by Tom Holt
IN THE BLUE CORNER REPRESENTING HEAVEN . . .
Too late now to make a bad day’s work good. Eventually there comes a time when all that matters, or at least all you think about, is doing the job and doing it well, and it doesn’t matter whether or not it’s a lousy rotten job that someone has to do. At the end abide integrity, skill at arms and the money, these three, and the greatest of these is the money. Everything else is vanity, vanity of vanities.
AND IN THE RED CORNER REPRESENTING MARKET FORCES . . .
A very great deal of money, it went without saying.
‘Well?’ demanded Bragi, the blind Norse god of poetry. ‘Have they started yet?’
There are those who’d have you believe that the post of Norse god of poetry must be, at best, a sinecure and, in all likelihood, a leg-pull (like the First Lord of the Swiss Admiralty or the Australian cultural attaché). Very few such sceptics have ever said anything of the sort to Bragi’s face, however, and those foolish enough to have done so tend to be easily identified by their false teeth and crooked smiles. It’s amazing how much damage a lead-weighted white stick can do at close quarters.
‘I don’t know,’ replied Ahriman, the Parsee Prince of Darkness. ‘That dozy cow in front of me’s got her hat on, so I can’t see a damn thing.’
‘I heard that. And it’s not a hat, it’s the top of my head.’
‘Sorry, Medusa, didn’t realise it was you. Look, have they started yet?’
The serpent-haired Queen of Terror shook her head. ‘Our chap’s out there already but their bloke hasn’t shown yet. With luck he’ll be out of time and we can claim victory by def . . . No, here he is, dammit. Booo!’
Medusa scowled. If looks could kill - if looks could still kill despite cataracts and glaucoma . . .
‘What’s he got?’ Bragi demanded.
‘Um.’ Medusa squinted. ‘Guns and things, I think. To be honest with you, I’m not very well up on these modern gadgets.’
‘If it’s Kurt Lundqvist,’ Ahriman interrupted knowledgeably, ‘it’ll be the .40 Glock and the Remington 870. He’s done all his best jobs with them.’
Bragi raised a redundant eyebrow. ‘What’s a Glock?’ he asked.
‘It’s a sort of gun. Actually it’s a state-of-the-art compact polymer-framed double-action semi-automatic handgun with—’
‘Glock?’
‘That’s right, Glock.’
‘Oh for crying out loud,’ exclaimed Bragi. ‘You sure it’s not a Colt or something? There’s masses of rhymes for Colt.’
Ahriman pushed aside a dreadlock of vipers and peered through his binoculars. ‘No,’ he said, ‘definitely the Glock. Adopted by law enforcement agencies worldwide, this revolutionary design—’
‘Block,’ muttered Bragi, ‘clock, dock, hock, jock, knock. What are they doing now, by the way?’
‘Shaking hands, I think. That or arm-wrestling.’
‘Lock, mock, nock, rock, sock . . .’
‘And now,’ said Ahriman, ‘the referee’s talking to them. Saying he wants a good clean fight, I expect, though personally I never saw a clean fight in all my life. Dust on your trouser knees at the very least.’
‘Is there such a word as yock?’
‘I have a feeling,’ said Medusa sadly, ‘that this is going to be a very short fight. Anyone like a sugared almond?’
‘Not for me, thanks. Here, did you know some of your green mambas’ve got split ends?’
‘That’s their tongues, idiot.’
‘There’s absolutely nothing at all that rhymes with Remington,’ Bragi complained bitterly, ‘except possibly Leamington, and really that should be Leamington Spa, so you’d have to have Spa as an enjambement on the next line. Why can’t the bastard use a spear like everybody else?’
‘Hey up,’ Ahriman interrupted. ‘They’re going back to their corners. I don’t think I want to watch this.’
‘Frock, crock, broch, pillock . . .’
The whistle went.
Nothing personal; Lundqvist jacked a round into the chamber of the Remington and fired. There was the usual universe-filling boom . . .
He blinked. At a target fifteen yards away, with a short-barrelled shotgun loaded with #00 Buck, it’s virtually impossible to miss unless you’re inadvertently standing with your back to your opponent. For a moment his brain was in freefall; and then he picked up a voice on the short wave of his subconscious. Or rather, not a voice. A smirk.
Osiris, you bastard, you’re helping him.
Certainly not. It just so happens that all of the little bullet things went wide. No violation of the laws of physics there, I promise you. After all, the shotgun is scarcely an instrument of precision.
You’re cheating.
Absolutely not. It was just one of those unforseeable fluke events, like a whole bag of coins falling on the floor tails upwards.What we in the trade call an Act of God.
We’ll see about that, Lundqvist growled. He slammed back the action, chambered another round and fired.
Would it be Brownian motion I’m thinking of, or is it Thingummy’s principle of uncertainty? I’m rather a latecomer at physics, because in my day the sky was held up on the back of the goddess Nuth. Now you may think you know a thing or two about lumbago . . .
Before his conscious mind could override, Carl was on to him. Sand exploded in his face while the baseball bat sent the shotgun spinning across the arena into the crowd . . .
(‘Stock, shock, cock, who threw that? Just wait till I get my hands on whoever . . .’)
Oh good, said Lundqvist’s subconscious mind, mortal danger; now we know where we are. Before Carl could bring the bat down, Lundqvist dropped his shoulder, side-stepped, hit the ground and rolled. By the time Carl knew where he’d got to he was on his feet, the knife in his right hand. Carl struck out hard, and if he’d connected there can be no doubt that Lundqvist’s head would have ended up in the press box. As it was, the bat whistled through empty air and a fraction of a second later, Carl was on the sand, vaguely wondering in those parts of his mind still open for business exactly why his legs had suddenly folded up like a Taiwanese shooting stick, and what had happened to the lungful of air he’d invested in only moments previously.
Lundqvist straightened his back and drew his pistol. It was extremely likely that he’d broken a bone in his foot, and there were small bits of glass from his watch sticking in his ear. Apart from that, he was back on top . . .
All right.You win.
When you’re around gods, time tends to have all the value and relevance of a fifty-lire note. In the short space of time between the front pad of Lundqvist’s forefinger tightening on the trigger of the Glock and the hammer falling, the following subliminal dialogue took place:
Do I?
Seems like it. Go on, pull the damn trigger, get it over with.
But I don’t want to.
You don’t?
Apparently not.
Tough. Should have thought of that before you became the greatest assassin the world has ever seen, shouldn’t you?
But hey, I’m on your side, you fucker. You want me to do this?
I want you to do what’s right. That’s what we created you people for, for gods’ sake. If you can’t do a perfectly simple thing like solving an insoluble moral dilemma . . .
The hammer quivered as the sear began to roll out of its notch. In the members’ enclosure, Julian was smiling. And something deep inside Lundqvist’s head grabbed the mike, and shouted.
‘Dragon King of the South-East,’ it shouted, ‘get your great scaly ass over here.’
G’day.
‘Third wish, right?’
Fair go, sport. What’s it to be?
‘I need,’ said Lundqvist, ‘an act of God. Can you manage that?’
No worries. Strikes me you don’t need one the way you’re set, but—
‘Do something.’
Like what, mate? I’m not a flamin’ mind reader, you know.
‘Jam t
he gun. Take all the powder out of the cartridge. I don’t know. Just do it, okay?’
Like a rat up a drain, mate. Here’s luck.
The hammer fell.
Nothing happened.
‘What’s happening?’
‘I can’t see,’ Ahriman snapped. ‘Look, either keep your bloody pets under control or get a haircut, all right?’
‘I’m sorry. I washed my snakes last night and now I can’t do a thing with them.’
‘He’s just standing there,’ Ahriman said. ‘The gun didn’t go off and he’s just standing there like he’s waiting for ivy to grow up him or something. He’s not even trying to clear the gun, although with the unique toggle action of the Glock, clearing a first position stoppage is an extremely simple—’
‘Why?’ Bragi howled. ‘This is ludicrous. Blow yer whistle, you great fairy!’
‘Now he’s looking up,’ Ahriman went on. ‘Blowed if I know what it is he’s seen. Hang about, though, there’s something . . . Looks like some kind of bird. No, it’s too big, it’s more like a . . . Well, if I didn’t know better I’d say it was a . . .’
‘Doesn’t look like Old Trafford to me,’ Thor objected.
‘I can’t help it if you can’t read a map.’
‘And even if it is,’ Thor continued, ‘somehow I don’t think they’d be overjoyed if we go and park this damn great thing right in the middle of the playing area.’
‘Ah,’ said Odin. ‘Actually, it’s not as if we’ve got a great deal of choice in the matter.’
‘I see.’
Odin braced himself in his seat and gripped the joystick firmly in his right hand. ‘Hold on tight,’ he said. ‘I should be able to bring her in smoothly if only I could just . . .’
If I were you, I’d get out of there quick.
‘Yes, boss.’
I mean really quick.
‘Yes, boss. Boss?’
Well?
‘How far should I go, boss?’
Oh, I think about five yards should do the trick.
‘Oh,’ said Bragi. ‘Does that mean we’ve won?’
Ahriman opened his eyes. He could see Carl, slowly getting up off the ground. He could see the traction engine, or at least the part of it which wasn’t embedded in the earth. He could see Thor bashing Odin over the head with a length of mangled driveshaft, while Frey made a show of dusting off his elbows. He could see Julian, standing up and walking swiftly towards the fire exit. He couldn’t see Lundqvist; but, since the sight of blood always made him feel faint, that was probably just as well.
‘I think so,’ he said. ‘Just because it was a pure fluke doesn’t mean to say it doesn’t count.’
‘Pure fluke?’
‘Act of God, you might say. Right, madam, just so much as another hiss and I’ll take you down the salon myself and see to it they give you a perm you’ll never forget, do I make myself clear?’
The immortal soul of Kurt Lundqvist stood up, brushed bits of body off its trouser knees, and looked down. Being an immortal soul, it had no lunch to bring up, which was probably just as well.
‘Hey,’ it yelled at the cosmos, ‘I was using that!’
No reply.
In the back of its residual consciousness, it could remember something it had once read in a Gideon Bible about how the trumpet shall sound and the dead shall be raised incorruptible, and it thought, Just my stinking luck. Come Judgement Day, and I’ll be the only one going round Eternity with a flat head, one foot at right angles to the other and carrying my left arm. Thank you very, very much.
Unless, it speculated, they patch you up first.
Yes, well, that might be something of a mixed blessing, bearing in mind the standards of celestial reconstruction work he’d seen recently. If Osiris was anything to go by (and he was a goddam god, remember, so presumably he merited the Grade A custom deluxe service) divine reconstitution would leave him looking like something brought home from school by a nine-year-old just starting pottery classes.
It ain’t so reliable, what they say in the Bible, it ain’t necessarily so. Or at least, the soul fervently hoped it wasn’t. It reckoned it had done its bit for these people, one way or another, and the thought of dwelling in the House of the Lord for ever as the human equivalent of a Skoda was not pleasant.
The gods as creators; the whole cosmos a Friday afternoon job if ever there was one. The imperishable part of Kurt Lundqvist shook its head and walked away.
The first thing we’ll do, we’ll kill all the lawyers.
No, Osiris reflected, that’s looking through the wrong end of the telescope. If we’re going to do this thing, we may as well do it properly.
He rose slowly out of Carl’s body and resumed his own. It was like stepping out of the water back into the air.
‘All right, people,’ he said, ‘gather round.’
The gods went into a huddle.
Nobody knows what actually happened to Julian Magus and the godchildren, although there are a number of extremely imaginative myths, most of which fail to convince simply because they were concocted by people who don’t actually know what brimstone is.
The truth is that Julian had made plans for this, as for all other contingencies; and, like ninety-nine point seven per cent of all Julian’s plans, this one worked flawlessly. Within ninety seconds of Lundqvist’s death he was clambering into a waiting helicopter clutching two suitcases full of uncut diamonds, while the in-flight plastic surgeon sterilised his instruments.
‘Alpha Centauri,’ he snapped to the pilot, ‘and step on it.’
There are places where even the gods won’t follow you; and, once you’ve come to terms with the fact that the beaches are blue and the ocean is yellow, and the combined power of all three suns isn’t enough to convert the first taramasalata pink on the shoulders and back into true California golden brown, the good life can be successfully synthesised as well there as anywhere else. Beware, however, of ninety-nine point seven per cent success. After Julian had been in Alpha City for just under three years he was waylaid by a smooth-talking financial services consultant who persuaded him to invest his entire capital in Amalgamated Heliconium 37½% Unsecured Loan Stock, and is now earning his living as a washer-up at Z[i4kh98/98fß***sgwy’s Bayside Diner at the unfashionable end of Neutron Cove.
For the record, he’s never been happier; which only goes to show that where gods are concerned there’s no justice, but there is, occasionally, mercy.
It began to rain.
‘Be reasonable,’ Pan yelled, as the water started to seep through the seams of his oilskins. ‘What the hell are we going to need tarantula spiders for anyway?’
‘Two of them,’ Osiris replied, from the shelter of the covered wheelhouse. ‘Sharpish. And remember to get a male and a female.’
The level was rising fast. Pan growled, gripped the handles of his supermarket trolley, and squelched away.
When a god wants an ark in a hurry, he doesn’t muck about waking people up in the middle of the night and giving detailed specifications in cubits; he simply ordains, and there it is, riding at anchor, ready for the statutory whack round the gunwales with seventy centilitres of Moet. It was big, comfortable and well-equipped, which was a good thing in the circumstances; because this time, nobody was going to be left behind.
Sandra looked in to report on her inventory of the ship’s stores. ‘We’ve got,’ she said, ‘five hundred billion rounds of egg and watercress, seventy billion small cardboard cartons of orange juice, ninety billion Mars bars, forty-six billion packets of peanuts and twenty-seven billion cubic tons of freeze-dried Red Mountain coffee. Do you think that’ll be enough?’
Another good thing about being a god is that people do what they’re told. No sooner had the first big rain-drop splatted itself like a summer bluebottle against a windscreen than the human race, all of them fast asleep, began to form orderly queues at the designated embarkation points, whence they were collected in winged minibuses. The only small gnat in the o
intment was the distinctly unethical behaviour of Mercury, god of thieves, who managed to get the fast food concession for the embarkation points by asking Osiris for it when he was busy with something else. Sad to say, not one human being got on to the ark without first buying a frankfurter in a roll, smeared with blood-red sauce.
‘Sugar?’
‘I knew I’d forgotten something.’
‘Never mind.’ To the gods all things are possible. ‘Let there be sugar. It doesn’t actually matter,’ Osiris went on, ‘because all this is all illusion anyway, but there’s no point in upsetting people unnecessarily. How about biscuits?’
‘The whole of C Deck is full of biscuits,’ Sandra replied. ‘If it’s an illusion, why bother?’
Osiris looked up from his charts. They were plain, unmarked blue, apart from a tiny dot representing the peak of Mount Ararat. ‘It’s like building an office block,’ he said. ‘You put up hoardings until the work is finished, so that people only see it when it’s complete. It looks better that way.’
‘Ah.’
Osiris shrugged, so that his yachting cap flopped down over his left eye. ‘Besides,’ he added, ‘the other gods won’t believe in it unless we do it this way. You’ve got to remember that your average god is about as conservative as you can get, or otherwise how come they spent thousands of years making the crops grow on manual?’
The other gods spent the entire voyage on A deck, lounging beside the pool and throwing empty cans and bottles into the water. The New Mythology states that just before the waters subsided on the third day, all these bottles drifted together and formed the continent of Australia. One of the good things about the New Mythology is that it’s usually more convincing than the truth.