by Andy Remic
I flicked on TV. Thankfully, Jolly Joker was just finishing his sitcom, where he played himself in a remake of the 2035 hit play: ‘Jolly Joker’s Jolly Jokes and Jolly Japes’ that had been a hit both at the theatre, then at the cinema filmys, then in book and combo–opticube format. His silver face left the screen and music blared announcing the news. It was Kate Jess again:
... thanks Jonny, I’m here at the Royal Swedish University once more to hear the latest on the investigations being carried out by that genius Gerry Cantrell. And yes, his press–release has just been released by his PR and publishing people.
It reads: Research into HRG has taken several exciting turns by way of revealing more facts on this deadliest of viral infections; I have now assembled medical and biological evidence after the study of many subjects, especially the seriously mutated viral cases, and can announce that HRG will further effect SIMs and peps over the next few generations. This evidence also demonstrates that humans will regress further, and this one viral strand will destroy hearing and taste over the next two generations. There is also test evidence coming in of a ‘mutation’ on the HRG virus that causes death within 96 hours; there is no need for panic though, as there have only been 58 victims so far. However, it certainly strengthens the necessity to find a cure for this terrible disease; and if not a cure, then at least a way of preventing further viral evolution.
*
The news item faded and Kate Jess reappeared, and there were several graphs of statistical information that looked like dreg to me urging the population of State not to panic and that the mutated virus that kills within 96 hours had been restrained due to scientific genius and GOV. I laughed out loud then because it was all a madness and the peps were in a panic whether GOV wanted it or not from their stupid announcement. And I knew that the longer it now went without decisive – and positive – news concerning this virus, then everybody would be nervous and scared to the death because it was the biggest threat to mankind since the Red Q Plague of the late 2040s.
I put my Niobium pack together again, drilling the bolts into place and strapping the pack onto my armour.
Then, later, I headed wasteland side to the dregs on my Leviticus 20. And I could feel the increased tension and panic there; a caged beast waiting for a chance to escape.
*
A week passed with much serious grievance, to SIM and pep and reb alike. The atmosphere was bad and you could feel it just walking down the street, or if you went for food or some narco in a public–injecto unit. And everywhere humans were talking about the virus and were scared of the virus, and the tension was rising rising rising like high flames. I stood, one night, in the public injecto; I fancied a bit of public (legal!) narco and the queues to the booths were longer than usual – this I put down to the fear in peps and SIMs surrounding me. This booth was South Side, just over the wire from Outer Dregs and in the distance as I waited in my queue, I could see the dark outline of wasteland and the dregs beyond.
‘Sir?’
‘Some narco,’ I said, stepping forward and the booth slid down to encompass my body; beyond the semi–glass the peps became mere grey–shade blurs.
‘What type, sir?’ crackled the speaker.
I eyed the menu for a few moments, weighing the pleasure with the side–effects; then I said, ‘50 mags of icarus, injection.’
‘Very well, sir.’
The needles slid out, slid in, pierced, delivered; the slap went to my brain and the booth slid open and the air was suddenly cold outside. Icarus was a very powerful drug and on the borderline of legality due to its addictiveness – as the saying went: Take Icarus – Get So High and Then You Die.
There was an argument between two peps, and their voices were high, shrill buzzing insects flitting about my head; vague colours danced before my eyes as I scrambled my way for a privo–settee and this was just the icarus mixing with chemicals in my veins and the remnants of old good bad mandrake; but the voices of the peps stayed with me, faceless, swirling and dancing, nagging at me like a gunshot wife.
‘But it’s all wrong, we need to pump more funds into research; we’ve already lost our eyes, so what will be next, I ask you?’
‘Giving Cantrell GOV funds isn’t the answer. The guy’s a loony, what credentials has he got? Professor at the Royal Swedish University? What sort of proof is that? Fukking loony proof, that’s what it is.’
‘You’re living in a dream world, matey. Your problem is that you’ve reached the plateau – you’re standing on the plateau and you can’t see over the sides and down towards the common herd below. Believe me, I’ve seen peps reach the plateau before, they stand there without a clue as to what to do because the only way is down, but they don’t want to go down!’
‘What are you gibbering about? What plateau? What kak and fukk are you whining about? You listen to too much TV and that Kate Jess she’s a nice one ain’t she? With those legs? How I’d like to get my hands on that smooth skin, feel its softness and work my way up her skirt...’
‘You’re changing the subject again. You and that bloody Kate Jess – that’s what I mean about your plateau – in here, in your head! You’re on it now, you can’t see the wood for the trees, so to speak. You’re operating on a plane so high it’s fukking orbital.’
‘Now you listen, Bob: you panic too easy. All we need to do is use GOV funds to subsidise GOV research; we can beat this Cantrell fellow at his own game. HRG is a load of dreg. I have a SIM friend, an Entropy Vet who has met Cantrell; said he wanted to put a bullet through his fukking eye! Bored the tits off my friend, he did, with his spirals this and RNA that.’
‘Yeah, but that’s SIMs for you ain’t it, they’ll put a bullet through anybody’s eye just for fukking farting, they’re that anally retentive!’ They started to laugh, but must have seen me close by and furious and boiling because they soon were quiet; their debate had ended with my presence not that I cared because I was so high on icarus the world had become a much lesser place. I licked my lips which were dry and tried to catch the colours floating on the edge but they wouldn’t come to me and I heard the hydraulics of my k legs and I chased the colours and my SMKK was out and I seemed to sense people scatter, whining and buzzing, fukking insects, but that was all I remembered before I woke up the next morning.
After giving Emmy her milk and letting her out I switched on TV and felt groggy filled with narco dregs and each channel was filled with debating and news reports and the pictures showed pep disorder and scum and rebs from dregside breaking into State land and there were riots and the film showed buildings burning and Battle SIMs charging the lines with heavy SMKKs blowing humans in half; and yet still the madness went on and I had even heard disturbance on the streets outside my apartment and peps – and even some SIMs! – were marching with placards demanding immediate action from GOV and boy this showed they must have been scared and shitto because to the GOV there was no such thing as a peaceful demonstration and in went the Battle Ds and Es and I ate my oats and salt and leant over my balcony and watched the Battle SIMs rounding up the last straggling protesters and kicking bodies out of their path, and bundling the last of the scum into the back of big Battle Truks where they rattled the caged sides and it took several bullets in soft flesh limbs to quieten them. Some SIMs, mostly Menial Ds and Es, and a couple of Justice As, went crazy with their weapons and a few Battle SIMs were blown smoking across the street with their blood flowing free; but the Battle SIMs were tough bastards and there were many Entropy Vets and they soon sorted out the grievance situation and I finished my porridge and closed my window and hoped that Emmy would be all right out there with all that gun fire and shouting and screaming.
She came back safe and sound anyway, and I had bought her some fresh liver from a butchers when I came off my afternoon Bank Tour; the butcher had laughed and joked about pets when I asked for liver for my cat but he did not drag me into conversation because he was a pep and a low pep and I despise them when I’m in one of my moo
ds brought on by lack of narco or just plain bad temper. I cut the liver into small chunks with a sharp gleaming knife and placed the cubes on a saucer, piled high they were, and I put this on the kitchen floor and Emmy approached cautiously, sniffed, and then wolfed it all down and she was very hungry and she curled up on my knee after that real good feed and I stroked her and felt again at peace, her fur soft under my fingers, her purring touching a chord in my soul and settling my breathing in rhythm with her gentle breathing; settling the boiling rage in my mind.
*
It was 12 night and my Leviticus 20 had been cancelled for a more important SEM; seven Battle Jeeps rolled up outside my apartment block with two HTanks and I readied my armour, met the group of silent, grim Justice and Battle SIMs and was briefed during the journey; it appeared that Gerry Cantrell, the pep doing research into the virus attacking humans had many labs in UK and over wire; presently, defying the curfew, quite a large gathering of rebs had been reported. The major GOV fear was that rebs would attack the laboratories and thus induce Cantrell and his barristers issuing sues against GOV for lack of protection and a failure to keep rebs under control; so we sped with all haste, outside wire gates and into wasteland in force with the HTanks rumbling heavy behind us and their Air–T Tracks skimming lightly six inches above the ground.
It was very black and the Battle Jeeps’ lights cut a great slice of darkness from the night pie as we sped in bumpy silence, all armed and ready for the confrontation. Our guidance man, a Justice C, reported us nearing the scene and the Battle Jeeps slowed and scanners were switched on and I could feel the tension rising and like my comrades punched adrenaline injectors and suddenly the rebs were there and it was frightening finding such a large group out here wasteland side together, and gathered in secrecy and knowing there were so many. There were more than the GOV reports had reported, and there must have been forty of the bastard reb scum and they knew we were coming, they had formed a phalanx of tight infantry as our Jeeps roared to a halt and the HTanks hissed and boomed and fired krumps over our front line and broke the reb ranks; they fled into trenches they had dug – probably days before in preparation – and we assembled and with the smash and crash of krumps up ahead and the flash of mounted TTKK heavy artillery flashing bright in my mech eyes I could have almost been back in Entropy, back in the Old War, and this worried me because I had Emmy to look after now, and if I left her then she would die alone in my apartment and nobody would be there to feed her and let her out...
I shivered. It was a horrible thought and I pushed it from my mind with a grimace and with k legs pumping we charged their lines but they had high good weapons which smashed our armour and they had GOV armour piercing bullets and seven of our SIMs were cut down spewing blood to the wasteland dirt; we retreated in haste when we realised what had happened and my worst fears were true from all those nights ago hunting rebs in the dregs: the rebs were becoming a real threat now, and I had been injured but only in a minor way when a bullet skimmed my bicep and left a red trail in its wake and thus pierced my armour. Incredible! My Niobium pack started making funny sounds as the electron flow was interrupted. I admit that I felt fear then and it was truly like back in Entropy when armour didn’t exist and we were just front–line infantry fodder under bastard orders from bastard COs and not in command and so we let the HTanks pepper the trenches and the reb screams were loud and then slowly the HTanks advanced and we used them for cover to get in close through the heavy smoke and darkness and...
My boots hit the wooden boards in the trench and I crouched low, mech eyes glinting in the gloom. I eased my SMKK about and pointed the glistening barrel down the trench; then I crept forward, my eyes clicking and focusing, reading in detail. The trench was not one trench but a series of interlocking trenches, and the rebs they had been working hard on this for sure. Suddenly one appeared with his terrible rifle with terrible SIM–killer bullets and my SMKK bucked smooth and the round took him in the shoulder and he screamed and dropped fast to the boards, and I was on him, my knee in his throat, my SMKK to his forehead and he was trembling and I growled, ‘Which way did they retreat bastard?’ and he pointed with a shaking finger the whining coward, pointed up the trench from where he had just appeared and my bullet smashed his skull and silenced his whimpering and my SIM comrades appeared from the darkness after securing the line and guards were posted and the rest of us advanced through the groove in dark earth.
I pumped more adrenaline into my system and stepped carefully as the trench wound snake–like ahead, and we were three–wide and advancing and suddenly bullets screamed from up ahead and our SMKKs were on spray and we dived forward and the SIM on my left took bullets in the face through his armour and died and vomited blood over the boards and over me, but I kept my finger tight until the mag clicked empty; a sudden silence descended and it was strangely calm. I looked back, gestured to two Battle Es who did not argue with my orders and they climbed out from the trench and circled around; I could hear the HTanks closing on our position and suddenly the Battle Es attacked up ahead and the rebs were screaming and trying to escape and were chased towards us by the Battle Es’ bullets – and me and my SIM comrade caught them in a cross–fire and they were between hammer and anvil and were crushed like the evil little bugs they were. They went down in pieces. In slick chunks.
Smoke filled the trench.
It was over.
A great weariness overcame me then, and I realised I had been hit by the GOV armour piercing bullets and I think I might have screamed for my blood was flowing thick and fast and staining the boards and I had a bullet in the chest and a bullet in my shoulder and a fukking bullet in my thigh which hurt the most and the pain was like a sheet of ice dragged over my body in cold red hues.
I remembered the narco, and the HTanks were there, and I was stretchered aboard and given immediate injecto to relieve the pain and I remember dropping my SMKK and it clattered on the boards in the reb trench, and then my mech eyes went out and for a long, long time all was blackness.
*
‘get out of the fukking way!’ screamed mission and i hit the ground hard and fast and tasted mud so foul and burning and the guns roared over my head and bullets flew and all was an insane nightmare of bright grey and noise and he was beside me, I heard the ‘oof’ as breath was expelled from his lungs and i looked sharply left into mission’s face and he was smiling and i thought we had won, but no, i suddenly realised there was blood on his teeth and i reached out as all around raged the final battle of entropy and i touched his hot skin still dappled and streaked with sweat and cam cream and splashed mud and his mech eyes were still glowing and i realised it was because his battery pack was intact and yet he was dead... i crawled over him, covered his dead body with my own to protect his corpse from further shrapnel, further desecration and i know it was irrational but my mind had gone blank and i knew i was going to die anyway in that final terrible dark battle...
*
I do not remember much of my eight days in hospital; in surgery the bullets were removed, I was given blood, my wounds were glued and I was kept narco’d to the fukking tits and hot hot with chemicals in my new blood and pumping heavy through my veins.
I remember nurses, their faces blurring and passing before me and I healed fast being a SIM umbilicated and free but they kept me full of narco, mainly icarus and joy. I remember the food being fukk–awful but nobody visited me and I managed to get a nurse to contact Sullivan, and have him go over to my apartment to feed Emmy and check she was OK and let her out for fresh air.
He was a good friend, Sullivan, and did this favour for me whilst I was in that hospital place in pain and weak and I had many dreams and in many of them stood Mission with blood on his teeth and his body hitting the ground hard and those final moments as I dived across him and the world exploded in fire and ice.
*
I came awake in the simcab on my way home; my face was cold, where it had been pressed against the glass and I could see
rain falling heavy outside and drumming metallic on the simcab’s roof. I groaned, but the driver ignored me, and I rubbed my temple and rolled the stiff muscles of my neck and shoulders.
‘Where are we?’ said I.
‘15th West. Emerald Precinct.’
That reminded me of my cat. Of Emmy.
I had been in hospital for eight days and Sullivan had called in on the last, had told me Emmy was OK. But I still wanted to see. I wanted to see for myself.
‘Pull in over there,’ I said to the simcab driver and he gave me a contemptuous look and I would have liked to have blown his face off but killing arrogant simcab drivers was banned by GOV – actually made illegal – or we’d have no drivers left because that’s the way they just were.
I was still incredibly weak after my wounding and stay in hospital, and I still felt naked without armour. Sullivan was still ‘making’ me a new suit. But I was on sick leave now at least – three bullets are a good way of putting a SIM out of action – and I decided to treat this spare time away from dregs and tours as a sort of holiday; at least try to enjoy it despite my weakened state. Try to relax. Unwind. De–SIM.
The simcab cruised to a halt by the curb, and with a grunt of pain I jabbed the door mech and the alloy shell, which resembled a ladybird, opened; I heaved my bulk out onto the pavement and stood for a moment, feeling the rain on my face and lifting to look at the dark sky.
‘Wait for me,’ I said.
‘OK cunt,’ said the driver, because he could.
Along the street glittered neon lights from 24 hour shops; I walked slowly along concrete, my boots dull and heavy, my movements somewhat lethargic; that was it, I suddenly realised – Emerald Precinct. The name, it had reminded me of Emmy my cat and I was looking forward lots to seeing her and I stopped before a pet shop and peered at the rain–smeared glass.
With my heavy glove I rubbed away water and the movement made me wince, my face screwing up tight; the nurses had stitched and glued me up good at South State Hospital and I could feel the stitches in my flesh – in the shoulder, in my chest – and in my thigh, the hole that burned me with its pain now more than the others. Glue–fix crackled. It hurt like a motherfukker.