Yo-yo's Weekend

by David Brining

24.

  The Face of Death

  WHEN Yo-yo comes round, he finds he has been tied hand-and-foot and laid on the altar. Death is sharpening his sickle on a grindstone.

  ''I've changed my mind,'' Death declares. ''I shall cut your throat and bathe my hands in your witchy blood.''

  ''You're mad!'' yells Yo-yo. ''You're a jobbing actor! You just play a part!''

  ''I AM DEATH! AND YOU ARE MINE!''

  ''I appreciate Stanislavsky, The Method and all that, but this is absurd!'' says Yo-yo. ''Even Brando wouldn't push it this far.''

  ''SILENCE LITTLE GIRL! PREPARE THY SOUL!''

  Yo-yo sighs. ''Yes, yes, very good. Very scary. Did you learn that at RADA?''

  Death approaches the altar. ''Many people laugh at Death. Many people scoff and mock. But they are fools. they reckon not with the Reaper. He is implacable. He is determined. He will take all, princes and peasants, believers and non.''

  ''I agree, so let me go.''

  ''There is no point struggling, little girl. You are mine!''

  ''I'll have the law on you,'' warns Yo-yo. ''I'll tell 'em you felt me up. You'll get ten years in a nonce's wing, the other prisoners'll gang-rape you in the showers, the warders'll spit in your food and you'll be on the kiddy-fiddlers' register for ever. Even worse, you'll get your phone hacked and your mug in the papers. The Daily Nail will love you.''

  Death laughs a hollow laugh. ''LAW? I AM THE LAW. I AM DEATH.''

  ''No you're not,'' Yo-yo says patiently. ''You're an out-of-work actor. Didn't you use to be in EastEnders?''

  ''WHAT?'' says Death. ''EASTENDERS? How dare you!''

  ''Yeah,'' says Yo-yo, ''That's where I saw you, in EastEnders. You were in the launderette when Dot told Pauline about Michelle and Den an' then you popped over the Vic for a pint with the Mitchells. You were very good. Do you still see Grant and Phil? And Sharon. How's Sharon? I haven't seen it for ages. We don't have televisions in Gillworthy. Is that Nigel still in it? I like him. He has cool ties. Could you get me Frank Butcher's autograph? Or maybe some of Pat's ear-rings? They're lush.''

  Death places the sickle on Yo-yo's pale throat. ''ONE SLASH AND IT'S OVER. YOUR BLOOD SHALL SOAK THESE STONES.'' The point pricks the boy's skin.

  ''Jeez,'' says Yo-yo, ''Sorry to trouble you. You could just say 'no, she's a moody cow' and leave it at that.''

  Death rubs his forehead. ''Little girl, you talk too much.''

  ''Right,'' says Yo-yo, ''I'm convinced. I believe you. You're the best Death I've ever seen. So now let me go.''

  Death laughs again and folds back his hood. In place of a face is a giant black hole. Stars, suns and moons are rushing into it at a tremendous speed. Supernovas and blue dwarves blossom and perish. Comets flash and meteorites crash. Everything swirls into the centre. Around the stars a mass of spirits, a million billion nameless unknowns, swirling and screaming, whirling and wailing, howling and crying, follow them in, the dead of millennia sucked into the Face.

  ''LOOK ON THE FACE OF DEATH,'' roars Death, ''AND DIE!''

  George V Gary Speed John Mills Charles Dickens

  Sister Theresa Elvis Presley Eleazar Glenn Ellen the girl Arabian prince

  Humphrey Bogart American businessman Cossack horseman Ethiopian baby

  African slave Julius Caesar Filipino maid girl from Pompeii Mary the Scot

  old man with cancerwoman in childbirth man in a train crash young GI from 'Nam

  boy with leukaemia Cambodian farmer

  foetus aborted girl in tsunami

  Vladimir LeninIndian fakir

  Jonathan SwiftIranian child

  Princess Diana

  Christopher Reeve

  Ghanaian with AIDS

  Space shuttle astronaut

  Young girl from Hiroshima

  Palestinian stone-thrower

  Ayatollah Khomeini Wilma McCann

  Austrian goatherdbaby in cot death

  Joshua Tetley Oliver Hardy Sir Donald Bradman

  Yo-yo

  This is the Face of Death. Yo-yo is suddenly terrified. He has never been so terrified in his life. This surpasses even the moment he went into Gillworthy, even the moment when his mother waved 'bye' and left him behind with Doctor Molasses who had smiled his oil-slickly smile, this is the most bowel-clenchingly frightening moment in Yo-yo's young life.

  ''You have no f..f..face,'' he stammers.

  ''THIS IS MY FACE,'' thunders Death. ''THIS IS THE FACE OF DEATH, AND YOU ARE IN IT!''

  Yo-yo's life passes in front of his eyes.

  watching the play going to bed

  Baby and bathwater painting Rue's naked body

  travelling into the City The Trans-Pennine Express

  Gillworthy, medicine, trolleys Doctor Molasses, clipboards, pills

  His pastel-blue bedroom His parents joking and laughing,

  His primary teacher giving him stickers

  cot and birth back in the womb

  ''I'm not ready,'' he murmurs.

  ''Very few are.'' Death comes towards him and lowers the sickle. ''Prepare thyself.'' The blade digs in behind Yo-yo's Adam's apple. He swallows and feels his heart flutter, his bladder beginning to weaken, his breathing shallow. The skin is punctured. It hurts. He cries out in shock. Death laughs, puts the point of the sickle in the neckline of the blue frock and slits it down the middle to the crotch. He stands back in confusion as he sees Yo-yo's flat chest, the bra and the socks. ''You're not a girl.''

  ''No,'' says Yo-yo, ''I'm not.''

  ''Unless I'm Very much mistaken,'' says Death, ''that's a WINKIE.''

  ''You are not mistaken.'' says Yo-yo. ''That is a winkie.''

  ''Though I need a microscope to be sure.''

  ''Hey, steady, Eddie,'' warns Yo-yo. ''I'm only thirteen.''

  ''It might Be a Maggot,'' Death opines, ''Or a small chipolata.''

  ''Oi,'' says Yo-yo, ''Watch it, buster. It can still do the business.''

  ''It's not really a Giant Pork-Sword or a Massive Corn-cob, is it?'' says Death, ''Or a great Pink Python. More like an earthworm or a pea-pod. Or a baby’s finger.''

  ''Bugger off,'' snaps Yo-yo. ''It's not the size but where you stick it that counts.''

  ''Yeah, yeah,'' says Death. ''That's what everyone says who's got a Tiny tiddler. Why are you wearing a dress?''

  ''It's a kind of disguise.'' Yo-yo folds the dress over his parts. ''And it's not a tiddler.''

  ''I suppose You could be one of them-there trans-Gender Transvestite she-male types,'' muses Death, ''Or maybe you're one of them long-legged lady-boys who play tricks with goldfish.''

  ''I am not a lady-boy,'' says Yo-yo indignantly, ''Or a she-male. I'm All-Man, with a bit of wild animal thrown in. Grrrrr.''

  ''Can you Shoot Ping-Pong Balls out of your Fanny?''

  The approaching crowd can be heard in The Shambles. They are chanting, a mob on a mission. Fires are burning and tempers are high. Death's sickle droops. ''Come with me.'' Death scoops him up, slings him over a shoulder, blunders out of the shrine to the street. His sickle clatters on the pavement. The mob is closing.

  ''There he is, the child-snatching weirdo!''

  ''Paedophile!''

  ''Pervert!''

  ''Damnation!'' The sickle is abandoned. At Whip-ma-Whop-ma-gate, he looks around desperately. The mob is howling, close on his heels. There's nowhere to go. Settling Yo-yo over his shoulder, he crashes through St Crux's Church wall. A dozen spirits hail ''Hello!'' Death glances wildly, jumps through a window, faces the Stonebow Job Centre, imagines the interview:

  MIZZENMASTAre you claiming Contributions or Income-based

  Jobseekers' Allowance?

  DEATHContributions.

  MIZZENMASTSo what was your last job?

  DEATHDeath.

  MIZZENMASTAnd how long did you do this job?

 
; DEATHThree hundred millennia.

  MIZZENMAST And what did this job involve?

  DEATHKilling several trillion people.

  MIZZENMASTReason for leaving?

  DEATHI had some trouble.

  MIZZENMASTOh?

  DEATHOver a girl/boy/child.

  MIZZENMASTOh, kiddy-diddler, are you? On the Sex Offenders' Register, are you, you slime?

  DEATHMaybe. I don't know. What is it?

  MIZZENMASTList of nonces for the tabloids to print. Did your employer give you a P45? Are you claiming Housing Benefit as well, you scrounging scumbag?

  DEATHErr .. No… Can I get Disability Allowance? I

  done me back in, see? Too much lifting…

  MIZZENMAST'Ere, you're not foreign, are you? Bloody Brussels Eurocrats, filling our country with scrounging pedie dole-scum…..

  Death shudders. Job Centre Plus, with its inane forty-five minute interview and endless, mindless, pointless questions, is the first thing ever to scare him. He screams and charges off towards Coppergate, the mob in pursuit. He stands still. Yo-yo is heavy on his shoulder. Where should he go? Boot's? Fenwick's? The Japanese Shop? The mob is closing, screaming for blood. He stops outside Jorvik, the Viking Museum, and growls in his victory.

  ''The Viking Museum! We'll hide out in here!''

  ''Do you have a ticket, sir?''

  ''WHAT?''

  ''A ticket, sir. You need a ticket.''

  ''I AM DEATH! I NEED NO TICKET!''

  ''One adult, one child .…will you pay by cash or credit-card?''

  ''Look, you arse-head …''

  ''I'm sorry, sir. I can't let you and your daughter in without tickets. That's the rule.''

  ''Bloody hell.'' Death rummages under his robes for some money. ''I haven't got any change. Yo-yo, have you got any change?''

  ''In my little pink purse,'' says Yo-yo.

  ''There.'' Death slams several pound coins on the counter. ''happy?''

  ''Thank you, sir. Enjoy your visit.''

  They shove through the turnstile, pile down the stairs and find themselves in a model village with thickly thatched roofs, wax peasants at wells, wax dogs chewing rubbish, and truly revolting bodily smells.

  ''Jesus!'' swears Death, reeling back from the odour. ''They been boiling cabbage all day or what?''

  ''Hello there, Yo-yo,'' says a flaxen-haired wench on her way to the market. Her basket is full of ripe apples and bread. '' How are you?''

  ''Hi Gudrun Svensdottir, I'm very well, thank you.'' Yo-yo speaks over the shoulder of Death. ''How are you?''

  ''Ur-dur bur-dur,'' says Gudrun Svensdottir.

  ''Snnnnrrr snnrrrr Yo-yo,'' grunts a fat, pink pig.

  ''Snnnrrr snnnrr to you, Porky Pig. Meet my friend Death.''

  ''Snnnrr snnnrrrr grrrr grrrr snnrrrr snrrr,'' grunts Porky Pig.

  ''You know all these waxworks?'' Death shouts in despair, ''As well as the ghosts?''

  ''Who're you calling waxworks?'' snorts the pig.

  ''Sure,'' Yo-yo answers. ''I've known them for years.''

  ''I'm going to kill you,'' says Death, closing his fingers round Yo-yo's thin throat, ''Witch!''.

  ''You all right there, young Yo-yo?''

  ''Hi Sigurd Skull-Splitter. Just being strangled,'' chokes Yo-yo.

  ''Right-o,'' says Sigurd, shouldering his axe. ''Need any help?''

  ''HAK-HAK-HAK-GRRRRR-UUUUUUU,'' says Yo-yo, face turning purple.

  ''Hey, you! Viking chieftain!'' shouts Death, ''Give me your axe!'' Sigurd Skull-Splitter fingers his beards. ''Give me that axe and I'll bring you to life!''

  ''Ah,'' ponders Sigurd, scratching his head.

  ''HAK-HAK-HAK,'' splutters Yo-yo. ''Give .. him .. the ... Axe …''

  ''Bring me to life?'' ponders Sigurd.

  ''GIVE… HIM … URGGHGGHHHH!'' Yo-yo's eyes are starting to bulge. His tongue is swelling. Death reaches out for Sigurd's great axe. His fingers touch the shaft. Yo-yo twists his body away from the fingers and falls onto the time-line.

  ''ARGGGH!'' shouts Death, frustrated once more.

  A time-car is coming, a family of four, a mother and father and two little girls. Magnus Magnusson's voice on the tape tells them of mealtimes in Jorvik. As it passes, Yo-yo jumps in. The little girls scream.

  ''Hello,'' says Yo-yo, ''Do you mind if I join you? I'm running from Death.'' He smiles winningly. ''There he is.'' He points at the towering figure in black wielding an axe. The mother now screams. The father's already passed out. Yo-yo takes the time-car's controls. It accelerates quickly away from the village. Magnusson's voice gets faster and faster.

  MAGNUSSON: We have now arrived at the River Foss. On your right two children are playing a board game, on your left is a ship which has brought traders from Denmark or maybe Hamburg, trading in amber, teal or furs.

  There is a man with a yellow beard and a green tunic cutting teeth in an antler comb and, sitting on a wall, a blond guy in an orange cloak eating an apple and waving a knife.

  MAGNUSSONS: And here is the wood-turner named Uli. Heidlfu, Uli. He is expecting a visit from the children next door. They use the wooden cores from his cups as spinning tops. Here a man is gutting fish…. The next plot is occupied by a butcher.

  This is Coppergate, named not for the shiny orange metal that has given Yo-yo his nickname but for Koppari-gata, the Street of Cup-Makers (did you remember that gata means street? Well done. Gold star to you.)

  MAGNUSSONSON: Watch out for the pit filled with bones and animal waste. Here a couple is arguing over whether to have meat or fish for supper.

  Yo-yo looks over his shoulder. Death and Sigurd are now in a time-car and hurtling round the tracks in pursuit. Yo-yo seizes a bun from a tray and lobs it on to the rails. It doesn't help. Death's getting closer. Yo-yo smiles sweetly at the mother and father. ''Would you mind getting out?'' he says. ''You're slowing us down.''

  ''This is our time-car,'' says Mother. ''Get your own.''

  ''I know,'' says Yo-yo, cornering expertly and keeping the time-car firmly on track, ''But I've got Death behind me and if he outruns us ... well ... '' He draws a finger over his throat. ''Curtains, you know?'' The mother screams and somehow falls out. ''Sorry,'' says Yo-yo, ''Wasn't me. She just overbalanced ...oh, and bye bye to your father...over he goes…. Oh, right into Porky Pig's trough. Thanks very much. Now you, little girls …'' Another corner. Yo-yo takes it like a bobsleigh driver. The two girls have gone. When he looks back behind him, he can see their four sandaled feet sticking out of a pile of manure. Round The Jorvik Museum he races. There's nowhere to go. It is endlessly looping, for ever and ever. Over his shoulder he sees Sigurd and Death getting closer, Sigurd's twin beards streaming behind him, Death waving the axe and laughing AHHAHAHAHAHAHA! like a lunatic chasing an ant.

  Then a third car joins the chase.

  ''Hold on, Yo-yo!'' cries Chicory Lettuce.

  ''Pie 'em, Kos!'' yells Endive Lettuce, ''Pie the mardy twats.''

  A custard pie splats down on Sigurd Skull-Splitter's head. He growls and shakes his fist. He doesn't like cream dripping down his helmet.

  ''An' again!'' yells Rocket as a pie catches Death on the shoulder.

  Magnusson's voice gets faster as the cars whizz back past the little girls mired in manure.

  MAGNUSSONSSON:Heresachildwithaneggandthereadogpeepingoutofthehouse

  Toilets,rubbishpitsandwellsallneartheriverwaternotcleaneveryonedrinksbeereventhe

  children..

  Hooray! cries Yo-yo. The past was so much more civilized than the present. Vicious Vikings, Rotten Romans, Terrible Tudors and other simplistic reductions of history that talk down to children, my big, fat, hairy arse! They were all better than where we are now with our paranoia and health and safety and you have to wear safety glasses to play conkers and harnesses to climb trees and every bush contains a paedo and eveyr sweet is poisoned and every nut is gonna kill you…we got soft, you see….

  Porky the Pig grunts his agreement as anothe
r pie splats on the back of Death's head. How many circuits? Is there no end to this chase?

  MAGNUSSONSSONSSON: Theredkiteyouseeonthefenceisaregularvisitorscavenging

  Fromgardensandpitsandoverthereisamanontheplop….

  Yo-yo makes a decision and, gritting his teeth, twists the wheel with one savage jerk. The car leaves the tracks, crashes out through the wall and sails over a bunch of roofs and tables.

  ''Well, he might do all right,'' Katze concedes, sipping his pint. ''He scored a few for Grimsby Town.''

  ''Aye,'' says Reefer, chuffing on his pipe, ''And Grimsby ain't got the midfield we've got. Our boys'll give him much better supply.''

  With an enormous