The Solaris Book of New Science Fiction, Vol. 2

by George Mann

  After an hour the rats lit their fires behind the barns. Smiling to himself, Mason picked up another bottle of whisky and went out to join the party. By midnight the area was strewn with snoring rats and the chewed carcasses of pigeons, whereupon Mason, a little unsteady on his feet, set to work with his own wheel barrow. He counted two hundred and seventy rats into the back of the trailer and locked them in with a couple of buckets of water and some grain.

  The men from Rathammer arrived in the morning in two parcel vans and began to unload and program the TT15s. Keeping well back, Mason watched with disgust as the horrible chrome scorpions scuttled off into the fields. Beasley refused an invite into the house and stayed in the back of one of the vans, at a monitoring station with his two companions. Mason joined them.

  Three kills were reported in the first half an hour. By dinner time there had been eight and the TT15s had nearly completed their sweep. Mason guessed that took care of the teetotallers.

  “How strange,” said Beasley noncommittally.

  “Bloody Ministry,” said one of his companions.

  Mason nodded and smiled in his best thick inbred farmer manner and went to start work on Combine Bertha. Later he felt a momentary panic upon seeing one of the men head out into the fields with some kind of detector. Eventually the man returned with a crushed and burnt TT15.

  “Do you have heavy machinery operating out there, Mr. Mason?” Beasley asked him shortly after.

  “Yes, an autotractor.”

  “One that does not recognise standard agri-codes… I would be grateful if you would stand it down while we make our second sweep.”

  Mason went into his house, called up the autotractor through its satellite link, and ordered it to shut itself down for the next three hours before returning.

  The second sweep yielded only another three rats and Beasley reluctantly filled out an ABD45 for Mason. With greater reluctance Mason filled out a cheque and handed it over. As the two parcel vans departed, the autotractor returned from the fields towing its sealed trailer. Mason wiped his oily hands on his overalls and went to release some very hung-over and pissed-off rats. After that he kept his head down when he saw the catapult trained on his kitchen door.

  The rats relented late in the afternoon two days after their ordeal. There came a scratching at the kitchen door and Mason opened it cautiously to see the black rat standing there regarding him. The peace offering was an old milk bottle filled with grain spirit and a cold roast pigeon. He passed on the pigeon since he preferred his birds gutted before they were cooked, and peered out into the yard.

  The autotractor was back with what appeared to be the entire rat population sitting around it and on it. Two hundred and seventy heads turned to regard Mason and then as one turned back to regard the verminator on the tractor. Even from where he stood Mason could see the device was damaged. So that was it. He walked out to take a look.

  “Autotractor, access code seven three two, Mason. Run diagnostic on-”

  “The verminator is damaged. Replacement with M87 Rapifire with a two thousand round box of caseless plutonium needles or with a Zunigun armor-piercing laser is optimal.”

  That confirmed Ericson’s sources. Mason shook his head and climbed up onto the tractor to inspect the verminator. Rats sat on the cowling watching him, the tractor’s optics above them. It took him only a moment to realize the verminator had been wasted, probably by a low branch.

  “Mason!”

  The shout had an edge of hysteria, and Mason turned to watch a bedraggled figure dismounting from a bicycle. The Ministry man did not look at all happy. He glared at all the rats on and about the tractor, and began rubbing his hands on the front of his rumpled jacket as if he could not get them clean. Complete disgust twisted his features. When he returned his attention to Mason, his hands fisted round the material of his jacket.

  “I have been demoted,” he said, a quaver in his voice and his eyes as big as an owl’s. “I have been demoted because of my inaccurate assessment of the rat problem in this area.”

  Mason thought there must be something more involved in this demotion. As he understood it, incompetence in the civil service usually led to promotion. However, the true facts aside it seemed this official considered Mason to blame. When the man turned to his bicycle to unstrap his briefcase, Mason could see his hands were shaking.

  “Now I see the truth,” the Ministry man continued, spittle appearing on his chin.

  Mason noted that the rats were now abandoning the autotractor and fleeing. Even they recognized that a crazy man had arrived. From his briefcase The Man from the Ministry extracted a thick wad of forms.

  “No one makes a fool out of me! You will fill in forms DXA99 through to 403!” He started to step from foot to foot as if his shoes were too tight, waving the wad of forms to emphasize his words. “You will be fined, your latest crops will be condemned, and you will bear the cost of a full Traptech sweep!” Some of the forms slid from the wad and were being picked up by a breeze, whereupon Mason noted the autotractor’s ruined verminator tracking their progress. “When I return to the Ministry your ABD45 will be cancelled! This time there will be a body count!” His movements became even more frenetic and his bicycle fell over. Spittle now flew from his pointy teeth.

  “Enemy?” wondered the autotractor, and its engine started. Mason hurriedly leapt to the ground. Showing an immediate grasp of the situation the few remaining rats leapt down as well and all of them still in sight ran for cover. Such was his frenzy the Ministry man hardly noticed.

  “I want to see dead rats! I want to see hundreds of dead rats! This is war, Mason! You do not fool with The Ministry!”

  “Enemy,” snarled the autotractor, and with its wheels kicking up gravel it spun a hundred and eighty degrees to face the Ministry man, whose mouth abruptly dropped open. Remaining forms thumped down into the mud. Mason heard the verminator clicking ineffectually as the engine snarled out a cloud of black smoke.

  “Stop,” he said without much conviction.

  Its huge cleated tyres kicking up great clumps of mud, the autotractor hurtled forward. The Ministry man screamed and ran, his cycle-clipped trousers hiked up and his sock-suspenders showing. Mason watched him sprinting across the fields in storklike bounds with the tractor in hot pursuit, and soon lost sight of the both of them in the twilight.

  The autotractor returned when it was fully dark, but Mason was sitting at his kitchen table a third of a bottle under by then, and in no pain. He did not bother to find out what had happened. Later, when he peered out of the kitchen window, he saw that the barbecue fires had been lit, yet the tractor had bagged no pigeons that day. Some other meat was on the menu. Mason stayed indoors and finished the bottle. He never heard from that particular Ministry man again, and he hid the bicycle under a dung heap.

  Modern Times

  A Jerry Cornelius story

  By Michael Moorcock

  THE GOLDEN AGE

  MINIATURE phones you carry in your pocket and that use satellite tracking technology to pinpoint your location to just a few centimeters; itty-bitty tags that supermarkets use to track their products; bus passes that simultaneously monitor your body temperature to find out how often you are having sex…

  -James Harkin, New Statesman,

  15 January 2007

  WASHINGTON, April 24-President Bush and Vice President Dick Cheney aggressively challenged the motives of Congressional Democrats on Tuesday, as the House and Senate prepared to consider a war spending bill that would order troops to be withdrawn from Iraq beginning later this year.

  -New York Times,

  25 April 2007

  1. A MYSTERY IN MOTLEY

  Madness has been the instigator of so much suffering and destruction in the world throughout the ages that it is vitally important to uncover its mechanisms.

  -Publisher’s advertisement Schizophrenia:

  The Bearded Lady Disease

  The smell of pine and blood and sweet mincemeat, cak
es and pies and printing ink, a touch of ice in the air, a golden aura from shops and stalls. Apples and oranges: fresh fruit, chipolata sausages. “Come on girls, get another turkey for a neighbour. Buy a ten pounder, get another ten pounder with it. Give me a fiver. Twenty five pounds - give us a fiver, love. Come on, ladies, buy a pound and I’ll throw in another pound with it. Absolutely free.” Flash business as the hour comes round. No space in the cold room for all that meat. No cold room at all for that fruit and veg. The decorations and fancies have to be gone before the season changes. “Two boxes of crackers, love, look at these fancy paper plates. I’ll tell you what, I’ll throw in a tablecloth. Give us a quid for the lot. Give us a quid thank you, sir. Thanks, love. That lady there, Alf. Thank you, love. Merry Christmas. Merry Christmas.”

  “I hate the way they commercialise everything these days.”

  “That’s right, love. A couple of chickens, there you go, love - and I’ll tell you what - here’s a pound of chipos for nothing. Merry Christmas! Merry Christmas! Merry Christmas! Seven pound sacks. Two bob. No. Two sacks for half a dollar. Half a dollar for two, love. Last you the rest of the year. Stand up, darling. Here, Bob, hold the fort, I’m dying for a slash. Dolly mixtures, two bags for a shilling. Two for a shilling, love. That’s it, darling! Genuine Airfix they are, sir. All the same price. Those little boys are going to wake up laughing when they see what Santa’s brought them. Go on, sir, try it out. I’ll throw in the batteries. Give it a go, sir. No, it’s all right, son. Not your fault. It went off the kerb. I saw it happen. Go on, no damage. I’ll tell you what, give me ten bob for the two. Tanner each, missis. You’ll pay three and six for one in Woolworths. I’ll tell you what. Go in and have a look. If I’m wrong I’ll give you both of ‘em free. Hot doughnuts! Hot doughnuts. Watch out, young lady, that fat’s boiling. How many do you want? Don’t do that, lad, if you’re not buying it. Get some cocoa. Over here, Jack. This lady wants some cocoa, don’t you, darling? Brussels. Brussels. Five pounds a shilling. Come on, darling-keep ‘em out on the step. You don’t need a fridge in this weather.”

  Now as the sky darkens over the uneven roofs of the road, there’s a touch of silver in the air. It’s rain at first, then sleet, then snow. It is snow. Softly falling snow. They lift their heads, warm under hoods and hats, their faces framed by scarves and turned up collars. (Harlequin goes flitting past, dark blue cloak over chequered suit, heading for the panto and late, dark footprints left behind before they fill up again.) A new murmur. Snow. It’s snow. “Merry Christmas, my love! Merry Christmas.” Deep-chested laughter. Sounds like Santa’s about. The students stop to watch the snow. The men with their children point up into the drawing night. Merry Christmas! Merry Christmas! It’s a miracle. Proof that all the disappointments of the past year are disappearing and all the promises are really going to be kept. “Happy Christmas, darling. Happy Christmas!” The Salvation Army stops on the corner of Latimer Road. The tuba player takes out his vacuum of tea, sips, blows an experimental blast. Glowing gold flows from the pub and onto the cracked and littered pavement. A sudden roar before the door closes again. “Merry Christmas!”

  A boy of about seven holds his younger sister’s hand, laughing at the flakes falling on their upturned faces. His cheeks are bright from cold and warm grease. His thin face frowns in happy concentration.

  “Here you go, darling. Shove it in your oven. Of course it’ll go. Have it for a quid.” All the canny last minute shoppers picking up their bargains, choosing what they can from what’s too big or too small or too much, what’s left over or can’t be sold tomorrow or next week. It has to be sold tonight. “I’ll tell you what, love. Give us a monkey for the lot.” Merry Christmas. Merry Christmas - sparking toys - little windmills, tanks, and miniature artillery - glittering foil, tinsel, and trinkets. Clattering, clicking, nattering, chattering, clanking, whizzing, hissing, swishing, splashing the street with cascades of tiny lights. Multicolored bulbs winking and shivering, red, white, blue, green, and silver.

  Stacks of tightly bound trees, already shedding ripples of needles, some rootless, freshly sawn, some still with their roots. The smell of fresh sawdust, of earth. The smell of a distant forest. The boy knows he has to get a big one and it has to have roots. “Five bob, son. That’s bigger than you, that is. Give us four. Six foot if it’s an inch. Beautiful roots. What you going to do with it after? Plant it in the garden? That’ll grow nicely for next year. Never buy another tree. That’ll last you a lifetime, that will.”

  Jerry holds his money tight in his fist, shoved down between his woollen glove and his hot flesh. He has his list. He knows what his mum has to have. Some brussels. Some potatoes. Parsnips. Onions. Chipolatas. The biggest turkey they’ll let him have for two quid. Looks like he’ll get a huge one for that. And in his other glove is the tree money. He must buy some more candle-holders if he sees them. And a few decorations if he has anything left over. And some sweets. He knows how to get the bargains. She trusts him, mum does. She knows what Cathy’s like. Cathy, his sister, would hold out the money for the first first turkey offered, but Jerry goes up to Portwine’s, to the chuckling ruby-faced giant who fancies his mum. Nothing makes a fat old-fashioned butcher happier than being kind to a kid at Christmas. He looks down over his swollen belly, his bloodied apron. (“Wotcher, young Jerry. What can I do you for?) Turkeys! Turkeys! Come on love. Best in the market. Go on, have two. (Ten bob to you, Jerry.)” There’s a row of huge unclaimed turkeys hanging like felons on hooks in the window. Blood red prices slashed. Jerry knows he can come back. Cathy smiles at Mr. Portwine. The little flirt. She’s learning. That smile’s worth a bird all by itself. Down towards Blenheim Crescent. Dewhurst’s doing a good few, too. Down further, on both sides of the road. Plenty of turkeys, chickens, geese, pheasants. “Fowl a-plenty,” he says to himself with relish. Down all the way to Oxford Gardens, to the cheap end where already every vegetable is half the price it is at the top. The snow settles on their heads and shoulders and through the busy, joyful business of the noisy market comes the syncopated clatter of a barrel organ. God rest ye, merry gentlemen, The First Noel, The Holly and the Ivy cycled out at the same manic pace as the organ-grinder turns his handle and holds out his black velvet bag.

  “Merry Christmas! Merry Christmas!” His hat is covered in melting snow but his arm moves the crank with the same disciplined regularity it’s turned for forty years or more. Away in a Manger. Good King Wenscleslas. O, Tannenbaum. O, Tannenbaum. Silent Night. Rudolf the Red-Nosed Reindeer. Cathy puts a halfpenny in his hat for luck, but Jerry’s never known his luck to change one way or another from giving anything to the barrel organ man. He pulls Cathy’s hand on for fear her generosity will beggar them. “Come on. We’ll do that butcher right at the top. Then we’ll work our way down.” There’s no such thing as a frozen turkey here. Not in any Portobello butcher’s worth the name, And all the veg is fresh from Covent Garden. And all the fruit is there for the handling, though the stall-holders affect shocked disgust when the middle-class women, copying French models, reach to feel. “No need for that, love. It’s all fresh. Don’t worry, darling, it won’t get any harder if you squeeze it.” Dirty laughter does the trick. “Ha, ha, ha!” Gin and best bitter add nuance to the innuendo. Panatella smoke drifts from the warm pubs. Chestnuts roast and pop on red hot oil-drum braziers. The ladies smile back nervously, leaving it to their working class sisters to tell the stall holders off for the filth in their voices. “Come on love. Two bob a pound to you.” And Jerry looks behind him. “It was all true,” he says. “It really was. Every Christmas.”

  “Well, possibly.” Miss Brunner’s attention was on the present. The thing was big enough at any rate, in red, gold, and green shining paper and a spotted black and white bow. You don’t beat Christmas for horrible color combinations.

  “Of course, it couldn’t last.” He contemplated the best way of opening the present without messing up the wrapping. “The snow, I mean. Turned to sleet almost immediately. By the time w
e got home with the turkey it was pelting down rain. I had to go back for the tree. At least I could hold it over my head on the way.” He’d opened it. The brown cardboard box was revealed, covered in black and blue printed legends and specifications. Automatically he neatly folded the wrapping. He couldn’t have been more appreciative. There was the familiar sans serif brand name in bars of red, white, and blue. “Oh, blimey! A new Banning.”

  Shakey Mo Collier beamed through his scrubby beard. “I got another for myself at the same time. Joe’s Guns had a two-for-one.”

  Using a Mackintosh chair she’d found, Miss Brunner had built a blaze in the ornamental grate. Smoke and cinders were blowing everywhere. “There’s nothing like a fire on Christmas morning.” She drew back the heavy Morris curtains. There was a touch of gray in the black. Somewhere a motor grunted and shuffled. “Don’t worry,” she said. “I think it’s dead.”

  Carefully, Jerry peeled the scotch tape from the box. The number in big letters was beside a picture of the gun itself. BM-152A. He reached in and drew out a ziploc full of heavy clips. “Oh, God! Ammo included.” His eyes were touched with silver. “I don’t deserve friends like you.”

  “Shall we get started?” She smoothed the skirt of her tweed two-piece, indicating the three identical Gent’s Royal Albert bicycles she’d brought up from the basement. “We’re running out of time.”

  “Back to good old sixty four.” Mo smacked his lips. “Even earlier, if we pedal fast enough. OK, me old mucker. Strap that thing on and let’s go go go!”

  They wheeled their bikes out through the side door of the V&A into Exhibition Road. White flakes settled on the shoulders of Jerry’s black car coat. He knew yet another thrill of delight. “Snow!”