Scat (Scat's Universe, Book 1)

by Jim Graham

  ‘Speak to someone else. You’re not farking real. Get out of my head!’

  ‘I helped you with Petroff. I’m real!’

  ‘I guessed, and I was lucky,’ Scat replied. ‘It was logilly, logicallaly … ah, fark, you know what I mean. I guessed it, that’s all.’

  ‘They’re watching you Scat.’

  ‘Who is?’

  ‘All of them.’

  ‘Who are—all the souls?’ Scat asked, giggling.

  ‘No, you Knuckle Head! Your boys! Look at them.’

  Scat peered through slits, a stupid grin on his face, leaning on Goosen and facing Khan. He swivelled his head back and forth, ending up on Paul.

  ‘What you looking at, Hot Shot?’ he asked.

  Paul didn’t answer right away.

  ‘He’s looking at you, Scat,’ Pierce told him, bluntly. ‘There’s no one else talking to souls.’

  ‘Shut the fark up,’ Scat shouted, turning his head up at nothing in particular.

  Paul frowned.

  ‘Are you always like this when you’ve had a few, Scat?’

  ‘What do you mean, my young pup?’

  ‘No, he’s not, Paul,’ Khan explained. ‘I think he’s been hearing voices for a while now. I think the heebie-jeebies got to him bad.’

  ‘Scat, maybe it’s time for you to see a doctor,’ Goosen suggested. ‘For our sakes at least, eh?’ He laughed, as did Khan.

  Paul took it more seriously.

  ‘Perhaps you should, Scat. Get them out of your head. It isn’t right for you to be going mad. Not now. It’s over.’

  ‘I am not going mad—’ Scat began.

  ‘You certainly aren’t going mad, Scat,’ Pierce agreed, interrupting him.

  ‘Shut the fark up! If I want your farking comments, I’ll ask for them. Sorry, Paul, what was I saying?’

  146

  Scat lay on the medical bay couch in the ex-NARRie dorm, grateful to lie down and close his eyes. He had agreed to see the doctor, if only to calm his friends down, and, perhaps, to get the monkey off his back. Besides, he could always get a bag full of electrolytes: his hangover was beating drums inside his head.

  Pierce was pleased.

  ‘If I’m real, he won’t be able to get rid of me. If he can’t get rid of me, then you’ll know I’m real, right?’

  ‘I doubt it, Pierce. Shut up!’

  ‘Was that him, Scat: Pierce?’ the doctor asked, leaning forward on his booster cushion. He was a small man with a large ego who laid his credentials out for the world to see. Outside, on the reception walls, were the usual degrees and course certificates. On the shelves behind his desk were photographs of himself, shaking hands with politicians and minor celebrities. Scat wasn’t impressed.

  ‘Yes. No. Look, he was telling me that you’ll be totally useless, Doc and that I should get my money back before it’s wasted. He doesn’t reckon you’ll get him out of here,’ Scat said, touching his temple.

  ‘Really? So it started with the heebie-jeebies which were set off by the wormholes, right?’

  There it is, Scat thought, that soft tone of pity.

  ‘Yes,’ Scat confirmed. ‘By the energy source, if you want to be picky. One particular one. The others were OK.’

  ‘Just the one, then,’ the doctor said, making a note. ‘Here on Runnymede. That was the first wormhole, right?’

  ‘Yes, the first one. The rest were OK.’

  ‘Did it start immediately or over time?’

  ‘From day one, then it got worse. I could feel it follow me out onto the new planets, and it would only go away when the wormhole closed. Then I started dreaming bad dreams, though I can’t tell you whether the wormhole was working at the time. I can’t be sure.’

  ‘Bad dreams?’

  ‘Very. Most nights. As though something was trying to speak to me. Ominous scenarios.’

  ‘I was trying to speak to you,’ Pierce confirmed. ‘I couldn’t get through to the others.’

  Scat ignored him but looked uneasy.

  ‘Is he still here?’

  ‘Yes. I mean no. I’m imagining it. I want him out of here. Don’t you have a tape or a programme I can use?’

  The doctor shook his head.

  ‘But the Pathfinders who were fitted with the neuralnet weren’t affected,’ he said, probing to find out why Scat didn’t simply take the easy way out.

  ‘That’s right. Before they were fitted, most of them were affected by it, though not as badly as me. Afterwards, they seemed to get better.’

  ‘And you refused?’

  ‘Yes. They don’t dream at all.’

  The doctor made a note.

  ‘How do you know Pierce isn’t real?’ he asked.

  ‘Because he can’t be, right?’ Scat replied.

  The doctor put his notes to one side and placed his hands together, elbows on the arms of his chair.

  ‘Let’s try this. How about you ask him something about Pierce? Something that only Pierce would know about. Not something you already know, but something we can check up on later.’

  ‘Good idea, Scat. Ask me something!’ Pierce said.

  ‘How would that help?’ Scat asked.

  ‘Well, we need to convince you that Pierce doesn’t exist, don’t we? Once we've done that, we can move on to chiselling him out of that dome of yours.’

  ‘OK. What did Pierce tell me when I was in the observation deck with him, shortly before he died?’

  There was a moment’s silence.

  ‘He said ask me something you wouldn’t know about, Knuckle Head!’ Pierce said scornfully. ‘Look, if you’re going to do this, do it right!’

  The doctor spoke at the same time.

  ‘I said to ask Pierce something you don’t know the answer to, but something we can check up on.’

  Scat shook his head, slowly. His hangover was getting the better of him.

  ‘How about I tell you how I died, and you then go check with Rogers?’ Pierce suggested.

  ‘How do you mean, check with Rogers? Who’s Rogers?’ Scat asked.

  ‘Rogers was the one who vented me, I think. He’s here. He was on Petroff’s team.’

  Scat sat up.

  ‘Rogers vented you? It wasn’t Petroff?’

  ‘Yes. Actually, I’m sure it was Rogers. Petroff ordered it after he had blown me from my body with the neural disrupter. I can remember looking back down at myself. I was still breathing, but I looked, well, “vegetated”. Rogers was panicking. In fact, I recall Petroff telling him that it was a “slip of the wrist”. Then he told him to vent me.’

  ‘Did you see him vent you?’ Scat asked, completely forgetting he was sitting with an ISRA-appointed doctor.

  ‘No. Strange that. I wasn’t truly dead, I was a veggie, but I was snatched away as if I were dead. It was remarkably quick. You know the rest.’

  ‘What did he say, Scat?’ the doctor asked, leaning in closer, looking over to the empty seat that Scat was staring at. ‘Can you see him?’

  ‘Eh? Oh! No, I can’t. He’s just told me Rogers vented him on Petroff’s orders. They’d used too much juice on the neural disrupter. He didn’t see the venting though.’

  He turned back to the empty seat next to him.

  ‘Pierce, why was Petroff using the neural disrupter?’

  ‘Because he was introducing himself. He knew my father was the Old Man …’

  ‘What did he say?’ the Doctor asked.

  ‘Petroff was just being mean. He was letting Pierce know he knew his father.’

  The doctor made some notes. Scat sat silently, waiting for Pierce to say some more, but the on-going silence suggested he was being a little more reflective, not so antsy.

  When the doctor looked back up, he suggested they call a halt for a few moments.

  ‘Go get yourself a dandelion tea, Scat. I’ll call you back in after I’ve made some notes.’

  He waited for Scat to leave the room before picking up his graf from the back shelf. He placed a call.
>
  Scat sat in the anteroom reading and rereading a three-month-old magazine. He could no longer hear Pierce. He wondered whether the last conversation was the closure he needed to get the beggar out of his system.

  He looked at his graf.

  It had been an hour since the doctor asked him to take a seat and he was wondering what was taking so long. No one else had walked in since, so he couldn’t be boring another patient to death.

  He strode across to the reception desk.

  ‘Excuse me, missy, is the Doc taking a nap?’

  ‘No, he isn’t,’ she replied, smiling. ‘Please wait, Mr Scat. He’ll be out in a minute.’

  ‘What the heck?’ Scat told himself. ‘I’m free of the heebie-jeebies at last and I’m no longer responsible for anyone else for the first time in, what, five or six years? Enjoy the moment, Scat.’

  He waited a further 15 minutes, drifting in and out of a half-sleep but snapped-to when Mary Sheffield walked in, disturbing the library-like air of reception. She walked directly into the doctor’s room without acknowledging his presence. A few minutes later, she re-emerged.

  ‘Scat, come with me,’ she said softly. ‘We have some talking to do.’

  147

  Mary stopped at her desk and sat down. Scat took one of the easy chairs arranged to one side of it.

  ‘I’m not mad Mary, so there’s no need to treat me with kid gloves. I won’t shatter or do anything stupid.’

  ‘I’m aware of that Scat,’ she said as she settled down, and readied herself for the next conversation.

  ‘Pierce?’ she said.

  ‘Yes,’ Pierce replied.

  Scat sat bolt upright.

  ‘Pierce?’ Scat asked her. ‘You can talk to him?’

  ‘No,’ she replied. ‘But did he acknowledge me calling him?’

  Scat felt a little angry. Mary was taking the piss.

  ‘Did he?’ she asked more seriously.

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘Pierce, we’ve spoken to Rogers,’ she continued. ‘We offered him leniency if he told us how you died. We told him that we were more interested in Petroff.’

  ‘And?’ Pierce asked.

  Mary sat in silence. Scat realised he was expected to pass it on.

  ‘He says “So?”’

  ‘And he described it pretty much as you did,’ she replied.

  Scat leaned back in his chair. What was happening?

  ‘So do you believe in me now, Scat?’ Pierce asked, triumphantly.

  ‘What the fark do you think I am, Pierce? Peter farking Pan? What’s this “Do I believe in you?” crap?’ Do I get to fly if I do?’

  ‘What is he saying, Scat?’ Mary asked, not quite understanding the current conversation.

  ‘He wants to know if I believe in him.’

  ‘Well tell him that I do. I have very good reason to. Ask him whether there is any way he can make himself known to anyone else, other than you.’ She was hoping to get Scat out of the picture.

  Scat looked sideways at her.

  ‘Why?’

  ‘It’s important Scat. Ask him.’

  Pierce’s reply wasn’t what she was hoping for.

  ‘I’ve tried, Scat, and with everyone who came near the wormhole. I’ve even tried to speak to her. There’s nothing.’

  ‘He says “tough titty”. No, he can’t.’

  Mary gave Scat a scornful look.

  ‘I didn’t say it quite like that, Scat. Don’t make me look bad.’

  ‘He says sorry,’ Scat added.

  ‘Scat!’ Pierce protested.

  ‘I’m sure,’ Mary said dubiously. ‘Ask him if he has ever sensed others like him.’

  That piqued Scat’s curiosity.

  ‘I heard,’ Pierce said. ‘Tell her I did, but only for a short while. Not for long. While I was with them over Prebos. Oh, and then there was another time. Much later.’

  This was all new to Scat. He was getting interested. He explained what Pierce had told her.

  ‘How many?’ she asked.

  ‘Can’t be sure. Lots,’ Scat relayed without changing a word.

  ‘Thank you, Pierce.’

  Mary hadn’t been looking at Scat as she conversed with Pierce but now she looked directly at him.

  ‘Keep this to yourself,’ she said, waiting for Scat to nod. ‘As far as anyone else is concerned, you’ve gotten the monkey off your back and he’s out of your head.’ Again, she waited until he nodded. ‘Do not piss him off. Keep him tight. Don’t lose him.’

  She then looked about the room.

  ‘Pierce? Please do not go anywhere. We need you. I think you know why.’

  Scat couldn’t believe what she was asking him to do.

  ‘Are you kidding me?’

  ‘No Scat. Souls depend on it. Not a word to anyone!’

  In an instant, Scat’s blood pressure changed. He had heard the soul word from Pierce, earlier. Now Mary was throwing it at him. What on Earth was going on?

  148

  The next few days were difficult ones for him.

  Despite Mary having promised him a pardon, Scat had yet to receive it. She claimed they were waiting on confirmation, although for what she didn’t say. He had to face down his colleagues, who continued to taunt him mercilessly about Pierce. And Pierce taunted him whenever he was alone.

  ‘Please Pierce,’ Scat pleaded. ‘I’m begging you. Let me have one night’s sleep without you appearing in my dreams. I can’t take a piss without you looking over my shoulder and making snide comments. You’ve got to back off.’

  ‘I will. When you tell me that you “believe”,’ Pierce said, still amused by Scat’s comparison with Peter Pan. ‘I want to hear you say it.’

  ‘Never!’

  ‘I know you do, Scat. You’re a closet believer.’

  ‘A what?’

  ‘You believe in something other than what you see. A deity, perhaps. A God. Something spiritual anyway.’

  ‘What makes you think that?’ Scat asked, incredulously.

  Pierce carried on as if Scat hadn’t spoken.

  ‘None of the others believe, or even half believe, except for maybe Khoffi. I was getting close to him, you know, until he got neuralnetted, that is.’

  ‘You think that’s why you can speak to me: because I believe in a deity, or a God?’

  ‘Well maybe not believe, Scat. However, I reckon you’re still open to it. You’re not fully trusting in man or his things. You seriously hope there is something else.’

  ‘Pierce, I’m as trusting as the next man, I can assure you. I get farked about because of it. And I wouldn’t know the inside of a church or temple from a police station.’

  ‘You’re not seeing my point, Scat. Let it rest. I’ll make the point again when you’re ready.’

  ‘You condescending fart!’ Scat admonished.

  ‘Not so, Peter,’ Pierce replied in mock protest. ‘I’m just speaking the truth as I see it. So, you want me to take my leave. Well, fair enough. I’ll spread my wings, so to speak!’

  Scat panicked for half a second.

  ‘But I’ll be back,’ Pierce reassured him.

  Not too soon, please, Scat thought to himself.

  ‘Don’t worry. I’ll give you a few days to your precious self. Call me if Mary needs me.’

  149

  Charles Flowers arrived with little fuss. The ORF starflyer was delivering a new group of forensic scientists from Earth to plough through Lynthax’s Runnymede records and he had hitched a ride.

  As he walked across the spaceport apron, shielding his eyes from the sun, Mary walked across to greet him.

  ‘He’s still in the dark, Charles. When you land this thing on him, it’d better sound credible. It’s a big leap in thinking,’ she counselled.

  ‘I appreciate that Mary. We’ve also finished our talks on the incentives.’

  Mary knew he was talking about the ex-rebel incentives, aimed at getting Scat to agree to help them should they need him. It was looking increa
singly likely that they would.

  ‘And …?’

  ‘They’re approved.’

  Mary looked relieved. Flowers added a caveat.

  ‘Given the new situation I doubt it’ll amount to much. Anyway, how could we refuse, knowing what we now know?’

  ‘Exactly, Charles. It’s very different now.’

  They made their way into the spaceport administration offices, completed Flower’s arrival formalities and jumped into the pod.

  ‘The NARRie dorm,’ Mary commanded.

  Scat had enjoyed his two days off and didn’t mind Mary asking him to turn up again at the shrink’s offices in the ex-NARRie dorm. Pierce was AWOL. His team had also eased off ribbing him. They had moved onto Khan, who had taken to praying five times a day.

  ‘Good afternoon, Scat. Rested?’ Mary asked.

  ‘Yes, thanks. The monkey’s gone. What gives?’

  Mary introduced Charles Flowers.

  ‘Scat, take a seat.’

  Scat became wary. A director? What did he want?

  ‘How much have you been able to piece together on your lonesome, Scat? ’ Flowers asked. ‘Much, a little, or nothing at all?’

  ‘About what, sir?’

  ‘Pierce.’

  There they go again. Pierce.

  ‘Yes?’ Pierce asked.

  Scat cringed.

  ‘Nothing. I’ve been doing my best not to think about him.’

  ‘Don’t worry, Scat,’ Mary said, hoping to reassure him. ‘Mr Flowers just wants to talk to him for a short while.’ She then turned to Pierce as though he was sitting next to Scat. ‘Pierce? Mr Flowers would like to ask you a few questions and discuss a few points. Is that OK?’

  Scat made a gesture of resignation and stared out of the window.

  ‘Pierce,’ Flowers began, ‘Are you there?’

  ‘Yes,’ Pierce replied.

  Scat said nothing.

  ‘Tell him I said “yes”, Scat. Don’t sulk.’

  ‘Please, Scat,’ Mary pleaded. ‘Answer for him. We’ll explain afterwards. This is very important,’

  ‘He said, “yes”.’

  ‘Thank you, Scat. Pierce?’ Flowers asked. ‘When did you first realise you were “out of body”?’

  Scat relayed the answer.

  ‘Once I’d been ND’d for the third time. By Rogers. Well, on Petroff’s orders.’

  ‘OK. So not when you were vented?’

  ‘No. Even I consider that odd. You’d think it would have been, but it wasn’t.’

  ‘And then you were put to work on the wormhole?’ Flowers asked, just to confirm he understood the sequence of events.