by Scott Innes
Sprax Mambo laughed on hearing my request, a sound that seemed to make the room grow colder. He clicked his laser rifle into life and pointed it at us, prompting the assembled squadron standing behind him to do the same.
‘That’s a no, then,’ I said before Barrington12 could reply. Sprax Mambo spoke again, for longer this time.
‘SPRAX MAMBO OFFERS US THE OPTION TO DIE HERE OR ELSE BOARD THE MAKAZKA IN CHAINS. WE WOULD BE PUBLICLY DISMEMBERED AS AN EXAMPLE TO OTHERS OF WHERE DEFIANCE OF THE L’ZUHL WILL LEAD. THEY WILL THEN PROCEED DIRECTLY TO OUR NEW HOMEWORLD, WHERE IT WILL BE DESTROYED WITHOUT MERCY.’
‘Lovely,’ I said darkly. ‘He must be a big hit at parties.’
I looked to my left at Gerry; he was trembling as he fought the urge to cry, the sheer hopelessness of our situation getting the better of him.
‘I know I said I wasn’t a fan, but if you wanted to engage your Mullet God powers like you did back at Great Strombago, Gerry,’ I muttered from the corner of my mouth, ‘now would be the time.’
He looked at me startled and then hurt.
‘I don’t… I don’t want to talk about that!’ he blurted out. ‘It’s not real, it didn’t happen!’
Fat lot of good godlike powers turned out to be when you awarded them to someone who didn’t want or comprehend them. Then, with a heavy sigh, I made a decision. I stepped forward and held my arms out wide.
‘Take me,’ I said flatly. ‘Take me on board your daft ship – let this lot go.’
‘Kev, no!’ Gerry wailed.
‘This won’t work, Keegan,’ said the General. ‘Don’t be so bloody stupid.’
‘I volunteer myself as a hostage,’ I persevered as Barrington12 translated. ‘But only on the condition that my friends are allowed to go. Let them put their affairs in order before you annihilate our home.’
I was barely thinking about what I was doing. All I knew was that, when push came to shove, I was the expendable one in the room, like my agent was when I told Newcastle back in ’92 that I’d be happy to manage them for free. The General was required to lead the war against our enemies. Gerry, if the Watlaq were to be believed, had an even bigger role to play in the conflict to come. And, on a more practical level, Barrington12 was needed to fly Gerry home. But Kevin Keegan? Perhaps my time had come. Maybe this was my destiny all along. To die so that others may live to fight another day.
Sprax Mambo stared at me with an expression unreadable behind his visor. Then suddenly he smiled, exposing three rows of thin, yellowed, razor-sharp teeth.
‘Skral tik treuk sak sala!’ he cried, and the squadron behind him cackled gleefully. I glanced at Barrington12, who looked at me with what might have been pity, were he capable of expressing such a thing.
‘THIS LITTLE MAN HAS VOLUNTEERED TO DIE FIRST,’ Barrington12 said, and as my eyes widened and I began to protest that this was absolutely not the deal I was offering to them, I felt a searing hot pain in my abdomen which – as it turned out – was caused by the beam of Sprax Mambo’s laser rifle ripping my belly clean open. There was a peculiar smell of burning in my nostrils, which I promptly realised, as I sank to my knees, was a result of my innards being barbecued.
Distantly, Gerry was screaming in dismay, the General was turning the air blue with insults and the L’zuhl were laughing themselves silly. I looked down, all my movements in treacly slow-motion, and saw red and pink gloop cupped in my hands as I cradled my midriff. Humans look a right state on the inside, I thought, and then almost giggled at the absurdity of that ending up as my final conscious thought. I felt no real pain, save for a thudding in my head and a piercing ringing in one ear. With great effort I turned to Barrington12, who was looking down at me.
‘I just want to say,’ I whispered, blood bubbling and foaming on my lips, ‘it’s been an absolute pleasure fighting the good fight with you all. I… wouldn’t have had it… any other way.’
I held out my right hand to Barrington12, ignoring the horrible splatter of the guts I’d let fall to the floor. He stared at me quizzically for a moment and then raised one of his awkward pincer-like hands and gripped mine. General Leigh hobbled forward and placed a hand on one of my shoulders. I extended my left arm towards Gerry, back over my shoulder. He didn’t reciprocate.
‘Gerry,’ I said, turning to look back, my vision swimming. ‘I’m trying to say… goodbye.’
But Gerry was staring blankly ahead, his eyes a milky white. He stood there completely rigid, barely breathing. As I squinted at him, with the sound of Sprax Mambo ordering – judging by the sound of thirty laser rifles revving – to open fire on my friends, Gerry suddenly gasped as though in great pain.
‘Oh Christ,’ I whispered in a thick voice as I began to fade once and for all, slumping down onto the cool floor on my side.
There was a blinding burst of white light and Gerry was consumed in a ball of heat, throwing Barrington12 and the General to the floor beside me. The light pulsated and quickly permeated the walls of the station, which became suddenly translucent, spreading far out into the black sprawl of space. Faintly, I heard Leigh’s voice asking what on earth was happening but I could open my eyes no more than the faintest slit. Artificial stars exploded before me and I lay there at peace. Dimly, I saw Sprax Mambo’s squadron turning tail and legging it back towards the bridge doors – but it was far too late. The L’zuhl had not reckoned with the Slasabo-tik prophecy and it was to be their undoing. No more than thirty seconds after Gerry’s spectacular light show had begun, the Makazka was no more. With a faint thworp it burst like a balloon and it was as though it had never been there at all. The fleeing L’zuhl soldiers were, like the Winged Terrors before them, silhouettes burned into the wall of a forgotten space station. Then everything went dark, the Gerry-light was extinguished and he stumbled backwards with a yelp. I slowly inched open first one eye and then the other. My heart was pounding in my chest and my hair stood wildly on end; I felt like I’d been given a severe electric shock. My hands trembled and my breathing was uncertain.
‘Gerry…’ I whispered. ‘How did you…?’
‘Need to sleep,’ he mumbled and immediately clambered aboard Sir Les, where he curled up into a ball like a cat and passed out.
I sat up and looked at my hands. The dark red blood that had caked them a moment ago was gone. More importantly, my insides were no longer on the outside. Tentatively I rubbed my stomach and felt no pain, no lacerations, no nothing. I was absolutely fine. Feeling quite shaken by my brush with certain death, I stood up gingerly and looked at the General – he would have questions. That much was certain. He was stamping his foot on the metal floor of the bay and frowning.
‘The damnedest thing,’ he said in bemusement. ‘My ankle’s no longer broken.’ He looked up at me. ‘Keegan, what in the world just happened here?’
‘That’s… a long story, General,’ I said eventually. ‘And one I still don’t entirely understand myself. If I ever will.’
There was a brief respite as we took everything in. Twice now, Gerry had been possessed by this altered state and had obliterated our enemies at a stroke when all hope seemed lost. I had cut things fine – I knew from the incident on Great Strombago that his powers could heal the sick but not resurrect the dead and I had come within seconds of going over the precipice. While my prompting him to engage his powers had been fruitless, the sight of me gutted and dying had stirred them into life.
Finally, I felt that I understood how whatever lay within Gerry was triggered. Slasabo-tik, the Mullet God, this beacon of galactic hope, would come forth when that hope was lost. By relenting and allowing Gerry to tag along on this trip, I had put him in harm’s way once more and had only myself to blame for the return of those strange powers which slept inside him. Of course, without them I’d have been toast, but nevertheless, I was disappointed in myself. As a manager, I had a duty of care to my players but that surely also had to extend to any members of my coaching staff affected by arcane intergalactic prophecies.
&n
bsp; Looking at him now, Gerry seemed sallow, something I had begun to notice since our return from Great Strombago. I had put this weary disposition down to the rigours of what we had been through on our great Palangonian adventure, but now I wasn’t so sure. Gerry looked… old. And after each apparently involuntary deployment of his, for want of a less ridiculous term, Mullet God powers, he seemed depleted. Less there. How many times could he do this and survive? And if he couldn’t control it or indeed even really remember it happening, as was the case the first time, what could be done to save him wasting away to nothing?
‘Whatever it was – and I want a full debrief on our return, I assure you – that was a… brave thing you did back there, Keegan,’ the General said magnanimously.
‘Look, we’re all in this together,’ I replied firmly. ‘And at the end of the day, you and I are on the same side.’
‘The L’zuhl will be back this way,’ the General warned us. ‘The Makazka was only the first. They will not take kindly to losing one of the jewels of their armada – they have rarely experienced such a defeat as this. This is the beginning of a dark new chapter, arriving far sooner than the Alliance had anticipated, and we must all be ready.’
I didn’t respond to this. I was simply too exhausted to consider the ramifications of what had just happened.
‘Come on,’ I said to Barrington12 as we clambered back aboard Sir Les as Gerry slept on, the General’s shuttle already departing ahead of us. ‘Let’s get out of here.’
I pushed the lever in front of me to fire up the thrusters and I flew backwards violently. I panicked – had one of the L’zuhl soldiers survived and opened fire?
‘KEVIN KEEGAN, THAT LEVER IS YOUR SEAT RECLINER,’ said Barrington12.
And so, we headed for home. Our flight back turned out to be a rather sombre affair, perhaps surprisingly given the massive and unexpected victory we had just been a part of. Although I’ve never been one for lording it over the opposition anyway – that’s the reason Freddie Mercury and I fell out. ‘No time for losers, because we are the champions’? Come off it, son. A handshake costs nothing.
In the space of just a couple of minutes, we all realised that everything had changed irrevocably. There was still so much left unsaid about what had happened, but for me, there was only one question to which I needed an answer. We would soon know who had betrayed mankind and brought the L’zuhl into the Antioc Nebula for the first – and almost certainly not the last – time. I wasn’t sure I’d be able to cope with the heartbreak if it did indeed turn out to be somebody that I knew.
AN ENEMY UNMASKED
I was relieved to have the General with us when we arrived home – a small group of guards were waiting to arrest us for stealing Sir Les but at a word from him they dispersed, though not without throwing suspicious glances in our direction. No doubt they had questions as to the General’s own absence during the lockdown but they wisely kept their counsel.
As we made our way across the platform towards the exit into the Compound, a throng of people could be seen heading our way. I felt mildly alarmed for a moment, then realised they were not there for us. Walking ahead of them, flanked by her personal bodyguards, was a genuine VIP. Padding along the tarmac was a small dog, its fur a muddy mixture of brown and white with a distinctive stripe down its snout, ears pointing up keenly, eyes sparkling in the glow of the artificial lights that illuminated the Compound.
‘Laika,’ I said, bowing my head respectfully. ‘An honour.’
Laika nodded back and sat on her haunches, regarding us all with a steely gaze that had turned greater men to jelly in the war rooms of The Oracle. The gathering crowd of Compound citizens had not seen a celebrity of her calibre among us before – certainly it put the weekend when cricket legend Ian ‘Meaty’ Botham came to visit firmly in the shade. Laika was the greatest asset the Alliance had, a decorated leader with a strategic mind most could only dream of. No one, Laika included, knew how her time floating through space after the Russians sent Sputnik 2 into orbit in 1957 had gifted her with this super-intelligence and the ability to speak, not to mention her unnaturally long life, but as a key figure on the Alliance Assembly she had guided the galaxy through many decades of tumult and uncertainty. I felt truly privileged to be in her company – very much like I did on the day I signed Al Shearer. You really do have to treasure those moments.
‘I’m delighted to see you return in one piece, Kevin,’ she said – and I was bowled over that she even knew my name. Though of course, Dr Pebble-Mill persuading her to sign my departure form would account for that.
‘Aye, well,’ I said bashfully, my face flushing pink, ‘it was a group effort. It was pretty hairy out there for a while, but we got through.’
‘The news of the L’zuhl incursion is dire indeed,’ Laika said. ‘Yes – I’ve heard all about that. The Makazka itself was spotted in this nebula this very day. Though I gather it is no more.’
‘It’s a long story, ma’am,’ General Leigh said. ‘I have much to impart, though not all of it can I explain.’ He glanced at Gerry.
‘We knew a day would arrive when the L’zuhl would come for us here, but not so soon. Had this dratted spy been apprehended sooner…’ She threw a dark glance in Leigh’s direction and he turned his face away. His failure to find the culprit quickly had played a major part in how things had panned out. Laika suddenly looked up at Gerry, who met her eyes only briefly and looked away.
‘You’ve seen such things,’ Laika said suddenly in a strange, wistful voice. ‘Things we would never believe or understand. I see it in your eyes. You… have a part to play in all of this when the darkness comes, don’t you? I can feel it.’
I shivered at Laika’s perception but said nothing.
‘So… who was the spy, Laika?’ I asked, feeling a little emboldened. ‘I assume you’ve got the sad sod locked up in Fort Emmeline by now. I don’t usually advocate torture but the guy wants his head felt, he really does. He’s bollocksed things right up these past few weeks, I don’t mind telling you.’
‘We don’t have the spy locked up,’ Laika said matter-of-factly. ‘Though you’re right, it’s high time we did. That is why I came here to meet you all this evening.’
Laika barked at one of the guards who nodded and unhooked a pair of cuffs that were really more like medieval manacles. I watched in growing horror as he walked over and placed them around the wrists of the spy, who stood there without protestation or complaint, head bowed low.
‘No…’ I said in a strangled voice. ‘No, it can’t be…’
‘It is,’ Laika said. ‘The evidence is incontrovertible. I appreciate that this may be difficult to accept.’
I turned to look at the culprit, blinking away tears.
‘But… but why? How could you?’
‘I AM SORRY, KEVIN KEEGAN,’ Barrington12 replied plaintively. ‘I NEVER WANTED TO DISAPPOINT YOU. I LOVE THIS COMPOUND AND ALL OF THE PEOPLE WITHIN IT.’
‘Perhaps you should have thought of that before you began feeding information to our enemies,’ Laika said brusquely. ‘Your actions have threatened to destroy everything that the Alliance has built here. Mankind’s existence in this galaxy hung by a thread following the invasion of Earth – my home planet too, remember – and you have helped them take a great step towards total extinction.’
‘I DID NOT MEAN TO,’ Barrington12 replied, lowering his head again.
The crowd turned on Barrington12 immediately and as he was led away, docile and broken, they booed him and threw insults and one or two even chucked missiles as he passed – shoes, coins, a banana. They thudded dully off the robot’s steel exterior. He did not react. He was bundled into the back of a Harbinger vehicle, Laika hopping in beside him, speeding off towards Fort Emmeline. I had a horrible feeling then that I would never see my friend again.
It was as though I’d been punched in the gut. I met Leigh’s gaze for just a moment but his expression was impossible to read. It was closer to disappointment than anyt
hing else. He strode away without a word. Gillian suddenly appeared from the crowd and hurried over to us, her face ashen.
‘Kevin,’ she said. ‘I… I’m so sorry. This is…’ she trailed off, lost for words.
‘It can’t be,’ Gerry said, looking at me frantically. ‘Kev, this must be a joke! Mustn’t it?’
My mind was racing; I couldn’t begin to compute what had just happened. How could he have done this? Why? I stuffed my hands in my jacket pockets dejectedly and shook my head in disbelief. My fingers wrapped around something in my left pocket then, a smooth, flat chunk of metal. I retrieved it and looked at the small internal memory card that Barrington12 had dropped in the mud during our trek to Great Strombago – it already seemed a lifetime ago. I’d picked it up when he’d unwittingly dropped it and had intended to return it to him later on but had forgotten all about it – little wonder his battery had run down so quickly during our journey home and my farewell to Akkie. And now it was too late. It would remain a grisly souvenir.
‘Oh!’ Gillian said, looking at it in the palm of my hand in horror. ‘My Q7 Keycard! Good God, Kevin, where did you find this?’
‘I… your what? Barrington12 dropped this. Last week, I… meant to return it to him. I thought it was just a bit of his what-have-you falling off.’
My face fell as the realisation set in. Damn it all.
‘He had my Keycard all along,’ Gillian said, taking it from my outstretched hand. She sighed. ‘It is true, then. He is what they say he is. Who am I kidding? He just admitted as much himself.’
I looked at Gerry, tears now streaming freely down my cheeks.
‘Oh, Gerry,’ I said, and buried my sobbing face in his shoulder.
THE WEAPON
It had been, without question, one of the worst weeks of my life. Far from returning home as glorious heroes, lauded for our defeat of the Makazka and for striking at the heart of the L’zuhl, we had been rent apart, physically and emotionally. Barrington12 was in chains, sitting in a dingy cell in Fort Emmeline awaiting a trial hearing in front of the Compound Council. Gerry was, frankly, a mess – and I’m not just talking about his dress sense or the way he can’t eat beans on toast without ruining his shirt and, in many cases, his trousers too. Much like the first time it had happened, he had grown increasingly distant, quiet, withdrawn and really not like the Gerry I knew and loved at all. Now, whenever I sang a quick burst of Charles & Eddie’s ‘Would I Lie To You?’ I was met with silence from my number two, whereas previously he’d have been there, right on cue, ready to interject with an ‘oh yeah!’ It was heartbreaking – and it wasn’t difficult to understand why.