquee. The single clamp wiggled again. SQUEAKsquee… SQUEAKsquee…
‘If anyone interferes with my Styrax again, I’m really gonna to kill someone, and for the benefit of Mervyn out there, that’s hyperbole. I’m not really gonna kill someone. All right, Morris, I’m ready.’
Helen stood sullenly by the Styrax. Morris readied his camera.
‘Now smile…’ said Morris. ‘There’s going to be a flash, so try not to blink…’
And then the Styrax exploded.
CHAPTER THIRTY-THREE
Mervyn was showered in bits of Styrax and, he realised, bits of Smurf.
He screamed, but couldn’t hear his scream because he had no hearing left. He could see the vast rump of Helen poking over a shattered table and Morris lying awkwardly on the ground, still clutching his camera.
The Styrax was gone. Smurf was gone. Only the base of the Styrax remained, engulfed in flames. Foul-smelling smoke filled the room and the air turned grey and greasy.
‘Smurf!’ He hoped he’d said ‘Smurf’, but he didn’t know for sure. He needed someone to lip-read his own mouth and report back to him.
The plumes of smoke were swamped by a big black cloud which surged into the air like an evil genie. Morris’s huge body stood over him, filling his eyeline. Morris gallumphed over to Helen, yanked his ConVix T-shirt out of his jeans, bunched it in his fist and pulled it up to his face, revealing a generous role of belly fat carpeted with black hair. He buried his nose in the T-shirt with his left hand, reached out with his right and flipped Helen over his shoulder with surprising ease.
There was a greasy smell.
Like…
Like the smell at a barbecue.
Mervyn felt sick.
Then Mervyn watched the ceiling come towards him, and he watched it glide past. Morris was carrying him on his back.
He put Mervyn gently down outside. Mevyn lay there, dazed, and the big man knelt down and silently mouthed ‘Are you all right?’ to him, while humming a high-pitched note that never stopped.
Mervyn was going to answer, but he was staring disbelievingly past Morris’s shoulder.
Through the carnage, through the burning, charred wreckage, the smoke and dying flames, he saw someone walking towards the inferno. Mervyn thought he was hallucinating, but there he was.
A man from the hotel holding a little bucket of sand.
The man upended his little bucket of sand on the raging carcass of the Styrax, and mopped his brow.
‘Bugger,’ he said. ‘We’re going to need a bigger bucket.’
CONVIX 15 / EARTH ORBIT TWO / 4.00pm
EVENT: A PRODUCER’S STORY—NICHOLAS EVERETT
LOCATION: Vixos Central Nerve Centre (main stage, ballroom)
EVENT: ‘HYPERDEATH’ EPISODE SCREENING
LOCATION: The Catacombs of Herath (video lounge—room 1024)
[Cancelled] EVENT: PHOTOS—WILLIAM SMURFETT
LOCATION: Transpodule Chamber (room 1030)
EVENT: PHOTOGRAPHS—BERNARD VINER & STYRAX SUPERIOR
LOCATION: Outside the spaceship (hotel car park)
EVENT: AUTOGRAPHS—RODERICK BURGESS
LOCATION: Arkadia’s Boudoir (room 1013)
EVENT: ACTION-FIGURE ADVICE, EXPERT PANEL with Graham Goldingay, Fay Lawless, Craig Jones, Darren Cardew
LOCATION: The Seventh Moon of Groolia (room 1002)
CONVIX 15 / EARTH ORBIT THREE / 10.00am
[Cancelled] EVENT: UNDER THE BONNET, WILLIAM SMURFETT
LOCATION: Vixos Central Nerve Centre (main stage, ballroom)
[Cancelled] EVENT: ‘DEATH TO THE STYRAX’—EPISODE SCREENING
LOCATION: The Catacombs of Herath (video lounge—room 1024)
[Cancelled] EVENT: AUTOGRAPHS—Katherine Warner
LOCATION: Arkadia’s Boudoir (room 1013)
EVENT: REMEMBERING WILLIAM SMURFETT—Fan Panel with Graham Goldingay, Fay Lawless, Craig Jones, Darren Cardew
LOCATION: The Seventh Moon of Groolia (room 1002)
CHAPTER THIRTY-FOUR
After a quick examination from a doctor, Mervyn was pronounced okay. His hearing soon returned.
‘Hi Mr Stone. I mean, Mervyn.’
Unfortunately.
Stuart sat down beside him, unprompted.
‘Hello Stuart,’ Mervyn said wearily.
Mervyn had watched the comings and goings for an hour from a chair tucked away in the corner of the foyer. He’d been sitting alone. Until now.
The police had started taking things seriously all of a sudden. They were all over the hotel last night, interrogating the guests. Both Mervyn and Morris had had a perfunctory little interview about the circumstances of Smurf’s death. Mervyn started outlining his suspicions to the policeman, but slowly gave up. The police all thought it was terrorists; some religious fundamentalists who believed they were alone in the universe, and that anyone who strapped antennae to their head and pretended to be from another planet was being blasphemous. Mervyn’s tale of autographs dressed up as suicide notes and multiple blackmail plots simply didn’t interest them.
Morris was, as ever, his implacable calm self; in fact, he had asked the inspector if he could film their interview for the convention website—a suggestion which caused both Mervyn and the inspector to go bug-eyed with disbelief. The request met with a firm ‘No’.
After their police interview, Mervyn asked Morris about Hefty Helen. The last he’d seen of her she had been sprawled lifeless on the carpet where Morris had dropped her, great patches of soot plastered to her face as if she had come dressed as a panda.
‘Oh, she’s fine. A bit shaken up, concussion… And she’s got bits of Styrax embedded in her leg and arm and both cheeks of her bum.’
‘Oh dear.’
‘No, don’t worry, she’s fine with it. She already checked herself out of hospital. Doesn’t want the shrapnel removed. She says it makes her more valuable. More of a collector’s piece.’ Morris gave a slow wink. ‘We’ve got a date tonight.’ He’d lurched off, thinking about his forthcomi
ng evening of romance and of wooing a prime piece of merchandise.
Whereas the death of Simon was still officially ‘just another nerd who couldn’t take being a nerd any more’, the death of Smurf was unquestionably murder, obviously premeditated. The story made it to the national newspapers. Tasteless headlines abounded: ‘Pop goes the Wee Will’ was The Sun’s, The Mirror came up with ‘Alien Blownapart’ and The Daily Express crudely went with ‘Shred Dwarf’. If Smurf was looking down on them now from above—and quite a novel experience if would have been for him to be looking down on anybody from above—he would have been most offended by The Daily Star, which had ‘Small Fry’.
Reporters were now at the hotel, trying to gain access to the convention. Morris had stepped up security, asking his stewards to help the hotel staff by keeping a look-out in the foyer by the exits. Some stewards had gone way over the top, using the situation as an opportunity to don biker boots and black crash helmets, patrolling the foyer like royal guards from Vixos. This at least gave the frustrated paparazzi outside something to photograph.
The journalists’ attempt to inveigle their way into the hotel were pretty pathetic. They’d hired cheap monster suits from fancy dress shops. One such reporter was at the reception desk now. The large purple hairy thing with horns sprouting out of its head was being interrogated by Morris.
‘I tell you, I’m with the convention and I’ve locked my pass in my case,’ it said.
Morris raised a sceptical eyebrow.
‘Really. I have.’
‘Oh yes, and you’ve come as…what, again?’
‘A Krell.’
‘And this Krell is from…which planet?’
‘It’s also called Krell. Everyone knows that. From the episode “Bride of Krell”. It’s the beast that Arkadia marries in series seven. She marries the Krell to gain access to the mines of Krell, where they mine Krellinine 60.’
Mervyn was impressed. The hairy thing was doing awfully well. Must have stayed up all night reading Vixipedia.com. It was still a futile attempt, though. Morris was just toying with the poor fool.
‘Oh really? Series seven you say? So the production code for that story would be…?’
‘Ah…seven.’
‘Seven what?’
‘Seven… G?’
‘Nice try, Mr Journalist. Goodbye.’
The attendees were also taking it seriously now. Very seriously. One death was bad enough, but two deaths in two days had raised a few glitter-encrusted eyebrows. All the ‘normal’ fans, the nice affable types with jobs and families and Other Things They Could Be Doing were leaving early. He could see a family bustling to the entrance, bags in hand, checking out; a mum and dad and two small girls about seven years old who were dressed—somewhat scarily—as Vixens in knee-high boots, basques and lycra. Mum and dad went to the reception desk, which gave the two girls an opportunity to make a break for it and run around the foyer, bouncing on the seats and hiding behind the plastic pot-plants.
The parents finished checking out and shouted out to the girls. ‘Medula! Arkadia! We’re going!’ The girls ran back to join them.
Mervyn didn’t wonder what kind of parent named their children after fictional characters; he’d met enough young Leias, Romanas and Buffys in his time. He did wonder which girl was named after the good character and which one was named after the evil character…and whether it would have any bearing on how they grew up. Not for the first time, Mervyn felt uncomfortable about what he’d unleashed back in 1986.
So, the sane fans left. The others remained.
The interruptions for Simon’s death were all very well as far as they were concerned, but this had been a guest for heaven’s sake! They bitterly resented the remainder of the previous day’s schedules being cancelled to make way for the police, and were completely thrown by the schedule changes for day three.
One by one, they ambled up to the timetable in the foyer, eyeballed the ‘cancelled’ bits written next to Smurf’s name, made audible clicking noises with their cheeks (as if Smurf planned his own death just to spite them), and ambled away again. Some of them ambled in Morris’s direction, complaining that the loss of Smurf’s ‘Under the Bonnet’ panel had left a yawning hole in their convention experience, and could they have a partial refund please? This request was also met with a firm ‘No’.
*
Stuart beamed at Mervyn. ‘How goes the murder investigation?’ he asked.
‘Great!’ said Mervyn. Sarcasm greased his voice. ‘Look, I’ve discovered another murder.’
They watched as policeman carried out bits of exploded Styrax.
‘It was a propane canister,’ explained Stuart. ‘Mr Smurfett used propane to juice his Styrax flamethrower. It wasn’t very safe. It was even less safe when someone fixed an automatic pistol to it, tied the pistol’s trigger to a piece of cord, and tied the cord to his seat, so when he raised the seat, it tightened the trigger on the gun, the gun fired into the cylinder and…well…’
Mervyn was glad of Stuart’s inside information, but wished he’d go away.
Two murders.
His chief suspect was now his only suspect. A pattern was forming, a pattern about as subtle as the insides of an Indian restaurant.
Simon blackmailed Vanity. And was murdered. Smurf threatened Vanity. And was murdered.
Both had been threatened by the same person: Vanity’s daughter.
What to do now?
Bernard’s capture back in the 80s had been so easy. A quick word with the producer, and unsmiling men in shiny hats came to take Bernard away. But he couldn’t just run up to the police and shout ‘J’accuse!’ this time. His theory was just a theory, born from circumstantial evidence. What to do? He had to get firm evidence on this woman. He had to find her, follow her, find out everything about her.
Stuart sighed. He seemed to be marshalling up his courage to speak. ‘I knew, you know,’ he said at last.
‘What?’
‘I knew.’
‘What?’
‘Back then. Back when Vixens from the Void finished. When you didn’t have any work. When we got you to come to Peterborough. I knew you hadn’t got any work.’
Mervyn stared ahead. ‘I see.’
‘Not that we didn’t want a proper professional to write our script. I just knew, that’s all. Fans do.’
‘Of course they do.’
‘It was…fortuitous. I mean, you were our favourite writer anyway, and you helped us, and we…um…helped…you.’
‘I understand.’
‘It wasn’t charity, if that’s what you’re thinking—’
‘Yes it was. But it’s all right. It’s… It was a nice gesture.’
‘You weren’t offended?’
‘About giving me some work? How could any writer be offended by that? We survive through pity and charity at the best of times.’
‘But it wasn’t Hollywood, was it? Sorry.’
‘No, you’re right. It wasn’t Hollywood, but it was fun, I must admit. Writing a film with practically no budget, it was a good exercise. Exercised the little grey cells. Something new to do—after all, anything’s better than just fading away, dining out on past glories until you end up telling anecdotes about anecdotes…’
Stuart’s face glowed. His eyes bulged with pride. ‘That’s what I thought. I think a lot of fans employ their heroes just to see them back in action again. Watch them working. Give them a bit of self-respect.’
‘I think you’re probably right.’
‘Listen. About our murder mystery…’
‘It’s not a murder mystery. It’s a murder. Multiple murders. I’ve told you, it’s not a game. You must take it seriously.’
‘Oh absolutely. I do. That’s why I want to show you something.’
‘Hey Dr Spock!’ called a voice. ‘Loser! Looo-ser!’
Mervyn blinked, startled. Someone was shouting at them.
‘Having a good time with your mates, Stu?’
‘Where
’s your scarf?’
Stuart cringed, curling up like a prodded woodlouse. ‘Oh no. They’ve seen me.’
Mervyn looked in the direction of the shouts. It was two policemen who had been going round the hotel making enquiries.
‘Oi! Batman! Where’s your cape?’
Stuart gazed fixedly at a piece of air about a foot above nowhere in particular. ‘Oh ha ha, Baz. Very funny.’
‘Enjoying yourself?’ Baz jerked a thumb at the doors of the hotel, where the Styrax was parked. ‘Just give us the word and we’ll confiscate it as material evidence. I bet you’d love to drive to work in one of those. You could zap villains in it.’
The other one was holding fingers up over their heads to simulate antennae.
‘Beep, beep, beep! Oi, are you listening Stu? Beep beep beep! Where’s your sonic screwdriver? Up your arse?’
The policeman who wasn’t Baz had stuck pencils in his belt and pulled his trousers low to unleash a generous portion of lower cheek. He proffered his backside in their direction. ‘Stu! Look! I’m a Rectoid from the planet Bumcrack!’
Stuart leaked a watery smile at Mervyn. ‘My work colleagues. They don’t like special constables.’
‘Do you want to get out of here?’ asked Mervyn.
Stuart whispered a heartfelt ‘Yes!’
They got up and retreated into the hotel, the policeman yelling after them. It was only after the cries faded into the distance that Stuart was able to straighten up and breathe.
‘Now, where shall we go?’
‘I’ve got a place we can go. I think it might be useful.’
CONVIX 15 / EARTH ORBIT THREE / 11.00am
EVENT: VANITY MYCROFT—VIXEN TO FLY
LOCATION: Vixos Central Nerve Centre (main stage, ballroom)
EVENT: ‘THE PANDORUS PARADIGM’ EPISODE SCREENING /
