Kzine Issue 17

by Graeme Hurry et al.

  “The Director wants to talk to you,” Large-guy says, flipping the little device at me with practiced ease. It strikes me in the belly, and I fumble for it with my un-mangled left hand as the ‘pad rebounds. When I right her image, she’s closed her eyes, and is facing off screen.

  “Denise?” I croak out, my voice hoarse from shrieking seconds earlier. Oh, and I’m done with honorifics too. She’s not.

  “Mr. McCaul,” her eyes open and she looks at me through the screen. “I can’t say I’m surprised to find you here. Not with your reputation. Nevertheless, would you care to explain yourself?”

  “Of course. As soon as you agree to reciprocate. You’ve been keeping some things from us. Stuff we had a right to know.” She says nothing for a moment. Probably wondering how much I know. I begin to wonder if I’ve been stupid to shoot off my mouth, here in this deserted corridor. Just me and my two burly friends.

  “Ok,” I start, tired of the games, and in no small amount of pain. “Here’s what happened. This fellow on the floor here hands me a ‘pad with instructions to meet him here. I’d never met the boy before, but it seems my late cottage-mate has. You were right to be suspicious of someone in our cottage—you just suspected the wrong man.”

  “Should I not now be suspicious of you?”

  “Me? Let’s talk about the suspicions I have about you for a moment, shall we? About the true nature of the subjects.”

  “They are fully formed humans. Is that what you want to hear?”

  “No, Denise, it’s not. I want to hear that they are adult humans with nothing but reptile brains keeping them going, until they become hosts for us. That’s what I signed up for. That’s what I paid you for.”

  “Well, you of all people should know the truth is rarely what people need to know.”

  “Yes. You’re right.” I’m quaking inside, I realize. I’m more nervous than I’ve been in decades. Not good for my ticker—it’s falling over itself trying to keep up to the adrenaline that no doubt has flooded my system. “So… what now? Do you get your boys to spray me with more lovely foam?” I toss my chin towards Interpol. Poor kid.

  “Of course not, Mr. McCaul! You’re a paid customer. He was a traitor and a thief.”

  “I expect his employers, and most of Earth, would see it differently.”

  “We’re not on Earth.”

  “I’m increasingly aware of that, Denise.” I pause. Even with my decades of experience, I feel out of my league here. I take several shuddering breaths before continuing. “So what now?”

  “Well. You’ve put us in quite a difficult position, of course. Had you simply reported the agent to us, instead of engaging in his subterfuge, you would have secured our trust, and been none the wiser.”

  “But I wouldn’t have known the truth!”

  “Truth—like beauty, Mr. McCaul—is often in the eye of the beholder. Regardless of what you think you know, the procedure is safe, and humane.”

  “But they’re…!”

  “Enough. We’ve each invested far too much into this venture to be sidetracked now—you and us both. Your group will show Earth that immortality is possible. Once we demonstrate it; once we can come out in the open with the procedure, there will be nothing people won’t do to get a piece of it. However, we all have to be of one voice. Are you with us, Mr. McCaul?”

  “I…” I swallow, trying desperately to think of something that will buy me time. But Larger- and Smaller-guy are looking impatient, and Denise is giving me pursed lips through the tiny monitor. “I… look, I can’t go through with it. Not now that I know.”

  “Oh. I see. Well, I wish you had told us that before your accident.”

  “My…” I fooled myself into thinking I was already at full fight-flight mode. A wave of cold pounds through me, and I swear—my heart comes to a complete stop for a full second. “No,” I say, but no sound emerges. My knees tap onto the ground. Thank goodness for the low gravity up here, or it would have been two smashed kneecaps right there. Large-guy has snatched the ‘pad back, but I can hear Denise passing on instructions.

  “Earl—you take him to the shaft, and push him down. Leonard, collect him at the bottom.”

  “No! I…” Large-guy grabs me by my busted hand, which effectively cuts off my resistance. He quite casually drags me along the corridor, my legs flailing behind me, my left hand grasping at anything to arrest my motion. We reach a hatch that opens to reveal… well, another corridor, I guess, only this one runs the full length of the spoke. I’m blubbering and slapping at my captor, as he swings me forward towards the edge. “Wait, wait! You don’t want this on your conscience, do you?!” Large-guy—Earl—merely shrugs and grunts. His eyes hold no emotion. I’ve known men like this before. I truly have no hope. He lets my hand go, but I’ve grabbed on to a pack of wires with the other. Maybe I can pull myself up and away from him. I’m a babe in his arms, though: he grabs my left forearm with both hands, casually bringing it down over his knee. I let loose a shuddering cry, looking through tears at my wrist and hand dangling at near ninety degrees to the rest of my arm. Breaking my arm tosses him off balance, but he pulls it together more quickly than I do. He braces himself with one hand, then pounds me in the head with the other. I don’t feel any pain – just a black-out sensation, my inner ears telling me I’ve begun to spin. Something snatches at my leg, and I’m brought back to him, defenseless. I think how nice it would be to be able to spit in this guy’s face, but he lifts a foot and slams it into my chest before I can collect any saliva. And down I go.

  It’s slow at first. I instinctively reach out to stop myself, but my hands are destroyed, aren’t they? The most I do is smack the back of my right hand against some protruding metal, which elicits no more than a quiet whimper from me. I’m slowly accelerating as I drop through the spoke. My legs are kicking as if I’m in water, and I’m looking down, wondering how much further it will be. I could survive this, I think to myself, but the thought is ten seconds old already, and I’m travelling that much faster. So this is how it ends. I wanted to die in my sleep. Or just instantly somehow, without knowing it was coming. But this is quite possibly the most horrible way to die—my last living moment, seeing my end approach. Peripherally, I’m aware of the buzz modulating to a background hum once again. And then there it is. The bottom. I’m falling quite fast now.

  This will hurt.

  * * *

  White.

  Everything is white, and bright. But it’s quite cool, and—oh yes—there’s the hum, which tells me this is probably not heaven. OH! And pain! It hits me, jerking me completely free of sweet oblivion. Pain from every corner of my being, crying at me in dissonance. Above the din of my pain, I sense murmuring, and my head twitches to the side of its own accord. Who else would it be but Denise? Standing there in conversation with some nameless uniform. The uniform senses my awakening and juts his chin in my direction. When Denise has caught sight of me, she waves him off; he nods and backs away.

  “You survived,” she says, barely concealing the curl of her lip. I want to throw back some saucy remark, but the pain. The pain. A shudder runs through me. It’s hard to focus with my body in ruins. “It appears luck is on your side, Mr. McCaul—luck your friend Mr. Trenton lacked.” She pauses, during which I’d say something else, if I could. “Now, what do we do with you?” Finally, I find my voice.

  “Are you going to kill me?”

  “Kill you? No. Not now. You’ve proven yourself to be quite resilient. Or lucky. Perhaps a bit of both, I think… I think I’d like to let you live. But you have presented us with a problem.”

  “I want to go home. I won’t tell anybody about what you’re doing up here. I’m not interested in those games anymore.”

  “You’re not going home. But I want to give you another choice. Go through with the procedure…” I immediately shake my head (bad idea – the sound of crunching vertebrae resounds throughout my body). She clicks her tongue and reaches out to a machine next to me. I realize I�
�m attached to it. “Or I turn this off. We are not a hospital, and these resources will be in high demand shortly, as your fellow clients undergo their own procedures.” I blink. Blinking doesn’t hurt. Before I can respond, a uniformed attendant arrives, leading a naked man by the arm. It’s him, of course.

  “Damn you,” I breathe, averting my gaze. I have to give it to Denise: her timing is impeccable. “I…” Unwittingly, my gaze flicks back to him. Flesh. “Flesh,” I say out loud. His eyes find mine. I swear he recognizes me.

  “Yes. This flesh is yours, Mr. McCaul. Paid in full. We’ll put you in him, and you’ll stay with us. Up here. You’ll be kept in utmost comfort. And we’ll make very good use of your legendary skills, of course. I don’t expect we’ll have any more trouble with spies or saboteurs, with you here to help us.”

  “I told you—I’m done with that. I wanted a new life: a new identity, a new future.” Denise squints at me, considering something.

  “There’s nothing new about it,” she mutters. And I realize for the first time how… young. she looks, for a director.

  “You’ve done it,” I say, my voice no louder than hers now. Her expression hardens.

  “Take what I’m offering, Mr. McCaul.”

  “Or?”

  “Or you die. On this bed. A truly shameful waste.” I let my eyes return to Flesh. He looks at me, at my broken shell, spread out on this bed. He’s beautiful. He could become… me. But he’s already someone! I swallow, or try to; I can’t trigger the reflex anymore. This body is done for. It’ll die soon. With or without me in it.

  Am I brave enough to die for his sake? Or am I strong enough to kill him for mine? I squeeze my eyes shut tight.

  “I can’t… I…” But it’s this or nothing. Denise is right: there won’t be a new life, just a new body. I’ll still be who I was… and I was the best. No space station will hold me. No Chief Director can silence me. A smile splits my old face; the gears of my rejuvenated mind spin up.

  “…Actually, I think maybe I can,” I conclude, opening my eyes towards Flesh.

  I nod. And so does he.

  THE RAINBOW

  by Kenneth O’Brien

  Jean stepped out of her small Fiat and into the heavy rain. She took a deep breath. Could she really go through with it? More to the point - did she have any real choice in the matter? She was glad that Bernard wasn’t standing in front of her at that moment because she was ready to claw out his eyes out. Her whole body gave an involuntary tremble and she fought back tears. How could he have been so stupid? No, she corrected, how could she have been such a fool? She knew before she married him what he was like. He always had some kind of get-rich quick investment on the go. The danger signs were there and her parents had warned her about him but she was too blinded by love to see. And now, she concluded resentfully, at a time when they were both approaching their retirement - a period in their lives that should consist of making plans to fill the twilight of their years, they were faced with losing everything including their home.

  She leaned against the car for support and summoned what little courage she had. “She’s bound to be loaded,” Bernard had said, “and if she’s as dotty as you say, she’ll never miss some of it. I bet she keeps wads of money in a biscuit tin under the bed – her kind always do. You read about them all the time – all these millionaire recluses. They lead a pauper’s existence when they could be living like royalty. She’ll probably leave it all to a cat and dog home. Better in our pocket, I say.”

  Yes, Jean mused with some bitterness, Bernard did all the talking but she had to be the scumbag that robbed a poor old lady of her life savings.

  Tartarus Towers loomed before her. It was a foreboding and ugly place that had once been typical of the post-war high-rise architecture around the city. Most of these buildings had been deemed failures and had long been demolished but this one remained and her client, Lizzy, was its only resident. What must it be like, Jean wondered, to have folk waiting for you to die in order that they can then move in with the bulldozers? How must it feel to know that there were people looking forward to wiping away any evidence of your existence – all in the name of progress? And now, to add another layer of callousness, here she was, like a vulture about to swoop down to pick at the bones of a woman not yet dead.

  The rain had lessened to a drizzle as Jean walked towards the entrance to the tower block. The dark grey clouds still roiling in the sky seemed to reflect the bleakness of her mood and she wondered if she was now finally beginning to hate Bernard for having driven her to such desperate measures. This isn’t me, she protested to herself, I’m not a thief. And, yet, here she was. The realisation tasted as bitter as bile.

  The entrance to the stairwell smelled of stale urine and alcohol. The walls were covered in obscene graffiti and one of the glass panels on the entrance door had recently been broken. Jean tutted in disgust. Bulldozing this place to the ground could only be an improvement in her opinion. But Lizzy called this place home, refusing to leave. The redevelopers had offered her new accommodation.

  Lizzy had been adamant. “I’m not going into a home.”

  “Not a home,” Jean had reassured her. “Sheltered housing. You’ll still have your freedom.” Even now it sounded trite. Freedom? What freedom did the old biddy have? Lizzy wasn’t even capable of negotiating the stairs of the high-rise any more. It had been quite strange when Jean had gone to the council to ascertain how long Lizzy had lived there and for how much of that time had she been housebound. Nobody seemed to know. One clerk even joked that she’d been there forever – as had the tower block.

  Jean went back and made one final plea to the old woman.

  “No,” Lizzy had replied firmly, shaking her head vigorously. “I won’t go. I can’t go.”

  Then, she leaned forward. “It’s not allowed,” she hissed, eyes searching for eavesdroppers. Jean remembered frowning at this last statement. “Who won’t allow it?”

  Lizzy pointed towards the sky and gave a sly wink. “Them. They think I’ve forgotten everything but I haven’t… not everything. They put a spider in my ear and it spun a web around my memories. Most of what I can recall has become like half-glimpsed shadows in the dark – like when you wake up in the middle of the night certain that something was there a moment ago and now it’s gone. But there are things my mind still keeps safe. I won’t tell you what they are because they might be listening. But worst of all, I still remember that I’m being punished.”

  “Punished for what?” Jean had asked.

  “For love,” Lizzy had replied with glistening eyes. “For loving the wrong man to be precise.” The old lady then stared at Jean for a moment before giving a shuddering sigh. “Don’t listen to me. You’re not supposed to know. It’s just an old woman’s ramblings. Nothing more.”

  * * *

  At the top of the stairwell, Jean paused for a moment to catch her breath and cursed the fact that the lifts were no longer operating. Once she felt able to continue, she walked across the landing to Lizzy’s apartment, slipped her key into the lock and opened the door.

  “Only me!” she called on entering the flat. She made her way along the narrow corridor until she reached the bedroom where Lizzy was still sleeping.

  “Wakey, wakey!”

  The toothless old wild haired woman woke with a start, grabbed the bed sheets and only let go when she recognised Jean. ‘Bloody hell,” she spat.

  “Did I give you fright?”

  “Yes you did.’ She clamped her lips together in annoyance.

  “Sorry,” Jean replied with a slight smile and held up her bag for the old woman to see. “I brought you some milk and bread. How are we feeling today?”

  Lizzy shook her head. “Not good.”

  “Pain?”

  The old woman nodded and indicated that the source of her discomfort was in her head.

  “Doctor Herm left you some tablets, didn’t he?”

  “They’re on the chest of drawers.”

&nb
sp; Jean picked up the tub and counted two pills out into her hand. “Take these and then I’ll get you up and we can have a nice cup of tea.”

  Lizzy sat by the dressing table and stared into the mirror. Jean ran a brush through the old woman’s unkempt hair.

  “You’re quiet today,” said Lizzy.

  “Am I?” Jean replied.

  “You know you are. Fallen out with that dreamer husband of yours again?”

  Jean sighed.

  “I thought so,” Lizzy said and gave a wide, toothless grin. “Men are only good for one thing and when they can“t get it up any more, you’re just as well without them. They’re far too much trouble for anything else.”

  “Shame on you,” Jean replied in mock outrage.

  Lizzy laughed, revealing a large set of gums. “I told you I still remember some things, and you never forget a good cock.”

  Jean shook her head. “I should wash your mouth out with a bar of soap.” Then, “I really wish you’d put your teeth in, dear.” She tugged the brush through a knot of hair.

  Lizzy grunted. “They hurt and make me look like a horse. Anyway, I don’t need them. It’s not as if I’ve got men calling on me anymore. I used to be beautiful once, you know.”

  “Is that right, dear?” Jean said absently as she continued to struggle with the old woman’s hair. She’d heard this story so many times before.

  “I was a goddess back then. I could have any man I wanted. They used to fight over me, you know. But my name wasn’t Lizzy, although I can’t quite remember who I was.”

  The conversation had developed into the usual rambling nonsense. “Yes, dear. I know.”

  Lizzy’s shoulders dropped. “Then I made my choice and this is my punishment.”