by Kim Newman
Robin stopped cajoling. ‘Get ready to be remaindered, squitch!’
His voice was behind the right door. She took aim at it.
There was a pause.
Left door. Right door. Left door. Right door.
He came through the wall, to the extreme left. There was almost no lath and plaster left, all he had to do was tear through a sheet of flowered paper. He had IR shades on. She recognised the kind with a homing facility.
He had been tracking her somehow. There had been a third concealment, one she’d not found. Rats. He had the edge now.
Robin smiled, ‘Wedding ring, dear.’
The squidge.
He shot her in the hip and she fell over, sprawling rather than crouching. The impact hit like a mailed fist and waves of warmth ran through her. It was a sensation. Her back arched and her mouth hung open. Her stifled cry dislodged the blackcaps. She had enough control to spit them out, to prevent herself choking. Her altered nerve endings mistranslated the signals from her wound. Caught up in the rush of feelings, she was nevertheless able to exaggerate her helplessness. She floundered, twitching helplessly. Robin came closer and shot her through the lung, missing her heart because she twisted under him. He was too close. The quickill slug went through her and fragmented somewhere in the floor, porcupining her back with splinters.
‘Sweetheart,’ she gasped, squeezing in her first shot. She was hurting now, for real. The confusion of pain and pleasure didn’t affect her body control. He took the slugs in his lower belly and thighs and bent double. She knew where his alterations were. He spasmed, and squeezed his grip too much. Slugs sprayed the room in a figure eight. Light flashes gave his dance of death a disco strobe. He stitched her a few times, but she kept her roscoe arm whole.
She got him several times. Knees, for balance. Belly again, for pain. Heart, for the remainder. He went down. The stink made the air thick. His clothes caught fire where the slugs had gone in. The little flames, light-amplified, burned into her lensed eyes. She slithered over to him on her elbows, face down. He was still drawing coughy breaths, and slobbering strawberry spittle.
Before she finished, she stroked his face and neck, leaving her marks, opening his pipes. The last she heard was his final crackle of exhalation. She fell, relaxing, over his remain, and blanked.
Later, the Resurrection Men brought them back. They revived together in their own bed, fast-fading milky scars where their holes had been. The Game Official told them she had won, on points.
After everyone had left, Robin was ungracious. They hadn’t been able to get all the slugs out and had had to promise to return and finish the recovery work for a further fee. He had an unwanted alteration, an extra testicle made of lead. She cuddled close to him under their duvet, feeling the odd weighting of his asymmetrical scrotum.
He was still being a skulk. She squeezed him gently.
‘Darling,’ she said, ‘how was it for you?’
ABOUT THE AUTHOR
Kim Newman is a novelist, critic and broadcaster. His fiction includes The Night Mayor, Bad Dreams, Jago, the Anno Dracula novels and stories, The Quorum and Life’s Lottery, all currently being reissued by Titan Books, Professor Moriarty: The Hound of the D’Urbervilles published by Titan Books and The Vampire Genevieve and Orgy of the Blood Parasites as Jack Yeovil. His non-fiction books include the seminal Nightmare Movies (recently reissued by Bloomsbury in an updated edition), Ghastly Beyond Belief (with Neil Gaiman), Horror: 100 Best Books (with Stephen Jones), Wild West Movies, The BFI Companion to Horror, Millennium Movies and BFI Classics studies of Cat People and Doctor Who.
He is a contributing editor to Sight & Sound and Empire magazines (writing Empire’s popular Video Dungeon column), has written and broadcast widely on a range of topics, and scripted radio and television documentaries. His stories ‘Week Woman’ and ‘Ubermensch’ have been adapted into an episode of the TV series The Hunger and an Australian short film; he has directed and written a tiny film Missing Girl. Following his Radio 4 play ‘Cry Babies’, he wrote an episode (‘Phish Phood’) for Radio 7’s series The Man in Black.
His official website can be found at www.johnnyalucard.com
AVAILABLE NOW FROM TITAN BOOKS
ANNO DRACULA
by KIM NEWMAN
It is 1888 and Queen Victoria has remarried, taking as her new consort the Wallachian Prince infamously known as Count Dracula. His polluted bloodline spreads through London as its citizens increasingly choose to become vampires.
In the grim backstreets of Whitechapel, a killer known as ‘Silver Knife’ is cutting down vampire girls. The eternally young vampire Geneviève Dieudonné and Charles Beauregard of the Diogenes Club are drawn together as they both hunt the sadistic killer, bringing them ever closer to England’s most bloodthirsty ruler yet.
Shortlisted for the
Bram Stoker Vampire Novel of the Century Award
by the Horror Writers Association
“Compulsory reading… glorious.” Neil Gaiman
“A tour de force which succeeds brilliantly.” The Times
TITANBOOKS.COM
ANNO DRACULA
THE BLOODY RED BARON
by KIM NEWMAN
1918 and Dracula is commander-in-chief of the armies of Germany and Austria-Hungary. The war of the great powers in Europe is also a war between the living and the dead. As ever the Diogenes Club is at the heart of British Intelligence and Charles Beauregard and his protégé Edwin Winthrop go head-to-head with the lethal vampire flying machine that is the Bloody Red Baron…
A brand-new edition, with additional unpublished novella, of the critically acclaimed bestselling sequel to Anno Dracula.
“…stunning follow-up to his inventive alternate-world fantasy, Anno Dracula…” Publisher’s Weekly
“Gripping… superbly researched… Newman’s rich novel rises above genre… A superior sequel to Anno Dracula, itself a benchmark for vampire fiction.” Kirkus Reviews
TITANBOOKS.COM
ANNO DRACULA
DRACULA CHA CHA CHA
by KIM NEWMAN
Rome, 1959, and Count Dracula is about to marry the Moldavian Princess Asa Vajda. Journalist Kate Reed flies into the city to visit the ailing Charles Beauregard and his vampire companion Geneviève. She finds herself caught up in the mystery of the Crimson Executioner who is bloodily dispatching vampire elders in the city. She is on his trail, as is the un-dead British secret agent Bond.
A brand-new edition, with additional previously unpublished novella, of the popular third instalment of the Anno Dracula series.
“He writes with sparkling verve and peppers the text with cinematic and literary references. Dracula Cha Cha Cha has full rations of gore, shocks and sly laughs.” The Times
“Like the blood gelato lapped by the un-dead demimonde, this novel is a rich and fulfilling confection.” Publishers Weekly
TITANBOOKS.COM
ANNO DRACULA
JOHNNY ALUCARD
by KIM NEWMAN
New York, 1976, and Kate Reed is on the set of Francis Ford Coppola’s movie Dracula. She helps a young vampire boy, Ion Popescu, who leaves Transylvania for America. In the States, Popescu becomes Johnny Pop and attaches himself to Andy Warhol, inventing a new drug which confers vampire powers on its users…
A brand-new novel in the Anno Dracula series, this fourth instalment sees Dracula take Andy Warhol’s New York and Orson Welles’ Hollywood.
“Massively entertaining.” Booklist starred review
“Compulsively readable, bitingly satirical.” Guardian
“Outrageously inventive.” Independent
TITANBOOKS.COM
JAGO
by KIM NEWMAN
In the tiny English village of Alder, dreams and nightmares are beginning to come true. Creatures from local legend, science fiction and the dark side of the human mind prowl the town.
Paul, a young academic composing a thesis about the end of the world, and his girlfriend Hazel
, a potter, have come to Alder for the summer. Their idea of a rural retreat gradually sours as the laws of nature begin to break down around them. Paul and Hazel are soon drawn into a vortex of fear as violent chaos engulfs the community and the village prepares to reap a harvest of horror.
A brand-new edition of the critically acclaimed novel. This edition also contains the short stories ‘Ratting’, ‘Great Western’ and ‘The Man on the Clapham Omnibus’.
“A roaring good read.” The Times
“Newman’s prose is sophisticated and his narrative drive irresistible.” Publishers Weekly
TITANBOOKS.COM
THE QUORUM
by KIM NEWMAN
In the polluted River Thames, a monster is born. Formed of filth and grime, Derek Leech emerges from the murky depths, destined to found a global media empire.
In 1978, three school friends with high aspirations – Michael, Mark and Mickey – are offered a deal by the mysterious magnate. If they agree, their future wealth will be ensured, but they must offer Leech a sacrifice in return, a conspiracy of lifelong pain against their absent friend, Neil. Accepting the terms, the men prosper over the next fifteen years. But as the era of excess comes to an end, the trio must pay the price for their success, and they soon discover that fame and fortune is a fate worse than death.
A brand-new edition of the critically acclaimed novel, featuring five short stories by the award-winning author.
“Fascinating, witty and sage.” Library Journal
TITANBOOKS.COM
LIFE’S LOTTERY
by KIM NEWMAN
At six years old you’re asked to make a choice, the first of many in a multitude of possible lives.
If you make the right decision, you may live a long happy life, or be immensely powerful, or win the lottery. If you take the wrong path, you may become a murderer, die young, make every mistake possible, or make no impression on life at all. The choice is yours. And by making the choices you do, you will change forever the lives of your family, your friends, your enemies, and your lovers. You can even change the fate of the world; all you have to do is choose…
An adult role-playing novel where small decisions have monumental consequences.
“Curiously unsettling but always gripping… like nothing else you have ever read.” The Times
“The hero’s life is in your hands… an epic read.” Guardian
TITANBOOKS.COM