by Ben Elton
And so they both boarded a helicopter for the short flight across the construction site in order to go and interview their captive. Actually they could have driven the distance more conveniently but years of incredible riches had led them both to always instinctively take the most expensive option in any situation.
153: TRAPPED IN THE LION’S PORTACABIN
On entering the room they dismissed the guards who had been standing nervously around a severely trussed and bound Zimmerman ever since his arrival. The guards hadn’t known who he was, or what he wanted, but they knew him to be dangerous. He had, after all, hospitalized three of their colleagues (if you included Pete with the broken arm) and it had taken the armed intervention of the Bullens Creek Police to bring him in. This long-hair with the slightly greying beard was the hardest case that any of the cocky little security figures had ever come across and when Sly summarily dismissed them they were more than happy to get him off their hands. ‘Out! All of you. The Colonel will keep an eye on the prisoner,’ Sly shouted — not because he was a natural shouter, he wasn’t really, but they were, after all in the middle of an enormous building site cushioned from it only by a flimsy Portacabin. The noise was fairly horrendous.
‘Colonel’ Du Pont was the head of on-site security. His rank was self-conferred and was a commission in the world army of arrogant macho pricks. He was an unpleasant, officious bully of a man. He had taken up bullying as a profession partly because of his nose — it was a whopper, made gross by the pitted scars of countless failed experiments in plastic surgery. The terrible complex of impotent, bitter rage that his conk gave him had made Du Pont take up bullying for a living.
He had a large staff of lesser thugs — with lesser noses — but he was the only goon to have been indoctrinated into Stark. The brave new future that Stark would create was to be self- regulating. The last thing those involved wanted was anyone bringing along a private army.
Du Pont stood behind Zimmerman whilst Sly addressed him and Tyron paced about.
Zimmerman was gashed, bruised and bound but he did not in any way cut a sad figure. There was a latent strength and dignity about this cornered animal that made him appear like a rather noble early Christian martyr or something similar — until he opened his mouth that is.
‘Oh man, I mean, what is the point, for sure, you know, I mean what is the point right? Like, all this tying up stuff and bashing in the face scene is a very long way from being cool, you dig? I mean, sure I know I totalled a couple of your guys and like, I’m sorry, but you know? I mean they were hassling the chick right? Like four goons hassling a chick is — ’
‘Shut the fuck up, you stupid fool,’ barked Sly, who was very disturbed indeed to find that the mysterious hippy was the same one who had eaten his burger at Facefull’s revolting restaurant. Was there some kind of shadowy conspiracy on their tail? Hippies? Financial journalists? Beautiful girls, what the hell was going on? ‘Who sent you? Who pays you? Who are you and how long have you been working with that girl you saved?’ said Sly, trying not to appear scared in front of Tyron.
Zimmerman saw no reason or profit in lying.
‘I just met the chick at the airport, right. I don’t work for anyone, no one pays me, I’m just a concerned dude, right? You know, social responsibility, dig?’
In fact neither Sly nor Tyron dug very clearly. Of course they both knew the term ‘social responsibility’ but it held very little meaning for either of them.
‘It’s like we told you at that chicken shit burger disaster area,’ continued Zimmerman; who despite his disadvantaged position, still felt that the onus of explanation lay with him.
‘We’re green terrorists. Ever since we heard you sicking those Nazis on our Ab’ friends, we’ve been wondering what goes down.’
Sly shot an angry glance at Tyron, who came as close as he was capable to coming of blushing — which wasn’t very close.
‘What does go down here, by the way?’ asked Zimmerman curiously.
‘Like I told you, you interfering bastard, we’re building hotels. Now where are your — ’ Sly was nervous and angry, but not half as much as he was about to become.
‘Oh come on man, I mean like, for sure, you know? I mean, do I look like I’ve had my brains removed man? Do I look like some kind of space case, lobotomized air-head man?’ Zimmerman asked.
It was a stupid question.
‘Yes,’ interjected Tyron. ‘Now what do you know?’
‘I know you ain’t building nothing but trouble here, man, big trouble. Like you got it all pretty covered man but the chopper your goons brought me from Bullens in was close to the ground, like real low man. Man, I was with the fighting forty-third in ‘Nam for five years. I know a launch site when I see one, and I seen a big one man! One mother-of-a-fucking enormous launch site. Silos, towers, you got it all! That’s the first time I ever heard of a hotel with enough fire-power to take out the whole of South-East Asia.’
Sly and Tyron stared at the apparition in the chair as if their nemesis had just risen up out of the floor and stuffed a pie in their face. Sly nearly shot him dead there and then.
Of course Zimmerman was aware that by exposing so much of what he knew and what he had guessed, he was basically asking to be killed. But he reasoned correctly that whatever it was they were planning, he was in far too deep for them to trust him alive anyway. Therefore his best bet was to make himself appear dangerous. That way, they would be all the more anxious to find his companions and hence be forced to keep him alive to help them.
‘Where are the others, the ones who were with you last night on the wire?’ Sly asked, confirming Zimmerman’s theory.
‘There were no others, man,’ he replied, ‘your goons were so shit scared, I reckon they just must have multiplied me up a few times.’
‘Don’t crap me, mate!’ Sly shouted, making each word sound like an individual and very special threat. ‘Or I’ll have your bollocks,’ he added, making, in Zimmerman’s case, no threat at all.
‘I doubt it, man,’ said Zimm, ‘you’d have to go back to ‘Nam for a start and then you’d have to find the right tree, OK? Which would be incredibly difficult, and even then man, like even if you did all that, I really don’t think they’ll still be there.’
Sly didn’t follow any of this and so decided to get back to the interrogation. ‘There were four of you at the restaurant; you, the other hippy, the pratt in shades and a girl. The one who came prying around, asking questions.’
Tyron stared at Sly angrily.
‘Questions?’ he barked, ‘I thought you said that nobody had been asking questions? I specifically asked you if anybody had been asking questions and you said that nobody had…’
‘Yeah, well, if you hadn’t got your useless pig of a brother to drag in a bunch of incompetent Nazis then nobody would have been asking any questions in the first place, would they?’
‘That’s not the point, Moorcock. I specifically asked you —’
‘Guys, guys, guys, guys, guys, guys, guys,’ Zimmerman pleaded. ‘You know, you two really have to talk this thing out. You have a definite confrontation problem. You need to discuss your frustrations about each other honestly in the presence of a disinterested third party. But excuse me if I don’t volunteer. Like, these ropes are cutting into me so can we maybe put the family row on ice for a while, right? You know?’
Tyron strode across the room and punched the defenceless Zimmerman in the face.
‘Tell us where your friends are right now!’
‘Leave that kind of thing out of it, all right Tyron. We’re not savages,’ Sly admonished.
‘Maybe we are, maybe we aren’t,’ Tyron replied, nursing his grazed knuckles. ‘But this is a fight for survival, either way; the law of the jungle, and it seems that there are people out there who may know plenty. We need to find out who they are.’
‘Well I ain’t going to tell you, man! Like you know, I’m a peaceable soul but I don’t reckon I’d tell you fellahs if you
r car was on fire. So fuck off!’ Clearly lines were being drawn in this discussion and Tyron and Zimmerman stood pretty resolutely on different sides. Tyron was about to hit Zimmerman again. Sly asked him to step outside for a moment.
154: SUCCESS BY A NOSE
Zimmerman was left alone with Colonel Du Pont.
‘My name is Colonel Du Pont,’ said Colonel Du Pont, who was also acting like a Nazi officer in a film. ‘Now you will please tell me the names and whereabouts of your fellow conspirators. Or…‘ and there was a tiny pause for maximum effect — which was minimal effect on Zimmerman because anyone who had spent fifteen years living with Walter was used to pauses. ‘Or…I shall be obliged to inflict upon you pain beyond belief. Beyond your wildest dreams…’
Whether or not Du Pont would have been capable of this is a moot point. After all, a man who has seen his own testicles hanging from a tree knows a fair bit about pain. Plus, somebody who had done as many different and dangerous drugs as Zimmerman would, in his time, have had some pretty wild dreams.
Anyway, Zimm was left with no time to debate this point with Du Pont, because unexpectedly a plan of action presented itself.
Du Pont had been making a pretty major issue out of strutting and posturing in front of Zimmerman. This was because recently most of his time had been spent working out guard rosters and he was relishing the chance to pretend that he really was in the Gestapo. To this end, at the end of his little promise about pain, Du Pont had thrust his face to within an inch of the bound Zimmgrman’s. He did this because he felt it was intimidating and impressive. It gave him the opportunity to spit his words directly into Zimm’s face, and hence gain for them the maximum effect.
This had been his mistake, for in a sudden and wholly surprising move (to both of them) Zimm had pushed his own face forward and grabbed Du Pont’s substantial nose firmly between his teeth. Understandably Du Pont was rather shocked, momentarily too shocked to utter, a fact which gave Zimmerman a chance to speak (with difficulty) a few well chosen words.
‘Listen, creep mother-fucker!’ he spoke up Du Pont’s nose. ‘I’m gonna bite it off I swear. I truly swear by the Lord I’ll bite it off if you squeak man, if you squeak at all.’
Zimmerman was not an easy man to follow at the best of times, and speaking with a nose in his mouth obviously did not make his speech patterns any clearer. However, Du Pont could not help but be impressed by the extremely threatening tone Zimm was employing. ‘I swear I will bite it off if you squeak man!’ Zimm reiterated. To demonstrate his point he bit hard and Du Pont could feel the skin break and the bone and cartilage creak. It may not seem the most awesome threat in the world, ‘don’t move or I’ll bite your nose off, but in fact, if one thinks about it, as Du Pont was being forced to do, it’s actually a pretty heavy deal. The pain and disfigurement would be considerable to say the least.
Du Pont made an effort, he was after all a security officer. His hand moved to the pistol hanging at his side. Instantly Zimmerman twisted his head right down to the left, nearly breaking Du Pont’s neck but keeping an ever firmer grip on his honker.
‘Don’t fuck with me, man,’ Zimmerman spat and Du Pont could feel Zimm’s saliva running down over his upper lip, adding nausea to the list of Du Pont’s ailments. ‘Now don’t fuck with me!’ mad Zimm repeated. And with horrible force spun his head from his left shoulder right over to his right shoulder, and then back again, taking Du Pont’s nose, head and indeed whole body with him. Inevitably the nose broke and Du Pont nearly fainted with pain. Zimm spoke quickly.
‘It’s broke but you still got it! Man, you make a squeak I swear I’ll be crapping it out with what’s left of my breakfast! Now you untie me, man, you untie me or else I’ll bite off your nose and suck out your eyes!!!’
Mad Zimmerman was an intimidating force indeed when he was being mad. In fact what with Zimm’s unusual speech impediment, and the considerable noise coming from the building site, Du Pont was not really following the finer points of Zimm’s monologue. But it was quite clear to him what Zimm must want, and how best to end the terrible pain.
Du Pont’s salt tears ran into Zimm’s mouth as Du Pont reached behind Zimm in a strange embrace and fumbled blindly with the knots. They came away and Zimmerman’s arms were free. He took Du Pont’s gun and released his nose, spitting as he did it and grabbing a quick gargle from the jug on the table — these are, after all, paranoid times. Then with one deft little chop of his hand he knocked Du Pont unconscious and headed for the window, pausing only to pick up the Judge Dread and Phantom comics that had been left on the desk by the guards who brought him from the airport.
155: DAVID AND GOLIATH
The old biblical story of David and Goliath, in which we are reliably informed a plucky young lad bested a great big bully, is a story fraught with moral contradictions. The principal contradiction being that David only achieved his famous victory by means of superior weapons technology. His use of a sling shot (an early version of the Stinger, the Exocet and the Cruise) allowed him to floor Goliath before the big fellow even got close. The moral weight traditionally ascribed to David’s victory establishes a fairly dangerous precedent. For instance, when a mere handful of British Empire troops were able to slaughter thousands of their spear-carrying opponents by means of the Gatling Gun, was it a David and Goliath situation? When a few hundred USAF flyers attempted to ‘bomb Cambodia back into the Stone Age’ were they plucky little Davids using wit and cunning to overcome the Goliath that was the population of Cambodia? In fact Goliath was no Goliath at all but a pathetic, muscle-bound Neanderthal throwback. An elephant charging a bazooka.
Now if in that bible story, David, a small boy in a loincloth — which is the biblical version of wandering around in your underpants — had been facing a Goliath who was a multiheaded, multinational monster, richer and more powerful than any other force on earth. A monster bent on committing craven and wicked acts in the final seconds before the domesday clock strikes twelve and the dark midnight of ecological oblivion cloaks all life on earth. If that had been what David had been up against, the trick with the sling shot might have cut a little more ice.
156: DAVID
As Zimmerman hopped it out of the window, his friends, old and new, were hopping it out of the Culboons’ place. It was beginning to seem to Chrissy as if she had been scampering about in terror all her life.
They had decided that after Zimm had been missing for five hours, they would take a calculated risk. They would ring the police.
‘After all,’ Rachel had said, ‘maybe he just got busted, I mean arrested…‘ Even in this moment of crisis Rachel fiercely resisted the slow, insidious encroachment that Walter’s language was making on her brain. ‘It would have been a pretty serious disturbance up at the airport. Perhaps he’s just sitting in a cell waiting to get done for disturbing the peace.’
‘Listen, Rachel, I’m telling you,’ insisted Chrissy, ‘the guys Zimmerman was mixing it with run the world. When they have a problem they are not going to call the local cops.’
‘Maybe he’s in hospital,’ suggested CD.
‘Sure. Propped up in bed with a bunch of flowers signed love from the world’s billionaires,’ said Chrissy to Mrs Culboon’s laughter. ‘They’ve got him, I’m telling you, they’ve got him.’
‘Well, if they have got him,’ said Mr Culboon, sucking on his pipe, ‘they’re going to be coming after us pretty soon. I reckon Zimm won’t tell them nothing but we can’t lie low for ever.’
‘They know us blacks were involved,’ added Mrs Culboon. ‘Why there ain’t no more than fifty of us in the town, won’t take them long to get here.’
‘Exactly,’ said Mr Culboon, ‘we have to fuck off mates. Somewhere to think.’ It was at this point that they decided to ring the police.
‘I mean, man, if they’re going to get on us anyway, we might as well at least check that nobody knows where he is,’ said Walter. ‘You know he could be dead or dying or…or maybe he just had a littl
e victory celebration after the fight and got done for tooting on a doobie.’
Unfortunately Chrissy was right. The police denied all knowledge of the airport incident, which meant for sure that Zimm was being held by the shadowy mega-corporation. Also it meant that the police were bought…‘And it means that that call you’ve just made, Mr Culboon,’ said Chrissy, ‘is being traced as we speak.’
‘OK let’s split,’ said Walter.
And so it was that the entire world opposition to the Stark Consortium was splitting at once. Zimmerman was climbing out of the window of Du Pont’s office. Rachel, CD, Walter, the Culboons and Chrissy were running out of the back door of the Culboons’ house. They loaded up the old station wagon with what food they could, also some spare clothes and the guns and grenades that Zimmerman had taken from the guards at the perimeter fence, and drove out of town.
157: GOLIATH
Tyron and Sly stood in the burning sun on the steps of Du Pont’s Portacabin, shouting to make themselves heard above the noise. Although as it happens they probably would have both been shouting anyway because they were so furious with each other.
Sly strongly objected to Tyron’s interfering and his casual violence. Tyron objected to what he saw as a lack of urgency in Sly’s manner. After all, there appeared to be a situation developing where it was possible that a carefully orchestrated plan of infiltration was being carried out against them. Who could tell how far it had got already.
‘We have absolutely no idea how big this thing is,’ Tyron yelled, ‘maybe it’s the Russians! Those Kremlin Ayotollahs would give their balls for a piece of what we have going here!’
‘For God’s sake, Tyron, don’t be such a dickhead!’ Sly shouted back. All around them the roar of Stark’s ghastly creation seemed to swell to match their mood. ‘We’ve run a full background make on the KGB, the OKVD, the ABC and XY fucking Z for all I know!’ Sly continued. ‘Nothing. Nobody, has a hint of what’s going on here. We have an eye in every intelligence agency there is. We pay for half of them for Christ’s sake! Durf’s on the case, he says there isn’t a major criminal, government or military establishment that we aren’t monitoring. We are too big to touch.’