Tales From Beyond Tomorrow: Volume One

by Catton John Paul

Feeding, as the Benandanti discussed as they gathered over their salads and polenta, feeding what they planned to be the seeds of a brand new world.

  5: JUST DESSERTS

  Paranoid Pie

  In a food-processor, mix 2 cups flour,1 1/2 tbs. granulated sugar and 1 1/2 tbs. brown sugar, 1 tsp. baking powder, and a suspicion of salt. Slowly add 1/2 cup cream, 1 1/2 sticks of butter, broken into bits, and 1 egg. When the dough forms a ball, take it out and knead by hand for 1 minute. Roll out the dough and cut into 2 pieces, for top and bottom. Fit the first piece in the bottom of a buttered pie pan. Fill the pie with nothing but fantasies, then fit the top piece over it. Trim edges, and bake in a 375-degree oven for 10 minutes. Serve cool.

  – from Freud's Own Cookbook

  It was the day of Grandfather's funeral, and all over the Land of Nod, the children were rejoicing. In the Hall of Morpheus, the most insignificant runts of all were in charge of the happy occasion, leading the crowd in nursery rhymes and half-remembered songs. They danced around the candy-striped coffin, their tattered, dangling petticoats hissing as they trailed along the dusty floor behind each misshapen figure.

  Who among them would carry the old man to the river, and set fire to him? China cheeks blushed in modesty, arms swiveled around bisque shoulder plates to point the pointy finger, young hopefuls peered about with expectant faces.

  But just then!

  There came a loud KNOCK, KNOCK at the door.

  Oh, dear! The crowd of attendants hushed themselves, and stared at the door through painted eyes.

  KNOCK, KNOCK, KNOCK!

  Who's there? challenged the Dream Mechanics.

  Then suddenly, the door opened by itself, and who do you think flew in through the window? It was Grandfather! He landed on his feet on top of his own coffin, standing there with his pockets inside out, tall and terrible and laughing with rage.

  "You stupid little bastards! You couldn't even get the funeral right, could you? I told you! I showed you how to do it a hundred times, and what did you do? You forgot to put me in the bloody coffin!"

  The crimson O of the children's molded wax lips gave forth sounds of pure joy as their master scolded them.

  "Now for God's sake do as you're told. Open up the coffin again, put me in it and then set the bloody thing on fire! Is that asking too much? Or do I have to do everything myself?"

  Paperweight eyes winked on and off in admiration.

  Grandfather leaped airwards and slowly descended to the floor, straightening his shiny black suit, his long white hair sending dandruff in all directions. He grimaced in approval as as the nails in the coffin slowly wormed their way out of the wood and hung glittering in the air, and the jack-in-the-box lid sprang open with a squeak.

  But then – oh dear! A dirty clump of Big Sister's underwear flew out and hit Grandfather in the face. Poooh!

  Shiny silence from everyone.

  "All right! Who did that? Come on, who was it? I've just about had enough of this buggering about!"

  Grandfather sneezed impressively, the flaky snow almost covering his suit, and poised himself on the edge of his coffin. "If I ever find out who did it, they'd better watch out. I might be dead and gone, but I can still give you a nasty smack, you know. Now seal the lid, and prepare The Boy as soon as you can. You know what'll happen if the Malendanti come round here again. Come on, chop chop! I can't hang about here, I've got the rest of eternity to be getting on with!"

  At last Grandfather lay at rest, face down with his eyes glaring at the ceiling. There was a great haunted-house creaking noise as the lid swung slowly, slowly down. With more squeaks, the nails screwed themselves in, and to finish, the happy children wrapped the coffin up in a lovely red ribbon with a bow on top.

  "I haven't even had my supper yet," the old man grumbled from inside.

  *

  In the House of the Crazy Dead, Group Captain Ian was fighting for his life. Johnny Shoxx and his army of zombies had smashed down the doors to the ballroom, and were battering their way in – and for zombies as big, bulky and ugly as they were, they sure moved quickly. Keeping his finger pressed down on the automatic fire button, Ian thumbed the command for rapid sweep, and –

  "Ian!" As well as calling him, Dad gave the boy a quick, vigorous shake on the shoulder. "For the last time, stop playing that bloody game, will you? Look around you. You might learn something."

  "Yes, Dad." No mistaking that tone of voice, Dad wasn't happy. Ian put the Gamepocket back in his rucksack and folded his arms, glaring around him with a sniff. He could have got up to Level 5 that time, if Dad hadn't have stopped him.

  Bum. Ass-Hole. With an American accent.

  "We paid to get in here," said Mum with a sigh, "and all the time the boy's got his head stuck in that computer game. He's in a world of his own."

  "Well they're not interested in museums any more, are they? Everything's got to be online. Everything's got to be done with just one click."

  Ian had thought the Toy Museum had sounded like a great idea. All those weird and fantastic games and things from hundreds of years ago. But it was just boring. A few bits and pieces made out of wood and tin, lying there in cases. As if that was going to make them exciting – Doh! Ian scratched his big pink ears and swiveled around on his heels.

  Then he saw the house.

  "There you go, Ian! Now that's what a real Doll's House looks like."

  It was huge. The first thing Ian saw was the house-front; a huge slab of fake masonry painted in sugar-icing pink, open and swung away from the main body of the building to expose the tableaux within.

  That was a doll's house? A doll's house that big? It must have cost a fortune! Ian walked closer to look inside – and there, to his delight, was a tableaux of five rooms and a hallway, decorated in warm, glowing Christmas– colors. There were so many details in the rooms it looked like somebody had fired a miniaturizing ray-gun at a real house and shrunk it down to this size. And there were people in it. Well, not people but dolls. But not crybaby dolls. These dolls were wicked.

  "Oh, David! Look over there!"

  Ian stared intently at the doll's house as his parents wandered away. He could live in a house like that. Yeah. He felt more comfortable the more he thought about it. That house would be dead good to run about in.

  Dad's voice; "A Child's Garden of Verse, By Robert Louis Stevenson. Have you ever seen this before?"

  Mum's voice; "Robert Louis Stevenson. Didn't he write Treasure Island?"

  The notice on the side of the case read; 'Victorian Doll's House. Height 47 inches, width 41 inches, depth 14 inches. The front opens to reveal five rooms furnished with great care and attention to contemporary detail, and with great taste. The furniture is mostly early Duncan Phyfe, with the exception of the drawing room.

  'This house is generally known as the Faerie House. It is said that the donating family, who wished to remain anonymous, maintain that the house was built for the little spirit folk to live in.' Ian read that bit twice. 'A quaint tradition, which recalls the affair of the Cottingley Fairies…'

  Ian's eyes scanned the house, imagining where his toy soldiers would be hidden. They could jump out from anywhere, just like the mooks in "Time Massacre 4." There was so much analog detail in the rooms, dark corners, bulky furniture, loads of places for zombies to hide…

  "Look at the cover! That's even the same cover as the one Nan gave to me when I was a boy. Here, let me show you this, it's my favourite one in the book…"

  Their voices tuned in and out like a grown-up radio program. Ian set his soldiers moving. The house was his! He must protect it! He might blow it up a little bit while he was protecting it, but he was the boss, so it didn't matter!

  He imagined two of his soldiers in the house, one upstairs, one downstairs. And a zombie, crashing in through the window in slow-motion shattering glass. Boom! The first soldier gets it in the arm.

  What's up? calls the second soldier, in the big bedroom.

  I'm hit, shouts the f
irst one, ya gotta help me, ya gotta help me. So the second soldier gets his Big Gun out.

  "Ian? Did you say something?"

  "Oh, he likes that house, doesn't he? There you are, love, what did I tell you. Good old-fashioned stuff always appeals."

  "Oh, look, this is the poem I told you about. The Unseen Playmate. This scared the heck out of me when I was little."

  "Scared you? Oh, come on."

  "No, straight up, it did!"

  Flicking his gaze from room to room, Ian noticed that not only were there dolls in each house, but they were all doing something. The cook was making dinner, in the primitive-looking kitchen. In the bathroom, an old-fashioned maid was giving a baby a bath. A posh woman was playing the grand piano in the drawing room. But where's the old man, thought Ian? Where's the boss of the house?

  Oh – there he was.

  "Yeah, it really did! And I'll tell you another thing that used to scare me. That poem about 'the man who wasn't there'. Do you know the one I mean? 'When I was going up the stair, I met a man who wasn't there.' That gave me bad dreams, that did."

  "Oh, it didn't!"

  "Yes it did. Whoever's in that poem, he's both there and not there, you know, both at the same time. I think that's dead scary."

  "Well, I think it's just daft."

  In the study, sitting at his desk, was the head of the household. Thickly drawn rings for eyes, in a lumpy wax face, attached themselves to Ian's gaze. The doll wore an old-looking black coat and was stooped over his desk, as if he was really tired. Flakes of white paint, maybe from his long hair, speckled his coat like dust or dandruff.

  "There's something else I'll always remember, it's a poem that my Dad used to recite to me, I don't know where on Earth he got it from. It goes – no, don't laugh – it goes like this:

  One fine day in the middle of the night,

  Two dead men got up to fight.

  Back to back, they faced each other,

  Drew their swords and shot each other."

  "Well, it's a nonsense poem, isn't it?"

  "I know, but there's something really strange about it. It's like everything has been turned around and upside down. But to the people in the poem, it's perfectly normal. It gives me the creeps."

  The old doll in his stiff black suit continued to stare back at Ian as if he recognized him. Suddenly, the boy had one of those funny feelings, a feeling like he was not quite there. Something was at the back of his mind, another time, another place, he closed his eyes so that he could see it, but too slow. It was gone. Just that funny, happy-sad, sickly-sweet feeling that there was something really important, a place that he had to be, and something he had to do, but he couldn't remember what it was.

  Hot flushes coloured his cheeks. He really wanted to do a Mister Shaky, but he remembered the scolding his Mum gave him the last time he'd done that in public.

  "Ian? Ian, are you ready?"

  "Typical. Now the place is closing, he doesn't want to go."

  *

  Waking up time.

  Ian was really warm, curled up tight inside his duvet snugasabuginarug. He reached up a hand and rubbed his eyes to get the glue out.

  He sat up, his hair a messy fan-shape because of the pillow, and looked around. What's the matter, he asked himself – why do I feel so funny? He looked around the room, trying to find the important 'Something' that would tell him what the matter was. His eyes roved over the wonderfully grand ceiling of the four-poster bed that wasn't his, the tall stove in the corner that wasn't really there. The whole room had a hot, dark glow around everything. It wasn't Christmas. It wasn't his birthday. But he could tell by the twisty-turny-churny feeling in his stomach that today was a very special day.

  Throwing back the quilt, he climbed out of the bed, a little awkwardly because of the Big Gun where his right hand used to be. As he stood, barefooted in jim-jams, he noticed with pride that the nozzle of his Big Gun was almost touching the polished pinewood floor. Almost as big as he was. Crossing over to the curtains, he pulled them aside one-handedly and peered outside. Pitch black. Not even morning yet. The sort of black that could fill up with creepy faces if you stared at it for long enough.

  And then downstairs, the smash of glass, and his buddy's voice, calling; ya gotta help me, ya gotta help me.

  Of course. The feel of cool wood under his bare feet was replaced by the tight warmth of leather army boots. Instantly, his jim-jams shifted and wove themselves into combat fatigues. Only one boy could stop the enemy and Ian felt something well up inside him because He Was That Boy.

  Ian stood at the bedroom door, watching, listening. Beyond the tranquil first-floor landing the old oak staircase yawned. The boy scanned the landing. Quaint old doll's house furniture lay heavily in the quiet, smelling of dust and ancient teatimes. The ticking of a huge grandfather clock somewhere measured away the silence.

  Creepy music began to fade in from the back of his head, and Ian tippy-toed across the landing and down the first few stairs. His eyes were twin videocams scanning the hallway below, waiting for something to jump out of the shadows. Sweat feathered his upper lip.

  When he'd got halfway down the stairs, Johnny Shoxx ran out of the kitchen!

  It was just like he'd imagined it, all those nights lying awake, wondering what those funny creaking and sighing noises were. He knew that Johnny Shoxx was somewhere around, waiting to thrust his messed-up face into Ian's to make the boy scream. Here he came, growling and moaning, more skin peeling off him at every step. Well, Ian was better than that Ass– Hole. The boy swung up the Big Gun and fired.

  Johnny's chest just exploded, like his heart was some kind of bomb, and he growled "Ohnononoyougotmeyougotmeaaargh!" Ian fired again and the baddie flew backwards and through the wall.

  Somewhere in Ian's head, numbers flickered and then stabilized. First hit on the score. Ass! Hole!

  Something with a half-finished face loomed out of the hole left by Johnny's body. Ian fired again, a rapid tattoo of explosive shells, and the monster did the spaz-dance as it died.

  The game was on now. Ian had some well-wicked firepower and it was payback time. Payback for all those scary nights and bad dreams. This was his house, and he could do anything. Where was his buddy?

  The dining room.

  Wallpaper with yellow flowers. Shiny table surfaces and cutlery. A mob of growly chattering things eating fresh babies with long curved silver knives. Ian made a mess of the velvety curtains as he blew the mooks away. The scary music built up and slid down with the action, and somewhere deep inside the rhythm he could hear a muffled boom, boom, boom, the echo of the gunfire, maybe.

  The drawing room. His buddy wasn't there, either, but Ian was going to get a high score on this game, and no messing about. Sofa, dresser, lamp stand, floral rug. A big mirror above the fireplace. Curtains made of silk this time. Zombie guts, arms and legs all over the floor in glowing green blood. The biggest zombie's head he left swinging from the chandelier. That was cool. He liked that.

  Back into the hallway again – and hey! Sure enough, Johnny Shoxx tried to surprise him again, this time coming from upstairs. The gun roared. Johnny flailed down the stairs, his body snapping the banisters as he rolled like they were matchsticks. No wonder; Ian looked closer, and saw they really were matchsticks.

  Ian headed back up the stairs. His buddy must have gone up there when Ian was fighting the monsters. Time to throw somebody out the window and watch them do the crawl as they fell down. On the landing, he spread himself against the wall next to the door leading to the master bedroom.

  Remembering how everybody in the games and on TV did it, he pressed his ear to the door, breathing quickly, bracing himself. Swinging round, he kicked down the door at the first try, Big Gun pointing into the room's interior. Go for the highest score. The highest score.

  It was really dark in there. He screwed up his eyes, trying to adjust. Wait a minute. There was the bed. And there, the big black hump on it, that was the monster!

>   "Urh–"

  No, it was a doll. It was two dolls. Ian stood stock still, trying to understand.

  There was a Ken doll lying stiffly on the bed. It looked a bit like Ian's buddy, but there were no combat fatigues, and anyway, he was lying with his back to Ian. But Barbie doll was there. Barbie doll had her face turned towards Ian, he could see her stupid smile, and her half-closed glassy blue eyes.

  There was Ken, and he was lying on top of Barbie. And they had no clothes on.

  Was this a joke? Ian stuck his tongue out as far as it would go and made a long, dry-retching noise.

  "Urrrrrh–"

  No, this was stupid. Not doing anything, not paying any attention to him standing there. They didn't even have the sense to put clothes on, just lying there pink and useless.

  "I don't want you," Ian yelled, "I'm the boss now!" With a blast from his Big Gun, the bed burst into flames. Yeah, Ian never missed, the Gun always worked, the damage was always maximum. He watched feathers and bits of blackened bed-sheet snowing down onto the carpet. On the bed, the bodies were melting together. A marble-shiny blue eye dropped through the blazing mattress onto the floor, and the stench of burning hair filled the room.

  He felt sick.

  Stumbling down the wooden stairs, he wanted to cry, his eyes and the back of his throat felt like they were burning. The numbers in his head spun wildly into the last, multi-digit reading, and beneath them, glowing before his eyes, was the sign:

  GAME OVER

  *

  Waking up time.

  Ian rubbed his eyes, still lying curled up under his duvet. Poking his head into the warm air of his room, he gazed groggily around him. Boy, that had been a weird dream.

  Yep. He was back in his room, same as usual. The Savage Samurai poster. The Freakamon and Maximum Carnage trading cards all over the floor. Through the window, a grey sky and even greyer slate roofs. Boring. Ian yawned.

  He lifted his head, slowly easing himself out of bed. His mother hadn't called him yet. Had he overslept? It was quiet. Quiet, like that time of the morning after Dad goes to work, when the streets outside are empty, and there's the sound of Mum doing the washing, and there are only crap cartoons on TV.