Stark

by Ben Elton

  Before the smoke had cleared, Zimm had urged Walter Culboon down into it, where, amidst the dust and fumes, they found CD crawling out of the shattered car.

  ‘Dig you stupid dumb pommie bastard,’ shouted Zimmerman. And the voice said, ‘four minutes and twenty seconds to ignition.’

  ‘Dig?’ asked a dazed CD.

  ‘Dig!’ shouted Zimmerman. CD was confused.

  ‘Yeah, uhm, right Zimm, I dig,’ he said.

  ‘Dig the ground,’ said Zimm, grabbing CD by the neck.

  ‘OK, OK,’ spluttered CD, ‘I dig the ground, although I don’t see what’s so great about it.’

  ‘I mean, really dig, actual digging, not the hip word, dig?’ shouted Zimm and he frantically started attacking the ground.

  ‘Oh dig,’ said CD understanding at last.

  ‘Dig,’ said Zimm.

  Luckily the Culboons’ station wagon was equipped with spades, as indeed are many outback station wagons. Zimmerman grabbed a couple. ‘I mean man, what is it with you? And what’s more, what is the point!’ moaned Zimm thrusting a spade into CD’s hand. ‘Like can I just relax and watch the blast? No, not me, not old Zimm, I have to be fucking in it!!’

  ‘I’m sorry, Zimm,’ said CD.

  ‘Not as sorry as you’re going to be if we can’t make some cover. You dig a trench for yourself and me, I’ll look after Walter Culboon! We stop at minus twenty seconds!!’

  CD realized that with the car gone Rachel was now definitely beyond reach and so for three minutes, as the voice counted them towards near certain oblivion, they dug.

  Zimmerman was a wild man, he needed to be, trying to make a hole big enough for a camel. But they were at least in a natural hollow with the ridge CD had been trying to drive around between them and the blast. With forty-five seconds to go Zimm stood Walter Culboon, who was wondering what the excitement was about, at the edge of his shallow little trench.

  ‘Sorry, Walter Culboon, but you’ll thank me for this…’

  He chopped the camel in the neck and Walter Culboon fell neatly unconscious into the hole. Even in this moment of extremis, CD could not help noting that being able to lay out a camel with a single blow, really was pretty mega-cool.

  Walter Culboon collapsed and in a blur of energy, Zimmerman scraped down debris from the side of the incline on top of her.

  ‘Ignition minus twenty-five seconds and counting,’ said the voice.

  ‘OK, get in,’ shouted Zimm, and keep your head down, man. It’s a shame, we’re going to miss the whole scene…but I suppose really it’s the sort of thing you ought to see stoned anyway.’

  They lay down together in the little shallow grave that CD had dug and desperately tried to pull earth in on top of them.

  ‘Leastways they won’t have to bury us,’ said CD in triumph — he had finally managed to crack a gag during a moment of extreme tension. ‘Minus five,’ boomed the voice.

  ‘Cover your face, arsehole,’ said Zimm.

  And as the world seemed to erupt in heat and shuddering noise around him, CD’s last thought was to wonder why Zimm should want him to cover his face and arsehole.

  240: A HELL OF AN EXIT

  Back on the perimeter, as they listened to the final countdown, Mrs Culboon and Chrissy took shelter behind some rocks. They could see across their former battleground that those security personnel who had remained were doing likewise.

  It was a hell of an exit.

  Six old style space rockets blasting off in close succession. No sooner had one great tidal wave of burning atmosphere rolled across the desert towards them, when another would start, and then another. And out of this thick, bubbling carpet of shimmering orange heat and black black smoke the rockets rose slowly, almost seeming to hang in the air, reminding Mrs Culboon of the helicopter that CD had brought down, making her half expect these rockets to suddenly lose their fragile momentum and come crashing back down to the ground. But they did not, of course. Stark had been preparing for too long to make any mistakes.

  And so Stark flew away. Slowly the rumbling died down, the streaks of flame began to fade in the sky and they were gone.

  241: HELL ON EARTH AS IT IS IN HEAVEN

  And so it came to pass that the Stark consortium left the earth in their Star Arks. Escaping just in time as the storm of ecological disintegration gathered to become a catastrophic deluge; a great flood of dust, disease, heat and filthy, poisonous water, rising to engulf the billions who had created it.

  As had been predicted, the horrifying legacy of all the years of thoughtless vandalism turned in upon its creators, and upon all other forms of life on earth, for whom ignorance was no defence. Wave after wave of pollution washed across the dead and dying dirt. Warm, thick, heavy toxic rain fell from the muddied, burning skies, the acid in every drop bursting out upon what life remained, sad useless weeds, clinging to the shifting sands of the barren, infertile, salty ground.

  The seas, swollen and bloated by waters which had remained frozen since before the birth of humankind, rose up to reclaim the earth that had been theirs before the cold had bound them.

  The deserts that for so long had been chained and guarded by the great forests leapt forward claiming all the land that the seas did not seem to want. And everywhere along the changing shorelines of our retreating world, was washed up, with every tide, the filth and waste disgorged by the teeming billions day by day. Sand and pebbles became a memory as the shrinking coast grew mountainous, piled high with the live and festering muck which nobody knew where to put any more. All these things came to be, just as the scientists who served Stark had said they would. Indeed, all these things had already come to haunt the earth long before the rich and powerful finally took their leave. The seas have been rising, the deserts spreading, the stinking piles of rubbish growing, the poison rain falling and the land drying, since before the members of the Stark Conspiracy were born.

  242: THE TRUTH DAWNS

  After the Stark blast off, the world very quickly learned the facts of what had happened. At first there had been mystification as the news of the launches swept around the world. Then some bright spark at a local Perth TV studio realized that they had a scoop. Suddenly the Daft Dingo became the hottest news on earth. The tape (with the interviewer’s derisive comments edited out) was beamed around the globe.

  Chrissy’s voice was heard everywhere. ‘They have a research team called the Domesday Group, who have proved that the world is dying…’

  ‘…I’ve seen the evidence, it’s true…there doesn’t seem to be any hope any more…but there must be, I mean we’re not dead yet, are we…’

  For those who still doubted, the final proof came the next day with the first broadcast from the Stark fleet; a sombre message, explaining the situation, and almost apologizing for leaving.

  ‘We are sorry,’ Durf’s voice and image bounced off the world’s myriad communication satellites, ‘but we knew the truth, the Domesday Group had proved it for us. There is no hope. The Stark Consortium is now the human race. We will do our best to make it work this time.’

  Panic and fear swept the earth as daily reports of the departed renegades dominated the media. The world’s richest and most powerful producers had gone and left the consumers to their fate. Strangely there was little bitterness, or anger, it was all too hot and hopeless for that. People knew that they were all to blame, not one single person was without guilt. The least anyone had done was to stand idly by. The best that could be said of a person was that they had done no more than close their eyes to the cost of the great global party.

  People felt that the cynicism of the Stark departure was no greater than the cynicism with which the riches of the earth had been squandered. The world was dying and the world deserved it. This was the shocked fatalistic attitude of the final generation. If those bastards had bought their way out, it didn’t matter any more anyway.

  243: IF ONLY

  If only,’ people sighed, ‘if only we had done something. Acted when we
still had time, even just ten years ago,’ they said, ‘back in the late eighties, the early nineties when there was still time. The signs were all there, why didn’t we do something.’

  But they hadn’t, back in ‘89, ‘90 and ‘91, the years when the decisions needed to be taken, nothing had been done. People had listened to the politicians’ empty rhetoric at election time but nothing huge, nothing drastic, nothing real had actually been done. Too much money was involved, it simply wasn’t economical. Nothing had been done and now the reckoning was upon them all.

  244: PARTY TIME

  After the blast CD had tried to say ‘is it over, Zimm?’ but it is rather difficult to speak when you seem to have eaten about half of the Great Sandy Desert.

  Spitting and spluttering dust out of his mouth he rose up to find Zimmerman, sitting on the prostrate form of Walter Culboon, rolling a ciggie.

  ‘We have to wait for Walter Culboon to come around man, I reckon I hit her a little hard,’ was Zimmerman’s reply. As they waited they saw a car heading out from what had been the launch site. Zimm presumed it was another hallucination and ignored it. For CD, as always, hope sprang eternal, and just this once it was justified in doing so, because it was Rachel.

  It is a tribute to CD that the ecstatic relief he found in Rachel’s survival, and the discovery that she had remained loyal to the team all along, was only slightly tempered over the next hour or two by the dawning realization that Rachel’s experiences had not been sufficiently cathartic to shock her into wanting to sleep with him.

  The four of them headed off together, away from the smouldering remnants of Stark, until they found Chrissy and Mrs Culboon. There they said goodbye to Walter Culboon and the remnants of EcoAction (in CD’s case, smouldering), headed on back to Bullens Creek. Back to the home that Mr and Mrs Culboon had bought so recently when they had thought their luck was in. Now Mr Culboon was gone and Durf s thugs had smashed most of it up. Anyway the earth was dying. The cat was OK though.

  ‘So what do we do now?’ said Chrissy.

  ‘Well, I reckon we should sell the hire car and buy some beer,’ said Mrs Culboon. ‘I could certainly do with getting a bit pissed,’ said Rachel. ‘Yeah, but it’s not really the time for a party is it?’ said CD, thinking of the friends they’d lost and the failure of what they’d tried to do. ‘Sure it’s the right time,’ said Zimmerman, ‘it’s time to party like there’s no tomorrow.’

  245: HELL

  And the pioneers of Stark? Their lives were hell.

  It was too much for poor Sly. After only one year, on yet another lonely lonely night, he opened a pressure door and allowed himself to float away to heaven. He was glad that Rachel had not come with him. He would not have wished the world that Stark had created on anyone, let alone someone he loved.

  He was not the first to crack, and he would not be the last. The frozen embryos were destined never to be brought to life. The problem was not the conditions, it was not the work they had to do, nor even the food — the problem was the company.

  The pioneers of Stark hated each other. They had created Hell in Heaven. They had escaped pollution on earth, only to discover that they had carried with them another pollution, a pollution that they could not escape. The pollution in their own souls.

  THE END

  Table of Contents

  1: BREAKFAST IN CARLO

  2: COCKIES

  3: POMMIE POSEUR

  4: BREAKFAST THOUGHTS

  5: DINNER IN LOS ANGELES

  6: EMPIRE-BUILDING

  7: EASY AS PIE

  8: GOLDEN BOY

  9: CITY OF ANGELS

  10: THE CLUB

  11: FOR THOSE IN PERIL FROM THE SEA

  12: BRASS IN MUCK

  13: THE PASTEL FAMILY ON HOLIDAY

  14: COURT, HIPPIES AND LOVE AT FIRST SIGHT

  15: KAREN THE HIPPY

  16: COURT

  17: FALLING IN LOVE WITH RACHEL

  18: MORE DINNER IN LOS ANGELES

  19: ATTILA THE HAMBURGER SALESMAN

  20: COMING TO THE POINT

  21: LOVE AND CONFUSION

  22: A PLAN(ISH)

  23: DAVE AND BILL: AN INVOLUNTARY KILLING

  24: DULL

  25: THE SUBLIME AND THE RIDICULOUS

  26: MODERN BIRTH

  27: DEATH OF A STRANGER

  28: THE PURSUIT OF LOVE. THE DINNER GOES ON

  29: DREAM DATE

  30: TURNING GREEN IN LA

  31: A QUESTION OF PRINCIPLE

  32: CRUSHED IGUANA

  33: IDENTIFYING THE ENEMY

  34: CASE FOR THE DEFENCE

  35: CONNECTIONS

  36: LOVE AMONG THE RADICALS

  37: RADICALLY INEFFECTUAL

  38: THE RETURN OF THE DREADFUL KAREN

  39: DIE BACK DIPLOMACY

  40: THE FHAGWASH

  41: DENIAL

  42: STARK CONSPIRATOR

  43: MAN WITH A MISSION

  44: THE PROBLEM WITH ABORIGINALS

  45: THE COLLAPSE OF A DREAM

  46: HOPE SPRINGS ETERNAL

  47: ON THE BUSINESS OF STARK

  48: POOR BASTARDS

  49: PARADISE LOST

  50: THE DESERT OAK

  51: PROTEST AND SURVIVE

  52: AUSSIE ADS

  53: THE ONE WORLD FESTIVAL

  54: THE USS ENORMOUS

  55: ZIMMERMAN AND WALTER

  56: ZIMMERMAN

  57: WALTER

  58: WALTER AND ZIMMERMAN

  59: BULLENS CREEK

  60: STARK REQUIREMENTS

  61: DULLSVILLE WA

  62: THE NERVE CENTRE OF ECOACTION

  63: SPYING OUT THE LAND

  64: DINNER AND BULLSHIT

  65: A TRICKY PROBLEM

  66: MAKING AN OFFER

  67: JUDGING A BOOK BY ITS COVER

  68: A CALL FROM OCKER TYRON

  69: NAGASYU, THE JOKE AND THE WHALES

  70: HULLO YOUNG LOVERS

  71: MASTERMINDS

  72: TIME IS SHORT

  73: THE FIRST ENEMY OF STARK

  74: SUPPING WITH THE DEVIL

  75: ARISTOS

  76: ARISTOS GETS A JOB

  77: ARISTOS’ MISSION

  78: IN SEARCH OF THE NORSEMAN

  79: BLOOD RELATIONS

  80: PROPOSITION

  81: TYRON’S METHODS

  82: SCREAMS IN THE NIGHT

  83: A STEP TOWARDS EXTINCTION

  84: UNLOADING THE EMPIRE

  85: CURIOSITY KILLED THE CAT

  86: FACEFULL’S

  87: THE ECOACTION TEAM

  88: DINNER NEAR SINGAPORE

  89: GOD’S SPIT AND THE DOMESDAY GROUP

  90: PROFESSOR DURF AND THE AVALANCHE EFFECT

  91: CRASH, BANG, WALLOP

  92: DEATH WARRANT

  93: A MAN WITH A FUTURE

  94: THE POST

  95: STUFF TO DO

  96: JUNK

  97: LETTER FROM LONDON

  98: THE HONEST, DEDICATED JOURNO IS A RARE AND END…

  99: PRIVATE INVESTIGATIONS

  100: DISCOVERING MURDER

  101: FOR THE LOVE OF A GOOD WOMAN

  102: CONNECTIONS

  103: A VISIT TO THE MASTER RACE

  104: CRASH

  105: WELCOME TO THE PLEASURE DOME

  106: DICKHEADS ARE NEWS

  107: DISCO DOWN

  108: HOUSE OF CARDS

  109: GOBBLEDEGOOK

  110: STRATEGIC DECISIONS

  111: PLANNING MEETING

  112: FLIRTING WITH DEATH

  113: THE SALT OF THE EARTH

  114: ENCOUNTER AND DISCOVERY IN THE DESERT

  115: CONFRONTATION

  116: MISSILE FUEL

  117: BOOM TOWN

  118: HOSPITALITY

  119: THE HEAT IS ON

  120: HOT HOUSE HUMANS

  121: THE DARK

  122: CONSPIRACY THEORIES

  123: A LACK OF INTELLIGENCE

  124: KEE
PING A SECRET

  125: THE GATHERING STORM

  126: DOUBLE EURO-NUKE TERROR; FRENCH REACTOR BLOWS…

  127: WARMING GLOW

  128: CLOAK AND DAGGER DETENTE

  129: ON THE RUN

  130: WAITING AND WONDERING

  131: A BIT OF LUCK

  132: THEORIZING

  133: BACK IN BULLENS

  134: SURVIVAL OF THE STRAIGHTEST

  135: NO CHOICE

  136: HUNTED

  137: SALT RUNNING

  138: CLEAN GLOVES AND WARM TONGS

  139: TURNING TO CRIME

  140: BADGE OF RANK

  141: THE HIT

  142: LUCK RUNNING OUT

  143: AIRPORT RESCUE

  144: RECEPTION COMMITTEE

  145: FORSAKEN

  146: TERMINAL TERMINA?

  147: A KNIGHT IN SHINY TROUSERS

  148: MEANWHILE EVERYBODY WAS GETTING CANCER

  149: ZIMM PICKS UP A GIRL

  150: WORLD OPPOSITION TO STARK UNITES

  151: PRISONER OF STARK

  152: THE PROBLEMS AND THE ETHICS OF PREPARING FOR …

  153: TRAPPED IN THE LION’S PORTACABIN

  154: SUCCESS BY A NOSE

  155: DAVID AND GOLIATH

  156: DAVID

  157: GOLIATH

  158: COUNCIL OF WAR

  159: TAKING COVER

  160: THE BRIGHT LIGHTS OF A DARK INTENT

  161: THE GREAT SANDY DESERT

  162: BATTLE AND CAPTURE

  163: IMPRISONMENT AND INTERROGATION

  164: THE CENTRE OF CREATION

  165: MINOR IRRITATIONS

  166: FANCYING THE ENEMY

  167: QUESTION AND ANSWER

  168: ORIGINAL SIN