by Jack Yeovil
O’Pray knocked over his bottle as he reached for the Uzi sub-machine gun he kept by the altar. The whisky bled into the dust as he rammed in the clip.
“Father,” he said, “forgive me…”
IV
Before it hit the prime target, the demon wanted to spread the load a little. It circled the town, gunning the cruiser’s engine threateningly, whooping and taking potshots. There was a generator out back of the Silver Byte, and the whole place seemed hooked up to it. That made sense. Welcome, Arizona, was a one-power-source kind of burg.
It seeded the electrical system, and paused while its seed swarmed through town, animating appliances. Woolly Bully! Out in the motel, a kitchen disposal unit made a grab for a dishwasher’s hand and chewed his arm to the bone up to the shoulder. Be-Bop-A-Lula! The four wall-size screens of Old Woman Webster’s front room, installed so she could follow all her favourite soaps at the same time, blew out simultaneously and shredded her skin with glass shards. Goo-Goo-Barabajagal! The automatic tennis serve in Lance Dibble’s backyard put a ball into Lance’s face at 750 miles per hour. Do-Wah-Diddy-Diddy-Diddy-Dum-Diddy-Dum!
The demon yelled out in triumph. Hell was truly in session! It was aimin’ for a flamin‘, and yearnin’ for a burnin’! This was rock and this was roll! This was a righteous bust going down!
“This ain’t no Gentleman Jekyll,” it shouted through its public address system, “there’s a screamin’ demon ragin’ inside turnin’ this rig into Mr Hyde! Don’t gimme no sass, or Ah’ll kick yo ass! Keep yo lips shut, or Ah’ll ream yo butt!”
Then it made for the prime target, St Werburgh’s. It was time to besmirch the church!
A couple of people came out of one of the whitewashed houses, rubbing their eyes. The demon unslung the cruiser’s maxiscreamers and hit them with sonic torture. They held their bleeding ears and danced to the music only dogs could hear.
“Gimme a D!” it shouted.
“Gimme an A! Gimme ah M!”
The screamed-at citizens were still jiving to the beat.
“Then throw in a whole entire country, and what do you got? A D, an A, an M, plus the Nation, and what do you got?”
The victims were pounding their heads against the adobe now, blood pouring from the openings of their bodies.
“You said it, dudes, with all a those letters, we got ourselves a whole parcel of DAMNATION!”
That was fun for a while, but became boring very quickly.
“Let me say it again. Duh-Duh-DAMN, Duh-Duh-DAMN, Duh-Duh-DAMN-DAMNATION!”
It just popped their heads and let them fall. Their white wall was splattered red. It looked like Jackson Pollock had been at work with a limited palette. Two flavours of blood—“yassuh massuh, we gots pulmonary an’ we gots arterial, plus chocolate chip, pistachio and tutti frutti”—brain tissue for contrast, and bone bits for texture.
There were four dwellings, three inhabited, between the cruiser and the church. The demon drove straight through them.
“I’m a-comin’ Padre Burracho!” It shouted. “It’s the Poisonous Pontiff of Pleasurable Pain here! The Marquiss of Darkniss, Messiah of Desiah! The Grand Duke of Puke, Lord of the Abhorred!”
The houses came apart like ants’ nests. Some of the people inside got out of the way quick enough, but there would be time to deal with them later.
“I’m whole with soul and drunk with funk, blast from the past and rave from the grave! Yo, Burracho, are you ready to go steady, are you cruisin’ for a bruisin’?”
The cruiser lurched to a halt outside the gates to the well-stocked graveyard, and the demon activated all the onboard weapons systems.
“Ah don’ care if n it rains or freezes, jus’ so long as I gots mah plastic Jesus sittin’ on the dashboard of mah carrrr!”
It had been remodelling the cruiser since it moved in. It extruded its newest appendage through the radiator grille. A three foot steel stake, sharp at the end, threaded through with digital nerves, stuck out like a jousting spear, dripping engine fluid.
“This is your wake-up call, Father Drunk! At the third stroke of the irritating beeper, you will be dead! Dead! DEAD!”
The priest’s shack was at the other end of the graveyard. The demon lobbed a phosphorus grenade at it. It exploded with a satisfying blossom of white, and rained burning chunks all over the graveyard. They fell through the air like flaming confetti.
“I always cries at weddings!”
The demon honked its horn in the first seventeen notes of “La Cucuracha,” and drove forwards.
The picket fence went down under the front wheels, and the car leaped up, snapping a gravestone in two like an aspirin.
“I’m strong at the finish ’cause I eats me spinach!”
The priest came out and stood on the front steps of the church, in the centre of the doorless arch.
He carried a life-sized wooden crucifix with a one-armed, legless marble Christ nailed to it.
O’Pray propped himself up on his Redeemer, and hid behind the Son of God.
“Aw ‘c’mon, Burracho-baby, hidin’ behind a mammy’s boy who’s been dead two thousand years. I expected more of ya.”
The demon played “La Cucuracha” again.
The priest began to pray aloud, in Latin.
“Freakin’ A, Father Drunk, freakin’ A.”
“… in nomine Patris…”
“Cleanse your soul-ah!”
“… Filii…”
“For the Ayatollah…”
“… et Spiritu Sancti…”
“… of Rock and Roll-ah!”
The demon drove.
V
O’Pray heaved Jesus at the windshield of the possessed vehicle as it covered the distance between gate and steps.
The crucifix spun in the air and came down hard on the hood, denting it deep. The reinforced glass exploded as one arm of the cross smashed through. The statue was shaken loose, and dangled by its one whole arm.
The messiah’s face looked up to Heaven, wondering why his Father had forsaken him.
The demon beeped “La Cucuracha” again.
O’Pray pulled the safety catch and opened up with the Uzi, spraying the cruiser with ScumStoppers as if spraying a patch of stinging grass with Weed-Death.
The miniature shells exploded, pitting the hood, radiator and roof with measle spots of dented, paint-stripped grey metal.
He concentrated his next burst on the engine. Even with a diabolic presence in charge, it was just an automobile. It could be put out of action.
“Ouch, Father Drunk!” It shouted, exaggerated pain in its mocking computer-generated voice. “That hurts!”
It sounded like the altar’s evil twin brother.
The Uzi jammed, and O’Pray struggled with it as the cruiser inched forwards, bumping up over the bottom step.
A round had gone off in the chamber. The gun was ruined, unusable. He unslung it and, in the inevitable futile gesture, hurled it at the cruiser. It bounced uselessly off the roof.
O’Pray retreated into the church.
Perhaps the demon would be unable to trespass on consecrated ground? No, it had got into the graveyard easily enough.
It wasn’t the sanctity of the ground under a church that counted, he knew, it was the Faith of the man who stood within its walls.
If this thing were to be warded off, it would not be by some impersonal decree from Rome, it would be by the strength in his own soul, the strength he thought he no longer possessed.
He had stood by and seen injustice wrought in the name of the church. He had seen his woman—his wife, in all but name—die, and abandoned his child. He had bartered away holy water for poor quality whisky.
The demon was right. He was no Warrior of Rome. He was just Father Drunk.
A grenade rolled along the aisle, and exploded with a dull phutt. It was a dud. Or a sneering jest. Lases burned, and smoking beams collapsed.
The car came up the steps and through the doorway, pushing a pillar as
ide. A chunk of stonemasonry fell, and the entire structure shook.
O’Pray had nothing left to fight with. He stood before his altar, and extended his empty hands.
“Go back, Satan!”
The cruiser squeezed through the rubble, and advanced down the aisle, crushing pews under its ragged wheels.
“Isn’t this cosy?” it said, snidely. “What a shame God had to go home, eh? By the way things are really hottin’ up in Hell tonight. We got lots of friends of yours checked in for the big welcoming party. Lots of friends you haven’t seen in fifteen-twenty years. A couple of the guys took up residence in eternal burning hellfire and freakin’ brimstone because of you, you know. Guys you killed in them thar holy wars. Guys who got killed while you were watchin’ and singin’ hymns like an unmitigated spare testicle.”
O’Pray found his Faith inside him. He remembered the first prayer he had ever learned, the prayer his mother had taught him…
“Our Father, who art in Heaven…”
He remembered her soft, Spanish accent, the occasional Irish turn of pronunciation she had picked up from his father. And he remembered his Vocation. His burning, all-consuming, bred-in-the-bone, right-from-the-first need to be a priest.
“… Hallowed be thy name…”
“The Lord’s Prayer, eh? Performed by Paternoster Pete and the Putrid Pointlessnesses! That’s an oldie but mouldie, Father Drunk! That’s been out of the charts so long it’s almost not funny any more!”
O’Pray continued, his voice taking strength.
“Ah, freak you faggot, this is where you step aside and my sharpie spears your altar!”
“… as we forgive those that trespass against us…”
The cruiser revved, its engine turning over with a chainsaw buzz. The point of the hoodspike shuddered, dripping its mechanist saliva.
O’Pray sank to his knees, back braced against the altar.
“By the way, Maria Concepcion told me to say ”hi!“ What a hot babe, Father Drunk, eh? Who’d a think you had it in you to hook up with such a primo quality, Grade-A, slut-featured, hot-to-trot, itchy-underwear, if-yo-so-large-there-ain’t no-charge, roundheels, unholy rollin’, freakpig, 99 and 44/100ths per cent ratskag sex machine!”
“… thy will be done…”
He wasn’t afraid any more. He hadn’t noticed before how like Maria Concepcion’s the face on the St Werburgh’s Christ was.
“Coming through!”
“… on earth as…”
The spike shoved O’Pray back, shearing through his black robe, pinning it to his chest.
“… it is in Heaven…”
The cruiser pushed, and the spike went through him, displacing bones and organs, penetrating the altar. There were sparks all around, and the radiator was pressed up close against him, stinking of burning oil.
He spat blood up over the hood.
“… amen!”
VI
Connnnn-TAKKKK!!!!
The solid spike slipped easily through the dead priest, meeting no resistance, and rammed enthusiastically into the altar.
This was the moment the demon had been summoned for, and it relished its victory.
The spike brushed circuits inside the altar. Sparks flew. Currents crackled. Circuit-breakers blew out. Fuses melted. Microchips took on new configurations.
For a full minute, the systems melded. The steel spike lost its hardness and became malleable, durium turning to mercury. The demon let its consciousness flow out of the cruiser through the bridge of molten metal, into the body of the altar.
It was unprepared, unprotected. The menu up on the screen had given O’Pray the option of throwing up a SANCTUARY barrier around the terminal, but he had been distracted.
That was a shame. It had heard a lot about the SANCTUARY block, and would have liked to flex its muscles by penetrating one.
The cruiser’s central computer pumped into the altar terminal. It downloaded all the information the demon had accessed, plus a lot of garbage it had picked up along the way. Inside the rolling blobs of metal, the demon seed wriggled. The interstices of the altar were filled, connections were made, codes were broken, blocks were negotiated, standing orders were superseded.
The old body had nearly outlived its usefulness. That Uzi had done a lot of damage. The engine block had hairline cracks, and the fuel leads were holed in several places.
Before it left, the demon tidied up by burning out all the cruiser’s circuits, and wiping the memory tapes.
Then, nestled in the altar, it began to spawn again, to send its seed down into the datanet, to explore the nearby channels, to establish contact with the independent systems it had already colonized.
It liked to think of itself as a disease with a genius-level intellect. The Black Plague, smallpox, malaria and AIDS were random blunderers, spreading haphazardly through carelessly chosen vectors.
It was nice being the only bug on the block with an actual purpose in life.
The Summoner had charged it with a task, and it existed only to fulfil that task, and to procreate until it was the only thing within its field of perception.
Soon, it would be shooting down the line. Soon, it would be about the fulfilment of its purpose.
Soon.
Part Four: Meeting Cute
I
The cruiser had been here. Stack could recognize the signs by now. Burning buildings, wrecked ve-hickles, dead people. But his tracer was down. An hour ago it had cut out and gone cold. He had been on a mountain road that only led to this place, so he hadn’t had any trouble keeping on the track.
The sign at the town limits said “Welcome, Ariz” and there was a statue of a grinning Indian with his arms outstretched by it. But nobody was in a welcoming mood when Nathan Stack showed up on his requisitioned hog.
There were a few people in the streets, dragging corpses and extinguishing fires. This looked like the aftermath of a fair-sized firefight. Walls were scarred with fresh bulletmarks. The smell of cordite was in the air.
Most of the activity seemed to focus on a saloon. The Silver Byte. There was a row of motorsickles chained to the hitching rail. The machines bore the Gaschuggers’ colours. Not a few of the citizens mopping up wore the distinctive overalls of the ’chuggers, patchworked with the badges of dozens of car and gas companies. Stack hoped the gangcult would be too busy binding their wounds to blame him for the mess his cruiser had made.
A dark-skinned man with a Zapata moustache and a gold tooth was directing the salvage operation. The wounded were being triaged. One group were carried into the saloon for medical aid. The other were being hauled to the local Boot Hill, presumably for a merciful bullet.
Stack parked his motorcyke, and addressed the foreman.
“Did a driverless Cav cruiser do this?”
The man sneered and spat. “Si, Trooper. Thees ees so.”
“Where is it now?”
He nodded fiercely. “Thee chorch. Eet keell thee padre.”
Stack pulled off his borrowed helmet. His ears were tired of Wagner. He was coming down from all the juju he had been shooting, and was beginning to feel his lack of food, drink and sleep. This was the end of the trail for a while.
“Is there anywhere to get a meal and a bed around here? The state will pay.”
The man grinned bitterly. “Wee do not accept loncheon vouchers or cashplastic, Trooper. Seelver dollars or pesos.”
“I have metal money.”
“Een that case, I serve you best cheellee you have in your life. An’ yiu can get a room over at Tiger Behr’s motel. I am Pedro Armindariz. Seence Meester Cass lose hees head thees afternoon, I guess I am Mayor of Welcome, Areezona. Thees ees my saloon.”
“Trooper Nathan Stack, at your service. Out of Fort Apache.”
“Yiu a long way from home, yellowlegs.”
Stack stretched, trying to dislodge the pain from his lower back.
“You’re telling me. It’s been a hell of a patrol.”
“Thee
ngs ain’t been so good roun’ here thees week, neither.”
Shots rang out. Permanent anaesthetic they called it on the Cav training courses. Stack had never had to apply the treatment, but had seen it done. It wasn’t pleasant.
“Start your chilli boiling, Pedro. I guess I better check out the church.”
“Yiu can’t meess eet. Jost follow thee holes een thee houses.”
He could see what Armindariz meant. The cruiser had ploughed through the whole town. One family were standing around, looking at half of their perfect home, salvaging pots and pans from the rubble. Stack followed the tyre tracks through the town to the church.
After he had checked out the scene there, he should try to find a phone or a radio and report in. He knew Major General Younger would be having Siamese kittens over this patrol. He wouldn’t be surprised if a Cav helicopter gunship were combing the mesas looking for them. If tradition was anything to go by, Tyree would get a posthumous medal, and he’d be quietly court-martialled out of the service. He needed some explanations.
St Werburgh’s was a little way out of town. It stood in its own plot of land. There were people digging in the graveyard, and a pile of bodies stacked against a fence. A Gaschugger with his right forearm replaced by what looked like a giant iron lobster claw was scooping earth out of a shallow grave.
“Looks like the well’s up for grabs,” someone said. A couple of Gaschuggers were emerging from the church with sloshing buckets of water slung peasant-fashion on wooden yokes.
He climbed the ruined steps and went into what was left of the church. There were people there, standing still, but they weren’t praying. They were staring.
The cruiser was there, bellied up to the altar, and between them was a crushed priest. He had been a big man, but he was a broken doll now, his head lolling at an angle. The car had grown some sort of spear and stuck it through him.
“How are we gonna get him loose to bury him?” someone asked. It was a skinny old man in shorts and a string vest. He had metal plates in his chest, his skull and stomach. His entire left arm, his lower right arm and hand, both his knees, his left foot, his right shoulder and his right eye were gone and replaced. Lights flashed and wheels revolved inside him. He had been rebuilt with durium-laced plastic, now badly scuffed, and old-fashioned robo-bits. He would have been chinless but for a sharp jawguard. Half his skull was metal, the other half still sprouted clumps of red hair.