The Quest of the DNA Cowboys

by Mick Farren

  The operation was going very well when a commotion started on the other side of the room. One of the sleeping drunks had woken up, and was wildly staring round the place.

  'Where's that goddamn pig with my money? Where's the blue-skinned bitch gone with my fucking money?'

  He caught sight of Angelina, and staggered across the room towards where she and Billy were sitting.

  'I paid you for time, bitch, and I ain't had nothing yet.'

  Angelina looked at him coldly.

  'You busted out, buddy. I can't help that you fell asleep.'

  The drunk grabbed Angelina by the wrist.

  'I aim to get what I paid for.'

  Billy jack-knifed to his feet.

  'Take your hands off her.'

  The drunk kept hold of Angelina, but swung round to look blearily at Billy.

  'Butt out, sonny. I'm getting what's righteously mine.'

  'I'm warning you. She's with me.'

  'Fuck off, kid, or I'll rip your arms off.'

  Billy swung at the drunk, and to his surprise he went down in a crash of overturning chairs. He came again, though, almost straight away, with a polished black tube in his hand. There was a shout from the bar.

  'Laser!'

  Everyone who was still awake hit the floor. A thin pencil of bright blue light flashed silently from the tube and swung down at Billy. Billy ducked and twisted, and it sliced through the table behind him. Billy found he had his own gun in his hand, and before the drunk could swing the laser back at him again, the gun exploded. There was a loud, frozen silence. A look of surprise came over the drunk's face. The laser slid from his fingers, and, almost in slow motion, he crumpled to the floor. The saloon seemed to breathe out. The bartender came across to where Billy was standing over the drunk with his smoking gun still in his hand. He knelt beside the body and put an ear to its chest.

  'You killed him.'

  'He went for me with a laser.'

  The bartender held up his hands.

  'It's nothing to me, kid. I'm just saying that he's dead. You could leave a twenty for the cleanup crew, though.'

  Billy dropped his gun into its holster, and took a hit from the bottle of mescal. He tossed a twenty on to the table, and turned to Angelina.

  'I've got to get out of here.'

  She picked up her bag.

  'Want me to come with you?'

  'How much is that going to cost?'

  She ran a pointed tongue round her blue lips.

  'You just killed a man, honey. You can have me all for free.'

  Chapter 10

  She/They moved forward, the two units carrying the fallen third cradled in her/their arms.

  Forward, along the blue bridge that cut such a perfect line through the swirling kaleidoscope mists.

  Forward, seeking a place of stasis where Her/Their power could be concentrated on healing Her/Their wounds.

  Forward, creating the bridge in front of Her/Them.

  Forward, with the bridge behind Her/Them smoking and boiling, finally becoming one with the swirling, shining, coloured chaos as Her/Their area of power moved on.

  She/They had been alone from the beginning. It was Her/Their choice. The other beings who had, on occasion, used the order that She/They created for their own purposes had been so contaminated with the seeds of chaos that if they appeared too often, She/They had always moved on, removing the field of influence and leaving the area to disruptors and the shim­mering mists. There could be no serenity and order where other beings came with their scattering influence. Since the beginning Her/Their being and purpose had been concen­trated on creating an order sphere wherein She/They could find the real satisfaction.

  She/They had devoted Her/Their infinite existence to that world of white sky, smooth surface resolved into perfect squares of alternate black and white, total density of the solid ground and total purity of clear air.

  Her/Their being found its only satisfaction in the poetry of ultimate symmetry, in a purity of form that had been de­stroyed by the coming of the disruptors.

  Her/Their memory of Her/Their life before the disruptors raged across the levels of the finite world was old and clouded. The most She/They could recall from that time was a longing for a cloistered, patterned existence. It came to Her/Them as indistinct fragments of pale contentment. She/They had long abandoned any hope that She/They might regain Her/Their place in that ordered work. The order that now maintained Her/Their being was the single purpose to reconstruct as much as She/They could of that which the disruptors had ruined and destroyed.

  Her/Their wounds, the bridge across which She/They travelled, and most particularly the circling, twisting mists that insinuated, attacked and sought to engulf Her/Their sole symbol of order caused Her/Them pain and horror that were unique in Her/Their experience.

  Although She/They used the entire residue of energy that was left from Her/Their creation of the bridge to break down, analyse and catalogue these impulses, She/They was intensely aware that the very existence of such phenomena as fear, pain and the awareness of danger had introduced disorder into the heart of Her/Their consciousness.

  She/They loathed and hated the impulses that attacked Her/Them, but in that loathing She/They knew that She/They was Her/Their self producing disorder. The silence She/They prized so much was flawed with a high static sound, and the words that formed in it glowed a garish, ugly red,

  'Irregular spiral.'

  'Estimate product to be destructive.'

  'Energy drain approaches critical.'

  'Active destruct move at spiral results in tightening the circuits.'

  'Emergency.'

  'Willeffort fails to negate trend.'

  'Passive acceptance reduces trend but increases spiral motion.'

  'Paradox.'

  'Paradox is not.'

  'Paradox exists therefore is.'

  'Contradiction produced.'

  'Warning warning.'

  'Reduce trend or increase speed.'

  'Solve paradox.'

  'Energy drain.'

  The words were burning with a hideous brightness, crackling against themselves. The silence began to break up under the strain of gusts of white noise.

  'Attempt order production by mathematic route out'

  'Product of wave form.'

  'Prime.'

  'Root of wave form.'

  'Prime.'

  'Numerical escape blocked by prime number groups'

  'Out, out, out.'

  'Negative.'

  The bridge began to turn, it assumed an elliptical and downward form. Inexorably it started to corkscrew.

  'Class A emergency.'

  'Disorder in terminology.'

  'Terminology by definition is a factor for order.'

  'Disorder as term becomes factor of definition.'

  'Reject.'

  'Rejection tightens spiral.'

  'Stop.'

  She/They stopped.

  'Paradox flow up four points'

  Cracks appeared in the bridge.

  'Prepare passive state.'

  'Wounds preclude total passivity.'

  Her/Their form became spherical, but gradually one side began to flatten and streaks of colour began to creep across Her/Their reflective surface.

  'Wounds render passivity partial.'

  She/They resumed the triple form. A large section of the bridge fell away into the mist. Slowly She/They raised the energy wand. It glowed a dull red. She/They stood on the flat side of a blue hemisphere.

  Slowly it began to rise, and the silence broke into a scream.

  Chapter 11

  If Billy's mind hadn't been blown by the killing, it certainly was after Angelina had finished with him. She did everything that Miss Ettie's girls had ever done to him, and then took him into places that he had never been before.

  Her blue skin was strangely cold. Afterwards, he told Reave that it was like fucking an energetic corpse. Fucking was, by no means, the end of it. It was little
more than a beginning. After she'd sucked him and brought him on, she rushed him through to a series of numbers that took him higher and higher until he finally blew apart. That wasn't the end of it, either. She pulled a little induction coil from her bag. It didn't generate more than maybe ten volts, but it was sufficient to do alarming things to their nerves when each of them held a term­inal and their bodies came in contact. Her arms slid round him like blue snakes, and they started again. This time with the added electric jolt.

  Billy's head was spinning and his body was exhausted by the time they'd worked out all the possibilities of the shock machine. He lay on his back and stared at the ceiling while Angelina ran her fingernails over his chest.

  He was drifting in a half sleep when there was a furious pounding on the door. Billy woke with a start and reached towards the gun in his belt.

  'Who is it?'

  'Never mind who it is, open up.'

  Billy carefully got up, and draped a blanket over his shoulder.

  'Hold on, I'm coming.'

  Holding his gun in one hand, he opened the door a tiny crack with the other.

  It was immediately kicked open and the barrel of a huge .70 calibre recoil-less pistol was shoved under his chin.

  'Police Department, freeze.'

  Billy stood perfectly still as a huge beer gut of a man re­moved his gun, while his equally huge partner held the pistol at his throat.

  The Dogbreath Police Department took pride in their ap­pearance. They wore yellow metalflake helmets with a red star on the front and black visors. Their bodies were encased in black PVC one-piece suits with padding on the shoulders, ribs, elbows, crutch and knees, and decorated with a wealth of badges and insignia.

  They were also well prepared. From a wide belt around their waists hung a riot stick, tear gas canisters, a stock prod, handcuffs and a narrow beam laser. All this was in addition to the .70 calibre recoil-less that each of them held in their pudgy hands.

  The pistol was taken away from Billy's throat.

  'Okay, relax, but don't try nothing or I'll blow your head off.'

  The cop holding Billy's gun looked at his partner.

  'Is he the one that shot the guy?'

  The one holding the gun on Billy grinned.

  'Must be, Angelina's up here with her shock box.'

  Angelina sat up in bed.

  'Screw yourself, pig.'

  'Shut your mouth, honey, or we'll book you for L and F.'

  The one with the gun prodded Billy in the stomach.

  'So you're the gun-happy kid?'

  Billy tried to explain.

  'Listen, he pulled a laser on me . . .'

  The cop slapped Billy across the face.

  'We'll tell you when to talk.'

  He pointed with his gun to the upright chair.

  'Sit.'

  Billy sat. The two cops stood in front of him.

  'So you're the killer who blasts down citizens of Dogbreath with his fancy reproduction pistol.'

  The one with his gun spun it on his finger. Billy tried again.

  'He was roughing up Angelina, I hit him and he pulled a laser.'

  'So?'

  'It was self defence.'

  'So?'

  'I don't understand.'

  'What makes you think Dogbreath has got any laws about self defence?'

  'It wasn't my fault.'

  'No? You shot him, didn't you?'

  'But . . .'

  'It's lucky for you, kid, that Dogbreath don't have no laws about killing, or you'd be in trouble.'

  Billy looked bewildered.

  'So what are you here for?'

  'We don't like gun-happy kids in town.'

  'But you said there was no laws . . .'

  'We kill who we don't like. The stage leaves at midnight. Don't miss it.'

  Billy shook his head vigorously.

  'I won't.'

  The cop pulled a pad of printed forms from a pouch on his belt.

  'Sign here.'

  'What is it?'

  'Statement exempting the People's Metropolis of Dogbreath from all claims by agents or relatives of the deceased.'

  Billy signed.'

  'Okay, that'll be . . .'

  The cop counted on his fingers.

  'Conveyance Fee ten, Mortification Duty twenty, Disposal Fee twenty, and Law Enforcement Charge fifty. That's a round hundred altogether.'

  'You mean I have to pay to go through this?'

  'You better learn, kid. Nothing comes free.'

  They gave him his gun back.

  'Be on the stage.'

  They left. Billy looked round at Angelina.

  'What was that all about?'

  'They shook you down for a hundred. You got taken, honey.'

  'So what was I supposed to do?'

  She licked her lips with a swift, lizard-like flick of the tongue.

  'You could have killed them, and run.'

  'Wouldn't that have been overdoing it?'

  'You don't have any sense of class. No drama, no romance.'

  Billy started to get into bed, but Angelina pushed him away.

  'I've gone off you, honey. I don't think I want you any­more.'

  'What's the matter with you?'

  'The way you handled those cops, you're just no good, babe.'

  Billy began to get annoyed.

  'I was good enough to handle your buddy with the laser.'

  Angelina thought about it, and then slowly rubbed her thighs together.

  'Yeah, I guess you were at that. Come on back to bed.'

  After another strenuous hour with Angelina and the in­duction coil, Billy passed out.

  He woke up with Reave shaking him.

  'Wake up, old buddy. The stage leaves in an hour.'

  Billy yawned.

  'Have I been out for that long?'

  'You have indeed.'

  Billy sat up rubbing his eyes.

  'Got a smoke?'

  Reave handed him a cigar, and then struck a match. Billy inhaled and coughed.

  'Did you have a good time last night?'

  Reave grinned and winked.

  'I'll say.'

  Billy got out of bed and struggled into his clothes. Reave laughed.

  'You look rough, did you have a heavy night?'

  Billy pulled on one of his cowboy boots.

  'Heavy.'

  'Yeah? What happened? Did you come back here with that blue chick? She looked weird.'

  'She was weird.'

  Reave poked him in the ribs with his elbow.

  'Come on Billy, it's me, Reave. What happened? Don't be so cagey.'

  Billy took another cigar from Reave and sat down on the bed. He began reluctantly to tell him about the killing in the saloon and the scenes that followed.

  '. . . And then, to top it all, the fucking cops took a hundred off me.'

  The atmosphere of all boys together telling tales dropped away. Reave stroked his chin and looked worried.

  'How much money have you got left?'

  'About eighty, why?'

  Reave looked guilty.

  'I don't have more than that left myself.'

  'So? We've got a hundred and sixty between us, and the Minstrel Boy must have some more money.'

  There was an awkward silence. Reave walked across to the window and looked down at the street.

  'That's the trouble. I haven't seen him for hours.'

  'You mean he hasn't been back?'

  'There's not a sign of him, and the stage goes soon. I mean, if he don't show up in the next few minutes we're in trouble. We don't even know where the fucking stage goes to.'

  Billy stuffed the last of his things into the bag and did up the straps.

  'We don't need the Minstrel Boy to nursemaid us.'

  He strapped on his gun belt.

  'We'll go down to the stage, and if he doesn't get on it, we'll just ride it down to the next town and see what happens there.'

  Reave slung his own bag over his
shoulder. He still looked unhappy.

  'I don't like it, Billy.'

  Billy turned in the doorway.

  'What's the matter with you? We've done okay so far. We don't need anyone to look after us.'

  Reave shrugged, and followed Billy out of the door.

  'Maybe you're right.'

  In the foyer Mohammed stood behind the counter and watched them walk to the door.

  'Good luck on your journey, boys.'

  Billy glanced back at him.

  'Yeah, right.'

  Whatever Billy and Reave had expected, the stage was a total surprise to them. It was like something out of a legend. Billy had seen pictures of things like it, back in Pleasant Gap. The battered wooden coach with its high spoked wheels, small square windows, three on each side, and the brass rail round the luggage rack on the roof. None of the pictures had shown anything like the four huge green lizards that were harnessed to it, and squatted on their haunches, waiting for the journey to start.

  On the boardwalk, beside where the stage waited, there was a signboard. Overland Hollow City and Dogbreath Stage Co. — Passengers Wait Here. Only one man stood beside the sign. He wore a wide-brimmed bat hat with a band of silver and turquoise links, and an ankle-length, dirty yellow duster coat. His pin-stripe trousers were tucked into high black boots. As Billy and Reave approached, he turned and they saw he had a weather-beaten brown face with a blond drooping moustache and short pointed beard. A strap across his chest, outside his denim work shirt, indicated that he was wearing a shoulder holster. He looked Billy and Reave up and down.

  'Well now, two more for the stage. Where you boys headed?'

  Billy shrugged.

  'Anywhere, we're just drifting along.'

  The man stroked his beard.

  'You better stay on the stage right through to Hollow City. This here stage only stops at two other places. Sade and Galilee. Galilee is bad, and Sade you don't even want to talk about in broad daylight.'

  Billy and Reave looked at each other.

  'Looks like it's Hollow City for us.'

  Two men came down the boardwalk. Both wore peaked caps and heavy fur coats. One carried a long whip, while the other cradled a wicked-looking riot gun in the crook of his arm. The one with the gun climbed up on to the driver's box of the stage, while the other stopped in front of Billy, Reave and the man in the hat and long coat.