I caught the large bore of the revolver as it was pushed blindly through the violated steel door out of the corner of my eye as out the double glazing I hurled my wretched body. You ever heard the sound of shattering glass as you're flying through it? Like lump hammers inside your skull. You black out.
My body, in pain though it was, had fed itself so much adrenalin in the furore that it had unbelievably picked itself up from the grass where it had landed and was making it clumsily over the garden fence. I was racing away down the country lane on which my house was situated.
The sound of the garrotted gunman tumbling down the stairs the last thing I heard.
I must have stumbled on for a mile or so.
I couldn't believe how athletic I had become after a long life of near immobility. The death-threat induced art of instant rehabilitation; just the good stiff kick up the arse I'd always needed. Adventure's warped circumstances folding their ridiculously misrepresented arms cloyingly about me. Suffocating and liberating me with the same all-encompassing embrace. All about me was cold and wintry. There was no snow, though, odd to not have snow this time of the year.
I decided to get off the road; in case the gunman had survived his beheading and was even now racing after we in his black-windowed standard-issue pursuit vehicle. Four and a half litre supersonic monster. The black dick of death and destruction, you could forgive me for coughing up phlegm.
Over the rutted ground of a vast fallow field I stumbled, heading in the direction of a woods I remember playing in before the Polio of my early teens. Hoping to secure some cover and rest awhile. As I staggered lamely through the sharp undergrowth and overhanging foliage the silence of the place; the lack of life sounds; the electricity in the air eventually got to me.
A car glided by on the road I had just left. It could have him, holding his slit throat. I hope the fucker bleeds to death.
I stumbled deeper into the cloying dampness; hearing now the odd footfall behind me. Getting exceptionally fucking paranoid. Continually spinning round; checking over each shoulder. Listening intently for those terror striking sounds of stealthy pursuit.
I remained this paranoid, convinced someone was following me, until I ascended the mossy incline to the outskirts of the woods. There. at the summit of a grassy knoll, against all reason, a large wet metallic globule; a shining living transmutating mass writhed hypnotically. Something grabbed at my hand; making me shriek. A female thing black with lust. Contorted into and out of herself a couple of times; easily refigurized by the power of the passion that burned in her eyes.
“Fear me not, little one.” was the greeting as she folding back on herself, her grip tightening round my wrist. “I have come for you.”
I didn't understand; I was cold; I was shit scared. Her body unravelled slightly so that both her feet and hands were visible, available for utilisation. Then she lumbered, well more rolled, towards the coagulating metallic mass illuminated by a column of peacock-blue light that emanated from a concrete structure beyond. Its monumental geometry described a pyramid set atop a cube some twenty feet in height, in worship of who or to what I knew not.
“Come with us.” she grinned from the centre of her back, Let’s give it a whirl.
It seemed so easy to follow her, neither physical or emotional impediment held me back. In all honesty, I went gladly. Isn’t it everyone's dream to just spot the enigma and just flow with it?
Then it happened.
From the far side of the glade; the ginger-bearded murderer, having somehow tracked me down, was hanging out of his car screaming BANZAI!!! as he careened towards my female rescuer and myself with murderous intent. Angel that she was, I'm sure she sacrificed her own life by taking the full impact of the collision as the murderer slammed his car into us driving us instantaneously deep into the glimmering silver object as it began to slothfully and soundlessly rise from the ground.
I passed through the centre of the shimmering thing and was spat out the other side, landing heavily in the grass on my rump. What I witnessed after that point, it is not possible to convey – I just don’t have the words. But something inside me had been irreparably erased. That special part of me called my identity had been swallowed up in that thing, while I was left on this miserable planet to rot in my impending lunacy.
TWO
Moments later, Oliver Connecticut strode down Acton, the spring in his step hard to hide. His head held high. Everyone got a greeting today. Everyone was a mate of Oliver Connecticut. He took a left onto Dicconson, nearly stumbling over a shady-looking lad heading in the opposite direction.
“Outta the fuckin way...” Oliver Connecticut was about to headbutt the jerk, then recognised the badly battered but lovingly cradled brown-leather snooker cue case the lad was cradling like a broken baby,
“Vini, mate…”
“Watch it, boy. You nearly got yourself worked over there.” Vini Arkansas glared effeminately, bouncing out of range of a playful uppercut, “Too slow, big guy”.
“You'd say that if I got hold of you.”
“Oh, Ollee you mean that? Just you and me, honeygay?”
“Fuck off, Vincent, you reprobate. Anyway, what’s all the big ‘lesbo in a pickle’ rush?”
“Big game on, you know.” he held up the proud but battered snooker-cue case of future stardom, “Money’s floating round today, Ollee. Come with us. Watch a winner. Buy the winner a pint of liquid good luck.”
“You!?!?! You got no fuckin chance down there; they’re hustlers; check out their fuckin shark fins as you walk in. You can see them trying to hide them from the new boys like a sharp lump under their leather jackets. That's all they fuckin do all day. Playing with their balls.”
“Not like some whorry fucker I could mention, eh? So how the fuck was she then?” Vini played his trump card.
Oliver Connecticut feigned innocence - a common precautionary measure.
“Go on, you’re a crafty slut.” quipped Vini Arkansas . “Lily, you reading me? Lily Veyne, barmaid lust crack of the decade. You and her were all over each other, what a sorry fuckin sight. It was her fuckin night off alright.”
Oliver Connecticut was Elvising his upper lip; the legend proven.
“So, you fuck her?” Vini Arkansas demanded the intimate details, as a mate should.
SESSION II
Dr Fanny Bradburg was the clinical psychologist at the Fountains Institute in whose bespectacled care I had been placed. She said nothing for a substantial length of time.
“So?” I prompted her, “What does it mean? Am I insane?”
In my head I heard a cuckoo calling. I did the funny insane face, you know, rolling my eyeballs about a bit and showing her a thick tongue. I cracked my knuckles. First the left hand then the right hand.
“And you say these are a series of recurrent dreams?” Dr Bradburg looked at me intently, her voice like truck tyres on gravel.
“Just like Coronation Street.” I said.
“Sorry?”
“A series.”
“Oh, yes. How quaint. And how often would you say? How frequently?”
“Oh, every night.” I tell her the truth.
“Every night, then?” she scribbles in her notepad. “And ... for how long?”
“I don't know? I guess all night though some people say you only really sleep for half an hour every night and it is all time compressed so you think you have dreamt all night but you have actually only..”
“Not the... How long has this occurred? The dreaming? The Coronation Street?”
“Forever, I guess…”
“Forever?” she makes a note. “Always the same locations? Same characters? Same…”
“I’ve never thought about it…”
“Even before the Polio?” she asked, the wicked smile that passed across her face was like a cheap American flag ripping in the wind.
The Polio really affected me, this much is true. Not just physically but mentally; quite seriously in fact, hence my outpatient s
essions with this lovely old bat.
I began afresh, “There was a man with nine pairs of canary-yellow sunglasses, sitting at the bar of a local eaterie. Even from this distance he reminded me of Steve Martin. You know? Steve Martin, the comedian and film star. Uncanny likeness...”
“Nine pairs of canary-yellow sunglasses? Dr Bradburg scribbled down this relevant detail, “And what was this man doing…”
“Mr Whysilage…”
“Mr… Whysilage?” Dr Bradburg noted down the name, spelling it out loud as she did so, “W H Y S I L A G E – WhySilage?”
“Hmm.” I nodded
“And what was this ‘Mister Whysilage’ doing with these nine pairs of sunglasses?”
“Wearing them of course!” I explained. Bit of a dumbkopf question, don’t you think?
“Of course he was.” Dr Bradburg scribbled, “Please. Continue.”
“The Battleship crash landed on this planet...”
“Sorry?” interrupting my flow once more, she tilted her head and frowned ferociously as if having trouble hearing or believing what she was hearing.
“The Battleship. Remember? From last week? You were taking notes?”
“Oh, yes; indeed. The metal blob.” she guessed, “But why call it a Battleship?”
A rose by any other name, and all that. “A Battleship is what it was, Doctor Bradburg. Not Star Class by any means. I mean, we didn't have hyper-light drive like the enemy but we had Communal Personality on our side.”
“Communal Personality.” she scribbled down this information, “You mean tactics; strategy. Yes?”
Stupid woman, I nearly said. “No.” I sneered, “That was how we got about. Communal Personality. A command from our pilot and if we all worked together as one machine we could just about outrun any fighter-class, vessel they had. It was just our misfortune to get pasted by a Star Cruiser. You earthbound lot wouldn't believe the size of those things.”
“Sorry.” Dr Bradburg tugged hard on my reins, “Mister Deniz. I know this is all very exciting for you. But ... I'm totally lost.” she confessed with a twisted grin.
Typical.
Okay, here goes for the likes of you beginners to Interstellar logistics. A clear concise telling of the weird and wonderful facts of my amusingly quirky adventures on the far side of our Galaxy what is known as the Milky Way.
“Maybe you can start by telling me the name of your pilot? You said a command from your pilot.” Dr Bradburg referred to her notes. “It never occurred to us to ask of our pilot her name. HER name?”
“Eh?”
“The woman behind the driving wheel.”
What a supposition, that this vessel made of living chrome would need a driver, and a woman at that… I agreed that our ‘pilot’ sounded like a woman. But I know many men who ‘sound’ like women. It’s all about the genemix, isn’t it?
Dr Bradburg's pen floated hesitantly; circled angrily above the page, “So.” she tried another angle, “The spaceship ... battleship.”
“Yes?” Where was she going with this, I wondered.
“What, exactly were you doing?”
“Battling. The answer was that obvious.”
Dr Bradburg laughed softly and shook her head. You could tell the smile was being used out of context on this occasion, as she did not look at all happy.
“Let me rephrase that question, Mister Deniz. Were you working for any particular agency, shall we say?”
“Like I said, we didn't consider it…”
“Okay. Tell me about the battle. Were you a lone vessel?”
“It sure seemed that way. We were under no obligation to anyone. No leaders, no team orders. Our pilot was well briefed. She seemed to know exactly what she wanted and just plunged into the thick of it. She was very brave. A ruthless combatant. The number of enemy ships we took out; commando style. Red & White bandanaed kamikaze tactics that always seem to work against bloated over-polished technology-crippled war machines. But then, of course, we did get bit by the big dog. This beam weapon, sheared across our bows. Crashed on this lump of rock. Randal they called it. Don't know whether that was its official name or just...” I lost the thread of it. Confusion suddenly reigned. My recollection had fallen clean away.
Found myself exactly where I started, in my chair adjacent to Doctor Fanny Bradburg. Her unnerving eye piercing vulturelike. Waiting for the cadaver to settle. Eager to get her hooked beak into the soft underbelly of the analysis. Rip out the guts.
“Tell me about the crash-landing.” she said.
“Don't remember much about it…” I conferred with a shrug.
“You say you…” she checked her notes frantically, “..saw a man in a bar with nine pairs of...”
“Mr Whysilage.”
THREE
Young estate mother, Carroll Maryland, fifteen going on twenty-seven, pushed along her eight-month-old son, Evanda, not bothering to register the existence of either of the lads; not her type, probably not even Catholic.
Anyway, she had other things on her mind, like fags; her teenage lungs were just gasping for a smoke. Just one of life's petty worries that grew to cancerous obsessions. There will be no lazy, therapeutic walk in the park for her today.. nor any future bath time water fun with baby Evanda: no watching the kid break his first tooth, due any moment, or him growing out of Pampers. Unbeknown to this young mother she had been stalked by a grey Morris Minor since she turned off the high street; the driver's beady eyes on the plump little freight in the cheap pushchair.
Bulbous, bloodshot eyes. The eyes of a tortured soul. The eyes of a man way out of his depth, up to his neck in all sorts of shit no-one would otherwise suspect him of unless they could witness now the predatory, hawklike glare and the sweat-mottled upper lip; the knuckles white from gripping the steering wheel in trepidation, in anticipation of the deed he knew and understood he must do if his grand scheme was to work. If his dreams were to finally come true. If he was to finally crack the code; decipher the enigma that would fuel his contribution to the cause.
Carroll Maryland parked the pushchair by the OFF LICENSE OPEN stand to the right of the entrance door, ensuring that she positioned it in such a way that she could keep an eye on her snugly warm dreamland inhabiting son, her OIRISH mother's cautionary words still ringing ray in her ears - Always leave Evanda’s pram where you can see it, there's some thieving shites round here'll nick the turd out of a dog's arse given half a chance!
Carroll Maryland smiled at the crude truth of the humour, and while checking that the positioning of the pushchair was as perfect as possible she pushed absently at the off-license glass door. It seemed to move away from her of its own volition and she stumbled over the metal step into the arms of a young Oriental called Clive Idaho.
“Ooops.” he half caught her, wasn’t keen on touching her.
“Shit!” she exclaimed in her soft Dublin tone, clambered clumsily at her saviour; mauling him. Straightening herself up, she saw for the first time the man's dark eyes. Deep with charm. Heavy with grace. She blushed, I think.
“Okay?” he asked, his lips were full, dark. He blinked, perfectly.
She smiled, struck dumb-idiot by his awesome beauty; his pristine olive skin; his glossy black hair combed to one side, flicked out of his eyes by a slender olive band.
He mirrored her smile back at her, nodding uncomfortably, then passed by, exiting the shop. The image of the Yellow Gentleman remained in his absence like sun blindness, gradually stepping aside to allow the interior of the off-license to flood her view. The sight of the chocolate counter was suddenly, instantaneously alluring; a Siren singing storms.
Her saviour now an all-too-distant memory, she wiped her forehead on the short sleeve of her mauve, cotton Summer dress. It was a really hot and sticky day in the filthy North. Carroll Maryland chose, after much deliberation, a Bounty bar, a biscuit & raisin Yorkie, a bag of Chicken flavour crisps, a bag of Cadbury’s Buttons, oh, and a packet of salt & vinegar Ringos for Evanda to suck on. Fags
. she reminded herself, turning to check on Evanda, Don't forget the fags…
Carroll Maryland turned to salt. Nailed to the spot by the dread she hoped was a trick of the light, an optical effect of the thick safety glass at this angle refracting the child's image so as to make the pushchair appear empty. It suddenly got even more stiflingly hot and claustrophobic. Her innards physically dropped. Her heart fluttered into a startled panic, her jaw slowly fell open like an old prison door. Her legs felt as though they were dematerialising, turning to a warm, gooey jelly beneath her. She believed she was going to faint. Some young yobbo who had just purchased a four-pack and a bottle of woodpecker cider for him and his hard mates to guzzle in the park bandstand with their current 'chicks' stopped to watch the gaping woman before leaving. He tried to see what she might be seeing.
Carroll Maryland didn't see him though, she saw nothing but the empty pushchair, felt nothing but the desire for the earth to open up and swallow her whole. She willed the child to reappear in his cheap, stinky seat.
“You okay?” he asked her. No reply from the sculpture.
“Fuck this.” the lad shuffled past her towards the exit.
The sculpture began to hyperventilate, choking on sobs as her chin reached a resonant quivering state, “My baby...” she mouthed. But the image of the pushchair, without Evanda or his sleeping blanket, only that brown pies discoloration dried into the faded rainbow of the acrylic seat, remained.
“You paying for those or what?” Stanley Washington, the owner, called across to her, the off-license now empty save for the pair of them. The sculpture took a hesitant step, dropping all the chocolate to the floor.
“Hey!” Stanley Washington barked coming round from behind the counter to give her a piece of his mind. He almost has hold of the clumsy little bitch.
Twilight's Last Gleaming Page 2