‘Dead Pranzi.’
‘No.’
‘For the cow, then.’
‘Leave the poor cow out of it, Proton.’
‘The poor, dead cow…’
Finally they had him stand a little to the left of Proton, in front of a blue curtain that had been found in amongst the engineer’s things, while Proton was seated, and they chained him to the armrest hidden by Proton’s elbow, because Cormack had relented enough to agree to just be there, silent while Proton talked.
Proton had a sheaf of papers and his hair was brylcremed and teeth even shinier than usual. He looked like a jacked-up newsreader.
He was waiting for his cue from Meson, who was holding the camera.
‘Can I go now?’
‘Yes, Captain.’
Proton cleared his throat, fixed his grin, and began.
‘Members of the Empire, inhabitants of the Universe, I am Captain Proton, the Commander of the Praetorian Guard,’ he said, pompously, thought Cormack. ‘Three weeks ago, as a result of orders from the Emperor – now assassinated,’ he added in an undertone, unnecessarily, thought Cormack – ‘we, the Praetorian Guard, were summoned to Palanka on Zargon 8 to deal with an extreme situation. Contained within the belly of a Prison Whale, there was a boy, a boy from Earth…’
‘And his cow…’ added Cormack quietly, which was sufficient to distract Proton so that he lost his train of thought and ummed and erred and shuffled paper a little while before continuing, ‘…a boy from Earth who had been placed there by the Emperor because he is special. Special because he has knowledge and experience of something beyond our Universe: something prodigious; something we have been searching for signs of for many millennia. This boy, his name is Cormack, by the way…’ Meson fiddled with the lens of the camera and pointed it more towards Cormack, putting him in a wide shot with the Captain. ‘…has met with….now this may sound strange but please bear with me…God! God, himself! Now, I know that sounds extreme, but it is the truth and our scientists have verified the encounter. The event registered on the detectors. It is irrefutable. The Emperor was convinced. I myself have seen the evidence. He gave us our orders. He wanted us to kill Cormack. Why? Because Cormack represented the most extreme threat to his Empire imaginable. For, my friends, is it not written in the Ancient Texts, thus…’
Here Proton adopted an inscrutable, Oriental-type expression and started intoning in a language that Cormack could not understand. It sounded vaguely Chinese, but he spoke it liturgically, as though he was singing a long slow psalm with complicated cadences.
‘Yes!’ Proton said at last, escaping from the trance and opening his eyes very widely. ‘I could not allow it to happen. On realising the truth about this boy, the truth that was kept from you, citizens of the Empire, by the Emperor, I kidnapped him. I took him to Foul Ball, to Shambalah, to meet with the Shamanic Throat and undergo the Ordeals that would confirm him as the Negus. And my friends, Cormack, passed all the Ordeals. Didn’t he, Bernard?’
Bernard was shuffled on in his capacity as Sibyl and was suitably subtitled. Proton had to dissuade him from giving a long dissertation on testing procedures in favour of a simple confirmation. The scroll was produced, shown to camera and Bernard was shuffled off.
‘It can be edited later, OK?’ said Proton because Bernard was protesting and had to be silenced with a lemon tea.
‘My friends,’ continued Proton. ‘I am far from religious, but when it was apparent to me that the prophecies in the Ancient Texts were to be fulfilled and that the Negus was amongst us, I had to act. I am proud to say, my actions have been justified. Cormack is the Negus. He has proved himself as such and we need to recognize him as such. I intend that he be crowned. I am going to Zargon 8 for that very purpose.
‘The Ancient Texts have been fulfilled. The Negus has been found. We have our new Emperor!’
‘What a load of twaddle,’ said Cormack.
‘Put it on the uniSwarm, but don’t allow access until we’re safely on Zargon 8,’ said Proton.
***
Chapter Seventy
Stanton Bosch and the cow and Traction were in a space troika, three thousand clicks from Foul Ball, following the transporter.
The Bosch had opened his arm and was within the armature, performing his daily routine of cleaning the joints and lathing the flesh that hung like skewered meat off his metal bones.
‘The Sibyl should be supporting me and my claims,’ he said to the cow. ‘Then there would be no trouble whatsoever.’
‘He will,’ said the cow. She had dropped the accent and spoke quite clearly now. ‘But you understand that the Sibyl has always been a little backwards in his attitude to replicants like yourself. You are half robot. You are not fully human. That is why he has never allowed you to take the Ordeals.’
‘Which is why I had to do them covertly, in conjunction with the mock Negus,’ said Stanton Bosch. ‘And I did them. And I survived them. I ain't care if I is half robot or half teacup. It was still damned difficult. I is the Negus. It is I that is to be crowned.’
‘In good time,’ said the cow. ‘The validity of the Ancients Texts cannot be questioned. These claims will resolve themselves eventually. The Sibyl will come round to our way of thinking. The true Negus must triumph and the mock Negus will be destroyed. However, the mock Negus must first validate your claim. He was the only one that saw you. He must confirm that you completed the Ordeals.’
‘And the Sibyl must too.’
‘The Sibyl is under obligation, religious and otherwise. Don’t worry about the Sibyl. He will come round. But we need the mock Negus’ support as well. What could be more powerful than his confirmation of your status? What could be more damaging to Proton?’
‘So we don’t kill him yet, cow?’
‘Not yet.’
***
Chapter Seventy One
The transporter was given clearance to land on Zargon 8 without hindrance, as expected. Nobody was looking for Proton or his ship - he was still presumed dead and the ship destroyed.
They descended from the transporter purposefully - Bernard, Proton, with Cormack surreptitiously handcuffed to him and the Guards at the rear, all dressed as anonymously as possible in the dowdiest of Zargonic capes - and then mingled with the crowd as best they could.
It was obvious to Proton that something had changed on the planet in his absence.
The crowds in Central Square were bigger than he remembered and of a more cosmopolitan hue. There seemed to be people from all over the Empire here: Venutians in flashing green jumpsuits; Spandraws from the Outer Core beyond Gannymede; Gimlets riding Carpruthians that flopped and gimballed along the sidewalks. The Emperor would never have allowed it.
Everywhere there were beggars.
Proton was disgusted and had a mind to shoot them all there and then, but was dissuaded by Bernard who was against causing too much of stink before they reached the Palace.
‘The place has really gone to the dogs,’ said Proton.
Cormack was examining a long line of turd that spread from the outer paving of the road towards its central bow and appeared to have been dropped by a giant flapping eagle that was hovering sixteen feet above.
‘Things have definitely gone downhill,’ he confirmed.
They stopped by a market where Bernard gathered fruit and didn’t have enough money to pay, which Proton initially assumed was because of his anchoritism and lack of interest in worldly things, but then he remembered the fees he had had to pay him to get Cormack certified and did a double-check, shocked by what the stall-holder was asking.
‘That is almost fifteen times what we would have paid a month ago,’ he said.
‘Since the Emperor’s death, inflation is running at two hundred per cent,’ said the stallholder. ‘The economy is in freefall.’
When they reached the trams, further confusions - few were running, and the ones that did were not travelling to any timetable. The drivers and guards had to adjust the points as they
rode.
Still, they climbed aboard. It seemed a rather inauspicious way to travel to the Palace, thought Cormack, but Proton’s appetite for les grandes gestes appeared sated by his experiences with the army on Foul Ball and he made it clear that public transportation would have to suffice for now.
They were sat next to an odd-looking couple of visitors from out of town who clutched each other in fear every time Bernard shifted in his seat. He smiled at them benignly and waved benedictions on them, flicking them with the sleeves of his cape.
‘So what’s the plan then, Proton?’ said Bernard, when he had finished.
‘We head for the Palace,’ said Proton.
‘Are you sure?’ said Cormack.
‘Everything is in hand.’
‘Aren’t they just going to throw us in jail? Or a Prison Whale? Or execute us? Or something?’
‘Due process, Cormack. All of that would take quite a while to arrange and the planet’s shot to pieces. ’
‘We’re just going to declare ourselves?’
‘A little faith, Bernard.’
They rattled on towards the Palace, every now and again jumping the points and stopping with a slam, until the driver engaged reverse and sent his guard out with a crowbar and they were set and off again.
***
Chapter Seventy Two
Stanton Bosch, the cow, and Traction were not far behind and were themselves using public transportation.
The troika was parked in low orbit and they crammed with other tourists into a space shuttle that would take them to the surface of Zargon 8.
The cow was having a hard time of it, and, being unable to reach the straps that Stanton Bosch and Traction clung to as though they were sailing a catamaran, was lain on the floor. She found it difficult to reconcile her discomfort with her new persona as agent provocateur, so the sunglasses were removed for the time being. They hoped to find her some kind of baby carriage on Zargon 8 that would accommodate her more fashionably.
Again the issue of the Negus and his coming with an army was raising itself.
‘We should have brought the other Boschs, you know. Contrary to the Ancient Texts to come here unarmed,’ said Traction as he swung precariously.
Stanton Bosch interpreted the comment as a sign of fear and gave a little laugh.
‘They is coming in the rear, Traction my boy, so don’t you worry. But we can deal with the mock Negus weselves just as well without them.’
The cow was not so sure.
‘They’ve just released a broadcast to the news feeds. Proton trying to whip up support for the mock Negus,’ she said. ‘It’s gone ballistic.’
She must have been parsing on her duct as she lay on the floor, which, thought Traction, explained the dazed expression.
‘How many hits now?’
‘It’s in the hundreds of millions.’
‘Aye, the people have been waiting for this. The Emperor’s death has left a void. It did signal a coming. The people were expecting it.’
The shuttle at last decelerated and gave a little jerk, which was the cue for a stampede to the sliding doors, and the cow was lucky she had room to squirm close to Stanton Bosch’s hairy legs or she might have been crushed in the rush.
Traction and Stanton Bosch had never been on Zargon 8 before so they looked to the cow to guide them, but she was also disconcerted by the new dispensations that had so horrified Proton and didn’t want to use the subways because the entrances were full of unhealthy looking gentlemen with plastic cups for begging bowls, so was at something of a loss as to how to exit the spaceport.
Traction took charge, heaved her onto a baggage trolley, and led them up a gantry until they reached street level.
‘They must be headed for the Palace,’ he said.
‘Then we shall meet them there,’ said Stanton Bosch and hailed a taxi.
***
Chapter Seventy Three
Proton, Cormack and Bernard stood before the gates of the Imperial Palace with Meson and his fellow Guards.
The Palace was built some three hundred years before, from sandstone faced in marble, and appeared to Cormack to be somewhat in the Gothic vein, featuring flying buttresses and ogival arches, clustered columns and ribbed vaults. It had been started in the time when Zargon 8 was still a protectorate of the Galatian Commonwealth and was ruled by kings who lacked expansionist ambition, but it had been extended and improved, and with its manicured gardens, topiaries, herbariums, greens and hunting grounds, stood on close to four hundred acres now. It was surrounded all round by a palisade of wrought iron, painted black, eight feet tall, that allowed glimpses within. Zargonic children were brought on their birthdays to hold to the rails, and they might spy a gazelle or a rhinoceros grazing amongst the poplars, or the spray from a fountain rising above the laburnum maze, or hear the shouts of a Guard as the watch was changed, or gunfire from the range, or reveille, or the hoots of a twitterhawk, a whole aviary said to be caged on the badminton lawns, or, if they were really lucky, before his assassination, the Emperor, himself, at a window on the fourth floor, behind the laser-proof glass, waving languorously to his subjugated people, sometimes for up to three minutes.
It was still heavily fortified, in spite of the chaos they had seen elsewhere in the city, but Proton was, as usual, bullish. He, like the cow in the spaceport, was ducting. Cormack thought he looked as though he was relieving himself into his bodysuit after an anxious wait.
‘Oh my Lordee, Cormack,’ he said emerging from the trance. ‘This thing is taking off, man! Two hundred million hits and counting! Mine eyes have seen the glory of the coming of the Negus!’
‘So where are the crowds to hail us?’ said Cormack looking about the street that was empty, save themselves and the Guards and a sprinkling of tourists trying to take pictures of the Palace through the wrought iron gates.
‘They will come when you are crowned. All the prophecies will be fulfilled. It will be a fait accompli and the Senate can go hang themselves.’
‘How are you going to manage a coronation?’
‘We need access to the throne room.’
‘And the Archbishop of Canterbury,’ added Bernard helpfully.
‘Gosh, are you all Anglicans?’ asked Cormack, who was having a flashback.
‘Kantleberry,’ said Proton. ‘It’s a small planet in Sector Seven. Home to the Semiotics. Sort of a priest caste.’
‘Oh!’ said Cormack, feeling foolish.
‘But first we must break into the Palace.’
‘I was wondering how you were going to do that.’
In the end, it wasn’t as difficult as Cormack had imagined because the Guards had plenty of inside information. They were, after all, the remnants of the Emperor’s personal bodyguard and had been formerly garrisoned within the Palace walls.
They led him to a small side street, south of the main entrance, where there was a Guard hut that marked a tradesman’s entrance, and the Guards, under Meson, blasted it open with assault grenades, and then killed the occupants, clinically, with their laser guns.
Then, with the hut properly secured, they went inside and, hidden from the security cameras, Proton detailed the plan. The half a dozen Guards would be conspicuous all together in the Palace, so they were to remain in the hut and were to secure it. Only Cormack, Proton, and Bernard would proceed from there, in disguises procured from the bodies of the dead about them. Bernard was reluctant to go, but Proton assured him that he was required. He must authenticate protocol during the coronation, especially if the Archbishop was uncooperative.
Proton, Cormack and Bernard dressed variously, picking uniforms that might suit. There was such a strange assortment of individuals dead in the hut that Cormack wondered how they had all come to be together at one time, but the costumes to wear were obvious.
Proton intended to be rubberized again, because he was dressing as the Praetorian Guard he had once legitimately been, but he was still handcuffed to Cormack and it req
uired many complicated contortions from the both of them to get him clothed.
At last, it was done and Cormack put on his pageboy costume. It was rather fey and his pants were too tight, but Proton allowed it because the sleeves were florid, flared, and hid the handcuffs.
Bernard had found a hassock, which consumed him baggily.
There were quiet goodbyes to the Guards. Then they opened the door to the small corridor that led into the Palace and Proton led them across to the side entrance that would take them to the Reception Rooms and beyond.
***
Chapter Seventy Four
The Archbishop of Kantleberry had quarters in the West Wing.
He had taken to going to bed early because he had gout and needed to keep his left leg raised. His bed had been specially engineered for the task: it had an appurtenance like a pier that ran off from the main frame to be jacked up with a little handle by the comforter. He had been meaning to get it oiled for quite some time because it was stiff, but hadn’t remembered to call maintenance so he was stuck, prone, with the leg raised too high, caught in a horizontal goosestep.
He was a tall man, a little stout, bloated by the ecumenical wine and the conviviality of the succession of meetings, receptions, and assemblies of which his office seemed largely to consist. He wore his long brown hair tied at the back with elaborate ruffles, and his pyjamas were scarlet, like his vesture, and stuffed with his greying long johns. On three fingers of each hand, he wore rings like scarabs, and his nails were long and manicured and painted a Tyrian purple.
He summoned the chambermaid by pushing a button near the bed head.
She knocked on the door and he called her to enter.
‘Yes, Your Grace,’ she said. She stood by the door boldly. He was such a dreadful frump. It would be the first of many such summonses tonight and she had only just clocked on.
‘The contraption has gone up too high. Could you try to adjust it? And I would like Horlicks.’
‘Of course, Your Grace.’
She had to bend low to get at the gearing and he had a good view of her for a while, but there was little she could do about the pier and she said, rising, that she would have to call the mechanic, which he didn’t want so he waved her away and she left to get his drink.
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