Stark

by Ben Elton

  ‘I’m going,’ she said, ‘I’m going with Silvester. He offered me a place and I accepted.’

  Obviously it was a shock. Walter was the first to speak.

  ‘Man, you have got to be crazy?’ he said inadequately. ‘With this dude? With this bread-head? What about all your…all your stuff, man, the things you believe in. I mean the whole Eco-trip…’

  ‘It’s got nothing to do with the things I believe in,’ said Rachel not very convincingly. ‘I still believe all the same things…this is simply a matter of life and death, that’s all. My principles won’t be any use to me dead will they! I’m sorry, but if you get the chance you might as well choose life…You’re going to die…I’m telling you, you are, and I think given my opportunity you’d make the same decision…Yes you would, you fucking well would. It’s easy to say you wouldn’t because you don’t have the choice to make, but you would…’

  CD found himself crying.

  Sly tried to help her out.

  ‘She’s right you know,’ he said, ‘any one of you would jump at the chance, if you had it. But you haven’t, so shut up and listen.’

  ‘I’m not listening to you, you…prick!’ shouted CD.

  ‘Colin, if that’s your attitude, just shut up, all right!’ Rachel shouted back. ‘And that goes for all of you! Silvester and I have made an understanding. He’s my…friend. So if that’s your attitude, any of you, just insulting him, well screw you! I only came down here because I made releasing you lot a condition.’ There were many tears starting in Rachel’s eyes.

  ‘We don’t need any favours girl,’ said Mrs Culboon, ‘this fellah’s giving you stuff, and he gets what you’ve got in return, right? Well, there’s a word for that kind of woman where I come from, and it isn’t a pretty one.’

  ‘All right, you watch your mouth,’ shouted Sly, ‘right now! You start watching your mouth.’

  ‘You telling me what to do? Ha!’ said Mrs Culboon, who loved saying, ‘ha’. ‘I got a gun this time, Mister, and you ain’t. So this is what it feels like to be a boong, OK!’

  She poked Sly in the ribs with her rifle. Walter decided it was time to pour oil on troubled waters.

  ‘Hey, come on everybody, be cool. Please can we just be cool? You know it’s still a free world, right? even if it is dying. A chick can hang out with whatever dude she pleases and for whatever reason you know man? I think that’s in the American Constitution or something. Like what I’m interested in Rachel, is your prior implication that you might be able to help us get out. Is that for real?’

  ‘We don’t need any help, Walter, we’ve being doing just fine on our own,’ said CD. ‘Oh yeah, kid?’ Zimmerman was in a lucid mood, ‘well certainly we’ve being doing OK so far, but may I remind you that we are still in the centre of the pig-pen and I reckon two hippies, a middle-aged black woman and a guy who won’t take off his sunglasses are not necessarily guaranteed a safe passage out of here.’

  CD had not taken off his shades since the mission began, not even at night, possibly this was how he had come to shoot down the helicopter.

  ‘Can you help us get to the wire?’ Zimmerman asked Rachel.

  ‘Of course. We’ll be gone very soon,’ said Rachel. ‘There’s nothing you can do to stop it and anyway, I can’t be involved if you lot are all locked up like animals. I’ve told Silvester that he has to let you go.’

  ‘I won’t go!! I’m staying here, I can’t leave Rachel with that…that…!’ About five minutes later CD would think of a magnificent and perfect insult but for the time being his mind was blank. Zimmerman gave him little time to think.

  ‘Shut up, man,’ said Zimmerman, ‘if we can split, we will split.’

  ‘Stop telling me to shut up,’ shouted CD even louder, but it was clear that everybody thought that he should shut up.

  ‘I have security passes here, they should get you through if you’re careful,’ said Sly.

  ‘Hey, uhm, forgive me if I appear cynical man,’ said Walter, ‘but, like, why should you do this thing for us?’

  ‘I can’t see a problem with letting you lot go,’ replied Sly. ‘After all, what we’re engaged in is not actually illegal. We were always more concerned about the panic that we would spark if what we were up to was known. There’s no time left for you to even convince the people of Bullens Creek, let alone anyone else. We own most of the papers, we own most of the TV, we’ll be gone in a matter of days. What can you do? Anyway, Rachel wants it — ’ He looked at Rachel.

  ‘How very fucking touching,’ observed CD bitterly. Rachel tried once more to convince them that she really had no choice. It was difficult of course because it rather meant rubbing in the hopelessness of her friends’ own situation. After all, her argument for picking up on Sly’s offer was the absolute certainty that the world was dying.

  She soon gave up and took her leave without a word, Sly followed her. Zimmerman considered detaining them, but could see no point, they had been given the passes, there was no reason for Moorcock to come after them. Anyway, it was still difficult to see Rachel as one of the enemy.

  204: FURTHER DIVISIONS

  Mrs Culboon,’ said Zimmerman, ‘we have to find our way back to the wire where I’m presuming you have wheels. This is your patch, you’d better lead.’

  ‘Hey, it wasn’t a rocket launching site when I lived here,’ Mrs Culboon protested, ‘things have changed.’

  And so they had. Already the consequences of the proposed eight-day count-down were being felt, the whole site was alive with thunder and light.

  ‘Well, I know it’s tough, Mrs Culboon,’ said Zimmerman, ‘but you have to try and guide us, we need to get out and to consider this. It’s like an incredibly heavy conspiracy that we have uncovered here and we have to consider it very carefully.’

  ‘We have to do something about Rachel,’ insisted CD desperately.

  ‘That woman’s doing just fine by herself, boy,’ said Mrs Culboon. ‘You’d better start thinking about your own problems.’

  ‘We can’t just leave her!’ CD protested. ‘I mean he’s probably brainwashed her or something.’

  ‘Listen man, I know you are hot for the chick,’ said Walter, trying to be soothing, but failing utterly, ‘but you have to curb your urgings you know? Like put the lid on the whole passion thing, turn down the sex heat until we have a plan.’

  CD bridled.

  ‘It has absolutely nothing to do with a passion/sex heat thing,’ said CD sniffily. ‘I will have you know, Walter, that my emotions and intentions towards Rachel are entirely honourable.’

  ‘Ha!’ barked Mrs Culboon, who could be as irritating as anybody when she wanted to. ‘Boy, I reckon your tongue’s been hanging out so far for that woman I’m surprised you don’t have cleaner shoes.’ And she laughed long and loud. Discretion was not a major part of Mrs Culboon’s nature and despite the fact that they were trudging through the enemy camp she could not keep her voice down. Luckily people were far too busy to notice.

  CD was surprised, he had thought that he’d been discreet about his obsession. Of course, he had confided in the guys, but he could not recall sharing the secrets of his heart with old Mrs Culboon.

  ‘How did you know?’ he asked in all innocence.

  ‘Listen son, when a fellah eats up a girl with every look and follows her around the room like his eyeballs were attached to her legs with string,’ Mrs Culboon explained, ‘I guess he ain’t paying a casual interest in her.’

  CD blushed to be so transparent. Then Zimmerman lost patience.

  ‘Oh man, I mean, what is the point, no, like for real, you know? What is the point? Like I have to lay some information on you people right? We are in heavy shit here, you know? But are we doing a little hurrying? No way, man! Is there a degree of urgency in our actions? Is there fuck! No like there’s just a whole lot of hanging out and chatting about sex, a subject incidentally, right, that some of us find like a drag and irrelevant, OK? I mean just what is the point! I rescue you all fro
m death by electrocution and…’

  ‘Zimm, you’re getting hung up, man, you have to deal with it…‘ Walter, like Zimmerman, was anxious to move things along. They were, after all, still in the midst of the enemy camp and, despite their security passes, by no means out of danger. He for one had no desire to find himself back in a chair facing the electric wool.

  ‘We really do have to split.’ And so with Mrs Culboon as a very nervous guide, they set off to make their way out of Hell’s kitchen. She did think about trying to make a route by the stars but was forced to discard the idea as it was still daylight.

  205: LEARNER DRIVER

  The little EcoAction team were not the only people to be trying to get out of the compound that morning. There was a constant roar as trucks carried off workers whose tasks were now finished. There was much whooping and hollering from the happy ex-employees of Stark as they headed for Bullens Creek airport. They were all suddenly very rich, having received upwards of a year’s salary for a couple of months’ work. Stark had paid well for fourteen hour days with no questions asked and now they were laying off the workforce, giving them the sort of severance pay normally reserved for loyal employees of fifty years standing.

  ‘Maybe,’ suggested Mrs Culboon, ‘we should try and hitch a ride out on one of these trucks because even if I can find the route, it’s going to be a hell of a walk.’

  ‘I’ve got a better idea,’ said Zimmerman.

  A couple of hundred metres or so from where they stood was the source of Zimmerman’s idea, a heli-pad, on which stood four helicopters.

  ‘You think we should steal a chopper?’ asked CD, momentarily forgetting his misery over Rachel in this new excitement.

  ‘I don’t really accept the term ‘steal’,’ replied Zimmerman. ‘I mean, in the greater scheme of things, like that helicopter is as much ours as it is anybody’s.’

  ‘You should have studied law, man,’ said Walter. ‘You’d blow the average wig-head away.’ Zimmerman began to lead the little group towards the helicopters, strolling casually, as if he was off to the shops. ‘Take it easy everyone,’ he suggested, ‘it is important to be inconspicuous…CD, what goes down?’ It looked like CD was going down. He had adopted a sort of crouched, low lope, dodging about behind parked cars and piles of equipment, scurrying from one thing to another.

  ‘We’re trying to steal a helicopter, Zimm,’ said CD reprovingly, ‘don’t you think maybe we should take some cover?’

  They were having to shout to make themselves heard, they were close to the heli-pad and one of the machines was ticking over noisily.

  ‘Hey listen, CD, I didn’t expect the SAS you know? But you are a definite liability,’ shouted Zimmerman. ‘Did you take lessons in looking suspicious, or is this a natural talent? I mean if you lope around like that, you might as well hang a sign around your neck saying ‘I shouldn’t be here, please shoot me’. The art of camouflage is to blend in, man, be inconspicuous.’

  There was a pause.

  ‘What?’ shouted CD.

  Zimmerman gave up, reflecting that despite the impracticality of CD’s approach, it was probably better karma if everybody did their own thing. And anyway, there were no rights and wrongs in life, only different ways of being.

  They walked along together, both pursuing entirely contradictory methods of disguise. Zimmerman, strolling with confidence and brazenly nodding greetings at passers by. CD crouched low, dodging about, occasionally jumping behind piles of equipment to emerge moments later glancing furtively over his shoulder with his collar turned up. Zimmerman made a mental note to ask CD why he felt that turning up his collar made a man about to steal a helicopter less easy to spot.

  Of course, Zimmerman never did enquire, because for him, making a mental note was about as reliable a memory-jogger as writing condensation in the window.

  The four of them strolled onto the pad and a great big man with a leather jacket and a gun asked them who they were. Zimmerman grunted and waved the pass that Sly had given him. This seemed to satisfy his macho challenger, who, if he thought them a pretty strange crew, decided to let it go. Live and let live was the guard’s philosophy. He believed that everyone should be different, that was what made the world go around. In fact, under the leather belts and buckles and bullets, he himself was wearing white silk panties. Why should he worry because some bloke doesn’t comb his beard, no reason to start a war. Private security attracts all sorts of types. Wearing a crash helmet for a living is, after all, a fairly weird job in itself.

  There was an engineer working on the craft that had its engine running. Zimmerman approached him.

  ‘This bird work good?’ he asked.

  ‘Sure, just fixed it up myself,’ the man replied.

  ‘Good, we’re taking it.’ Zimmerman did not even need to use his pass. The whole Stark operation had come together so quickly that everyone was a stranger to everyone else. What’s more, none of the people employed in security had the faintest idea what it was that they were supposed to be guarding. The helicopter engineer accepted the arrival of the four weird looking strangers with the same fatalism that he greeted his enormous pay packet. He didn’t know what it was about, but he certainly wasn’t going to start rocking any boats.

  They squeezed into the machine. It was a tight fit because it was clearly really only designed to take three, which meant it would have been tight for Walter on his own. CD grimaced, it had been one of these same craft that he had shot at, he could imagine the men screaming and writhing desperately in the tiny space as they burnt to death.

  ‘I must say, Zimmerman,’ said Mrs Culboon, sitting in Walter’s lap, ‘I must say, there doesn’t seem much that you can’t do mate. All this fighting, and shooting and stuff and now knowing how to fly a helicopter. Yep, I reckon you’re a pretty spunky all-rounder and no mistake.’

  Having delivered this magnificent compliment she settled herself as comfortably as she could on top of Walter.

  ‘I don’t know how to fly a helicopter,’ said Zimmerman, waggling the stick and punching buttons. ‘Ha ha!’ shrieked Mrs Culboon, ‘and I reckon you’re quite a card with it, ain’t that so mates?’ She twisted around, soliciting Walter’s agreement for her sentiments, but Walter knew Zimmerman better. ‘You say you can’t fly this thing man?’ he asked nervously as Zimmerman experimented with the levers under his seat. ‘I didn’t say I couldn’t, I just said I didn’t know how to,’ Zimm replied. ‘Oh yeah? Well like, what the fuck is that supposed to mean?’ asked Walter, not unreasonably.

  ‘Well, there’s a difference you know? Like I might be able to guess.’ With that Zimm must have pushed a particularly significant button, or pulled on an unusually sensitive knob, because the whole craft screamed and shuddered and rattled and vibrated so that the poor occupants could scarcely focus on each other. Fortunately it resolutely refused to leave the ground.

  ‘I think maybe the anchor is out or something,’ shouted Zimmerman. ‘I mean we have plenty of power here, but no rising-up scene, is going down.’ The others could not hear him, they could not even hear themselves think. Had they been able to they would probably have heard themselves thinking, ‘Get the fuck out of the helicopter’. However, before this idea had a chance to percolate through the shuddering and the noise and penetrate into their rattling brains, an alternative course of action presented itself. The engineer whom Zimmerman had addressed before, came charging out of a nearby hangar to see who was making a puree of his chopper’s gear box. He rushed up to Zimmerman’s window and began frantically banging on it, jumping up and down, mouthing obscenities and generally employing body language to express distress.

  Zimmerman opened the window — probably the only function in the whole helicopter that he was capable of working. He hung his elbow out and turned his head slightly. He looked for all the world like he’d just parked his ‘57 Chevvy down by the boardwalk and was preparing to eye the chicks, catch some rays and take it nice and easy. The fact he was sitting in the middle
of what was beginning to resemble a mini-earthquake, had yet to dent his sang-froid.

  ‘Yeah?’ he mouthed at the frantic engineer.

  The engineer leaned in through the window and flipped the controls about a bit; here a knob, there a lever. The machine spluttered and the juddering mercifully calmed itself, the noise dropped to something just below ear bleeding, and the vibrations no longer threatened to actually remove teeth.

  CD, Walter and Mrs Culboon breathed a sigh of relief. Now it was merely intolerable, before it had been like a disco. ‘Don’t you know how to fly a chopper, Mister!!’ shouted the angry engineer.

  ‘Nope,’ confided Zimm with disarming honesty. ‘Do you?’

  ‘Well of course I do,’ the man screamed, ‘but that’s not the point. What I want to know is…’

  He stopped there, not because he had suddenly lost his thirst for knowledge but because Zimmerman was pointing a gun at him.

  ‘Get in,’ Zimm said. ‘Don’t be absurd, look what the hell is going on…There isn’t any room.’

  But a glance at Zimmerman’s expression convinced the engineer that it was time to make room. With resignation he squeezed in and sat on Zimmerman’s lap.

  ‘Ha ha!’ laughed Mrs Culboon, mightily relieved that Zimmerman had relinquished the controls. ‘Take us towards Bullens Creek, cab driver, and no racist aneCDotes.’

  206: BIRDS EYE VIEW OF GENESIS

  They soared above it all. Above Tyron and Moorcock and the ghastly betrayal in which they were both involved. They soared above Rachel too. CD stared desperately downwards, in the absurd hope that he might be able to spot her amongst all the trucks and construction and scurrying figures. Under normal circumstances, the thrill of his first ever ride in a helicopter would have driven all other considerations from his mind, but this was different. Already he didn’t care, he only cared about Rachel, despite the fact that she had betrayed them. Except he could not think of her in those terms, not as a betrayer, as a Judas. He knew that however weak-willed she had shown herself, he would always forgive her. In the midst of these fine emotions, it was bitter gall indeed for CD to know that Rachel almost certainly didn’t give a flying bugger whether he forgave her or not.