Stark

by Ben Elton

  In the morning Sly returned from his meeting with Durf and Tyron where he had discovered TT O and the fatal sandwich. It was decision time.

  198: THE TABLES TURN

  199: GETTING TIED UP IN KNOTS

  Covering his erstwhile captors with one hand, Zimmerman cut his comrades’ bindings.

  ‘Man, I’ve been hanging out on that roof for twenty-four hours,’ he remarked, ‘I don’t recommend that kind of shit to anybody.’

  ‘Zen is the only way to deal with trips like that, Zimmerman,’ said Walter. ‘I guess you must have found your centre and relaxed into a meditative balance.’

  ‘I killed two lizards and ate them,’ replied Zimm. Walter agreed that this was one way of passing the time and that everybody had to do their own thing.

  By now Zimm had released all three prisoners. He dragged a chair into the corner of the room and stood on it, this gave him the optimum available field of fire with which to cover operations while the others used their bindings to tie up Tyron, Du Pont and the guards.

  This done, Zimmerman inspected the knots. ‘CD, man, this is a double bow,’ he protested.

  ‘It’s the only one I know Zimm, it works fine on shoes,’ said CD who had not really recovered from his interrogation and still looked like you could have run a three bar electric fire off him.

  Zimmerman attempted to explain the art of knot tying to CD, taking the two ends of the rope and creating a complicated system of loops and bows. ‘This is a knot, man. You have to make a tunnel, then the train goes through the tunnel, right? Then these two ends here are the people OK? And you put them perpendicular to the train and wind the track round them, right? Then you gather up the slack right, that’s the uhm…’

  ‘Station buffet?’ enquired CD.

  ‘Well, no man, I don’t think so, but I guess we can call it that, because actually, rules are just mind control,’ said Zimmerman who, it must be remembered, was only lucid when he absolutely had to be. ‘You gather up the station buffet…stuff it into the train…Oh yeah, that’s right, it’s the coal, not the station buffet, it’s coal, right…you stuff the coal into the train, and pull the train back through the tunnel, man, then you jerk the signal tight and dig, the dude will never escape.’

  As Zimmerman said this the knot fell apart and the two ends of cord fell to the floor.

  ‘Maybe you forgot the driver, man,’ suggested Walter. ‘When I was in the boy scouts I remember there was always a driver.’

  ‘You were in the boy scouts man!’ said Zimmerman, surprised.

  ‘Well, yeah, like for a week,’ replied Walter defensively, ‘until I discovered it was just fascistic social engineering. Anyway, man, what’s your beef? You were a fucking Marine Commando.’

  ‘Oh yeah, Walter, that’s right, dwell on the past,’ said Zimmerman. Mrs Culboon tried to restore order. ‘I can do knots,’ said Mrs Culboon. ‘I’ll tie them up.’

  ‘Hey, listen lady, I can do knots, right?’ said Zimmerman in an offended tone. ‘I mean, knots are one of my big things.’

  ‘Ha!’ said Mrs Culboon. And even mad Zimmerman had to admit that she had a point.

  ‘Look, be sensible,’ protested Tyron, ‘you can’t possibly get away, it’s many miles to the wire, there are guards and cameras everywhere. And even if you did get through, where will you go then? We own Bullens Creek, lock, stock and barrel, and everywhere else for that matter. You’re in the middle of a desert, what can you possibly achieve?’

  ‘Oh yeah, that’s right, bring us down,’ said Walter. ‘Make it all sound totally depressing, why don’t you? You have a real attitude problem, Mr Tyron. You have to take a more positive trip. It’s just a bio-rhythm thing.’

  ‘Listen,’ interjected CD. ‘I don’t care what there is to face out there. While we were in your care, Mr Tyron, I got plugged into the wall and turned into a light bulb. Personally I’ll take my chances.’

  ‘They’re all tied up good,’ said Mrs Culboon.

  200: FURTHER INTERROGATION

  OK,’ said Zimmerman, ‘nearly time to go, but first we need a few answers. After all, I reckon that’s why we came here in the first place, to find out what’s going on…So, what is the scene Daddy? What goes down here? Why the rocket fuel? The launch silos? The guns and stuff? Man what is this trip?’

  There was a sullen silence from Tyron and Du Pont, the guards obviously said nothing because they knew nothing. ‘So you ain’t going to tell us nothing, then?’ continued Zimmerman. Still there was a sullen silence.

  ‘CD would you be so kind as to pass me the electrified wool, please,’ said Zimmerman. ‘Taking care to hold it by the leads. Dig?’

  There was a surprised silence at this turn of events. CD crossed the room and picked up the instrument of torture. It crackled a little and a few tiny sparks flew from it.

  Tyron and Du Pont were thinking. Tyron was thinking about guts, honour and not being pushed around. Du Pont was thinking that this was a mad hippy who had recently nearly bitten his nose clean off.

  ‘We’re building a colony fleet of rockets to emigrate to the moon because the earth is in rapid and terminal ecological decline,’ blurted Du Pont and Tyron gave him a disgusted stare.

  The ironic thing was that Du Pont’s craven cowardice did him no good at all because obviously nobody believed him. ‘You sure do have to hand it to these fellahs,’ laughed Mrs Culboon, ‘when it comes to thinking up really shitty excuses for what they’re up to they are the very best. The moon! I reckon that’s even better than the story about building a hotel.’

  There was general laughter, and then Zimmerman seemed to snap. ‘Now let’s have the fucking truth!’ he screamed making everybody jump at once. ‘Right now!’ He grabbed the electric sponge from CD and held it so that its edge was a millimetre away from the whimpering Du Pont’s face.

  ‘It’s own medicine time, man!!’ Zimmerman’s eyes were wild and fearful. The veins on his hands stood out firm as he gripped the clamps of the jump leads. ‘You’re gonna burn man, you are gonna fucking burn!!!!’

  Walter had no cause to love Du Pont, even less so did CD, but they both felt that Zimmerman was becoming somewhat alarming.

  ‘Hey, Zimm baby, this is your man, Walter…Listen you have to cool it, you know? I mean, we cannot start torturing people, because like, in many ways that puts us on the same level as them, right? Which kind of begs the question, what are we fighting for?’

  ‘Yeah,’ CD chimed in, ‘he who sups with the devil should use a long spoon and all that.’

  ‘Give him a tickle with it, the bastard deserves it,’ said Mrs Culboon, representing the hawks, so to speak.

  Zimmerman just went wild. He screamed that everybody — ’ and he meant everybody — should shut the fuck up. And whilst Walter mumbled something about hurting a guy’s feelings, Zimm hurled what was left in the jug of water at the wall, then he dragged the electric wool back and forth across it, in huge sweeps, causing great showers of sparks to burst further from it.

  ‘We have no time man!!!’ he shouted, ‘We have no time for chicken shit liberals!!!’ Had a psychiatrist popped his head around the door at that moment and taken a peek at Zimmerman, he would have instructed his secretary to cancel all calls for the next decade because he had a big job on.

  ‘We have been shot at! Imprisoned! Sexually abused!’ This last one was a surprise to everybody, but Zimmerman was employing the degree of dramatic license traditionally afforded to the psychotically insane. ‘My main lady, Mrs Culboon, has been hassled by Hitlerheads,’ he continued, pausing only to kick Tyron in the chest so that the chair which he was tied to toppled over backwards. ‘And I want to know why man!! I want to be hip to what is going down here! And this dude!!’ He flung a fist across Du Pont’s face ‘…is going to lay it on me! Man, he is going to divulge the whole vibe, or the lights are gonna dim all over Australia, because he will be soaking up most of the national grid!!’

  Zimmerman spat on the wire to make it crackle. ‘Now — l
ay — it — on — me — man!!’ And he punctuated each word by sweeping the mesh at arms length in front of a weeping Du Pont, missing him by a hair’s breadth — and a thin hair at that, not the thick, coarse, lush kind, but the sort that comes from a person that you always think is going bald, even if they aren’t. Du Pont was, understandably, terrified and also rather confused. All this dig, dude, hip and vibe talk was new to him. He had spent the sixties as an administrator at a Swiss finishing school.

  ‘What does he want?’ Du Pont pleaded through his tears. CD jumped in. ‘He wants to know what you’re building here, and please tell him quick.’

  ‘I swear you’ll fry, man, I swear!!’ added Zimmerman unnecessarily.

  Du Pont nearly had a heart attack.

  ‘I’ve told you,’ he bawled, his cheeks wet, ‘we’re building a colony fleet of rockets to emigrate to the moon because the earth is in rapid and terminal ecological decline. It’s true, please believe me, it’s true.’

  ‘Like fuck it is,’ said Zimmerman suddenly calming down and turning off the electricity at the wall. ‘But you’re a brave bastard, man, that’s for sure. I took you to the edge, nothing left to do after that but fry you and I’m no pig. I’ll leave that to you.’

  The tension in the room relaxed somewhat.

  ‘Well you certainly had me fooled, mate,’ said CD, ‘I really thought you’d gone completely mad for a minute there.’

  ‘I did go completely mad,’ said Zimmerman, ‘but I’m completely mad anyway, so it doesn’t make any difference.’

  ‘You should have given it to one of them,’ said Mrs Culboon, ‘now they know you won’t do it, none of them will talk and maybe we’ll never know.’

  ‘If you want to do it, Mrs Culboon, be my guest,’ Zimmerman offered her the jump leads but she declined.

  ‘I ain’t the damn loony Vietnam hero,’ she said. ‘You are, Zimmerman. It’s your job to do any electrocuting that needs to be done.’

  ‘Well, I’m not going to. So let’s get out of there,’ he replied.

  ‘Hang on, hang on, what are we going to do about Rachel,’ protested CD. And suddenly CD’s mind flooded with horrible fears and suspicions. What the hell had that man Moorcock taken her off for?

  201: DECISION TIME

  Sly knocked on the door of his quarters. He had not seen Rachel since the previous night when he had shown her around the launch site, and left her with the videos to consider his proposal.

  She was standing at the window when he entered, watching the intense activity which the impending commencement of departure count-down had made all the more intense.

  ‘Those are the rockets, the Star Arks,’ he said, ‘we’ve started preparing them for lift off.’

  ‘Really? I thought you were putting in some new plumbing,’ replied Rachel, who may have been seeing too much of Mrs Culboon.

  ‘We’re going real soon. Probably in eight days. Apparently the food chains are collapsing, it’s Russian Roulette every time you have a sandwich,’ said Sly ignoring her sarcasm. ‘Better make up your mind, Rachel, there’s only going to be one trip. Those who go, will be gone for ever, those who stay will stay for ever. The only difference being that those who go will still be breathing.’

  ‘Breathing bottled air in a tiny cage.’ Rachel was trying to protest but knew that she was wavering.

  ‘Don’t knock it, I expect it will be welcome enough when that’s all there is. Besides,’ Sly continued, ‘that will only be for a year or two, slowly but surely we shall expand the cage and with that will come a less artificial environment, with oxygen from plants rather than bottles.’

  ‘But you can’t just go…can you?’ Again she felt herself assailed by doubt.

  ‘Well, I’m assured we can,’ said Sly, ‘I suppose maybe it’ll screw up, but as I hope you have now accepted, the alternative is certain death. I know it sounds cowardly, I suppose it is, but at least somebody will be getting out. Would you rather we went out and picked up a couple of hundred hippies and dropouts? Would that be a better, more moral thing to do?’

  202: WHO DO YOU LOVE?

  Look,’ said Rachel, getting down to the main point. ‘Why me? I mean a new life on another planet is a lot to offer a girl you hardly know.’

  ‘Who would you take?’ asked Sly.

  ‘What do you mean?’ replied Rachel.

  ‘Exactly what I say, who would you take?’ he continued. ‘You’re not particularly attached, you have to take someone, or else you’ll be all alone in space, so who?’

  ‘Well…‘ said Rachel with hesitation.

  ‘Not so easy, is it? Sure, at first you think that there must be someone. You think, after all, I’m very fond of any number of people. But that’s not enough is it? If, despite knowing them well, you’re only fond of them and not in love with them, then there’s a reason for that. Sides of their personalities that you can avoid on earth, you couldn’t get away from when you’re drinking out of the same bottle of air. So, for a single, essentially lonely man, there is no clear choice, in fact there is no choice at all, I simply don’t know anyone I love enough to take…In fact I’ll go further, despite being fond of quite a few women, I love them so insufficiently that I actively don’t want to take them…’

  ‘And me?’ asked Rachel, seizing the obvious line of questioning like an ace lawyer.

  ‘Well, I don’t know that I love you, but I certainly fancy the knickers off you, besides you’re a spunky type…Now I’m a clear-headed enough bloke, I’ve fallen for girls before, it could all be over in a week, but you see I don’t know that, do I? Maybe these feelings will last for ever, that’s the difference, you see. With all the other girls that I care anything for at all, I know I know that I will never love them. With you I have a chance. That’s why I want you to come with me. Until you busted your way into my life, frankly, I had no idea of what I was going to do…’

  ‘Well, I must say you certainly have some terrific root lines. Live with me because I might not end up hating you…‘ replied Rachel.

  ‘But that’s not what I’m offering, that’s not the reason you should come with me. The reason you should come with me is because that way you’ll stay alive and what’s more, it’s the only way…Listen I’m not going to try and jump on top of you the moment we blast off…’

  ‘Well thanks,’ said Rachel, dryly.

  ‘I’m just saying that, well with a bit of understanding, we might be able to build something together…’

  ‘Please spare me the hearts and flowers, Mr Moorcock.’

  ‘Look, don’t take the piss out of me, girl! Because this is not a piss taking situation! I’m offering you life for Christ’s sake.’

  ‘All right, all right!’ Rachel snapped, ‘you’ve been living with this for a long time you know. It’s still fairly new to me.’

  She sat down, stood up, wandered around a bit, trying not to think about her family and the people she knew…they were all so far away.

  ‘Well…‘ she said, and looked at Sly for a long time. He was certainly quite tasty. What’s more he’d been straight with her about his emotional end of it. He didn’t seem quite the bastard he had before. And after all, somebody had to survive the Vanishing Point.

  ‘Well…‘ she said again…

  203: BETRAYAL

  Sly’s conversation with Rachel had taken place whilst Zimmerman had been going mad and threatening Du Pont with electrification.

  When Rachel had thought a bit more, she and Sly made their way over to the complex of security cabins. They entered just as Zimmerman and his little party were gingerly emerging from the room containing the bound and furious figures of Tyron, Du Pont and the guards. For a moment the two groups stood at either end of the corridor, very surprised to see each other — CD was ecstatic.

  ‘Rachel!’ he shouted, ‘you’re back, you look fantastic, no really, fantastic. It’s OK, don’t worry, we’ve escaped! God you look great.’

  ‘Keep it quiet kid,’ said Zimmerman, pointing
his gun at Sly. ‘Thanks for bringing our comrade back, man, if she’s been hurt you’re going to suffer for it. You OK, Rachel?’

  ‘Umm, yeah, great,’ said Rachel rather nervously. ‘Listen, Zimm…’

  ‘Then what are we doing hanging about?’ replied Zimm, ‘we’ll just tie-up the fat cat here and we’ll all be on our way.’

  ‘Zimm,’ said Rachel more firmly. ‘It’s not going to be like that, I need to talk to you all.’

  ‘Rachel, for Christ’s sake, we have to split,’ said Walter.

  ‘No really,’ said Rachel. ‘I need to talk to you.’

  Zimmerman gave her a puzzled frown, then he waved his gun towards the open door of an empty room. As quietly as possible, they all hurried in.

  ‘Uhm, Colin,’ said Rachel. ‘Mrs Culboon, Walter, Zimm. This is Silvester.’ She looked slightly nervous, on edge, all sorts of terrible thoughts entered CD’s head…‘What have they done to you, Rachel?’ he shouted. ‘What’s he done to you, I swear I’ll…’

  ‘Oh do shut up, Colin, we don’t have much time. I’ve found out what we wanted to know.’

  CD nearly had an apoplexy.

  ‘How! How did you find out, what did he make you do!!’

  ‘Shut up, Colin, I’m telling you…’

  And she went on briefly to outline the things she had learnt. She did the best she could to convince them of the true facts about the earth’s condition, explaining that most of the terrible evidence had long been suppressed in order not to interrupt commerce. She described some of the things that she had seen on the video, and some of the things that Sly had told her. She spoke passionately, but of course, they were very sceptical, she had been herself. It is extremely difficult to convince people that their world is in a hopeless condition and virtually dead.

  She explained a few of the details of Stark which sounded even more far-fetched. It wasn’t until the end of her little speech that she managed to impress on the four sceptical listeners that she at least certainly believed every word that she was saying.