I stared up at her appraisingly and without hate; for hate will slow the warrior’s hand and eye. “What tribe are you?” I asked.
“You do not know my tribe,” the warrior replied, in a husky low voice that made my flesh tingle with the eerie unfamiliarity of its tone.
“What is your name?” I continued, patiently.
“Zala,” said the warrior. “And yours?”
And she stared at me impassively, unafraid to meet my eyes.
“I am,” I said proudly, “Sharrock.”
She stared at me, unimpressed.
Hiding my disappointment at her lack of response to my, by all objective criteria, legendary name, I added: “You are, I take it, not from our lands.”
“I am not.”
“Tell me then, whence do you come?”
She was still staring into my eyes; shamelessly, and in my view arrogantly. I felt a flash of rage and stifled it.
I would kill her first; and then I would savour my wrath.
“Far away,” she said, in what sounded to me like sad tones. “Another planet, around another star.”
“As I had suspected,” I told her, formally. “For your ship is like nothing I have ever seen. Your appearance is hideous and strange. You are an alien.”
“In your terms, I am.”
“Why do you wage war upon us, you whore-fucking turd-eating cock-swallowing monster from afar?” I asked her, with ritual invective.
She laughed.
“Answer my question, o withered-hole!” I insisted, and she laughed again.
“We come,” she said with open mockery, “o pathetic-male-with-a-tiny-prick-that-I-will-eat-and-feed-in-morsels-to-my-female-lover in order to conquer and destroy you.”
“Why?” I said, stung at her unfamiliar insult.
“Why not?” said Zala, the female warrior, tauntingly.
Once again I had to bite back my rage; for I truly despised this warrior’s lack of respect for tradition. Her people’s war with my people should not have been fought like this! A formal declaration should have been made, and hence due warning given; poems should have been spoken, songs composed, regrets expressed. All this should have been done, to create a war that would have been ennobling for all concerned.
Instead, they had simply ambushed our valiant warriors, massacred our defenceless families and Philosophers, and left them all to rot.
“Which planet do you come from, you tainted-by-vulgarity-and-laughed-at-by-small-children shit-covered-whore?” I said.
She grinned, clearly amused by our social ritual of rhetorical abuse. “It has a name,” she said casually. “You will not know it. It is far away. Your astronomers will never have seen it. All you need to know is I am a warrior of a once great world. Will you fight me?”
“I will.”
“If I kill you, your world is forfeit,” the alien warrior said arrogantly.
“Very well,” I said calmly. “And if I kill you?”
“That won’t happen,” said the alien warrior Zala and she lunged forward with her long curved sword, the hilt clutched in both her hands.
I dodged easily and drew my sword from its scabbard on my back with one hand and swung it fast at her and she recoiled and barely dodged it, then I wove forwards to the left and then to the right, ducking and rising in a single flow, then thrust the tip of the sword towards her bare midriff. But she leaped in the air and danced on the flat of my blade and kicked my head and somersaulted over me then plunged her sword back and over her own head at me, without turning around.
I was awed at her speed, but evaded the blow and swept my own blade a thousand times in the air in a series of continuous movements. Zala countered each sword-strike with a speed that impressed me, for we were both fighting faster than the beatings of a baro bird’s wings.
But I was stronger, and the next time she leaped in the air I leaped high too and clutched at her face with my fingers and plucked out one of her eyes.
We both landed, swords held upright and clashed steel once again. Blood dribbled out of her empty eye-hole. Her face was a cold mask of hate. I felt a surge of joy; this was glorious combat.
Then her blade went through my heart and I exulted, and with my dagger hand I sliced off her hand at the wrist and stepped back. I grunted in pain, and also in delight. For her severed hand and blade were now trapped in my chest, with the tip of her sword protruding from my back. But my second heart was easily able to sustain my body. And now the alien was fighting swordless and one handed, with scarlet blood gushing from the bloody stump of her right arm.
But Zala just laughed and drew her second sword, and I lunged again and she dodged and stabbed my leg and so I butted her face and swung my own weapon in a rolling patterns of cuts that shook sparks from her blade. Then with my left hand I stabbed once more with my dagger and slashed at her throat so powerfully it severed her head, and the head fell off her body and bounced on to the sands.
And I paused, and for a moment allowed myself to relax; but her head continued to laugh.
I was shocked at this; then I realised that the head must have its own blood supply. And, too, the headless torso was still holding its sword and was undeterred by the loss of its head; with speed and bravado it leaped at me and carried on fighting, blind yet unerringly accurate in its sword strikes.
I was on the defensive now; the headless torso had renewed strength and was able to somehow perceive where my body was and even anticipate my moves in ways I could not fathom. And all the while the head on the sand laughed, as its body fought me; and I forced myself to ignore the absurdity of it all and lost myself in battle-lust until my blade swept down and rent the warrior’s body in two.
The two halves of the alien warrior’s torso twitched on the sand, blood gushing, organs spilling out. The battle was over; or so I thought.
But then the right half of the warrior lifted its sword again, and tried to stand up. And the left half of the warrior drew a knife and rolled in the sands, trying to get upright with only one foot.
The warrior was still not dead. Still not dead!
I brought my sword down and split the head into two halves. Blood splashed, and I could see the grey folds of the creature’s brain. Her tongue was split in two, but her one remaining eye was staring at me and yet still she was laughing, even though it was a gurgle and not a real laugh.
“Die you devilish fucker-of-evil monster!” I screamed.
The two halves of the head spluttered with delight.
I lowered my sword. I was defeated; no matter what I did, I could never kill this creature.
“What will happen now?” I asked. But the sundered head could no longer speak. And there was, I felt, sadness in her remaining eyes.
And at that point, Zala’s head started to shimmer before me, and I realised I could see through her face and sundered smile to the sands behind. Then her head slowly vanished, and her body too, like mist dissipating in the morning heat.
I marvelled at this magic. What powers did these creatures have? And what utter, taunting, disgusting malice. This was not war, it was mockery.
I looked around.
The alien battle ship had not returned. But in the distance, a false bright red dawn on the horizon revealed that the city itself was ablaze.
And I saw that the sky above me was now black with single-Maxolu fighting craft; but they weren’t fighting, they were just spiralling aimlessly. There was no battle being fought, merely the sad savouring of abject defeat. I had a sinking feeling of despair.
The ground below me shook again. But these weren’t bombs exploding in the distance; this was an earthquake.
And I realised that the sand beneath me was hot; my feet burned through my boots. I cleaned the blood off my sword and dagger, then sheathed them.
The ground shook again. I braced myself.
Then the ground erupted. The sand was scattered into the air and the rock below was exposed, and it split before my eyes, and red liquid lava poured out of t
he rents. A volcano was erupting, directly beneath me.
And at the same time lightning once more ripped across the sky, vast forked bolts that stabbed the air and made it scream.
And a loud roaring sound filled my ears, and then a wind sprang up from nowhere and knocked me off my feet. I staggered upright and saw hot volcano-spew rolling towards me like tides in a raging ocean. The sky was empty now, all the Maxolu craft had been obliterated by the savage winds. The air itself shimmered with heat, as if it were ablaze; and hail rained down on me and burned my face.
I sank to my knees. I knew now that my world was dying and there was nothing I could do.
A river of lava flowed fast towards me, and engulfed my knees and thighs, and burned off my trousers and boots and the flesh of my legs and arse beneath, and I tasted ash and my own blood as I accidentally bit my tongue. My skin was hot and my body hair was sparking, and waves of heat oppressed me like a pillow used to suffocate a convicted coward.
I howled in despair. I could not run, I could not even stand. My legs were ablaze, the flesh was turning molten.
Then the red-hot volcano-spew engulfed me, up to the chest, then up almost to my neck. I thought about my wife, Malisha, and my baby girl, Sharil. And I mourned their deaths, as my tough flesh began to burn, and my bones were seared with heat, and my eyes stung with ash that turned my tears into hailstones.
Sharrock defeated? I wondered.
Never! I vowed. But in my heart I knew I was doomed.
And then—
Table of Contents
Front Cover Image
Welcome
Dedication
Extras
Meet the Author
A Preview of HELL SHIP
THE COP: Version 43
THE COP: Version 44
THE COP: Version 45
THE COP: Version 45
THE COP: Version 46
THE COP: Version 46
THE COP: Version 47
THE COP: Version 48
THE COP: Version 55
THE COP: The Last Version
APPENDIX 1
APPENDIX 2
BY PHILIP PALMER
Copyright
BY PHILIP PALMER
Debatable Space
Red Claw
Version 43
1 Welcome to quantum logic.
2 Esp. on pp. 2, 3, 5, 32, 33, 55, 58–93, 97, 102, 107–159, 242, 290, 301–302, 499, 501–509.
3 But oh! There’s a really good one about Bohr on p. 359.
4 See Bompasso, Ruppe and Everett, Science Digest, Vol. XIV.
5 See David Deutsch, The Fabric of Reality, for an account of this vital distinction, which many scientists do not comprehend, even when we explain it to them.
6 I have a left hand where my right hand should be, and a left hand where my right hand should be. Ditto with my feet. My organs are also all inverted, though in the case of bilaterally symmetrical organs like kidney and lungs this makes very little difference. However, I now hang to the left instead of the right, which is weird. And don’t even get me started on my eyes…! JB
7 See Sharpe, Dewie and Malone, “How to Build a Quantum Beacon,” Science for Teens, Vol. XXIII.
8 That’s because it’s STUPID. But generations of scientists have clung to this model of quantum physics, and they still do. Because although this view is STUPID, it also appears, on the basis of trillions of correct experimental predictions, to be RIGHT.
9 “Rantings of an Angry Scientist,” www.rantingsofanangryscientist.com
10 “Priorities and Pork-Barrel Politics in the World of FTS Space Travel,” Science Now, Vol. 3.
11 I am writing this in my cell. My cellmate is a rapist and armed robber with tattoos all over his body, which he has insisted on showing to me. Forgive, therefore, my sometimes intemperate tone. But I mean! Just because I stole a spaceship, is that any reason to put me in jail?????
12 See I, Cyborg, by Hamilton.
13 See “Journeys Around Our Lab, by Clark, Featherstone and Stafford-Clark,” New Nature, Vol. LXV.
14 Unfortunately, because I hadn’t been to the loo, and was in a state of high excitement, then – sorry, sorry, too much information!
1 As rendered in the original text, for reasons that elude common sense (since the rest of the poem has been translated into English, by enslaved human scribes!). For public performance, pronounced “diabolish.”
2 Generic term for the aliens who are, supposedly, narrating this poem, sometimes represented thus: . Think – Vikings with multiple arms and scales! For photographs of the Pala, click here. (These are supposedly images from another dimension, which are uncorroborated, but highly convincing – or at least, I believe in them. – Ed.)
3 All ancient scribes, long forgot, but for biogs click here.
VERSION
PHILIP
PALMER
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Copyright
Copyright © 2010 by Philip Palmer
Excerpt from Hell Ship copyright © 2010 by Philip Palmer
All rights reserved. Except as permitted under the U.S. Copyright Act of 1976, no part of this publication may be reproduced, distributed, or transmitted in any form or by any means, or stored in a database or retrieval system, without the prior written permission of the publisher.
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ISBN: 978-0-316-18109-9
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