by Jack Yeovil
Black Hats were working over the consoles. One or two were in poor shape and had been dismantled, tangles of multicoloured wire spilling onto the floor as screwdrivers and soldering-irons were wielded in their insides. Others were operational, and the staff were transmitting test signals. The Black Hats were using a decomissioned but still-functioning satellite for the tests, bouncing messages off it to their HQ in Salt Lake City. Fonvielle was proud that the technology had lasted so well, so long.
The monitors began to hum, and an operator began tracking the target objects. Fonvielle stood over her and looked at the screen, recognizing the familiar ring of dots in their regular orbits. The operator had taken off her Black Hat to get her phones on. Without their hats, they were just ordinary people, if a bit more perfect-faced. Fonvielle laid a hand on her shoulder, and she smiled up at him, displaying white, even rows of enamel.
The target objects circled the globe projection. A printer began to emit a sheet of graph-paper, recording the twelve regular passages through space. Fonvielle looked across the room and saw Grissom, standing unnoticed amid the scurrying Black Hats. The astronaut gave him the thumbs-up, and Fonvielle shakily returned the gesture. He tried to hold back the tears, but they trickled anyway.
The Great Days were back again. At last, the Dream was shared.
They had had a big meeting in the old conference room, the dustsheet coming off the round table with the NASA symbol inlaid into it. The Prezz and his advisors had yanked out a whole mess of spec sheets on imperishable plastic, and outlined the aims and intentions of the project. It was the one he had expected. He still knew all the plans by heart, and he had been itching for another crack at this for better than two and a half decades.
Mars was more romantic, the Moon had more practical applications, and Deep Space was where the scientific data the whitecoats wanted could be scooped. But this was the one that ate him up from the inside. It had never been right, and Fonvielle didn't like leaving it that way. It could be made right, and he wanted it so.
The Prezz gave orders. And Commander Lawrence Jerome Fonvielle snapped off a precise salute.
There was a schedule. There were targets.
And within a month it would finally be done. The Needlepoint System would come on line.
And down here on Earth, the Arms Race would be over.
VI
It was just a couple of swamp shacks on poles, but it had a diner. They had been in an amphibious mode for thirty or forty miles now, the Cadillac's wheels sealed off and the rear motors kicking in. The machine displaced quite a bit of water as it cruised through the thick swampland, and they were leaving a foamy wash behind them. Progress was slower than it had been on the road, but Elvis liked being on the water—if the thick mud and chemical stew that made up the Florida swamps could be called water—and the Cadillac handled, as always, like a streamlined dream. His only worry was that there'd be something toxic in the swamp that would eat the paint off the car's hull. They hadn't crossed streams with anything alive and large enough to be dangerous.
Thanks to an old friend at T-H-R, Elvis' onboard computer had a hook-up into the Gazeteer, the map-making-cum-census-taking service underwritten by the big Agencies. Wacissa was recorded as being still barely populated. The diner was called Casper's Chow-Down, and the trilobite thermidor was triple-starred. But the date of the last check on the entry was eighteen months ago. You couldn't rely on things staying the same for five minutes out here, let alone a year and a half.
Since their tangle with Chamberlain, Krokodil had been sitting quietly, rarely talking. He was intently conscious that the obstruction had been his fight, not hers. In her place, he would be wondering whether hiring the Op had been worthwhile. After all, as she had shown, she could certainly take care of herself in a fight. Elvis was beginning to feel the strain of so much driving, the familiar ache in his neck and shoulders. And he was tired of their road rations.
He pulled the Cadillac up by the diner's jetty, and used the automatic grapple as an anchor. The ve-hickle settled down, waters lapping around the sides.
Krokodil started, as if jolted out of a waking daze. Elvis had noticed the girl occasionally seemed to lapse into vague trance states. That was what cyborgs did instead of sleeping, he knew. The trances were functional. You could live without sleep, but if you didn't dream you went crazy. Sooner or later, the GenTech brain-meddlers would find a way to burn out the dreaming synapses, and Elvis reckoned the whole human race would just have to give up and die, because it wouldn't be worth carrying on. There were some things the brain boys should just leave well enough alone.
"Chow stop," he said.
He knew that Krokodil did eat, if only occasionally. It was probably a habit, like scratching an itch on an amputated leg.
"Fine." She didn't protest. Some of his courier clients objected to anything that slowed down the journey, but as they got nearer Cape Canaveral, Elvis got the impression that the woman was displaying a certain reluctance. She wasn't chicken, the run-in with the hoodheads had demonstrated that, but she was nerving herself up to face something pretty damned formidable out on the Cape. Elvis didn't like to think about the kind of thing Krokodil would find formidable. He had enough nightmares of his own.
The roof rolled back, and the thick, heavy air of the swamp, with its many odours, swept in, blowing away their air-conditioned, pollution-filtered and temperature-regulated bubble of atmosphere.
They stood up, and Krokodil helped him onto the jetty. The old boards creaked under them. Elvis was a little unsteady on his legs after so many straight hours at the wheel. He swivelled his hips to get the circulation moving. A mosquito buzzed by, but a stare from Krokodil warned it off.
"Hi y'all," said a voice. There was someone sitting in a rocking chair on the porch of the diner. "What's yer pleasure?”
Elvis tried to make out the man's shape, but he was shaded by a saggy awning.
"Vittles would go down well, I reckon," he said.
"Yep, I guess they would." The old man laughed, coughing. There was an unhealthy rasp in his chest, as if it were clogged.
"Are you Casper?"
He coughed and laughed again. "Hell, no. Casper done upped and ran off with a li'l high yaller gal a year or so back. I heard he settled down in Cuby with them ceegar-rollers and drug smugglers."
"You run the diner?"
The old man hawked at maximum volume, and spat clear off the jetty. "Nope. You'll find them inside."
"Thank you kindly, sir."
"Don't thank me, boy, until you come out o' the place. You'll find it ain't the same since Casper took off. No sirree, not the same at all."
A spear of sunlight came through the shifting cypresses and landed in the old man's lap. Elvis saw that his hands were knotted with arthritis. They were green and thickly scaled, and his nails were stubby yellow talons. The swamp bred strange things.
Krokodil tugged his sleeve, and they went into the diner.
It was empty of customers, but there was a youngish man standing behind the counter and a woman who could have been his identical twin over by the griddle. The man had a blond crewcut, a pipe clamped between his perfect teeth, a lightweight sports jacket and a Howdy Doody bowtie. The woman had a fluffy blonde perm that had turned to a concrete helmet with pink ribbons, a puffed-out dress, and a tiny, frilly apron. Elvis had the impression that the couple had been posed lifeless as shop-window dummies until the very instant he and Krokodil had come into the diner, wherupon they had sprung miraculously into an imitation of life, like the animatronic presidents in Disneyland.
"Hi, neighbour," said the man. "I'm Donny, and this is my wife Marie. We're here just to serve the Lord, and our good customers. What can I offer you?"
Elvis looked at the menu, which listed plain fare but was covered with curlicue flourishes and smiling cartoon faces licking their lips.
"Recaff, and…tell me, these porkchops you got listed here? They ever walked around as part of a pig?"
&
nbsp; "Yes sir. No vatgrown meat at the Walton Family Diner."
"Great. I'll have a couple of them, smothered in brown gravy, with a side order of fries, salad hold the mayo, and, to follow, a slice of deep-dish apple pie, with ice cream if you've got it and nothing if you ain't."
"Coming right up, sir. And for your lovely wife?"
Krokodil raised the eyebrow over her patch, and didn't say anything.
"She'll just have mineral water. She's on a diet"
Donny grinned even wider. "A figure watcher, eh? Just like Marie."
Mrs Walton giggled wholesomely, and slapped a couple of chops on the griddle. She managed to cook without besmirching her pristine self, and the meal that was set before him on the counter looked as perfectly-arranged and brightly coloured as an illustration in a cookbook. A delicious aroma wafted up and curled into his nostrils.
Elvis took his knife and fork, and began carving into the chops.
"Excuse me, sir," cut in Donny, a tone of good-natured disapproval creeping into his easygoing manner, "but aren't you going to say grace?"
Elvis felt a chill, but bowed his head and mumbled.
"There now," said Marie, "don't you feel better now you've thanked the Lord?"
"Yes, ma'am," he raised a forkful of chop to his mouth.
Marie and Donny linked arms and smiled benignly at him. They could have stepped out of a '50s Sears-Roebuck catalogue, fresh from standing admiringly over their new kidney-shaped coffee table, backyard barbecue or atomic fallout shelter. Behind them, between the framed wedding photographs and the Norman Rockwell prints, Elvis could see embroidered Bible sayings.
Krokodil reached out, her arm moving faster than his eye could register, and she took a grip on his wrist. Not knowing what was happening, he instinctively craned his neck forwards, opening his mouth.
His tastebuds tingled, his saliva glands secreted. The hunk of perfectly done chop, rich brown on the outside with a core of subtle pink, was the most delicious fragment of food he had ever lusted after.
Krokodil forced his hand down, making him lower the fork.
"What?"
Donny and Marie smiled even wider. Nobody could smile that wide. Their smiles were slashes that cut into their cheeks almost to the ear, disclosing sharper and sharper back teeth.
"Is everything all right, sir?" Donny asked.
"We refund your money in full if you aren't satisfied with the food or the service," said Marie.
"They're Josephites," Krokodil said. "I've seen this before."
"Praise the Lord," said Donny, hauling a skeletal European machine pistol out from under the counter.
"…and rejoice as you follow the Path of Joseph," said Marie, pulling two three-feet-long, razor-edged skewers from a rack.
Elvis hit the floor, as the first stream of fire ranged across the diner. Plastic tomatoes leaped in the air and exploded ketchup. Salt and sugar shakers shattered. The checkered plastic tablecloths were shredded. Napkins danced as the bullets tore them apart.
Krokodil was flipping across the room, tables and stools flying out of her path, and Donny was trying to bring up the fire.
Elvis had his derringer out of the small of his back. He sighted on the still-grinning Donny's forehead, and put a ScumStopper into it. His fingers felt wrenched off his hand as the recoil hit him. The derringer was a one-shot fight-finisher.
Donny's perfect tan burst open, and gobbets of flesh flowered above his eyes. But there was no blood, and he kept emptying the machine pistol.
Elvis rolled just in time to avoid Marie's skewers, but the metal speared through the sleeve of his leather jacket, sticking him to the floor. Still simpering, she positioned her other spike over his heart.
"Have a nice day," she said.
Hating to strike a lady, Elvis lashed out with his boot, aiming for Marie's midriff. The skewer above his chest wavered and plunged into linoleum, but his foot felt as if he had just tried to give Mount Rushmore a good, solid kicking.
"Now, now, courtesy is cheap, sir," Marie said as she took his ankle and began twisting it viciously.
Donny's gun wasn't chattering any more. As he reloaded, Krokodil vaulted the counter, and double-kicked him in the head. He shrugged it off, and tried to fit a new clip into his pistol. Krokodil slipped behind him, and tried to pin his arms to his sides.
Elvis felt his bones grinding as Marie smilingly continued the torture.
There was a wrenching sound, and Elvis saw that Krokodil had pulled Donny's arms off. He turned to face her, his pipe still clamped in his mouth, and head-butted her. She went down behind the counter, the thump of their clashing skulls resounding throughout the diner. Donny wasn't bleeding from his shoulders.
Elvis tore his jacket free, and dragged himself upright. Marie still clung to his ankle, and hauled herself across the floor, her smile opening. He kicked at her teeth, trying to prevent her from fastening a poisoned mouth on him. Her hair was still perfect. Her make-up was unsmudged. It was as if her cosmetics were part of her skin.
She was babbling about the Will of the Lord and the Path of Joseph, and Elvis realized just what it was about the Josephites that stroked Krokodil's fur the wrong way.
The bastards weren't freaking human.
Donny came at him, kicking. Elvis felt agony explode in his pelvic girdle.
Marie's mouth gaped. The inside was as red as a firehouse.
And Krokodil exploded through the counter, screaming. Donny half-turned into her first slash with the cleaver, and it lodged in his neck. She should have taken his head clean off, but she simply sank the blade deep as if into a hardwood tree, and was unable to pull it out. Donny's pipe snapped, and Krokodil heart-punched him with what Elvis recognized as a killing karate stroke. The Josephite bumped back against the wall, bringing down a paint-on-velvet print of Whistler's Mother. He lurched forwards, and Krokodil shoved Marie's lost skewer into his stomach. The steel length bent as it went in, but Krokodil pushed hard, and Elvis heard the metal sinking into the wall. Pinned like a butterfly, Donny struggled but was held fast. He still wasn't bleeding, but Elvis couldn't see metal flashing in his wounds. If he was a cyborg, he was some odd new variety the Op wasn't familiar with.
Marie let him go, and slithered backwards like a crab, her starched petticoats flaring like a lizard's ruff. She was hissing like an animal.
Suddenly, the woman pushed against the floor and swung upright like a stepped-on rake. It was a neat, impossible trick.
Elvis pulled his Colt Python and shot Marie a couple of times in the chest. It didn't even slow her down. Her blouse erupted where his slugs went in, and blackened.
"It's no use," Krokodil said. "Bullets don't hurt them."
Marie's smile closed, and she spoke in an even, bright, reasonable tone. "Have you noticed how even with the new blue whiteness in your wash, you still can't get rid of understains, static cling, waxy yellow build-up, unpleasant household odours…"
Krokodil stepped in front of Elvis, and bowed to Marie, a martial arts formality that struck the Op as incredibly inappropriate.
"And is your kitchen floor sparkling fresh, lemony-honeyed, economy-sized, family-friendly, cottage-loaved, kissing sweet, babyskin-soft…"
Krokodil kicked Marie in the face, leaving a dusty footprint.
"Pain, tension, headache? You need fast relief…"
Marie's hands were around Krokodil's throat.
"Honey," said Donny, gargling around the steel in his throat, "I'm home." The lights went out inside his eyes, and he sagged dead against the wall.
An adorable dog ran into the room with a rolled-newspaper and a pair of slippers in its jaws. Elvis shot it, and it rolled away in a mewling ball.
Marie's fingers were sinking into Krokodil's flesh. His employer didn't show pain, but Elvis knew she could be hurt.
He punched Marie in the kidneys to no effect, mashing his knuckles. The woman must wear solid steel foundation garments.
He was flagging. His body could take it, but
inside his mind voices reminded him of his age. When he had first had the Zarathustra treatments, there had been a lot of barracks scuttlebutt about the so-called Dorian Grey Effect. Apparently, some of the first volunteers had done fine for a while but then had the years catch up with them in fast-forward, like the last reel of a horror movie.
With a gasp, Krokodil broke the grip, and landed a right cross on Marie's chin.
"A Godly Home is a Happy Home…"
Yellow fluid was leaking from Marie's eye, like yolk from a cracked egg. She tossed her hair, trying to make herself perfect again.
The Waltons were like refugees from the 1950s. The thought chilled Elvis, as he remembered the decade of the music. They weren't the only leftovers from the years of canasta, Joe McCarthy, sputnik. Sergeant Bilko and Rock Around the Clock. Sometimes, Elvis felt a peculiar sense of responsibility about his longevity, as if he were the last survivor of the Battle of Waterloo or the audience at the Gettysburg Address, and it was all down to him to pass on the memory to an uncaring posterity.
Locked together, Marie and Krokodil crashed against the picture window, which exploded outwards. They rolled together onto the jetty, broke apart, and came up fighting.
Elvis left through the door, looking around for something to use as a weapon.
The porch-sitting old-timer had beat it out of there. Something else was missing, but Elvis didn't have time to think about it
Marie pulled up a board from the pier, and the Op saw polished nails sparkling in it. Krokodil put up an arm, and the board splintered against it.
Elvis found Donny's pistol under his feet. He picked it up, and rammed home the clip. Bullets might not hurt the Josephites, but they couldn't do them much good.