by Steve Tasane
There’s the sound o’ summat smashing. Obnob barks. Banks must have just punched in the dashboard.
“I never meant to!” he wails. “It were just more funnies, weren’t it? Squiggle a line on the kid’s face – would have only stung for a minute – and then boom boom, on we party. Me and you and Alfi-Crow and Grace. Grace my real true-to-life dolly-girl. She were the best gift I ever got given. Thanks, Mr Governor Call-Me Norman. So much. I never meant to!”
Smash again. Another punch to the dashboard. And again. “Never, no, never! I can’t replace her; one of a kind. She – she’s all I ever. I would’ve twisted necks for her, busted up anyone for her.”
The car jerks to one side and I bash against the side o’ the boot. Someone toots their horn. I can feel the steering going all wobbly, and hear him sobbing in the front, not really steering at all.
“Grace!” he’s wailing. “My straight and narrow… My bleeding, bloody heart…”
Obnob gives a bark, and there’s a soft thud against the seat behind me bag. There’s a whimper next to me ear – he’s jumped into the backseat, away from the loon, close to me as he can get. Good doggie…
Up front, Banks is punching Hell out of the car. He’s mad. But he’s right. I’m crying too. How could he do it? Grace were the best thing ever. The best sister, the best mother…
He killed her.
They kill everything good, the Groans.
My mam should never have died.
Or Digit’s sisters.
Or Didge.
It’s Newton, in’t it? Newton and the Jimmys. Destroying everything.
It were Call-Me’s lot that turned me into Alfi Spar. And now they’re going to bury me back at Tenderness House.
Bookmark this. Here’s the Citizen plonked and plumped up in the driver’s seat of a spanking Jag. I zig and I zag like a cabbie on laughing gas, hogging all the lanes, and the pavement when I need to. Citizen Digit is a natural born roadhog. The North Circular Road ain’t never seen anything like it.
Jackson Banks’s pimpmobile Bentley is going to have to zoom full throttle to outrace this mean machine.
Virus fired all our shots. But he didn’t think it through. Newton is finished and Barry, and Banks is finished as well, and when that penny drops, it’s going to be curtains for Alfi too – because the apes are going to go ape.
But then again, Virus didn’t fire all our shots. Citizen Digit is a bullet in a gun, aimed right at the bad guys’ heads.
You want to mess with the WhyPees, do you? ’Cos you think we’re too weak to fight back? ’Cos we’re so small you think you can do what you like to us? Shave our heads and beat us and burn us and feed us to the Jimmymen?
Your mistake, Guvnors.
Jackson’s going to take the most direct route back to Tenderness, so all the Citizen gotta do is the same; keep my peepers peeled for a red Bentley with blacked-out windows and SH4NK1 plates. He’ll be speedy, but I’ll be speediest. JB won’t be wanting to be pulled up by the Traffic Sherlocks when he’s got Angel-Face stuffed in his boot. Citizen Digit, on the other finger, doesn’t give a monkey’s hooter. The more Sherlocks chasing my exhaust pipe the merrier.
The Digit don’t even bother checking his watch because a) he doesn’t have one and b) he’s going so fast he’s leaving time behind. It’s a matter of mere moments before Londinium is left behind too, and we find ourselves jet-fightering up the M1.
Once you’re on three lanes, you can chill a little and check the car radio news reports while Top Gearing along. Three or four junctions pass by and then bingo! Breaking News: Scandal that goes to the heart of the Establishment. Maniac on the motorway (hey, is that him or me?). Police forces across three counties on high alert.
I check the rear-view mirror, see if I’m being trailed by any Sherlocks, but there’s none behind. The Digit has never needed the Sherlocks, indeedly has spent his entirety avoiding their long arms, and what happens the one day you need them? Nowhere to be seen. On high alert indeed. Let’s see if I can make this silver machine go a tad faster, find out if I can raise their alertness levels a bit.
Breaking News: A video has appeared on YouTube, which appears to show Minister Chris Primrose…
Whoo-hoo! The media’s beginning to get up to speed alongside my liberated car and my agitated heart, both roaring along at 100 mph.
…apparently in breach of YouTube’s decency code has been taken down…
Decency code. That’s been well and truly prised apart by Call-Me and the Jimmys. Is it only now that the Authoritariacs have actually noticed?
…available now, in a censored version, on the Guardian website. Meanwhile, Chief Constable Wedderburn—
Ah-hah!
I crane my neck upwards and spot a Heli-Cop hovering over. I’m just thinking this is the final showdown when my peepers clock the media logo on the copter’s belly. I see: literally Sky News. Makes sense, they’re going to get on the case quicker than the old plod.
Citizen Digit needs the police, needs the police, needs the police…
…numberplate sh4nk1. Motorists have been tweeting its location, just north of Junction 27 on the M62. The Transport Minister is advising drivers not to access social media while dri—
Hold your horsepower – I’ve just passed that junction – and, yes indeedly, there he is ahead. Citizen Digit spots the fleeing villain first. It’s the Digit who knows whowhatwherewhenandhow! JB may well be oblivioned to the attention he’s getting from the media, but I seen his eyes. The Mad Dog knows he’s gone on one rampage too many.
I slow the Jag, cruising behind him. He’s doing a steady hundred in the fast lane, which is just breaking the speed limit enough to not get pulled up.
And ta very muchly, I guess Banks has too many voices guffawing round in his head to bother listening to the radio, because all of a sud he’s indicating in and slowing up, the fool! He’s going to pull into a service station.
Beautilicious: Banks has got all this way – the turning for Tenderness House only a mile or two off – and he’s run out of petrol.
I follow suit. This is it. This is my chance. Alfi, I’ll save you yet.
I pull up and wait. Banks fills up, twitching and jerking so much he spills more than he fills. He probably thinks the sound of the media-copter is his own headcogs whirring. He lurches towards the shop.
Paying for anything is against Jackson Banks’s religion, but I suppose he’s trying – thinks he’s trying – to keep a low profile. I can see him all red-eyed and sweaty, like he knows he’s wiping his bloody boots on Satan’s doormat. I clench my fists. Alfi Spar is right there, mere feet away, locked in the boot of the Bentley.
Still no handy Sherlocks hereabouts. Typical.
Okily-doke. I can break into a car boot quicker than any Sherlock anyway.
Keeping my eyeballs on the slow-moving queue, I casualize myself over to the Bentley, dig out my precious magic paperclip and begin to fidget with the lock of the boot.
That’s when the Sky News starts to hover lower. I swear I can feel the wind made by the coptor blades stirring the hairs on the back of my neck. The Digit hates to have an audience. Don’t film me; film the mad psychopath! That’s what your viewers want.
I drop the paperclip.
Can you believe it? I’m on my hands and knees trying to spot where it fell with a live audience getting an aerial view of my clumsy butt. And now the copter blades are sending a strew of litter across the forecourt. My paperclip’ll be blown to Stationery Limbo.
Jackson’s reached the front of the queue. I surrender. Leap to my feet, bounce up and down, throw my arms in the air like a waving Mexican. All right already, the whole world is watching me, I might as well make use of it. So I’m sweeping my arms in the direction of the shop, gesticulating and pointing, trying to force the media chopper to focus on Banks – like I’m a bonkers farmer trying to herd clouds.
Dunno if they see him, but he sees them all right. I’ve never seen him jump before, but he lea
ps right up in the air like a frog poked with a stick. The roar of the copter is all anybody can hear now, and it’s not just JB caught by its noisy windstorm. Everyone else is looking up and pointing too. What’s the point in my even trying? Hello, everybody? Don’t look at the chopper – look at the maniac. Over there! I take my life in my hands and step towards the garage, still pointing and waving at JB, but not a soul is interested.
It’s lucky for me that JB is focused on the chopper now too. He falls into a total panic station, the like of which the Digit has never seen. First thing, without taking his eyes off the sky, he makes a mad dash – and runs straight into a trucker eating a sandwich. Sandwich goes flying, but before the trucker can respond, Banks gives him such a look – like he’s going to rip his head off – that the bloke backs off.
I hurtle back to his car, gesticulating at the boot where Alfi’s locked in. Jumping up and down for the camera, making big arrow signs with my arms and hands. Could I make myself any clearer?
People are noticing Banks now though. They’re backing away from him. And he’s backing away from them. He looks worse than cornered. You can fight your corner. Here, he’s exposed.
He punches himself in the face. Uh-ho. That’s how he gathers his wits. He’s refocusing himself – staring back at the car. Right where I’m stood.
I duck round the side. There’s nowhere for me to go. If he sees me, I’m dead. I’m out of view, but that ain’t going to last for long.
I hear JB coming. He’s jibber-jabbering like a zombie giving a speech.
Under the car I slide, sandwiched between the tarmac and the frame. I see his boots, stampy-stompy, two feet from my face. He opens the door.
Alfi, I’m sorry.
Jackson laughs, or cries, and slams the door. He starts the engine, stalls it, smashes his fists – bam! bam! – against the roof of the car, starts the engine again and roars off.
For half a mo, I’m on a hot beach, lying on the tarmac staring up at the sky blue. Citizen Digit reckons he could stay like this for quite a while, in restfulness. Golden sands. Sky News up above, taking pics. Holiday snaps for the folks back home.
’Cept I ain’t on holiday yet. Up I leap and wave my arms to all my adoring fans. If I’m going to be Hi-Vis, I might as well be Maxi-Hi Vis. Being in the company of Alfi Spar-Face has finally made me surrender the last of my power of invisibility. Thanks, pal; the whole world is Googling me now.
So I do the Digit Dance across the forecourt –let’s be worth seeing. Lookie here, viewers! See the Good Citizen dance!
Ten spins, a shuffle and a bow-wow later, I look up to see Sky News is joined by passing friends. Heli-Cops. Two of them. Circling overhead like vultures over roadkill.
Peeps pointing, and I see a Traffic Sherlock gawping my way, chinwagging his radio.
I make straight for my own wheels. I leap in, hotwire the engine and I’m away. Two Sherlockmobiles pull into the forecourt behind me. As I whizz away, their lights start to flash. I accelerate, and they accelerate, and JB on the motoroad ahead accelerates, and the Heli-Cops buzz down low, tracking the both of us. The game has reached the Highest Level.
Now the Digit has to really put his foot down. One hundred and twenty mph and rising, rising, rising. I could smash right into the back of Jackson’s boot, if it wasn’t filled with a skinny, all-too-snappable Spar-Boy.
And one of the Sherlocks is on my own tail, threatening my very own booty. Oh, you want a race, do you? Formula 140. Second Sherlockmobile drawing up alongside, and passenger Sherlock actually pointing a camera my way. Smile, please! I give ’em my cheesiest.
Two more Sherlocks revving up behind us. The speed dial goes where it’s never gone before, and the steering wheel starts to vibrate like the ferocity is threatening to make the whole car go BANG!
The Sky copter is so low it looks like it’s trying to land on JB’s roof rack. The other side of the motoroad is suddenly empty, like the Sherlocks have blocked all the traffic, and sure enough our own three lanes are filled with nothing but flashing cop cars.
All of a sud, Jackson swerves left, ramming the Sherlocks, sending their wheels skidoodling over the hard shoulder and whizzbanging onto the soft verge.
But then another Sherlockmobile comes up and rams Jackson’s car, and he rams it back and it all goes a bit biff baff boom. I wish they’d have a care, on account of the flesh-and-blood luggage in the boot. Best I can do is tail close as I can, so the Sherlocks can’t squeeze in behind JB and give Alfi an ugly shunting.
Ooof! Now it’s me who’s getting rammed. Not having that, am I? So I ram ’em straight back.
Jackson Banks knows he can’t escape. He can torch his own HQ, try and cremate Grace out of evidence’s way. He can give Virus the kind of sending-off he don’t actually deserve. And he thinks he can bundle Alfi back to Tenderness House, where he’ll be locked up and Jimmyfied. But none of this is of any use when he’s surrounded by Traffic Sherlocks with a Heli-Cop – two Heli-Cops now – dropping on his bonce.
I pull up alongside. I toot my horn and turn my head. Jackson looks at me and his jaw drops. I am dead. I am the Avenger Angel. You thought you killed me? I am back, for my sisters, and for Grace.
The colour fades from his face as he sees me, his unholy ghost. He frowns, puzzling it. He puts his head back, and opens his mouth and lets loose his terror.
He is finished.
So what does he do? He floors it. He zooms forward, swerves the Bentley left, edging tight into the hard shoulder, notches up the speed, and swerves back right. He’s heading straight for the central crash barrier. He’s planning to break through into Southbound.
And just like that, the chase stops.
I didn’t think it through.
Jackson’s car smashes up off the barrier, rolls, over and over, crumples and smokes. He has a tank full of fuel. Two hundred metres down the other side of the road, it comes to a wrecked, awful, stop. For a second, it sits there.
Then, it explodes.
25. NAMED
Ain’t nobody surviving a fireball like that.
I pull up. I get out. All the Sherlocks in their cars do the same. The Heli-Cops land on the other carriageway. We all stand there and stare at the flames.
The car and everything in it, incinerating up into the blue sky. It’s a media free-for-all. Cameramen crawling out of the roadworks. It’s time for the Citizen to disappear again.
I zombie-walk over to the hard shoulder, clamber the barrier and slip down the embankment. Out of Sherlock view, I walk on for twenty minutes or so, then I make my way west, through a farmer’s field. This territory is beginning to feel familiar. I ghost onwards, and after a while I come to a village. Villages are quiet, peaceful. I always used to wonder what people did all day. Now I get it. They don’t do nothing. They just be. I suppose, right now, there’s a certain appeal. I’m so tired all of a sud.
Alfi lived in a village, once. He had a happy foster family, and he used to do nothing as well. He liked that, just being. He told me he used to bake cakes.
So very, very tired. But Citizen Digit is not finished yet. Not quite. There’s a bike leaning outside the village shop. It’s chained, but it’s the sort of lock the Digit can open just by staring at it. Thirty seconds later I’m pedalling away up the road.
I never thought I’d find myself voluntarily going back to Tenderness House. But this time, before he does a stretch in a Relaxation Room of his own, I want to give Norman Newton a talking to. Let my fingers do the talking. I’m normally a passive-fist, but my fingers are itching, just this once, to have a pop at his nosebone, knowing I’ve got Long Arms a stretch or two behind me. I’m all a-clench, thinking of the crack as his hooter snaps out of shape.
I stop at the perimeter fence and let the bike fall to the ground. I glance at the driveway. No police cars, so I guess they’re yet to arrive. Suits me. Once I find my way in, I’m heading straight for Call-Me’s office. Going to shove his face full of Bourbons.
Rest of Ten
derness House is in afternoon lessons, which is just how I like it. I’m planning to surprise him. Go round the back, slip through his Party Lounge, sneak up through the adjoining corridor, pounce like a cat on a rat.
Alfi told me about the escape hole he made in the fence when he liberated himself. I hunt around, find it. I squeeze through. It’s a tight fit. I guess I must be growing big.
Growing. Something that Alfi Spar is never going to do.
My trouser pocket snags on a loose wire, and I’m having to wiggle to get myself free.
“Citizen Digit,” says a voice, up above me. “I should have guessed.”
I feel the car slowing to a halt and then the engine stop. Where are we? Door opens and I hear the petrol cap pop. He’s filling up – it’s a petrol station. Yes! He’ll have to go and pay. It’s now or never. Digit reckoned I’m totally useless in any kind o’ dangerous situation, but what he never knew is that Alfi Spar’s got some skills of his own. What’d he think I did wi’ me life when he wan’t around to muck it up for us?
Digit, you’d be impressed wi’ this, you would. This Great Escape is for you. First up, unzipping the gym bag is a doddle. You just need that little gap where it zips up, waggle your finger in, then, slowly slowly, tooth by tooth, ease it open. Once you can get a hand out it’s just a case o’ feeling round and finding the outside zipper, and then you’re free.
Did you know, Didge, that the bit between a boot and the back seat of a car is – with a bit of elbow grease – completely removable?
Ladles and Gentlespoons, applause, please.
Obnob’s been snuffling and whining in the back seat, and Jackson Banks probably reckons he’d have me nose off as soon as I stick me head through.
But it’s Banks who’d bite a chunk out o’ me face if he found us.
Don’t care. Stick me head out o’ the bag anyway.
Free.
Straight away the dog starts yapping with excitement. It’s a giveaway. Me legs go rubber and I’m gonna mess me pants. Clamber back. Faint. Go under. Shut your eyes. Curl up.