by Heide Goody
“And so many misplaced apostrophes. My old English teacher would explode. Do they not spellcheck these?”
“I like to think there’s a street gang somewhere with deliberately misspelled tattoos who kill people who point out the mistakes.”
“Unlikely.”
“I said I’d like to think it. Didn’t say it was true.”
“Can’t they sue the tattooist?”
“It’s like sign writers. The customer gets what the customer asks for.”
Morag made a disagreeable noise. “I don’t understand why people do it. I think you’ve got to be seriously shallow to think you can have a personality painted onto your skin.”
Rod cleared his throat meaningfully.
“Really?” she said. “Where?”
Rod rolled up his sleeve. “Had it done the week after I was airlifted out of the Syrian Desert.”
“And here I was thinking it was going to be an ‘intimate’ tattoo.” Morag read the thick gothic script on his upper arm. “Carpe diem.”
“The thinking man’s YOLO,” he said.
“But you were in the SAS.”
“I can neither confirm nor deny.”
“You’re not allowed tattoos.”
“Aye. It was also my sort of resignation note. What I’d seen beneath that desert was enough to shake all my assumptions about the world and what I was doing with my life.”
“What happened?” asked Morag.
“Lois not tell you?” he said. “Surprised. Queen of gossip, that woman. I got separated from my patrol outside Al-Qa’im. This was back in the Second Gulf War. The big one. We were helping the Americans put a stopper in the flow of military hardware coming across the border from – Ay up, what’s this?”
Morag looked up. Down the road, the door to the previously closed tattoo shop opened. A man and a woman, both of them thin as rakes, stepped out.
“You think it’s our Bluenose tattooist?” said Rod.
“It is,” said Morag.
“You reckon.”
“Look at that fresh tattoo on the woman’s arm. Venislarn.”
Rod tried to get a good look. “You know,” he said, “I’d be able to see better and feel a flaming bit less conspicuous if there weren’t a pair of ginger toms sat on the bonnet, pawing at the windscreen.”
Rod tried putting on the windscreen wipers to startle the cats, but they pounced, wide eyed upon the moving blades, clearly enjoying the game.
“Sorry.”
“Didn’t say it was your fault.”
“Oh, it is,” said Morag. “This body spray…”
Rod sniffed and shrugged.
“Are we going to collar these two, then?”
The tattooist had the woman’s elbow in a firm grip as they walked away.
“I’d be interested to see where they’re going,” said Morag.
“Aye,” said Rod. “Me too.”
Nina wished sex shops didn’t smell.
Night Pleasures on Milk Street had clearly made an effort to be welcoming and respectable. It wasn’t a dingy cave of suspicious cinematic delights and dubious sex toys overseen by a miserable troll who had been ground down by the day in day out of peddling smut to furtive men in long coats. Night Pleasures was a bright, cheery and well-organised grotto of erotica and filth. Light samba music played in the background and the shaven-headed woman behind the counter greeted Nina with an upbeat ‘Afternoon!’ when she entered. But the smell…
Nina browsed a little. The DVD selection had been organised with ruthless precision.
She had a pretty good idea of what she’d find in BDSM, but paused to examine what Double-Stuffed MILF might contain, so to speak. She skated quickly over Diaper Fantasies but the sheer scale of the Vocational section took her breath away. Plumbers, nuns, milkmen — all available, complete with their specialist equipment.
There was even a selection of porno reworkings of a popular series of magical movies. Nina was quite tempted to get Harry Poked-her and the Prisoner of Ass-to-Spank out of sheer curiosity.
In an age when the porn industry had almost entirely moved online, a place like this had to survive on personal service and giving the customer exactly what they wanted.
Nina was impressed. It was just a shame about the smell.
She supposed there wasn’t much to be done about it. All that rubber and latex and leather. All those little jars and tubes of lubricants and spray. People didn’t complain that carpet shops had that carpet shop smell, or that IKEA had that furniture shop smell. Maybe she shouldn’t complain about sex shops having that sex shop smell. It wasn’t like they could prop open the door to get the air circulating.
“You all right there, love?” called the shopkeeper.
“Yep, just browsing,” said Nina and held up a copy of Harry Poked-her and the Orgy of the Penis as evidence. The Shawspank Redemption slid forward to take its place.
The shop did sell handcuffs and other items for recreational bondage but not exactly the same cuffs that Izzy Wu had used. Nina went to the counter.
“I wonder if you could help me?” Nina asked.
“I’ll try,” said the shopkeeper.
“My friend, Izzy, bought some handcuffs. I’m not sure if they were from this shop.”
“Have you seen our selection in the alcove?”
“Yes. I was looking for some exactly the same as hers.”
“Exactly?”
“Yes,” said Nina. “This is one of those ‘dead rabbit’ situations where I need to replace them before someone notices.”
“Can you describe them?”
Nina pulled a face.
“No, I’m…” She dug in her pocket for a phone. “This is Izzy. Do you, perhaps, recall selling them to her?”
The shopkeeper looked at the phone and then immediately looked up into the corner of the room at a CCTV camera. An interesting development, thought Nina.
“I could ask Tony,” said the shopkeeper.
“Tony?”
“He runs the shop sometimes.”
“That would be lovely,” said Nina, sweetly.
“Bear with me.” The shopkeeper came from behind the counter and went to a curtained-off door. There was the rattle of keys and the woman was gone.
Nina paused a moment or two, twiddled with a penis-shaped toothbrush on the counter and then followed the woman. The hardboard door behind the curtain had a Yale lock but the shopkeeper had left it on the latch. Careless. Nina cautiously pushed it open. A set of stairs led down. A purple-green light lit the lowest stone steps.
“Okay.”
She made her way down as quietly as possible. Beyond the turn in the stairs, the steps continued on down more than a storey. Nina could just about make out voices ahead.
“— about one of Ben’s girls,” the shopkeeper was saying.
The next voice was deep and guttural and Nina couldn’t make out the words.
“I don’t know,” said the shopkeeper. “What do you mean she’s not in the shop?”
Nina reached the bottom step. The sub-cellar was large. Curved brick arches like whale bones supported the ceiling. Near to, brick dust covered the floor. Further in, plaster walls had been put up and concrete flooring laid. Hooks had been drilled into the ceiling to support light rigs. A fuse board had been set into the wall and leads ran from it to recording equipment, mixing desks and computers.
She had walked onto a film set.
A red velvet sheet had been thrown over a concrete platform in the middle of the room. The naked woman laid upon it stared dreamily at some markings on her forearm. The samakha between her thighs made a noise like a vacuum cleaner trying to suck up jelly. Nina couldn’t tell if either of them was really putting much effort or emotion into their performances.
Off to the side, four barely dressed women lounged on bean bags. Two of them were passing an e-cigarette back and forth. All had tattoos, Nina noted.
“Well, I’ll be…” said Nina.
A third samakh
a – cameraman, director and sound guy all rolled into one – turned from his conversation with the shopkeeper to see Nina. He wore a Yankees baseball cap, black shades and enough sparkling fake gold chains to give someone bling blindness.
“What da bhul?” baseball cap said.
“No, no,” said the shopkeeper startled. “You can’t be here.”
“It’s okay,” said Nina. “I know Tony T. Tony T knows me.”
Tony T took off his sunglasses and squinted. “Ggh! Muda!” he said.
“I don’t get it,” said Nina. “You wear those things indoors. They don’t even cover your eyes. Your eyes are in the wrong place for… To hell with it. Excuse me. You. Yes, you. Could you perhaps quit doing the nasty with Debbie Does Dolphins there. That, that noise is really off-putting.” The samakha on the platform didn’t even pause in his ministrations.
Nina turned to Tony T. “Jesus, does someone need to say ‘cut’ or something?”
“Oi! Pup!” shouted Tony T. “Quit it! The feds – ggh! – are here!”
The samakha stopped and looked up. “Ggh! What?”
“‘What’ he says,” sighed Nina.
The other naked samakha was on his feet. He had a nervous energy about him, probably an inkling of the trouble that he was in, and Nina couldn’t be sure if he had decided between fight and flight.
“Easy, big boy,” she said. “Is that a crab stick you’ve got there or are you happy to see me?”
The fish boy visibly wilted at her words. The shopkeeper was making a faint keening sound, as though she was about to burst into tears.
“This has nothing to do with me,” she said. “I had no idea.”
“You had no idea the Waters Crew were running a fish porn movie studio in your basement? I’ve got to admit, it’s really surprising. Not what I was expecting. I came down those stairs and saw this and, I’ve gotta say I was shocked, bhul-me-sideways shocked.” She held up a warning finger to the nervous samakha. “That wasn’t a request, by the way.”
“Listen, please,” said Tony T. “We weren’t – ggh! – doing no harm.”
“I’m all for freedom of creative expression,” said Nina. “And I even admire your entrepreneurial spirit, but I’ve got a couple of issues. I don’t think any of these other women are registered as samakha associates.”
“Oh, come on, dog.”
“And then there’s the small matter of your gang’s involvement in an attempted break-in at the Library.”
That was it. Clearly, enough blood had returned to his head to allow the tall, nervous one to make a decision and he broke. But he didn’t make to run past Nina; he turned, thrust aside a hanging sheet and fled naked through a door that Nina hadn''t noticed.
“Hell!” she spat.
Before she could give chase, though, the samakha was back: staggering, screaming and swatting at – Nina had to double-check – yes, at a black cat that had inexplicably become attached to his groin. Its teeth and claws were pinned to his fish-and-two-veg. Intriguingly, he was followed in by Rod and Morag pushing a pasty man and woman before them and trailing a short retinue of stray cats behind them.
The cats immediately hissed at the samakha lads. The one on the platform, Pup, leapt to his feet and covered his exposed codpiece.
“Nina,” said Rod.
“How did you get in?” Nina asked.
Morag gestured behind them. “A lock up in the railway arches. Followed these two.”
Nina pointed upwards. “Sex shop. Where Izzy bought the cuffs, or maybe her boyfriend.”
“Help me!” squealed the cat-savaged fish boy as he rolled around on the floor in the grip of an enraged pussy.
“I’m going nowhere near that,” said Rod. “Now what the bloody heck is going on here?”
“Our friends have been filming their own dirty movies,” said Nina, “and, by the looks of it, not just for their own entertainment.”
Pup shifted unhappily as cats circled him hissing.
“These girls drugged up?” Rod looked at the waiting women.
Morag crouched beside the women on the bean bags. None of them had been remotely startled by the interruptions. The two smokers were still passing the e-cigarette back and forth, zombie-like.
“Zahir tattoos.” She had to make a conscious effort to close her eyes and pull her gaze away. “God, I don’t know but these could be high-power stuff.”
“Zahirs?” said Nina.
“What better way to keep your… your cattle in line? Get them hooked on viral images. Drag their tiny minds into cages.”
Nina looked at the women. They weren’t just skinny movie fodder; they were skin and bones, their wills and minds lost in recursive visual loops. She threw an angry glance at the tattooist but the look on his face revealed that he was a victim of his own creations.
“I’m phoning Ingrid,” said Rod. “We’re going to need some sort of containment here.”
“And we’ll need to register all these people as Venislarn associates,” said Nina.
“If they live that long,” said Morag.
Nina felt fury rise within her. “Tony, you complete low-life. You absolute bottom feeder.”
“What?”
Nina gestured angrily at the used women. “Who gave you the zahirs?”
“Ggh! I don’t know what you’re talking about.”
“Don’t,” she said firmly. “It’s time to fess up, Tony. Get a grip! I don’t want you to make it any harder than it has to be. It’s in your hands, don’t blow it.”
“I’m not blowing – ggh! – nothing,” said Tony fearfully.
“Good. Because I want to get right down to it. I want everything you’ve got and if you’re not going to give it to me then I’m going to have to take you in hand. I hope you grasp my point.”
“I grasp. I grasp,” said Tony T.
“Good!” Nina, wiped her mouth with distaste, “I want names. Who gave you these designs? Who gave you the access codes to the library vault? And who are you selling these DVDs to?”
“I don’t know. Ggh! Really, miss, I don’t.”
“B Shark handled everything,” groaned the cat-mangled feller on the floor.
“B Shark?”
“Billy?” said Rod.
Tony T nodded.
“And where’s he?” said Nina.
“Don’t tell her,” said Pup. “Don’t.”
“Where?” growled Rod.
“Fish Town,” said Tony T. “With the fed woman. Ggh! Mrs G.”
Vivian was starting to wish Billy would get on with it and actually kill her.
They had tied her hands with old net twine in a dilapidated boathouse at the far end of Fish Town, near where samakha territory re-joined the regular geography of the human city. The floor of the boathouse – by accident or design, she couldn’t tell – sloped down to the meet the canal''s dark waters. There was no current and no wind, but glutinous waves lapped at the boards.
She had never seen Daganau-Pysh, Venislarn lord of the deep, god of unfathomable reaches. Those few humans who had glimpsed him had tended to be robbed of the wits and vocabulary to describe what they had seen. She wondered, with a certain detachment, if he would meet her expectations.
Billy the Fish sat on a rotten crate that looked as if it had spent a century at the bottom of the sea. He was toying with his long knife and watching her. His two henchmen, Tyrone and Jamie – Death Roe and Jay-Jay – skulked behind him in the shadows. She might be tied up but a whole afternoon of watching her had allowed a bit of the fear and respect to creep back into their faces.
“Hypodescent,” she said.
“What’s that, bitch?”
“Your word of the day, William,” she said.
“You being funny – ggh! – bitch?”
“Do you know what it means?”
He glared at her. Fishy eyes tended to glare anyway; he couldn’t really help it.
“We used to have an empire,” she began. “The British. Not quite like the one t
hat the Venislarn are building on Earth. Well, maybe quite a lot like it. And we colonised a quarter of the globe so they say. And our soldiers and businessmen and explorers had children with the people they conquered. I doubt love played much part in that. In Australia, in Africa, in India, children were born. Half-British, genetically. White and black. White and Aborigine. Fifty-fifty. How do you think we, the British, treated them?”
Billy said nothing.
“Did we welcome them as our own?” said Vivian. “No. We categorised them with their mother’s ethnic group. We might have called them mulatto or half-breeds but, in truth, they were lumped with the ‘lesser’ race. They were tainted with the degenerate genes of their mothers. Hypodescent: automatically associating a child with the subordinate race. Do you see where I am going with this?”
“Talk, bitch,” said Billy. “You’ll be – ggh! – dead soon.”
“You are not human, Billy. You could not walk our streets without people screaming in fear and hiding their children from the sight of you. And yet, are you true samakha? No. Daganau-Pysh might be your great-great-granddad but you are nothing to him. You are an afterthought.”
Billy was on his feet. “You tryin’ to rile me, Mrs G?”
“No,” she said. “It had simply occurred to me that, apart from your poor dear mothers, we are the only people who understand you.”
“You?” Billy sneered. “Ggh!”
“The ‘feds’.” She would have put air quotes around it but her hands were tied behind her back. “We understand each other and that’s why you won’t kill me.”
“I got me a pocketful of Elizabeths – ggh! – and more honeys than I’ve got arms and —”
“So, three.”
“— and the youngins respect me. Ggh! They know I’m a made man.”
“Booya,” said Jamie supportively.
“You make and sell dirty movies, William,” said Vivian.
“For the greater glory of Daganau-Pysh.”
“He must be so proud.”
“Muda!” shouted Tyrone abruptly, barrelling into Jamie to get out of the way of a cat that had just wandered into the boathouse.
“What the…?” said Jamie.
Billy was confused. “Ain’t no cats allowed in.”
He stopped. There were footsteps outside, running feet. Billy closed the gap between them and grabbed Vivian as the side door flew open and Rod stepped in, pistol raised.