Really, really, really, really weird stories [1st ed] 1892389010, 1892389029, 9781892389015, 9781892389022

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OHN

Digitized by the Internet Archive in

2011

http://www.archive.org/details/reallyreallyrealOOshir

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Really, Really, Really, Really,

Weird Stories

Contents ©1999 by John Shirley Cover, cover design, and interior artwork Interior design

All rights reserved. Printed in the

©1999 Alan M. Clark

and composition by John Tynes

United States of America.

No

part of this

book may be used

or reporduced in any form or by any means, or stored in a database or retrieval system, without prior written permission of the publisher except in the case of brief quotations critical articles

embodied

in

of reviews. Making copies of any part of this book for any purpose other than

your ovra personal use

is

a violation of United States copyright laws. For information, please

is,

without warranty of any kind, either express or impHed. While every

contact the publisher.

This book

is

sold as

precaution has been taken in preparation of this book, the author and Night Shade Books

sume no

responsibility for errors or omissions. Neither

any

is

liability

assumned

for

as-

damages

resuling from the use of information or instructions contained within.

This

is

a

work of

any resemblance to

The

fiction.

real

The

characters and events portrayed in this

people or events

is

book

are fictitious,

and

purely coincidental.

publisher would like to thank the following for indespensible help and support. William

K. Shafer, Alan Bcatts,

John Pelan, Matt Johnson, John Tynes, John Shirley and Paula Guran.

First

Edition

Printed in the United States of America

Limited Edition ISBN 1-892389-01-0

Trade Edition ISBN 1-892389-02-9

Night Shade Books

870 East

El

Camino Real

#133

Mountain View, CA 98040 www nightshadebooks com .

.

night@nightshadebooks com .

Really,

Reall^dl^' Really,

cVVeird iStories

John Shirley

NIGHT SHADE BOOKS

MOUNTAIN

V

1

E

VV,

C A

this

book

is

to these really

dedicated

weird people

Micky Shirley, Ivan Stang, Paul Mavrides, Harry S. Robins, Rudy Rucker, Shikhar,

Gene

a Texas Fan, Jan

My Man

Laidlaw, Richard Kadrey, Paula Guran,

in

Germany, LadyCro, Marc

Mark

Ziesing,

Tim

Powers,

Serena Powers, Art Cover, Steve Brown, Richard Smoley, Michael and

Misha Chocholak, Simpson,

Mark

DC Moon,

Sten,

Dona

Robert Sheckley, Ed Kramer, Corby

Bolt, Jeff Bolt,

Dale van Wormer, Charlene

Jon Nev^on, Jim Baldwin, Katherine Dunn, Julia Solis, John Roome, Don Roeser, Eric Bloom, Ted Oliphant, Greg Bishop, Tim

Zaharakis,

Brigham, and the Reverend Nanzi Regalia.

REALLY WEIRD STORIES "I

Want To Get Married,"

Says the World's Smallest

Man!

Will the Chill

Tapes

12, 14, 15,

22 and 23

Don't Be Afraid Lot

5

19

38

49

Five, Building Seven,

Door Twenty-three

Kindred

55

68

The Word "Random,"

Deliberately Repeated

69

Voices

76

The

78

.

.

.

Last Ride

And

the Angel with Television Eyes

The Sweet Caress of Mother Nature In the Cornelius Arms Quill Tripstickler, Out the Window I

Live in Elizabeth

Morons

at the

158

166

,

Screens Brittany?

112

125

145

Speed of Light

Silent Crickets

92 108

169

Oh: She's

in Translucent Blue

Ticket to Heaven

189

202

REALLY, REALLY, REALLY, WEIRD STORIES Ash

222

Triggering

When

Enter

235

Came

247 260

Skeeter Junkie

What Joy! What

Fulfillment!

270 277

199619971998 Preach

289

Preach: Part Two: The Apocalypse of The Reverend John Shirley

294

Modern Transmutations

297

of the Alchemist

Just Like Suzic

3^4

Cold Feet

316

The

Peculiar

Tahiti in

Happiness of Professor Cort

Terms of Squares

319 333

Equilibrium

340

What Cindy Saw The Almost Empty Rooms

350

Ten Things to be Grateful For The Sea Was Wet As Wet Could Be

378

3^1

387

.

The Author Wants To Tell You

This collection

in four sections.

is

RIES; second one

The

first

.

.

is

REALLY WEIRD STO-

one

REALLY, REALLY WEIRD STORIES; third one is WEIRD STORIES; last one is REALLY, RE-

is

REALLY, REALLY, REALLY

REALLY WEIRD STORIES.

ALLY, REALLY,

way—so

stories in just that

than the ones in the

As

for

The I

why

.

.

I've tried to

arrange the

that the stories in each section are "weirder"

last.

.

idea for this collection

came

to

me when Paula Guran said,

"Yeah,

read that Lot Five story. Shirley, that was a really weird story." muttered, "You think thafs weird?"

I

relative.

it's all

if

you chose

yeah,

it

to.

really

I'm still

like to .

.

think

its

it

is

gimmicky,

we

Or

is

think.

it's

a sort of high concept

entertainment element

more going for

it

than

that.

How far can we go, and How far can we go without get-

get lost, can

we

find our

real, to

way back? Does

know who you

normality or so-called weirdness goes

are,

it

matter?

whatever

down?

the point just to have one motherfucker of a ride?

You decide right: if

quality, but,

.

the point to be aware, to be

relative

but—

experiment: this journey.

really into this

if

it is

according to weirdness

The

existence.

has

take our reference points with us?

Isn't

I

I

said that

ting lost—or

as

collection

that doesn't justify

does, perhaps, but

Having

thought: Well,

fun to do.

And so it has been. This and

I

stories

That wouldn't be any kind of measure of

would be

collection,

Then

mean, you could stack up

I

if it's

a

good

each section

Weird

thought

is

is

ride.

And you can

weirder than the

decide

last.

Let

if I

stacked these up

me know what you

obviously relative, and this "stacking" wasn't half so easy

it'd

be.

Some

weirdness because of the

stories are in a particular section of relative

way

they're written rather than because of

what happens

in

them. Not everyone

weirdness of these

stories.

will

agree about the comparative

Within given sections,

stories are arranged for

other reasons, having to do with pacing and tone and

be noted that

this collection

Many of the in

some

stories in this

cases were

what

I

is

no

particular genre;

.

.

.

me—to

Some

of the

be too weird to be pub-

now.

till

There are a few

weirdest stories

stories that should,

by

rights,

I

be

in this

most

book but were

part, these are the

ever wrote; especially, as you might suppose, those in

last section.

As I was compiling this book, over a couple of weeks to

should

several genres.

think of as barely published.

unavailable for contractual reasons. But, for the

the

variety. It

book have never been published before-or

former group were judged— not by lished

it's

do

too),

was mostly

I

(I

had other

stuff

listening to the following music:

Monster Magnet's Powertrip album, Nick Cave's Murder

Ballads,

Lou

Reed's boxed set and Live in London, Frank Zappa's Hot Rats, various things by King Crimson, various cuts by Bauhaus

and by Peter Murphy,

PJ

Harvey, the band Poe, Iggy and the Stooges and Iggy's recent solo albums,

Hound Dog

Taylor,

John Lee Hooker, the Oblivion Seekers, Big Mama stuff), Cake (my kids made me; I liked it).

Thornton, Frank Sinatra (60s

We

Wm

Cramps,

Fall (Iggy tribute Tilt,

Cash, and the

Have

CD), Trust/Obey,

Patti

Smith, Cracker,

Witchman, Mudhoney, Rolling Stones, Johnny

The

Sick,

new

Blue Oyster Cult 3lhum—Heaven Forbid.

a weird day.

The

Have

a really weird day.

John

Shirley

For more about the

you are

weird author,

really

invited to visit the official

John Shirley Web

http

:

/

Site:

/www. darkecho com/ JohnShirley .

or contact him via email:

darkecho@aol com .

CO CO

The the

first

time

dum dum

CX3

I

saw

boys

was fascinated They just stood in front of the old drug store I was most impressed I

No Not

one

else

was impressed

at all

—Iggy Pop, "Dum Dum

Boys'

Really

^Veird

Stories

"

"I

Says

Want To Get Married,"

the World's Smallest Man!

"You a fucking ho," Delbert

"You don't come

said.

at

me

like that,

not a

fuckin ho."

"Fuck you, Delbert,

Capp

Street

tossup don't

when

like yo'

come out

it

who

me

out?

thirty

nigger bitch cousins,

You busted me out

degrees— I

Tm

a white

ain'a girl,

on

there

motherfucking

motherfucker,

I

of that—"

You was already a ay motherfucker CheeChee—

"Don't be talkin that that ess

turned

was fucking

shit.

"Sure so he didn't beat

my

fucking head

were you when he was slapping Delbert. Shit you

me and

fucking whore, you fucked

Where were you? Where

in.

shit? Hittin'

the fuckin' pipe,

knew what was going on-Where you going now

goddamnit?" Delbert was mumbling over the loose knob of the hotel room's door, trying to get out into the hall.

Brandy was glad Delbert was

The knob was about

going because that

come

ready to

off.

meant he wasn't going

to

work

himself up to knocking her around, but at the same time she didn't

want

to be left alone, just her

a radio

now

TV

and the fucked-up

because the picture was so

slant)'

that

was more or

you couldn't

make

it

less

out, a

two-week-old Weekly World Inquirer, and one can of Colt Malt stashed on the window ledge. And something else, he was going to get some

money, maybe get an out-front from Terrence, and do some shouted after him, "You going to suckin'

it all

pipe without

up, microwavin' that pipe, fuckin'

Terrence going to kick yo' ass

if

as

he slammed

it

'Tuck you, you better bring off as his steps

receded down

Really Weird Stories

yelling,

me

She

again?

You

up the way you do

it

you smoke what he

But he'd got the door open,

SLAP YOU!"

hit that

rock.

it,

and

give >'ou to sell-"

"SHUT UP

WOMAN

I

BITCH-

behind him with that soapH)pera timing.

me some the

hall,

fuckin

." .

.

She

"... dope."

let

her voice

trail

.

6

Want to Get Married,"

"I

The

fight

.

John Shirley

.

had used her up. She felt that plunge feeling again, like nothtry; and what she wanted was to go back to bed.

ing was any use so why

She thought, maybe

I

my baby out of Foster

Care Hold, that place's

Candy's not a baby anymore, she's ten, and she's

just like prison. Shit

half-white, looks

get

more white than anything

else, she'll

be OK.

Brandy got up off the edge of the bed, walked across the hugging

chilly

room,

her sharp hips under her fingers, as she went to

herself, feeling

the window. She looked out through the

little

cigarette-burn hole, just in

time to see Delbert walk his skinny black ass out the front door, right up to Terrence.

"The man's going

to

go off on you one of these days,

Delbert, you be a dead nigger before

you

emergency room, you

hit the

fucking asshole," she said, aloud, taking satisfaction in

it.

There was no reason, she thought, to be looking out the burn-hole instead of just lifting the shade; she didn't have anything to be paranoid

about, there wasn't even any fucking crumbles of

hadn't had any hubba in two days, and night thinking about

now

dope

in the house, she

she was laying awake at

not wanting to go out and turn a trick for

it,

cause she had that really bad lady trouble, and the pain

fucked her was

There

bad

it

clinic,

go to the

be-

they

stabbing her pussy, the infection-

like

was, soon as she started thinking about

again, itching

it

when

and burning

clinic.

in her cunt.

it,

the itching starts

up

Ow Ow. Ow. Shit, go to the

She didn't have the energy. They made you wait

so long. Treated you like a fucking whore.

She turned to the burn-hole again, saw Terrence walking along with Delbert, Terrence shaking his head.

up

here, beat her

cigarette hole.

till

No more

credit. Delbert'd

she'd hit the streets again. She

Looking out through the

habit. Like picking holes in

be back

mrned away from

tiny burn-hole

the

was a tweakin'

your skin trying to get coke bugs. Once she'd

spent a whole day, eight hours straight staring out through that hole, picking her skin bloody, staring, turning away only to hit the crack pipe. That was when Delbert was dealing and they were flush with dope.

Fucking cocaine

made you

tweaky,

it

lurched. She

went back

stuff. Maybe Delbert's some head. Her stomach

was funny

cousin Darius would give her some. For

to the bed, looked again at the Inquirer article

she'd been laboriously reading:

I

WANT TO GET MARRIED,

SAYS

WORLD'S SA4ALLEST MAN!

Ross Taraval, the wodd's smallest man, wants to get married-and he's one eligible bachelor! He weighs only seventeen pounds and

Really Weird Stories

John Shirley is

"I

Want to Get Married,"

only 28 inches high but he has a budding career as an enter-

tainer

and

he's got plenty of love to give,

my success,"

to share

he

who

said Ross, 24,

shot in Mexico, making him a

tells us. "I

has starred in two films

was given a "small"

wood

me

film.

wife in real

more

"There's

"The doctors

say

style!

And

listen,

man wants—and got so much love

real

I

I've

body wanting

little

in

to give

and

Miami. After

he wanted

to.

who

got

That's

eye

what

a

man

inside this

woman!" was

raised by

manager,

his

Book of

six-foot-five-

could carry Ross in his overcoat pocket

Chafin trained Ross

my

said.

my new

climb aboard!

attracting attention in the Trafalgar

soon found him work "I've

me

at three years old,

World Records, Ross was contacted by inch Benny Chafin,

let

there's a real

to the right

it

support

I'd

full-sized wife.

can handle her—just to give

role in a Holly-

than meets the eye," Ross

want a

I

who was abandoned

Ross,

nuns

to

could have children— and

I

want a wife

or anyway a comet, in that

star,

enterprising land. Recently he

if

...

in nightclubs

on a

in singing

TV

and

beautiful

and dancing and

endorsements.

house

in the

Hills for the right lady,"

Ross

said.

There was a picmre of the

little

guy standing next to

Hollywood

his

manager— not

even coming up to the manager's crotch height. The manager, now, was cute,

a

he looked kind of

little

box

at the

If you think to get in

like

Geraldo Rivera, Brandy thought. There was

bottom of the

youd be a

likely life-mate for

touch with him, you

World Inquirer and

Huh. Stupid

to

.

She could peel

I

letter to

him. Address

idea.

There was a stamp on the

think

like

.

.

She heard Delbert's footsteps

"I

Ross and would

may write him care of the Weekly

forward your

we'll

your correspondence

celed.

article. It said:

it

in the hall

letter

.

from her

.

.

sister that

hadn't been can-

off.

got you a job at Universal Smdios!" Benny said, striding breath-

lessly in.

"Really?" Ross's heart chair he'd

been squaring

boy Channel. Really Weird Stories

thumped. in to

He

climbed arduously

down

off the

watch TV. The Sleepytime Inn had a

Play-

7

"

8

"I

John Shirley

Waot TO Get Married,"...

He

hurried over to Benny,

who was

taking off his coat.

was

It

May in

Los Angeles, and sort of cold there. The cold made Ross's joints ache. Benny had said it was always warm in LA, but it wasn't now. It was cloudy and windy. It

took Ross a long time to get across the floor to Benny, and Ross was

know what was going

impatient to

on, so he started shouting questions

through his wheezing before he got there.

am

"What movie

down,

"Ross, slow It's

at their

I in.^"

he asked. "Does

you'll get

theme park. They want you

the tourists.

It's

a

live

have Arnold Schwarzane^er?"

it

your asthma started. No,

it's

not a movie.

King of the Wonksters for

to play

show."

Ross stopped in the middle of the

floor, panting, confused.

"What're

Wonksters?" "They're

.

sort of like

.

.

Ewoks.

outer space guys. Universal's got

Little

a movie coming out about 'em at Christmas so this'd be next

summer—if

the movie hits— and—

"Next summer!

need some work now! Those bastards! You

I

said

I

could be in a buddy picture with Arnold Schwarzanegger!" "I

He

spoke to

want

doesn't

"You

said

He

his agent.

do

to

already did a

buddy

picture with a

little

guy.

that again."

could meet him!"

I

"You're going to be around

your hero, Ross, calm dovm,

Maybe we can

get a photo

Hollywood

all

right?

You

for a long time, you'll

meet

don't want to have an attack.

op or something with him—"

Benny had turned away, was frowning over the papers

in his briefcase.

"We're not even sleeping in Hollywood!" Ross burst out. He'd been saving this

morning, having heard

all

"Hey, we're

in

LA,

OK?

It

from the maid. "We're ..."

it

doesn't matter where you

live

as long as

you

can drive to the studios. Most of 'em aren't actually in Hollywood, Ross, they're in

Burbank or Culver City—"

"Mary, Mother of God! getting wild with

all

the

I

girls!

want

to

go out

No? You

are!

in

And

Hollywood! You're out leaving

me

here!"

Benny turned to him, his cheeks mottling. He cocked a hip, and Ross backed away. He knew, from the times he had run away from the mission, how people stood when they were going to slighdy,

kick you.

He'd spent his ribs,

when

six

weeks

in the

mission hospital, after one kick stove in

and he wasn't quite right from

it

yet.

He most

definitely

knew

they were going to kick you.

But Benny

made

that long exhalation through his nose that

meant he

Really Weird Stories

.

John Shirley was

trying to

Want to Get Married,"

"I

keep

He'd never kicked Ross, or hurt him

his temper.

he probably never v^ould. He'd done nothing but help him, "I'm sorry, Benny," Ross said. "Can

we

have a Big

after

at

.

.

all,

all.

Mac and watch

Play-

boy channel?" "Sure.

We

deserve a break, right?" He'd turned back to his briefcase,

sorting papers. "I

had a

here for you, from those people at the

letter

World Inquirer!' don't like those people."

"I

"They're bloodsuckers. But the publicity play along. We'll get a

hope you

"I

"I'm not

are not

mad

TV commercial mad

at you.

me, Benny

at

Hey, here

There was something off about

it is.

good, so whatever

is

or something out of

it is,

we

it."

." .

.

Your

letter."

Brandy thought. His nose

his face.

seemed crooked or something. His feamres

a

distorted.

little

Must be

from being a dwarf, or a midget, or whatever he was. She

him

tried to picture cuddling with him, think of

when

but

feeling

.

as cute, like a kid,

she pictured him unzipping his pants, she got a skin-crawling .

.

Hit the pipe a few times, anything's

all right.

She pushed the pipe to the back of her mind. She had to play this

They were actually,

sitting in the

corner booth

was standing on the

leatherette seat, leaning

who

on the

bar,

They

also probably thought he

was her

He was wearing a

in the pocket; lot

of

women

he looked

stiffly

Or

they were black.

your hair

is

a

like

little

tie,

1

was very

letter

nice.

was very

guess you're looking at

a

little

"It's

It's fine.

Fine."

OK

Siamese

to notice

cat.

it,"

Really Weird Stories

handwriting was

at

really.

skin-" she began.

He

Brandy

You know how

liked you, because

She could see he was staring

His voice sounded

tube from the next room.

or old, except

Smelled nice too."

distractedly.

my

I

fat

nice, the

the scabs on her cheeks. There were only a few,

no!

and

don't want a black wife.

But he was talking sort of

"No no

big for his

Sunday School. "Did a

kid going to

that did are too big

blonde, and your

nice, the stationery

"I

Too

with a hanky tucked

write to you?" she asked.

"Not too many. The ones you.

pressed suit and

it

sitting.

he was twenty-eight

kid. Shit,

inches high. His head, though, was almost normal sized.

body.

table like

passed probably thought he was

was a

but the people

carefully.

of a Denny's restaurant. Ross,

the

like

smiled at her.

said. little

"My

.

.

.

it

was coming through

He had nice teeth. my sister has this crazy

fuh-" Watch your language, she

.

10

"I

Want to Get A4arried,"

.

John Shirley

.

how they jumped up and scratched me ... " "You know

told herself.

He seemed

Ross nodded.

to

are.

buy

bent over to pet him and he

I

Maybe where he was from

it.

didn't have a lot of hubba-heads picking at their skin

"There was a

He

Big and fat and mean."

nice of

you

she thought. Well,

to

buy

maybe

quite

me

was

it

make he

like

said,

fries for

work

to

the

little

what you can

out? Get

now

when

said.

A

was

just

it

fucking Denny's, the nearest one .

.

.

Brandy—who knew

now—and

this

if

a milkshake and

which was kind of a funny dinner. Brandy thought.

guy,

The waitress had done a double order;

else in his

really fancy place

waitress brought their order, steak for

was going

at the mission.

out.

Brandy

dinner,"

and he was hungry. But she'd pictured some

The

the time.

scowled and muttered something

munchkin voice she couldn't "It's

all

he said absently, "who scared me,

cat,"

they

when

take

she'd

first

come

to take their

she didn't look at Ross directly. But she stared at Brandy

she thought Brandy wouldn't notice.

Fuck you,

"You

bitch,

really

you think I'm

do look

nice,"

sick for kickin' with the

Ross

said, as the waitress

little

dude.

walked away. Like

he was trying to convince himself.

Her

She'd done her best.

was a

good, but

it

washed

with that

it,

out, so she'd

had

little

thin

shitty

hair

was almost

and dry from

hand soap

to corn-row

it.

that

gage, so

it

Delbert had,

off a pair of

him

at the

room, and she'd got twelve

was beginning

it'd

was

she'd

frizzed

new

pantyhose and

down

here

San Francisco station into

at the

helping her out, and then she'd ditched to the men's

all

the Payless drugstore. Getting the bus

was harder, but she'd conned a guy gone

was

when

She'd handwashed her dress and bor-

rowed Carmen's pumps and ripped

some makeup from

naturally blond, that

the hubba, and

all

LA

station

when

he'd

dollars for the guy's lug-

to click.

Ross started to cough. "Are you choking on something?" she asked, dreading

it,

"No—my doll hands.

because she didn't want to attract even more attention. asthma."

He

He was

found an

fishing in his pocket with

inhaler,

"Just rest a bit,

you don't have

So

was not

his health

thing, then,

if

at

one of

his

little

it.

to talk or nothin'," she said, smiling at him.

that great.

It

wouldn't seem too weird or any-

he died, or something.

me

"You

just

were

hella cute at the

swept

manager over

and sucked

off

my

Brandy

feet,

I

guess,"

wedding.

I

was surprised you

to be, like, best

man

said. "I

thought you

didn't have your

or something."

Really Weird Stories

.

John Shirley

"We had

me

lots

own room "Wow,

be married

to

doesn't want

But he has

"I

of

Come on

girls.

I

know what he would

.

he

say,

he checks everyone out, you know.

in,

come on

in, this is

our room, our

it

.

even has a kitchen! Anyway, look refrigerator

little

.

wasn't bolted to the wall. couldn't get shit for

do

till

.

." .

wave and a

"I

because

first,

to get married

Want to Get Married,"

.

It

."

it's

got a bar and a micro-

She noticed that the microwave oven

was

though, she probably

pretty old,

it.

like this refrigerator, this little refrigerator

by the

floor.

When we

get a big house we'll have a real kitchen!"

"Yeah?

He

Uhhh

.

.

.

When do

you think-"

interrupted her wdth a nervous dance of excitement, spreading his

arms to gesture

whole

at the

place.

beautiful, everything's like a palace,

"Uh

up, so

all lit

huh." She started to

sit

Las Vegas.

much money,

so

It's

everything's

on the edge of the bed, then noticed

round and buggy when he saw her

all

sofa,

like this place.'^

a treasure chest."

like in

got

"You

and

sat

down, kicked

stayed in the

there.

his eyes

She moved over to the

off her shoes. "It would've been nice

if

vinyl

we coulda

Golden Nu^et or one of them places—this Lucky Jack's

own casino, they don't got room service best, when Benny finds some work for me

okay, but they don't got their

"Oh—we'll

stay in the

.

is ."

.

in

Hollywood."

He

toddled toward her, imbuttoning his coat.

was going

to

Crack cocaine

town out by the

And

then

it

did he think he

do?

She wondered where you got a rock place.

What

is

airport.

hit her,

in Vegas.

She knew there'd be a

everywhere there's money.

She could find

and she stood up,

it.

Maybe

the edge of

She needed the cash

sharply.

He

.

.

.

took several sudden

down at him, feeling unreal. creature? "When Benny finds you

steps back, almost stumbling. She looked

Had

she been husded by this

little

some work? What do you mean?" She

felt

the tightening in her gut, the tease of imagined taste in her

mouth: the

taste of vaporized cocaine

She could almost

feel

and the other

shit

flowering in the glass mbe, coming to her.

Her

The

little

wood!"

He

on

the back of her

left

in

it.

smoke

heart started pounding,

hands twitching, fuck, going on a tw^ak with no dope picking at a scab

they put

the glass pipe in her hand; see the white

to

hit,

one hand

forearm.

guy was chattering something. "Oh, I'm working in Hollyactually puffed out his chest. "I'm going to star in an Arnold

Schwarzanegger movie!'

Really Weird Stories

II

.

12

"I

Want to Get Married,"

.

"You mean you're going to get

John Shirley

.

co-star

How much did you

with him. OK.

paid.'^"

He

fiddled with a

lamp cord.

"I

don't have the check yet."

"Jesus fucking Christ."

He

looked

looked

like

phemy! That

mouth open,

her with his

at

it

had been punched is

the Lord's name!

I

so round and red and wet

head with a

in his

can't have

tool.

my wife

"That

is

it

a blas-

talking like that!"

"Look—we're married now. We share everything right? How much we got to share? I need some cash, lover—for one thing, we didn't get a ring yet,

you

said

we'd get a diamond ring—"

Ross was pacing back and forth, looking the men's room, trying not to

money now—thirty

wet

like

a small child waiting for

his pants. "I don't

have very

much

dollars—"

"Thirty dollars! Jesus fuh

.

.

.

that's a kick in the butt.

What about

credit cards?"

He wrung his little

hands.

Made

her think of a squirrel messing with a

peanut. "I'm paying with American Express for the airplane

Benny

and hotel-

will stop the card!"

"American Express? Can you draw cash on the card?"

He

stopped scuttling around and blinked up

"Come

on, we're

gonna

at her. "I don't

know."

find out. We're going out."

"But we're Just Married!" "It's first.

not even dark out

We

can't

yet,

Hold your

Ross.

do anything without a

ring,

something, don't worry. I'm hella horny. But ring.

horses, okay? First things

can we? We're gonna do

we

can't

do

it

without a

That'd be weird don't you think?"

When

she

came

in,

the

little

with his legs crossed Indian

guy was

sitting in the

a pair of red

style, in

silk

middle of the bed, pajamas. There was

a Saint Christopher's medal around his neck. Probably couldn't get shit for that either. It

was

down

after midnight,

low,

and the

dimness he looked stuffed toy,

'til

on the Playboy

tall

sometime.

floor

like

lamp

a doll

He

had the overhead

in the corner

somebody had

he leaned back on the pillow

in

lights dialed

was unplugged. In the

on the bed, some a pose he'd maybe seen left

channel.

They'd got the

limit for the account, three

hundred cash on the Ameri-

can Express Card. They'd endured

all the stares in the American Express and she'd kept her temper with the giggly fat guy who thought they were performing at Circus Circus, but the hard part had been mak-

office,

Really Weird Stories

.

John Shirley

"I

Want to Get Married,"

ing Ross swallow the amazingly bullshit story about tion in California for the

gjrl

to

go shopping

how

was

it

for the ring alone

.

.

.

a tradi.

.

She'd had to cuddle him and stroke his crotch a few times.

His dick was a hard

little

Then she'd left him some shit about He'd made kissy faces at her as

thing like a pen-knife.

here with a bottle of pink Andre champagne, watching big-tit

she

gids shooting each other with uzis.

left.

Right now, stoned, she thought maybe she could give him a blow job

or something

if

fifty dollars in

she closed her eyes. She had gone through two hundred

hubba, her mouth was dry as a baked potato skin from

hitting the pipe.

"Let

me see the beautiful ring on the beautiful girl," he said, his voice He said something else she couldn't make out as she crossed the

slurred.

room

to

him and

"Hey, you said,

on

fending his clammy

She pointed der

sat

lingerie.

the bed, just out of reach.

know what?—Whoa, at the girl

"How'd you

little

slow down, not so

on the wall-mounted TV like

fast

me

up

to dress

screen; a

like that,

huh?

thing like that. I'd look hella good, just hella sexy in that.

can get some, there's an adult bookstore

open

all

night,

you can go

in

compadre^' she

hands away.

and look

that's

at

"No!" His voice was unexpectedly low.

got

some

movies and "I

I

girl in

laven-

need some-

I

know where

I

lingerie, they're

I'll—"

need you now!"

"Hey cool off—what I'm saying you could call Benny and ask him to wire you some money. We need some things. He could send it to the allnight check-cashing place on Las Vegas Boulevard, they got Western Union—" She picked up her purse and went unsteadily toward the bathroom. The room was warped, because of the darkness and what the crack had done to her eyes. It always did weird shit to her eyes. "Where you going?" "Just to the bathroom, do some lady's business." I could tell him Tm in my period, Latin guys wall steer clear from that, she thought. Maybe get another girl in here, give her a twenty to keep him occupied. "Why don't you call Benny while I'm in here, ask for some money, we need some stuff, hon!" She called, as she closed the bathroom door and fumbled through her purse with trembling fingers. Found the pipe, found the torn piece of

copper scrubbing pad she was using

Her thumb was was pounding

it

found the

lighter.

Her

heart

in her ears as she took the yellowish white dove of crack

from the inner pocket of the

dropped

for a pipe-screen,

already blackened and calloused from flicking.

purse, broke

in the pipe bowl, melted

Really Weird Stories

it

down

it

in half

with a thumbnail,

with the lighter

.

.

.

14

"I

Want to Get Married,"

.

John Shirley

.

There was a pounding on the door, near her knee. She stared at the lower part of the door, holding the smoke in for a moment, then slowly

Her

exhaled.

vision shrank

and expanded, shrank and expanded, and

then she heard, "You get out here and be with your husband!" Trying to

make

his voice all gravelly.

She had to laugh. She took another

much now. And

wasn't getting her off

the tweaky paranoia prod her with

Someone was going

to hear

its

him

and she'd be busted

on

hit. It

the edge of

around the corner of the high; she

that plunge into depression, that

see the pipe

she was feeling

cops. Lot of times they raped the

they were going to

yell;

in a

felt

hot icepick.

Vegas

jail.

come

in

and

She'd heard about Vegas

women they brought in.

they didn't

If

your looks, or you pissed them off more than once, they'd take you

like

out to the desert and use you for target practice instead of highway signs or bottles, and just leave you out there

"SHUT THE FUCKUP, ROSS!" that's

in

.

.

.

Oh

great,

don't want anybody to

come

she bellowed.

even worse. She hissed: "Be quiet!

I

Then

thought:

here—"

"They were

here, to bring towels,

for the ring alone! That's not any kind of tradition!

more

me women

and they told

don't go

You come on

out,

no

jokes!"

little

''You re a fucking

joke!" she yelled, as

little

he started kicking the door.

She turned the knob and slammed the door outward. Felt him bounce off

on

it

the other side.

bedframe.

A wail,

Heard him

slide across the rug, stop against the

then a shout of rage.

She thought again about a

will.

He

might have more money stashed

someplace, or some coming. But there was no to last out the night

was already

sell

hit the

tensely for the hotel's

—get that

some

call

bullshit story,

Circus Circus or

thing. star,

all

after the first

make

his thirty little

get-

pipe again. Part of her, tweakin', listened

in-

manager or the cops.

have him send the most cash possible.

the it,

call

Maybe

hustie a

and then he should get a heart attack or some-

he'd hustled her, telling her he had money,

the time he wasn't doing

false pretenses,

Rolex and

champagne—and maybe those

Or maybe the little guy could be sold himself somewhere. some place, or some kind of pervert. No, too hard to

He deserved

but

was going

through to his manager, make him give the manager dude

thousand bucks.

handle. Just

no

that shit,

She paused to

this thing

and she couldn't get him to a lawyer tonight and he

suspicious. She'd have to just get his

bucks—twenty some now pajamas,

way

fucking

little

shit,

getting her to

was a big

marry him under

parasite, kick his miniature ass

.

.

.

Really Weird Stories

John Shirley

"I

A pounding low on was pardy open.

the

bathroom door

stood to one side and peered

my

ing to ruin

in a picture

me

now. The door

again. Angrier

It'll

"What

in at her.

What

that?

is

going to get us put

Shit, you're

career!

with

in

jail

that in

is

and you're go-

be a big scandal and Arnold won't want to be

He

and—!"

had to break off

for wheezing,

and she

heard him puff a couple of times on his inhaler, which was funny,

was

like

swishing arc. Fell

looked so

in

how

it

her pipe.

He jumped

She kicked the door open.

for

...

fucker was scared to put a limb through, but he

Little

your hands? Drugs!

Want to Get Married,"

much

some reason

one hand and

on

his

little

For a

butt.

like

one of her

that

made

back, narrowly avoiding

moment she

kids, like

felt

its

bad because he

he was going to

cry,

and then

her even madder, and she stepped out, pipe

lighter in the other,

the side of the head with her heel.

and kicked

He

at

him, clipping him on

spun, and blood spattered the

yellow bedspread.

She paused to slowly at

him

hit the pipe,

as she

took a

hit.

melting another rock.

Her mouth was

Then she came

starting to taste like the

more than coke, she wasn't getting good hits, she needed cash, get some cash and get a cab. He was up on his feet, scuttling toward the door to the hall. He was just tall enough to operate the knob. There was no way she could let the pipe

filter

little

fucker go, and

room

Vegas, fuck that. She crossed the

went,

trailing

to let the rollers get her in

no way she was going

smoke

like

turning to block the door.

in three strides, exhaling as she

a locomotive, doing an end run around him,

He backed

making some kind of ugly hiccuping

away, his face in darkness.

noise.

He

being now, in the dimness and through the kind of

little

gnome, or

like

one of those

human dope; he looked like some

little

fuckers in that movie

some sneaky little run around in the dark spots and pull shit on you. Maybe the microwave. If you didn't turn it up much Gremlins, which was what he was

boiled things inside,

it

suaded him to check Unless he'd told the

like,

could look in

girl

without

like

He was

didn't look like a

thing going to

it

just sort

of

he'd had a stroke. She had per-

her, they didn't

know

she was here.

with the towels.

was here?" Brandy decided, he wouldn't have told Probably, He didn't answer. much to some cheap hotel maid. So there was nothing stopping it. He mrned and scrambled under the bed. "That ain't gonna do you no "You

tell

good you

anybody

little

I

fucker," she whispered.

Really Weird Stories

15

i6

John Shirley

Want TO Get Married,"...

"I

oo oo oo

Ross heard her moving around up

The nuns, when they were he would hide

sion;

like

mad

him, would hunt him through the mis-

some

a rodent in

with asthma. She was going to get him

him and

and he

in

closet

till

they found him.

dust under the bed was furring his throat, his lungs.

The kick

He pictured her in a nun's habit.

there.

at

him with those

kick

spit

He

up blood.

into a corner,

hard, pointy shoes until his ribs stove

tried to shout for help, but

coarse whisper between wheezes.

He wheezed

and kick him. She'd

He

it

came out a

sobbed and prayed to the Virgin

and Saint Jude.

He

heard her muttering to herself.

He

now, to a corner of the room.

would hear

heard her move purposefully,

heard glass break. Surely someone

and come?

that

What was

He

she doing?

What had

"Little hustlin' tight-ass

she broken?

motherfucker," she hissed,

down on

her knees

now, somewhere behind him. Something scraped across the squirmed about to of

it,

was the

see. It

broken the bulb, and

with a

broom handle

jags

was

still

plugged

broken off

He

tried to

tall

it

He

shoved

in the socket as she

scream and rolled

thought he could

She shoved the thing

at

like

an old widow

under the bed, shov-

of blue sparks jumped from the bulb

aside.

glass swoing to follow him, sparking. ing.

it

it

at him.

A cluster

in.

He

it

at his face.

The lopsided

crown of

king's

could smell shreds of rug burn-

feel his heart bruising against his

him

he

floor lamp. She'd broken the top

she was wielding

trying to get at a rat, sliding

ing the long brass pole of It

now

rug;

again, forcing

him back

farther

breastbone. .

.

.

Then

it

stopped moving. She had moved away. Giggling.

Moving around the bedRoss

felt

her fingers close around his ankle. Felt himself dragged back-

wards, his face burning in the dusty rug, the back of his head smacking against the

bed

slats.

He

frustration, as she jerked

He

clawed and kicked

gave out a wail that tightened into a shriek of

him out from under the bed.

at her.

nal smell, big slapping hands.

head rang with

it.

He

She was

One

just

a great blur, a strange medici-

of the hands connected hard and his

began to gag, and found himself unable

to

lift

his

arms. Like one of those dreams where you are trapped by a great beast,

you want to run but your limbs won't work. She was carrying him somewhere, clasped against her, trapped in her arms

He

gagged again. Heard her

fucking puke on

me you

little

say,

like

a

dog

to

be washed.

from somewhere above, "Don't you

freak."

Really Weird Stories

John Shirley

"I

His eyes cleared.

on

The

this side.

early

Want to Get Married,"

He saw she was carrying him .

.

it

In less than a second she

had crammed him

never quite

made

it

the skin of his hands and face; his head

cheek smashed up against the cold

glass.

out of his throat.

inside

legs again, feel the glass lining of the

crammed

He

closing door.

Crushed

He

into a

feel

box.

little

tunity to close the

But

feel his

into a corner, his

in

both her hands,

against his feet with the

her whole weight against the door.

A

box. Crushed into a

little

He pressed his palms flat against the glass, chest, deliberately pulling

could

found some strength and

enough so she could press

could

He

it.

microwave oven against

kicked and she swore at him and grabbed his ankles stuffed his legs in far

The

.

''Bennnnyyyyyyyyr But

arms and

toward a big box, open

place had an old, used, cheap microwave oven.

ones had been rather big

...

little

.

.

.

tucked his knees against his

deeper into the oven.

Felt her using the

oppor-

door on him.

now he had some

leverage.

He

used

all

his strength

and a

lifetime

of frustration and kicked.

The door smacked outward, banging footing;

he heard her

dropped out of the oven, his small feet.

against her chest. She lost her

backwards, even as he scrambled back and

fall

fell

on

to the floor himself, landing painfully

She was confused, cursing incoherently, trying to get up.

He laughed, feeling light-headed and happy. He sprinted for the living room, jumping over her outstretched leg, and ran into the bedroom area. He could see the door, the way out, clearly

ahead of him, unobstructed. It was like she was climbing a mountain to do it. Someon the back of her head. The little fucker. The pipe. \X/Tien had

Brandy got up. thing wet it

got broken.^

make

It

was broken, beside the

Shit-maybe the She

her

felt

little

lip curl

hooked on the wire

She grabbed the stem.

It'd

fucker had already gotten out the door.

into a snarl,

The lamp hadn't

left

air

and ran toward the door-her ankle

stretched across the rug, about three inches over

drawn from the bed frame

The

sink.

a knife.

to the dresser.

cord, she thought, as she pitched face

the cord that way

knocked out of

it,

.

.

first

onto the

rug.

She

.

her, she

mrned onto her back

choking, trying

to orient herself.

The

little

bottle in his

fucker was standing over her, laughing, with the little

hands; he clasped the bottle by the neck.

Really Weird Stories

champagne

A narrow

bar

17

i8

"I

Want to Get Married,"

of light

came

He was pagne

.

between the

in

John Shirley

.

curtains, spotlighting his

round red mouth.

towering over her, from that angle, as he brought the cham-

bottle

down "A

hard on her forehead.

BURGLAR KILLED MY NEW BRIDE!"

SOBS WORLD'S SAIALLEST MAN The newlywed bride of Ross Taraval, the world's smallest man was murdered by an intruder on the first night of their Las Vegas honeymoon. Ross himself was battered senseless by the mystery man— and woke to find that his wife had been struck unconscious, raped, and murdered. Her throat had been cut by .

.

.

the broken glass of the drug-crazed

killer's

The

"crack" pipe.

burglar so far has not been located by poHce. "It

broke

my

heart," said the

game

have learned that to survive in

rooster of a

little

I

you must be stronger than other men! So

And

I

have not given up

my fame and fortune

my search

my

world when you are

"but size,

this

man,

I

will

go on

woman,

for the right

.

.

.

to share

..."

Ross hints that he's on the verge of signing a deal to do a

buddy movie with reer

Arnold Schwarzanegger.

his hero,

looms up ahead

some deserving woman!" Ross If

you'd

smallest Inquirer,

like to

send a

we'll

to

forward the

big cait

with

says.

letter to

man, you can write and

A

for a small guy! "I'd like to share

him

Ross Taraval, the world's care of the

letter to

him

.

.

Weekly World

.

Really Weird Stories

Will the Chill

"I refuse to

"If

you

speak to him," declared Tondius Will.

don't, there will

be no more sponsor," replied Great Senses.

The bioq^ber computer paused,

its

ing-yellow to assertion-blue; the

programming room's shadows

wall of lights changed

fore the brighter blue so that the oval

from consider-

chamber resembled the

fled be-

interior of

a great turquoise egg.

The

ship's

computer

asserted: "Sports-eyes

is

serious.

No interview, no

sponsorship."

"Very well. Let there be an end to

"Nonsense. You cannot Great Senses

Contest and you

owned by

amid the blue of

Sports-eyes.

"I'll

find a

knew

it

way

And

there

is

"You cannot

the

immense

cost of the planet-

to sponsor

it

myself." But even as he said

And you know how

Latest

homeworld

If

you refuse to speak with

"No

I

dress?

What

need. Nudity

"I'll

like to

And

he'll

come

touch you in greeting-

The

self-cleaning walls of the ship ab-

is

is

speak to the reporter. But only on the screen.

the present custom?"

sanctioned."

Will uirned and strode to the tiary level,

they

spittle.

"All right," said Will.

Should

Tondius

fad."

Will the Chill spat in disgust.

sorbed the

it,

was impossible.

here personally. lips.

without

this starship

.

the reporter, you'll have to talk to the show's director.

the

live

And

." .

"Sports-eyes has legal access to this ship.

on

that."

panel of honeycomb-cTystal glow-

assertion.

cannot Contest without a contestship.

push-coils to consider

Will

it."

without Contest. Mina's death proved

said, its fifty-by-fifty-meter

ing red for regret

is

live

communications.

Really Weird Stories

He

lift,

rode the compression tube to

glimpsed

his reflection in the glass

ter-

of

John Shirley

20 Will THE Chill

He was

the communication room's inactive screen.

golden-skinned,

compact but muscular, utterly haidess, his bald scalp gleaming with metal hookup panels-for his physical guidance-rapport with Great Senses and the contestship-set flush with his cranium. His dark-eyed, pensive features, already cold, intensified as he approached the screen.

His

A The

hardened to thin

full lips

screen flickered

spaceship shaped

and WiU eyes

lines; his hairless

brows creased.

him

nulgrav cushion darted from a wall niche to uphold

and

The

alive.

an

like

as

he

sat.

Sports-eyes communications ensign, a

eye, flashed

onto the screen. The sign faded,

faced a spindly, nude, gray-haired

man

with

tiny, restive

blue

seemed permanently puckered.

lips that

The stranger ceremoniously blew Will a kiss. Will merely nodded. The man moved uneasily in his seat; his shoulders bobbed, his thin cheeks ticked, his

spoke

prominent Adam's apple bounced. "Eric Blue here."

"They

rapidly.

me, Tondius

call

me

Blue the Glue. This

is

He

a guh-reat honor for

A very great honor."

Will.

Will shrugged.

Blue the Glue pounced that

you didn't want to

Will

nodded

on

Will the Chill. "Will,

my understanding

it's

give this interview. Correct?"

slightly.

"Well, uh, Will—heh—why

that?

is

Can you be

frank?

I

mean, you're

Tideholder for four Contests, you've been a planet-hurlin' waverider for

many longuns now. Twice my so you'll

live

another century at

other century? As far as

spoken to you

"What

is

lifetime.

I

know

You've earned two replenishings,

least. Is this

the last interview for an-

only one other SprtZ

your entire—"

in

the pertinence of this?" Will asked sharply. Blue's voice was

abundant with hidden meanings. His face was not he were back on "It's

draw.

who

wished

spoke with no faces

is

dropping

off,

at

all.

WiU. Though some say

planet-hurler since Elessar in 2270.

Still,

don't caper and jape for the cameras like Svoboda?

lessly

up

damn

those

his face. Will

And your image is important to your audience-

your audience-draw

you're the best "I

Five, listening to

relevant to your image.

And

NewZ holorag has

I

you don't—?"

don't brag end-

on my prowess and gossip about lovers like Browning? Munger? Is that your complaint?"

I

don't soak

publicity like

"Look, Will, there's a difference between, uh, maintaining dignity—snd being cold.

And

you're cold,

man. That's why they

call

"There's a difference between being emotive and

"Look reporter,

here, let

my job

me

is

put

it

to

you

you Will the-"

artistic,

Blue."

in the plainest terms. I'm a Sportsize

public relations-yot/V^ failed to give

me

anything to

Really Weird Stories

John Shirley

Will the Chill

relate to that public, Will. Sportsize stars

need audience appeal. They

have to be likable characters. They have to be likable-ah-/b/^5. They

have to be fellows people can identify with. Not cold and distant au-

tomatons—" "Ail

coldly

waveriders are cold and distant, as you put

and

distantly.

maintain themselves in the public eye. But

Not

inside. It

is

Blue," said Will,

it.

"But most of them pretend they're not, it is

in

order to

not coldness, not

really.

the aura of unflinching and unremitting dedication."

Blue the Glue looked starded. "Well. Philosophical Waverider.^ Image

Now weVe making progress. The

BoyZ might be

able to

do something

with that." Will snorted. "Will,

wath

I

wonder

if

you'll

be kind enough to examine a holotape

me and give me your analysis

of

feed

it. I'll

have

I

into your screen, with

it

your permission." Without waiting for permission. Blue punched a button and the screen was

weeks

filled

with a simplified holoimage of the

Contest with Opponent Brigg in system GV5498.

Will's

Two

planets a|>

proached one another, one brown-black, crescent-edged with

atmosphere swirling turmoil; the other. chrome-blue sized

like

masspiece,

Will's

silver, its

shining,

the shield of Perseus. Both were approximately Earth-

and devoid of

life,

as

was customary.

Relative to the viewer's plane

of perspective, the planets closed obliquely, Brigg's

hand corner and

final

condensed action) of

(time-lapsed, sped-up to twenty minutes

Will's

from the lower

left-

from the upper righthand corner of the rectangu-

lar screen.

How diluted the public impression The

right-hand planet,

of Contest! Will thought.

GV5498 Number

Four,

showed white pushcoil

equator and Southern Pole. Atmospheric disturbances and

flares at its

volcanic explosions roiled the contiguous faces of the planets as gravitational fields

meshed and

struggled.

Involuntarily, Will twitched

hookup

and flexed

his

arms

again, adjusting pushcoils, controlling the

momenmm,

and mass

as tilt,

if

he were

impems,

in

spin,

resistance of his masspiece.

Seconds before impact,

as

dead seas boiled and

ice

caps fractured, as

continents buckled, the pushcoil on the South Polar face toward Will's

Opponent

flared

bing the North

nent expected

and forced the pole

to

swing back,

tilting

the axis, lob-

Polar bulge forward, precipitating collision before

Oppo-

it.

Opponent's planet took the worst of the

collision forces.

impact, the orgasmic rending of twx) worlds:

Really Weird Stories

more

And

after the

of Will's masspiece

re-

21

22

John Shirley

Will THE Chill

remained of Opponent's. So Tondius Will

intact than

mained

And took Title from

Contest.

The two

won

the

Brigg.

Sports-eyes contestships, Will's

and

were glimpsed

Brigg's,

speeding to safety from the still-exploding bodies—

The image Blue,

vanished, the face of Blue the Glue returned. "Now," said

"why did you fire

Opponent, during the "It

on your South Pole,

the face toward

should be obvious," Will interrupted wearily. "You must have noticed

my masspiece had

that

that pushcoil

last stage's final—"

more mass

a

more

irregular

spherism than

North Polar hemispheres.

in the

I

Brigg's.

There was

applied torque in order to

use the club-end of the planet with the greatest force of

momentum—this

can be useful only in rare instances, and Brigg probably hadn't seen fore.

Most impacts

"I see. Beautiful.

viewer

who

it

be-

are initiated along the equatorial swell."

Uh, such

niceties are too often lost

on

the Sports-eyes

sees—"

"Niceties! It

was the most obvious ploy of the game. Brigg perceived

instantly but too late;

most important

he couldn't compensate

plays of the

game

in time. Niceties!

are the early stages

when

it

The

masspieces

are moved into place for the final approach to designated impact zone. What is this whole affair to you. Blue? What can you know of the exquisite visions of hookup? You see only very limited aspects of Contest. You

observe composite images, you see them in timelapse and you see only brief flashes of the

months of preparation. There

is

no comprehension

of the internal artistry requisite—we spend weeks at a time in hookup,

and

assessing

tasting

and

physically experiencing every

known

factor in

hundreds of millions of cubic kilometers of space!" Will was not aware

was shouting. ''What

that he

is

it

to

youf

A

contest between two

waveriders hovering off dead planets which they

seem to— to shove

about by remote control, kicking—^'c^'wg.'-the planets out of orbit and tossing

them

greatest

the

'flight'

bowling

at

one another—and the piece surviving impact with the

mass determines Winner. That's of planets, their

balls in the

You huzzah at garganman mrnings; they seem like colossal

hands of mites riding

drink and clap your hands

when you

all it is,

tiny

to you.

specks and you

see the wracking

swill

your

and cracking of

You enjoy the sight of planets cracked like eggshells! Idiots! What do you know of the possession of men by worlds? Can you even impact.

for

an instant imagine—"

Will stopped.

swarmed

He

swallowed, sat back, untensing. Specks of black

his vision.

Blue was grinning.

Really Weird Stories

John Shirley "I

suppose," said Tondius Will ruefully, "that youVe proud of yourself

now,

eh, Blue?

was

Will's tone "It's

good

How

no doubt.

tirade,

you got a

You'll

crow about

out of Will the Chill."

rise

Though

to see passion in you, Will!

We

really, can't

little

bitter ice.

your meaning. But

entirely get

asm. Will?

"I

You recorded my

SprtZwrtrZ Club.

at the

it

Will the Chill

why

can build your ratings

you leak us

just a little

you so

are if

have to admit

tight

you'll give

of your love

I

I

don't

with your enthusi-

me more

of that. And,

life?"

have no lover: male, female, or bimale. None."

"No? None? Except your masspieces and playing But you had a lover once, didn't you, Tondius?" Will

felt his

face growing hard

perhaps

fields,

.

.

.

and dark with anger.

Blue spoke rapidly. "Just for the sake of accurate historical perspective, listen, please,

ment here or

and answer

my question—a yes or no will do.

read to you.

I'd like to

false. Is this true? 'In

years;

was

Title. It

want

to

know

if

what

have a docu-

I

it

states

is

true

A.D. 2649 Tondius Will's fourth confrontation

with Enphon brought him

running for

I

at last into the public eye

said

he had prepared for

Enphon's reputation doubtless warranted

and put him

this

this,

in the

Contest for eight but eight years

is

unprecedented even for a waverider.

known

"'It is

permitted to

visit

the waverider—he avoided

years he refused to screen to her for

need

is

just

distractions. For eight

best advised to understand

for utter concentration. Apparently,

She hovered

all

Threeface, was not

more than a period of ten minutes

once a month. The lover of a waverider his

Mina

that at this time Will's lover,

Mina

did not understand.

out of scanrange in her father's yacht and, minutes

before impact, she dove on a sure course for the impact zone between masspieces, dispatching an emergency transmission to Tondius Will: I've

gone

to

Impact Zone. Avert your masspiece,

love me. Will.

Or

Tondius

I die.

His Great Senses

Will's thoughts

ure the scope of two loves.

lose Contest

dutifully relayed this

can only be conjecmred.

He

because you

He

message to

had to meas-

found he could not permit himself

to

surrender or even stalemate Contest simply to save Mina. She was

trapped between impacting planets, she died there and, though Will

won

Contest,

it

was

this victory that also

won him

the

cognomen

Will

the Chill-'" "Yes," Will said softly,

control.

heart

is

though inwardly he shook with the effort

"It's all true. It's true."

far

more

chill

And

than mine

Will broke contact and strode

Really Weird Stories

at self-

he added: "Your heart, Blue-your

will ever be."

to the

hookup chambers.

23

John Shirley

24 Will THE Chill OO OO CO

Hookup

flushed Will's circulation,

winnowing

to extern.

cups gripping his shaven pate,

at his back, the

crowded instrument panel—all seemed

the

his

hookup from yoga

blood, unclouding his brain. Refreshed, he adjusted

The cushions

from

fatigue poisons

to vanish.

He

closed his eyes

and saw the universe. senses (but not the mind) of Great Senses were his, now.

The

scanned

first

through

two months; the

for

masspiece.

And

had been orbiting Roche Five overwheeling the Roche

sys-

Dominating the right-hand

natively familiar.

his vision: Five, fifth planet

golden-red

in

He

alien constellations

tem seemed almost scope of

visible light.

He

from Roche's

Star,

was

bulking half

Will's

Contest

patching into a drifting Sportseyes camera

satellite's

half

light,

shadow.

in

Five

above the

twi-

light border, north-south over the face of the Earth-sized planet.

The

he could see himself:

signal,

contestship, with its

his contestship soaring

outspread solar panels and the beaked globe

its

at

forward end, resembled a metallic vulture scanning the barren

planet face beneath.

Not

He from

more than

desert

looked up from visible

and

Five,

down

survey crew was

and sought for Opponent. Focusing away his

way down ("down") through

down through

letting frequencies riffle

cards, each card with

for a

Queen

its

wrong—

there.

the longer wave lengths.

sorted through the transmissions of the star

ground sources,

up

ruins

he worked

light,

infrared's multifarious blaze,

He

The

quite barren, thought Will the Chill.

there's

by

itself,

like

discarded back-

an endless deck of

He was looking He worked his way

wave-length-identifying signet.

of Diamonds. She wasn't transmitting.

("up"), toward shorter

wave

lengths,

themselves ten thousand times apiece.

and ten thousand

He skimmed

hairs split

X-rays,

and,

through hookup's multifaceted neutrino-focused eyes, spotted her, traced her spoor of nuclear radiation— she fusing, traveling overspace, so Will's

was using a hydrogen-scoop,

Great Senses (constantly monitor-

ing gravwave ripplings) wouldn't notice her change of position. She

was

far

from Three, her own masspiece.

What was

she doing? Then-Will shuddered.

had bounced from waited.

It

his contestship.

came no more. He

He

felt it

A

strong probe signal

again,

and

again.

He

traced the signals and found that the

source was Opponent's contestship, fusing to travel unnoticed in ordi-

nary space. Will tied in with Great Senses. "Did you feel that?"

Really Weird Stories

John Shirley "Someone

Will the Chill

tasted our defense screens with a probe signal," Great

Senses replied, voice particularly mechanical coming through hookup channels.

"Who was

was Opponent!

"It

it?"

She's traveling through upper space so

we wouldn't

came from her ... no reason for her to assess us from that direction, surreptitiously. She knew in this stage we'd expect to find her wave-riding. What do you think? Is she testing our be

think the probe

likely to

reflexes or trying to

kill

us?"

"Three sleeps gone there was a disguised Opponent drone— I recognized

what

for

it

it

was because

was maneuvering

it

which a Sports-eyes vehicle would have no

use.

It

in a pattern for

was probing our de-

fense systems."

"You didn't

tell

was waiting

"I

"She plans to

me."

my

for confirmation of

kill

suspicions.

We

have

it

"That's within the scope of Contest rules. She has the right to

Under

kill

you.

certain conditions."

accepted technically but

"It's

No

not considered sporting.

it's

one's

an Opponent for half a thousand Contests."

killed

we

"Shall

"No.

I

kill

her

first?"

shall Contest,

brought her

and

this far. She's

I'll

defend myself. She's inexperienced. Luck

too impulsive to take the Tide."

"But she has innersight. Admittedly she's unjudicious, yet.

now."

me."

Her Opponent second to last They said it was a leak."

died in deep space

litde precision as .

.

.

She admitted

nothing. "I

didn't know." Will snorted. "So, she's a

killer.

Let her

kill if

she can.

That's all—I'm going back to scanning-"

"One moment. Do you want me "Yes.

I'll

He

ah—"

self to

hesitated.

Why

lie

keep the planet

gravity.

ten."

I

He

But

want

to

I've

got to go

down to—

to Great Senses? But he couldn't bring him-

voice the truth. So he said: "I'm going

scoops. All that dust— there we'll

to maintain ship's gravity?"

be going planetside. After hookup.

to inspect the fusion

corrosion on the pushcoils.

may be

in this orbit for

down

And

another sleep. Until then, maintain

be grav-adjusted-I might be going planetside

fairly of-

broke contact with Great Senses.

in the

programming room the

lights

of Great Senses went from

questioning-green to doubting-orange.

The atmosphere of long.

So he wore

Five

was breathable, but too

rarefied to nourish

him

a respirator. Also, a thermalsuit against the bitter cold.

Really Weird Stories

2.5

26

John Shirley

Will THE Chill the cutting winds. That

was

Unweaponed

all.

(against the advice of

Great Senses: Opponent skulked nearer), he leaped from the airlock of

He stretched, getting the He walked a few meters to

the lander.

wieldiness of planetside back into

his limbs.

a large boulder, clambered atop

it,

and looked about him. Just below, the double-domed lander squatted on spidery limbs. Be-

yond the

lander,

Anemic

many

kilometers across the battered yellow plain, rose

column of the nearest pushcoil, the planetmover.

the shining

sunlight glanced

shadows of

from

its

argent hide, light streaks chasing the

striated dust clouds skating

low

in the bluegray sky. It

was

afternoon, but overhead a few stars guttered, visible in thin atmosphere.

The

pushcoil

beyond.

column towered, broad and

clamped the ground; steam and fumes skirt:

austere, into the clouds

lower end widened into a compression

Its

trailed

skirt that

from vents

in the conical

the column was converting minerals into energy, building

for conversion into magnetic push. at regular intervals

and

uniformly

power

There were ten such columns placed

about the planet. Put there by the Sports-eyes Corpo-

ration for Will the Chill's exclusive use.

Made from

metals extracted from Five's core, the columns were pow-

ered geothermally. Sports-eyes had built hundreds worlds. Worlds

now

asteroid belts

and clouds of

on hundreds of and

dust; crushed

dis-

persed for the amusement of jaded millions on the homeworld.

The

Sports-eyes

they were gone.

crew had departed months before; Will was glad that

He

hadn't spoken to another

human

on

being, except

screen, since Mina's death, years before.

Will turned and gazed west. Roche's Star was low, opposite the column. Long shadows reached from the endless scatter of boulders and crater rims.

The

meteorite-scored

hills

to the north stretched to

him

like

the pitted, skeletal fingers of a dead giant. Will strode into the grasp of those peninsular fingers.

In those

hills

were the

ruins,

and the sunharp, and the

voices. Will

began to climb, anticipation growing. In the ship. In the

Time its

hookup chamber.

In the

to re-examine the playing field.

slant

and

tional energy.

An

hookup.

tested the solar wind, noted

himself in somatic-eidetic impressions of gravita-

exquisitely fine

star systems.

monstrous

seat. In

strength.

Then he immersed between

He

hookup

On

and

this skein

resiliently

powerful fabric flexed

a star and ten planets

spiders, electromagnetic grips adhering

them

moved

like

to the field.

Really Weird Stories

John Shirley

Will the Chill

bending the webwork. The gravitational

field

was the playing

field,

and

He

had

Will examined each component's interaction with the whole.

WiD needed no

numerical calculation.

No

holotrigonometry.

never got beyond the multiplication tables. All he needed was hookup

and Great Senses and the

skill,

tor, astrogator, life-systems

the innersight. Great Senses was naviga-

watch.

Hookup was

Will's cerebral connec-

tion with the ship's electronic nerves, a binding of synthetic and biological

was the

neural systems. Will's

instinct,

the athleticism, the determination.

Determiner of destinations.

He knew the ship physically. The ship's cognizance of (and gamma

rays,

rays, nuclear

De hipbone

interaction with) visible light, cosmic

forces— these he

felt in his loins. Physically.

connected to de backbone; the electro

is

The

to the magnetic.

seat of his magnetic sensorium

is

was

connected his spine.

This chakra he experienced in the region of his heart. Electricity

the

in

heart. Physically.

He comprehended

the gravitational field through shoulders, legs,

arms. Very physically. In loins, light-packets. In heart, electromagnetism. In limbs, gravity. In

hookup they

his brain.

integrated as variations

from

wave-particle theme: in

Sometimes, Tondius Will remembered a poem, one of many

the ship's library had recited to him.

Energy

on the

is

the only

life

and

It

was Blake

.

.

.

is

the body:

and Reason

is

the

bound or outward

circumference of Energy.

Energy

is

Eternal Delight.

Innersight hookup.

On one level he knew the vast gravitational field in

term of mass and weight, gross proportions.

Take

He

it

down, another and broader condition of

unity.

penetrated the vacillation of gravitrons, the endless alternation

between wave and

particle

forms, slipped the knife edge of his

innersight into the transitory sequence between

wave

particle into wave; waves, here, revealed as particles

and

into particle

and

particles ex-

posed: packets of waves.

His brain took a playing

And

Picture,

recorded and

filed

it.

He had memorized

the

field.

that

was enough

Really Weird Stories

for

now.

He willed

internalization.

Hookup

shut

27

28

John Shirley

Will THE Chill

down

connection with Great Senses.

his

He

sat

up and yawned. But

his

eyes glittered.

He was hungry, and there was no hookup here to feed and refresh him. He was weary, but the hills drew him on. There was only the sighing wind, hiss of breath in respirator, clink of small

crunch of

boot steps

his

trudged the rim of a

in sand.

And

slopes, the red nipple of iron oxides in the

of

were the

this crater

on

his belt,

He

the wide-open, the empty.

admiring the crystalline

crater,

tanks

air

ruins, upthrusting

glitter streaking its

impact basin.

On the far side

along the broken ridges

exposed spinal segments. Light splashed off the sunharp,

still

like

half a kilo-

meter away.

The sun was westering behind the mesas, shadow wings to enfold the bluer horizons. Will

slid

down

sisting his boots.

the

embankment, enjoying the earthy

uneven walls

stretch of ragged ruins,

The

hills

heft of hillside

re-

He reached the floor of the gully and picked his way over

rough shin-high boulders to the base of the first

the jet sky overhead spread

were not simple

hills—they

hill

like

whose crown exposed

the

battlements above.

were barrows, grave mounds

cloak-

ing the remains of a once-city. Here, an earthslide triggered by a meteorite strike

had exposed a portion of the

metal and cracked glass and tired

city's

plastics,

skeleton.

The

walls of rusted

throwing jagged shadows in the

fading daylight, were notched and scored with age, erosion.

But there were no signs of war, on the battlements

.

.

ruins.

Genetic Manipulation experiments had released an un-

.

stoppable plague, robbing the world of most of

No

offspring were born to lower

People they were, of a large air

These were not broken

and

all its fertility.

forms, or to the world's people.

with tendrils instead of boned fingers and

sort,

golden whiteless eyes

life

its life

like

polished stones.

The

plants withered, the

Those who survived, one hundred thousand on chemically synthesized food, were so long-lived they were

thinned, the land died.

living

nearly immortal. Childless, living without societal evolution in an endlessly

bleak landscape, they surrendered to a growing collective sense of

futility.

A new

religion arose, preaching fulfillment

death, advocating mass suicide.

A

vote was taken,

The remaining one hundred thousand decided together,

and

all

at

once

For so Will had been

He

.

.

beyond the its tally

to die.

To

veil

of

unanimous.

die by poison,

.

told.

The

voices in the sunharp told

him

this.

passed through the maze of roofless ruins, coming to the broad

square at their radial center.

He beheld

the sunharp. Everything here had

Really Weird Stories

John Shirley

Will the Chill

decayed but the sunharp.

The diamond-shaped

A

sunharp's frame was constructed of light silvery tub-

of sunset, veering lances of red, broke the thin dust

final rays

ing in the subsonic. Struck

full

Till

by corpuscular

now

it

had been

sing-

rays, its netting vibrated

resonated internally, interpreted the sun

sound waves, photons sang

man

for sifting

light impulses.

cloud and struck the coppery sunharp wires.

visibly,

monument.

coppery netting was woven densely between the frames,

and carrying

The

built at the end, as a

endure a nova.

Built to

ing.

had been

It

shiver.

Translated into

out. Choirs of alien races,

chorus of hu-

subhuman voices, wolves baying and birds singing: all in concert. The wind sounds of thousands of landscapes (each landscape altering the wind song as Bach's inventions vary the hymnal theme) combining into a single voice. The nature of rippling endlessly defined voices,

in song.

more than

Will listened, and

Glue had seen

listening:

Will's face just then,

he heeded.

And

if

Blue the

he might not have recognized him;

he did not associate joy with Will the

Chill.

Royal purple gathered in the ground hollows, dusty darkness collected in the

mesas

dead windows of the at the

ruins, the stars

lower frequencies, softly moaning to to

cosmic

Other

rays.

shuddered and, for an

him

shone more

horizon swallowed the sun. The sunharp's

abruptly, as

it

sighs

came

instant,

starlight

call

the

fiercely,

dwindled to

and occasionally pinging

to replace the sunharp's voice. Will

dread enfolded

his heart.

But the fear

always did before they spoke to him.

He

left

smiled.

"Hello," he said aloud.

There came a

reply,

one hundred thousand voices speaking the same

word at once, a mighty susurration in an alien tongue. A greeting. Then they spoke subvocally, in his own tongue, echoes within the For the first

fifth

skull.

time you have returned to us (said the voices). But the

time and the three thereafter you came alone.

Why

have you

now

brought a companion? "I

have no companions," said Tondius Will.

We see now that you is

a lurking he

who

do not know about the one who

follows you.

It

does the bidding of a distant she. The he comes to

destroy you.

"Then he

is

an assassin," said Will

sadly, "sent

by

my Opponent.

She

She has breached the rules of Contest. Death-dealing must be done by Opponent or by her machines only Still, I will not pro

becomes test.

reckless.

Let him come."

Really Weird Stories

29

30

John Shirley

Will THE Chill

The time

not

is

yet,

Tondius

Will,

be soon?"

"Will the time

You doubt us. You wonder if you are the One prophesied by the Gatekeeper. You are he. Ten thousand times in ten thousand millenniums we have attempted transit to the fuller spheres. Ten thousand times

we

have been denied.

One hundred thousand cannot enter as

the Gatekeeper, unless they

by a

sailor

of inner seeing.

Simultaneity.

We

one, said

become onemind, or unless they are guided were bound together by a united death.

We

We plunged together into

need a guide to lead us

Do

out.

that tenuous Place, this between.

not doubt

You

us.

are

He. The

Gatekeeper whose seven stony visages exhale blacklight said to

who are

you through spheres above

wields spheres below can guide

He.

We know your history,

Tondius

You

.

on moimtainous Reginald

"My great-grandfather ." Was a Terran trapeze artist. "My great-grandmother ." Was a surfer on the vast seas .

IV,

ultimate

and died on Thornslope.

.

.

wave

.

.

.

course

.

.

.

ski

.

Will.

"My father ." Was an orbitglider, a great athlete of space race. "My mother ." Was a freefall ballerina for a space-station ballet company. ." "My grandfather Was an Earthborn snow skier of Earth who journeyed to the .

One

us:

.

of terra-formed Venus, and once rode a

for seven days.

"And

." came to waveriding When your mother killed herself en route to Earth from your father's doom on Reginald IV, and the captain of the transport adopted you; he was himself a retired waverider. "And I know your history, and how you came to die, one hundred I

.

thousand

We

at a single stroke,

are as

.

trapped by imperfect unity

one hundred thousand waves

"On a single sea." The understanding forged anew, began to course and in the

dark of

whirl, a dust-devil rose

on

flesh,

He wept

and swept him up

...

for a while,

and

.

.

The

up and the

air

about him

spirit

host— seen

banners of unfurling white-

in unbridled joy

He

not since he had crushed

him with them,

.

the voices hushed.

his closed eyes as endless

enclosed Tondius Will. tered him,

.

." .

and

relief as

they en-

could not abide the touch of flesh

Mina between two wodds. They took

let

him incorporeally

ride, like a surfer

Really Weird Stories

John Shirley on a For

Will the Chill

sea constituted of the ectoplasm of

one hundred thousand

souls.

time of merging, loneliness was beyond conception. For

this

this

time of—

But

it

ended.

Remrned

to his body, he felt like an infant

coughed from the

womb

into a snowdrift.

He No

screamed.

He

begged. "Please!"

longer (the voices said), for now.

any longer, you'd wither and pass on to not quite ready to lead us

yet,

particles,

and planes. You are a born

Next

One

"Wait!

Was

us. It

kept you from your body

would be too soon. You're

sailor

of upper spheres. But not

time. Soon.

thing!

You

said

you would search

for her.

much

alone. She

is

call.

We

have found her. She was

coming. Next time. Soon. (The voices faded.)

They were gone. Will, was alone in the dark. The sunharp moaned faintly. Distant whispers; its webwork.

He

Have you found

she too far away?"

Linear distances don't impede our very

we

though you have the innersight of energies,

quite yet.

her?

If

rumors

starlight

stirred

shivered in sudden awareness of the night's cold. Stretching, he

He

fought numbness from his limbs.

turned up the heat

his

in

thermalsuit, checked his air tanks' reading. Best get back to the landing

pod, and soon.

He

turned and began to descend the

of the ragged walls,

He

took an

he stopped and

electric light

from

hillside.

listened.

At the outermost finger

He nodded

his belt, flicked

it

alive,

and

beacon on a ledge of the crumbling wall. "Come out and shoot me!" he

echo of

me

you

as

his shout.

Then, a squeak of boot steps on thermalsuit stepped warily from a Will.

set the small

face

called.

Silence, except for the

from

to himself.

Most of the

gravel.

A broad,

murky doorway.

assassin's face

dark figure

in a

He was two

gray

meters

was concealed by goggles and

res-

The hand. The

pirator mask. "You are one of the guild," Tondius Will observed. assassin

nodded.

tube's muzzle

guild that

if

He held a small

was directed

silver

Uibe lighdy in his right

at Will's chest. Will said, "It

is

a tenet of your

your quarry discovers you and challenges you then you are

compelled to face him. Yes?"

The

assassin

"Well then, face as

you

nodded.

come

kill

my lamp. want to see some of your begrudge me that, surely."

into the light of

me. You can't

Really Weird Stories

I

31

32

John Shirley

Will THE Chill

The

assassin

took two

strides forward, stepping into the ring of light.

His lips were compressed, his eyes were gray as the ice a thousand meters beneath the ice cap. His thick legs were well apart and braced.

on those of

Will the Chill fastened his eyes

The

the assassin.

stranger

frowned.

Tondius Will spoke in a voice compelling;

was the raiment of

his voice

it

was compelling because

power, and his

his will

will

was backed by

He

said: "I am show something. Do not in order to you quickly arm my going to move fire the weapon, I am not going to reach for you. I'm going to reach into

the unspeakable mass of

this wall

.

.

.

Ancient but that there

its

members gready

.

solid. Will

had explored these ruins thoroughly.

was a metal urn on the other

just

where

it

He

was.

moved,

side of the wall, lying visualizing his left

if

small urn; he pitted perfect

form against the mass

There was a crack! and a small explosion chips of glass rained.

arm from

The

He knew on

a shelf;

hand passing

through a cloud, fingers closing about the

through the obstruction as

his

skilled in

was a high wall of transparent bricks backed by old metal.

his left

he knew

guild of assassins esteems

."

martial arts

To

The

.

the planets he had hurled.

all

resistance of the wall.

in the wall side; dust billowed,

assassin twitched but did not

He

the hole he'd made.

fire.

Will withdrew

held something in his bare hand.

A

stoppered urn of age-dulled gold. "Waveriders learn that masses are merely electron-bounded

fields

ing the urn in the

dim

of space-influence," he remarked light,

"and

all

fields

have a

which seems impenetrable may be penetrated."

weak

He

casually,

point,

examin-

where

that

paused, glanced up,

murmuring, "That's the principle behind the traversing of space between stars:

knowledge of secret passages through the

the principle behind his right

what you've

hand, poised

it

fabric of spacestuff.

just seen, assassin." Will

reached out with

over the urn, and, with a motion outspeeding the

thumb

eye,

he stabbed a

rigid

urn

split neatly in

two; half of it dropped to the ground.

at the

The The assassin took a

metal casing held in his other hand.

step backward; his eyes dancing with wonder, he held his

Tondius Will reached into the half of the urn tracted something that

had

lain there for ten

fire.

in his left

gus.

who

A shame

replaced

it

way around,

ex-

A tiny

mummy.

"It's

died at birth," Will muttered. "The urn was his sarcophato disturb

over the

hand, with the

hand and

thousand millennia.

skeleton to which a thin shroud of skin clung; a miniature

an infant

And it's

it.

.

.

."

He

mummy. Clamping

thumb of his

fusing

So

it

shut.

right

bent, retrieved the fallen half,

the two halves snug with his

he pressed the seams of the urn,

Moving slowly and

easily,

all

left

the

he replaced the urn

Really Weird Stories

Will the Chill

John Shirley in the hole

he had made

eyes of the assassin.

The

know

step forward so that

Then he

returned his gaze to the

"Now: can you match what

assassin slowly

"Then, you

in the wall.

shook

that

could

I

you," said Will

kill

he was within

before you pressed the

fire

"Therefore, your mission

just

lightly,

done?"

is

assassin

useless.

WiU

The

Will

saw the man's eyes narrow. Will knew,

.

.

.

you even

kill

smiled. "Yes?"

nodded.

Depart now,

The

head

taking a cautious

striking distance. "I could

assassin

his

have

stud of your charge gun."

Looking stooped and weary, the

shook

I

his head.

in peace."

tenets of the assassin's guild.

a split-second realization,

was depressing the stud of his charge gun. doubly. One hand struck aside the charge gun,

that the assassin

Will struck,

assassin's chest. Just as that

dipped into the

the other

hand had penetrated the

Will took something from the man's chest and held

it

up

for

him

wall.

to see.

Spurting blood from the gaping crater in his chest, the assassin took

two seconds

to collapse,

two more

to die.

In A.D. 1976 the physicist-philosopher Denis Postle said: "Mass-energy tells

space-time

how

to move."

how

to curve

and curved space-time

Imagine that you are involved

in a

tells

mass-energy

competition which requires

that,

you throw a discus with Olympic skill, while your with your legs are performing an elaborate ballet movement and with your left hand you are playing the world tennis champion (and winning), and in right hand,

between racquet strokes you must move a piece

to attack a

chessmaster effectively on a three-dimensional chessboard.

imagine doing

what

it is

to

chest,

on

that in near simultaneity, then

you can

you know something of

be a waverider.

Externally. In rigidly

all

champion If

hookup.

Will's eyes

were closed,

his

hands were clamped

armrests, his legs flexed and poised; except for his heaving

he seemed inert-about to

Internally.

He saw

fly

himself, in his

to activity like a

drawn bowstring.

mind's eye, floating naked

in space;

and him were luminous out of ken as he looked up and down the spectt-um. He approached a pulsing sphere-to innersight, the sphere seemed only ten meters across. matrices, the energy fields, flickering in

outside

It

traveled in preordained paths through the mattix. Paths he

dained.

He

had

set this

globe on the road

it

Five.

Really Weird Stories

or-

was taking by manipulating

pushcoils situated about the vast surface of

Roche

had

its

genuine counterpart,

33

34

John Shirley

Will THE Chill

He felt the presence of Opponent, though he could not yet see her. He sensed her position as a man with closed eyes knows the whereabouts of the sun by the feel of

moved Roche Three from satelliting

Three

its

on

glare

But she was there,

orbit.

tertiary-stage

elliptically, just

She had not yet

his eyelids.

within pushcoil-control range. She was

waiting for Will to serve. Will served.

He

reached out, mentally, for the imaged sphere.

He

placed his hand near the Eastcenter South Polar pushcoil, poised over

column

the pushcoil

how much push what

intervals.

hand posmre

that told Great Senses exactly coil,

and

for

how long, and

Through hookup, Great Senses drank Will's muscular

pressions, translated

knew Will's

in a

should be exerted by the

flesh,

them

at

ex-

into mathematical formulas. Great Senses

though Will denied that

flesh to humanity.

Except for autonomic functions, breathing and blood moving. Will's

movement

every

(as visualized

on

the

noumenon

plane,

hookup)

repre-

sented, to Great Senses, a signal to be transmitted to the pushcoil control units

on

Eive.

He

Externally.

was rippling

three dozen signals in

like

an

rippling purposefully, sending

eel,

one dozen seconds. Sometimes

were activated simultaneously, sometimes one

several pushcoils

at a time;

on each

occa-

sion the activation signal carried a precisely quantified regulation of the thrust applied.

Roche

moved out of

Five

orbit.

A man about 1.8 meters high and weighing 170 pounds moved a mass of about 6

billion trillion tons,

some 11,000

kilometers in diameter.

And he

did this (apparently) by rotating his hips and flexing shoulder muscles. Internally.

about ball,

it

Swimming through space

in intricate patterns like a

he swept

from the

it

easily (but

not effordessly) in a wide

solar system's orbital plane, right angles

This was stage

The

after the sphere,

waving

his

hands

wizard invoking visions from a crystal

three-fifty in Contest. Six

arc, ninety

from

months

its

degrees

former path.

since stage one.

greater the scope entailed in implementing an activity, the greater

the need for

strict

attention to small details.

Each split-second decision taking into account gravitational fields, electromagnetic

all

and heat-energy

that Will read of

factors,

gravdrag on

nearby asteroids, influence of solar wind— the consequences of interaction with these factors.

Will struggled with ecstasy. Each aspect of the celestial field had

own

music, in Will's mind, and

its

own

fireworks, exquisite

its

and hyp-

notic: a threat of distraction.

Really Weird Stories

John Shirley .

.

Will the Chill

Opponent drew Roche Three

.

breaking free of the gravitational

in ever-widening spirals, never quite

of the sun. She used the pull of the

field

sun, increasing her speed as she neared tegic repositioning, always

the Chill

moving with

it.

She expended weeks in each

strict

..

Concentration opaqued time; Will's fixation on Contest never

The weeks

tered.

nearer,

and

Hookup scious

upon

collapsed

fal-

themselves; Three and Five spun

nearer.

fed and cleansed him. In place of sleep

and hung

to dry in the

it

minutes. Sports-eyes recorded angles, a

stra-

reference to the ploys of Will

it

washed

his

uncon-

winds of dreaming. Weeks melted into

all.

Sports-eyes staring

from a thousand

thousand droneships with camera snouts preparing the compos-

time-lapse film reducing Contest to the relative simplicity of a bullfight.

ite

They entered the specified ninety thousand cubic kilometers of space agreed upon as Impact Zone. Like macrocosmic Sumo wresders, the planets closed, bulk upon bulk.

The masspieces were She was

closing

fast,

ten thousand kilometers apart.

impulsively, driving straight as a billiard ball,

utiliz-

ing the equatorial bulge as impending impact point. She was overconfident, perhaps, because Will past; his

mind was

had not been performing

He

troubled, divided.

had

as well as in the

to struggle to

keep from

thinking of the ruins, the sunharp, the voices, and Mina.

This was his

final Contest,

and

his heart

pleaded with him to play

it

to

denouement. But as the two planets engaged for impact-each making minute splitsecond adjustments in trajectory, rate of spin, and lean of axis-Will rose

up from hookup, your

own

Alarmed by Will's

was capable of alarm. withdrawal from hookup, the computer spoke to him

know. Less than two hours. So

expects. But there will be

no impact.

back out of the approach pattern

will

Crack

it

through ship's intercom. "What's wrong? Impact

I'll

re cheated.

eggshells.

Great Senses was not capable of surprise. But

"I

you

thinking: Sports-eyes, this time

it is

We

as

if

is

in-"

scheduled, and so are stalemating;

Opponent

no one

wins.

I'm preparing another. But Five

never collide with Three."

"Because of the voices

in the ruins?"

Will was capable of surprise. "You aren't supposed to read

my mind."

"I read only what hookup leaks to me. I know you want to preserve the planet for the voices. The dead one hundred thousand. Why?

Really Weird Stories

35

36

John Shirley

Will THE Chill They're already dead.

ment

you want

to preserve Five intact as a

monu-

them?"

to

"In a v^ay,

of

Do

it

wdll

be a monument. But— do you know^ what they require

me.-^"

"They want you

knovm

want to

"I

to depart

the

to guide

them upspectrum. Beyond the

shortest

wavelengths, the highest frequencies. Into the fuller spheres." go.

I

want

from an

to see upspectrum.

intact planet;

it's

And I want A/[ina

.

.

We have

.

a door into the Farther Place. If

like

game were consummated, most of Five would be destroyed

my love

only reason—beyond

be near

Five.

I

had

of Contest— that

I've

to Contest to stay near, since this

"Within an hour the quakes on Five

.

.

.

The

played this far was to

will begin. If

is

sponsor's Ship."

you want

to preserve

the ruins—" "I've

programmed

the backup navigator.

You won't have

will

prevent her from coming about to

impact zone, on that right at this point,

I

strike.

As soon

message to

instant, transmit a

do a thing.

to

In forty-five minutes the pushcoil will veer Five. Opponent's

momentum

as we're out of

her, tell her, as

is

my

declare stalemate, by right of points accrued. That

will infuriate her."

"And "Yes

you'll .

.

.

"And on

go to the surface of

and

you'll

Five."

go to serve another waverider."

Five you'll die

and go with the unseen multitude."

"Yes."

"How? "No.

Will you crash the lander?"

I've

got to be in sunharp rapport with

"Then—you'll remove your "I tive.

me

respirator?

An

them when

I

die."

ugly death."

don't think that wiU be necessary. She's proved herself to be vindic-

When

she discovers the stalemate

she'll

come

after

me.

She'll find

in rapport." «

That was where she found him.

The sudden change in orbital trajectory had riven the surface of Five. The sky was mordant with volcanic smog. Some of the ruins crumbled. The sunharp survived. Roche

Five

was moving

into a wide, cold,

permanent

pushcoil column, in the waning light like a colossal mailed

arm, flared for the

He

orbit.

The

and

fore-

fist

last time.

stood before the sunharp, tranced by

its

distant

hum. The voices

whispered, sang louder, a cry touched by exultation. "Hello," he said.

Really Weird Stories

John Shirley

Will the Chill

Again you have not come alone small, "I

armed

ship. Just

know. She

Tondius

.

will

out of

(said the voices).

sight, in the clouds.

A she

comes

in a

She approaches.

be the instrument of our union."

.

.

"Mina!" shouted Will the Chill warmly.

I'm here.

The

planet was rotating into darkness. Light diminished, night en-

gulfed Five. But Tondius Will had

no

lack of light: "Mina!" he breathed.

She touched him before the others, a

chill breath, a kiss of ether. Then came and he was borne up, the surfer deliquesced; a sea of one hundred thousand and two waves. His body, still standing, remained alive and for a few moments it tethered him to that plane.

the others

Something metallic broke from the clouds.

low

in the black sky, growing.

spat a

It

beam

and through

his

with a joyous

through

One

of harsh red

It

was a

light;

A

chip of light glittered

contestship, diving like a vulture.

the laser passed through Will's chest

heart—but before his body crumpled

cry,

his ears

resounded

the song of the sunharp: struck by the laser passed

his flesh.

wavelength, infinitely

divisible.

Freed of his body Will had no need of hookup.

He showed them

the

way. In a moment, the one hundred thousand and two had gone.

.

.

.

Far over the surface of Five, Great Senses surveyed the planet.

honeycombed

of

crystal

was a mixture of three

blue for considering, green for triumph

.

.

Its

face

colors: red for regret,

.

Great Senses veered from Five and departed the system.

Opponent's ship departed

Now, Roche

as well.

Five, icing over,

a frigid forever

monument

to a tran-

scended race, was utterly empty. Except for the lonely ghost of a forgotten assassin.

Really Weird Stories

37

Tapes

22 and 23

12, 14, 15,

///Therapeutic sessions and lecture address tapes transcribed July 1999 by ML, RK, for

on Dexter Weston Dexter;

files

3,

Dr. Jeremy

Berenson, primary mental hygiene physician.

CC: Detective

Pearlman, Los Angeles Police Department

Lt. S.

cide Division. Note: emphasis added, as patient raises voice. ramifications in this case transcription tive

Due

Homito legal

unusually detailed as to adjunc-

is

events.///

Tape

12:

[Garbled beginning, psychiatrist adjusts tape recorder.]

Dexter:

.

.

.

Sometimes they catch

somebody somewhere enjoying of us don't get to see said

.

.

it

.

.

.

Kill

it

on video

the killing City

.

.

.

.

on

.

.

maybe always on video,

video, even

Kill City,

when

the rest

doctor, like the

man

.

Doctor: I'm unfamiliar with the reference.

Dexter: Well, Kill

City and

it's

is

a song

more

Kill

lyric, see,

but

it's,

like prescient,

Doctor: Actually, the Homicide Rate has been going

much

all

Dexter:

American

Is

that

cities.

somea

Actually you have

Not

that shit

to real-world input? Like all

because

LA

is

City every day.

Tm

vastly,

dovm

in pretty

but noticeably.

me

how I

react

from Mars, doctor' and the doctor

says.

where you,

like, test

the attributes of a

to see

human being and

I

have a

Really Weird Stories

John Shirley

Tapes

fucking birth certificate for you from Quincy, get the fuck over

it.'

And

it's

fucking

know

Mars no matter what they

Doctor: Well, yes,

it

that he

is

22 and 23

Illinois right here, pal,

just to test his reaction,

to agree or not because they

12, 14, 15,

so

whether he pretends

going to believe he's from

say.

might go something

like that,

sans the colorful

expletives.

You know better than to try to talk some of them do. You're a hypertrophi-

Dexter: You're smart, doctor. Ahnost.

my

language, 'streety'

cally

stuff, like

educated motherfucker and you talk

one because you know I'm

like

sensitive to phoniness.

Doctor: Yes. Very impressive. pressive,

we

can

get back to

Now

what we were

sure as hell. gets old, the

Dexter:

It

Parents.

Mums

That's the

first

of shit for

it.

that I've

talking about, this last

way you guys

I

like to talk

and Dad and how they traumatized trauma

right there,

didn't think

little

week-

about the

Dexter Dexter.

naming a kid Dexter Dexter. Got a

But don't get hung up on that

Doctor: No,

acknowledged you're im-

lot

either, doctor.

dismay over your name would lead to staking

out cops and shooting them. But-

Dexter: But the Parents did

posed that

Freud

first

dream

thing?

it

stuff,

some way,

yes?

How long has

it

been since

along with the sexual complexes and the

A hundred years? And you guys never solve anyone's prob-

lem based on the fucking clue! Give

it

'it's

the parents' assumption. But you don't get a

up, that

one

ain't

working dumbshits!

Doctor: Remember, you have to stay in control or Mike'll be here with the restraints. Big pain in the rear for everyone.

Dexter:

I'm cool, I'm

chillin',

I'm positively nitrogen infused.

We

wouldn't want Big Mike to interrupt our session.

Doctor: But

it's

interesting

how the very subject of parents

causes you to

start shouting.

Dexter: You're a cunning fucker. I'm not talking to you anymore today.

Really Weird Stories

39

40 Tapes

12, 14, 15, 2.2

AND

John Shirley

23

Anyway your tape recorder

about to shut

is

off.

Doctor: Tape recorder looks fine to me.

Dexter:

I

///Break

About

said about to.

in continuity;

to.

Watch.

Now

.

.

not

.

yet.

Now.

resuming tape 12 (RK)///

Dexter: Get the tape recorder going again, doctor?

Doctor: Yes .

.

.

.

.

.

you

.

.

.

Dexter:

How'd you manage

Well!

You must have

a sense for

its

that!

I

batteries ... oh,

didn't see

no

you put something on the tape that made

Did

Doctor:

I

I?

When

did

do

I

it's

it

you touch

plugged

get stuck, did you?

doctor?

that,

Coming in? A spitwad? It could just be know something about tape recorders

don't know.

dence. But you probably

know. This

is

one way

it

Oh—

in.

coinciI

don't

that paranoids with a megalomaniacal fixation

tend to— sometimes—gather followers. Like Jim Jones, or Rajneesh. They are very acute observers, their

minds

appearance of having supernatural

Dexter: That bullshit

Doctor:

Is it

make you

now? Dexter

.

.

are unnaturally quick, they give the

abilities

feel better,

because—

doctor? That's

for today.

.

Dexter: I'm outta here. Yo, nurseboy! Mike! Take

Tape

all

me back to my fucking cell!

14:

Doctor:

How are you feeling,

Dex?

Dexter:

How

Doctor Jeremy Berenson? You seem

are

you

feeling,

seri-

ously nervous today.

Doctor: No, I'm not, but that remark could be considered a preface to hostility

and remember—

Dexter:

Oh

I

know, you can press that button

right there

and you've got

Really Weird Stories

John Shirley

Tapes

mace and Big Mike'll be

in here getting

me

in his

22 and 23

12, 14, 15,

sweaty choke hold. I'm

cool, I'm nitrogen cooled.

Doctor: Are you ready to stop playing games and talk about your parents?

Dexter:

You know

from the prison

the facts about

my parents,

people from a notch above

trailer

park

trash.

my files

dude, you've got

psychiatrist, court testimony,

and

White

all

that shit.

trash,

White

but didn't have

The very model of dysfunctionality. Daddikins: Classic raging alcoholic, would try to get close to the kids and then blow it all with another boozy rage. Twice in jail for B&E. Mommikins: Kind of a slut, but not an to be.

outright whore; drank too

claims she molested

much, but

him once, but

I

tried to hide

think he

it.

made

My older brother

that shit up. He's a

whiny, delusional fucker.

Doctor: Your mother-

Dexter: Never molested me, no. That'd be too easy a diagnosis, right?

My Mom was dad was

too,

most of the

really pretty intelligent,

my own

and

kind of unusually sharp, and her

IQ was way up there for a kid

time, but that didn't keep us

who

from being white trash-

Do

Doctor: That's a social judgment, that white trash business. ally

buy

I

dysfunctional,

mean in

Is

that

other people's eyes. No,

you bet your

People that cover up

Doctor:

you

re-

into that?

Dexter: No, man, call

cut class

ass.

we were what you'd

But what's functional? Tell you:

better.

what everyone does, do you

think, cover

up

their

dysfunctionality? Society as a whole?

Dexter:

You

you could

trying to get

give a shit.

You

me

thinking you're actually sympathetic? Like

charge the state for an hour

when

I

talk to

you

another hour on your pay-

an hour. All you fuckers do. I'm just check to you. You don't actually care about me.

for half

Doctor: I—

Dexter: You're going to say:

Really Weird Stories

"It's

a balance.

I

can't

do my job

right

if I

41

42 Tapes

12, 14, 15,

John Shirley

22 and 23

don't care about

my patients,

but

get really involved

if I

be unable to

I'll

continue because of the emotional stress."

Doctor: Yes.

You look a

Dexter:

Doctor: No. other,

it's

Not

wacked, doctor. Because those are the exact

little

to use. Exactly. Weren't they?

words you were going

far off,

though,

you

give

I'll

that.

not hard for you to predict generally

You and

I

know

each

what I—

Dexter: Especially as I'm one of those fast thinking paranoids? Right,

make

doctor, sure,

mean, it all

I

really can.

your mind.

yourself feel better. But see, / can read

Not

the time, though

.

delusionally imagining .

I

can ... So

far

I

I

do

can't

.

Doctor: Let's get back to your—

Dexter: What, you don't want to

Try

me

do

a

little 'reality

check' for the patient?

out on the mind-reading?

Doctor: Instead of—

Dexter:

—me

therapy'.

You look wacked

flicker— that

I

playing your games,

might actually be able to read your mind and something

about the money you raked off the nurse

who was

A Miss

why don't you play along with And now you're worried—just a

again, doctor.

clinic

medication funds to pay off a

going to sue you for sexual harassment

.

.

.

Blackmail

.

.

Hernandez—

///Tape 14 abruptly ends here///

Tape

15:

Dexter: So where's Dr. Berenson?

Doctor: He's ... on a leave of absence.

Dexter:

I

heard he was going to erase some therapeutic tapes, in

tion of hospital policy,

and

his supervisor

caught him at

it,

and

it

viola-

led

to—

Really Weird Stories

John Shirley

Tapes

Doctor: Let's talk about you, Dexter,

how

are

you

22 and 23

12, 14, 15,

feeling?

Dexter: [extended laughter]

you

Doctor:

If

Dexter:

It's

let

can't control yourself—

okay, but

you keep up

much

.

.

.

you guys crack

me

up.

How long am

this pretense, this patronizing bullshit.

I

going to

don't think

I

longer. I'm almost ready.

Doctor:

Go

on.

my plans

Dexter: I'm not stupid, man. I'm not going to babble

Doctor: Let's

over again.

start

How's

the world been treating

Dexter: See there, you're using that angle to get

you can

attribute to a paranoiac's conspiracy

me

to you.

you.-^

talking about smff

complex. Well,

I'U

play

along and give you something to write in your diagnostic evaluation; tell

you about the World, but

knows the world your step, you

ones

But

who

life is

is

it's

die.

There're six billion people in years don't

live

all

it

very long,

sometimes:

precious, too, at least

that there are compensations,

You

much

as

a hostile place. That's not paranoid.

live seventy-five

ments, right?

about you as

that's

You

don't watch

now and

I

even the

really. Life is

what you're

those loving children and

think I'm gonna say

cheap.

thinking,

warm mo-

never had any of those? But

did, with my granddad, and with my ovm my own kid, and with a dog I had, and a couple

nephew, he was almost

notice

I'll

me. Everyone

of girlfriends

I

I

like

had-you

put the dog first—and with a couple of good friends, stoned on

I

when we woulda died for each other. I know those things are I know something else. I've been worked on since I was a kid, the way you work on a lab rat. You're looking interested, like you think I mean I was abducted by aliens or CIA mind-control scientists or some the road,

there.

But

bullshit,

and maybe

you have

me

that's

pegged

my-delusion-that's what's buggin' you guys,

as a paranoid, but you're askin' yourselves what's

this guy's specific delusion?

fear

is

sciously operating

on purpose

for

and get a year

got

I

a survival tool, pal.

I

some paranoia, paranoia's a skill. And mean to say anybody's been con-

don't

on me or something or planting implants or arranging

my

old

in juvie

Really Weird Stories

man

to

because

be an asshole and for I

took a ride in a car

me I

to get busted

didn't

know my

43

44 Tapes

12, 14, 15,

girlfriend's

John Shirley

22 AND 23

brother had stolen-I

mean

we're

all

part of a big pecking

food chain, a big machine of stronger preying on weaker, and you're part of the social services foodchain, and so am I, and—oh, you order, a

think I'm babbling. Hebephrenic manifestations or something. Yeah,

what you were thinking and now you're thinking that I'm doing 'paranoid anticipation' according to the classic profile and now you're that's

thinking this whole session

and you wish fore all

it

you can go

making you

is

to lunch

and get

if

matchbook

in

won't shut up after

me

be-

been thinking about

to

be drinking anymore and did

your coat from that bar on Winston Av-

enue— [laughter] You should see your Doctor: You've been talking to

watching

I

your old lady knows you're back on

when you're not supposed

she find that

because

that cocktail you've

morning and you're wondering

the cocktails

tired

were lunchtime but you've got another guy

face!

someone—the

nurses, someone's

been

me—

somebody following you.'^ Huh? Are you being conspired against? You should see somebody for those symptoms. Dexter: [laughter] Right, Doc,

is

DocDoctor: Look,

I

don't

know how you—

Dexter: Hey, I'm going to terminate this interview right now. Your audi-

ence

is

over.

///Tape 22/// Dexter: 'You can run, but you can't hide.' That oughta be stamped the coin instead of E Pluribus

Doctor: Everyone

feels

on

Unum.

hunted sometimes. By needy family members,

the tax man, supervisors-

Dexter: By death.

Doctor: Yes.

Dexter:

Do

you

When was I

feel

in

hunted by

county

Koran. Well, he was Black

stir,

it?

there

was a spade

there, big into the

Muslim— Really Weird Stories

John Shirley

know that you've

you

12, 14, 15,

22 and 23

Now you're talking to me as if I haven't been keeping up on you.

Doctor: I

Tapes

just 'heard

it

read widely in

from a

Dexter: You're going to

You

don't have to talk as of

You're one of our best-read patients.

guy.'

me

tell

spirituality.

to leave off the front?

What about

the

Anyway—in

the

doctor front?

Doctor: I'm not the one here for therapy.

Dexter:

You

Depends on your

sure?

Qu'ran, pronouncing neck. That's funny

Doctor:

If

you

.

Dex

.

.

right,

says that eternity

it

to put

isn't it?

it,

Gives

You

my

lap! Is

it

Doctor: Stop

Dexter: ing,

.

a choking sensation.

don't—

.

my smell? The .

a near as the veins of your

trying to say something?

Dexter: Don't what? I'm sitting across the in

is

me

.

.

Dexter: What's that?

Doctor:

it

way

definition of therapy.

.

You rung

stench of

room from you with my hands

my

diagnosis choking you, too?

[unintelligible]

for Mike,

huh? How's that micro-willy of yours hang-

Mike?

Psychological Technician:

You

okay. Doctor?

He

touch you?

Dexter: Never got near him.

Doctor: tion ...

He He

Psych Tech:

Dexter:

... I'm

all

right

now

...

mentioned choking and

guess

I I

it

began to

was .

.

.

.

.

was autosugges-

.

Ow—shit!

What are you

clutching

you

testicles for there,

someone hit you in the nuts. Can remember suggesting it. I'll be damned. that

Really Weird Stories

Mike? You

happen by autosuggestion?

act like I

don't

45

46 Tapes

12, 14, 15, 2.2

AND

John Shirley

23

Psych Tech: That's it-Slim!

Womack! Get me

a sleep shot! Get Morris in

Ow, dammdt!

here!

Dexter: You're not injecting

again—

doing

but you can't do

it,

once—hold the fucker— stop the—There he goes

of us at .

ass

how you're

Psych Tech: I'm not sure

goes

my

.

.

.

it

to

all

There he

.

.

Doctor: Are you sure he's out?

Oh yeah.

Psych Tech:

That

stuff

boom.

is like,

///The following record of the interrupted

lecture

vided for homicide detectives, transcribed by

Tape

by Dr. Lewis

is

pro-

ML///

23:

Doctor Ransom Lewis:

I

want

to thank

all

the doctors and staff

gave up their Saturday afternoon for this seminar. I'm sure we'll

all

who find

make our work easier in the coming months. I'll be giving the first talk myself. The topic is comparative medications for the treatment of it'll

bipolar disorder, with a particular—who

you see

man?

that

let

man

in here?

him— [garbled]

Mike,

will

A^e?

Are you okay? Dr. Ferratosco—ring the general alarm— Dexter-

stop

Restrain

you— [garbled]

it,

Dexter: All

riiiight!

How

right.

to that

My own

nice to have

microphone.

you

all

I

hope you're

tapin' this. All

Everyone but the patients are

here.

in-

vited to this seminar about the patients, right?

But here

I

am.

I've let

passed the key around. side,

as

so you

Mike

blood

No,

he's

vessels in his brain.

show you— I can go Look

at

No

they locked these here doors from the out-

I'm afraid the other two orderlies are as dead

not

just

Once

unconscious, doctor,

ol'

I

broke some

you're inside the brain—it's so fragile!

inside your brains,

Ferratosco, and chubby

heads.

And

ain't leaving.

there.

the other patients out from the security ward,

Dr. Lewis

.

.

I

can extend

my

I'll

field— Dr.

.

'em thrash around, grabbing golf this Sunday, boys.

I

think

their highly intellectual fore-

I'll

fuckin' vegetable. Yeah. Yeah. Start droolin'

let

Dr. Lewis survive—like a

any second now.

Really Weird Stories

John Shirley You Give

.

.

.

rush me?

gettin' set to

all

have you.

kind of pathetic,

It's

You guys

on your

all fall

22 and 23

12, 14, 15,

really haven't figured

it

out

You feel

that? Fifty or so of you in here

asses as a fuckin w^ave of brain-hurt goes over

Well I'm not going to

my

kill

on your

don't worry. Just get

No? Try this... How'd that feel? Now. Down on your

yet,

really.

a try— and dow^n you go!

it

and you

Tapes

audience before

knees. Yeah.

On

it's

heard

me

you

out so

girls

and

on the

out-

your knees,

bitches.

See,

it

had

and the brain

side

together, see, like

posites of the I

knees. All

to happen.

The

a maze

is

fifty

brain

is

on the

of you. That's

a maze. Life inside

it

.

.

.

a maze

is

and those two mazes lock

one of those M.C. Escher paintings w^here

same place

boring you? Howe's that for boredom, there, doctor. That

Are wt

Okay and

Yeah—oh now^ everybody

Listening novv^?

so

yes,

I I

was

there's op-

interlocking in a kind of tesseract that

saying, the brain, see,

was one— they get

it's

a maze.

And

.

Am

.

good?

feel

suddenly so

is

.

attentive.

your paranoids—

maze, they can't distinguish the

lost in that

maze from the outer maze, and they wander around from one personal symbol to the next, am I right? See, you'd be amazed at some of the strange books people sent us in prison— and in prison, you got time

inner

to read, unless you're into lifting weights shit gets old.

and trading

Anyway, harken back to the night

I

for blowjobs.

That

went home and saw

my

on dope and she had were afraid I was the cops then shoot her and

old lady dead, and the cops said she'd freaked out a knife and they had to

going to sue them so they started following me, laying for a chance to

me out-and

take

wasn't paranoia

was

that

when

I

for real, see, that wasn't the paranoia.

started to snipe those fuckers

em

and take

It

out.

do some heavy speed to stay up all night so they couldn't I slept and it was, like, a self-fulfilling prophecy. "He's a get me when paranoid—get him!" And I became one! It was the speed, see. I took a Anyway, uh-you see most of the time few of them fuckers out before But

I

started to

.

no one maze. I

finds their

Maze

saw myself

tred

me

and

I

in

way

your head. But

for

what

could see

I

I

.

.

through the I

in

realize

it's

a

did. Self knowledge, see. That's the key.

really was,

was

maze because they don't

I

knew I was hopelessly sick with I knew there was no hope

a mind maze.

because of what the demiurge and the archons and fuckers made out of this world and made out of me. So

people have

.

like .

hafor

you

.

So... I

turned inward. Catatonic, they

the maze. There's

said,

but

more than one way

Really Weird Stories

I

to

wasn't.

I

was going through

go through that

labyrinth.

47

48 Tapes

12, 14, 15, 2.2

There's what you way.

And me,

it's

AND

John Shirley

23

the white-magic

call

too bad and

I

way and

know it's

there's the black-magic

too bad, but: I'm too sick to go

the white-magjc way. Too.. .not paranoid, not delusional, but just plain

damaged. So brain

I

went the black-magic way. And I got to the core of the is, the power underneath despair, and I set it

where the power

and the changes started

free,

to

now

come, and

I

found out that

absolutely present here

and

sense every wave of

the waves you emanate, there

And here I am, And now Dr. and

I

want you

others here That's

it.

boys, here

I

world

in the

in every sense,

my

to be

cute

what obedience Rip that .

is

shit right .

as well as outside! In

.

and you

power

is

in that.

am, and here you are too.

Ferratosco— I want you to take Dr.

Now you others tell

all

you are

if

Little

puppet, and

I

Means by

want you

and what disobedience out of his

you can kneel

both mazes!

to

.

.

me

.

is

.

.

the throat,

to

show

the

.

yeah.

for real.

Kneel for

real!

Inside

And you can obey me, and go where

I

you, and profit by submission to your Lord, your Prophet of the Final

Night— or you can die

right

now. What's your choice?

Note to Lt. Pearlman. Regret I am unable to obtain statements from the other doctors and staff at the seminar. All surviving doctors and staff have resigned and we are unable to locate

///End

transcription.

them. Their whereabouts, and the whereabouts of Dexter W. Dexter, entirely

unknown

.

.

.

is

///

Really Weird Stories

Don't Be Afraid

"I really

ward

don't have time for

Nilly,

aka Will E.

this," Nilly said.

Nilly, a

"You don't have time

for your

men's dressing room of the

in the

The Lodge

itself

for parties, for

his pirate radio days.

own child?" Bonham asked. They were Moose Lodge 17 Public Meetings Hall.

almost never used the place. Nowadays

punk rock

window

it

was rented out

concerts, to obscure religious sects,

scure political factions like Nilly's

painted-over

His name was William Ed-

nickname from

rattled,

ovm

now and

Absolute Freedom

and

to ob-

The Novem-

Party.

then, with flurries of chill

ber rain blowing in off San Francisco Bay. They were almost under the 80 Freeway, in Berkeley, and between rain tappings trucks

moan

past.

As he waited

room

Bonham could hear semi-

for an answer,

mirror. Nilly touched

Bonham watched Nilly preen in the dressing

up

his chin

with a portable electric shaver. For

anarchist, Nilly was very conscientious about his appearance. Bonham, at sixty-one, was twenty years Nilly's senior and felt it tonight. He was tired. He wanted to go home and wash off the insulation

an

dust.

He'd been

worked

laid off, a year before,

insulation factory if

now.

he didn't rinse the

"Goddammit,

It

stuff off regularly.

Nilly,

Nilly turned, giving

Nilly

from the savings and loan he'd

Minimal retirement pay: he worked in an made him cough, and the coughing was worse

at for twenty-six years.

answer the question."

him a look of mingled

wore a workshirt, blue

jeans, a

and condescension.

white linen sport jacket.

compact man with

flashing,

tied into a ponytail.

His movements, every

ies in intensity,

pity

He

was a

compelling black eyes, receding black hair syllable

he uttered, were stud-

pregnant with expression.

"Frankly-there are bigger issues at stake, here. beautifully teetering,

and

Really Weird Stories

it

needs a push and a

Our society is fall,

and

it

teetering,

needs some-

50

John Shirley

Don't Be Afraid one

to pick

up the pieces and

"You want

redistribute them."

You got my daughter pregnant—what an unwed mother?"

to talk social issues?

about your social responsibility to

"My

being the father— that's disputable."

"Bullshit

it is.

You

led her on,

you knocked her up, you dropped

She's got a three-month-old child.

She needs

importandy she needs help with the

knew what my philosophy

"Selena

kid. is

.

.

at least child

support—more

Your daughter." .

and

it

includes absolute sexual

He stood up, took one last look in the mirror, adjusted his coat. A

freedom."

baldheaded graduate student in a black buttoned-to-the-neck appeared

at the door, looking at Nilly inquiringly. "I'm

"What the

hell's

your philosophy got to do with

"Everything. Social anarchism family unit

is

to. It's

You want

coming, Mark."

this?"

individual responsibility.

The old

are

women's communes

I

can recommend

about freedom."

"Your freedom to screw "I really

means

collarless shirt,

part of the patriarchal hegemony. She needs to get with an

commune—there

anarchist

her

her.

who you

like

without—"

don't have time for this Calvinistic guilt-tripping, Mr. to take

"You know we Nilly smiled

me

to court,

Bonham.

go ahead."

can't afford that."

and went out

to the stage.

March stopped on a street corner, and looked around, and tried to remember how hed come here—y-ii Store, ^^ Cent Store, Shell station, a boarded up motel, cars pulling up to a stop away,

its

hands on

stereo 'er I

banging

rap.

let

a minivan a few steps

"Motherfuckuh that

my

goodie, put you

bust you cherry," March chanted along with the rap.

was a white guy, long hair matted wouldn't

light;

them cut

it

March

into a single dirty yellow thatch—he

at the hospital. They'd learned not to try to force

him. The black guy at the wheel of the minivan glared at him

when the light changed. March again wondered: How'd I come

and acceler-

ated

He

here?

have,

remember breaking out of the Security Ward, but he must they'd never have let him out. Not after the last time. Oh wait. Oh.

wait.

Metal mesh,

again

and again

didn't

.

rusty metal

it'd

break,

and it'd cut,

"... Social justice

is

ture of society as

we know

phone

expertly,

mesh on

the

window,

if you

yanked on

it

too, cut into the orderly's^

completely and utterly impossible within the struc-

from many

society," Nilly rallies.

boomed. He used

He made

a micro-

eye contact with the audi-

Really Weird Stories

John Shirley

Don't Be Afraid

ence. Felt a glow, noticing they

He

ing at the back.

had more than a

about Selena Bonham's age in the front row. they're eighteen, that's the

Mark was beaming right,

full

house. People stand-

took note of two-three, really— admiring young

at

main

Make

Possibilities.

girls

sure

thing.

him from the back. Pleased

as hell.

He'd been

they were catching on. Frustration with the

telling Nilly that

economy from the poor end of things—he just might spark a revolution after all. The fact that the economy was booming for the middle class only made it more volatile.

Bonham watched from ness, really tasting chist followers

denouncing

the back of the room,

in his

it

Nilly.

They'd never

let

him

say

lying

about

mation agent or something. Might

as well

March was drifting down

tasting bitter-

mouth. Mark and some of Nilly's other

were watching Bonham sidelong,

assume he was a reactionary

to sleep

amazed and

University,

in case

he should

anarstart

much and everyone would

Nilly, a

government

go home

.

disinfor-

.

.

toward the bay. There were places

along the bay. But he couldn't sleep until he

let

was so heavy in his gut. It was like a hard, superdense and it pressed, and unless he let some of it out—

some of it out.

It

living stone in his

gut,

"Don't be afraid of freedom!" Nilly thundered, and there was a ing roar of response.

It

was the Absolute Freedom V^xv/s

be afraid of taking responsibility for

down— and from

The

all

threats

.

a simationist proto-society

no one was ever

Same They were just so didnt stop them. Everyone yammering, the .

.

.

ture of cement

.

.

.

.

really quiet.

as in prison, only worse, because

TV on,

arguments,

the institutional walls, the echoes carrying the tex-

and steel

was noisy here

now a man A man was

this society

former categorizations."

shouts echoing from

It

moment by moment,

noise, the noise in the hospital—oh,

Just so

can pull

the ashes anarchism will rise like a phoenix to sponta-

neously re-construct, that defies

We

yourself!

gratify-

slogan. "Don't

too.

bars back with them

.

.

.

There was no peace anywhere. The

cars.

And

.

walking toward him, singing loudly along to something on earphones. March grabbed a Coke bottle from an overflowing trash can, smashed it jagged, and expertly slashed the man's throat out, all in

one motion. Really Weird Stories

51

52

John Shirley

Don't Be Afraid

He walked on, That's

the broken bottle in his

when he saw the cop sitting

hand dripping

blood.

with his back to him at the counter

of the coffee shop. cop, a middle

The

aged black man, was just so

look in his eyes just like a frightened

little

How

kid.

was a

startled; there

easily big, tough,

was one of the things look. The cop seeing his gun in seeing that him, in that lifted the boulder March's hand—March had stepped up behind him at the counter and pulled it from his holster, just so smooth and easy—and the cop put up trained adults could turn into scared kids. That

his

hands as

if to

block the bullet

and

the first bullet carried

knuckles from that hopelessly-blocking

"Where does

it

start? It starts

roar— there'd been a Navy,

all

last bit

of

it!

Getting rid of the banks! Dismantling

Police, the

we

A

call

bigger

"Getting rid of the Army, the

lately.

of social trash from a society that

of living without the Nazis

one of the

mouth—

right into his

with getting rid of the police!"

of busts

lot

hand

is

all

of

it.

every

All,

not w^orking. Don't be afraid

the Berkeley police, the San Francisco

Los Angeles Police— and when you have a problem, even now,

before the revolution—Jo w't call them! Relying to authority! Submitting to authority

rendering responsibility

is

is

on

authority

is

submitting

surrendering responsibility! Sur-

surrendering freedom!"

Outburst of applause.

Bonham

thought: Let

no appeal

There's

Go home,

conscience.

daughter

it'll

Bonham

be

go. There's

off, kiss

him

flat

on

looking up at the

the collar—and the

his back.

man with

tell

no

your

He lay there gasping,

gun

in his

trying to get

the matted hair and the drooping, that

were so empty and so

name

MARCH

stenciled

full at

under

hand.

"Hey!" March shouted, as people mrned to

Hey

your wife,

hand on the knob, and the door slammed

once, and the institutional shirt with the

heavy!

he's going to change.

all right.

moving mouth; with the eyes

silently

no way

to a state of mind. Rhetoric has

shower the poison

turned, put his

inward, knocking his breath,

it

no appeal

here,

you're looking at me!"

stare. "It

And he began

still

hurts!

It's still

to fire the .45

Glock

automatic into the crowd, the screams and the running began, and he

stepped over Bonham, perhaps thinking him already dead,

gunshot noise

like

firing,

the

a big metal institutional-door slamming shut close by,

slam-bam.

Bonham shaken.

pulled himself

The room had

all

up on the door, discovering he was unhurt, only but emptied, everyone had run out the

fire exit

Really Weird Stories

John Shirley doors on the

Don't Be Afraid except for three people, two of

side,

of them unconscious, shaking—and a fourth, Nilly

had been shot

back of

in the

and pulling himself along with

his

Nilly,

his right

arms and

them on

clearly dead,

one

the stage.

knee and he was weeping

his

good knee,

trying to get

up, leaving a snailtrail of blood.

Bonham knelt by the shaking, bleeding girl, used his coat to compress wound as best he could. The gunman was talking to himself, clearly completely psychotic, and

the

he

more

fired twice

both times missing him but each shot mak-

at Nilly,

ing the anarchist convulse with terror as

it

smashed holes through the

stage near an arm, a foot. Police sirens

.

.

.

Bonham looked

on the floor. She had stopped shaking. She was unmistakably dead. He went to the door. A clutch of anarchists huddled outside, arguing. The cops were coming down the street—but they didn't seem to be coming here. They were headat the girl

two blocks down. They

ing for a coffee shop

"You haven't "I

called them?"

them

told

ing his

didn't

know about

right—"

was sobbing. "They won't!"

Mark

said.

But he wasn't sure about

it.

chew-

The guy with You jeer at the

smiled. "Stand by your beliefs. Don't call them.

the gun'll run out of steam. Are you anarchists, or not? until

He was

looking at the lodge door.

lip,

Bonham cops

this yet!

said.

to call the cops!" said a teenage girl with dyed-black,

waist-length hair. She "It isn't

Bonham

you need them? Don't be hypocrites." one of them shouted.

"Let's take a vote!"

A quorum! "Look-we'll appoint an ad hoc committee. Then we, uh-"

Bonham left them arguing and went back into the building. The madman was straddling Nilly, who was lying on his back, flailing. "Get him away!" The madman raised the gun, pointed it at NiWy-^lick. It was empty.

He "I

looked

still

feel

at the gun. Nilly it,"

March

looked

at the

madman with

panting

relief.

said.

"Get the cops!" Nilly shouted, seeing

Bonham watching.

"Don't be a hypocrite, Nilly."

"What?" "Shut up,"

March

said to Nilly. "You're too loud."

Nilly tried to crawl away.

"The COPS!"

March knelt, pinning Nilly with his knees and hit him, tally,

v^th the butt of the gun, the barrel held in his

Really Weird Stories

fist.

rather experimenNilly screamed.

53

54

John Shirley

Don't Be Afraid "You're

March lice!

too loud. You're

still

hit

him

hit

"Please!

him

God

"You don't

in the

it

.

.

Nilly

screamed louder. "Cops! Po-

hurry!"

shit, shit,

head

."

so

and

again, harder,

Cops, goddammit,

March

just

this time.

Bonham! Call the cops!" want the cops—you can't dismiss

hurts,

really

when you need

and then

call it

isfaction,

he added,

"It's

it,

Nilly,"

about personal

Bonham

said.

responsibility.

police protection

With

infinite sat-

It's all

about

.

.

.

your freedom."

Then Bonham

turned,

the wet thudding sounds,

and walked

out, so

he wouldn't have to hear

and the screams.

Outside, the anarchists were

still

Bonham went home and took

arguing.

a shower.

Really Weird Stories

Lot Five, Building Seven,

Door Twenty-three

"He's

my

last

hope," said Oliver Dunsmuir.

"It's

him or

despair."

"What's underneath despair, Ollie?" asked Rodney Collins, in

his af-

fable, abstracted way.

They were walking through underground

hallways that

new concrete. They passed now under Lot Five

smelled of

still

of the Spiritual Freedom

Complex, the corridors seemingly endless and empty, the sound of their footsteps echoing against the metal pipes snaking the ceiling. All the circumlocution to reach the

Dunsmuir thought;

smacked of the

it

Teacher was a

bit

folderol the Sufis

of a bore,

really,

and the Tibetan

monks put you through before you could reach their inner sanctums. The point was some psychological state they wanted you in, and not the supposed secrecy of the Teacher.

O Dark Truth, spread your cape for me; O Vlad the Living Gateway, open your white "I

lips

and show me

mean," Collins was

long strides were making

saying, it

the key

.

.

.

"what are the borders of despair?" His

difficult for the shorter, stockier

Dunsmuir

keep pace wdth him. His English accent and his English reserve a subject

like

despair

saw the glimmering, and a warmth

seem

cool, detached.

again, just for a

But glancing

moment,

reddened hand through

his receding, curly

"You've got to go through in order to

come

Dunsmuir shrugged. The remark was an nothing new, nothing

They'd

at last

new

at

brown

Collins' ran a

hair

camera lens over the

Really Weird Stories

and went on,

esoteric

commonplace, and

all.

Dunsmuir and

elevator.

work-

out, what?"

reached the elevator at the end of the

blue-painted metal doors.

him, Dunsmuir

in Collins' dusty blue eyes,

mouth.

in the rueful curve of Collins'

at

to

made even

Collins looked

hall.

up

Ordinary

at the

little

A light beside the camera was flashing red.

56

Lot

Five,

Building Seven,

"My name's Rodney

Door Twenty-three

There was an electronic

to the door. "I

he said

Collins,"

hesitation.

John Shirley

Then

know Webb."

the elevator doors opened.

Dunsmuir mused over the exchange with computer. "You said you knew Webb. Is that a code-phrase

In the elevators, riding up,

the security

or ...

?

"No. He's head of

Security, they

buzzed him and he

may be

willing to

see me." "I

thought you said you'd been here before— that you were in here!"

"I

said nothing of the sort,

They stepped out side, as

they

my

dear fellow— ah, here's our floor."

into the shiny hallway.

moved down

the

hall,

was a

The

entire wall

tinted

on

their right

window. Beyond

it,

the

towers and elevated tramways of New York. He could make out the brown smudge of what had been Central Park; the plants and trees were uniformly dead now, of course. There was talk of putting a bubble over the park, but they probably wouldn't get the funding. Spiking the horizon, the Earth-to-Orbit access shaft, under construction since 2013,

some

like

Looking the

whiskered-alloy

at

ETO would

They strode "You did

Tower of Babel gouging

Dunsmuir had an

it,

say,"

was

the ceiling of clouds.

Tower of

intuition that, like the

Babel,

never be finished. past potted plants, and pleasant, meaningless murals.

Dunsmuir went on, "you were

in

with Vlad. You

knew the

Teacher." Collins chuckled.

the mind, hear.

it's

"No matter how much one

No, old chum,

to see

learns about the filters of

always astonishing the sort of things that people think they I

did not say

him— and you could come

I

knew

the Teacher.

I

said

I

was going

along."

"But—you've never—?" "No.

I've

never been here before."

Then

"Well fuck. fury

simmer up

this

is

a waste of time." Dunsmuir

felt

frustration

and

So much had been a waste of time. The Gnostic

in him.

Christians, the Theosophists, the Buddhists; the Children of Crowley;

the

Temple of Set; the

half

and the therapeutic scam ther

complex

dozen other artists

esoteric disciplines he'd pursued

he'd fallen victim

to.

frauds, like the Scientologists, or they

They were

all ei-

were simply new

ways to ask the questions; they posed no answers.

Dunsmuir knew about wasted "I mean," he went on, gritting this far before, right

up

to the

time. his teeth to

keep

his temper, "I've

been

door of Building Seven. With Singh.

used to get in-but they won't even

let

him

in to the

He

Teacher now. They

say the Teacher's sequestered for good."

Really Weird Stories

Lot Five, Building Seven, Door Twenty-three

John Shirley "Oh," Collins said ing,

you

him.

It's

a matter of tim-

see."

day of the week and every hour of the day, Collins!"

"I've tried every

meant— time

"I

breezily, "I think we'll see

in a

And

broader sense.

more

in a

holistic sense. In

several directions at once."

Dunsmuir

sighed.

"More

from Christian Rosenkruz Crowley "I

mystical claptrap. I've heard

it all,

Collins,

to Steiner to Blavatsky to Franklin Jones to

to Ouspensky. Spare me."

hope

to, actually."

They'd come to a white desk at the end of the rust colored carpet. behind the desk was a black

man

knew damn well he was

more than a

aged man,

in

dark

a lot

glasses, a silver

He

of the Teacher's followers. Collins, turned

in a security guard's uniform.

security guard.

"You

Who

"I

back to Dunsmuir as

He

." .

.

shook

backwards out of

and bolted from

if

gende touch of

"The Center

for Spiritual

stare at Collins.

Freedom

is

that touch;

man who turned

from

.

.

.

Collins' mild eyes, the

not interested in comforting pana-

The Teacher who

is

you

for your

money in

return

Center for Spiritual Free-

at the

life,

inner and outer'," Danitra mut-

along with the videotape narrator. "Christ.

it

What

is

I'm going backwards." Danitra Johnson shifted in her chair, watch-

ing the big video screen at the other

long legged black

woman,

the symbols of the

initiate;

she wore the standard black jeans and initiate;

a year of initiatory seminars in lost in

some

end of the waiting room. She was a

her hair shaven close to her skull and cut into

and the black sandals of the

now she had a suspicion she

sort of theocratic bureaucracy.

video-the same she'd seen

before-was here only to thing encrypted in

She was,

t-shirt,

V in her left ear, she had

she had the

her head and

But she made herself watch the Introductory Video. this

He

interested only in—"

tered, finishing

was

back to

dodge

in terror

"-'radically transforming your

this.

at

his callused hands.

for false promises. is

Dunsmuir, glanced

reached out to touch the black

ceas, in maternalistic therapies, in soaking

dom

at

him—then did a doubletake

to rebuke

his chair to

Ran

his desk.

a middle

his head. "I can't."

He

can," Collins said.

fell

He was

V stapled through his left ear, as had most

looked disdainfully

right out of a twentieth century movie, turning

swallowed.

Sitting

Dunsmuir

herself,

it

test

when

she

Really Weird Stories

It

could be that

joined the Center a year

her patience, or perhaps there was some-

she hadn't seen the

on

first

first

time

a video screen in the next

.

.

.

room.

57

58

Lot Five, Building Seven, Door Twenty-three OO OO

John Shirley

CX3

James Webb, the direct descendant of the man Bram Stoker had called "Van Helsing," was frowning as he watched Danitra on the video screen.

The black woman, a former model, was a

of the waiting room. She

late against the pastels

pressed energy.

Oh yes. He would

there

would never be a

the hoped-for creature

moment

own

of Divine

he

shivered;

uses ...

felt

a

It

chill

much

Webb was

He

as

beginning to think that

mass" with Him; there would never be

And

Satiety.

this exquisite, intelligent

would be simply wasted. Webb considered

the herd for his

He

"critical

quivered with sup-

fairly

enjoy her, of course, as

could enjoy anything, anymore. But

and choco-

stroke of charcoal

wouldn't be the

from

cutting her out

first

time

go through him. Was

it

.

.

.

His influence,

reaching through the walls— or a withdrawal from the specially treated cigarettes

Webb smoked?

a mild addiction so

far.

Probably

Not

like

while

test.

A test

Webb glanced

to

was the

the other

Him. That, now, was worth

to

it

fighting.

Only

synthetic morphine.

one— the

ancestral addiction

This

might be a worth-

girl

answer the question: Could

He

be denied?

were

pre-

He

didn't see

the

and

really

sumably gone; sent away by the guard, as per Webb's instructions.

at the other monitors. Collins

his friend

them on the monitor. So perhaps he was

free to dally

with

girl.

Webb made

his decision.

He went through the door into

the waiting

room. "Ms. Johnson?" "Yes?" She uncoiled

from her yellow

plastic chair like a pit viper.

O Divider and Unifier, O Destroyer and Renewer, the

cauterize

of pity and fear, and remake me, remake

irrelevancies

me

from

utterly

me .

.

.

"I'm Jim Webb." "I

know who you

sorry. "It

are."

She grimaced

at

her

own

impatience. "I'm

This video—"

seems

old hat? Well. Yes and no."

like

charming patrician look— the older

man

Webb

smiled, trying for his

with the disarming smile, the

white temples, the dark, confident eyes. He'd always had good luck with that particular image. "It's just

that

I

feel ...

I

know

." .

.

are. But as you know— and the general announcement went out— He is not seeing anyone at this time." "But— Georgei said, on the telephone—"

"That you're ready. I'm sure you

"That there are exceptions. Yes."

And

one, he thought. "But—The Teacher

deep

is

I

hope you won't have

not ready

at this time.

to

He's

be in

intra-cyclic meditation."

Really Weird Stories

Lot Five, Building Seven, Door Twenty-three

John Shirley She stared glowered

"No. To ready.

at

him. She glanced past him, at

at the floor.

"Very well.

my meditation temple. We'll prepare

However long

Door Twenty, then

she

back to the Ashram.^"

It's

ourselves there

till

He is

takes ..."

it

He could imagine her long, muscular limbs against his. The thought of her African-dark thighs cupping his pale, Uimesced genitals ... he hoped she didn't note the growing bulge in his pants' crotch

He

stepped to the door opposite-moving

.

.

.

hastily to hide the telltale

evidence of his intentions— and opened the door for her. It swung inward—and she shoved Webb through it. She was strong; the story of her

being a black-belt might well be true.

He

turned in time to see her slam the door in his face.

her wedge a chair against

Danitra's heart

it

on the other

Then he heard

side.

was pounding. Webb had made the mistake of

leaving

the other door unlocked. She wasn't going to lose the chance. She'd got-

Door Twenty. From what she knew of Building Seven, that three more doors between her and the Teacher. She was fairly sure—or so she told herself, as she strode down the forbidden hallway— that He wanted her to do just this. To break the rules. ten through

meant there were only

That sending

Webb

out to seemingly misdirect her was a

My rules are rigid, inflexible, and pletely expendable. You II know when One Who Knows

.

that time comes.

You

com-

will then

be

.

.

Even through the heavy walls of the Center for

Dunsmuir could hear the people daring the upper airlocks.

test.

utterly necessary—and also

sirens

streets

Spiritual

Freedom,

announcing a Toxic Front. The few

would be scrambling

Another Black Wind was coming, bearing

for the underplex

lethal toxins

manu-

factured in the upper atmosphere by evaporated pesticides and manufacturing by-products, pollutants chemically transfigured by the UVs; the

heavier UVs, admitted

same

now

that the

ozone

layer

ultraviolets that slowly toasted the worid

was all but gone. The on the spit of its axis,

destroying crops and oceanic plankton, shattering the food chain, ing the famines: the

riots,

initiat-

the hundreds of brush wars over the globe's

remaining pockets of resources. The complexes of urban undergrounds

and sealed

buildings, the hydroponic high rises,

gering on. Especially those born into times he thought that despite the walls

would

fall

.

.

Really Weird Stories

.

all

money

had kept the race

like

stag-

Dunsmuir. But some-

the electronic and concrete barricades,

59

6o

Lot

"The not

Building Seven,

Five,

siren's

Door Twenty-three

a frightening sound,

John Shirley murmured, seeming

Collins

isn't it?"

frightened.

at all

They were walking up a stairway. The guards had frozen the elevators, now, but Collins always seemed to know where there was an unlocked door.

"The

Dunsmuir was thinking

siren?"

Rodney

Collins,

that he

was more frightened of

now, than the Black Winds. The way the guard had

acted; the way the doors seemed to come unlocked

What

re-

at his touch.

know about Collins? Precious little. Collins was a self God" who traveled from community to community—

did he

styled "servant of

and had done so even before they went underplex—and offered whatever

vices as "a builder— of

and

wood and

whatever was

plastic,

of the Masters of the various spiritual disciplines, and to

he

liked.

He knew

a great deal about yoga, and just as

Stations of the Cross tain Schools" as a

and the

lives

young man, and

of the

saints.

He

"The

had studied

it all

.

.

it

.

people into looking for God," Collins was

sirens have frightened

"and they have given the powers of entropy great

saying,

the televangelists

real irony,

now,

in the

Dunsmuir was puffing with to feel

it's

joy,

way he

you

since

been

and the Scientologists and the other

things being relative. Tell me... what brought

There was

in "cer-

scared him. Collins

people have, in their panic, run the wrong way. But

most

lovely for

parasites. All

to the 'Teacher'?"

said 'Teacher'.

effort at the climb; Collins didn't

seem

it.

"The june.

come and go as much about the

that sort of mysteriousness always set

Dunsmuir's teeth on edge—but in Collins' case,

was altogether too casual about

his ser-

He built housing of metal around. He seemed to know most

needed."

is

miracles, of course,"

He

Dunsmuir

said,

knowing

it

would sound

je-

was supposed to be attracted to the Teacher purely for His

Spiritual Profundity.

"He was

tested everywhichway by every skeptic in

the world. All the best stage magicians, electronic techies—no one could explain the levitations, the

power over animals, the vanishings ... the

other miracles."

"Did you ever notice that the miracles were always performed

at

night?" Collins asked, offhandedly.

"He exactly "It

explained that— the sun's vibratory energy

is

...

I

can't

remember

." .

.

never does

fail

to astonish

They reached the top then froze.

landing.

The camera seemed

me," Collins

said, chuckling.

A security camera whirred toward them-and as

spooked

as the black security guard

had

Really Weird Stories

Lot

John Shirley been.

"Is this it?"

Oh

"What? click.

Dunsmuir

Five,

Building Seven,

Door Twenty-three

asked, almost childlike in his

no, no," Collins said, putting his

"No, we've got to go

down

sudden eagerness.

hand on the door.

Click-

now."

He opened the door and Dunsmuir followed him through—and found now outside. They were standing on a metal

were

to his horror that they

outdoor stairway, a sort of emergency escape

There was some

shelter

The

stairs, in

the

open

air.

from a metal roof over the stairway—but

wind teased

it

their nostrils

with hydrocar-

toxic front isn't here yet," Collins replied, with

maddening un-

wasn't sealed

off.

bons,

PCBs and heavy

sulfites,

dirty

metals.

"We'll choke out here!"

"The

concern,

"You

"I

think we'll

think!

We

make

into Building Seven before

it

it

gets here."

haven't got respirators!"

But Collins was already

clattering

down

the pitted metal

Dunsmuir, pahns sweating, turned to the door behind him.

The hell with Collins. The door was shut; the knob wouldn't God, oh fuck!"

stairs.

He was

go-

ing back.

He

turn.

He was

locked out.

"Oh

turned and hurried after Collins.

He's insane. I'm going to die out here with a madman.

She might have known But she could

feel

Door Twenty-three was

it.

Him

in there: a pulsing

locked.

from beyond the door; a

throbbing of sheer presence, unheard, but distinctly

felt,

in the

bone

sockets and teeth. If I

can

Him, she thought, then He can feel me. before the door and began to pray.

feel

She knelt

"That won't get His attention, though he might enjoy the pose could see

it,"

Webb

said,

stepping up behind

if

He

her.

Danitra got slowly to her feet and turned to face him, expecting him to

be with several burly security guards. But Webb was alone. "I'm going to give you a chance to save your life," Webb said, "not because I'm any kind of philanthropist-I'm too much a scientist for

that-but because

"What

you threatening

are

I

prize beauty."

me

with?" Danitra asked. She decided she

could take him, long before he could pull a gun from his

"Me? Not a

thing.

I

that door, though, well

..."

He

"Test me, then," she said. "And

another of them."

Really Weird Stories

suit jacket.

won't do a thing to you myself. You go through shrugged. I

will pass the tests.

And I know this

is

6i

62

Lot Five, Building Seven, Door Twenty-three

He

actually laughed in her face. "You're so bright

same

the

John Shirley

time!

and so

childlike at

My dear Danitra ... all tests are quite concluded, except Him. My hypotheses with respect to Him have been

those that involve

disproved, or nearly so.

"You're

To

.

.

.

And

have studied him long enough.

I

I

know."

studying him?"

Webb

her astonishment,

anymore. "I'm studying him,

lit

yes.

You

a cigarette.

didn't see

them often

My esteemed ancestor began the pracWhom Stoker called Van Helsing—

Funny old Professor Von Weber.

tice.

and made look

some

like

sort of scientifically-minded saint. But the real

'Van Helsing' was a pederast, a heroin addict, and had an unwholesome fascination—one

back

home

I

understand

in Wallachia, as

all

too well—with Vlad Veovod. Known,

The Son of the Dragon. The

Whom

Impaler.

Stoker renamed: Dracula."

She smiled. "This

test is rather transparent."

"Oh get over it." Suddenly Webb seemed much older, much wearier. "We can't study him, you know. That's what I've come to believe ." He .

.

leaned against the wall beside her. "You can only serve him or fight him."

He

down the hall. "I wonder where come to that?"

glanced up and

gone

.

.

could

.

it

They heard another warning yowl of sounded almost "Another call

like

damned

irony,

people

The drawn-out note

sirens.

trumpets. Like a clarion

call

from the sky

itself.

He made them—Dracula, the entity you make them, with His influence, and then, a

toxic alert.

the Teacher—He helped

grand

the guards have

all

have

like

you ask

Him to remake the world

her the cigarette. "Want a hit of this?

I'm afraid I'm kind of jonesed for

." .

.

He offered

A bit of smokeable morphine in

it.

it."

She shook her head. Was he joking? Or

testing her again?

The smoke

did smell strange.

Webb's eyes glazed over his voice slurring slightly,

brain,

as

he drew on the

"He was

you know. The bloodsuckers

aged along ...

I

like

...

cigarette,

and he went on,

a spiritual tumor in the social all

the bloodsuckers he encour-

remember Mike Milken— that was before your time—

and Charles Keating and the Dow-Corning people and the Chevron people and the Bank of Credit and bide and the

how He really

Mob and the Vatican bankers

relished

that level

Commerce people and Union

it all

.

.

.

how it fed Him

was never enough

.

... .

.

all

Car-

the bloodsuckers

.

.

but of course drinking on

for ol' Vlad. His appetites are very basic,

." .

.

She shook her head. stoned, crazy or acting.

Webb—the "Open

Teacher's

High Devotee—was

either

the door," she said.

Really Weird Stories

Lot Five, Building Seven, Door Twenty-three

John Shirley

Webb

looked

ride-tube to

makes

life

and shook

at her

his

head

"Downstairs there's a

firmly.

my plex. High security, high comfort. Lots of everything that an antfarm still worth living. Come with me."

in

She gazed

at

him and saw

real lust, real loneliness,

and

But that

real fear.

shouldn't surprise you, said something less than a voice in her head.

It is

the

The ones closest to Jesus, too, were often the blindest She turned and pounded on the door. To her astonishment—and Webb's dismay—it opened. The door was opened by an old man with a bald head, a walrus mus-

Judas

effect.

tache,

and

Eastern

.

black-brown eyes.

striking, sad,

outfit,

a vaguely Middle

baggy trousers and sandals and a rough tunic from some

And around

other century—or from a costume shop.

heavy iron

He wore

.

collar,

rusted with age.

It

his

neck was a

was studded and bolted and

have been painful, even after an hour or

so.

She could

tell it

it

must

had been

there for years.

"You

to

come

in.

She recognized

Miss?" the old

Ivanovitch. She'd only

"Georgei,"

Webb

man

said.

Russian accent and gravelly voice.

his

spoken to

Georgei

him on the phone.

said dangerously, "close that

door and go away."

"Can not do. Dr. Van Helsing— "That

is

not funny."

Georgei smiled as tor Webb.'

Webb

Can not

if

to say,

it

was

funny, in a sad sort of way. "Sorry. 'Doc-

The Master, He feel her here. Is too late." if enduring some cryptic pain. "Where are the

close door.

closed his eyes as

guards?" he asked, his eyes

still

shut, nervously sucking at the stub of his

cigarette.

"He take them too. Could not wait. He very afraid now." "What-he took ... all of them?" Webb opened his eyes and looked sharply at Georgei.

So many! But growth does not stop." Georgei threw Door Twenty-three wide open and stepped back. "Yes.

"Both, please come. Pretty Lady wants. Pretty Lady gets."

Danitra hesitated, feeling as liquid along her spine.

Webb

Georgei turned to Webb.

Teacher too. "You're in

"For a "I

if

someone were dripping

didn't

He

a thick, cold

move.

chuckled. "You

Von Weber." a damned cheerful mood," Webb

come

to say hello to

said, glaring at

Georgei.

slave."

have seen in dream:

Looisil,

my

he speaks to me."

Really Weird Stories

atonement ends.

It

ends today. The Angel

63

64 Lot

Five,

Webb

Building Seven,

Door Twenty-three

snorted. "BuUshit."

Danitra hesitated

room beyond.

It

on

the threshold of the dimly

black curtained

lit,

smelled of iron and sweat. But then she remembered

the Twenty-third Invocation: fear.

John Shirley

the brink of your salvation, I tremble in

At

Open wide your wings and enfold me

.

.

.

She took a deep breath and stepped through. Then she turned to see if

Webb was Behind

coming. She preferred more company, here.

her,

Webb was

away—and then turned

man

shaking his head. "I'm going home."

unwillingly back toward the door.

Moving

like

a

caught in an unseen current, he staggered through the door, and

into the black curtained

Dunsmuir was only a

room beyond.

little

Door Twenty-three unwent contrary to everything he knew

surprised to find

locked and unguarded. True,

it

about the Center. But with Collins along, surprise was inevitable

seemed

to have

the door

was a

same time

was dusty but

five

huge idol dimly seen

for the path

one

draped in shadows; time.

Its

at the far

covered the windows near the

it

cavernous

inte-

The

con-

between Door Twenty-three and the

end of the room. High overhead, hunched

forms crouched on the guano-crusted ceiling;

steel rafters.

Black velvet curtains

the far walls were stark and murky.

here; they could see their breaths, in the faint light that

struck in shafts, here against the high is

at

or six stories up, hundreds of feet across.

reached

crete floor

was cold

vast one,

been an airplane hangar,

rior spaces

"What

at the

and inappropriate.

The room beyond

It

He turned

and

there,

where the

curtains

were not quite snug

windows. Dunsmuir and Collins walked on.

that?"

Dunsmuir asked,

in a whisper, peering at the idol.

"A

Buddha?" Collins laughed softly at that. "Buddha!"

Nearer the idol was a thirty feet

above the

circle

And he

laughed again.

of high black curtains

floor; the curtains

on runners about

were drawn partly back so

Dunsmuir could see only the silhouette of the idol beyond. As they neared the curtained-off area, Dunsmuir's eyes adjusted— or perhaps there was a kind of black

from the bulky

figure

on

the dais.

light

It

was

emanating, almost unseeably, cold; but

Dunsmuir found he

was sweating. ITiey reached the curtain, and there less

came a

cry that

was something

than a wail and more than a moan, a cry of soul-deep

ment and

And

betrayal.

disillusion-

A woman's voice.

then they stepped through the partition.

Really Weird Stories

Lot Five, Building Seven, Door Twenty-three

John Shirley The

figure lying

on

the cushioned dais, propped

two story house; was not an

as a

"living"

on an elbow, was big

was the "Teacher." In the

idol. It

flesh,

but not breathing; he had no need to breathe.

Dracula was draped in the same sort of black velvet cloth— hundreds of square yards of it—that hung from the runners and covered the win-

He was a giant. He was bloated, pig-like now, though no pig had grown this big, bigger than a blue whale—and his face was tormented by hunger. The deepset eyes, the heavy eyebrows, the Slavic dows. ever

mouth—all of it quivered with a tortured need, new victim he only grew thirstier. He'd gone bald and his hands—big as krakens— shook as he reached for the man hanging

cheekbones, the seductive as

if

with each

great

on a hook beside his head. It was the black guard who'd run from Collins below. He was stripped nude, and hanging by a hook through the jaw, alive and wriggling but unable to speak, choked with trickling blood. Vlad Veovod, Dracula, the

Son of the Dragon, and writhed his

in

lifted the

black

pain— and took him

man

hook—the man groaned two hands, and brought him to

off the

in his

mouth.

Dunsmuir and the others—Webb, the woman who knelt before Dracula amid the ruins of the drained people, and Rodney Collinswatched

in dull

amazement

as Dracula

puncmred the black man's

chest

and belly with his fangs, fangs the size of sabers, so that his victim writhed out gushes of thick red. But rather than drinking

withdrew his fangs and raised the

him out

a wet rag, squeezed

Though choked, spine

was twisted

torso,

the

into his

mouth

man managed

apart,

and he

it

thus,

Dracula

man over his head and wrung him like

split

showering Dracula's upturned

.

.

.

a single piercing shriek, before his

open between the two lips

rents in his

with blood.

"Behold, the Teacher," Collins said dryly. "It's

... an illusion ... a vision ..."

"My you

Dunsmuir stammered.

are in denial, Oliver," Collins commented.

Dracula roared in frustration and disappointment, and tossed the gutted, drained corpse disgustedly onto the floor before him. It fell with a sickening slap.

"Not enough

yet,

Vlad?" Collins asked

airily,

stepping forward. At

were the wreckages of other victims-judg-

below the dais, ing by the uniforms and outfits that had been stripped away like the Collins' feet,

peels of

and

A

fruit,

they'd been the inner circle of devotees

cult executives;

great

those the "Teacher" had saved

moan went up from

Really Weird Stories

till

and bodyguards last.

the rafters-where crouched hundreds.

65

66 Lot

Five,

Building Seven,

Door Twenty-three

John Shirley

Dunsmuir saw, of Dracula's "initiates." Those not fortunate enough be simply drained and destroyed

the shadows, toward Collins—with a sword in his

Someone came from hand.

It

"Look

.

.

.

to

was Georgei.

Dimsmuir

out, Collins!"

Collins turned toward the

man

said, staggering back.

wielding the sword—but only smiled.

He made some kind, then knelt before Collins, weeping with joy, and handed him the sword. "Oh Angel, I beg you now release me." He said something more in Russian-Armenian. Collins answered in the same dialect. Then he accepted the sword and struck down with it. The ornate sword struck the collar on Georgei's neck— and split it. The blade shouldn't have been able to break iron, but it did. Georgei cried out, and fell on his face, shaking, the life Georgei had raised the sword over his head each one a

several passes in the air with

it,

going from him, babbling in

joy.

"You have atoned long enough, G. innocents to him. In a

movement

Go

No

ritualistically.

.

of

sigil

longer will you have to bring

to the Betsveen place,

as startling as a

.

.

and await Word."

house unfolding

itself,

Dracula stood,

draperies flapping with a bullwhip sound, floor shaking under his bare feet.

Dunsmuir threw himself down, crawling away from the heat of

Dracula's rage,

and found himself crouched beside the black woman

He'd seen her

at

"Oh no

it's

a

one of the seminars. Danitra

lie it's

a

lie it's

a

lie

.

.

."

.

lips—but Collins

made

mock

.

.

made

a gesture, and Georgei's

silver butterflies that fluttered

Dracula's head like a

.

she wept.

Dracula bent and snatched up Georgei and

with a cloud of

.

to raise

him

to his

body vanished, replaced

up

into the air

and about

of a halo. Dracula howled and swiped at

them, and they drifted away and up and became a luminous mist, that slipped right through the ceiling. "It's frustrating, is it?"

Collins said, speaking softly but his voice carry-

ing to every corner of the

enormous room.

"Yes, Count,

I

expect

it is.

How

many chances were you given, Vlad? You were driven from this world many times—and many times you let your rage feed you, and you found your way back, until at last you were incorporated into the Great Plan by your Master Dracula's voice strike.

"Be

"Demons

as

.

came

silent, fly

masquerade

.

.

and by like

his

Master

." .

.

the sizzling sound that follows a lightning

of God! Your buzzing aggravates

my

torment!

You

an angel but you are a demon!"

made within men, Vlad," Collins replied calmly. "And you were one such. The Impaler. And then less than a man— with a hunare

Really Weird Stories

Lot

John Shirley

Five,

Building Seven,

Door Twenty-three

ger beyond men, when Stoker told your tale. And now in self mockery you grow—but you are not nurtured. You have infected the world with

your greed, your bloodthirstiness, trying to

finally get

never

just

will. You'll

never have enough. You're

dovm and

Shaking with rage, Dracula reached

enough, but you

a hungry

little

boy

." .

.

snatched at Collins, his

roar like thunder echoing in a cavern, his great, clawed fingers closing

around the diminutive

And floor.

figure

.

.

.

He

then screaming at the touch.

Something passed from

to the spark

And

shown passing from God

Dracula was uncreated.

like

beacons.

And

for a

to

Adam on

Silver-blue

through him, and crackled between within

could not

from the

an opposite charge

the Sistine ceiling

electricity

his fangs,

moment, the

Collins

lift

Collins, into Dracula,

and

lit

.

.

shivered visibly

up from

his eyes

divine energy blazoned out

something that had been hidden before, something only recently imprinted

on

the Lord of Vampire's forehead:

666,

This completed, the energy detonated within the monstrous corpus of the Lord of the Living Dead, and he was sundered from head to foot,

torn

open and turned

trapped

with them those

who

out—freeing,

inside

spirits that spiraled

upwards

in the process, ten-thousand

in silver skeins of release

.

.

.

Taking

crouched on the rafters— taking them up, and out,

through a ceiling suddenly become as vaporous as cloud. This time, there really was nothing

left

of him. Nothing but a lump in

a puddle that turned the stomach to look upon. Collins turned to Danitra

They knew

Collins

what

and Dunsmuir, and took them by the hands.

for

who he

was, and

let

him

made, outside these real world,"

he

said.

walls.

The veil

"And see

it

is

them like a some changes

lead

parent v^th two children, out the door. "There've been

torn away. Let's go and look at the

for the

first

time."

They left Webb—the genetic and spiritual echo of Van Helsing—lying on the floor, sobbing for his loss, the loss of his master and his enemy. Never knovmg which was which.

Really Weird Stories

67

Kindred

Harry brought Norris a golden twelve years, and they were,

Norris told him

how

ting out of the state

and

how

knife.

his kids

pen

for

Norris had been Harry's fence for

not friends

if

were doing and when

a person actually had to

when he went

was

it.

get-

buy a house. He'd got

for that stolen knife.

crew—

he figured he'd get a

steal things. Yes,

price because Norris loved gold: he

rings, a

his wife

into someone's house with a carpet cleaning

which he did mostly so he could

good

something close to

women and how to hide things from the IRS

Harry had figured he'd get a good price it

exactly,

had gold watches,

gold pendant, two gold chains, a gold painted

six

gold

car.

Norris surprised him by offering him a low price for the knife.

man. Fine workmanship,

"That's solid gold,

an antiques

I

checked

it

in

fourteen karat. Sharp and in mint condition.

register. Solid

want three times

solid gold.

I

that."

Norris refused, but he couldn't take his eyes off the knife. So Harry, still

surprised, shrugged

and put the

"I'm outta here," and he was even

gym bag and said, when Norris jerked

knife back in the

more

surprised

the bag away, took out the knife, and stabbed

him

in the chest

with

it.

Norris stood over him with tears in his eyes. "I'm sorry, man. I'm sorry. always liked you.

I

to pay for like that.

brought

me

ten

want

didn't

gold.

It's

silver

to

It's

pay for that

beautiful.

But

knife, though. I

had

to have

wish you'd

spoons worth the same as you wanted.

bought them. But gold

.

.

.

and a knife perfect

for killing, both.

the gold go, or the knife, but not both the gold and the knife."

Harry whispered,

Then he I

mean,

"I

understand, man.

I

do."

died, but he died understanding. it

made complete

sense. Totally.

too good

It's

it. I

I

I I

would've could

let

The Word "Random," Deliberately Repeated

He

was

tired of the library.

were shaped

like

The

faint,

echoing words of the librarian

the books they passed through.

He

lingered in the

scant poetry section.

No one reads poetry at this jock university, he thought. Lots of dust on the

book

He

covers.

They

haven't been checked out in ages.

leaned his large athlete's frame against the lonely shelves and

membered

re-

the canyons of eastern Oregon.

He closed his eyes: He and Maria were drunk together. It hadn't been too hard to seduce They lay balmed in her. You can't seduce someone who doesn't want it.

the smell of sage and sequoia.

They

rolled off the blankets in search of

new touchings and caked their bare sweaty skin with warm from the sun that was laying torch to the horizon.

He remembered

dust, dust

the desert and Maria often because of one special

peculiarity in the incident: afterward, they

had not regretted

it.

They washed and sobered themselves in a canyon stream. But a move to dress, though the air grew chill. With most, it was

made

over and followed by an embarrassed silence and

But not with Maria. They had desert sunset burn

hill

like.

neither quickly

a scuffle to get dressed.

sat together, close for

the outline of the

school, about the team-letters ceremonies

had pretended to

still

warmth, watching the

in the sky.

He

thought about

and the cheerleaders that he

No one had understood when he refused to go out

The team had berated him for trying to start a poetry club-that was for women. Had Haggart gone faggot? But he loved The Game and the feel of muscles that were so much a part of his responses that they jumped as his thoughts did. He loved to

for football that last time.

feel the pain of pushing past his limit and the feeling of growth afterward. And, as Maria pulled him again on top of her, he thought of the

70 The Word "Random," Deliberately Repeated sexual elasticity of contact sports

John Shirley

and the orgasmic

swell of

Making

It,

of Scoring.

The desert evening draped them, pressed them closer together. They moved against each other like clapping hands at a pep rally. As he reared and shuddered over

her, his vision

The randomly placed boulders of

seemed

to coalesce; then sharpen.

the hillside were scattered seemingly

He

without pattern, edged and shaped without purpose. ticed any organization in the

morose shapes of the desert or the crum-

bling wind-swept canyons. But now, they

seemed

tonishing coherence. Each boulder, each stone

on

elaboration

They had

a central theme.

codified to an

desert sun burns stark

its

to shift, falling into as-

and gnarled bush became

relationship,

mented orgasmic second, they came together alien intent.

had never no-

and

in that frag-

as

though

in

The image was burned

into his

mind

an order as the

landscape.

He was

He opened his

eyes:

The image of

the broken layers of rock and shale, of torn igneous

lumps and gouged ravines was

back in the

still

strong.

library,

He

but

looked

.

.

.

at the directly pur-

poseful arrangement of the books in the library, and suddenly

felt

the

desert image transposed over them.

They were the same.

He looked at the to forget that they

knowledge that mal System. tions.

on

objects lining the shelves

this

He

They were

was a

library,

and allowed himself briefly

laid aside, for the

ordered, according to the

moment,

the

Dewey Deci-

saw the books stripped of anthropomorphic

associa-

new and unidentifiable, bound together random. Some were tall, reaching almost to

alien objects,

the shelf apparently at

the next shelf;

And he

were books.

some were

and

thick

He

others were short and thin.

fat,

three times the width of most;

could see no pattern in their visual

ar-

rangement. They progressed with three high and thin ones, went to four

low and

thick ones, shifted to pamphlets.

with random

tint

He laughed, swathed

in

and

loudly.

They were colored

at

random,

texture.

A scuffle, of feet. Something on two spindly limbs

green cones of cloth waved a gangly wrinkled upper limb at

him and flapped its lips. It said something he chose not to hear. He looked away from the thing and back to the wild chaos of straight ravines filled with rectangles.

They were ordered

He

again.

stopped playing the game.

Dewey Decimal

System.

You can look up

anything you want in the card catalog.

He

ignored the librarian

who was whispering angrily at him

for ignor-

ing her.

Really Weird Stories

The Word "Random," Deliberately Repeated

John Shirley

He

window

caught a glimpse of himself in a

broad chest and shoulders, short black

tall,

back from the reflection shirt, jeans,

hair,

he

and tennis shoes. Big

blue eyes that looked

human

he thought.

deal,

the building:

left

He wore

a separate person would.

like

thing that'd never seen a

as

I

wonder

a blue

some-

if

before would see a purpose in the

way

I'm put together?

The campus was emptier than

the desert. All the buildings were cast in

same ugly gray concrete mold, mottled by

the

metal supports for the forms had been. stretched uninterrupted

from top

to

little

holes where the

The long naked windows

bottom concentrated

ency on him as though he were an ant burning under a magnifying

There were a few stunted There was no

life

on the

trees set in pots

that

thin transparglass.

concrete.

in the passing self-involved faces.

There was no

fertil-

ity

in the cement. Haggart debated with himself as to whether he should

go

to class. Sociology.

Where

societies as concrete as their

Forget him.

He

it,

he decided.

He

it

was

the fluid

movements of

started, hearing a feminine voice call after

turned, half expecting to see a

eyed Maria. But

make

they tried to

campus casement.

Blonde

Leslie.

smooth dark Chicana short

hair,

skirt, trite

face, dark-

questions in

philosophy.

"Where you going?" she asked. "Home. Where you going?"

"Come

He

on.

I'll

followed.

really pretty.

give

He

Uses make-up

her? All the beautiful

"Here

it is,"

ride."

symmetry of her

at the doll-like

well.

women,

Big

tits.

in this

goddamn

in.

Her

pay

She drove

for her birth control.

easily

one hand. Very

university,

I

should

be-

parents probably paid for the car, he thought.

And whether

they paid for her tuition and room.

not, they

profile. She's

how come I'm not attracted to

So

she said, interrupting his thoughts. She unlocked a red

Camaro and got

And

you a

looked

And

from the parking

casual.

lot

they

know

it

or

so they pay for me.

and

into the street, steering with

Very cool.

"How do you like the philosophy class?"

she asked, trying to spark the

conversation. Finally, out of habitual politeness, he answered,

"She proselytizes. Everybody swallows body,

tries to

make

Plato

sound

"You're right," she said. She

but

it

like

it.

She pushes her Zen on every-

a narrow-minded ass."

would

say that.

doesn't have any pragmatic value.

I

"Zen

is

fun to play with,

mean, the philosophy has to

serve the people; otherwise you've just got an excuse to

Really Weird Stories

." .

.

71

72

The Word "Random," Deliberately Repeated

He mind

poem began

to

he watched the autumn-yellow trees flash

by.

listening. Pieces

stopped as

John Shirley

of a

fall

together in his

Some

lost part of their leaves already and they bared limbs as

short-sleeved shirts.

He

him a puzzled sideways

He

fell silent.

At

of them had if

they wore

interrupted her and asked for a pencil. She gave look, then indicated the glove

compartment and

found a scrap of paper to write on.

speed, not really autOy

this

trees revolve like children

on a

carousel;

arms, branches, outstretched.

white teeth

break the edges of clouds into film-negative clownfaces.

The clown even

faces

would continue laughing

we had an

if

accident.

"What's that?" Leslie asked "Just

some

notes.

She pulled up

mock

sigh, "here

when he

finished.

Reminding myself of something."

in front of his

we

are."

apartment house. "Well," she said

She looked

at

in a

him, obviously expecting to be

asked in "for a joint or something."

He

almost asked her, then realized that he

her, that

if

he asked her

in

it

really didn't

would only be because one

not to waste an opportunity. But he said only, "See quickly out of the car

and walked up the

to pick

up odds and ends of

minutes he had enough.

ya."

want

to see

always careful

And

climbed

steps.

He stopped at the top step and remembered the He heard Leslie drive off. He walked back and down the road a block to a began

is

desert in the library.

small park

where he

Htter that lay in the grass. In a

few

He walked home, but just before he reached his

apartment the uncomfortably familiar voice of Benny Clummworth

rumbled from behind.

Clummworth had come from

the

had, and he lived a few doors down.

same high school

He was one

that

Haggart

of the jocks

who had

given Haggart a hard time for "going with a Mex." Haggart had

to a fight.

ig-

No

one understood why he didn't challenge Clummworth Just as no one had understood why he had to drop out of

nored him.

athletics.

Really Weird Stories

The Word "Random," Deliberately Repeated

John Shirley

Clummworth's presence made Haggart think of Maria

wondered

again,

and he

he'd broken up with her for her sake as he'd claimed.

if

Haggart's thoughts were jerked back to the present by

Clummworth

snatching at his arm.

"Whatcha doing?" Clummworth, asked a monumental

witticism. "Picking

Haggart gave him a cold

"Come

Cans and beer

"Make was

and

bottles

tightening grasp.

though he were building up to

for the sanitation department?"

He

"Whatya gonna do with that

persisted.

sticks

a mobile," Haggart

closer to the truth.

as

litter

stare.

Clummworth

on,"

up

shit?

and stuff—"

lied.

"Or a

shook

The buUetheaded

his

That

sculpture or something."

arm

Clummworth's

loose from

jock laughed.

"A copy of the Venus de Milo?" Haggart turned

back on him and walked to

his

not to drop anything.

The

walls

went

into

heavily

on

his eyes

It

was a

studio:

bedroom,

were bare but the floor was a

litter

apartment, careful

kitchenette,

bathroom.

of books and papers.

the bedroom, dropped the things he

the bed.

his

and

carried,

sat

He expelled a great gust of air and lay back,

He

down

covering

with his arms.

Maria had been

like

the desert, simple but potent. She had

little

edu-

understood what he meant when he said it simply. He memories of her out of his head. He stood and stretched, felt young muscles complain with the need for exercise. With a last, puzzled glance at the odd array of artifacts on the floor he grabbed his swimming suit and towel and walked swiftly out of the building and four

cation, but always tried to shake

blocks to the Forty-five

YMCA.

minutes

later,

exhilarated by a brisk swim, he sat at the edge

of the pool, staring at chlorinated ripples.

The

mers came to him across the water, vibrating shouted in

his

He He

loud as

slightly, as

if

they

YOU SPLASH ME AGAIN BOY

ear-IF

Haggart looked up. ter.

shouts of other swim-

A random splash covered Haggart's face with wa-

A mask of water. Something tugged at the edge of his understanding. got up, walked carefully over the slick wet

when it came he and splashing water. Randomly splashing

waited his turn, but

library

tile

hesitated,

to the diving board. still

water.

thinking of the

Someone

yelled

in his ear:

"Hey,

let's

go!

You

waiting for the board to dive off of

Starded, Haggart ran out sloppily

on

on the board and jumped, coming down up in poor form. He might hit with his face. The first part of the dive had

the end and springing out and

the water wrong, and slap

Really Weird Stories

it

your

73

74

John Shirley

The Word "Random," Deliberately Repeated been clumsy. But

at the last

moment he snapped

his legs straight

and

arched his back, cutting the surface cleanly.

came

It

to

He

bubbles.

him underwater,

as

he was yet a knife sheathed

in frothing

had started awkwardly, diving askew, righted himself—mak-

ing purpose out of aimlessness.

He

A

surfaced quickly and

half-hour later Haggart

up the books

He

He

stairs.

aside.

laughed

What at that.

to the side.

came back

to his apartment, aknost

running

unlocked the door and entered hurriedly, kicking the

He

hell,

he thought They're

just

random

rectangles.

thought of the term paper abandoned

and of the overwhelming

last

night

feeling of purposelessness that possessed

whenever he entered the thought.

swam

college. I'm

Where purpose comes from.

going to find out what

him

it is,

he

be wearing nothing but a mask

I'll

of clean water.

He went to

the things he'd

Four or

tory.

left

some

five sticks,

on the bedroom

and took inven-

floor

string, pipecleaners,

some cardboard,

sandpaper, a fingernail clipper, a tin can, a small block of wood, two

He went to the bathroom to get tissue, came He put the tissue in an open can after

beer bottles and a spoon.

back tearing

into small strips.

it

winding sandpaper around the can, and hair.

He put the sticks in the beer bottles

protectively.

to that,

like

to support

two

He hung a string from the

ceiling light, attached pipecleaners

the string and a length of steel

from the cup.

in them.

wool

He hung a styrofoam

that

hung down

like

cup from

Spanish moss

He was putting things together at random, but thinking all

the time of the desert

was

and used them

out

spill

that arched over the other things

a small gate of

and wound up a spoon

somehow

paper ribbons

wood

make

others to

that

let

and the ragged, weather-carved

linked together. In a half-hour, he

at the

same time anachronism and

with the deliberate effort to randomness.

cliffs

that

were

had an anomalous shape affinity.

He had

He

was sweating

caught himself several

times making a recognizable symmetry with seemingly unrelated shapes.

Random. Got

He He

to

be random.

No

pattern.

finished, putting the bottlecaps in as a finishing touch.

back and closed

sat

shape he'd made. pressions:

He

his eyes:

felt his

A gate. A gate

of fuel and was spewing a

mind

Tried to forget having ever seen the blank,

opened

his eyes.

under a rocket (the cup) that had trail

of

smoke

(the

tail

Random just

of steel wool).

im-

run out

A paper-

fountain (the can with strips of tissue emerging) spilling over granite facing (sandpaper).

The

fingernail clippers that stretched

from the upper

Really Weird Stories

The Word "Random," Deliberately Repeated

John Shirley

edge of the sponge to paper below looked leap.

The beveled block with

car.

A

into

which someone dived

car passing under an arch

Maria died

Run

A

The

car

his eyes

feeling like

attention

like

a

by a waterfall that flowed into a pool

cliff

by a drunk under an arch of wind-shaped

had crashed

into the water,

impact before she could drovm. Maria masked

He shut

a jacknifing diver in mid-

in a car accident in a place like that.

off the side of a

desert stone.

like

the paper and the bottlecaps looked

an

and cried icy

was drawn

and she had died from

in water.

out:

made him look up again. His made by random twisted shapes; space between the objects in the random

hand on

his face

to the oudines

they seemed to delineate the

construct into the feamres of a face.

"Maria," he said.

"Thank you, Ronny," her calm voice said. "Thank you for the mirror." Her voice resonated with hollow reassurance. "I needed a mirror so badly in this place. Nothing here

Her

reflects.

I

couldn't see myself

." .

.

voice faded into the lines of jagged sticks and cups and blocks.

Random

lines.

A mirror.

Really Weird Stories

75

Voices

"Your parents are worried about you," the child psychiatrist told Jeremy.

"Do you know why?" "Yes," the

boy

said, "it's

because

hear voices."

I

"What do the voices say?" "They don't say anything." "Then how can you be hearing or bark?

I've

heard of

"No, they're not even voices.

"Then what

The boy leaned back in "You

like

They

just sort

of

hum

It's

only one, and

it's

not exactly a voice."

like?"

is it

toral certificates,

voices, Jeremy?

that."

the leather chair.

framed, on the wall.

He looked at the cryptic doc-

He

looked

at a

bowling trophy.

bowling?"

"Yes." "I

don't think of a doctor bowling."

"Well

I

do.

It

makes

me

I'm

feel like

just

doing what

my body

likes,

sometimes." "I

know what you mean by

"The voice, or whatever

The boy looked The boy

it.

Can you

try to

um

...

tell I

me what it's like?"

don't know."

considered; the miniature grandfather clock ticked.

hung beating the

window and seemed

air,

psychiatrist waited.

wall, so that

hand and

in

humit.

said.

At

last

the boy said,

"It's like

dark cold room, and somebody pulled back a curtain,

up on the

A

puzzled by a reflection in

looking at the glass, fooled and not fooled, then

went away. "Huh," the boy

The

Jeremy.

do."

Take your time."

mingbird came to the It

I

world globe. "Well,

at a

"Try to describe

it is,

that,

...

if

you're in a

just a little,

high

one ray of light came down and you put out your

the dark cold

room you could

feel that

warm

light

on your

Really Weird Stories

John Shirley

Voices

how

hand, and

that feels."

"That sounds "It

like

a good

is. It is

a pleasant feeling.

feeling.

saying, 'Ray of Light,

You and Me.'

saying

It's

But

Ray of

at

.

.

.

one."

all.

feel

the feeling

It's like

Ray of Light.'

'Open and

not saying anything

either. It's

just

it's

Light,

A good

It's

Me.' But

No words.

It

it's

is

talking. It's

saying 'You

and Me,

not saying anything

doesn't talk in words."

The psychiatrist realized his heart was thudding loudly in his chest. feel this?" when do you hear "When when things are a certain way in me. I don't know how to "When .

.

.

say

.

.

"Is

Very

.

.

.

.

.

.

it

.

.

when .

.

.

.

The

just like receiving?

very empty except for

"Yes! Yes that's

want

.

psychiatrist

.

.

.

A feeling of nothing but receiving?

for receiving?"

it."

looked

at the clock.

"We

have some time

left.

Do you

to play Chinese Checkers?"

"Sure."

The

psychiatrist told Jeremy's parents there

was nothing wrong with

him. But he asked permission to speak to the boy on his birthday every year, "just to

to

do

keep an eye on

this for himself,

things," but

and not

Really Weird Stories

what he

for the boy.

didn't say was: he asked

77

The Last Ride

"See that

girl

in the last car?" Bixby asked. "She's ridden five times in a row."

Chad

"In a rowf'

blonde and of

on the

five rides

pretty, in

stared at the

girl.

She was about twenty, slim and

an exotic kind of way. Big Mediterranean

small side, something doll-like about her; looked too

on

the Hellcoaster—in a row.

"Or stoned.

Tell

"Maybe

you something—I think

I

eyes.

frail

Kind

to take

she's drunk."

saw her playing with

herself,

a couple of times, right before the Hellpit."

"Oh yeah

right."

Chad was

skeptical.

Bixby was a weedy

little

with a big unsatisfied horniness, and the dude had a rich fantasy

"Check her twenty-five,

Chad

out!

still

I

with

.

Chad waved goodbye, and went down

thought.

life.

my Mom's picking me up ." Bixby was his Mom. No wonder he never got laid,

gotta go,

lived

guy

.

the line of cars

taking tickets. It

was strange how you got used

He

the ground. the

amusement

to

working outdoors seven

stories off

looked out over the Central Texas countryside beyond park, burnished like

hammered

brass in the

sundown-

tinged light of early evening.

"Can I simply give you

all

my tickets in advance?" a dollsized voice asked.

Chad looked at her, his hand still extended for her ticket. The girl. She was offering him ten Hellcoaster tickets, all still linked together. She added, "I have no pockets in this skirt, I'm afraid I will lose the tickets ." She had a faint accent he couldn't quite place. An odd out there formality in her grammar. Her tone a little distant. As if in her head, she was still "out there". Her eyes were gray blue, picked out with only the .

.

faintest traces of blue

matching

skirt,

eyeshadow. She wore a blue leather jacket with a

and blue pumps, which she'd taken

"You're kind of into blue, say. Pretty

I

guess,"

Chad

off.

said, just for

something to

lame remark, he told himself.

Really Weird Stories

John Shirley

The Last Ride

am today,"

"I

looked up

He

at

him

took her

can handle "Yes.

It's

she said.

"Tomorrow I

gravely.

said,

"Ride as

hear you already went

it. I

be dayglow yellow." She

it'll

Something smoldering

and

tickets

think

many

.

.

.

times as you want,

if

you

five."

There's a god on the roller coaster." She smiled from a

easy.

long ways away.

moment he

For a

thought he saw something glimmering around her

head; a kind of faint aurora. Trick of the sunset

"A god? Yeah? What's he look She frowned, and

"He

it

was

perhaps what you'd

is

like?"

as

if

call

light,

he supposed.

Hoping he would

fit

He said,

the description.

she were frovming in another language.

a

satyr.

A satyr with wings and a huge

.

.

and huge shoulders." "Oh." Chad didn't fit the description. He was tall and slim, with long brovm hair that his guitar player was always trying to get him to dye. His band. The Strokers, needed some on-stage glamour, the dude said. "And the god on the roller coaster rides with me," she added dreamily,

"and he protects about

.

.

."

me and

.

.

It

was once the Oasis of Fun's most popular ride-

being one of the biggest

ters

of the

it

had

lost

Wet Fury

roller coasters in the

ground

to the waterslides

section of the

"Come onnnnnnn^' some girl.

me what the roller coaster is really all

She looked out along the swoops and loops and wicked dips

of the Hellcoaster.

States—but

shows

.

"Ask her for a date and

amusement

Southwestern United

and

artificial

white wa-

park.

letterman jock said, two cars up from the

let's

get this ride

goinr

Chad felt his face go hot. He stalked over to the lever, and pulled it. The jock's jaws clacked shut with painful force as the cars lurched into sudden acceleration. The girl licked her lips and spread her legs as she rushed by Chad.

And

then they'd plunged out of sight, the riders scream-

ing and the 'coaster roaring like a steel giant.

When

the ride was over, there was almost

next one. Just a the

last.

"Hey,"

fat,

drunk Mexican

Chad

said,

no one

else to

guy, in the first car,

walking over to her between

go on the

and the rides.

girl,

in

"Uh-"

know my name, I think?" I-" name's Chad "Um-my shaken. "Yeah," he said, a little Just then Bixby came up the stairs, pimply face made even grottier by a deep scowl. "My Mom wants me to move out," he said. "She's, like, "Selinda," she said.

"You wanted

to

.

kickin'

car

me

out.

We

had a big

fight in the parking lot

and

I

.

.

got out of the

and she—"

"Hey Bix—would you run "Uh-" Really Weird Stories

the machine once or twice for me?"

79

8o

John Shirley

The Last Ride Chad turned

"Thanks."

"Get

in,"

to the

she said, anticipating

girl. "I

him

was thinking—"

again.

He

Okay, he thought, so I'm predictable.

got into the car next to her,

down to hold them in place. Muttering, The sun went down—just like that. Darkness fell as

pulled the rubber sheathed bar

Bixby threw the

lever.

they plunged into the Hellpit.

on it, Chad wasn't sure quite how it happened. He wasn't expecting it. Not just a few minutes after he met her. He supposed it was the steepest plunge, the Deathpit, that pushed them Afterwards, thinking back

in

one another's arms.

wind

in his hair

coaster

had changed

different, riding

ond time around,

somehow

.

wasn't

It

tween her

.

it

they plunged into the

was

last

much

It

arms around

and she came

her,

since the

now.

girls.

Especially

band

lost its

And he

Daffy Duck.

as

when

They were

first

since

of

all,

one-

Borden

lizzie

Dody

left

.

.

him—

gigs.

No

damn about consequences

the Hellcoaster, they pulled out

lights

Chad

all

the stops.

of the amusement park glowed against the lit

up by

And though

drugs.

drugged as Selinda pushed the bar aside

felt

his lap, facing just

is,

she put her hand in his pants.

he'd taken nothing,

onto

laid,

do

pretty girl that'll

Or maybe

a hot

night in lurid colors, like a nervous system

slid

be-

Be-

caring.

drummer, meaning they couldn't get

just didn't give

was dark out, and the

and

and neither one

car,

head warned him, even then. Any

in his

The second time around It

and

to him,

to the climb that reached for the

But he'd been two months without being

right

more

long, jarring, shuddery kiss, their teeth clacking to-

and second, loony

no

.

to kissing at the Plateau, the long stretch that takes

and then out again

kind of thing—gratis— five minutes after meeting you

gigs,

.

as kissed her.

was a

Something

and

.

big dive before the sec-

somehow. It was her. she'd taken his hand, and put it Under the skirt. No underwear. Wet, hot, and sticky.

into the dock,

of-a-kind;

seemed

It just

they were leaping into a bottomless well

like

his

gether at times with the rollicking of the

this

it.

roller

legs.

They got around Helldip.

been on

the

it,

.

fore he'd so

you

down into somehow the

going

feeling,

inertia in his gut, that

since the last time he'd

So he flung

together.

had a strange

with her. Higher and deeper and faster and

And when

personal.

He

and the

him, and opened her blouse

climbing the

first

peak, before the

.

first

.

.

Helldip, the

Roller Coaster laboring up, up, clickaclacka clickaclacka, as

nating before the big plunge, and they had a few

moments

if

procrasti-

to get things

Really Weird Stories

The Last Ride

John Shirley His pants unzipped, cock

in position.

and

free

rigid as the steel rails of

the Hellcoaster; Selinda straddling him, grinding against him. Then, just as they reached the top, lifting her

on

vagina dow^n hard

little

round

ass

up and

Both of them shuddering

his cock.

driving her

at the rich heat

of that probing—just as the roller coaster cars shuddered, poised,

top of the peak

down

plunged

Thunder

.

.

And

.

the

her hips again— and the cars

lifted

into the Helldip. Simultaneous with his plunge into her.

in his ears;

with joy and

then Selinda

on

Wind

fear.

of his cock, his

balls,

breasts dappled

amusement park

thunder in

all

Both of them screaming

his senses.

streaming around them; cold wind on the base

the crack of his

ass;

her small firm, pertly uplifted

and streaked with the clownish, racing .

.

lights

of the

.

Chad was dimly aware

that, after the first

the Hellcoaster to other riders, put up the ing tested for defects, and

them go

let

it

two

little

alone.

rides,

Bixby had closed

sign that said

it

was

be-

So that he could watch

down and bought a cheap telescope at one of and Chad had glimpses of the light flashing off the

them, of course. He'd run the souvenir stands,

'scope's lens as Bixby

little

watched them

There's an art to fucking

on

fuck.

Who cared? Chad didn't.

a roller coaster, they discovered.

You had

to brace yourself a certain way, with reference to the direction of the G-

going downhill; going uphill you had to brace another way. Going

pull,

uphill, in fact,

And he

she had to do the hip-pumping; downhill, he had to do

thought he

ing him,

its

felt

the

god she'd

it.

talked about helping him, possess-

spiritual strength manifested in the gravitational

and

inertial

them as they rode the peaks and The god taking her in his strong arms, fucking her as they plunged into the bottomless well. She came at least twice. And he never quite came himself. Or anyway, never quite ejaculated. valleys of the

energies wrenching Hellcoaster.

Not yet. Not 'til the sixth time around. The first five times delight was mingled with

fear.

The knowledge

that

the restraining bar wasn't in place, and she was half standing, and he was half out of the car himself,

humping

into her, legs straining against iner-

and the shock of wrenching turns. Stomach wrenching with the eager strain, feeling his insides wracked by the conflict between his as all dangerous was this that Knowing gravity. fucking and the pull of flying go could they time, Hell. They could lose their hold at the same

tia

out of the cars together, to their It

way

fall

seven stories, locked at the groin, fucking

to death.

was both

terrifying

and

peaks of arousal-and yet seemed to constrict

Really Weird Stories

him to unspeakable semen in his testicles.

exhilarating. It drove his

8i

82

John Shirley

The Last Ride As

should he ejaculate, the act would cause him to be ejaculated from

if,

the car— he and Selinda shot like

But

on

finally,

orgasm. She

coming— saw back— and opened her

felt it

arching of his

it

into the sky.

in the

accumulated force of the four

it

widening of his

legs

wider to take

thundered agreement.

as the rollercoaster

like

semen

the plateau, the fourth time around,

He

happened. His

eyes, the it.

sudden

She screamed

shot into her with

rides, all that falling

and rushing

the

all

built

up

a tightened spring, a taut coil released in that orgasm.

Afterwards, he

He

he was going to throw up.

felt like

signaled Bixby frantically,

Chad

dock.

lay

and the

cars

ground

to a halt at the

back gasping, gagging, shivering with sweat, as she

calmly climbed off

him and stepped onto the dock, brushing herself off,

buttoning her blouse— facing away from Bixby— and putting on her shoes. "I'd better find

the lady's room," she said, with great dignity, and walked

off toward the stairs. Unruffled—but walking sort of

By

contrast,

it

was with great

effort that

stiffly.

Chad managed

to put his

man-

zip them up. He felt like he'd been through a car The kind where your car rolls over five times before coming to a stop.

hood back in his pants and wreck.

He

tasted blood.

His lower

was

lip

split.

His upper

lip

was

bruised. His

cheeks were bruised. His hips were bruised. His pubis. His stomach was flailing

about in

"Wow!" Bixby was a

girl!

be

He lay back gasping in the ridecar.

his gut.

saying.

Hey, you think she'd

better,

more my

style,

."

"Jesus Christ

.

.

"We oughta be selling tickets for this! What me, uh—Well, maybe the Ferris Wheel'd

let

but—"

She? She. She!

Chad

Where was shef Grimacing with pain, he and went unsteadily dowm the stairs. Forced him-

sat bolt upright.

climbed from the car self to take

No way

them

three at a time. "Selinda!"

was he going

rassed her, he guessed,

to lose her

now. The whole thing had embar-

now that whatever it was had worn

off,

and

now

she was going to vanish, never see him again.

At the bottom of the

stairs

crowd parading down the giggles.

He

No

he stood staring into the Saturday night smiles

and balloons and beery

into the crowd, cursing

and bellowing her name.

fairway,

all

sight of her. "Selinda!"

shoved

his

way

Spent half an hour

at that,

before he was ready to

fall

running through the park looking for her,

from exhaustion.

He

found himself leaning

dog stand, muttering, "Seven-Up. Seven-Up." They gave him one, he found a little change that hadn't been shaken from his pockets on the ride, and was listlessly sucking soda when he

against a hot

Really Weird Stories

The Last Ride

John Shirley heard

it.

The

dollsized voice. Saying,

"How about if we

try

on

it

the

Tilt-

a-Whirl next?"

He

turned, and grabbed her, clasped her to him.

away from him. "One moment!" she stiffness

He

That's

were

"We

with the language again.

gaped

was

it

actually

hardly

Jaw hanging halfway

at her.

what

protested.

like.

doing

it.

She kept him

And

she pushed

That odd accent, that

know each

other!"

to his shoes.

distance—except

at a

And she wasn't interested in beds. No

motels, not even sleeping bags.

had

It

when

they

apartments,

to be riding—or, anyway,

it

had

to

be dangerous.

She wouldn't

on

tell

him a damn thing about herself, either. They went once a week at the Oasis of Fun, and other

for five weeks, meeting

peculiar trysting junctions,

and he never so much

name. She was able to see him

He

thirty.

between seven and eleven-

never saw her consult a watch—but she always seemed to

know what "It is

exclusively

as learned her last

time

almost

it

was. She'd look at the

tirne for

me

to

go

most women. Most of them, life to be founded on a deep

.

."

.

or sniff the

stars,

air.

And

say:

She was the absolute opposite of

quite understandably, preferred their sex

Mutual knowledge. Conver-

relationship.

Meeting parents. Quiet dinners, noisy concerts, dancing. Hours talking in bed, comparing notes on life. It was what Chad wanted himsation.

self,

deep down.

Not Selinda. She was with

its

inside-out.

She seemed to regard ordinary dating,

involved conversations, as a kind of obscene intimacy-and quick

on the longest park waterslide was the decent way to relate. Could be, he thought, that conversation with her would be redun-

sex

dant-because she always seems to

know what

I'm about to say

.

.

.

Seemed to be able to see right into him She was quite opaque to him, though. Couldn't see into her at all, beyond the passion. Oh, he knew she was using him, in some way. And he knew she had to be crazy, and that this was a dangerous game. They'd been caught twice; he'd used up all his favors in the park getting them .

out of

it.

And

there

was something

.

incredibly lunatic in her eyes some-

times. Especially the first time they did

Going down the old highway

.

it

outside the park

at ninety-five miles

.

.

.

an hour.

Chances old cracked concrete road was scarcely used anymore. an were they'd be the only ones killed in the accident. But the odds for "FASTER! screamed, she as accident were brutally mounting

The

MORE

SPEEOr Not

talking about

Really Weird Stories

hip-pumping speed.

83

84

John Shirley

The Last Ride

They were both buck naked in the car. The seat vinyl sucking at his buttocks. She was straddling him as he drove his rickety old '71 Impala, straining it's tired horsepower to get past ninety. It was eleven at night, with a

full

moon

glowing over the desert, no sign of

eyes for a

moment

caught

the headlights,

fire in

incandescent secret with Selinda before

Chad had one arm around little

ninety

it

was a

seemed

some

to share

trotted into night.

it

work

onto

the steering wheel; he was leaning

and the

to the right, trying, to see past her

windshield. Lucky

whose

up ahead,

Selinda's waist, shoving her dovsoi

him, the other free so he could a

no one

civilization,

watching— except the coyote dashing across the road

dusty, bug-flecked

They'd

straight road, for a while.

just hit

and she screamed "FASTERRRRR!" Digging her immaculately

manicured golden

nails into his shoulders,

looked up into her face and saw

She was pushing out the

limits,

wanted them both

death. She

it

him on. And he

urging

in her eyes: Death.

pushing the border between

life

to die, doing this. Crazy as Daffy

Crazy as Lizzie Borden.^ Hell, she was crazy as Jimmy Swaggart,

and

Duck?

Tammy

Faye Bakker, Jim Bakker, and for that matter, Jim Jones, rock and rolled into one.

But Chad couldn't stop. The

car's

2500 pound, ninety mile an hour

momentum was his momentum too—it was his

sexual, emotional

tum, carrying him beyond the reach of loneliness. as

if

the car were expressing

92, 94, 95

.

.

.

its

own terror as

and she rutted harder and

The

car's tires

momen-

screeched

the speedometer climbed to

faster

on him, her

eyes rolling

back in her head, her tongue emerging from between her trembling lips, glistening pink tip reaching for his lips ... 96, 98,

There was a curve coming up. yelled.

"We've gotta

let

"No!" she shouted

A ways

yet,

.

.

.

but coming. "A curve!" he

up!"

in his ear, clutching

sticky breasts nosing his neck.

Come or we die! He knew he should

100

its

him

against her.

"No! Not until you give

it

to

Her

sweat-

mer Mean-

ing:

sible, stupid,

and

have flung her off right there. This was irrespon-

futile.

How could he even keep his hard-on this way, let

alone ejaculate? With the curve rushing up toward them... But something,

maybe masculine

live for this

pride, kept

him pumping

into her.

You got

to

second, he told himself. This very second. Take the risk and

come because

of

it!

They'd never make

it

around that curve

But he kept pumping into her—like the in the engine's cylinders—even

at this

speed

.

.

.

car's pistons furiously

when he saw the boulders

pumping

at the curve

.

.

Really Weird Stories

The Last Ride

John Shirley His radio worked sometimes, and sometimes

didn't.

it

There was a

when it chose to come on—suddenly it started blasting AC/DC's Highway To Hell, the solo screaming into its own collision course. And it pushed him over the edge. Laughing hysteristrange synchronicity about

he shot

cally,

his ejaculate into her. Just as they hit the curve.

His hand jerked spasmodically on the steering wheel, an involuntary

motion twitched out of him by the orgasm, and car careened, missing the heap of boulders

the desert, where

it

struck a

at the last

second the

and veering instead out

dune and jumped— like a stunt car

at

into

an exhi-

ramp—whistling through the air, the wheels five feet over the ground, as he pumped out the last of his semen into her Believing for one lunatic moment that the act of his ejaculation had somehow shot the car into the air And then WHUMP, they came dovm in a patch of cactus. Bounced

bition

jumping from a

.

.

around inside the car

like dice in

up through one of his the car

bumped

a gambler's hand.

He

watched numbly

and checked

herself over.

back from the steering wheel and a

"I

think

A nasty shiver of pain

his

nose crunch

.

.

and

.

to a stop. Steaming.

car's interior light

in her lip.

"Are you quite

.

something made

testicles;

Selinda climbed off him.

from a cut

.

.

all

That was

it.

bump on Almost

as

as she switched

One

on the

big bruise across her

her head and a

little

blood

an afterthought, she

said,

right?"

my nose

is

broken."

"You do not seem badly

hurt."

She glanced

at the sky. "Ah!

I

had

better

get dressed. I'm going to be late!"

He

stared at her in dull amazement. Finally, wiping blood off his

mouth, asked, "Late for what?" She wagged a finger

know

him

each other so well as that

She'd almost got them

was no doubt about

He

at

it.

killed.

And

had a nightmare about

and put

his bruised

ing love

on

reproachfully. "Foolish boy!

don't

yet!"

They'd escaped death by a whisker. There

there

it,

We

that

bones wearily

was no doubt

same

that she

night, after

in bed. In the

a tiny platform atop a flagpole.

he

was a psycho.

finally

got

home

dream, they were mak-

Which was atop

the Empire

State Building. Standing up there nude, balancing carefully, fucking, taking her from behind this time, as people on the observation deck below

cheered and waved and laughed. harder!" His legs

balance!

We'U

shook with

faU!"

Really Weird Stories

fear

And

Selinda shouted, "Harder!

and he

Do

yelled, "I can't! We'll lose

it

our

85

86

John Shirley

The Last Ride Seeing, in the sky, the

winged

hovering, toying

satyr, fluttering there,

with his erect, godsized member, and laughing at them. His lean,

sar-

donic, face etched out of dark leather.

"Selinda this'd be a ridiculous

away from the her. "If

"Do

I

do

it!"

it

satyr.

it.

Chad

to die!"

Struggling to keep his balance as he

He

couldn't

let

"Do

it

or

I

He

pumped

into

jump!"

will

He

her jump.

loved her.

And they lost their balance and went tumbling, end wildly the

shouted, looking

harder-"

she screamed at him.

So he did

way

over end, screwing

whole time, until— bed, slick with sweat.

sat bolt upright in his

"It's

got to end," he

told himself. Staring into the darkness. "For sure."

when

But

she called him, a

week

Southerton Airport," his cock leapt

he said

The

.

.

later,

like

and

said,

"Meet

me

at the

a hungry wolf in his pants and

.

plane's pilot

knew something weird was going

on.

He

was a

middle aged black guy, had the hardnosed, hard-drinking look of a

Vietnam

vet about him. She'd probably picked

kind of guy

So long

as

who

him because he was the

didn't give a flying fuck, so to speak,

how weird it got.

he was paid.

So he didn't react when Selinda told Chad, "Put your manhood

me

in

almost immediately, as soon as you can, otherwise we'll not

achieve congress."

Achieve congress^

And under

the lead

"Uh—if you say so." Chad felt made out of lead. was magma: Under the heaviness was anger. He'd

spent an hour before the flight trying to talk her into coming clean

with him. Begging her to

tell

him about

herself.

To

talk

about

this

.

.

.

thing they did together. But she just smiled vacantly, and shook her

head

gently,

And now

and

earth of Texas. prised him. "It

too

.

.

The

."

said,

"Take

me

or leave

me

as

I

am."

they were about two thousand feet over the packed sandy It is

was

their first

meeting in daylight, and that had

sur-

murmured. "But

that

a risk, meeting at this hour," she

She shrugged.

little

Cessna bucking,

murky with dust

in the intermittent turbulence.

in the distance;

The

sky a bit

blue blurred with graybrovm. Only a

few clouds scribbled long and bluegray against the horizon. And Chad

was

thinking. What's important in

always believed?

worth

it? Is

lifef

You going

to live the

Or not? If those are her terms—ask yourself

anybody? Probably

not.

But

living

way you

pal: Is she

with the volume knob on

Really Weird Stories

John Shirley the

amp

The Last Ride

turned up

Well, here

was

.

.

That was worth

.

So he made himself stop head, strapped

him

it.

Hope

I

die before

I

get old?

his chance.

on

thinking.

the parachute,

He

taped the

Walkman onto

his

went through the routine they'd taught

in the skydiving classes— make that "class," exactly

one— and he

open door. She didn't ask. She took his hand and him out with her The first time he'd jumped—the only other time—he'd nearly pissed his

joined her at the pulled

.

.

.

pants in terror, going out the door. This time he was slapped in the face by a

wave of

unreality.

He was

being suspended, hung

Wind roared

tunnel.

whipping

at

like

like

a

whirling; the clouds

then he

felt

Looked

passed.

god—like

him, snatching at his

and mouth. His stomach

And

falling,

on

but

didn't feel like falling;

it

some

a mobile from

felt like

up

drying the moisture from his eyes against his diaphragm.

The world

the horizon snaking past as he turned in the

her grip

on

into her eyes.

his

a wind

the winged satyr of the roller coaster-

hair,

flattened

it

invisible ceiling—in

air

.

.

arm, and some of the disorientation

Reached up automatically

button on his Walkman. Rock'n'roll thunder in

to hit the play

freefall.

The world was spinning at 45 RPM, and the breath was wrenched from him and despair and delight married in him and went on a perverse honeymoon, and he shouted, "Sellliiiinnnnda!" She pulled herself hand over hand—up his arm. Coming at him like a panther. /'// never he able to get hard in this scene! he thought desperately. And then: what the hell kind of thing is that to worry about, man! You dont jump right, you

re

going to

Accept

it.

Or

die! this is all for nothing.

So he dragged her to him and she locked her trifugal force

used

all

and

legs

a jealous air pressure tried to pull

his strength, every muscle,

denly they shared one center of

by the pressure and

inertia,

around him. Cen-

them

apart, but

he

and dragged her close, closer, till sudand they were sucked together

gravity,

almost crushing one another

.

.

.

Don't throw up.

He

swallowed hard, and reined in

fluttering belly,

and

pressed against him.

his racing heart,

tried to concentrate

Her

skirt

vibrating her blouse's collar

and quieted

on the warmth

hiked up around her hips now.

whipping her

hair.

his

where she was

The wind

Kissing her, though the

wind blew the saliva away, made their mouths like dry sponges on one another. The ground spinning. The wind roaring and the music thundering in his ears ... an old song from Iggy and the Stooges. "Loose." Iggy bawling, / stick it/deep-inside/l stick

Really Weird Stories

it

deep inside- cause I'm loose!

87

John Shirley

The Last Ride So was Chad. Set loose. Surrendered. Thinking: Fuck anyway. And

evitable

was able

hard, so he

Death

it.

to wriggle into her. Probing.

Hiding

is in-

made him

the surrender surged into his cock,

in that inner

world. Pumping. Short shallow pumps, but hard. Freefalling. Grinding

out that sweet internal recognition.

"You must come!" She shouted suddenly. "The orgasm! Now!

must

he shouted

"I can't!"

the wind. "Not yet!"

long way

in her ear,

He was

not sure

working

his

if

she could hear him over

way

there, but

it

was

a

still

off.

The ground swinging at them like a mallet. when he lost his grip on her—some errant wind them, prying them apart. One second she was there—the next,

"Do

it!"

"I'm

.

.

.

jerking at

there

We

pull the cords!"

she shouted.

trying!" That's

was the sound of canvas snapping—

And he had

He

her parachute in his hands,

screamed and

flailed,

still

in

its

pack.

spinning, looking for her, the

gone, torn away, too, the wind sucking

Walkman

sound from him. His head

all

throbbing in time with the sobbing thud of his heart.

There she was: about

He

thirty feet away.

tried to

remember how

way over to her, but she seemed to drift farther from him. on her face. As if she were concentrating Calling

plane his

strange look calling

.

.

.

silently

.

.

.

.

to

A .

.

out to something.

A smell of leather. A deep, inhumanly-masculine laughter. And then he was

there. Leather

legs

hard with muscle. His eternally hard

wings spread wide to block the sun; furry chest and

member wagging

with his

wingstrokes. His goat's feet dangling like the strange irrelevancies they

were up

here.

Sardonic face etched in dark leather. Bottomless eyes.

He

swept past Chad

down on onto

his back,

around

his

rally-stiff

and swooped Then heaved her

effortiess as a stingray in the sea

Selinda, caught her adoringly in his arms.

where she hung between

his wings,

her legs locked

waist— and her feet clamped on either side of his supernatu-

member. She pushed

to the right. Obediently.

it

to the right with her feet—and he flew

They went laughing away,

flying across the

desert toward a distant butte. Selinda riding him; directing her mount.

And Chad

heard

it

in his

Knew

head, then.

that she could talk to this

creature, but not with words, with the psychic talent that

been /

hers.

am

awhile,

Some

of

sorry

I left,

and

don't

I

it

leaking to

Chad

she told the god.

know how

.

/

.

had always

.

wanted

to explain

to play with

them

for

why.

Really Weird Stories

The Last Ride

John Shirley /

understand, the winged satyr answered her.

can die and we cant.

And

then

Chad

It's

lost

so seductive

them,

.

.

tried to tell himself

horror of seeing her

body

in the desert.

fall

No

it

their mortality.

Chad was

had been a hallucination brought on by the

without her chute. But no one ever found her

one

fitting

got something out of

his

demo

for the record

"The Last Ride." And

it

Really Weird Stories

He

his ripcord.

her description ever turned up missing.

Probably because she'd never entirely been in the world in the

It

They

a radio station going out of range.

like

pushed her parachute away from him. Pulled

Chad

It's

.

went

it.

He wrote

a song.

company and

first

place.

You must've heard

his first big hit. It

was

it.

called

to the top of the charts with a bullet.

ReaUy, ReaUy,

AVeird

STORIES

.

.

.

And the Angel

WITH Television Eyes

On

a gray morning, April

perched on the right-hand post

Max watched

to

find

at the foot of his antique four-poster bed.

of shining metal—began to preen It

at first that

in his

breathing griffin

a living,

with sleep-fuzzed pleasure as the griffin— a

beak of polished cadmium.

Max assumed

Max Whitman woke

the year 2020,

ii,

midtown Manhattan apartment

its

griffin

mirror-bright feathers with a

creaked a

he was

as

little

still

made

hooked

moved.

it

dreaming; he'd had a series of

oddly related technicolor-vivid dreams recently. Apparently one of these dreams had spilled over onto his waking

the griffin from a

dream of the night

reality.

previous.

It

He remembered

had been a dream

brisding with sharp contrasts: of hard-edged shafts of white light—

warms—breaking through clouds the color of suicidal melancholy. And weaving in and out of those shafts of light, the griffin came flying toward him ablaze with silvery glints. And then the clouds never

light that

coming

Red

together, closing out the light,

rain.

Thick, glutinous rain.

A rain

and

letting

go sheets of

of blood. Blood running

rain.

down

the sheer wall of a high-towered, gargoyle-smdded castle carved of

transparent glass. Supported by nothing at

and steady

as

Mount

all:

a crystalline castle

Everest, hanging in mid-air.

the sky-castle was a flying

army of wretched

And

still

laying siege to

things led by a

man with

a

barbed-wire headJust a

bad dream.

Now, Max gazed at the griffin and shivered, hoping the rest of the dream wouldn't come along with the griffin. He hadn't liked the rain of blood

Max

at

all.

blinked, expecting the griffin to vanish.

Fulsome. Something hungry

.

.

It

remained, gleaming.

.

Really, Really,

Weird Stories

John Shirley The

.

Max

griffin noticed

.

And the Angel with Television Eyes

.

watching.

It

straightened, fluttered

morning

meter wingspread, wingtips flashing

in

through the broad picture window, and

said, "Well,

me?"

had a strangely musical, male

It

"Whuh?" But

it

"I

said

looked so solid

soft.

heard and "Look,

You

and he could hear

.

.

Who

didn't—"

her

is

sat

it

little

on

it

But

yet.

I

me?" and

sat up.

high.

It

gripped the bedpost with

haunches, and

its

on its

its

lion's

forepaws—from

pin-feathered knees.

from a machine-shop. The Its

griffin

The

had a

feathered chest rose

fell.

"Machine?" The tufted lion's

"Ah."

griffin's

swished.

tail

circuitry.

presume to

But

I

Max

." .

."

.

Max murmured.

opalescent eyes glittered warningly.

Its

wire-

my semblance is all alloys and plastics you I am not an example of what you people

"It's

assure

felt

cold,

true

and pulled the bedclothes up to cover

Dont make it Good Lord, no."

"Sorry."

snorted. "Sandra! .

.

call 'artificial intelligence.'"

pimpled shoulders.

"I

call

He yawned

head, but an eagle's beak replaced a muzzle.

"A machine that breathes

It

claws rasping the bedpost.

must admit. You're a marvel of engineering.

I

pinfeathers looked like sweepings

and

a holograph?

was too loud, and then

cuteness."

a lion of some polished argent alloy—rested

and

it

got the hang of mindsending

was about a meter

metallic eagle's claws;

lion's

what do you want of

stopped, and smiled. "Sandra. Sandra Klein in

"She outdid herself with you, griffin

its

"It

you and why did you

are

He

Special Effects, right? This

Damn." The

went on.

the griffin

really haven't

came.

I

I

.

call,"

two-

its

slanting

light

voice.

Max blearily. "Me? Want with youT Was

heard your

was too

the

Max's throat was

dry. "I

he'd taken a drug that couldn't

saw you

make up

his goose-

mad. "Sandra didn't send you?"

in a

its

dream."

mind

if it

He felt odd.

Like

were a

tranquilizer

head

attentively.

or a psychedelic.

"You saw

"Who "Oh

else

me

was

in a

in this

dream?" The

griffin

cocked

its

dream?"

there were-things,

A rain

of blood.

A

casde that was there and

wasn't there. A man-it looked like he was made of ... of hot metal. And Well, his head was all of wire. I had a series of dreams that were .

.

.

things like that." "If

you dreamed those

act as

if

my coming here is ordained. You know why I'm here." It blinked, tiny metal

things,

you honestly don't

then

shutters closing with a faint dink. "But you're not

much surprised by me.

Most humans would have run shrieking from the room by now. You cept me."

Really, Really,

Weird

Stories

ac-

93

94

•

•

Max shrugged. said

it

was—ordained?" I

can

you

tell

that

I

am

and

Flare,

I

a Conservative Protectionist, a High Functionary Ln the Fiefdom of

am

Lord

You

And you—if you're human—must be wild talent. At least. mindsend in your sleep, unknown to your conscious

Viridian.

transmitted the

mind.

I

should have guessed from the confused

Such things are outside the realm of

my

You people keep food

thing to eat.

be through that hallway

The

Well well well.

You might be one of

First, I've

in 'the kitchen,'

I

got to have some-

That would

think.

." .

.

of shining metal fluttered from the bedpost, alighted

griffin

and hopped

floor with a light clattering,

Max

signal.

expertise.

the Concealed. We'll see, at the meeting.

got out of bed, thinking: He's

ented. But I'm not.

I

he'd taken

on

the

into the kitchen, out of sight.

right.

should be at least

I

disori-

have been expecting him.

dreams

Especially since the

ter

me why you're here. You

"Maybe. But you haven't told

''Planned might be a better word,

ter

John Shirley

And the Angel with Television Eyes

on the

himself— there'd been

And the dreams began a week afRed Mark. He'd named the charac-

started.

role of Prince last

moment

misgivings about the original

name chosen by the scripters, and he'd blurted, "How about 'Prince Red Mark'?" And the producer went for it, one of the whims that shape show business. Four tapings for the first two episodes, and then the dreams commenced. Sometimes he'd dream he was Prince Red Mark; other times a flash of heat lightning; or a ripple of wind, a breeze that

could think and

blooms

.

.

awoke with about

feel,

And

.

swishing through unseeable gardens of invisible

then the dreams became darker,

his fists balled, his eyes wild,

griffins

and

rains of

blood and

fiercer,

so that he

sweat cold on his chin. Dreams

by wretched

sieges

things.

The

things that flew, the things with claws.

He'd played Prince Red Mark

for seven episodes

picked for his athletic build, his thick black

PR people

hair,

called "aristocratic detachment."

and

now. He'd been

his air of

Other people

what the

called

it ar-

rogance.

Max Whitman had When he played

role.

and simple

.

.

.

The

found, to his surprise, he hadn't had to act the Prince

Red Mark, he was Prince Red Mark. Pure would make fun of him, when they

set-hands

thought he couldn't hear, because he'd forget to step out of the character

between shootings. He'd swagger about the

pommel

set

with

his

hand on the

of his sword, emanating Royal Authority.

This morning he didn't

feel

much

like

and confused and mildly threatened.

Prince

He

Red Mark. He

felt

sleepy

stretched, then turned toward

Really, Really,

Weird Stories

John Shirley

.

.

And the Angel with Television Eyes

.

the kitchen, worried by certain sinister noises: claws

Wet, slapping sounds.

He

He

burst out,

"Damn,

hurried to the kitchen. "Hey-oh,

hell.

on

glass. Splashings.

my

got into

it

My

fish."

The

perched beside the ten-gallon aquarium on the breakfast palm-sized damsel-fish were gasping, dying

The

griffin fluttered to the floor,

with

its

tile

puddled with

"Was

Max

red.

"It's

my

nature.

I

Three

bar.

blue-tile floor.

fish neatly into sections

an eagle would have. The blue

just as

turned away, saddened but not really angry.

"Okay.

I

was hungry.

I

dead things

decided

the meeting.

it

And

their balcony

a message for you.''

we

And

after

didn't eat

you

.

if I

.

.

have to

eat. I

some considerNow, let's go to

862 Haven, apartment seventeen.

.

.

It

cocked

its

head

to

one

side as

if

for eating your fish. Apparently

of respect in their

level

I'll

meet you

wait. Wait. I'm getting a send. They're telling

.

me I must apologize

some unusual

And

we're bodied,

refrigerator.

don't say, 'What meeting?'"

lt's

tell

When

your

won't."

on

"They

in

would be best

"Just take a fast cab to

gize.

snipped the

was

griffin

that necessary?"

can't eat those

ation

them

beak, and gobbled

on the wet

aquarium!"

circle." It

bent

its

head.

they say you are to read a letter from 'Carstairs.'

me-

listening.

you have "I

It's

apolo-

been

in

your computer's mail sorter for two weeks under personal and you keep neglecting to retrieve griffin, fluttering its

doors opened for

it

it.

Read

as

it.

That's the send

hopped

wings, if slid

.

.

.

into the living

Well then

.

.

."

back by some ghostly hand.

It

went

to the

balcony, crouched, then sprang into the air and soared away.

thought he heard

shout something over

it

its

The

room. The French

He

shoulder at him: something

about Prince Red Mark.

The sun came and went. Max stood under the rain-shelter in the gridcab station on the roof of his apartment building. The grid was a webwork of metal slats and signal It

was a breezy morning,

feeling like spring.

contacts, braced by girders

and upheld by the buildings

that jutted

mountaintops through a

cloud-field.

through the finely woven net

like

Thousands of wedge-shaped cabs and private gridcars the grid in as Impatiently,

many

Max

signal stanchion.

once more thumbed the green

patched by the Uptown

bay under the

main

cab, cruising

area's traffic traffic

rain-shelter.

Really, Really,

along

different directions.

An empty

verishly interfacing

hummed

Weird Stories

call

button on the

by on automatic

computer;

it

swarm and arced

pilot,

was

dis-

detached from the

fe-

neatly into the pick-up

95

96

.

.

.

John Shirley

And the Angel with Television Eyes

Max The

climbed inside and inserted

Unicard into the cab's

his

"Where

to?"

Max

tapped

creditor.

bank account and asked,

small terminal's screen acknowledged his

his destination into the keyboard: the cab's

computer, through the data-feed contacts threaded into the grid, gave the destination to the main computer, which drove the cab from the bay

and out onto the

grid.

The computer kept

here and there were currents of

on the

track of every car

grid;

an individual cab might cut right

traffic;

through one of these without slowing, the computer calculating the available aperture in the traffic

flow to thousandths of a second. Acci-

dents were almost unknown.

You are to read a letter from Carstairs, the griffin had said. He'd met Carstairs at a convention of fantasy fans. Carstairs had hinted he was doing "some rather esoteric research" for Duke University's parapsychology lab. Carstairs

could

feel the

man

Max

had made

nervous—he

following him, watching him, wherever he went in

the convention hotel. So he'd deliberately ignored the message. But he

hadn't gotten around to deleting

As the cab flashed across the

it.

city,

weaving in and out of the peaks of

narrow parks that had taken the place of the Av-

skyscrapers, over the

Max punched a request to tie in with his home computer. The cab

enue,

charged his bank account again, tied him system to print out a copy of the letter,

focusing

first

on: "...

letter

when

I

and he asked

in,

from

Carstairs.

saw you

He

his records

scanned the

convention

at the

I

knew

Hidden Race had chosen to favor you. They were there, standing at invisible to you—invisible to me too, except in certain lights, ." when I concentrate and all my training on looking Max shivered, and thought: A maniac. But—the griffin had been real the

your elbow,

.

He

skipped ahead,

century, people

own

were

to:

"... You'll remember, perhaps, back in the

last

talking about a 'plasma-body' that existed within our

physiological bodies,

an independently organized but

skein of subatomic particles; this constituted, called soul. It occurred to in so cohesive a

.

some of us

that

if

it

this

interrelated

was supposed, the

plasma body could

form within an organism, and could

so-

exist

survive for transmi-

gration after the death of that organism, then perhaps a race of creatures, creatures

who seem

to us to

be

'bodiless,'

could exist alongside the em-

bodied creatures without humanity's knowing

Max. and

It

This race does

exist.

accounts for those well-documented cases of 'demonic' possession

poltergeists.

studying the years.

it.

And

for

much

in

Hidden Race—some

We kept our research

mythology. call

secTet for a

My

organization has been

them plasmagnomes—for

good reason

fifteen

." .

.

Really, Really,

Weird Stories

John Shirley

Max was

.

.

.

And the Angel with Television Eyes

distracted by a peculiar noise.

He

roof of the cab.

A

scratching

sound from the

glanced out the window, saw nothing, and

shrugged. Probably a news-sheet blown by the wind onto the car's roof.

He

looked again

plasmagnomes

"... for a good reason. Some of the

at the letter.

are hostile

.

.

The Hidden Race

.

of about ten thousand plasmagnomes,

sists

who

is

live

very orderly. for the

the world's 'barren' places. Such places are not barren to them.

of the plasmagnomes are a well-cared-for serf class, base plasma

and elaboration of

in

The bulk

consumed or

used in etheric constructions. The upper classes govern, study the

ous universes, and most of

con-

who labor in creating

packets of nonsentient energy to be

fields,

It

most part

vari-

concern themselves with the designing

all

their Ritual Pavanes.

But

this

monarchist hierarchy

is

factioned into two distinct opposition parties, the Protectionists and the Exploitationists: they gave us those terms as being the closest English

The

equivalent.

Protectionists are sanctioned

by the High Crown and

the Tetrarchy of Lords. But lately the Exploitationists have increased their

numbers, and they've become harder to police. They have gotten

out of hand.

And

centuries ago as 'Merlin'

members of

the

Max glanced

up

The it;

letter. ".

.

structive

slavery

would

.

The

and an Exploitationist

as 'Mordred,' certain

Hidden Race have taken bodied form among us sound from the

why

his heart

roof.

Louder this

was pounding.

Exploitationists maintain that

He

.

He tried to ignore

time.

looked doggedly at the

humanity

is

small-minded, de-

of the biosphere, too numerous, and in general suitable only for

and kill

knew my organization

as sustenance. If they

me

and

my

them

to affect us

fields

keep them

when at

dragons, sorcerers,

they're unbodied, because

a distance

fairies,

leaned back

studied them, they

associates. Till recently, the Protectionists have pre-

vented the opposition party from taking physical form.

Max

." .

again.

scratching

he wondered

walked the Earth

for the first time since a Protectionist

.

.

harpies,

in his seat

.

more

difficult for

Centuries ago, they appeared to us as

winged

horses, griffins-"

and slowly shook

took a deep breath. This could

It's

our biologic magnetic

still

his head. Griffins.

be a hoax. The

griffin

He

could have

been a machine. But he knew

better.

He'd knovm

since he

was a boy,

really.

Even then,

dreamsphantom scrabbling had come again from overhead.

certain technicolor-vivid

He tensed: He glimpsed

the

a dark fluttering from the corner of one eye; he turned, thought he saw a leathery wing-tip withdraw from the upper edge of the

windowframe. Really, Really,

Weird Stories

97

98

.

.

.

John Shirley

And the Angel with Television Eyes

"Oh God." He decided it might be a good idea to read the rest of the letter. Now. Quickly. Best he learn all he could about them. Because the scratching

and

on

the roof

was becoming a

Louder

grating, scraping sound.

harsher.

He

forced himself to read the

last

paragraph of the

"... in the

letter.

old days they manifested as beast-things, because their appearance fected by our expectation of them. filtering

enter the visible plane only after

through our cultural psyche, the society's collective electromag-

mental

netic

They

And

field.

something to do

their shapes apparently have

with their inner psychological make-up—each one has a different

When

age.

they

become bodied, they manipulate

atomic-physical world with plasma-field telekinesis,

what

is af-

at least

seem

be

to

self-im-

the atoms of the

and shape

it

into

actually functioning organisms, or machines.

Lately they take the

form of machines—coUaged with more ancient imag-

ery—because ours

a machine-minded society. They're

is

myth

robots, per-

haps. They're not magical creatures. They're real, with their

own

subtle

metabolism—and physical needs and ecological niche. They have a

method of keeping records—in 'Closed-system Plasma fields'— and even constructing housing. Their castles are vast and complex and invisible to us, untouchable and all but undetectable. We can pass through them and not disturb them. The Hidden Race has a radically different relationship to matter, energy— and death. That special relationship is what makes them seem magical to us Well, Mr. Whitman, we're getting in touch .

.

.

with you to ask you to attend a meeting of those directly involved in plans for defense against the Exploitationists' campaign to—"

He

got no further in his reading.

He was

distracted.

Naked

terror

is

a

distracting thing.

A squealing sound

of ripped metal from

cringe in his seat, look as a

up

just

over his head

made him

to see claws of polished titanium, claws long

man's fingers and wickedly curved, slashing the cab's thin roof. The

claws peeled the metal back Frantically,

Max punched

.

.

.

a message into the cab's terminal:

direction for nearest police station. bility

Emergency

priority. I

Change

take responsi-

for traffic disruption.

The cab swerved, grid to spiral

down

street level, across

station.

the traffic parting for the off-ramp.

from a cop

It

pulled

just getting

it,

up

and took an

exit

from the

in the concrete cab-stop at

out of a patrol car at the police

Wide-eyed, the cop drew his gun and ran toward the cab.

Claws snatched

at

Max's shoulders.

He opened

the cab door, and

flung himself out of the car, bolting for shelter.

Really, Really,

Weird Stories

John Shirley

.

.

.

And the Angel with Television Eyes

Something struck him between the shoulderblades. There was an into his flesh

icy digging at his

and

lifted

him

fell

face

down; he

staggered.

off his feet—he could feel the muscles of his

shoulders straining, threatening to

and he

He

shoulders-he howled. Steel claws sank

lay for a

The claws opened, moment, gasping on his tear.

released him, belly.

He had

a choppy impression of something blue-black flapping above and be-

He felt a tugging at his belt—and then he was lifted into the air, the

hind.

clawed things carrying him by the belt as

if it

were a luggage handle.

He was two, three, five meters above the concrete, and spiraling upward. He heard a gunshot, thought he glimpsed the cop fallen, a winged on him.

darkness descending

The ful

city

wings

whirled into a gray

just

above.

He

Max heard the regular beat of power-

blur.

thought: I'm too heavy.

It's

not aerodynamically

possible.

But he was carried higher

still,

the flying things making creaking, whip-

ping sounds with their pinions. Otherwise, they were unnervingly

Max

stopped struggling to

ten stories to the street.

free himself. If

He was

slumped

silent.

he broke loose now, he'd

like

fall

a rabbit in a hawk's claws,

hanging limply, humiliated.

He of

saw two of the

sight.

middle.

They

They

flying things below,

carried the

carried

other by the throat.

now,

just

policeman— a big bald

climbing into his line

man

with a paunchy

him between them; one had him by the

ankles, the

He looked lifeless. Judging by the loll of his head, his

neck was broken. Except for the rush of wind past the belt was cutting into him.

He was

afraid,

his face, the

Max felt numb,

deeply afraid, but the fear

pain at his hips where

once more

with the world, a background noise that one grows used constant banging from a neighborhood construction

he looked vu.

at the things carrying

He remembered them

in a

dream.

had somehow become one to, like

site.

But

the

when

him, he had a chilling sense of deja

from the dreams.

Two

mornings before,

he'd awakened, mumbling, "The things that flew, the things with

claws

." .

.

They were made of vinyl. were made

cars

were bony, almost their

Blue-black vinyl, just exacdy the stuff seats of

of, stretched over,

skeletal

he guessed, aluminum frames. They

women, with

little

hard knobs for breasts,

arms merging into the broad, scalloped imitation leather wings.

They had the heads of women-with

day-glo wigs of green, stiff-plastic

brisdes-but instead of eyes there were the lenses of cameras, one in

each socket; and

Really, Really,

when

they opened their mouths he saw, instead of

Weird Stories

99

loo

.

John Shirley

And the Angel with Television Eyes

.

.

narrow

teeth, the blue-gray curves of razors following the line of the

jaws.

Max thought:

One

a harpy.

of the harpies, three meters away and a

vinyl head, its

It's

its

camera lenses

mouth and threw back

came

A vinyl harpy.

glittering, to its

head

like

little

below, turned

look Max in the a

dog about

face;

to

its

opened

it

howl and out

GO TO THE SHELTERS. GO IMDO NOT STOP TO GATHER POSSES-

the sound of an air-raid warning:

MEDIATELY TO THE SHELTERS. SIONS. TAKE FAMILY TO THE SHELTERS. BRING NOTHING. FOOD AND WATER WILL BE PROVIDED. GO IMMEDL\TELYAnd two others took it up. GO IMMEDIATELY- in a sexless, emotionless tone of authority. TAKE FAMILY TO THE SHELTERSAnd Max could tell that, for the harpies, the words had no meaning, it was

way of animal cawing,

their

They

the territorial declaration of their kind.

more than

couldn't have been in the air

ten minutes—flapping

of, the city churning by below— They were going down beyond the automated zone. They entered Edgetown, what used to be the South Bronx. People still sometimes drove combustion cars here, on the pot-holed,

unevenly over rooftops,

when

bits

and pieces

they began to descend.

cracked

when

streets,

men were

they could get contraband gasoline; here police-

rarely seen; here the corner security

smashed, the sidewalks crusted with

trash,

cameras were always

and two-thirds of the

build-

ings deserted.

Max was carried down toward an old-fashioned tar rooftop; roof of a five-story building, wedged in between three

four looked derelict and empty; the building across the street

few

signs of occupation: laundry in the airshaft,

roof.

The

Max felt Where

a

a

child, little

little

black

girl,

one small

was the

it

ones. All

taller

showed

child

watched without any sign of

a

on the

surprise.

better, seeing her.

the shadows of the three buildings intersected

the deepest pocket of darkness, there

rooftop doorway into the building.

was a small

on the

outbuilding;

fourth, in it

was the

The door hung brokenly to one

side.

A

cherry-red light pulsed just inside the doorway, like hate in a nighted soul.

Max

lost sight

of the red glow as the vinyl harpies turned, circling for

The rooftop rushed up at him. There was a sickening moment of freefall when they let go. He fell three meters to the rooftop, struck a landing.

on the

balls

of his

feet,

plunged forward, shoulder-rolled to a stop.

gasped, trying to get his breath back.

He

ached

in his ankles

He

and the

soles of his feet.

He

took a deep breath and stood, swaying, blinking.

staring into the

He found

he was

open doorway. Within, framed by the

dusty, dark en-

Really, Really,

Weird Stories

John Shirley

.

trance to the stairway,

was concentrated

.

.

And the Angel with Television Eyes

was a man made of red-hot steel. The heat-glow and arms. He touched the wooden frame

in his torso

of the doorway-and

it

tar rooftop, leaping

atop chimneys and

wings to

TERS,

flap,

burst into flame.

The

harpies capered about the

down again, stretching their booming, GO IMMEDIATELY TO THE SHEL-

cawing,

GO IMMEDIATELY, GO GO GO

.

.

The man made of hot metal stepped onto the roof. The harpies quieted, cowed. They huddled together, behind him, cocking their heads and scratching under their wings with pointed chins. To one side lay the lifeless body of the policeman, its back toward Max; the corpse's head had been twisted entirely around on its neck; one blue eye was open, staring lifelessly;

the man's tongue

For a

was caught between clamped

moment all was

of the small

fire

on

quiet,

but for the rustling of wings and crackling

the outbuilding.

The man of hot chrome wore no nearly two-and-a-half meters

tory-new chest,

fighter-jet.

with the

teeth, half severed.

He

tall,

clothes at

and smooth

was seamless— except

metal turn-handle on

little

it.

all.

He was

immense,

as the outer hull of a fac-

for the square gate

The

gate

was

on

his

precisely like

the door of an incinerator; in the center of the gate was a small, thick

pane of smoke-darkened

glass,

through which blue-white

seen burning resdessly. Except for their bright metal legs

and

stylized genitals

fires

could be

finish, his

arms and

looked quite human. His head was formed of

barbed wire— a densely woven wire sculpture of a man's head, cunningly

formed eyes,

to

show

grim, aristocratic features. There were simply holes for

behind which red

fires flickered in his

hollow head;

now and

then

flames darted from the eye-holes to play about his temples and then cede; his scalp barbs.

was a

crest of barbs;

Gray smoke gusted from

"Feed me." The wire

lips

his

moved

re-

eyebrows and ears were shaped of

mouth when he spoke

to the harpies:

a man's; the wire jaw

like

seemed

to

work smoothly. "Feed me, while I speak to this one." He stepped closer Max, who cringed back from the heat. "I am Lord Thanatos." A voice like

metal rending.

Max knew him. One

of the harpies

moved

to the corpse of the policeman;

it

took hold

of the arm, put one stunted foot on the cop's back, and began to wrench and twist. It tore the corpse's arm from its shoulder and dragged it to

Thanatos, leaving a out with

its

free

trail

The harpy reached handle on its Lord's chest. The

of red blood on black

hand and turned the

tar.

door svmng open; an unbearable brightness flared ing its head, turning its eyes from the rapacious Really, Really,

Weird Stories

in the opening; ducklight,

the vinyl harpy

ioi

102 ...

John Shirley

And the Angel with Television Eyes

watch and blue

stuffed the cop's arm, replete with digital

coat-sleeve,

bosom of Thanatos. Sizzlings and poppings and smoke unfurling. And the smell of roasting flesh. Max's stomach

into the inferno, the

black

recoiled;

He

he took another step backward.

lyzed, as the harpies scuttled

watched, feeling half para-

back and forth between the corpse and

Thanatos, slowly dismembering and disemboweling the dead police-

man, feeding the pieces into the furnace that was

And

his fire

"This

is

burned more

how

look on me.

will be," said

it

Max Whitman,

glow

furiously; his

their Lord.

increased.

Thanatos. "You will serve me. You can

and upon

my servants, and you do

not go

mad. You do not run howling away. Because you are one of those who once, you and serve

us, in some way. We met on the dream-plane knew you for what you were, then. You can among men. You will be my emissary. You will

known about

has always

me, and

and

I,

still

I

live

be shielded from the cowards

You

world.

will

wealthy ones. Thanatos.

I

how

is

will

As he

it

prevent

who control the many. The them about a great source of power. Lord send fiends and visitations to beset their enemies. grow, and they will feed me, and my Power will grow.

will be."

down from

finished speaking, another harpy flapped

smudged white

suit.

"They always

kill

not break them of

the sky,

was a young Hispanic

It

Thanatos opened the wiry mouth of

head and sighed; blue smoke smelling of munitions

surable to

entry into your

will tell

dropping a fresh corpse into the shadows.

air.

my

go to certain men, the few

You

Their power will This

who would

his

factories dirtied the

them, somehow, as they bring them to me.

it.

They always

consume when

there

kill

Men

the humans.

is life left

them.

in

in a

hollow

are

can-

I

more

My curse is

plea-

this:

I'm

served by half-minds."

Max The

thought:

Why didn't

into their master's fire.

Thanatos looked

And Max do

fire.

just

the harpies

kill

me, then?

an arm from the sprawled dead man, and fed

vinyl harpies tore

at

Max. "You have not

yet spoken."

thought: Say anything. Anything to get the hell away.

what you

it

Their camera-lens eyes caught the shine of the

ask. Let

me go and

I'll

bring you

lives. I'll

"I'll

be your, uh,

your emissary."

Another long, smoky Instinct of

some

sort,

I

sigh. "You're lying.

I

was

afraid you'd

be

loyal.

suppose."

"Loyal to who?" "I

can read you. You see only the semblance

past your semblance.

You cannot

lie

to

one of

I've

us.

I

chosen. But see the

Really, Really,

lie

I

in

see

you

Weird Stories

John Shirley unfolding

not

.

And the Angel with Television Eyes

the blossoming of a poisonous purple orchid.

like

You

can-

licked barbed wire lips with a tongue of flame.

So they ity! Is

.

to a Lord."

lie

He

.

will kill

me,

Max

that a strange death?

thought. They'll feed

An

No

absurd death?

me

into this monstros-

stranger than dying by

on some Israeli battlefield; no more absurd than my uncle Danny's death: he drowned in a big vat of fluorescent pink paint.

nerve-gas

"You're not going to die," said Thanatos. "We'll keep you in ever imprisoned, unpleasantly

What happened

next

made Max

From Above. Because

down from above and struck the two body of the man in the smudged white suit

silvery flashed

bending over the

on the

think of a slogan stenciled

snout of one of the old B-12 bombers: Death

something

stasis, for-

alive."

.

harpies were struck with a terrible impact, sent broken and

harpies .

both

.

lifeless

over

the edge of the roof.

The

griffin pulled

up from

its

dive, raking the tar roof,

the burning outbuilding and up for another pass. rose to

meet

Other North.

harpies

it.

figures

were converging on the

One was a man who

His body was

what looked

and soared over

The remaining

roof,

angelic, his skin dazzling white;

like

aluminum

coming

in a

group from the

hovered without wings; he seemed to

foil.

levitate.

he wore a loincloth made of

His head was a man's, haloed with blond

curls-but where his eyes and forehead should have been was a small sion screen, projecting from the

image of a man's screen. nickel,

Two more and

just

griffins arrived,

behind them came a

ton blown on the breeze. nude, a plastic are

bone of his

eyes, looking about;

She was

Madonna made

made; she was

glossy,

and

it

skull.

was

as

televi-

On the screen was a TV if he saw from the TV

one electroplated gold, another of

woman who

drifted like a bit of cot-

shapely, resembling

Mother Mary, but

of the stuff of which inflatable beach-toys

striped in

wide bands of primary colors. She

seemed insubstantial as a soap-bubble, but when she struck at a vinyl harpy Flanking her were it reeled back, turning end over end to fall senseless. two miniature helicopters-helicopters no bigger than

horses.

The lower

section of each helicopter resembled a medieval dragon figured in armored metal, complete with clawed arms in place of landing runners.

Each copter's cab was conventionally shaped-but no driver sat behind the windows; and just below those sinister windows was a set of chrome teeth

mouth opening to let loose with great peals of electronically amplified angling their laughter. The dragon copters dived to attack the harpies,

in a

whirring blades to shred the vinyl wings.

Really, Really,

Weird Stories

103

104

•

•

•

And the Angel with Television Eyes

Thanatos grated a

command and from

John Shirley doorway behind

the burning

him came seven bats big as vultures, with camera-lens eyes and sawing and wings of paper-thin aluminum.

electric knives for teeth

Max threw himself to whipped

fire;

the bats

tack

Our Lady of

Two

the roof, coughing in the

close over his

smoke of the growing

head and climbed, keening, to

dog-sized spiders

made

of high-tension rubbery synthetics, their

on whirring

clashing mandibles forged of the best Solingen steel, raced

copper

The

at-

the Plastics.

legs across the

roof to intercept the angel with television eyes.

Max. The spiders him down, slashed bloody

angel alighted and turned to gesture urgently to

clutched at the angel's legs and dragged

hunks from

his ivory arms.

Max saw Lord

Thanatos catch a passing

onto the roof; he clamped the

and began

Two

griffin

by the

shower of blue sparks. Our Lady of the

dents into the aluminum ribs of the vinyl harpies slashed,

it

to melt.

metal bats collided head-on with a copter dragon and

disintegrated in a

burst

and slam

tail

griffin in his white-hot hands. It shrieked

and boomed

open—but

GO IMMEDIATELY, bellowing

all

three

Plastics struck

who

darted at her,

in

triumph as she

it

they recoiled in dismay, flapping clumsily out of reach,

when she re-formed, anew in mid-air.

gathering her fragments together, making herself

Max sensed that the real battle was fought in some other dimension of subatomic

physicality,

with a subder weaponry; he was seeing only the

distorted visual echoes of the actual struggle.

The

He

spiders

were wrapping the

angel's legs with chords of

them off, Max: "Take your life! You—"

gave a mighty wrench and threw

reach, shouting at

"SILENCE HIM!" Thanatos bellowed, stabbing a hot gel.

And

instantly

two of the harpies plummeted

the throat of the angel with television eyes.

glass.

finger at the an-

to sink their talons in

They

gouting, ragged wreckage of his white throat— and

spun

out of their

levitating

tore at him,

Max blinked,

made

a

seeing a

phosphorescent mist, the color of translucent turquoise, issuing from the angel's slack

mouth

as

he

fell

to the ground.

I'm seeing his plasma body escape.

He

Max thought. I'm realizing my talent.

saw the blue phosphorescence, vaguely man-shaped,

in the air over the

body of the dead Hispanic.

corpse. Possessing

it.

Sans

its

right arm, half

its

It settled,

drift to

face clawed away, the corpse stood.

shuddered, spoke with shredded

lips.

"Max,

kiU yourself

and

Really, Really,

hang

enfolding the

It

swayed,

lib—"

Weird Stories

John Shirley

.

Thanatos lunged

at the

burned

.

.

And the Angel with Television Eyes

wavering corpse, closed hot metal fingers

The corpse slumped. coming back to him— or was someone sending them back? Someone mindsending. You were of the Con-

around But

its

throat,

Max

its

voice-box into char.

stood. His dreams were

cealed.

Thanatos turned from the Bind him, carry him to

battle, scowling,

the angel with television eyes,

A

and crept toward Max. forced himself forward.

commanding: "Take him!

The spiders, gnawing on the corpse of moved reluctantly away from their feeding

safety!"

He

of revulsion went through him.

thrill

He

"Don't hurt

knelt, within the spiders' reach.

him!" Thanatos bellowed. "Take care that he does not—"

But he did.

He embraced a spider,

thing dear; and used

He

fell,

its

spasming, and knew

grayness.

And

clasping

it

to

him

as

if it

razor-sharp mandibles to slash his inexpressible pain;

a shattering while

were some-

own

throat.

and numbness, and

light.

He was dead. He was alive. He was standing over his own body, liberated. He reached out, and, with his plasma-field, extinguished the fire on the outbuilding. Instantly.

The battle noises softened, then muted— the combatants drew apart. They stood or crouched or hovered silently, watching him and waiting. They knew him for Prince Red Mark, a sleeping Lord of the Plasmagnomes, one of seven Concealed among humanity years before awaiting the day of awakening, the hour when they must emerge to protect those the kin of

He was ers,

Thanatos would slaughter for the

arisen, the first

of the Concealed.

eating.

He would awaken

the oth-

those hidden, sleeping in the hearts of the humble and the un-

known. In old

women and

was one, hidden

in a

tired,

young black

middle-aged soldiers and-and there girl,

not

far away.

Thanatos shuddered and squared himself for the

Max, Lord Red Mark, scanned the other

Now

battle of wills.

figures

on the rooftop. them as in-

he could see past their semblances, recognize

networks of rippling wavelength, motion that is thought, energy equal to will. He reached out, reached past the semblance of

terlacing

Lord Thanatos.

A small black girl, one Hazel Johnson, watched the battle from a rooftop across the street. She

was the only one who saw

it;

she had the only

suitable vantage.

Hazel Johnson was

know that the

just eight years old,

but she was old enough to

scene should have surprised her, should have sent her

Really, Really,

Weird

Stories

yell-

105

John Shirley

And the Angel with Television Eyes

io6 ...

Momma.

ing for

But she had seen

dreams were

lieved that

And now

it

dream, and she'd always be-

in a

real.

man who'd thrown

she saw that the

himself

on

the spider

body had given off a kind of blue phosphorescence; and the blue cloud had formed into something solid, a gigantic shape had

died,

and

his

that towered over the nasty-looking wire-head of hot metal. All the flying

things

had stopped

flying.

They were watching

the newcomer.

The newcomer looked, to Hazel, like one of the astronauts you saw on TV coming home from the space station; he wore one of those spacesuits they wore, and he even had the U.S. flag stitched on one of his sleeves.

But he was a whole

He

she'd ever seen.

tall.

And now

of those helmets that the Knights of the

man

movie on TV. The knight

of hot metal

.

.

Round Table wore,

in the spacesuit

like

she saw

was reaching out

to the

.

Lord Red Mark was

distantly

from the rooftop across the

aware that one of

his

ovm was

Lady Day asleep

street. Possibly

human being; a small person who really human after all.

of a small wasn't

she saw

He had one

that he didn't have a helmet like the a regular astronaut had.

in the

man

than any astronaut, or any

lot bigger

must have been four meters

didn't

know,

watching

in the

body

yet, that

she

Now he reached out and closed one of his gloved hands around Lord Thanatos's barbed-wire neck

glove began to melt in the heat.

hand opened the that

burned

And

in the

how it.

(that's

and held him

ing from across the street)

Red Mark

incinerator door,

bosom

of his

snuffed out the flame,

The metal body remained

like

looked to the

fast,

little girl

watch-

though the metal of that

held him, and with the other

and reached

his

hand

into the fire

enemy— a

man snuffing a candle with his thumb.

standing, cooling, forever inert.

The minions

of Lord Thanatos fled squalling into the sky, pursued by the Protectionists,

abandoning

their visible physicality,

becoming once more unseeable. And

so the battle was carried into another realm of being.

Soon harpies,

the rooftop

and the

shell

Red Mark turned

He

was empty of

all

but a corpse, and a few broken

of Thanatos, and Lord

to look directly at the

levitated, rose evenly into the air,

Red Mark. on the opposite

little girl

and

drifted to her.

He

roof.

alighted

beside her and took off his helm. Beneath was a light that smiled.

was

beautiful.

He

She nodded, the

human

said, "Let's

go find the

slowly, beginning to wake.

shell, said,

"Do

1

He

others."

But the

little-girl

have to die too? Like you

part of her,

did.^"

Really, Really,

Weird Stories

John Shirley

.

.

.

And the Angel mTH Television Eyes

"No. That was for an emergenq^. There are other ways." "I don't have to die now?"

"Not now and You'll never die,

Really, Really,

.

.

."

my

The

light that

Lady."

Weird Stories

was a smile grew brighter. "Not

ever.

107

The Sweet Caress OF Mother Nature

Damon Stout was when

summer,

strolling in Central Park, at dusk, in the early

the cat spoke to him.

Stout was out walking with the vague notion of exercising himself into sobriety.

He'd gotten drunk on

his

lunch hour, hadn't returned to the

editorial office, couldn't face his secretary as shit-faced as

He

was.

though reading still, it

it

was only a

must be read and

He'd been walking

him along the in

he obviously

had the new Dean Koontz manuscript waiting on ritual,

officially

since accepting the

responded

blindly for an

his desk,

book was

a given;

to.

hour or more,

letting his

nose lead

paths, barely aware of the lengthening shadows,

and then,

one of those shadows, two golden eyes brought him out of

his gray

revery.

"Well," said the cat, an ordinary orange-striped tabby, "you certainly

sssseem depress-ss-ssed, mister." Stout stopped walking.

anyone but the

He blinked. He looked

mouth

cat. It's

around, and didn't see

hadn't moved, except to

open

just

a

little,

but he had the distinct impression that the small, soft voice, drawing out the Ss was

"Oh "No

He

its

throat, as

seriously, mister,

like that.

"Bullshit.

it

added, "Are you okay?"

he muttered.

you look depresssssed."

thought of Candid Camera.

shows

"I

coming from

bullshit,"

The

cat could

It

was

off the air but there

were other

be animatronic or something.

Where's the camera?"

think you are

." .

.

It

seemed

to think about the wording.

".

.

.

labor-

ing under a missss-app-re-henshhhhhion." It

had trouble pronouncing the longer words.

"It is

"Oh

I,

who's talking to you, mister," the cat

wait ... the medication

said.

." .

.

Really, Really,

Weird Stories

I

The Sweet Caress of Mother Nature

John Shirley

He was on

a

new

antidepressant medication—most

New York editors

were, since multinational conglomerates had bought out the publishers-

and he'd been warned not from

mind

his

to mix alcohol with moment.

until this

"You," he told the

a warning he'd blocked

it,

a neurological side effect, the result of mix-

cat, "are

ing psychoactive chemicals which should not be mixed."

"You're saying I'm a hallu-ccin-a-tion?" "I

am,

of

yes. First

know how

all,

cats can't talk.

Second,

they would learn English, and

would they acquire such good

if

if

they could,

I

don't

they did learn English,

how

diction?"

"Good points, all. We are able to talk, firsst-ly, because of mini-aturizza-tion. You know how people make micro-chipsss that keep getting tinier so they can put bigger

"Ah—so you

computing power into smaller placesss?"

are a machine?" Stout was beginning to enjoy this halluci-

broke him out of the maze of

nation, hoax, or whatever

it

standard dilemmas, and

woke him up

God.

He was

it

was.

It

all

has happened

pssssychic organism

you

call

way

in the

by

that felt good,

that

you yourself are a

think you'd

call

it

an adjustment by the

is

Mother Nature.

me Mother

"You're telling "I

and

org-anissssms are bio-log-shick-allll machines, wouldn't you

What

agree-yeee?

little,

inclined to prolong the experience.

"No, I'm not a machine— except machine:

a

his

Nature

The

Gaia.

is

She's ex-peri-menti-ing—

real?"

living Earth. She'sss exper-iii-menting

with animalssss, trying to find one that hurts her beingsss, sssearching for

an

alter-nat-iiiive

cause of the ssself-ev-i-dent

all

collective

around

dominant

than

less

speciessss,

of

exccccel-lllence

human and

cats,

be-

she

chossse us. She's done the equivalent of super-mini-aturi-zzzing a micro-

chip-but she's done

it

with braincellsss.

I

have even more braincells than

you—but they are mini-aturi-zzzed. And my vocal chordsss have mu-tat-ed. Do not make a joke about 'mew'-tations. The lassst fellow who passst by did and

.

.

.

bessst

we

not ssspeak of

"Are you the only cat

"Not

at

all.

And

that." Its tail

twitched warningly.

like this?"

asss for your questions

about English

The cat Some pa-ra."

.

paused to scratch vigorously behind one ear. "Excuse me. sssite or other. We'll have to keep sssome vetsss around

.

.

.

.

Asss to

speaking English, you can thank Msss. Teresa Carpenter for that: An elderly cat-loving lady who strove to teach English to some of the ad-

vanced mu-ta-ted

felinesss

in turn taught others. at the

I

among

can read a

moment."

Really, Really,

Weird Stories

her thirty-two adopted straysss. bit, in fact. I

We

rather fancy R.L. Ssstine

109

no The Sweet Caress

me

"Tell

of Mother Nature

something

things they're killing

one

"If

.

.

.

.

always wondered.

I've

.

.

like

mice, they

not in a hurry, mister,

is

John Shirley

them

kill

why not

Why do bit

by

cats play

bit,

with

sometimes."

enjoy one's occ-up-a-shunnn?

when you can? And if you think it cruel— don't tell me there isss no sssadism among humans. I know better. All animals know better. Shall we speak of laboratory resssearch?" Smell the ro-ses. Don't you,

Let It

not.

s

yawned, showing needle-sharp

He went

"Good

on,

you chosen to

point about

teeth.

human

behavior ... So:

Why

have

me?"

talk to

wasn't really necessssary. But—one likes to smell the rossses."

"It

"Excuse me?"

when he saw them—as

That's

were giving birth to a

ward him, and came

"Oh "Oh

surely not,"

litter

"After

He and in

.

.

said,

backing away.

Ms. Carpenter

almost

like

We

died, there

chicken

its

ears back, twitching

was nothing about

dissscovered that

human

to eat

.

.

.

beings have a lovely

." .

.

tried to run, of course, but there

it

to-

into the light with their golden eyes blinking.

he

except Ms. Carpenter. .

the long shadows of deepening evening

yessss indeed, mister," the cat said, laying

its tail.

taste

if

of slinking smaller shadows which oozed

was surprising how much

were about a hundred of them,

truth there

is

in the expression strength

numbers.

And

him down and he remembered, the

so they dragged

coming

to

him

in a flash:

having his

own

vision of

it

and how he'd

cat years before,

mouse or, as often, portions of dead on the welcome mat; a mouse-head neatly

found, nearly every day, a dead

mouse: a discrete torn from

pile

mouse

and

stiff bristling

tion

on

little

head, with shiny black eyes

whiskers and incisors immaculately intact, a decapita-

his doorstep;

away from

of guts

shoulders, a perfect

his belly,

and

now

as

he

he remembered

how

bowel the mouse, and

flailed at

how

them, trying to get them

the cat had loved to disem-

they could prolong the process, and he

heard them chatting as they sliced at him with their claws and dug at his eyes

and

his belly—and

he screamed—

But there were other screams, now, cat screams, drowning out

own, and he

felt

the tearing pain recede,

himself panting in a small pool of his

around him was a

Hundreds of

living

and he opened

own blood

green parrot: house birds

like

his

found

in the grass, while

whirlwind of yellow and pink

budgies, hundreds of parakeets,

his eyes,

.

.

now and

.

then a flash of

a cloud of airborne piranha gripping the

Really, Really,

Weird Stories

The Sweet Caress of Mother Nature hi

John Shirley cats

with their talons, tearing

dozen birds to each

now

else, too, bils

and white

screaming

at

them

mob; a dozen, two despairing cat—and something

in a fluttering

shrieking, panicky,

lunging into the few aperatures of open chattering to

rats,

felines

.

.

one another

as they

fur: gerbils, ger-

burrowed

into the

.

Chattering in English.

A

kind of pidgin English; exchanging brutal

pleasantries with the birds who, beaks red with cat blood, hopped away

from the looking Stout his cuts

a

good

feline remains, leaving the flesh to the rodents; the cats

like roadkill

managed

to

.

.

sit

were deep or

up— the

lethal,

cats

had been torturing him, and none of

they hadn't yet got that

far.

He would need

antibiotic.

But Stout was

in shock, feeling cold

scarcely reacted at

all,

when

the

colored parakeet perched on are not badly hurt,

to the pet stores,

form you great

now

.

if

you

man.

its

and numb and

dog spoke

shoulder nodding in agreement. "You

Rrrrise, rrrise

where yourrrr work

and bandage yourself and report as servant will begin.

arrrre to take part in the

war

us,

pink ape. Rrrrise and serve us well,

Really, Really,

Weird Stories

We

will in-

The

against the felines.

wave of mutation has come and gone and

some of

and

distant,

to him, a big Akita, the jade-

if

liberation

is

you would

here: for

live

." .

.

In the Cornelius Arms (thanks to Michael Moorcock)

As Timothy made up

blood

his face dead-white, his lips

red,

drawing a

slash-wound on his neck with special-effects authenticity, he listened to the

sounds of lovemaking from the next room. could

her—even posed

comfortable with two

feel

licking

He wondered how

took another

sip

Elena

each other right in front of

between times, one of them was going down on

if,

was the drugs. Chasing the dragon

it

places you'd never have

He

men

until the

dreamed of going. Maybe

her.

He

sup-

dragon lured you into

it

was nice

of absinthe, and the liquor, as

it

there.

shivered through

him, seemed to suggest that he join Elena and Garret and Sylvain. But he

knew he

wouldn't.

Anyway,

this

morning, he had been entrusted by Jerry himself with

showing the new

He

looked

girl

the ropes: the silken ropes of the Cornelius Arms.

at himself in the mirror,

standing for the

black

full effect;

frock coat, French ruffles, French cuffs, whitened hands, black finger-

he flicked the onyx inverted-cross earring with satisfaction and

nails;

blew himself a

"The

devil's

an angel sucks

kiss.

on

the roof!" Sylvain groaned, from the next room.

my dick!" There came

on buttocks. Timothy went

"And

a smacking sound— a palm striking

flat

downstairs, descending magisterially, elegantly, and

cognizance of his responsibility as Chief Lord of the Darkmoors,

with

full

First

Family of the Fens, looi Guerrero Street, San Francisco California.

Beth loved the look of the place from the see

it:

overcast, gloomy, the

sullen light;

Arms tere

itself

like

and untouchably

it

trash in the gutter.

a sphinx in the gothic,

and

was a

fine

day to

broken clouds shot through with shafts of

wind spinning paper

stood

first,

its

But the Cornelius

crowded San Francisco block,

architectural inner eye fixed

Really, Really,

on

aus-

eternity.

Weird Stories

John Shirley

the Cornelius Arms

In

Beth pulled her black wrap

around her shoulders, hugging her

tighter

old carpet bag, shivering in the wind, as she gazed up at the hotel's peaks

and towers,

walls of stone

and roofs of

and stained

stained gutters

glass,

crow squawked on a wrought-iron

timeworn gargoyles, as a slitted

iris.

its

A

lightning rod.

USA could

looks older, she thought, than anything in the

It

just

slate; its

windows narrow

be.

But

it's

another pre-Victorian San Francisco monstrosity.

To one

side of the

Arms was an

one of those with a Grande

intricately-restored Victorian house,

Dame

sensibility that

was a

little

over-

painted, frilled with colorful flowerpots, like a well-appointed drag

queen; probably a wealthy gay couple lived there. shabbier Victorian, beginning to

As she ascended the

list

On

front steps she found a street-Goth squatting be-

side the black-marble collonade, staring sullenly at the

ment he'd torn

off the neighbor's "beamer"; he

face crudely whitened, lips glossed black with like

eyes, giving

him a panda

being ignored. She

what looked

knew

What was

his

sixteen, his

like

mascara,

his long-lashed

look: his dirty blond hair half dreadlocked

Manson

him, she thought, from a Marilyn

or maybe Alien Sex Fiends. "Hi Beth," he said,

"Fii."

BMW hood orna-

was about

kohl— possibly charcoal— thick around

something

cert;

the other side, a

a little—away from the Arms.

from con-

lifelessly.

name?

"Prince Dreybak," the boy said, giving her a look of sidelong reproach for not

remembering

"Cold to be fully

sitting

mordant out

He

me

on

today.

the front steps," she said. "But then

Supposed

to

be fog

it's

beauti-

this evening."

nodded, but was not consoled. "They won't

"Do you have "I

his tide.

let

me

in."

rent?"

have enough for a week.

I

got

my

SSI check.

But they won't

let

in."

"You're too young, they don't want to get raided or something." "I'm, like, a legally

how many

emancipated minor.

Shadow? Not very many, not I'm a

I

mean, we're

Goths are there around, real Goths,

member

really.

We

who

all

Goths and

really live in the

should be helping each other.

of the Malacosto Clan, too."

"Are you?" She wasn't surprised; the Malacostos were easygoing about recruitment. When the "vampire games" were played at the clubs and the parks, the

enormous

role playing

games with

"writers" setting

up

simations for the supposed Vampire Clans to act out, neogothic passion plays and Anne Rice fetishism, there were always too many Malacostos

and they had

to

Really, Really,

make some of them

Weird Stories

wait.

113

114 In

THE Cornelius Arms "Well, Prince

.

.

John Shirley

Dreybak.

.

room." She wondered what

ask about you.

I'll

name was. She thought maybe

his real

my

already got

I've

it

was

Morris.

She ruffled

his hair as she

walked

by,

then surreptitiously wiped her

hand on her bag, and went inside. Timothy, the Baron of Malthustra, was waiting posed and picturesque, gazing

case,

gnette.

at

for her

on

the

stair-

her through a mirrorshades

"Welcome, Beth, Lady HoUowbones of Clan Sangre,

lor-

to the

Cornelius Arms."

Jerry Cornelius spread his arms like Jesus little

tily

on the

Edwige could wash under them, and across

muscled white

chest.

cross, so that lovely

his pallid, scarred, pret-

He glanced down at his

shoulders and thought

again of having the tattoos lasered away, especially the one of the goat-

man crouched on

the Seal of Solomon; but then, the tats were appropri-

ate to the present conceit.

"Edwige," he said, "you are French, you vorite is

food

live in is

named

for a

queen of Sweden, you are

America, your favorite music

sushi.

What

are

we

to

is

Turkish, and your

do with you? Consistency, my

fa-

dear,

everything."

She smiled, dimpling, her black eyes shining, knowing he was teasing her, as she

swabbed

his legs, his genitals, his arse.

He wondered if his current dislike

of immersing himself in water, even

showers, was a permanent quirk. Lately—if a time traveler could have a "lately"—there

kinking back

He

had been so many

upon

itself in

had changed; and

Of course, he

yet

was

quirks. It

sheer rebellion to

as

all it

if

his character

were

had been subjected

to.

he never changed.

Nothing touched him

didn't really care.

in his

innermost

places.

She touched him, though, on

his

John Thomas, and he

languidly let

her suck him for a while, stroking her raven hair the while; and he gazed at the dust spiraling in the blue tinted light slanting

After a while he said, "James O'Barr—is he

She kissed him

"He, Mr.

Shirley,

there,

and stood. "No,

and Mr. Gould

sent please them, and

here?"

still

sir."

Her

it

must

accent was delicate.

The carriage you airport when the horses

leave this morning.

must have surprise the

brought them there, but

through the window.

also have

been

tres

cher for you."

"No no, a trifle. And Mr. Moorcock?" He chuckled at the thought of Moorcock; the man's expression when he had realized .

"Mr Moorcock

leave last night; he

seem

.

.

... to hurry."

Really, Really,

Weird Stories

John Shirley "A

bit

In

of a shock to find out

quantum

I

was real—and of

spectra of the continuum.

paused, for this was

the Cornelius Arms

his responsibility in the

Edwige love—what about

the important matter. "... the

girl?

Has

He

." .

.

she come?"

"She has, sweet master." "Ah!

And

has she brought the macrochip, then?"

'']ensais pas, she has only just arrived." "I felt all

the lines

"Ow/, bien

sur,

convei^g for tonight—I'm sure she has it. Dress me now."

mon amour'

Beth was nervous about meeting him. There were so many

though he'd only come on the scene a year before,

come with Barry

at the

stories

Halloween

House of Usher,

the

Goth-rock club, and they'd been surprised to hear there would be a

live

dance. Beth had

performer.

The man, who

that night, to the

called himself Cornelius,

be proprietor of the Cornelius Arms, was large black eyes; night,

he dressed

and seemed

to have

like

all

and who was

said to

with long black

pale,

hair,

a nineteenth century undertaker, that

the best British chromosomes.

He'd been accompanied, on the

tiny stage, only

by the small

woman

with the long straight hair and bangs, Edwige, on keyboards. Jerry a stool, and played certain songs, covers mostly;

"Astronomy" by the Blue Oyster Cult,

Iggy's

all

sat

on

she remembered was

"Some Weird

Sin",

and

something by the Sisters of Mercy, Bauhaus, Joy Division, and something he claimed was by Trent Reznor though she'd heard all Reznor's releases and she'd never heard that one. He played something by the Panther

Moderns-all she could remember was the chorus: black, because

it

makes

me

feel like

Mostly she remembered the way he played: but with

full

attention;

"I like

to see

you

in

your husband's dead".

and she had the

casually, utterly relaxed,

distinct impression his fingers

had not touched the strmgs-and yet she was quite sure it wasn't some sort of audiotape, he was really playing, and sometimes there seemed to be a

violet

shimmer under

his fingers, as

if

he were playing the

field around the guitar pick ups instead of the

The music was Goth-rock,

all right,

electric

guitar.

but in his improvisational interpre-

owed as much to chamber music and tation and Sun Ra (incredible contrast somehow fused!) and, perhaps, Mahler, as to rock composers-especially when he performed his own composition, baroque digressions

it

a morbid confection called "The Curiously Cruel Destiny of the Eternal

sang in a kind of gutteral purr that sometimes became Bowiesque; someone had heard him complain that David Bowie "stole

Champion".

He

so very artlessly from me".

Really, Really,

Weird Stories

115

ii6 In

John Shirley

THE Cornelius Arms

had wanted to do things

club, she

Watching him, that night at the

for him,

without even being introduced, that she had refused to do for her boyfriend, despite his pleading for the past year.

And now

background, except that he was

his

some

to have played in

haps Gary

Glitter,

British

effortlessly wealthy,

and he was

said

rock band in the 70s, perhaps Hawkwind, per-

but no one was quite sure. She wondered

Timothy opened the door

Just then

House of one knew much

of the

No

"caretaker" of the Cornelius Arms.

Usher, the self-styled

about

new owner

she was going to meet him, the

for her

if

he were gay or—

and she went

into Jerry's

study, trying not to stumble over anything, admiring the inevitable mis-

matched

Her

.

.

window,

eyes stopped at Cornelius himself, framed in the

hands

apart,

goat-man

antiques, the Victorian bric-a-brac, the sculpture of a

on a

standing

in his trouser pockets, squinting past cigarette

sort of

European

mouth.

It

cigarette, she thought, stuck in the

was impossible

thought he might be

to

forty-five,

how

tell

smoke.

legs

Some

corner of his

was— one moment she no more than twenty-eight.

old he

the next ...

He wore an old fashioned black and gray pinstriped suit, white silk shirt, black

silk tie,

boots that were rather high and high heeled and anoma-

lous with the rest of his outfit.

on

candelabra,

Style fireplace,

where a

fire guttered.

dear

on

from the

light

Old West

"A multicultural mishmash,

innit.'^"

He never seemed to actuthe whole time she was there. He only inhaled. "I was

exhale smoke,

just twitting

was

there

lit;

the Chinese table to one side, and from the

said, taking the cigarette

ally

small blue dark glasses, low

though the room was but dimly

his nose,

he

He wore

little

from

his

mouth.

Edwige about inconsistency,

too."

saw you play the House of Usher—you were ... it was—" God what a stupid way to start! She should quote Rimbaud or some"I

admire the framed

thing, or

"Yes, night.

I

Max

remember seeing you

But with romance's usual

Ernst.

there.

But no.

And

irony,

very charming you were that

you went home alone,

She was starded he'd known so much about year

"A at

later.

bit

my

"Uhhh

.

of a poof?

old school.

"Tonight?

I

.

.

yeah. Barry

A 'friend

to

be

I

believe."

and remembered

I

let

you

.

a

.

stay here tonight, love,

to stay the week.

it

."

of Dorothy's'? Well. He'd be right at

So—why should

was supposed

mrned out

her,

And—I

thought

it

home hm?"

was

all

arranged—" "Stay the week, you say.

My dear,

you

will

not want to stay here after

tonight."

"Oh

I'm

really

not so fragile—"

Really, Really,

Weird Stories

John Shirley

"No

the Cornelius Arms

In

no, I'm sure you're quite suitably decadent and

no one

just that

want

will

come out

wouldn't enjoy yourself tonight and

you

assure you,

will, as

continuity with the

much

you you

as the

"Look, I'm

.

.

.

I'm into

that rot,

Not

lots

you you

of

now

are

it's

you

tomorrow,

right

it all

no

that

can have any

of

is

se-

not enough—"

just

stuff,

I

real

be tomorrow. But you see— I'm very

will

you know, and money

lective, as

all

to stay here after tonight.

but

you're, like,

if

pimping people

or something—"

"Oh ho ho ho ho no no must know, it

well,

just prior to the

I

tried that, once,

if

French Revolution, in the outskirts of

was a bloody contretemps indeed

.

.

No, no,

.

was

I

me. Frangois

He

looked

is

little

rather an adequate

cockney twins

cook

referring

He

like

it.

"And why don't you

just

the thing she'd brought.

ask for

mouth.

.

.

.

whatever

it

might be.

Without any

She thought he

bit.

then?"

it

shifted the cigarette with a twitch of his

offered

the

is

clean up for

like to

.

She had an impulse to take the piss out of him a might

to—

." .

He wanted

at her expectantly.

you

Paris,

everyone antes up something here, besides money. Timothy

house steward, for example. The

My

a steaming load of bollocks!

one, whores are altogether too demanding.

little

and

What

no!

.

.

.

"It

has to be freely

provocation."

"Why?"

He

studied her for a

moment. "Do you

believe in magic?"

"Of course!" "No,

I

don't

mean

the play-acting 'vampire game' fantasy variety, or

the sort you think you

you play

at

invoking

do with your

because you once read a

'spirits'

ous old sod Aleister Crowley.

Mind

to the

Laws

mean

I

when

friends at cemeteries at night,

magic.

of the Universe. There

is,

The

you

book by

that odi-

relationship of the

see,

but two things in

the universe: chaos and mind. Some would say chaos and order, but they ." He seemed to be thinkare really quite confused: order is mind first .

.

ing aloud, then realized that he'd said too much.

He

shrugged, with a manner that annoyed her, for

decided

didn't matter

"Just

what?" he

Had

he

"You so I

it

really

feel

I

what he

you

squinted at her.

.

.

.

insubstantial? Love,

to say

.

.

.

Mandarin

urn.

"Two

years ...

Weird Stories

you

you are very young,

you will never have Being. In

survive the threat to your

Have you read Mr. Ouspensky?" Really, Really,

just

said that he'd

read her mind? "Uh-just what, what?"

regard you as

if

She was

asked, flicking his cigarette into a rare

many ways. But I am not one

sense that

said to her.

it

life

that will

will live to

come

in

.

.

in

fact,

."

He

have very great Being.

117

THE Cornelius Arms

ii8 In

"A

John Shirley

I—what do you mean, a threat to

little.

my life in two years? Are you

pretending you can—"

He

ignored

knew Ouspensky,

that. "I

just

before the Russian Revolu-

he was preparing to leave the country with

tion, as

mind

Just keep in

was a very great contribution

Ouspensky only knew

that A4r.

Now, you were

half.

saying

.

.

.

.

.

well, never

mind.

half the truth, but

it

something about your

.

." .

.

." He had her completely confused now but she "Oh yes. Umm knew she very much wanted to stay. She opened her burgundy velvet .

.

hand bag, and took out the matchbox. She put

wooden and

sculpture of a grinning dragon (Eastern

said, "I give

He

it

box and opened little

do

it

is it

I

afraid

indeed!

"It's

"It

little

match-

with exquisite care and looked at the electronic chip

baggy within.

believe you've

was

the head of a

hand trembling, he took the

done

it,

my

We

dear.

spect way, because of the magical laws ... that

on

freely."

smiled. "Very good." His

in the "I

you

to

it

European she thought),

if

had

to ask in such a circum-

you want to

you wouldn't know what we meant but

The

call it .

.

.

'magic'

this

is it,

.

.

this

Pride of Axis Enterprises!"

the right microchip?"

is, I

microchip.

believe, the

And

the only

one

extent. Isn't it?"

With

equal care, he returned the chip to the box, which he slipped into a pocket. "It's

the only one

"Do you

I

this is a magnificent,

She stared

spilled

Father I

see.

.

.

."

to give

Perhaps

"What

He

ful

back.

it it

I

suppose you

Why should

was her expression

deserves

Timothy came

in,

it

know

that

he be

delicate?

that told him.

and some of

it

then—"

flush faced. Jerry wasn't pleased at the in-

cop

here.

I

them you were running

this fantasy

is

safe."

testosterone in the old bastard

terruption. "Jerry—there's a

the porch told

Daddy's

monstrous betrayal of him."

Too much

onto you.

Just then

in

your father so much?

him, amazed by his candor. But he had the thing now,

at

and he wasn't going

"My "Oh

saw

really dislike

guess that kid

who was

sitting

on

a brothel or something."

about prostitution that keeps cropping up? Wish-

thinking?"

"But—" Timothy's voice became a whisper, "—we do have some drugs here." "/ don't.

can't

Bored with them years ago. I'm merely the manager of the

place,

be responsible."

"He

says

you haven't got—" Really, Really,

Weird Stories

John Shirley

In

"An operator's

license,

the Cornelius Arms

or any sort of business license, for this place,"

He

room.

said the cop, striding into the

was a plainclothes cop with a

middle aged spread, dark aviator glasses and

There was a badge clipped

of sunburnt forehead.

lots

His hand was hooked near the

to his belt.

butt of his gun, visible under his seedy gray blazer, but not threateningly.

He seemed in

not

at all surprised

San Francisco,

you can

find,

after

among

all,

by the strange furnishings: he was a cop

where, under "churches" in the yellow pages,

the usual, the Church of Satan.

He seemed

But there was nothing Satanic about Jerry.

"Oh

dered English businessman.

ments—we'll dig them up for you

The cop was looking

my

any objection to

might be opium

.

.

.

we do

but

have

all

a slightly bewil-

the proper docu-

." .

.

But uh—

at Jerry's cigarette. "Yeah, well, fine.

having a look around? Thought

been a long time since

I

smelled what

smelled that, this side of

I

Chinatown, but—" "That was incense,

officer.

The Goth kids who

frequent

my tacky little

establishment adore incense. They love atmosphere, you see, however artificial.

He

And why not? You'd like one

of these cigarettes. Wouldn't you."

held up the pack.

Well yeah ...

"Do any

Rothman?

frowning, as he stared at the cigarettes. "That a

The cop was

used to smoke those

I

of us

really,

have a Rothman.

Then

though I'll

we

.

.

But

.

gave up smoking."

I

die ten years without a cigarette?

find our

Do

paperwork and you can bust us

to

your heart's content." Jerry took out the pack, took a

moment adjusting the

before extracting one and

fussily,

The cop

shrugged, and, in a

offering

flash,

lit

up and deeply

posed to be smokin' ... so, there's some see

some

His voice was slowing down,

." .

.

battery running

did

." .

eyes;

.

it

.

Then

dovm. "Some

...

I

...

.

.

some

like

D ...

cigarettes rather

to the cop.

it

ID

inhaled.

kids here,

"Not

I'll

sup-

need to

on a player with the Yo, what see some

a tape ...

.

.

.

and so did the consciousness in his stood there like a mannequin, cigarette

his voice trailed away,

seemed

to evaporate.

He

his fingers, staring into space, scarcely breathing.

burning between

as surprised as Beth.

Timothy was

"What happened

to him?" they

asked at once.

"Oh-I had know. It's

Had

a bit of a premonition this morning.

a fag prepared.

treated with barrachera.

Columbia. There for

Good job

two days

.

.

Really, Really,

.

it's

And

A

.

very interesting substance

used chiefly for robbery.

by then of course

Weird Stories

The / Ching don't you I gave him

he accepted the one

it

will

He be

won't come out of

all

over

." .

.

obtained in

I

.

it

119

120 In THE Cornelius

John Shirley

Arms

Timothy looked at him. "What will be?" Beth realized Timothy knew no more than she cop, took the cigarette from his fingers, stubbed pocket.

walked over to the

out in the cop's coat

it

No reaction. He put his mouth close to the cop's ear, and said in

a strangely

one you

monotone

see,

yet powerful voice,

and check

The cop

and go

in,

Go

TV, and report to no one.

"Go

to bed,

to a nice hotel, the

and sleep and

eat

first

and watch

now."

turned, nothing zombielike about

it.

He

simply walked away,

come, went out the door. Through the window they watched

as he'd

him

did.

He

Jerry shrugged. "Musm't spoil the surprise."

get in his car

Beth was amazed building

it

was

in.

and

drive away,

toward the nice

at the size of the ballroom;

But here

hotels.

was

just

too big for the

in the heart of the Cornelius

Arms two hun-

it

dred Goth kids danced a strange waltz to slow industrial music, under black-light chandeliers

and a

ceiling painted, silver

on

black, with the

wicked constellations of the Secret Zodiac.

A tall gaunt Goth boy in a frock coat,

hair piled fantastically atop his

head, plucked eyebrows painted into golden hooks, gold

on

the dead

white of his skin, the lenses of dark glasses glued to his sockets

He bowed

ornately to Beth, requesting a dance; she gave

hand, gloved in old-world black typical

.

.

.

him her

they performed the pas de deux

lace;

of the Clan Sangre, while at the other end of the

room an

ar-

ranged "minimalist choreography" of group-dancers glissandoed and curtseyed obeisance to the Vampire receptionist for a

bank

Queen (whom Beth knew Vampire Queen,

president); the

black and white, raised a

fist

The

it

dirgelike music,

once, heard quite Pierce the flesh

to drip

wig of

to be a scarlet,

overhead and squeezed a concealed

sponge—blood streamed from between her her arm; she allowed

in

fingers

on her dusty white

and

spiraled

down

dress.

from Jerome X, voiced a quatrain

that Beth, for

clearly:

of the darkness

Initiate the night

Elevate to vastness

The echoes of His

And

light:

the light that never

there were strange sparks in the

air,

as sated bats, unfolding, spreading electric

warms

sparks of blue and violet fat

plumage

into

mandalas that

became jellyfish of the ether Has someone slipped me something? Beth wondered. But no one had. It was in the atmosphere. It was .

.

.

.

.

.

Really, Really,

Weird Stories

John Shirley

In

the Cornelius Arms

00 00 00

"Computers

in this universe's Earth are so very

much more

sophisti-

cated than in our world of origin, don't you think so Edwige?"

"Eef you say so, Jerry." Jerry was standing at the console, in his penthouse, as the old Bavarian

clock in the arms of the cigar store Indian struck ten P.M.; he was tap-

ping at the keyboard, inserting a disk that would boot up the program capable of activating the macro chip, which had been installed, with

much temple

sweat, but an hour before.

Edwige was wriggling you zeep

"Jerry, will

He

me

into a black Spanish

dress.

up?"

reached over to her with one hand, found the zipper, zipped her

up with one hand without pinching her or

from the computer,

eyes

Flamenco dancer's

as his other

getting stuck, never taking his

hand tapped the keyboard.

"

''Merci.

As

if

this

were some sort of keyword, the computer chose that moment

to complete

its

internal

mumbling, and

adjuncts a three dimensional image of

There was an

attractive

if

was a bald man with a neat tiny

little

in his face

chilly-eyed

projected from .

four

human

woman

its

hologrammic

heads.

with flaxen

hair; there

beard and a large bulbous nose, and

little

you could

was a middle aged man with

thin

scarcely lips,

make out

the features; there

a cocky manner and slicked-back

The heads hovered in the air, in the middle of the room, gazwith self awareness and some degree of consciousness, at Jerry and

black ing

.

was an old man with shaggy white brows and so

eyes; there

many seams

it

.

hair.

Edwige.

"They are rather ugly

yawn with

"We

your

not

Edwige commented, covering a

a pretty litde hand.

are not

mindclones. "If

little spirits,"

self

'spirits',"

And we

said the

woman. "We

.

.

copies.

.

full

self pitying expressions," Jerry

of yourselves,

remarked.

little

are

I'd say,

judging from

"These, Edwige," Jerry

"are the mindclones of the four

Boardmembers of

Axis International, preserved should the originals bite the dust. tawdry, foolish

We

are self aware."

aware, at least rather

went on musingly,

are

attempt at immortality;

it is

It is

their

a forbidden technology,

known and secretly banned, but Axis has chosen to use it any." way. One of these gendemen is our little Beth's father The middle aged man with the slicked back hair said, scowling, "What do you know of my Beth?" secretly

.

Really, Really,

Weird Stories

.

121

122 In

THE Cornelius Arms "She's

mine now, old

John Shirley

boy. She hates you,

you know.

It

me

was she gave

the chip." "I

don't believe

"Believe

it!"

you

it,

judgemental about idiosyncratic "I will

Not

child molesting bastard.

transmit a warning to

that I'm really so very

tastes."

my original

about

all

this—"

"Rubbish," Jerry said, lighting a cigarette. "You are mine now. vertical

and the

course,

I

horizontal. I've got you. Just

wanted a

must aid the further convergence of the

ah. You'll see.

Edwige—has

"Yes—everyone

is

lines,

I

control the

test run.

Next, of

and bring about

.

.

the cognitive emulator charged the ballroom.^"

ready."

Beth was surprised to see Morris, the scruffy Goth kid from the front corner of the ballroom, drinking the punch that

steps, standing in a

brimmed

the giant clam shell. "Didn't think they'd

"Scared 'em into

it,"

Morris

said, sniffing.

"Are you," Timothy laughed, getting himself

were shaking. The sizzled

said

about the

electricity in the air

light fixtures. "Jerry

something about taking

pity

on

let

you

in,"

she said.

"I'm from a powerful clan

." .

.

some punch. His hands

sparked from the spoons and

has no fear of you at

in fact.

all,

you were much

you: that

like

He

some-

one he'd known once." Morris frowned and turned toward the dais

end of the

at the fair

room, where suddenly a spotlight found Jerry, sweeping through the tained

doorway

to gaze

down on

cur-

them.

"Light your candles!" he thundered, descending to them.

Life in death

and death

Lady Despair a

in

life

luscious wife

The music intoned with

.

.

.

exquisitely

maudlin excess, the bass beat a

dirge against the walls, the chandeliers swayed, in black capes

and

swirling

gowns and

and scores of Goth kids

spiky lingerie

and bloody tuxedos,

each carrying a blackwax candle, stepped with the grandiosity of fearless innocence, in a slowly circling procession, spiraled negative galaxy, around Jerry the galaxy's core.

ume

as Jerry

like the

arms of a

The music ebbed

spoke into a headset microphone, raising

his

arms

in vollike

a

high priest, Edwige kneeling before him, apparently praying.

"Hear

me

vampire

clans!

psychic wars! Another time

now

I

I

You

see

me now

was a vampire of

merely borrow, and focus and return

the veteran of a thousand sorts,

all

to

a drinker of energies;

you transformed: For

Really, Really,

I

Weird Stories

John Shirley

In

the Cornelius Arms

fought the law and the law won! Jerry has changed! Jerry has learned to

much

nourish as

as

he

is

nourished!

And

if I

have used you, brought you

my own purposes, I have

here to be living generators of psychic energy for also given

you orchids

sliding

on

a subterranean

river; I

have given you the

pulse of blood in clitoris and throat—"

They roared approval

at that one.

on the

"—I have given you Antarctic moonlight

have given you lightning in a coffee cup!

I

frozen bones of a mariner!

I

have given you heavy metal, black

and silver! I have given you fireflies in the sockets of a skull! I have given you the whisper of

silk

over cobblestones!

coffins that bring safety for white! /

And

at

and

solace!

I

have given you a dream of velvet lined

I

have given you white for black and black

have given you a Mardi Gras of the Necropolis ofJoy!"

each phrase he

made

a pass over the

Goth

kids with something

that glittered—something that looked like a long platinum needle in a daggerhilt

of figured ruby; something that was both machine and decorative ornate

knife.

Subde energies coursed

length.

its

Beth, with Morris at her side, approached the center of the living gal-

axy of dark celebrants, and could not take her eyes from the platinum

and ruby instrument

And And

in Jerry's

hand—

in his other hand he held the Macrochip—

then he put the two of them together and—

She heard help, love.

Magic

is

redefined.

longer states or even relationships

'Thank you very much for all your The nuclei of the modern world are no

his voice in her head.

cities,

but interkcings of information, the matrixed

buy andsell-what we call multinational

of the capacities to

corporations. For

my long range purpose,

I

have to have one, have to be

And I do

intend to be real in

this

enough of this world's imagination ..." world. I've had -and the instruments touched, and a blaze of headess light spread

out,

one, to be real in this world,

you

see.

quite

rippling in a circle

Edwige

from the contact

in a ball of translucent

of energy and grabbed Morris. find a place for

bubble of

you ..." And

light,

panded and

filled

the

room

They were wandering

encompassing Jerry and

pulled Morris, "Prince Dreybak", into the

which wobbled, once, and,

fusion, the fusion of being

just

before midnight, ex-

inexorably with the white incandescence of

and nonbeing.

in aimless circles in the darkness of a socket of

earth; in the smell of a

pipes.

point,

He reached through the membrane ''Come my woebegone little urchin, I'll

light.

new

grave, of

soil,

sliced

earthworms and rusty

The daze slowly seeped away from Beth, and she

Really, Really,

Weird Stories

realized she

was

123

124 In THE Cornelius

cold.

Her

a sort of

eyes

John Shirley

Arms

came

something

into

focus and she found she was in

like

between two old San Francisco buildings. There was

pit,

enough urban

light to see

an old, disused concrete

way up it. Beth slogged through the cold mud,

were already working

staircase.

The

just

others

their

shivering,

head aching, trying to

remember. Jerry had taken the boy Morris and Edwige and the three of

them had vanished and gone She climbed the

.

.

.

reached the

stairs,

The Cornelius Arms was gone. socket.

its

A

water.

scores of

Goth

and turned around.

out

like a

tooth from

up from the mud, one of

else.

kids stood in the midst of the street, staring

stunned

She and Timothy had been on the

How unreal

glass buildings

it

and

silent, as

fog rolled

all

and

Don Johnson TV

my parents," Timothy

"You'll like

train

night;

looked in the morning

pastel murals

something from that old

Now

lifted

down

si-

the street

wave, and engulfed them.

San Diego.

and

street, crossed,

had been

There was nothing

lently at the pit in the earth,

in a gray

It

few wayward pipes draggled

them spouting

And

where?

they're in real estate.

it

just pulling into

with

mission-style

its

to

palm

trees

Old Town;

show. No, that was

"They used

said.

was

light,

like

Mami.

be in rock bands.

But they're pretty cool. They smoke pot, but

not every day." In the train station Beth found herself

She had

just

right away. .

.

.

enough change

for the

drawn

to a

newspaper

San Diego paper. She saw

Scanning lower she found

Will be officially designated the

.

.

kiosk.

his picture

.

new CEO of Axis Enterprises,

Fri-

Company spokesmen said that the four members of the Axis board, who were killed in a plane crash at Sunday midnight, made extensive arrangements for the new CEO to replace them in case of emergency. Industry sources are calling Jerry Cornelius the "Unknown day morning.

Tycoon", claiming that his business history

However, Axis public

is

foggy

and

unverifiable.

relations expects Cornelius' transition to

power to

be "very nearly seamless ..." "Is that really

"Yes.

Magic

him?" Timothy asked, looking over her shoulder.

is

redefined, he said."

"There was a plane crash? Wasn't that-?

"My

father. Yes.

wonder what

I'll

My

"

father died in the plane crash." She smiled. "I

inherit.

Come

on,

let's

get a latte."

Really, Really,

Weird Stories

Quill Tripstickler,

Out the Window

"There are a variety of terms

Commissioner ring to

Feldspar. "But

I

might appropriately apply here," said

stumblebum has

think oafish

I

the right

it."

Quill cleared his throat. "Yes,

Actually,

sir.

I

think honest misjudgment

by a loyal—'

"And yet," Feldspar went stumblebum hasn't the proper for.

have

I

it!

Bumbling

Bumbling Clod. At "Yes,

if

he

hadn't

more

piquancy. Something it!

heard, basic

''oafish is

called

You, Quill Tripstickler, are a

best."

He winced when he heard Feldspar's pet He despised poultry—the profusion of poul-

said Quill meekly.

sir,"

the one remaining sort of domestic animal in the twenty-fifth century,

was the bane of Earth, and to his

was

as

clodl That's

duck snickering in the corner. try,

on,

home

in the stars—there

a desk operative,

made sisted,

how

it

made

He

Quill wish he hadn't

come back

Galactic Tourist Agency, his duty

were some things a

seemed.

it

almost

As an agent of the

planet.

field

agent could not explain to

should never have returned. Should have

the report by tachyon transmish. But Father Tripstickler had

and

Quill

stood in fear of that fearsome patriarch. That's

still

Quill thought of his father, except that he thought

PATRIARCH. And

seemed then

it

Father Tripstickler's

ovm

that Feldspar

spirit— Quill's father

but that didn't prevent him

liberally

about—when he thundered: "And

I

you and your robot,

word with

glee

is

FEARSOME

had been possessed by

was by no means deceased,

spreading his Spirimal Influence

want you

of that snooty cybernetic valet of yours. In the pacemaker. Yours

it:

in-

just

to

fact, I

know

I

don't think

much

think robots are a pain in

always complaining. Well, I'm going to be rid of

Tripstickler. You're

and with the

slap of his

He

emphasized the

glass

desk (which was

both firedr

palm on the

also a miniature

henhouse—Feldspar's house was crowded).

Really, Really,

Weird Stories

Quill

opened

126 Quill Tripstickler,

his

mouth

Out the Window But Feldspar, shaking

to protest.

narrowed, bulled on:

John Shirley his jowls, his

"How do you excuse going

dim blue

and prompdy seducing the queen's parthenogenic

celibates

eyes

to a colony of religious

and

child

nearly starting an intersteller war?

How in Tallahassee Rorida the princess

human

is

could find a

Did you

platypus like yourself attractive

erotigas her? Is that

"Erotigas? Certainly not,

it,

sir! I

duction and Erotic Conduct,

"human

use of the term

And,

hold Winner's Ribbons in

sir!"

Quill

classes of Se-

all

was deeply offended by

yes,

it

Feldspar's

was oddly proportioned.

platypus." True, Quill

he had a large nose. Well,

true,

beyond me.

quite

hm?"

was a very

His

large nose.

long neck, weak chin, large spreading nose—which inelegant dullards sisted

And

on

in-

beak—gave him a slightly duck-like appearance. evolved ducks had become so common, some oaf

referring to as a

since cerebrally

was always drawing the comparison. Gangly, gawky, pout-lipped, beaked as

he was,

still

Quill refused a body-rebuild. Strangely, he firmly believed

he was Devilishly Handsome.

that

He ran a hand through his thin brown curls and tried to "My

of reasonableness.

assume a tone

assignment, Commissioner Feldspar, was to

introduce tourism into the planet Nunneras. tion to undertake, since the

Nunnerans

It

was a

difficult negotia-

believe that a offworlders are of

needed someone on the

inside to suggest to the

Satanic origin.

I

queen that she

trust

bold steps,

And, to be perfectly honest, the princess seduced

naturally

sir.

turned

I

do so—until

my life

.

.

felt 1

me.

this

A Galactic Tourist Agent must occasionally take

intimacy to the

the queen discovered that

good of .

.

well,

.

Or

the agency.

me—

sought to

barely escaped with

sir, I

I—"

.

"Oafish stumblebum." Feldspar's body-rebuilt face had badly gone to sag;

it

Nero.

was supposed

And now

invectives

came

"Moronic

.

.

like

."

to resemble Julius Caesar, but

was bright red with

it

fury.

it

more

"Bumbling

.

.

closely befit ."

Feldspar's

the rumbles of a volcano building to eruption.

He drew

a deep breath for:

stumbling

''Oafish

bumbling CLOD!" As

Quill left the

room

... as Quill beat

it

hastily

from the room.

Feld-

spar sent his oversized (bigger than two fat geese together) pet duck to chivvy him.

Ducks had always provoked

in Quill a thrill

of revulsion.

He

ran from the house, the duck quacking at his heels, snapping at his ankles, squawking,

"Quan quon't quaum

Quill sat in the cool dimness of

quack!'"'"

The Terminus.

It

was a

suicide bar,

designed to appeal to those surfeited with existential ennui. '"'

Translation from the duck argot of Quill's time: "And don't

come

And

it at-

back!"

Really, Really,

Weird Stories

John Shirley

Quill Tripstickler,

tracted the victimizjers, a breed of bar-haunter

Out the Window

emerged

accommodate

to

those preferring to die at another's hands.

From somewhere droned dolorous sigh harmonizing with

the bartender (whose

funereal muzak. Quill sighed, his

numerous other

lifelike

"For the moment, nontoxic.

I'll

The bartender nodded and

asked the bartender.

sir?"

have a Cable

TV Cocktail."

caressed a keyboard.

wire affixed to

slot in the bar, a

he signaled

black eyes seemed forever sympathetic and

welling with tears). "Toxic or nontoxic,

from a

sighs along the bar,

the glass contained a tiny three-dee image of a ledge, about to leap into oblivion, as a

A

emerged

glass

underside, the green liquid in

its

crowd

man

at

poised on a

window

nearby windows begged

him to reconsider. Quill sighed, and sipped. The drink tasted of liquor, mint— and blood mixed with concrete, plus a suggestion of sweat. There was, too, a savor of distilled desperation.

"Master QuiU?"

He knew whose

Quill winced.

ignore

Perhaps

it.

it

But Fives cleared

was

voice he

hearing.

He

preferred to

would go away. he made a noise that was

his throat—more accurately,

a theatrical approximation of throat clearing since he hadn't a throat to clear.

me

Robots have no need of an esophagus. "Master

me

sent

to

to seek you.

He

bids you to 'buck

remind you of that immemorial

Quill,

up and take

Tripstickler

down he can

is

"Then you may up, drink them,

always take heart/he

words,

his start.' Stirring

may

sir, if I

say so.

and gag on them.

TV

twisting the

knob on

Cocktail.

He

I'll

asked Say-

'When a

Trip-

knows that his end is Words that stir the—"

really

take those words," Quill said miserably, "and

of his Cable

He

aphorism— from

ings of Father Tripstickler, Selection Ninety-six— to wit: stickler

your father

heart.'

drink to that."

stir

them

He took another sip

frovmed and changed the taste-channel,

the side of the glass.

The image

in the liquid

swirled, blurred, changed, reforming into a troupe of briefly clad danc-

ing

girls.

Quill tasted the drink

But he couldn't smile.

had paid been

for his

He was

two years

costly training.

and almost smiled.

And

Starcruiser (second-hand).

ruined. His father

at the Tourist his father

A

had believed

Agent Training School.

had bought him

fine gesture

in him,

his

own

It

had

Agent's

from a Grand Old Man. And

had given him Fives "Meddling Old Fool," Quill murmured, frowning.

his father

"I

.

beg your pardon,

"Nothing

when

I

." .

have

.

let

Really, Really,

sir?" Fives

Quill sighed. "I

.

.

asked

am an ingrate.

him down. After

Weird

Stories

softly, rolling nearer.

all

he's

done

Calling for

my father names, me through

me. Put

127

128 Quill Tripstickler,

school—and

agent's

come

now I'm

its effect.

He

fired."

John Shirley took a long

pull at his drink

and

alcohol and opiate in the drink was beginning

The combination

blinked. to have

Out the Window

"My whole

down

career

the Disposetron

.

.

Well, I've

.

here to find Peace."

"Surely not, Master Quill!" Fives rocked back

simulated (or

was

it

gentle reproach. Fives

He

wheel

in

head

in

lifelike

styled to resemble, from the waist up, an Gendeman's Gentleman. He rarely removed

the black bowler hat—which was

head.

his single

was

early twentieth century

British-style

on

astonishment, shaking his

real?)

pinched

more than

it

seemed— from

his florid synthaflesh

nose

one of the charming personality gestures the brochure on

round

his

in

dismay-

this

model

quizzically. The quizzical programmed charming personality

robot had listed— and arched his eyebrows arching of eyebrows was another gesture. Quill didn't find

charming.

it

And somehow he

sensed Fives'

went beyond programming. The robot had a number of annoying habits all his own invention. For example, his way of hooking

personality

a lifelike single

thumb

wheel

in his waistcoat

at the

bottom of

watch pocket, straightening on the

his inverted-cone

brushed-aluminum un-

dersides, tugging the tails of his coat-and-tails with his other hand,

causing his

brown

eyes to sparkle, his ruddy English cheeks to

become

ruddier, as. he recited:

"A Tripstickler looks to see who's Before he loosens his

downwind

belt;

He thinks of others before himself Of their skins before his own pelt." Quill "I

winced

"Do you "I

again. "Don't

beg your pardon,

mean,

Quill's

misery.

think I'm blind? sir—do

that, Fives.

I

saw the

sir.

it

torment me."

to

sign. It's

his expression

this

is.'^"

The Terminus." this is?"

maudlin

in

its

celebration of

a suicide bar."

"But Master Quill—The Terminus

don,

You do

you know what sort of bar

nod was somber,

"It's

do

Master Quill— do you know which bar

sir.

One

goes to such a place

.

is .

."

a pick-up bar, begging your parFives looked furtively

around

at

gloomy bar and lowered his voice. "... One meet someone. A partner. Someone to kill one-

the other denizens of the

comes

to such a place to

self with.

Or someone

"I'm aware of here a victim.

all

to

do

the deed.

And

there are those

that," said Quill in a voice

A voluntary victim,

who—"

awry with drink.

seeking a ... a victimizer."

Really, Really,

"I

He

came

sniffed

Weird Stories

John Shirley

Quill Tripstickler,

(the sniff reverberated in the voluminous

down

looked up and

the bar as

if

Out the Window

echochamber of

his nose)

and

pondering the options.

The shadowy chamber was hung with black translucent scarves. Over the bar was a human skull, fleshless except for two heavy-lidded eyes leaking tears.

The

figures at the bar

in every

man

were studies

in quiet misery. Self-pity

There were those, however, standing against the walls ers,

spoke

itself

or woman's body language.

whose red-glowing

in

gloomy corn-

cocktails signified their preference: they

were

victimizers, licensed, looking for voluntary victims.

One

of them was looking Quill up and down.

His smile showed shark's. Quill

.

femitaur once before, at

odd

a

tastes in

.

.

were

lovely.

But she was two

feet of her front set of legs

boned black-maned head. He had only seen a the Conference on Interdimensional Travel.

had found them quite

"You've got

like

then he saw her.

four-footer. All four of her feet

to the top of her delicately

Quill

And

measuring from the spike-heeled

tall,

sharp rows

some of the victimizers were cannibals. The do as they pleased with the bodies

that

Quill looked hurriedly away.

meters

smiling.

his teeth. Big teeth, rebuilt in three

had heard

law gave them the right to

She was a

And

attractive,

women,

thing—about the sweep of the

much

to the

dismay of

Tripstickler," they'd said.

lovely, quite

his peers.

But some-

human, womanly upper

half

of the femitaur, the curve of that back arcing neatly into the equine

lower back

.

.

.

something

horse and woman woman's legs (woman's .

.

for the small flickering

.

in the perfect

legs, horse's torso,

tail)

and the

rives

.

.

.

.

human

feminine derriere but

fine black felt-like fur beginning just

beneath the upper waist ... the antelope's breasts, the oval eyes

melding of the back parts of

something about her two pairs of shapely

tail

.

.

.

the pointed, upturned

.

.

"Sir?"

"Did you, ah, notice the femitaur

in the corner, Fives?

here. Notice the red-glow drink in her hand.

"A splendid example of her But something in the way she perfectly

species, is

sir.

.

.

Is

Lovely large

perusing you,

The only

alien

she not lovely?"

sir,

brown

strikes

me

eyes,

sir.

as-to be

candid— hungry."

"Women

of

all

persuasions look at

me

garish urbanity, hobbling his eyebrows

hungrily. Fives," said Quill with

and

his crab-apple

lump of an

Adam's apple, "for I am 'one who is catnip to women.'" Do you read the ancient writers. Fives? That's Mencken. And look at her! The sweep of Really, Really,

Weird Stories

129

Out the Window

130 Quill Tripstickler,

her back, her upper back at a

Her

John Shirley

ninety-degree angle from her lower.

strict

quivering, perfect—"

"Begging, your pardon,

sir,

but don't you think we'd best exeunt?

you are to convince Commissioner Feldspar to

If

you a second

give

chance, you must—"

would take a

"It's useless. Fives. It

coup

in Galactic Tourist Agenting."

miracle.

Once

needs a legend-making

It

again Quill was plunged into

gloom. "Suicide then, tain

Very good,

sir?

employment

alternatives

As you

sir.

open

to

me

I

say.

I

suppose there are

"I'm going to get drunk," Quill interrupted, "and then

manfully up to her, and ask her— nay,

me

kill

.

.

.

You know

Fives, I've

universe in which the femitaurs

I

shall

heard that to

live is to

lent to

me. Ah!

story goes that

How

shall stride

I

implore her poetically— to travel into the alternate

embrace death.

the death that one embraces, then that embrace

fies

cer-

could explore. In fact—"

If

she personi-

no longer

is

despair infuses the soul with poetry!

Ah

.

repel.

the

.

one steps into the transporter and emerges into

their

world, gasping with disbelief at the beauty beheld there— this by neu-

back

trino transmission devices the explorer carries, sending messages

he goes— ah, as

as

death.

If

I

said,

I

he gasps

at the

beauty and explodes! Instant

could find a way to take tourists to the world of the

femitaurs, safely,

I

would be a legend among tourist agents The seem confused when trying to explain the pheown inter-dimensional transport. No one has yet .

.

.

femitaurs themselves

nomena and

their

fathomed them; they us but

we cannot

derstandable. There

and

talk cryptically of

them

visit is

.

.

If

she

is

we speak

tangled his feet trying to recover. oafish stumblebum," Quill

visit

Un-

rarely.

is

universally under-

flourish,

some

waving

invisible

his

hand

in the

audience of ad-

together."

He

murmured

He

stumbled into Fives and

pitched to his muzzily.

belly.

"Umph

.

"Bumbling clod of a

.

.

ro-

smmbling—

The man with

the large teeth, drawing a cloak of flayed

about him, strode to

my

They can

here, in a suicide bar, then the language of

turned to reel toward the femitaur.

bot. Oafish

.

.

They come here

.

over his head, drunkenly orating to

mirers, "—is the language

He

.

a communication gap between the femitaurs

death—" Quill spoke with a dramatic

ally

Itself

ourselves. But the language of death. Fives,

stood everywhere.

air

Death

man," he

Quill's side,

said,

bending to

assist

him

human

skin

to his feet. "Re-

"you ought to find a better way to off yourself

than stumbling to death."

Really, Really,

Weird Stories

John Shirley "Not usedtuh Cabbie

.

Quill said, sitting heavily

"The best way "is at

.

cobble

.

on a

.

.

cubical

.

I

to say, ah

else,"

the dark

no

Take

it

"Chalky? like

man went on. "Somewhere

realistic

outside!

rather think, that

is,

private."

that

is

to

man whose

taste runs to

The dark man's hands

closed round fin-

wheezed.

head, shaped

Meet 'em

up from the other end

Gary Gilmore's

like

"No

for historical

suiciding or victimizing in the

here but don't eat 'em here!"

you?" Fives asked, bending toward the bartender. "Sounds

your voice. They haven't altered

Good

"I

said the robot bartender, rolling

Is that

arm

"Trust me."

glittered.

"You are a

atmosphere, shook disapprovingly. bar!

placed an

hard-muscled hands with black-painted

Quill's throat. Long-fingered,

gernails tightened. Quill

"Here now!"

He

.

public self-destruction. Charming!"

of the bar. His

be quick-but

fee. It will

artful."

." .

said the victimizer,

see,''

I

TV Cocktails,"

Cable

dry.

think not," said Quill politely.

mean

"Oh,

was

go somewhere

"Oh—I say,

His red eyes

Quill's shoulders.

"We'll

.

to die," said the swarthy stranger with a wolfish smile,

the hands of an expert. There will be

Quill's throat

.

.

barstool.

poignant. Painless-but evocative. Firm-but

about

Out the Window

Quill Tripstickler,

that.

But

this distasteful

new head—"

Got a new gig, I see! Valet? Yes, it's me. Say, Fives old man, whatever happened with that job you had pretending to admire people wdth inferiority complexes for some therapeutic clinic—?" "A curious story, that one," said Fives, "Beginning some years ago on "Fives!

to see you!

the Beauty Spa planet Aphrodite—" "Fives!" Quill called hoarsely, clawdng to izer

from

The

his throat. "Help!"

neck across the floor toward the door

He

the floor.

pry the hands of the victim-

victimizer

have to attend to

this,

that lovely self-lubricator

'*Fivesr Quill

a corpse

.

.

was blacking

Chalky.

He

turned to the bar-

The young master has .

.

.

But,

you used to have

out, felt himself

towed

tell

a

way of

me, what be-

." .

.

as

if

he were already

.

"Release this one."

A strange, melodious voice. "He and

an agreement of intersecting gazes. Quill looked up, blinking legs

be right there. Ran into

I'll

his shoulder.

getting himself throttled at regular intervals

came of

by the

scraped

struggled feebly.

an old friend here," he called over "I'll

Quill

of the bar. Quill's heels

"What's that? Oh, a moment. Master Quill,

tender.

was dragging

away a red

upholding the femitaur

Really, Really,

He

who now

Weird Stories

is

I

have a pact:

mine."

fog, to see the four pairs of lady

stood beside him. Her hooves

131

132 Quill Tripstickler,

grew

Out the Window

John Shirley

naturally to resemble black spike heels.

made an from

expectorant sound, wheezed, and

was with one of these

The man

air

and reached

victimizer stood, snarling,

back, fingers unwrapping

fell

gulped

Quill's throat. Gratefully, Quill

The

It

her back, she kicked the victimizer in his gut.

that, turning

and got

for a

to his feet.

weapon beneath

his

cloak.

A black bowler hat, of blue light from

its

descending from the shadowy

silk-lined interior.

knees buckled, and he

fell

The Victimizer's

from the

"I'm grateful,

said,

my lady,"

"My lady,

I

like

who

trying

flourish.

will give his

wind through the

life.

One

spires of

have been dishonored with

yours to do with as you

unfearing death," she

another world.

failure.

My life is nothing. am I

will."

me

liana.

Come."

liana led

them

into the street;

"Call

Chalky

and

said Quill, pointedly ignoring Fives

bowing with a

have need of one her voice

my lad,"

paralyzer, Fives

bar.

to regain his dignity, "I

eyes crossed, his

heavily to the floor, unconscious.

"You were always a mean shot with a called

a bolt

ceiling, fired

all

were

careful to step

on

the supine

victimizer.

Quill turned to Fives. "Fives,

you

He

voice broke.

my

"Send cover

sniffed

and pretended

body. Fives, to

me with nodes

my

fruitful.

I

suppose

I

.

and wrap

me

all

in black silks, ."

of onyx and, stones from the deeps of the sea

rather thought

I

His

."

.

sternness.

father,

For some minutes they endured one of Quill's orations, in. "Actually, sir, I

How-

are a disrespectful bounder.

our association has on occasion been

ever,

.

.

broke

until Fives

might send the body to Nunneras."

"What?" "Well, best to recall that the

and he

will

make

the

most of a sad

duty,

And

sir.

it

Nunnerans have a legend. 'One from the

be rebuked.

He

shall find death,

and he

seems to

stars will

me

I

come,

will return

from

search you asked

Word of a new age and a new Way.' Part of the reme to do on Nunneras, Master Quill. We could send

them your body,

explain that you had killed yourself because you had

death, bringing his

'converted' to their religion; your suicide faith

.

.

.

'back to

and perhaps we could arrange life'

with a hologram

which the backward, advise

them

atavistic

.

.

act of

martyrdom and

to create an illusion, bringing

you

The hologram— a technology with

Nunnerans

that the time has

from other worlds.

.

was an

come

to

are unfamiliar—would naturally

open

their planet to travelers

We don't have to call them tourists— pilgrims! And—" Really, Really,

Weird Stories

John Shirley "Just

Quill Tripstickler,

how would

Why would you state that a if

my

are merely

assistant.

once I'm dead?"

this,

new among

looked apologetic. "The

Fives

You

this serve you, Fives?

engineer

Out the Window

robot can become,

equal rights for robots laws,

sir,

other things, a free tourist agent,

he proves that—"

"Why-! Of all the-!

perfecdy ghoulish! Using my dead body

Fives, that's

make a career for yourself." He put an affectionate hand on Fives'

to

On

the

way

to the corner they encountered a

dozen pet owners,

ostentatiously walking their poultry. Quill wrinkled his

three people looked

shoul-

something from our association, old boy."

der. "I see you've learned

up when he did

this,

since his nose

nose— two or

was prodigious,

the wrinkling seeming to profoundly revise a major feature of the street's architecmre.

"Oh,

it's

man

just a nose," said a fat

walking a duck.

thought they

"I

were tearing down a building—" "Your duck," said

Quill, "is offensive to

me. The animals are

loath-

some." They walked on, side-stepping outsized ducks, chickens, geese,

and an occasional

turkey,

leashed.

all

The squawking and

cackling

com-

peted with the noise of breezecars whining by on their sparkling mag-

The moraines of duck droppings

netic fields.

contrasted with the clean

planes of glassteel comprising the buildings around them. Someone's

duck tugged

its

sively at Quill,

snapped

It

from the roboserv walking

leash

squawking "Quey!

I

quot

I

it

and waddled

aggres-

quold choo kwuh queat

at Quill's ankles. Quill kicked at

it,

and

it

it!"

fluttered aside,

squalling. lessons." Quill said, addressing the duck. "Try saying

"You need diction it

again, like this: 'Hey!

duck

again,

"Menace

which ran

I

thought

I

told

fear not,

sir,"

you to beat

to the protection of

to the public health," Quill

sioner Feldspar's duck. Fives.

be

I

Why

its

kicked at the

hourglass-shaped roboserv.

murmured

don't you see

said Fives politely.

He

it!'"

"That's

bitterly. if

you can run

Commisit

over?"

"Commissioner Feldspar may soon

my employer."

Quill groaned.

He

turned to liana. "Have you ducks in your plane of

reality?"

She smiled and shook her head, paused to rub one of her four

hooved one, "It

we

feet

on

another, her

tail

have no giant talking ducks, nor ducks of any

wasn't always

now, the imbroglio

like this, liana," Quill said.

in

spike-

flouncing merrily. "Fortunately, brave

He

sort."

was

The Terminus had sobered him

striding steadily

up. "But because

of a peculiar ecological imbalance, the only domestic animals which

Really, Really,

Weird

Stories

re-

133

134 Quill Tripstickler,

main an Earth

Out the Window

are poultry. Cats

John Shirley

and dogs once were populous, but when

they evolved and gained self-awareness, they killed one another off in wars.

And

pure and

the cockroaches exterminated the

simple.

mannered,

somehow

I

A

cockroach ghettos.

I

know a little

to the

you know.

matriarchy,

we might take

myself right away,

kill

opposed

better at four feet high as

ones. Interesting culmre they have. haven't got to

es-

look upon, of course, although they dress well. But

them

like

mild-

and unthreatened. They're not

as long as they're well-fed

thetically pleasing to

of course. Genocide,

rats,

no complaint with cockroaches. They're

I've

Still,

If,

little

ah,

I

a detour through the

sidewalk stand where they

sell

marvel-

ous grub-excretion patties—"

"No,

we

will

be

late for

my brave

the gateway,

one," said liana, caress-

ing Quill's cheek with one of her long six-fingered hands. "Better

cockroach ghettos, no matter

side-traipse into

how

we

not

picturesque, coura-

geous one." "Your form of address celebrated in myths

mean

my courage is

and—"

"Indeed," Fives put "I

appropriate," said Quill. "Since

is

in, "it is

mythical."

to say," Quill said hastily, glaring at Fives, "that

it is

the stuff of

when the strongest of men wonunknown is wisest. There is more

legends. But of course there are times

der

if

plunging thoughtlessly into the

than a

modicum

of

wisdom

in the expression, 'discretion

is

the better

part of valor.'" "Is that

the expression,

asked as

sir?" Fives

if

genuinely perplexed.

thought the expression was something to do with 'cold liana turned her lovely

do not intend Quill took a ." .

.

it. I

to seek

head to gaze

feet.'"

"You mean you

at Quill quizzically.

honor and peace

in death?"

deep breath. "Ah. But of course, of course,

He closed his eyes. And shrugged. "Very well. cannot face my father after my disgrace."

They had come

"I

to a busy intersection.

It

I

however, ah

Let us have done with

was a truck

route.

Huge

gray-

metal and plastiflex-jointed freight trucks-growled along on blue-sparking magnetic fields. Except for the lack of wheels and diesel, semi-trucks

had not changed

significantly since the twentieth

quintessentially brutish. Quill

still

swallowed hard and took a step back from

the curb. "liana you don't propose to liana

cenmry. They were

was gazing down the long

?" .

.

street to the right, searchingly, as

if

looking for just the proper truck. "There!" she exclaimed. "That one will piece from a

slit

in the skin

between her

do

nicely. Yes."

She took a time-

breasts. "Fifty seconds," she said.

Really, Really,

Weird Stories

John Shirley "A

Quill Tripstickler,

religious ritual,

assume," said Quill aside to Fives. "She has to

I

me in accordance with the He chewed at a thumbnail. you?" She

"Kill

Out the Window

mrned

to Quill. "I too shall die.

We

together."

"Both of us?" Quill was both saddened and heartened. He looked at the trucks; they were like organized avalanches.

He

considered.

we

looked away. "Perhaps

ment haven and reconsider our course

He

kill

proper astrological conjunction, perhaps."

He

should go into yon refresh-

." .

.

turned to go.

She took him by the hand and stepped Quill with her.

The

truck bore mightily

in front of a truck, dragging

down on them,

unable to stop in

time, blasting out a warning. "Ah, well," Quill said at the last

moment,

He

glimpsed

"better death than to live in a worid infested with ducks." Fives

waving

The

his

bowler hat goodbye

truck hit them.

It

made them

.

.

.

broken, battered things.

Quill Tripstickler, run over by a truck.

The somber procession wound Pious, the capital of Nunneras.

way through

its

the garlanded streets of

On one side were the Nunneras men wear-

ing their long-skirted nun's habits, groaning as they lashed themselves with penitati

heads bowed.

flails,

Nunneras

women

(the

On

the other side of the street were the

two genders kept always

to their

own

sides of the

street

and

to their special dormitories, lest they should brush elbows or

come

into

some other heinous

physical contact) in black-leather priest's

cassocks. Everyone native to Nunneras, excepting the royal family,

removed.

their lips

It

was a

city

had had

of enforced grimaces.

But in splendid disavowal of soberness the famous Nunneras Gardens,

means of

the population's only sanctioned

to either side of every street, in the

walks and the roughly

Some subde

built

dorm

life-expressiveness,

buildings.

some

of the flowers were huge and gaudy,

in shadings of hue, they

as genitals.

and—not

atmosphere— designs which an

Here and

objective eye

there topiaries of blue-green

bloom, with species

Fives, riding

on

and

exquisitely

surprisingly in the suppres-

riotous display. Nunneras' temperate climate ers to

small

twined and bunched and waved in rows,

arabesques, geometrical intricacies sive social

bloomed

narrow plots between the wooden

alternating,

all

made

would recognize

added it

dignity to the

possible for flow-

year round.

the center float of the procession beside the glass cas-

ket containing Quill's body, observed the gardens with pleasure. His optical filters

were opened wide,

Really, Really,

Weird Stories

his olfactory sensors

were

fully dilated.

135

Out the Window

136 Quill Tripstickler,

John Shirley

On the flower-encrusted float ahead of Fives,

in papal robes

and

glori-

ously the centerpiece of a purple whiskerbloom floral arrangement, sat

Queen CoUana and her daughter were

They were not

Enrilla.

both

lipless;

cloudy-haired and lithesomely personable. Enrilla looked un-

tall,

comfortable in her ermine robes—it was a hot day—as she turned in her

and cosmetically

gilded chair to stare wistfully at the supine quite dead)

body of

Quill Tripstickler.

daughter; Enrilla turned away.

The queen frowned

The two

figures

rebuilt (but

sternly at her

swayed with the march-

ing rhythm of the littermen bearing them. Fives too turned to sadly contemplate the

He

took

little

satisfaction in his

have admitted as

much

body of

his erstwhile master.

He would

impending promotion.

to Quill, but he

wished

his

master

never

alive.

On the front end of the casket hung a huge placard containing a testimonial to QuiU, cunningly scribed with

marshblossom

petals, scarlet against white:

A SATANIC CHILD OF EARTH FOUND FAITH FAR FROM NUNNERAS

AND GAVE HIS LIFE IN MARTYRDOM AND PERFECT CONTRIHON, SEEKNG REPENTANCE. E^ DEATH HE IS REDEEMED. "Blessed are the self-destructive," Fives murmured, "for they are harmless to

the State."

Nunneras had been death. Fives

learned to

lie

far

from

Quill's

moment of his But somehow he had

thoughts at the

had not been programmed

to

lie.

beautifully.

Quill sat up, smiling.

He

looked around.

About him and

He

felt

giddy and clean and new.

He was

stretched radial avenues of blue-green grass, neatly clipped,

thickly twining jade-colored le^fy vines.

The

vines clung thickly to

colonnades, and to columns supporting the grass-draped only

relief

new.

from the green color-scheme was

thin streams of sparkling blue water.

The

in the

place

was

ceiling.

The

white columns and like

a vast cathedral

inwardly coated with greenery, with six hallways extending in spokes

from the center-sward. The center-sward was occupied only by Quill and liana. liana

got to her four feet and, in her peculiar way, stretched.

"Even the

ceiling,"

blades of grass hung

Quill said wonderingly, looking up. like

mermaid's hair

in the mist

The long

from the narrow

Really, Really,

Weird Stories

John Shirley

Quill Tripstickler,

down

waterfalls tinkling

Nunneras?

Bending to

tear handfuls of grass,

thoughtfully, liana

yours.

here and there.

a garden planet, and this

It's

." .

.

"Tliis

is

raised to her lips

There was a note of sadness

is

You

Not

life,

in

shuddered.

come

to die to

not the

is

here,

my

afteriife,

our variant

is

you are not dead. brave Quill.

It is

another space-time continuum, after the radical transition

resembling Death. Truly, you

a dead

left

body behind on

is

an exact copy of the one

left

Earth. But the

you— the body you

InterEarth transportation process did not destroy

now inhabit

He

you mean. This

in the sense

And though you had

are not disembodied. This

your

force."

the Afterworld?"

"Afterworld? Paradise?

of Earth.

parallel to

in her voice.

we not dead? I remember

and with great

that the truck struck us squarely

and chewed

my world. A world

"Your world?" Quill was surprised. "But-are

"This, then,

we-are we on the planet

a marvelous garden."

which she

shook her head.

A lovely worid

"7\re is

Out the Window

behind. Even your clothes—

everything within your bioplasmic field has been copied, reconstituted, into an identical vehicle, for your consciousness." Quill looked quite sure?

in the finest

"You

down

at himself. "I

am

the same?

Nothing but an exact duplicate

way of

body you now

inhabit,

my world

I

.

.

.

to this

was made

do—"

newer. Your consciousness, your this

was transmitted

by means of neutrino interpenetration

Quill struggled to understand.

from

a hair amiss? You're

you know.

the finest stuff—nothing but the finest will

are precisely the same. Simply

memories, the sum of your personality—all the

Not

will do,

"Death—death

the

is

here, to ." .

.

means of

travel

Other Earth?"

"Only certain deaths.

It

must occur

with the right means. Most deaths

in the right place, at the right time,

will

launch you into the plane of the

disembodied. Die at the proper time and place-and you arrive here.

Now and

then one of your people stumbles through, to a

new body

au-

tomatically awaiting them; they are channeled by certain magnetic polarities to this spot, this

right death.

They had

charging elephant Quill

reception

blundering into our worid via the

inadvertently stepped in front of the right truck or

." .

was dazed.

.

"I

remember no

"There was no pain—because nervous system

hall,

at the last

I

pain."

held your hand.

those of us specializing in transition have learned

"But-what of those who were destroyed on

"They came through an

wrong means. The Really, Really,

I

moment and dampened

took control of your your pain.

It is

a

skill

." .

.

their arrival here?"

electronic Interdimensional Breacher.

The

dimensional dynamics will not allow this means for

Weird Stories

137

138

Quill Tripstickler,

Out the Window

John Shirley

the transition between your world and mine. the right channels or not at

They must come through

."

all

.

.

"But why?"

"Why is trail?

it

when you

that

step off a

cliff,

you

fall

and

are crushed?

Why

you crushed when you reach the bottom by wallking down the

aren't

The dynamics of your

are always a mystery.

"The gateway

One

to your

world's physical laws.

can only theorize

world

." .

.

Quill

The why of such laws

uselessly."

mused,

"is

getting run over by a

truck?" "It

need not have been a

truck.

We

needed crushing,

and

in that time

place."

"Crushing?" Quill stood, rubbing his chin speculatively.

"We might

build Interdimensional Gateways at the assigned spots—you could in-

form us of

these.

And,

at the calculated instants,

we

could bring crowds

of tourists into your world—by crushing them instantaneously in a huge

and quick metal

vise.

We could anesthetize them first

.

.

.

But

how would

they return?"

"We push them cific destinations.

use, as

is

Have you one

"Yes.

civilized galaxy."

do."

up

I

get the cooperation of your

government

in

tourist arrival centers?"

You

are

was prepared

now

inhabiting just such a terminal. This reception hall

specially in anticipation of tourists

need the revenue

tourists

show you our method of sible,

of them are not in

for the planet Nunneras?"

"Indeed ... do you think setting

window assigned— most

a

yet— for each inhabited world in your Universe's

"Yes?

"We

out windows," said liana. "Specific windows for spe-

There

would bring

.

.

.

from your world

.

.

.

We

and we brought you here

transition as quickly

and economically

to

as pos-

so you could arrange matters at the other end of the spectrum,

brave one." inspect your world,

"I shall

said Quill

loftily. "I'll

specific spot

make the arrangements," by way of Nunneras— can you arrange for a shall

on Nunneras?"

When

"Yes.

return

and then we

you go, simply

world you seek: you

will

visualize

another

living

being of the

be reconstituted beside that being."

"Good. My servant is on Nunneras. I will wish to confer with him—" He smiled thinly. "And to startle the treacherous blackguard.

Now

." .

.

"Let us not go from this place hastily, comely one." She gathered Quill into her arms.

Really, Really,

Weird Stories

John Shirley

Quill Tripstickler, Out the Window 139

my

"The others of

species," she said, whispering into his ear as she

him-and as he returned her caresses-" think that my seem to be attracted to spindly big-nosed bipeds."

stroked

odd.

I

"We

all

have our

.

.

.

our eccentric

tastes," Quill said, tracing

tastes are

her hind-

parts with an exploratory hand.

we

"Let us tarry here awhile, before said.

Her tone was

Quill tarried, ...

tour the rest of

my

Earth," she

wistful.

and he

tarried gladly.

But the time came when liana took Quill by the hand and escorted

him down

anomalously pragmatic

The

a metal door set to Quill, rather

in its verdant surroundings.

wheel and opened the door. Quill followed her

liana turned a

through.

came to The door seemed,

a green-blue misty avenue until they

into a wall of harsh black stone.

door, with a will of

its

own, shut behind them.

It

locked.

They were in a large room walled with white plastic and lined with aluminum shelves. On the shelves were glossy gray boxes perforated with thousands of tiny, almost microscopic, pinholes. The boxes were all alike and each a little bigger than a man's head. At the other end of the

room was another

rectangular

From

came

the door

liana turned to Quill

by

rote.

tive

metal door.

a droning and the thunder of

many

hooves.

and spoke something he suspected was learned

"Wear one of these perceptual enhancement boxes and the

my

beauty of

Earth will be enhanced a thousand fold.

And you

nawill

be able to communicate with others across the world as you choose, simply by tonguing the correct combination on your selector ..."

She selected a box with an extra bulge

commodate

on

Quill acted

instinct.

wheel, and threw It

it

open.

tive nostrils. All

And

"They've

.

all

.

its

with femitaurs and

some unguessable

All

were

dingy,

The

street

filth.

vermin moving too

thin, patchy,

on

and

the street

.

.

in

ill

health.

.

.

on their heads," Quill said in horror. He turned to fitted a box over her head. It completely enclosed

got boxes

She had already

her head,

tail,

excretions, running with

ac-

stench of unwashed billions assailed Quill's sensi-

seemed

every single being

Each one

liana.

A

presumably to

backed away.

human men and women.

in rags, sticky with

was cracked, oozing with

face,

He

to shoulder, chest to

manitaurs and, here and there,

quickly to identify.

one

He rushed to the opposite door, mrned He perceived a typical Other Earth street.

was crowded, shoulder

nude or dressed

at

She approached him.

Quill's nose.

fitting

Really, Really,

snugly shut under her chin, close around her neck.

Weird Stories

Out the Window

140 Quill Tripstickler,

She held a box out to

He

shook

John Shirley

Quill.

arms closed around him from behind.

his head. Strong

Manitaurs with boxes on their heads— they seemed to have boxes instead of heads, unless one looked closely—held Quill pinioned while liana ap-

proached him with the box, opening

away from one another

halves

bottom,

at the

it

to admit his

head

.

two

tilting its

.

.

rather thought the business about your wanting tourist revenue

"I

sounded specious,"

said Quill, stalling, "I strongly suspect

And something

leave your world.

you want

to

in the nature of the interdimensional

dynamics prevents your leaving for long unless you trade places with some-

one from our world, your place here grisly

.

yes?

yes?"

.

.

You can visit us—but

mess of your world and you must live

We have

own

our

mess.

one of us must take

to stay,

She nodded. Quill went on, "Well, you've made a

You can keep

in it—we

won't take your place.

yours, we'll keep ours."

him electronically from within the box she poised over his head. "We meant to put a box on your head before you saw what it's really like out there. Once the box "I'm sorry. Quill," said liana, her voice coming to

is

on, you won't notice the real world. At

overcrowded

ugliness.

The world

least,

the boxes will mitigate

look lovely to you— once your

will

Your physical sensations, your perceptions—all

buckles.

The box

contacts certain centers of your brain

.

.

will

You

.

be

its

will

altered.

see an infinite

of paradisiac greenery and only a few of those persons standing

vista

mbes

close to you. You'll be fed through

plain—You

Quill struggled uselessly.

Darkness.

And

began.

illusions

raised his

that

.

.

.

but no need to ex-

shall see."

The box

then the small

He

hands to

felt

his

closed over his head.

tri-vid

screens inside flickered

head and

felt his

nose, his eyes ...

all

The

alive.

ectoplasmic fingers probing his brain

.

.

.

He

through a

know the box is there," he said. "The illusion makes feeling my own head. The box warps my perceptions. I'll

layer of fuzziness. "I

me

think I'm

remember that." "You'll remember ." weeks

for a while," she said. "But

me

soon

.

.

.

after a

few

.

.

suppose you think to use

"I

use

it

this to

to lure tourists here ... so

brainwash

me

... so that you can

you can box them,

too,

and take

their

You hope to program me so that you can send me to my world You are hearing me, aren't you? You see, I'm on to your plan, isn't going to work. You can't program me when I'm aware of it—

places.

and and so,

I

.

.

it

.

can

resist

I'm willing

to,

it

ah

.

.

.

Best

we

forget the

whole

thing. Forgive

and

forget.

." .

.

Really, Really,

Weird Stories

John Shirley

He seemed

Quill Tripstickler,

to see her standing before him, smiling, shaking her

"Time

ruefully.

will

mad

"You're

Out the Window

if

head

change you."

you think our

tourists will stand for this,"

he

said.

"They're not that stupid."

"Your

tourists stand for

group

tours, don't they? Tourists

have been conditioned for centuries to believe that abuse of stimulating

is

everywhere a condition

travel."

She had a point. Quill could not deny But he broke from

his guards

and

it.

down

break

tried to

the door lead-

ing into the glade of green grass and clean columns and crystal waterfalls

.

.

.

The manitaurs stampeded. He shaped

like

felt

himself trampled under hooves

jogging shoes.

Fives frowned, inspecting the circuitry behind the interior of his

working.

He

He was Fives

in

bowler

hidden panel in the

His hologram projector didn't seem to be

hat.

glanced up, wondering

if

he were about to be evicted.

danger of being evicted from the entire planet.

had been

told that, as an emissary of the

dead Redeemed Hero,

on Nunneras for The queen did not

Quill Tripstickler, he might be allowed to remain

Nine hours had passed

hours.

since his arrival.

prove of soulless machinery that acted as

not produce starcruiser.

He

his miracle,

Or perhaps

reflected that

had a

if it

soul. If Fives

.

.

ap-

could

he would soon be taken by force to

to a recycling plant

ten

his

.

he might have made a mistake,

in hinting to the

queen that a miraculous resurrection of their new martyr was imminent. It

might have been better to spring the scam on them

out-of-the-hat, as

it

were. They'd accepted without argument Fives' faked holotapes seeming

Nunneranism. But

to depict Quill's conversion to Fives with

what was probably mounting

now

Fives stood outside the crypt containing Quill's body.

an oval whose nearer end was shaped orchid.

on ing.

The Divine Family and

the steps leading

A crowd

low the

up

their

the queen eyed

skepticism.

like

The

the blossom of a

crypt

was

Nunneran

gloomily caparisoned retinue stood

to the crypt, to Fives' right,

heads bowed, pray-

of the Nunneran populace had gathered in the square be-

steps,

men

leather cassocks;

all

to the left side, in habits,

droned

in prayer.

The

women

to the right, in

sun beat dovm, the

air

was

heavy with blossom scent.

The queen raised her head. The Prayers ended. The ceremony was done. The martyr was buried. The queen mrned to gaze at Fives expectReally, Really,

Weird Stories

141

142 Quill Tripstickler,

andy. Fives smiled,

Out the Window

wondering

fore the guards converged

more than

if

John Shirley

he could

summon

on him. The look in

his ship's shuttle be-

the queen's eye presaged

eviction. It w^as a this-robot-has-been-playing-us-for-fools-and-I-

say-we-melt-him-down look.

She turned to the nun-habited guards and spoke to them

The guards reached

gesturing toward Fives. Brissic spores.

would

into belt

They'd throw spore-packed capsules

would come

burst, the spores

in a whisper,

pouches containing

at Fives, the capsules

into contact with air and, in the

rude and impertinent manner of Brissic spores everywhere, they'd burst into root-base

an unbreakable

stantly into It

foam which would cover him shell

.

.

in seconds,

hardening

in-

.

has already been noted that Fives had no esophagus. Hence, he

was unable

to experience a

lump of

rate to maintain that a robot

fear in his throat.

cannot

feel fear. Fives

But

it is

inaccu-

began to overheat

with anxiety.

But between Fives and the oncoming guards, a vision interposed

To

Five's surprise, a partly serviceable

The holo-image swayed,

the steps, blinking confusedly. (causing this released)

monumental

and belched.

programmed it

facial feature to

Fives

pulled

do these

its

waggle obscenely when

found these actions disturbing.

the hologram to

itself.

hologram of Quill appeared on

things.

He

nose it

was

had not

Nor had he programmed

to say:

"The

pain's gone.

The box

is

The world

gone.

is

made

over again. I'm

new."

But that

is

what

it

said.

"Faulty hologram," Fives muttered. that

would mrn the holo

off before

hologram did not disappear. astonishing tale to

And

tell

It

it

He

flicked the switch (internally)

could embarrass him further. The

turned to him and

said, "Fives,

I

have an

you."

then Quill noticed the crowd at the bottom of the marble steps,

and he saw

that even the

queen of Nunneras was kneeling to him, chant-

ing hosannas and hallelujahs. Quill turned

bered the

he

Fives'

and viewed the

will

He

read the placard.

He remem-

scheme. Then, trying not to smile too broadly, he turned to

crowd and spoke, be rebuked.

bringing his

crypt.

Word

"It is written:

He

of a

'one from the stars will come, and

shall find death,

new

age and a

and he

will return

from death,

new Way.'"

A hushed silence was followed by a series of hymns.

As everyone sang

a different hymn, the result was dissonant clamor. After covering his ears for a

few moments, Quill raised

his

hands for

silence. In the

Really, Really,

ensuing

Weird Stories

John Shirley quiet,

Quill Tripstickler,

he spoke to the assemblage,

ringing tones, "First of

we

"Best

all

start off v^ith

there

lips that

they

v^ill

have returned from Heaven w^ith

cleared his throat

and continued,

.

only a

fevv^

reforms,

murmured

sir,"

Fives v^hispered.

aside to Fives.

easily

speak the holy w^ord. Second,

other worlds will be admitted to Nunneras and allowed to

They

shall

lactic

Tourist Agency.

be admitted only

They

if

they

may

change troubling will

come

shouted:

visitors

roam

their

from

freely.

they arrive under the auspices of the Ga-

shall

be given

And

lodgings at a reasonable price. this, that

He

be no more severing of lips—the young v^ill retain

may more

in

." .

"Yes, you're quite right," Quill "Firstly,

"I

He

w^ord of a nev^ order of things."

Out the Window

hospitality

and comfortable

clean towels—and sterile cups. All

see the example of Nunneras

their hearts ... so that,

on

to a realization of the glory of

and go away with a

their respective worlds, they

Nunneranism,

as

And

did.

I

think of the cash flow they'll bring in—" "Sir

.

.

whispered Fives warningly.

."

"Sorry," said Quill, aside. "Habit." Louder, he said, "And, finally, the

Princess Enrilla spiritual

tion."

The

and

I

will travel, alone, to other

envoys of Nunneras, bringing the

He

caught

Enrilla's eye,

skies of Terra

worlds of the galaxy as

Good Word of Holy Redemp-

expecting to see her blush. She winked.

were cobalt blue that sunny morning. Even the

squawks of poultry seemed

jolly to Quill.

Or

nearly.

and Quill paused outside Commissioner Feldspar's home. The commissioner's visage, three meters high, was reproduced on the facade Fives

of his synthawood house, between two bay windows.

through a series of expressions. All the houses up and typical facial facades, the

were fronted with the

day expressions of their owners. Fives turned to Quill

was

will in

most

flickered

the street

common

day-to-

that sort of street.

and remarked, "But

Other Earth

ple of the

It

It

dovm

surely.

Master

Quill, the peo-

time flood into our Earth through their

death portals, to escape the over-crowding of their

own wodd

." .

.

Most of them have been raised with their heads in their Only boxes. They believe the wodd they see on the small TV screens those in power would have come here, if their plot had worked. Their "Not

so.

.

government of course,

is

utterly autocratic ...

who made my escape

I

barely escaped myself.

possible.

It

.

.

was

She consented to show

liana,

me the

Calculated Death Windows because she loved me. She must have secretly known I'd try to escape through them. And she voluntarily indicated the window leading-through Death-to Nunneras. She could not

Really, Really,

Weird Stories

143

Out the Window

144 Quill Tripstickler,

John Shirley

bear to see the magnificent Tripstickler sword blunted. docile, as

if

succumbing

must have taken great courage, Master

"It

"I

window—to your must admit,"

said Quill with the airy

ledging His Humbleness, "that

desperation as as I

it is,

without

my own "Quill,

as courage.

I

up

wave of a Great Man Acknow-

My grasp

on

window through

reality is

my giving it into someone else's control

crypt, in

through

his employer.

leapt through the

But only for a moment.

hit the street.

pretended to be

Quill, to leap head-first

death," said Fives, buttering

much

I

was given a tour of the

I

Windows."

building containing the

that

to brainwashing, until

And

then,

tenuous enough ... It hurt,

when

was standing outside

I

Nunneras."

my boy!"

cried

Commissioner Feldspar

"Come

door to greet them.

in! I

want you

to

joyously,

know

I

coming

to the

have decided to

permit you to remain in the Galactic Tourist Agency after aU. And, at no significant cut in

pay

.

.

Your opening up Nunneras

.

for

us—after blun-

dering it—was a masterful stroke." Quill hesitated

work

on

the front step. "I'm not sure

I

want

to

come back to

for the agency," he said quietly, examining his immaculately mani-

cured fingernails. "Not without a substantial raise and a promotion."

"What! You weak-minded ingrate! You can stuff your—"

"Or all

else

have to

I'll

tell

the

to permit Satanic tourists

Feldspar

fell silent.

Nunnerans

on

that

He scowled.

A raise.

might be dangerous

after

." .

.

His image, on the facade of the house

above him, sccowled too. "Very well. You promotion.

it

their pristine turf

may have

anything you

like.

A

Anything."

"Anything?" Quill looked at the duck, which peered nervously, out

from between

its

owner's

legs.

"Anything," said Feldspar. "I

want

that duck," "I said.

"My—my duck.'*" Feldspar trembled. Then,

resignedly,

he

said,

"Very well."

"And," Quill added, grasping the duck firmly about the neck before

could speak,

"I

want a word with your

it

chef."

Really, Really,

Weird Stories

Live in Elizabeth

I

She

me

lets

way.

I

take control. Taking control feels like

coming awake,

in a

haven't been asleep, mentally; but physically I've been in whatever

my

when I'm asleep. There is a moment of disjunction, when I feel I'm floating free from her, and I experience an almost overwhelming relief. And then she slips aside and I click with her motor controls, jack into her senses, take command of corner of our brain

her coordination. rush:

I

begin to

of a sudden

all

sensations go

areas of pain:

one

circulation, as

we've been

midriff.

in her right leg, because

let

damned much

me

sitting

it's

begun

I

monitor a pain, two

to suffer

too long in one position.

what happened, so

We're having trouble

first

I

have to get used

to.

from lack of

And a pain in our to, since

And none

of it's

I'm male.

easy.

write the several sentences you've just read. We've decided

to write an account of

The

her physical sensations in a disorienting

Cramps. Her period: Something hard to get used

There's so

She

feel

evening and she's fatigued;

it's

time

I

saw

.

.

.

adjusting

Elizabeth,

I

.

knew

.

that

we can

get

some

help.

.

instantly she'd

change

my life.

was a cool Sunday afternoon in June, about ten months ago, outside a theater in the East Village. Clouds shifted the street into twilight and then slipped aside— and suddenly the sunlight was flooding her. She It

was

She looked older

at a

movie

poster. Jesus she

than seventeen, at

first. I

thought her twenty, or twenty-one. Partly

stood looking

lovely.

it's

the clothing she wears. New York dovmtown boutique. The Face magazine.

A touch pretentious, perhaps, like some of her speech mannerisms.

But she's a knockout. Long thick black

hair,

almost to her waist. Full

hips, long in the legs. Something Latin in her face.

We'd

just

come out

rows down from me, Really, Really,

of the theater-I'd noticed her inside too, about all

Weird

five

alone, rapt, a solitary bust in the artificial twilight.

Stories

146

I

John Shirley

Live IN Elizabeth

Now she

stood gazing at the movie poster. She glanced at me, and

had a glimpse of her eyes— so brown they were almost black,

mink

Her

lashes.

lips

were

full,

her lower

lip like

crawl

on every available

graffiti

and the

surface; the sidewalks

were the same grimy

by

seemed

to

a silk pillow.

She was a divine anomaly. The cryptic spray paint

ings

I

set off

walls of the build-

with bottlecaps and

gray, the streets imprinted

pop-tops pressed into the asphalt by thousands of cars. Against that

background: Elizabeth, luminous.

gone alone

I'd

to see Fellini's

conversational opening.

about a place

gic

She nodded.

maybe

"I

got

I've

I've

funny

how

some is

.

me

feel nostal-

My mother's Italian,

though, so

can make

Fellini

.

sort of ancestral

memory

teenager.

It

of the place.

And

of

."

incredibly well-defined

was a

realized that she

seemed the appropriate

It

."

never been to

know what you mean.

course the imagery I

"It's

Amarcord.

.

was

.

tone of voice, her

in her

me with her maturity. Most teenage girls don't use terms like ancestral memory and imagery. I told myself. Make tracks. You re thirty -one, my friend. Don't Beat pronunciation. Trying to impress

it,

be

foolish.

I

was

looked into her dizzy.

I felt

eyes.

A shock of recognition. And

been standing near the

I'd

wall,

moment

for a

my

with

back to

I

it,

gazing at myself. Seeing myself ogling her shamelessly, as she would

have seen me.

And back.

then

What

smiled at

it

was

over.

I

returned to myself, blinked, and took a step

was thatf I thought. me. From that moment, I knew. the hell

the dance, the preliminaries. level,

I

I

had

forgot about

I

It

was

to have her,

it

when

over but the

all

and

would.

I

she

ritual,

On some

knew.

We chatted. We exchanged names. and she admitted that she was from

name was

Elizabeth.

I

I

my friends call me

told her

Elizabeth,

resisted joking

about

New Jersey and

that.

I

had

just

"Blue"

that her

moved

to

Manhattan; she was only there for the day. I

her just

knew other things about her. Things she didn't tell me. I knew what bedroom looked like, and what her last boyfriend had said to her before she broke up with him, and what music she listened

what her parents were

come

to

know these

like. It

things.

I

didn't occur to

was drunk on

me

her,

to ask myself

and

I

to,

and

how

I'd

liked the feeling.

I

wasn't going to ask questions. I

knew,

I

looked

also, that

at

her

she was only seventeen.

lips.

I

swear to

I

God I knew

didn't care. just

what

it

Really, Really,

would

feel like

Weird Stories

John Shirley

I

Live in Elizabeth 147

And I knew that I would, eventually. come to the awkward moment. She had to say goodbye and We had move away, or seem easy. I had to come up with some alternative. Both of us waited for a few moments as I tried to think of something. to kiss them.

She smiled, seemed mildly disappointed, and

said, "Well,

guess I'd

I

better—"

"Have a cup of coffee with me?" that

was a lame thing

it

to say,

was past

I

I'd

be crazy to take her out. There were laws.

It

thirty.

a pretty decent

said, "There's

cafe

little

was a month—a month of meeting her a

school, of nights

after

me and ." .

.

from her

discreet distance

of doubts, of necking in Central Park.

full

And

around the corner

worked up the nerve to meet her parents. Elizabeth hadn't told them my age. I'd talked to them on the phone, once. Her father

before

told myself

She'd be crazy to go out with

she could see

But she

I

have a cuppa coffee with me.

all,

I

look casual.

tried to

A

month

I

Her mother

mystery boy!"

Blue, we'd love to little girl's

"Well do

said,

come

said,

"So

the

this is

over for dinner Sunday,

meet the boy who's been occupying so much of our little girl. "She says you do some kind of journal-

Our

time."

ism. For the college paper?" I

wdnced. "No,

A cub

"Oh?

My nerve

I

write for the Daily

failed.

"Something

pected her parents to forbid

Our

But

first

I

can

She says

feel I

me

time together,

me more

taught

usually."

like that"

in anticipation of

That week,

time.

News, Sunday Supplement

reporter?"

than

I

I

Sunday, the date after which to see her,

we made

mean: she wasn't a

tell

exfirst

virgin. In fact,

she

taught her.

her objecting to the direction this story

can

we

love for the

you about the drugs.

I

is

taking.

don't approve of them,

But that evening, trying to make love to her in my rickety studio apartment, I felt like a child molester. A grimy feeling. Made me tense. And tension made me impotent. So that's when she took the

usually.

black film container from her transparent plastic purse. The container didn't have film in it, though. "Demerol or coke?" she

litde

asked. I'd

ing I

my

never had either one, and here was this seventeen-year-old

me

girl offer-

both.

looked

at the bindle

head. But

I

said:

Really, Really,

and the half-dozen

"The Demerol."

Weird Stories

triangular tablets

and shook

148

I

John Shirley

Live IN Elizabeth

dropped two. Twenty minutes

I

didn't

know about

later

was

realized there

I

started to melt ...

till it

me

ice in

warm

turned into

I

I

water

and flowed into Elizabeth's arms. What had been tense became relaxed, and what had been limp became rigid. I felt myself moving

and she was

against her

than

silkier

silk

and

I

was amazed

to discover

how damn strong the muscles of her thighs were. Everything was we were shining together. I was a flashlight beam fanning

just

working;

over snow, making

my own I

glitter.

it

touch as she

felt

There was a funny sense that

was sending a sonar pulse into

she would experience

it

and

her: the signal

alter

could experience her experience

.

was spinning through space.

mirror image of I

Good-looking

was

terrified

With

And

felt

fellow, really,

body with

touched

I

so

I

fiery discus passing

through a

singing. thirty-one.

I

realized

mean,

myself— I

all

gay,

I

who he was. Me. I

touched

Elizabeth's hands.

body

Elizabeth inhabited the

my

skin

felt,

Elizabeth smiled at me, with

There was an amorphous the Looking Glass, again. chariot of flesh

body.

was a

with bright blue eyes. But I'm not at

hands,

me

indescribably peculiar.

face— how coarse

own

back to

and

a peak of ecstatic exchange.

by the positioning of things—until

Elizabeth's

Elizabeth's

it

fly to her,

bed with a rather gaunt young man of

in

feel

.

Somewhere, there was a wordless

itself.

found myself

I

would

and bounce

it .

I communed with her, and reached And then the world was gone. I

could

I

it—in a sort of empathy, a somatic echo. Like

We

my

I

I'd

departed.

touched that masculine

I

from the outside!

my lips.

tug,

and a negative shimmering. Through

was back

in myself, or

back

in the

rough

actual self rides about in. Elizabeth returned to her

had found our way back, tracing some ectoplasmic um-

bilicus.

My eyes

opened wide and locked onto

hers.

The mutual knowledge,

the mutual experience, crackled the space between us. Sweet sparks flew

when I touched her. You know how isolated most people are, most of the time.'' People who live together for years know a few camouflaging layers of each other's personality. Inside, they ache with loneliness.

A rier

few of us have a

talent that

makes

between people. I'm not sure what

it

possible to transcend the bar-

it is,

really.

But

it's

genuine.

No

hallucination.

And

we've got other

talents.

Really, Really,

Weird Stories

John Shirley

We spent a blissful week meeting secretly. work.

The Educated Male.

to play

No, no,

I?

I

I

really

helped her with her home-

knew it made me

don't think she needed help, but she

I

Live in Elizabeth 149

I

needed help on the

trig.

Blue. Only,

you made

Sorry.

She took control for a moment. Great

Oh:

helped her with her homework, and in return she

I

feature story

on the housing

crisis— she said

it

little

We made

The exchange less

didn't always happen,

got used to

till I

cohabited in

The

more than

my body

.

.

.

when we had because

relief,

a

first

as

split

pretended she

two minds

it

sex. It

happened

was a frightening

in

we somehow empty.

second. For ten or fifteen seconds

while hers remained

but

alive

We

one body, without

with a blizzard of random mental imagery. The

ended

the

occasion our two consciousnesses

cohabitation wasn't altogether pleasant.

communicate,

my

vilified

I

it.

Even more frightening was the shared one body for

worse.

criticized

was shallow, I

it

love.

than half the time. That was a

experience,

good

Where was

kidder.

landlords without taking their perspectives into account.

was wrong.

feel

In return-

had

to learn

terrifying

first

how

to

one another

few cohabitations

our nerves overloaded, raw. Now, we've learned the

in confusion,

internal dance, the revolving of polarized mental focus-points,

making

the sharing possible.

Sunday afternoon,

wore a

a

suit,

suit. I

I

went

and maybe

that

to Elizabeth's

house to meet her parents.

was bad psychology.

It

was July; too hot

I

for

stood on their doorstep, sweating, wires of tension knotting in

my gut, waiting for someone to answer the door. I remember I kept pickwrong for Summer. I felt Elizabeth coming to answer the door. The door opened and I had to fight myself. She wore a wrap around skirt and a bikini top. "Hi," she said, ing flecks of lint off—it

was a dark

suit, all

glancing over her shoulder. "Did you bring the—" Just then her

dad came

to the

door and interrupted

what she'd meant. She'd asked me

worked

it

me

up from her

bread on the

I

this

the

money and

friends, dutiful as a

way home from

work.

is

knew

I

bought two grams for

I'd

husband stopping

still

her;

for a loaf of

refused to use the smff, or

made

fun of me.

the mystery boy," said her dad, again.

my hand. But he didn't shake The smile had looked me over. "How old did you say you were,

smiled and extended

left his

I

up some blow for her. She and half her wages went to

even do a second dose of Demerol, and she "So

But

after school part-time at a bookstore,

cocaine. She'd given

picked

to pick

her.

face as he

friend?" he asked, rather abruptly.

Really, Really,

Weird Stories

it.

150

I

John Shirley

Live IN Elizabeth

I

was annoyed, and

I

opted for honesty. "I'm

Elizabeth closed her eyes

and swallowed

thirty-one,"

I

said.

visibly.

Mrs. Calder came to the door. They were the sort of couple who'd

come

one another, over the

to look like

bulbous, their faces lined in the

same

into the house.

daughter comes of age,

teen. In earlier times

uncommon

wasn't

marry

I'd like to

got a good job and

I've

her.

When

she's eigh-

for a girl of fourteen to

be—"

have to ask you to leave."

"I'll I

it

you think you're

"I'm not a chiseler or

said,

I

a creep, A^. Calder. I'm far from well-to-do, but

when your

hell

How smpid do you think we are?"

and walked

Elizabeth swore

little

Mi. Calder asked me,

what the

leaning against the doorframe, "Buddy,

going to get away with here?

Both were tanned, a

years.

directions.

my

lost

temper.

"Look—you're

a hypocrite.

was somebody

If I

really

Donald Trump or someone, but forty—you d shake my hand and ask which caterers to use at the wedding. You wouldn't give a damn

wealthy,

about crites

my age. You and your wife are a couple of narrow-minded hypowho wouldn't know love if it bit you on the ass—" All right, it was

smpid. But

I

was sure

I'd

Elizabeth's father gave

making

me

totter

never get to see Elizabeth again.

me

a vicious shove in the center of

backwards.

reached past him to a shelf

I

resented that.

just inside

water and wilted crocuses, and

No

at him.

solid connections.

my

chest,

returned to the doorstep,

the door, snatched up a vase of

dumped

my hand and

knocked the vase from

I

it

on

his head. Sputtering,

took a swing

at

me.

I

he

took a swing

His wife panicked and ran outside, shout-

ing for the cops.

My luck:

the guy across the street

was an

who

faced guy, smelling of suntan lotion,

Bermuda to state

shorts

and twisted

my

arms behind

my case. He was a big guy. I was go through my pockets.

He was

off-duty cop.

a red-

trotted over in his thongs

me

not so

before

big.

I

and

had a chance

He

told Elizabeth's

just

toughened the

father to

And I

then

I

remembered the

cocaine.

spent the next seven months in prison.

Possession of cocaine,

first

offense,

and they'd

laws—good timing. Would have copped two years maze,

if it

Does

in that concrete rat

weren't for the Agremerol experiments.

that

sound

like

I

You've already pictured

got off easy? it.

Only seven months

You picture

in prison?

the over-crowded cells-cells

crowded

men whose entire lives are just waiting periods between outbursts of rage. You picture the gang-rapes in the showers, the men drawing territorial lines, parceling out other men into allies and chattels and enemies; you picture the with

Really, Really,

Weird Stories

John Shirley

Live in Elizabeth

I

corrupt, indifferent guards, the smuggled drugs and, everpresent, the motionless horror:

the endless gun-colored claustrophobic confinement.

Well, you're wrong.

because

different,

It's

It's

different. it's

worse.

It's

at least five times

worse than you

imagine. Take everything ugly you visualize for prison, multiply

and you've imagined than

it

After her

my

was torment.

five

One A.M.

we decided not to

We had something better. .

bedroom,

She gave

me

tling gently against the

pane

cretly

my

once, before

when

I'd

on her bed.

hypnogogic

startling

from

my bunk would

clarity,

split,

would

The

on the

picture

two intense

fuse into

vision of Elizabeth, in

would begin with the eyes and

would be one moment on

was

lying

on

Elizabeth

Once

as a

were both

about.

had a

itself in

fill

a ratty

bunk in the

.

.

.

State Pen, seconds later

Elizabeth's fragrant bed, beneath a single soft blue sheet, a

was

there, with

me

laying a rosy tinge

bed with

boy, I'd shared a

five,

and our parents thought

Our house was lovely time.

I

on the shadows.

me.

little

small, the

brought a

of the house was asleep,

The

seen her

there; her brow, nose, lips, her oval face, her spill of glossy black

red lamp on the wall beside

I

rus-

the tree was a key,

visitation fall into place ... I'd

her white shoulders shaded with olive-gold

hair,

I

I'd visual-

window

run-in with her parents, meeting Elizabeth se-

orbs of onyx: the pupils of Elizabeth's eyes.

I

open my eyes and

the Elder Calders were away. I'd concentrate

and the darkness over

It

a time, a very specific

Somehow

in the breeze.

and helped the elements of the

room.

alone, at the appointed hour.

Wednesday and Sunday.

every

.

.

in her

visiting

her bedroom, her red-shaded lamp, the tree outside her

room

by five,

one another again,

see

stare into the darkness. I'd picture Elizabeth lying ize

it

more crowded

times

not through the wire mesh of the

least,

She would be

time.

it's

sanity.

to the prison,

first visit

got out. At

I

That's because

should be.

Elizabeth saved

until

right.

it

my visiting cousin.

we were

and

safe.

We

under the covers, when the

rest

beds few-they figured

flashlight

Lollie

too young too worry

and we examined one

it

was

another in fascination.

blanket over us, the atmosphere beneath steamy with body heat,

perfumed with our had gone body.

into a separate

A world

That's

natural scents—all of

how

it

made me

feel that

she and

where each shared the

I

other's

of innocent sensual sharing.

I felt,

then, with Elizabeth. Only, instead of our being un-

der a blanket together, exactly see

wodd

together,

we were nestling within a single

one another-it was a

Really, Really,

Weird Stories

skin.

We couldn't

sort of blind mental groping with

151

152

I

John Shirley

Live IN Elizabeth

ghostly physical sensations. quite her,

even now.

when

.

merged, and we never It

was

like

operate her body,

I

never lost

my sense

.

we were

But

.

will.

woman

holding a

of maleness.

I

We

never

close

from

And

the inside.

a particularly intimate dancing. I've

like

it's

distinct entities.

have never completely identified with

I

don't feel female;

simply

I

feel extraor-

dinarily close to one.

When both trol

of us occupied one body, either she or

of that body's movements at any one time.

When

I

would be

in con-

command

she's in

of the body, I'm there, passive but conscious of what's going on, experi-

encing her physical sensations in a sort of reverberation. of her thoughts, unless she wills

one

djinn in

it.

We are

distinct,

I

And when we make

love ...

through her nervous system.

Don t

I

could

tell

you about the

secret

I

And

then

tell

them

chambers

send racing

trade muscular control, very

It's

this.

just that

it's

an area of enthusiasm for me.

get to talk to anyone outside

You are No, no.

we

I

we can-

Sorry, dear. rarely

sick of

Let's

me.

I

knew

it!

And

It

was hard

to think, at

mine. Gambling for cigarettes, for syringes, for bits

of

steel, for

money,

all

first,

out, to lose yourself in the

it all

round the

squirrel's

cage in the

skull.

lighters, for

I

had

because

men

candy

in

bars,

the things they weren't sup-

posed to have that they always managed close

so

You—

the cells are so crowded, so noisy, and there were nineteen

sharpened

it's

you—

not go into that again, Elizabeth. Later. Anyway,

a lot of time to think in prison.

for

all

ornate bottle.

lovely,

of her, the cellular singings in her, the electrical rushes

quickly, so

don't hear

but intertwined, two

to get. But

you learned to

mental maze, to jog round and

To keep from

flipping out ... All

that thinking, together with a tattered science magazine in the prison library,

synthesized a theory. Suppose that

we

each have two bodies,

the visible body, cellular-organic, and the other a plasmic skein of sub-

atomic wave

particles,

flesh, inter-penetrating

right circumstances.

I

consciousness cohabitating with the body of it,

but capable of surviving outside

thought of

it

as the plasmic body.

it,

given the

My

plasmic

body could leave my material body, and transmit itself, through some medium beyond my guesswork, to Elizabeth. It was possible for two plasmic bodies to cohabit in one material body, while the departed

body waited felicitously,

in a sort of stasis, a self-imposed hibernation. It

with Elizabeth and

I,

worked

we were in love, because we man was invaded by an unwel-

because

accepted one another. But suppose a

Really, Really,

Weird Stories

John Shirley

come

plasmic body? Hadn't

happened, before?

it

I

Live in Elizabeth

It

could explain the

legends of possession.

And since it was possible might

not be possible to use

it

my own plasmic body,

to willfully manipulate

someone

against

it

In prison,

else's?

you're forever mulling the prospects for self-defense. I

was thinking about

the

it,

most

Tarnower had come

particularly, since

There were only three white guys

cell.

to

Tarnower was one

in the cell.

of them.

Tarnower had a

perfectly ordinary face,

one of those men who wore a ured his features; his face was

Even

self-pity.

in sleep, the

no doubt,

as a boy.

But he was

single facial expression so long, all

it

transfig-

whining resentment. Permutations of

same twisted sneer on

his lips.

His head was

vaguely peanut-shaped, and he was potbellied, soft of limb, always twitching, looking to see

if it

was he being laughed

at.

He

was

in for

dealing PCP.

Tarnower

didn't like the fact that Brinker protected

of law school, and Brinker prized

me

dorm

the

me from

hard-guys against me, implying

He

wanted

even more after the State Health teers in

was a spy

to earn Brinker's gratimde

had saved them from

that he, Tarnower,

I

extor-

trying to turn

for the prison ad-

by making

my treachery. And

Facility

and

rape, assault,

Tarnower had no protection, and he was constantly

ministration.

had a year

I'd

as his "in-house attorney." Brinker

was the dorm heavy, and he protected tion.

me.

it

seem

he hated

came around asking

me

for volun-

exchange for parole.

Volunteers for "experiments in drug abuse therapy." Several hundred

of us applied, including Tarnower.

taken to the research ous.

He

facility

I

was accepted, and was

furi-

was sure he'd been overlooked because of me. Because, he

claimed, he'd seen

me

"slip

something to the guard."

convince another lunkhead of the same thing.

making plans

me

told I'd be

the following morning. Tarnower was

to

kill

And

me. They'd been high on the

list

I

He managed knew

to

they were

of volunteers. With

good chance one of them would be picked. A drag me told me all this. "You gonna fall and hit

dead, there was a

queen who'd taken a fancy to

you head inna showers, honey," the queen informed make it look that way. You watch you ass now." "I

always watch

my

ass in the

me

sweetly.

"They

showers"

"That's two of us, honey."

So that I

set the killing for the next

waited

Tarnower

till

sat

well

up on

Really, Really,

after lights his

bunk,

his

Weird Stories

morning.

out.

Most

of the

men were

asleep.

back to me, talking softly to a Hispanic

153

154

I

John Shirley

Live IN Elizabeth

named upper

Altinp. Heavy-set

he shook with

lip;

man

with stubby hands and sweat beading his

silent laughter at

was doing more than watching them.

I

I

something Tarnower

was

focusing.

Channeling some of my plasma body, extending hands.

own

It

was

hands;

I

me

.

.

were reaching out with

if I

was

said.

reaching.

my outstretched extensions of my

from

invisible

pictured these plasmic hands as splayed and translucent,

I

two membranes, one on

gelatinous,

from

as

it

I

either side of the

two men across

.

brought the plasmic hands together, clapping their heads between. But

the hands didn't strike them, physically. skull, like

nets through water,

coming

They passed through the

and

into contact with the plasmic fields

them

of the two cons, compressing them, tugging

The men screamed, thrashed

skin

together.

seemed

in confusion as their senses

to

mingle. Altino splashed into Tarnower, Tarnower into Altino.

They'd been conspirators, not friends. They were frightened, small-

minded men.

They clawed

at

one another, the room erupted with shouting, and

somewhere alarm bells rang as the guards heard the uproar. The next day, in the cafeteria, the story was told like this: "Yeah, Tarnower. He's flipped out— frothing Altino—he's what they

his,

Who

knows what

And

in

call

at the

a vegetable.

it

was

mouth. That vato buddy of

He

just stares, like, all day.

the fuck happened."

due course,

after

an uneventful shower,

I

was taken

to the cus-

tody of dear Doctor Schusser. I

was paroled, but

therapy,

and

I

We made

motel. day,

and we'd

had

lots

But right

had

was allowed

ties. I

had

to participate in four

to stay at the Jersey

MHF research center's living faciliwe met at a cheap on her eighteenth birth-

to see Elizabeth three hours a day;

plans. She'd leave her parents

live

weeks of experimental

together while she went to college in Manhattan.

We

of lovely plans.

it all

waited on Schusser and Morgan.

from the

across

I

start

of

from two black

the right.

I

my

first

I

had a nasty sinking

conference with them.

vinyl armchairs;

Morgan on

sat

I

the

left,

thought of Tweedledee and Tweedledum. But

it

on

feeling

a couch

Schusser to

turned out

Punch and Judy. Morgan was a brown suit man. Thought he was dressing tastefully and casually in his various shades of they were

brown. ties,

more

He had

like

a shapeless red beard and sandy hair; he

always looked a

little tired.

Especially

Schusser: late thirties, paunchy, typically

turtleneck sweater—even

on hot

days.

when he spoke wore gray

was

in his for-

to Schusser.

slacks

and a blue

Dandruff salted

his shoulders.

Really, Really,

Weird Stories

John Shirley

I

Thinning, disarrayed black eyes.

wood

I

And

it.

how

I'd

seem a heavy ".

when

.

.

to summarize,"

therapeutically.

my

written application;

they asked

It's

my

me

about

Morgan droned, is

I

we call D-17, administered just we believe, will make you unusu-

a medication

a long, chill shudder

went through me.

I'd

to justify this kind of tampering. But

was

want

to break parole, to

in

our

lab's

dorm. The experiments began imme-

And for the first few nights, I noticed nothing unusual. I we slept, some white-coated drip would whisper, "Drugs

Cocaine makes you nauseated. Heroin does nothing for you.

ill.

Marijuana gives you a headache. You have no enjoyment of

The next

article

known about it

night.

told that, as

make you

didn't

I

.

signed the papers. Lots and lots of papers.

There were four others

That

." .

once written an

research into the dream-state. There was just too litde

diately

had

I

lied brilliantly.

subliminal suggestion during dream-time

I

when

"the experiment uses dream-time

a hypnotic, which,

always be running. So

mur-

I

my background.

"current problems with drugs,"

keep the parole.

The key

ally receptive to

And

developed

user, to

before you sleep.

on

replies

fabricated a grand story, a harrowing history of drug abuse

they asked to

a shoe, with a long curl of

like

listened distantly as they reviewed

mured monosyllabic

between us on which was

coffee-table

a yellow ceramic plant holder shaped

greenery growing out of

brown

Affected friendliness in his small

hair.

There was a polished

Live in Elizabeth

day, Schusser

and Morgan would

." .

.

test us, giving us small

doses of controlled substances, so they could watch for the hoped-for aversion reactions.

Morgan blamed

It

didn't work; the drugs continued to feel good.

Schusser's

"suggestion

Morgan's dosage. More than once office.

I

began to

some sort of state They hated one I

realize that they

I

script";

Schusser

blamed

heard them arguing in Schusser's

were working together

health department politics forced

it

reluctantly;

on them.

another.

and the three other

subjects,

who were black, weren't allowed to

dis-

cuss the experiment with one another. But as the days passed, the haunted looks in their tired faces confirmed my suspicions. They were

having a reaction to D-17 similar to mine. Nightmares. "Nightmares" doesn't describe it. An understatement. Everything matic that had ever happened to over,

magnified and exaggerated.

me I

trau-

dredged up and replayed, over and

saw

my mother

dying of cancer again,

dreamed I would come home but more vividly than I'd seen and find her in my bed, dying, wasting away So I'd run to the bathroomit

and she'd be

in the tub. Dying.

Really, Really,

in real

life. I

Wasting away.

Weird Stories

155

156

I

John Shirley

Live IN Elizabeth

I felt

I'd

ing

the nightmares

dream I was back in

my head

I'd

more

in the toilet.

deeply,

more palpably than I'd felt anything,

prison. Altino

and Tarnower

strangling

ever.

me, hold-

And worse.

wake up screaming, and

day long.

I'd feel like living hell all

Sometimes ghost images of the dreams would superimpose over waking

my

Tarnower caressing the corpse of

see

reality. I'd

the grass across from the park bench where I'd been trying to find

peace with Elizabeth. still

And

some

the subliminal suggestions, after three weeks,

didn't work.

At the beginning of the fourth week, Schusser talked Morgan into pling the dosage.

I

into trouble— they I

my

mother, on

had the impression were exceeding the

that

Morgan was

tri-

afraid they'd get

legal limit.

had a whole new season of nightmares. One

in particular recurred

On the third night, I woke up premamrely, screaming. my own room—our screams had made it necessary to isolate us. I was awake, but I was still having the nightmare; I was hallucinating, my night after night.

I

was

in

nightmare superimposed over the real world of the I

lab's

saw myself standing there—I saw myself as a separate

bedroom.

entity.

Only, the

man I saw, standing over me—his breathing glutinously bubbling—the man had changed. The face was barely recognizable. It was hardly there at all. My face was deformed, crushed into a bloody mockery. And below, my gut was laid open, my entrails pendulously dangling. It shuffled toward me and bent to ram its long, gray dead-man's tongue down my throat. Choking me. I saw it bright as noonday. I clawed the EEC wires from my head and ran to the window. I was awake— but I wasn't, quite. I hesitated at the

window.

I

mrned. The thing was

lucent but repulsive as a tumor;

it

hated me;

it

there,

behind me,

was malevolently

trans-

rabid.

plunged through the window in a panic to get away. Anywhere away. crash, crystalline explosion

and four kinds of

pain. Shouts

I

A

from some-

where. Consciousness coming and going in the same vacillation as the warbling of approaching

The

lab's

dorm was

sirens.

six floors up.

the window was a wrought One of the spears split my A third tore my face from my skull.

Under

iron fence topped with hard black spears. liver.

Another broke

my spine in two.

There wasn't much anyone could have done to repair

it.

my eyes remained. With that eye saw myself. saw what remained of my face, in the outside rearview mirror of the ambulance as the medics pulled me free of the spikes. The face saw was the face of the thing in my nightmare. It was me, One

of

I

I

I

now, and always would be,

if I

lived.

My new self-image. Really, Really,

Weird Stories

John Shirley

My soul,

or

I

you

if

like,

my plasma body,

Live in Elizabeth

me

passed from

forever then,

and

fled along the psychic channels to another receptacle.

ries,

my personality came

along.

found a home forever

I

My memo-

in the

body of

Elizabeth Calder.

we calmed into we going to do to them?"

After a few days of mutual comforting and readjustment,

cool determination, and she asked me, "What are

Elizabeth

was

in control that night.

opened the door arguing.

Ten minutes

regret for

We

opened her hands.

later,

death and the

official inquiry.

what they'd done

We

Morgan

now and

sat

one of the

sat in

He was lying on the floor,

a hole in his right bicep. His face was smeared with his

Morgan, or Morgan's body, hand. Blinking

me.

reached out, together.

the security guard found us.

black vinyl chairs, watching Schusser.

its

to

bent over their reports, sweating. Elizabeth

sat close together,

raised her arms,

watching as she

her,

There were Schusser and Morgan,

my

Blaming one another for

Never speaking a word of sincere

They

rode within

I

to Schusser's office.

up on the couch,

chewing

own

blood.

staring at the papers in

then. Seeing nothing. Empty.

wasn't there anymore.

He

was with

Schusser, very intimately

with Schusser. Inside him. Struggling, screaming

at

him

mentally,

trapped forever.

And

I'm in Elizabeth forever.

you'd talk to her,

another receptacle.

But she wants

It's

convince her to It's

me

not that

I

a kind of paradise,

let

me

really.

out once in awhile.

I

But

I

wish

could find

don't love her.

always near

her.

She never

lets

me

go.

You

see, a

man's material body might be stronger than a woman's. But when

comes

to a

Elizabeth

plasma body is

much

Really, Really,

.

.

.

stronger than

Weird Stories

I

am.

it

157

Morons at the Speed of Light

I

was charged with

The sun was

atmosphere had brations.

I

beating of

inspiration:

was

become

crystalized,

thought all

it

that kind of winter day in the

bloodless but amiable, the icy air was

the

city,

vi-

the collective

and

exhilarating with vibra-

Do you get me, oh do you see? A resonant day, when ramifications

normally inaccessible came into grasp the wrist.

The barren

beneath them

And

I

was

trees

returning to

like trained falcons

were the Earth's nerve endings; the sidewalk

tympanum.

its

strutting

through

sun, drinking in those vibes,

this exquisite

coming back

now: a young man finding the center of It

city.

if

those hearts in chorus; every tiny explosion in every piston-

casing in every car engine; the air frightening tion.

as

super-conductive of sounds and

could hear the heartbeat of the

I

was

still; it

medium, squinting

into touch with

who

at the I

was

all,

next

his youth.

was a long time ago.

That morning, semester, but

did offer

And

I

I

was thinking

I

ought to go back to school,

liked playing with the

band more—but,

after

after

all,

the

U of O

me a full scholarship—but then I'd have to move down to Eugene—

then

I

saw one.

You've seen them.

More and more called

them

of them,

as kids.

all

the time more, in

Ozone Zeros. You'd probably

all cities.

call

them

Goons, we nuts.

This

one was shuffling awkwardly along, stumbling and swaying. But you could

tell

stumbling.

He

he wasn't drunk or fucked up on reds—it wasn't that sort of It

seemed almost

deliberate, like pratfalling.

stepped onto the railroad tracks near Powell's bookstore, and

started tightrope-walking a railroad

He was orating to the air, hands before

rail.

Suddenly impossibly

adroit.

a gibberish soliloquy, flapping his long white

his grinning, twitching face, improvising doggerel for a line

Really, Really,

Weird Stories

Morons at the Speed of Light

John Shirley

or two, then shouting threats at the leafless trees arching over the sidewalk, along the street with the tracks in sides of the mirror

"Don't

it.

you vegetable brains or

me

tell

I'm on both

trim your sex organs but

I'll

good, Pinocchio was underage and you could do time, monkeybars!"

He

had one

boot and one

pants-leg tucked into his

An

back and buttoned up wrong.

sticking out in

His tennis shoes were laced

in

an

intricate tangle,

buzzing back and forth, scanning the

air

out,

and

his shirt

institution-blue shirt.

and

with equally intricate abandon.

He seemed to be trying to see everything at once, and as a result nothing. He leaned ahead as he walked, and he walked blindly. I

tend to

and

that

seeing

such folk morons, though, of course, the term doesn't

call

They're not morons

clinically apply.

them

were

his eyes

stuck with me,

it

speaking.

strictly

My Dad

called

is all.

You pass at least one every day in a crowded city. It's amazing; how many of them there are, and how similar they are, and how frantic. I pitied them and wished I could help and wondered if they were actually happier than

The pity,

I.

mixed emotions, when

usual

at

them. Revulsion and

empathy and compassion. And—

-for an instant, as he passed I

looked

I

looked

me

mine—he saw!— our minds met

Help me,

me

barrier between

That's

what

I

us,

Oh,

this

and I act

thought

seen that day), into

perhaps carried on the

the ordinarily inaccessible waves

air,

way, they

in invisible

his glance said to

as words, but as feelings crystalline

I'd

and he looked

his thoughts.

wasn't always

I

"moron"

his eyes

at that instant,

special tide of vibrations filing the

revealing to

(the third

looked into

closer than usual,

and

pictures,

made me

this

way, there

is

a

dramas.

me.

and

it

came into my mind not was clear as day, as that

It

morning.

shit. I

was

stricken. Buzzing

on

that flicker of revelation.

him but something froze my tongue-he walked away. Or was carried away. I was left alone on that corner, thinking: he looks like a puppet dancing all clumsy on strings. Something is yanking him, I

turned to

call

sweeping him along!

walked on, wondering what he had done, why Something had decided to consume the poor sucker. I

this

Unguessable

two blocks later I saw another. where the derelicts and I was getting into downtown, now. Old Town, He tourists rub elbows, and a goon came stumbling out of a doorway.

And

was

just

short-haired

Really, Really,

and

clean, dressed pretty

Weird Stories

much

like

the others.

Same

159

i6o

Morons at the Speed of Light

John Shirley

symptoms. Declaiming nonsense hebephrenic chatter, something

you

their ugly fingers yes

like

like:

was axiomatic

it

"No

to

won't yes you

I

no you won't, them and

will

world will

affairs,

a

not them

us tonight

you

cocksucker and ugly together a terrible cold uneasy parasites and night-

you know now, thanks but no, no

mare-flesh-crevices thank you,

what I

.

."

.

And

tribe

recited.

Just as disheveled, hebephrenic harangue, a surrealist dia-

with that special rhythm, and the current, the recurrence of certain

words bers,

later.

know

word mix that somehow There came another, ten

noticed there was a certain rhythm and a

matched the one the other "morons" minutes

I

on.

prime num-

in a pattern almost like a code, or like the return of

sometimes even

like multiples

of a given integer. Purposeful—in a

cryptographic way.

The in

special air brought

me. Some days you're

realize

how

to

it

me, the unusual keenness

more awake than

just

you are on other days

asleep

.

you

it skillfully

(and

ball

under the cups too

and you misread; but paranoia is a

to see,

skull-fully?)

may prod you

it

awake; into discovering that consciousness

awakened

some days you

.

.

Sometimes paranoia confuses, switches the fast for

that'd

others;

skill,

into being a

a direction,

is

and

you use

if

little

more

in a certain

is

direction: the least comfortable one. I

had stumbled

Using

my

into this

.

.

.

this

method

senses consciously, honing

psychic razor blade that split divides a string;

my

.

my

.

.

attention into a superthin

neural channels like a sharp knife that

opening and exposing

my senses, making them

hurt for

that extra edge of sensitivity.

But haven't you noticed it—that some days the goons, the twitchers, the voices crying out in their personal wildernesses,

where, a

sinister presence, as if they're

ground of our I

A

saw one

living tableau as a

after the other,

on

seem

display, sort

to be every-

of in the back-

warning.

and every one seemed

to

tell

me

something.

pattern in their jabber, in their Brownian motions downi the street—

and

gestalt patterns, a connective matrix of behavioral characters

scared me. So after three hours

Not I

"I

needed help"

like "I

I

knew I needed

help; a partner,

I

it

mean.

need therapy," okay?

brought Jim Burbidge into

it.

Burbidge, he's a genius. Behind his

mind hums. He's a technological avatar, went and told him; we sat on those reed mats that

gaunt, bird-like veneer a mighty is

Burbidge.

make up

And

I

the only furniture in his apartment. (Are bookshelves furniture?

Bookshelves overflowed everywhere

.

.

.).

He

stopped toying with the

Really, Really,

Weird Stories

John Shirley

Morons at the Speed of Light make

software he'd put together, software to listened with that urbane

He

and-he believed me. crossed legs went to

when he

felt like

it,

detachment of

sleep as

and

I

He

was

He was

waited.

I

a researcher for IBM,

almost expected a long tongue of computer

tape to start unrolling from his

But instead he

sense of Charles Fort; he

nodding

his poor posture, and thought and dreamed awake, and my

sat

his,

mouth with

the Answer.

My kind."

man.

said, "Let's meditate,

talking about the particular

brand of mindfulness meditation

he'd hatched: mostly with meditation you stay away from thinking, you

from

step back

it,

you

and

stay alert

receptive, but

you don't think—or

anyway, you're not identified with the part that does. But Burbidge had a

method— something he adapted from Raja yoga—

kind of mindfulness that took

command

associating minds,

something gaged I

sat

problem

my

back

A ball

at

The

hand

.

.

.

mind, not

sat across

portion, en-

breaths,

and then we did

that

.

my

chest. It

was a prism of

atten-

our observations, revealing hidden ranks of color. to

do

of the

lines

become

from me; we sank ourselves

it

then; in those days.

I

can't

has happened. I'm afraid to go that way, But then

The

some

just

to

.

of scintillant ice expanded in

knew how

mind

that part of the

entire .

he

straight;

Burbidge variation

tion, refracting I

inner "babbling hebephrenics," our free

moment, watched our

into the present thing, the

own

and commanded

a computer.

like

in the

with

of our

room and

superimpose, converge, and

air.

He

.

.

it

.

now. Too much

then

.

the skein of that day's events I

the room. Burbidge looked up

words from the

do

could see alertly,

my

life

in the

began to speak

.

.

seemed

to

geometries of

as

if

reading the

said the connective behavioral linkage

between

was a result of their suffering from the "morons," the same mental disease with the same symptoms; symptoms resulting from the same dilemma; alienation from our defacing monster of a the street babblers,

civilization,

and no

media bombardment,

excessive input, data overioad fugue;

no believable social shock from the modern world's war on

familiar ritualistic centers left in our lives,

symbols for centering on. Shell your nerves. Plausible. I

But-some

instinct told

me

it

was more. And

uglier.

If we recorded the morons' diatribes and unraveled the sub-sense of it, we somehow and

suggested an experiment.

codified that patterning

could perhaps contrive a means to cure these poor suckers and get rich touting the procedure, write books about it, clean up like Janov and

Bradshaw.

Really, Really,

Weird Stories

i6i

i62

Morons AT THE Speed OF Light

John Shirley

Burbidge protested, "We'd have to spend months

can be?

hov^^ tedious transcribing tapes

any idea

at

And

Do

it!

follow^ing ill-smell-

ing lunatics around, acquiring the microphones w^e'd need, novelty

fast,

man. Take up

"Jim you're sick of IBM.

all

my time.

you have

it'd

Unlike yourself. Sparky,

They owe you

you solved

bigtime,

I

lose

its

work"

that bubble-

on the new post-Crays. I almost threw the / Ching this morning—and if I had— I can picture it, right now, it'd say: 'Proceed with that which may seem extraor-

magnetism data-save problem

for them, saved

them

millions

dinary and time consuming and profit thereby.'"

no such

"There's

Ching—you know,

line in the /

never actually threw? But okay. turn

it

If

we

into a conceptual art project

concrete pillars— sell

it

to the

and

Museum

sell

of

Ching

the /

from

get nothing else

that

it,

you

we can

the transcriptions glued to

Modern

Art for a half a mil-

lion bucks."

It

We

wasn't easy.

Burbidge had a

Jimmy I

lot

Carter in

of

it

up and

money

started again eight or nine times. But

saved and

we had more momentum

was a while ago.

months of meticulously recording

their

ing their pathways (like neural pathways in the

down

wanderings

the street, tracing

it

harangues and

mind of

Oh yes

.

.

to the next

BIG computers,

math

.

.

film-

city), their

.

.

.

to

the parallels,

.

.

.

Burbidge translated

the

.

the

from rooftops, we were able

graph and codify their patterns-in-common and oh yes

one "moron"

than

'76.

told you, this

After two

gave

.

at

it all

work.

into computerese. Slipped

it

into

one of the

We got results. Three weeks later we confirmed

and we had three

solid results of

all

that apparently

mean-

ingless labor.

i)

An

2)

A diagram for an inertialess faster-than-light drive, utilizing aspects of

3)

A

the

equation for the Unified Field Theory

UFT

equation

chemical formula for a remarkable fuel which applies to the

gram

for the

FTL

We had it right there in our hands. We told no one.

That's right.

going to take time to figure out there

how

was the question of applying

stolen, but

.

.

dia-

drive.

to demonstrate

for patents

.

.

.

We

all

It

was

this—and then

didn't

want

it all

.

Really, Really,

Weird Stories

John Shirley

We

Morons at the Speed of Light

figured our fortunes were made.

find out

why it had

come from

all

background

tantalizing

hum

Still,

we

prudently decided to

the "morons". Because there

in the

whole phenomenon

that

was

that

seemed

to

imply external interference.

So we checked with the welfare agencies that took care of gibberers, and found out just who they'd been, before.

As a

I'm embarrassed to be seen reading the National Enquirer—

rule,

but maybe

it

out more often. Because Burbidge showed

appeared there

article that

mental

check

I'll

among

illness

Burbidge and

I

last

year remarking

firmed

me

an

rise in

research scientists.

got together at his apartment, sat in his personal medi-

contemplated the data— and had a simultaneous

tation,

most a dual

Then we checked

theoleptic revelation.

of insight:

fit

al-

the records and con-

it.

Most of our "morons" were former

chemists, physicists, engineers,

systems designers, mathematicians. But not

former

journalists, investigators—i.e., just

And

to the facts.

big things,

and someone stepped

found the machine, too.

brother, the

the notes

Marion County

on

of them. Eight were

all

people who'd

come too

close

these people had stumbled onto certain things, certain

and did a cruel number on them.

in

Changed them. With what? With a machine

We

on the very odd

that

makes them mad.

took pressure from Burbidge's older

It

District Attorney, to get the hospital records,

the "experiments."

We

found two machines,

actually,

and

God knows how many more there are about the country. We found one at Hardin Hospital,

New

York

City,

and one

in Salem's State Hospital, in

Oregon. Insane asylums. At Hardin, and the Salem nut-house,

known

as "an experimental electronic therapeuter,"

These EETs enclose the patient like that

mummify

Ones who

isn't

it,

I

is

what

is

for short.

electronic sarcophagi,

a portion of the living brain. They-and

mummy cases

mean THEY,

the

have insinuated themselves into the body of our society-they

put the poor guy into the hospital

EET

files

cruel

have

it),

EET and

"rephrase the neural channels" (as the

supposedly to straighten the guy out. Which

funny, considering what

it

is

funny,

does to them. Why'd they keep

using "therapeutic" devices that demonstrably

made patients worse.^ It was money from

part of a "Federal Program" and in order to keep getting the

the program, the hospitals had to continue the experiments under the

di-

rection of certain Federal Researchers. Follow the money.

Only those Federal Researchers

The

conditions under which

aren't really Federal Researchers.

the so-called patients

are only vaguely alluded to in the

Really, Really,

Weird Stories

files,

were

Of course.

first

arrested

though former associates and

163

i64

Morons at the Speed of Light

John Shirley was

family insist that in each case the researcher in question fine,

even exhilarated (as

after a great discovery), the

if

The day

she w^as "taken into custody."

fine, just

day before he or

the patient was taken a totally

unprecedented behavior arose—a wildness, a violence consistent with certain obscure psychotropic drugs, Burbidge says.

made them

their victims,

temporarily crazy— took

EET Scrambled

then destroyed their minds with

They

dosed

secretly

them

into custody,

eggheads. Better than

them—calls too much attention to them, to kill them. Every EET "patient" had been working on something to do with the Unified Field Theory, the drive, the fuel. We only know this through

killing

conversation with friends, family. Their notes, computer

experi-

files,

mental hardware vanished, of course.

The Big

But.

Discovery, being of

"moron's" former just as

we

all

paramount importance

emerges in

naturally

life,

the

in

his or her behavioral code,

exhibit unconscious obsessions in the emblematic expres-

sions of our entrenched day to day habits.

How had They found the scientists who were to somebody were monitoring computers used by research scientists, looking for certain types of equations You get it. But who was Somebody? If they were really government men, someone by now would have used the power in those equations—in weapons, in space travel, in some practical way to shore up our national power. And our country would have no military rivals, anywhere. We'd have imposed our will on the world by now So who were They?

be

their victims.-^ If

.

...

Or

it

.

.

would've been given to whatever huge corporations currendy

controlled the White

House and

they'd be

making money off

it.

Who

So follow the absence of money. If not the money— the motive. would benefit from suppressing this stuff? Take an E out of EET. No, purpose.

Maybe God put it

I

don't think they chose the acronym

there, to hip us to

it.

The ETs

on

don't want us

to invent certain things; perhaps they think we're too innately aggressive to

know what

amongst

they know.

We

can't

us, these extraterrestrials,

be

So they conceal agents

trusted.

some of whom

acquire posts of

fluence and affluence, and they use this influence and afluence to

mte the ET devices which

And poor

Burbidge

We were in las. We had

his

it all

the FBI!

.

.

in

mrn

in-

insti-

instimte our suppression.

.

apartment, arguing about what to do with the formuright there

And as we were

with

arguing.

a closet, as they were breaking

us.

I

said:

Run! Hide!

He

said:

They came, and took Burbidge.

down

the door.

I

Go

to

I

hid in

guess they didn't

know

Really, Really,

Weird Stories

John Shirley

Morons at the Speed of Light

about me, because they didn't look for me. They must've been monitoring IBM's Pordand facilities. And They got all our notes and records on

Those Three Things. The key

And

to star-flight, to immeasurable power.

didn't see Burbidge again for months. Till the

I

saw him

at

Fourth and Broadway explaining to a

had nothing against

it

summer

lamp post

after.

due to the shapes of the clouds

I

that he

he could not commit himself to

personally, but

for any serious length of time

steel

it

at three,

and nine o'clock Eastern Standard Time.

seven,

Sure,

tried the FBI.

I

leave their offices the

You know what they thought. And Men In White came to get me .

.

as .

I

tried to

Just for an

"evaluation," they said, in the hospital. I

had been

half expecting

though, and

it,

and out through the parking garage. And in

I

ran back into the building,

why I've been

that's

hiding out

San Francisco, panhandling, playing the part of a guy—a harmless

guy—who took too much

acid,

way back when.

''Don't point that at me, dude.''

F4ey man,

it's

just

know what you

are.

gun—right? Or

a squirt

Okay? This looks

one of those transparent toy raygun

like

squirt

is it? I

know what

it

is—and

I

a raygun-style squirtgun. like

guns

and dime

at the five

store.

and dime stores anymore. You've been wandering Haight Ashbury too long. Now if you'll excuse me—' Waitaminnut now—You think Fm doing nothing all these years? I've been experimenting, found that certain variants on LSD can reveal who ''They don't have five

among

who human. And

us are the ETs and

you mix

it

Dick-he intended the book

Philip

found out the same things

that's

it's

me

stuff on

Come stuff

You

is

on,

all .

.

.

done, so

come

You

obvious he'd

I

paid you to

tell

me your

street people in the Haight,

and

go of my arm-no don't squirt that

outside, that's it-just here, to the sidewalk.

DMSO

Now-the

and the psychedelic variant that-ah.

see?

Their enforcers, the ones

it.

You

who

do!

dress

No, don't scream, that'll attract like cops. You see how many of

there are?

even the lamp post knows. No, not that one-that one over there. knows, man. It knows. I told it so a thousand times-and it did not

And It

me either

if you'll let

You're beginning to see

Them

it's

if

one book by

oh Jesus ..."

water mixed with

see?

message for me,

my paper on

going to go into

we're

it,

as a

this

-

"Don't squirt any chemicals on story,

they're sensitive to water

with certain chemicals— I got a clue from

contradict me.

Really, Really,

Weird

Stories

165

Silent Crickets

The milky moonlight, sifted by mercuric clouds, snickers through the dense woods in slippery shafts. The faint light laps at the crotches of trees and catches on tangles of bated branches, giving the moss the silver sheen of mold. The deciduous trees are in bunches infrequently invaded by a lone pine. Roots are choked with

fallen leaves.

Bared branches are

abstracted into atmospheric capillaries. In the inky

short conical

fir

tree a

moves slowly forward, into the crater left by its

man

crouches with a

trying to

make

booted

tive

feet gripping the

song of the

is

He

mud,

rifle

hand.

He

its

trunk;

its

lying

is

hunkers in the shallow

barrel catching the light

on

roots are

and

pit, his

tinting

it

the chirr of a sneaking raccoon and the repeti-

crickets.

The crickets go abruptly The man is on the alert. Something moves .36,

rifle in his right

noise as he can, and creeps

crushed under

up over the man's head.

The only sound

blue.

little

an uprooted pine. The huge dying pine

side, smaller frustrated trees

thrusting

as

shadows under a

silent.

invisibly

through the woods.

He

tenses, raises the

props the gunstock against his right shoulder, finger tightening

around the

The

trigger.

He

reaches for the safety catch.

Is it

one of them f

figure emerges.

man alone. The man with the gun, Buckley, curator of the Deepwood Museum of Modern Art, stands and waves. The stranger, his It's

a man, a

face only partially visible,

few side.

feet

nods and comes forward.

from Buckley, looking

at the

The man wears dungarees and

long

rifle

He

stands silently a

upright at the curator's

a white long sleeve

shirt.

The

night

conceals most of his features. "Are you Buckley?"

He

asks in a low, oily tone.

"Yes."

Really, Really,

Weird Stories

John Shirley "I'm

.

.

Silent Crickets 167

Cranshaw. I'm from the

.

looking for you.

from your own talk to

you

in

New York Art Association.

believe your story

I

lips,

anyway.

.

.

had a

I've

more or

.

similar

.

.

less. I

experience.

.

.

of sexual reproduction are there?" Buckley asks, his

voice sounding strange to

him

in the sucking darkness.

and

there's mitosis

and among humanity

cross-pollination

good old—"

there's

"Among humanity ing in a rapid

clip.

there's

something

else,"

Buckley interrupts, speak-

"A mutation. Have you heard

doesn't create a 'new' vision, but only siphons

where

sion of reality

haps

business,

Miro and

.

"How many kinds .

it

to

."

Matta and Picasso

.

came

I

A strange

Buckley, burning eight hundred thousand dollars worth of

.

been

your study and your servant— she was quite flustered— said

that you'd run out here after burning the paintings.

"Well

I've

w^ant to hear

that abstraction

the abstract or surrealist

if

it

it

an

said that

artist

from another dimen-

the physical law? Perhaps. Per-

is

artist steals

from

that world's images,

from that other plane long enough, the creamres inherent to that world an

will take

us as a

interest in us

.

"Maybe.

Come

pearing? Well,

I

back to your smdy and

was

visiting

.

we'll talk

all

Matta when

about it-"

the artists who've been disapI

saw something happen

to

can't describe—"

"All this is interesting

"My

.

will replace its parents."

"No. Haven't you been reading about

I

here. Perhaps they'll use

I

Cranshaw, a child

him.

come

keep thinking of the words of the dadaist Jean Arp: Art is Someowing out of man-like the child out of its mother

insemination.

day,

to

transferring themselves through a kind of paintbrush

medium,

like fruit,

and contrive

but rather xenophobic," the stranger interrupts. much like yours as I had thought. It's not

experiences were not so

easy to be a curator these days,

God

knows. Those snotty young paint-

But come back and have a drink with me, Buckley. We'll work things out from there. Don't be afraid." He reaches out a hand to Buckley's

ers.

shoulder.

Buckley steps backwards, his hand tightens on the barrel of the gun. If like a country this man is from the Art Association, why is he dressed hick?

Cranshaw touches Buckley's

Buckley tion.

as

He

much

feels

it

steps

shoulder.

Suspicions confirmed.

then, the warning tingle, the onrush of activated abstrac-

back again,

raises the gun.

"You

lied to

me," he murmurs

to the night as to Cranshaw.

Another movement from the

far side

of the fallen tree catches his eye.

roots. Pure moving anachronism issuing from the areola of upmrned

Really, Really,

Weird Stories

It

John Shirley

i68 Silent Crickets

was the

abstract figure of

Marcel Duchamp's

own independent

case given

its

egesis of a

few moments of time

A

life.

Nude Descending A Stair-

study of strobed motion, the ex-

into cubism.

The

viewed

creature,

liter-

glowing against the tenebrous curtain of the woods, resembles a

ally,

robot strung in Siamese twin extrapolations of hallucinogenic acid

trail like

per-colored tin cans and

its

a mechanical cape.

itself,

It

leaving behind a

might be

built

of cop-

torso (futurist extrapolation of pivotal rota-

Moving toward Buckley, random tumble of spastic geometry, a carnivorous handy kitchen appliance. The figure is a vector for the bizarre, leaving behind it a wake tion)

is

built in striations like the gills of a shark.

a

it is

of abstracted

brush distorting into a vision of Siamese

trees,

dancers; tree trunks

made Rousseau

primitive

and

triplet belly

perfectly cylindrical-

smooth, branches becoming pin-cushion spines. But the voice of the vector

is

"I

human.

couldn't wait any longer.

"No," the stranger

came the

"Buckley,"

come

who

I

had

to

come. Has he been readied?"

called himself

Cranshaw

replies,

"not

just yet."

voice from the golden arachnid whirlpool,

here.

Buckley pulls a slim penlight from his pocket and shines

Cranshaw's pits

of

face.

Munch

proportional,

He

A Modigliani

on

simplification, that face, with

hollowness around the eyes. The man, while outwardly is

made

petual sardonic smile is

gasps.

it

of rigid planes, unmoving eyes, the same per-

two inches

to the left of his nose.

One

of his eyes

considerably higher than the other. His arms are blocked into rectan-

gular surfaces with ninety-degree corners. "It's all right,"

worry."

It

says the Cranshaw-thing,

its

voice fuzzy now. "Don't

reaches out a squared-off hand to Buckley's upraised

touches the barrel with a gende caress at the same

moment

rifle,

that the cu-

rator touches the trigger.

The gun explosion,

doesn't go off. There

comes a

faint puffing

is

a conspicuous silence. Instead of an

sound.

soap bubble off Cranshaw's chest and trees. Desperately,

Buckley

A globular bullet bounces like floats

feels the barrel

gers like an exhausted erection, rubbery

piece of the barrel and puts

it

to his

of the gun.

and

a

up through the clawing

pliant.

It

sags in his fin-

He

breaks off a

mouth. Licorice. The gun melts into

He flings it away but already the tingling chill is traveling up his arm. He looks at the two abstract beings standing patiently by, sees them reticulate and waver like an unstable TV picture. He

a snakelike abstraction.

looks

down

into the

at his body, sees his legs sprout roots

humus under

his

new

which rapidly burrow

hooves.

Really, Really,

Weird Stories

Screens

Out

there the air

noon,

toxic; the land

is

the bruised color of

is

mud

nearly barren.

is

The

sky,

dump. The oozing

at a city

even

at

plain has

the sheen of a puddle coated with gasoline: a slick of diseased rainbows. It

would

eat

In here, air

away

it's

my

skin

if I

safe, stainless,

were to step into

warm, shaded

and plenty of food and room

to

it

unprotected.

in amicable colors,

with clean

stroll.

I'm leaving here forever, and I'm going out there. Into the

ment of This

is

that twitches,

at the date

suppose, 140 years ago.

I

I

would

I

met Freda Gunderson

conclude

I

my assessment

I

in Austin, Texas.

wish

I

had.

have.

when we

year, she

record,

when

this log.

of conditions

of

was born about 250 years ago,

around,

ter

from time to time, with the clumsy move-

my last tape my remrn.

the final entry,

on Earth I

murk

the subhumans. I'm going out there

If I

I

should have died

hadn't married Freda,

,

met.

asked

at

More

me

to

Solarsong Farm, in

New Mexico.

It

was win-

than two centuries ago. In the spring of that

marry

her.

beyond the adobe walls of the Hackman hacienda grounds, was stippled soft orange and blue with cacms flowers. Near the balcony a mellow wind stirred one of the palms that Hackman had transplanted, so that it nodded like a drunk musician over a piano.

The

desert, unfolding

In nightgown and bathrobe, Freda and

I

were

sitting at the

second-

floor terrace, overlooking the thoroughly irrigated garden, listening to

the shuss of the sprinklers, the chatter of

pened on

this oasis

and couldn't

Freda's red-gold hair

and

fair

skin

of the garden, to me; the arc of her

Really, Really,

Weird Stories

some

desert bird

who'd hap-

believe his luck.

and blue eyes seemed an extension

full

breasts in the filmy blue negligee

John Shirley

lyo Screens

was

in thematic

concordance with the great arc of the planet around

We held hands and sipped

and

tea,

all

the

trivial

And I was

we

things

brim over with the significance of intimacy. OK,

to

sure:

I

impressed with her. Freda was an arcological

master's degrees in botany, zoology,

from high school

in love.

scientist,

with

and climatology. Most people

lucky to have one master's. Freda, at thirty-four, she'd graduated

seemed

said

was

had

us.

are

But then,

three.

at thirteen years old.

good to see you happy this morning, Ricky," she said. "You're moody, most of the time." Her English was perfect, but her faint Swedish accent clung to her talk like some intoxicating ethnic perfume. "It's

moody?

"I'm a

little

too

I

guess

civilized for

glinting lozenge of the

it's

this place. It's

me.

And

Glass's

a

little

Maybe glanced down at the

too perfect here.

people—"

I

huge greenhouse, a hundred yards away, on the

far side

of the mansion's groimds. "—watch us

see out

from the greenhouse, but you couldn't see

range surveillance cameras there,

when we walked about

I

knew.

the grounds or

And

went

all

You could

the time." in.

They had

they set watches

long-

on us

into town. "Daniel Glass

is

security paranoid."

know what you mean,"

"I

Glass have Gaia. I

The

more

in

she said diplomatically. "But

common

than you

natural world. Glass

admit.

like to

I

think you and

You both

winced, remembering Glass's poetry, recited after one of his Vibra-

Some ghastly Castenada-ish number about Up The Sky. Mawkish stuff. My analytical Freda wouldn't know good poetry if it nibbled her earlobe. tory Sermons.

Spirits

Holding

"Glass

is

a poet technically/'

ed, conscious that

we were

He makes

pocket.

New

Age

us

sit

I

said.

the Cactus left-brained

"But mostly what he is—"

A

puppeteer. He's got

on those

New Age

leader.

Going

hesitat-

Hackman

in his

cushions while he preaches

drivel— not only drivel but fifteen years outdated— about

merging into a new society of Vibratory harmony.' Preaching

and screwing

I

probably being recorded, and then plunged

recklessly on, "—is a despot.

his

love the

a poet, too."

is

half the

women

to lead us

all

in the project—Hie guy

to the

"The Starsong colony is not

promised land

Glass's idea. It

is

self-denial

a classic cult

in the sky."

was Dr. Branheimer's. And

Papa's."

"That's the point, Freda."

of

I

let

my hair out I'd let my didn't approve of my style. He

go of her hand and brushed

my eyes. My thick black hair had grown long and

beard grow. Freda's

father. Dr.

Gunderson,

unruly,

and

wasn't enthusiastic about Freda's romance with a liberal arts major, anyway. "Glass has co-opted your father's ideas."

1

glanced to the

Really, Really,

east,

where

Weird Stories

John Shirley had

the sun

Model, the

Screens

just risen

cate in the L-5 orbit.

I

Hackman had

long way lion,

but

off,

with

dome and

was the Arcology

I

make out the glint of his

could

green-glass center;

its

names

I

to repli-

The guard was

a

tacky golden-sun medal-

could imagine his

he checked

as

like

wanted

the hacienda-styled mansion

given over to the project personnel.

which never wavered using code

that

could see one of the guards from the Glass family

crossing the lawns between the that

dome

over the big geodesic

self-sustaining ecological unit that the project

tightly beatific smile,

with the other guards on his 'fone,

in

Laser and Aurora and Icemelt. Every one of

them a

former junkie or acidhead or near schizophrenic basket case that Glass

had put back together

own

in his

preferred reconstruction;

complain about Glass. Hackman adores him.

useless to

"It's

project

Half a

billion dollars of

it.

Glass

She stood up, came around the table to

is

sit

my

head. "Ricky

.

.

.

by me, to take

them

move up

to

little

She went on

"Come

off

hastily,

"You can go

made

a

the date of the final is

going. Soon.

over a year." Stricken by the implications,

I'd

it.

hands.

warning

act rang a

launch. We're going to the colony— I mean, the project

A

my

while you were in Santa Fe, they

decision. Glass has convinced

Next July.

the

part of the project to stay."

Something about the thought-out formalism of the bell in

And

Hackman's money and the money of Hackman's business

is all

associates.

her.

making them

dedicated to the American-born guru.

utterly

stared at

I

with us, Ricky."

be dead weight. I'm a

literary

academic. Useless! Just

another guy pawing through the Lake poets, and Whitman,

Jeffers,

Blake—and Yeats and Byron when they were feeling close to nature.

my

Those are

people.

technophilic enough.

how

I

feel

I

don't belong

And

on a space

lot,"

she said earnestly, looking

eyes. "You wrote the best promotional material;

backers.

You know

greenhouse—and

They would have "Me. Sure

species,

I

.

.

.

if

it

me in the

helped us get a

lot

of

a bit about environmental science, you're willing to

land— Dr. Branheimer

in the

in the sky.

me—he knows

about him."

"You've helped this project a

work

colony. I'm not

Glass would never tolerate

said

you were a

lot

of help in the

you were to marry me, that would make

to let

Freda,

it

definite.

you come." I

don't

want

to go.

I

like

the idea of the arcology

like the chance to preserve a lot of plant species and animal

away from the acid

rains.

But

I

don't want to live there. There's

another way-you can stay here on Earth and work to save

it.

With me."

"I can't, darling. I just cannot. It would break my father's heart. And I have given my life to this. It is what my father and I always planned for.

Really, Really,

Weird Stories

171

John Shirley

172 Screens

I

have to go.

But

we

If

you love me,

We can come back some-

go with me.

you'll

."

time, Ricky

.

.

never did.

We were

married two days

later.

And two

years later—it took

them a

year longer than they expected—we took the shuttle to the low-orbit

and then took one of Hackman's new

tion,

colony in the L-5

The colony was,

orbit.

as

I

sta-

freighters to the Starsong

knew it would

be,

cramped,

malodorous, gravitationally inconsistent, and an endless prescription for

work It

And

that

was never

quite filled.

was growing, though. Module by module, after a year

and a

half of

claustrophobic stink of pressure

and

suits,

woman to faulty sealants in the EVA units The

was

colony's garden in space

his

money back

for him.

give ourselves a holiday

.

.

expanded

into the void

The

two men and a

after losing

...

it

was beginning

and we were

thriving

manufacture the zero-g gjmcracks that

make

it

murderously tedious work, of enduring the

to pay off. starting to

Hackman had hoped would was

pressure

easing.

We

decided to

.

Glass didn't share our optimism. Glass, in

The

share anything

fact, didn't

dorm

with us but what he had

to.

section with his toadies.

He hadn't found paradise on the colony, and he

rest of the

sure as hell hadn't converted any actually

work.

And he was

new

to get him.

followers; worse, he'd

had

to

convinced the U.S. government—which had in

fact tried to stop the project, claiming

ous"—was out

time he holed up in his

it

was "uncontrollable and danger-

So when Hackman announced that he'd

come up and check

thorized a couple of senators to

au-

us out. Glass de-

cided they were spies for the Pentagon. "The Pentagon wants to take us over so

it

can launch a

here!" Glass raved. "They'll

They'U

We

start

against the PanArabic Republic

first strike

World War

make

from

the colony into an orbital missile base!

III!"

laughed at him.

So Glass simply appeared on the colony's announcing that

we had

to

make

"prevent the fascists from destroying

Glass— forgive

me—had

cracked.

TV

monitors one morning,

"the ultimate sacrifice" in order to

on

life

To be

Earth!"

fair.

Earth was experiencing a

vigorous political upheaval just then because of the Famine

.

.

.

What was

going on below us was enough to make anyone believe the end of the

world was coming. Because

You know about

it

was.

Maybe you don't—no The Famine came because

the Famine?

anyone's going to hear

this.

.

Really, Really,

.

telling

when

.

Weird Stories

John Shirley It

Screens 173

came because

in the twentieth century

time to deal with the

and we were

cutting

oned without

thought

we had

plenty of

The atmosphere was

A little.

back on pollution.

synergistic reactions. It

random chemicals

we

pollution problem.

air

vast,

assumed

But that thinking reckthat the wild variety of

would just sort of float around harmlessly. Stupid thinking. Some of them reacted with one another, and with other environmental factors. We should have seen it released into the atmosphere

coming in the 1980s, when to

form acid But

it

was

rain,

and other chemicals combined

sulfur dioxide

began gnawing

at the

biosphere

in the year 2018 that the sky

The phenomenon to the colony.

It

hit the

fell

.

.

.

apart.

news media a week

after

Freda and

started with the catalyst. Terranoxin

I

moved

was a compound

By

released into the air by a variety of industrial polluters.

itself,

Terra-

noxin was not found to have a negative environmental impact; but a

dis-

solution of the ozone layer had radically increased ultraviolet radiation.

And

UV

Terranoxin, exposed to

action that boosted stability. It

formed a

it

radiation, experienced a synergistic re-

into a catalytic

slick

inert molecules binding

on

compound

capable of runaway

oxygen and nitrogen into

itself.

the oxygen and nitrogen produced by living things.

Essentially,

catalyst will

is

making

pollution that

atmosphere's quickly

work through

its

capable of expanding exponentially.

catalyst

ability to

became

made

it

The

medium and

We

reaction

survive; a

had succeeded

pollution. Pollution that reproduced.

absorb and

filter

pollution

ate

Carbon dioxide con-

tinued to be produced, but oxygen and nitrogen weren't.

began small—but a

in-

plant surfaces, which forged a long chain of

in

The

was overwhelmed and

irrelevant.

Oxygen and nitrogen were

rapidly diminishing; the air

was becoming

unbreathable. Animals died; the food chain was shattered. People

moved

and narrower enclaves of breathable air. Great hurricanes of poisonous air swept over the land, smothering whole cities. The disruption turned cropland into dust bowls. Oxidation of ocean-dumped

into narrower

organic wastes and the pernicious action of pesticides worked with

Terranoxin to destroy the oxygen-production capability of the

seas.

The world moved indoors. The urban domes were hastily thrown upand many were almost as quickly torn dovm in the riots. Only the wealthy could afford a healthy stress

on the

Sure, Glass:

it

Glass-with

diet,

even in the U.S.

And

the consequent

planet's social systems generated massive political strife.

was easy

to be paranoid.

his pinpoint pupils, his

ways been a paranoid, manipulating Really, Really,

Weird Stories

shaven head, his anorexia-had

his followers

al-

with a masterful pater-

John Shirley

174 Screens nalism to close ranks around him.

To be an

extension of him, a buffer

against the world.

So

I

can't say

I

was surprised when Glass opened the

sabotaged the life-support I

air locks,

and

seals.

was doing a systems check on the escape pods when

it

happened.

I

was the only one near enough to use them. I heard the others screaming through the intercom. It was more horrible hearing it filtered. It was like they had a big mechanical hand clamped over their mouths.

Get into a pressure That's

suit;

when I saw

the

thought:

I

find Freda.

had been ready

Slashed. Glass

suits.

for this for

a while.

The

was going. Understand

air

that.

The

air

was

going. Freda

The instruments

the other side of the colony, working in the agribubble.

me

told

it

was one of the

first

sections to

become

was on

a vacuum. She was a

goner.

There was nothing I

I

could do.

was numb. Mechanically, and

tion, until

I

I

hit the

I

switch that

I tell

been sabotaged.

would put

me

under,

I

me

in

set

I

too.

The

with

relief. I

had frozen

was going

all

gas

is

years. Theoretically.

suspended animation

know why

limits

... So

I

was going

nerves melted away.

I

supposed to preserve you for about three hundred

Some people the

to test

pod

claim it

out.

work for only a few decades. I've got news for the skeptics.

it'd

from the dead hulk of the colony,

ejected

more than two hundred years. Maybe a meteor strike, damaged mechanism into action. Or a long-term effect of the pod's launch systems.

I

don't know. But

After two hundred years the escape

Their orbital drones, maintaining the

Nothing humane about

city,

didn't

stir

it.

where the airport used from the pod

.

.

city's

jarring

some on

radiation

.

pod launched

itself.

solar-power transmission

picked up the pod's signal and brought

side the

to die,

was flooded

all.

after

matically.

had

me.

one had had a chance don't

its

my

to die with Freda, after

right with

The suspension

I

for ejec-

should have launched immediately. Eventually, the

It

guilt that

That was

tions,

it

realized that the pod's ejection system

suspended animation would reach

I

the time.

all

was picked up and rescued.

As the gas put

No

myself that

got into the escape pod.

it

down. More or

They put me down

sta-

less auto-

a few miles out-

to be.

for a couple days. I'd used almost

Really, Really,

no measur-

Weird Stories

John Shirley

Screens 175

able oxygen in suspension, so there

them

OK—but

looked

I

days'

worth

spent

left. I

warmed-over corpse, which was maybe what I was. I had mental images of old horror movies I'd seen as a

kid.

George Romero

was

my

Still, I I

was a few

feeling like a

self

I

dovm

the electrolytic solution,

saw the acid ooze, the nightmare

window

But when the weather cleared, like

I

glass.

sky;

That

saw the

suits.

mash, and

when

Looking out the

could see that the atmos-

Maybe

the dying face of a sick old man.

of the dome, rising

ate the

I

repaired the pressure

I

phere was pitting the pod's

moon,

faces.

image for those two days.

sucked

could make myself work,

ports,

about walking corpses. Rotting

stuff

it

wasn't Earth.

pale, familiar face of the

And I saw the

smudged and segmented,

curving gleam

Big as a

at the horizon.

mountain.

Kansas

City.

A grief. A terrible

grief that could not

be encompassed by any poetry

who

could fashion. Beyond the sick grief and horror of a mother

missed her child for days, and finds

own

well,

grief of a

his

body broken and

rotted in her

and wonders how long he'd suffered dovm there man who realizes that, through his own bumbling .

gence, he has infected his wife and

I

has

.

.

Past the

self-indul-

newborn baby with AIDS. Even more

than grief for Freda. Grief for a planet.

They hadn't found a way did, it came too late.

to contain or reverse the catalyst.

Protected, for a while, by the pressure

toward the dome. The sky was a lines

suit, I

ceiling of

Or

if

they

slogged through the bogs

cobwebs.

I

remembered some

from Gerard Manley Hopkins:

Generations have trod, have trod, have trod;

And all is seared with trade; bleared, smeared with toil. And wears mans smudge and shares mans smell: the soil is

bare now, nor can foot

And for all this, There

nature

is

feel,

being shod.

never spent;

lives the dearest freshness

And though

deep

down

the last lights off the black West

Oh, morning

at the

But that was the

went

brown brink eastward springs-

bitterest drink at the

There would be no morning Really, Really,

things;

at the

Weird Stories

wake: Hopkins was wrong.

brown brink

eastward.

They had

John Shirley

176 Screens

Or the world

killed the world, finally.

poisonous ooze. But

a sort, in the

on

a

bathroom

wall

as

I

was

it

knew it. There was life here, of life the way obscene doggerel

poetry.

is

And Freda was dead. I wanted to be dead, too. Maybe it was curiosity. Maybe it was the faint hope

that they might

have preserved something green and something feathered under the

dome. There might be many such areas of

terraforming the Earth somewhere.

ironically, I

used to have a

air

away some of the gunk

had radioed

faulty,

it still

in

It

was down

to a pilot light

burned.

that clung to the lower part of the

to them,

KANSAS CITY: ARLK

and received no

reply.

I

But the

air

if I

dome; read

my

Perhaps

radio was

lock opened, sliding creakily aside.

chamber of milky

The

lock sealed behind me. Poisonous

A

Or

per-

died out there.

less

in.

cleaned

56.

or they weren't monitoring those frequencies anymore.

haps they didn't care

hissed

me.

lock was a man-high square panel flush with the dome.

the blocky, flaking lettering: I

hope

torch for

fair

on a grimy gas oven now. But

The

preservation; they might be,

I

stepped into a feature-

plastic walls. Startlingly pristine, after the bogs. air

drained away; breathable

green arrow flashed overhead.

I

air

unscrewed the helmet.

Brassy smells. Plastic. Detergent.

A ball of warmth expanded in me. I was going to see someone alive! Maybe there 'd be a welcoming committee and a big to-do. Fine. Let them paw me, gape at me, tear my clothing for souvenirs. It was all human contact. It was healthy life. It was a stinging reply to the flat gray hopelessness I'd crossed through on my way here. I needed human

contact.

The smooth, waxy wall dilated an opening. Beyond was a long, empty hallway. They had to decontaminate me. I followed the hallway to its end: a shower room where a gray uniform hung on a peg. I

stripped and showered.

I

Germ-killing ultraviolet lights in the

uniform:

conform

to

Padding

The doors

my

soft,

I

zipped

the hall in

parted.

came on

in the ceiling as

durable paper of

shape as

down

could smell a disinfectant in the water.

my

it

some

soft gray slippers,

poles, either side.

toward

It

I

dried.

felt it

I

came

rolled

I

dressed

contract to

to an elevator.

Something within was examining me. feet in diameter,

it

I

up.

chrome sphere about two impression

kind.

It

was a

dull

with two knobs at opposite

me like a beach ball. I had the

distinct

was observing me. Really, Really,

Weird Stories

John Shirley

Was

Screens 177

as a poinriess

and

left?

left their

monument

Had

the

robots to eternally maintain the empty

city

The automatons of

the place?

them?

to

took a deep breath to calm myself. "I'm Richard Gale Mazursky.

I

From

the Starsong colony. I've been in suspended animation— according

computer

to the suspension

two It

rolled

We

in the escape unit,

Look—can you

centuries.

back into the

down many, many ly

was

this all that

inhabitants died

take

elevator.

I

me

it

was, uh, for

more than

to a ... a person?"

accompanied

it,

and we rode

silently

levels.

arrived at another bland corridor, pale blue walls, the ceiling faint-

Muzak was playing from somemake out any definite tune. I accom-

glowing, plush white synthetic rug.

where; so homogenized

couldn't

I

panied the machine through an archway into a simple apartment.

room,

fifteen paces to a side, containing soft

slots in it,

one

waiting,

was a

?*.

photo of myself.

dun

rectangular couches,

and on A large screen on the wall was A question mark. A big black one. Followed by an old

and a

wall,

A

It

toilet.

lit,

had been taken not long before

I

went up

to the

was a blowup of my small corner of a group photo, a publicity shot of the project planners. My expression was rueful, faintly impatient; beside me, all that was visible of Freda was her shoulder. My

Starsong colony.

It

gut contracted, and I

It's

looked

at the floor. "Yeah, that's

me. Or was me."

at the screen as a picture of the colony appeared.

looked up

X was marked over "Yeah.

I

it.

And

gone. I'm pretty sure I'm the only survivor.

a couple of centuries since

Then an

a question mark.

I

Was

I

right? Is

it

went under?"

A + appeared on the screen. A plus. Positive. Meaning affirmative. A picture of a food tube appeared on the screen, and then a question mark. Moths with razor wings jittered in my stomach. "No, it this time-/ want to see some people" mean thanks. Look, I The silver ball rolled out the door behind me. There was no way to I

wasn't hungry.

shut the door.

It

was only

a slice out of the wall.

There they were. People. And a big luminous gray-white screen. The screen filled half the wall and dominated the room. The other three walls were gende pastels of blue, green, and yellow; everything I was to see

was done

ions.

On

in the

same

reductionistic simplicity.

No decor, a few cush-

these were four people with their backs to me.

They were dressed

in bright colors,

and

their clothing

styled like mine, but with

no two

of their clothes bled as

tie-dyed, spreading

Really, Really,

Weird

if

Stories

cut precisely alike.

was jumpsuit-

The primary

colors

out from the centerline of

John Shirley

lyS Screens

the body. I

It

me

reminded

of a fad that had been going before Freda and

Earth. Kirlian clothing.

left

changed

responded to your bioelectric

It

colors, eventually set in color patterns that

Their hairstyles were similar— sort of

distinctive to you.

was

pageboy-ish, but each

pixie-ish, sort

Their eyes were fixed on the screen, rapt but placid, as

was

afraid to

speak

The ambience was

of

with

listening

if

with

was soundless.

at first, to

fragile

and

faintly distinct.

great respect, though the image I

field,

were supposed to be

break the pervading sense of rapport.

were intruding on a church

felt as if I

it. I

service.

What was But

I

I

doing here? Maybe

needed them. The hunger

for

human

touch; the hunger in

hi.

I'm

.

.

.

I

was a bad memory,

in

to these people.

my hands made my fingers

my lips

tremble

burned for conversation. "Uh—

me

excuse me, the robot brought

here

.

.

.

I'm Richard

Mazursky."

No odd

reaction.

feeling

I

The chrome

was

alone.

left

I

saw the

The people on

my speech. Were

hadn't acknowledged

pose

out of the room, and

ball rolled

they

had the

the couches hadn't deaf.-^

The young man with

girl blink.

I

silky

Were they

moved

—

blond hair shifted

his

slightly.

Maybe

I

was being snubbed because

I

had

violated

some arcane

rule

of etiquette. I

looked

For the

at the screen. It

time

first

on a naked,

was the only

One had

knob and a notch

A soft silvery light.

took in the image. Four rubbery gray cubes marching

I

gelatinous gray plain,

exactly alike.

light source.

.

.

.

one

after the other.

a notch. Another

had a

The cubes weren't

crater in

Another had a

it.

Approaching from the horizon's vanishing point, a

procession of white rubber cones

slid

over the ground, five of

them

to

The procession of cubes intersected the path of the The cubes stopped as if pitched up against a brick wall; then the cones stopped. The cubes turned red, the cones green. "They win," the woman said, in a pleasant voice. Not too toneless, not

the cube's four. cones.

too expressive. "Yes," think.

I

my throat. "Evidently the, ah, cones have won. I um, instruct me in the significance of this? Is

said, clearing

Anyone

care to

it,

religious?" I'd I

spoken extra

loudly.

No

one so much

was shaking. "You people have a

past every day?

I

as twitched.

visitor

from two centuries

mean, didn't your systems inform you?

speak English, and

this is

Kansas, Toto

.

.

.

I

just

You wouldn't get that,

Really, Really,

in the

heard you I

don't

Weird Stories

John Shirley suppose

.

.

.

Something.

know

that

No

I

Screens 179

Look—just direct me to the nearest park. Or greenhouse. want to know that something green survived. I need to ."

.

.

response.

looked

I

something that looked

Nearby

at the screen.

three spindles amoebically

it,

birthing a sphere—it

The image had changed.

a pincushion, waving

like

made my

merged

eyes hurt.

to

become

When

saw

a larger spindle,

looked away,

I

I

pins frantically.

its

could

I

still see the images for a moment, tenuous as flashbulb blurs. I knelt beside the gjrl. "Can you hear me?" I whispered. No reaction. Chin propped in hands, she lay on her stomach, her legs closed and straight out behind her. A slightly Asiatic cast to her skin and eyes, the shape of her face. There was a flush in her cheeks, and her brown eyes

were feel

shining.

the

No,

wanted

to touch her. Just to

that the

world wasn't dead.

commit a solecism

in her.

This could be

her.

To know

alert. I

told myself. You'd probably

life

I

She seemed healthy,

a religious ritual of

She blinked, because

it-

was time

some

if

you touched

kind.

for her to blink.

Her

eyes followed the

jockeying procession of cones, spheres, cusps, the shifts in color screen. I

The

digital

images were

reached out a hand to her cheek,

could

feel

on

the

reflected in perfect miniature in her eyes.

her body heat on the

tips. I

my

fingers trembling so near

I

snatched the hand back.

arms around upraised knees, and waited. Sometimes I watched the screen or the roiling shadows it threw on the bare walls. But the images, though simplistic, were disturbing. Their tenacity in repeated Wait.

sat back,

I

patterns of mobility, their gelatinous activity-something about

gested living beings.

Hours

sifted by.

looked up. The

I

my

pressed

When I

face into

became aware

it

sug-

my knees, and waited.

that the

room was

darkening,

I

screen was blank except for four shivering green patterns

running the width of the screen. Wavelength patterns. Up and down, up and down. EEGs, I supposed. The four strangers were asleep, lying on their cushions.

Swallowing I

slept.

The

my frustration,

I

stretched out

on a

cushion. After a while

My dreams were blank.

increased light from the screen

snaking cylinders-each

slightly distinct

bery gray-white pincushion, with

seemed

woke me. The

alien to the other objects.

its

screen

showed four

from the others-circling the rubmass of out-thrust

prickles.

It

A departure in style.

Without squeeze tube was lying on the rug beneath my couch. were They the others. appetite, I sucked the faintly spicy mash, watching

A blue

Really, Really,

Weird Stories

John Shirley

i8o Screens

eating, too,

watching the screen.

from a hose

One

ion.

in the wall,

disposed of my tube and sucked water

I

used the chemtoilet, and returned to

my

cush-

of the cylinders was bending, wrinkling at the middle near the

As

spiny button.

which vanished.

I

watched,

felt

I

a

pressed one of the pincushion's spines—

it

chill in

my gut corresponding with

the instant of

the spine's disappearance.

OK. The pincushion was me.

moved

I

room. The pincushion moved away from

to a corner of the

The people

the cylinders.

room hadn't moved, but their images some other way. A group of eight-

in the

had. So they controlled their images

sided polyhedrons marched from the horizon toward the cylinders

.

.

.

I looked away from the screen. Reluctantly this time. Hours passed. More games, if that's what they were, were played out

on

the screen.

was

like

ing,

it

"Entropy check" once. Otherwise the day

said,

And

passed.

it

And

slept.

I

And

the next morn-

started again. Just the same.

went

I

Someone

the one before.

for a walk.

I

found more rooms with more people

More

identically occupied.

or less

who work in

other, but distinct as people

them,

in

the others. Distinct from one an-

like

a shopping mall are: variations

of a theme. They are generally of the same physical type— the type

used to

who

deodorants and wine coolers and Diet Coke on TV. in the other buildings. The streets were empty. I saw no old people. The occupants of the apartments ignored

was the same

It

no

sell

children,

me. Sometimes they did a

little

maintenance, assisted by small ro-

light

bots like metal and plastic crustaceans; the litde robots cleaned the

dome, vacuumed

floors,

expunged

fungi.

Sometimes

I

caught the town's

inhabitants doing light calisthenics, eating, using the toilets, even copulating in a

mechanical sort of way. They didn't

kiss

they never took their eyes from the screen during I

followed a young

man

as

all

they did

these

rode the elevator to the roof.

It

spiral

it.

And

activities.

he trotted purposefully through the

he watched a projection of a rubbery

We

when

halls as

followed by a pincushion.

was crowded with naked watchers

sunning themselves, in silence, lying on their backs, eyes staring upward.

The young man

stripped and lay

on

his

back with the others, soaking up

the sunlight and staring at the trapped sky. Overhead, gigantically magnified,

eral

projected holographically onto the

dozen geometric forms

same shimmying

stately

out as

under the dome, were

sev-

one pincushion, performing the

minuets of meaninglessness.

Sickened by claustrophobia, city stretched

circling

air

far as

I

I

looked away from the projection. The

could see on three sides.

The

Really, Really,

great geodesic

Weird Stories

John Shirley was

Screens

lost in the faint blue mist of distance.

The buildings were shaped like

cones, like blocks, like spheres. Far away was one white pyramid. There

were no

trees,

no

birds,

nothing growing. Nothing green anywhere, ex-

on me: my uniform had begun to change color. to be somewhere. They must have preserved something. went back down to the first inhabited room I'd seen. Things were

cept It I

had

unchanged

there.

sat

I

Egg shapes,

then.

down,

thinking, glancing at the screen

faintly distinct, circling a pincushion.

vanced toward the pincushion. "Fuck

The

encircling

went on. The

After three hours of

women—the one with that

on

"Look

me,"

at

woman and

waving

spines at

its

split.

Fuming,

shouting.

but

my

low

I

I

have to

insist.

I'm sorry

She

I'm

if

just stared.

could see the screen images repro-

and perfect. I looked down at myself. The picture on the front of my jumpsuit. The pincushion was

I

I

one of the egg shapes sprinted through the

.

.

.

halls. I

I

ran into apartments,

did everything short of violence to attract their attention.

No

reaction.

rearranged their bodies. They resisted a forcibly

mrned

little,

I

woke them

I

I

tugged their cloth-

but not much.

their heads, a projection of the screen

their line of sight. If

appeared I

backed away.

burning out.

I was distantly aware on one of the egg shapes.

sanity's at stake."

shouted, "Fire! Earthquake!" Nothing.

when

ad-

in her eyes, tiny

was there, projected

ing,

them

the screen, blocking her view.

hissed. "I'm afraid

I

It

now and

advanced, physically, toward one of the

Looking toward me, not seeing me.

I

muttered.

I

of

the vaguely Oriental features.

screwing up a sacred rimal,

duced

off,"

my patience were

the screen the pincushion was advancing

stepped in between the

I

I

it,

fuses of

One

And

would

fol-

from sleep, a screen projection

instantly.

shouted

in their ears,

I

beat

dripped blood on them. They

my

chest;

I

bit

through

my

skin

and

cleaned away the blood, but they kept

on the screen. I caressed them, embraced them, wept on them-I'm ashamed to admit I even considered rape. I was that angry.

their eyes

But

I

I

wasn't that far gone.

walked out, headed for the

street.

And this time I found the monument

was in a city square, atop a three-hundredcomposed of something like milk chunk foot pyramid, one seamless five-foot-square space on top glass. I climbed a slippery stairway. At the by a of the pyramid was an ancient Zenith color TV set, protected at the very center

of the

city. It

floor. bubble of glass, plugged into an old-fashioned socket on the glassy screen the ... I on picmre The mbe faced me, and there was a single

Really, Really,

Weird Stories

i8i

John Shirley

i82 Screens

watched

and the picture on the old wooden-cased Zenith

for a while,

remained the same.

A man's

head and shoulders, a fixed image; he was

smiling coyly, his gray-haired head tilted to the right,

wink. Across his chest were

yawing

was a monument. "Must be hard

It

head, the

enormous screen image

dome showed left

in a

in the

with a sinking

turned and fled

three of the spines

down

the

stairs,

PHD.

BSP,

muttered. Over-

I

concave interior face of the

on

A zero. the pincushion vanished.

When another spine vanished,

feeling.

in a

weakness of the horizon-

to get parts,"

a pincushion approaching a o.

Zero. One, two, and

was I

letters,

BREWSTER REGINALD PHILBIN, MD,

hold, speUing out:

tal

one eye closed

skidding the

I

retreated.

I

last twenty.

It had to be fast. The others knew what was happening via the screens. Maybe via something else, too. I had to do it before they could stop me. I picked her up. The woman I'd tried to talk to, the almost Oriental

one.

I

carry her

down

of the door,

you

tried to

down

the

if

the

to block

on

her.

She wriggled

I

from

darted out

She wasn't heavy,

effort.

on my shoulder; her

silently

the projected miniature of the screen that followed

hall.

heard no one in pursuit.

I

their eyes

me. But they were too slow.

grimacing at the

hall,

run with

eyes were locked

us

shoulder in a fireman's carry and turned to

away from the room. The others—never taking

the screen—moved as

until

my

slung her over

I

took the elevator

down

to the lowest level

would take me.

it

carried her to a

I

room

I'd

found the day before.

It

contained what

I

guessed was a heating and air-conditioning mechanism, a leviathan of

metal pipes and chrome blocks and

in

some

parts of the

room, dim

humming and shooshing with The light was indirect, too sharp

glass,

the internal passage of air and power.

in others.

A chain-Hnk fence guarded the

open. People

still

made

and carried the wriggling

girl

to a dusty area

enclosed by pipes fanning out from the machine

like

the arms of a

mechanism; but the lock had been I

went through the

Hindu god. It its

I

sat

gate,

her

down on

left

mistakes.

the floor.

worked. The projected image vanished. The metal leviathan—maybe

electric field—had

blocked out the projection. The

wail of panicky disorientation.

knock her down. And

I

didn't

I

was

afraid she'd

know if I

girl

run for

made it,

and

a long, low I'd

could bring myself to do

have to

that.

But

she sat frozen, her head moving herky-jerky around, looking for guidance. I

took her face between

eyes.

my

hands and turned her to look

me

in the

"Can you see me now?" Really, Really,

Weird Stories

John Shirley

Screens 183

She stared—then,

like

a

wounded

dog, she turned and snapped her

my hand. Sank her teeth into the meat of my palm. Jerking my hand away, swearing, I backed off. She looked at the floor,

jaws at

wild-eyed, a

little

blood running from the corner of her pretty mouth.

apologize to both of you," Dr. Philbin said.

"I

He stepped up from behind, smiling sadly. TV image. Same suit. I couldn't see him

his

ness in this enclosure. But

on the TV.

face

I

Looking almost exactly like clearly

because of the dim-

thought he had the same expression as the

I

hadn't heard him,

I

supposed, because of the noise of

the machine.

He was I

looking right at me.

He was

talking right to

my

stomach drew

Someone was

talking to me.

sagged back against a pipe. Something in

claws, curled up,

and went

"Why'd you make

to sleep.

me go through all this before you showed up?"

overestimated you. Thought you would socialize

"I

personally ...

like to interfere

something of an experiment.

and

all

I

suppose

A bad

one.

it's

more

I

young

its

asked.

don't

easily. I

the researcher in me.

I let this

in

It

was

woman down,

the others, in making that estimation of you."

wasn't going to hurt the

"I

me.

with me.

To

"Force her

talk. Just talk. is

girl. I

wanted

She was

to force her to

the lightest to carry.

communicate ."

.

the operative phrase here. Imposing your social impera-

on our society by main force." "Look-suppose you explain this

tives

And

place to me.

then we'll talk

about morality."

He

talked for a while,

and

I

asked questions, and

I

got the

gist

of

it.

Motivation, Philbin said, was ruled by the manipulation of archetypes in the subconscious. Something psychologists

knew about

analytically

and

Madison Avenue knew instinctively. The operation of the various sublexistructures of the mind-the ego, the id, et al.-involved the use of a comprised, con of symbols. Those symbols, and the archetypes they could be simplified and abstracted, purified for external concretization, and presented to the brain's centers of initiative directly-normally we of filtering and react to symbols indirectly, through a long, slow process related to the use of selection. Before Philbin, conditioning was indirect, in experimental stereotypes: visual dramatizations of people enmeshed dramaticonditioning desires for sex, success, recognition, approval. The

zation sometimes

came through

television

ceived and translated the imagery from

Really, Really,

Weird Stories

programming. The brain

social

re-

symbology to cerebral

John Shirley

i84 Screens

symbology. Social symbols became mathematic by

way of

the brain's

ei-

detic translations.

Philbin cut out the middle

man.

He

taught computer-controlled

language of the inner mind. "A language of dozens of researchers to learn."

it

When

TV the

me forty years and the aid

took

applied with a totality of stimu-

lus—the same style of imagery imposed from birth to death—absolute rap-

port was established. "Television

TV

is

And

meant absolute

absolute rapport

mesmerizing," Philbin

even during an argument.

I

said.

knew

control.

"People will turn and look at a

that there

was something

going on there, something more than the eye being dravm to

movement—and as

he

that

talked, in the

same

staring at him. Twitching.

on,

voice, motionless.

The wound

destruction of the food chain.

method social

I

looked

my hand

in

saw a new Dark Ages coming with the

"I

We

.

.

.

When

them

at the girl.

.

.

.

Home

of the Philbin

Institute.

the emergency called for a

spent most of the

first

survival technologies,

no room

human social

I

new

was the only

the time of the collapse.

city at

my

when

system was implemented.

our

artificial

food and

air

systems. There simply

Mx. Mazursky.

for any extraneous organisms,

We

had

desires, are acted

all

.

.

.

what you have

competition,

They

which the is

my

seen.

ego games and

all

out on the screen. We've trained our people

to identify so thoroughly with the screen imagery that to them.

was

to give

beings priority ... In the second century our application of

and

We

century refining the system—and developing our

system was further refined, and evolved to

There

it

and the

was, ah, influential in the city—and order,

A

transformation,

its

life-forms,

only Kansas City survived;

No materialized conflicts. All conflicts, striving

to survive.

be part of a harmonious

the atmosphere began

completely environmentally shielded

She was

of the ecosystem, the

fall

to

and

stood there

throbbed. Philbin went

and the anaerobic organisms became the dominant acid winds stripped the Earth

just

needed an orderly society

for training people, for teaching

environment

He

could be used constructively."

it

special

light

quite satisfying

it's

direct the screen with the output of their bioelectric fields,

city's

central

individuality

computers are equipped to receive and

here— true

individuality.

They

interpret.

are aware of

other, of their litde distinctions, in a peripheral sort of way.

one

an-

They gravitate

together and apart very, very slowly, and react to one another physically as well as

on

what they

the,

screen—but of course the screen imagery

identify with, finally

.

.

."

He

smiled.

made-a-society-of-mindless-conformists look

The

city

is

"You

on your

is

uppermost.

It is

have that you-haveface,

sir.

Not

at

all:

maintained by the people, for the people, of the people, and

every day everyone casts their vote.

On

the screens.

A consensus is evolved

Really, Really,

Weird Stories

John Shirley and

Screens 185

steps are taken. That's

voted

why we added

roof-sunning

was

last year. It

in."

"Come

on. You're telling

me

they have free will?

You

don't use this

system to control them?"

"They

are influenced to accept certain fundamentals.

And

pects the same.

they're

happy with

Any

society ex-

it—these people don't have to

Or dying. Their conwe clone them; their new brain, when the

suffer the hassles of reproducing, raising children.

do not

sciousnesses

minds

die.

are cybernetically

When

they begin to age,

downloaded

into the

clone has matured." "Rebirth in

"Don't

They

tell

are.

sterility.

me

But they're—"

and passions of

life.

their feelings eidetically.

On

They

are

they're not experiencing the joys

But they're trained to experience

the screen. Ever seen two professional chess players go at

it?

motionless, concentrating—but don't imagine they aren't boiling with ."

excitement inside.

.

new sunroof isn't progress. You could be

Deciding on a

"It's still stasis.

cloning plants, animals—there must be samples somewhere,

deep "It

freeze, or.

would be hopeless. The

based on

new

it.

planet, has

It

it,'

an ecology,

The new

sir.

Anyway, why bother?

If

we

re-

succeeded, we'd generate disturbing

you yourself have.

broken, don't

'If it ain't

Mr. Mazursky."

"I see.

The

urban-village paradise

Philbin-we were

all

is

achieved, so don't disturb

on our way somewhere.

We

blew

it,

the train. But there was someplace we were intended to stopping the last people who have the chance. And this just isn't intense

"You sound ers,

one,

has overtaken the planet. Hopeless to try and

social interference patterns-as fix

in

systems of chemical interaction with organic molecules.

Anaerobic systems. verse

maybe

." .

enough

like

to really satisfy anyone, Philbin

those quaint fellows from

my

it.

Look,

and derailed

get to. You're

kind of

living

." .

.

childhood. Punk rock-

they were called."

"Punks?"

But then

I

I

scowled. Nasty thought.

shrugged.

"Maybe

it's

was a scholar of namralist

I

sort of punk.

Maybe

a

little

poetry.

punk

is

necessary from time to time." "You're a

fascist,

Mazursky."

He

had dropped the

to supplant our tribalism with your

He was

right. It

"I'm going to

"And

was

relative.

fight you."

Really, Really,

But

go with what used

Weird Stories

own. And .

.

"Mister."

"You want

to you, I'm a fascist."

.

to be called poetic intuition,"

I

said.

John Shirley

i86 Screens

I

decided

need him

him with

take

I'd

as a hostage.

With the

us.

stepped

I

in,

and

girl

and me. By

sliced

force.

an uppercut

I

might

at the point

of his jaw.

My fist sailed

through

He was a hologram.

The image shimmied.

his head.

"You don't think

I'd risk

myself here, do you, Mr.

Mazursky?"

"An image. guess close

.

A TV image." I shook my head, feeling heavy and stupid.

wanted

I

.

.

to believe

Christ,

you were there so badly

I

you probably don't even look like that anymore. Cloned

a few times yourself ..." contact.

I trembled with frustration. I'd wanted him react as I hit him. time for you to make a decision, Mr. Mazursky. You can

Wanted

"Now it's

that

to see

Or you can go

yourself over to retraining.

people out there

.

.

.

sort of ...

I

And

out there.

"I'm going back to the escape pod. There's

glass

"I

didn't really look very

some

give

die."

air left.

There are

caught a glimpse yesterday, through the

." .

.

"They're not people as you

know them, Mr.

We

Mazursky.

haven't

seen them up close. But we're quite sure they're subhuman. They're not

oxygen breathers, "If

I

give in,

"Eventually.

I'll

.

be seeing projections everywhere

mind

This way

we

edits

go."

girl

me—

distorts things.

You

perceptions.

I

see nothing social

world

prefer the living world to

made up my mind: I'm going. And I with me. You send some of your athletic couch

your social world, Philbin. to take the

and

you the symbols of the

give

more directly." "And I lose the bulk of my want

I

But everything you see has always been a projection— on

the visual cortex. Your really directly.

."

certainly.

I

have

kick in a few heads before they get me.

It'll

be a

"Very well. She's already traumatized beyond recovery. Take her.

Her

potatoes to stop

bad

I'll

trade."

designation

And he

is

Curl.

Go

Something tore loose

like this

in."

blinked out.

Philbin! I'm

was

back out the way you came

me, and

in

it

began to howl. "Come back here,

not through with you! Listen, asshole— it was things

place that put the

television;

it

goddamn

planet into a doze

till it

fell

like

.

apart!

was malls— it was the brain death of your urban

.

.

It

villages,

turning people inward, into videogames and away from the outer

world—that's how it got poisoned and died and no one knew! It was like we were watching TV while the baby was poisoning itself in the kitchen!

We

got lost in our idiotic

little

distractions,

and we projected

Really, Really,

all

our

Weird Stories

John Shirley

Screens 187

problems onto real! It

was

television dramatizations

little

And when we

realized

was

real,

television that killed the world,

.

.

Philbin didn't

had

come

.

and nothing seemed

was too goddamn

it

my voice

first.

But

there,

screen projection followed us.

and

in

was the tape-log

it

And

few minutes she stopped

after a

teeth

and whimpering. She

sank into a sort of ambulatory catatonia. Philbin didn't

was

in the

lost.

back.

yammering wordlessly, stopped gnashing her

No

echoed

room, and was swallowed up, and

to drag Curl along at

her.

late, Philbin!

you smug bastardr

had shouted myself hoarse. Fugued, drained,

I

dull industrial spaces of the

I

it

We

I've

reached

try to reclaim

lock 56.

air

been using to make

There was also a rather antique pressure

My

suit

this record.

Curl— and a crude sled

suit for

with a big mbular device that synthesized oxygen from carbon dioxide

and carbon monoxide.

And

seemed, and what

its

own

air.

survived awhile.

He was

suit.

was

last entry.

escape pod. Oh,

mechanism working was thinking

last

in

in

getting her into the extra pres-

She came out of the catatonia, and

this in the

it

still

more bored than he would admit. pod was hard, because I got no help from Curl

Three days since the

I

used for

crossing to the

pulling the sled. But the hardest part

sure

if I

city

was curious about me,

Philbin

might do out there

I

a scientist— perhaps

The

A miniamre of what the

was a supply of "Food."

there

bit

me

again.

Things have happened. I'm not recording

it

was workable enough.

I

got the oxymix

it.

night that

maybe-almost

certainly-it

was wrong

to

drag Curl out here. She'd probably die out here with me. Die young. Like Freda. Who was I to say that death was better for Curl than life in the

dome?

But

me

it

was hard

to think about taking Curl back.

in the eye, seemed to try to understand me.

her to take

some food on

the second day.

And

Sometimes she looked

And

I

managed

she bit

me

to get

only once

yesterday.

She can

talk,

when

Remembering speech from an earlier This morning she said some things. Starting

she wants

clone-sequence, probably.

to.

with: "Are they alive?"

She was looking out the window.

I

stared at

her-and then looked out

window and saw them. At first the way they looked made me sick. The stuff was crawling over them with a life of its own. I assumed it

the

was

their skin. Slick, gray-purple oily gunk.

Really, Really,

Weird Stories

Bubbles for their eyes.

John Shirley

i88 Screens

I

just stared,

and waited,

them. They took

They were humans, under the Living

maybe. Bred for

suits,

ducing oxygen for the host

"When you the two men

came

as they

off their heads. Peeled

first

got here,

through the hatch.

Creatures that

who wears them we tried to catch up .

you moved too

Two

of

off.

oily stuff. Protective suits

this.

warn you away from

said, "to

assholes in there. But

in

them

.

live

of

some

kind.

anaerobically, pro-

.

with you," the

taller

of

that

dome. They're complete

fast for us.

We can't move very well

in these scavenger suits."

"You coming back

mossy teeth and

to the

greasy,

farm with us?" the shorter one

matted

hair,

Kansas City dome, we're pretty sure we're dred square miles terraformed, but .

.

.

You coming with

cob. Fresh!"

"Are

we

He

us?

grinned

You

it's

hurry,

said.

and he was grimy. "Except all

there

comin'.

is.

Long

He

had

for the

We only got a hun-

as

our bubble holds

you can make dinner. Corn on the

at us.

going to go with them?" Curl asked me. She was sweating

with the effort

at this

kind of communication. Squinting as

if

she had a

headache. But sane. "Yeah,"

I

said.

She raised

I

took her hand.

my hand

to her lips.

"I

think

we

She didn't

will."

bite

me.

Really, Really,

Weird Stories

Brittany? Oh: She's in Translucent Blue Some and

people go to bed with Lucifer

they cry, cry, cry

when

they don't greet the day with

God

—Monster Magnet

Marissa didn't see

why

she should get a

sitter

when Donny was

he'd watched Brittany before, one time before, and

was

there,

right before

nap anyway.

Brittany's

Henny something like that when they went down into basement. Doc's "rec room to my neighbors, dungeon to you," and

She was the Jill

it

telling

was smiling triumphantly

you they'd come," Jill taped cigar box of their early forties

Marissa and

"Gosh

it's

his. Jill,

them from the

at

Doc,

said, to

as

he came

built-in bar. "I told

with that old, masking-

Doc and Marissa's husband Henny were

Marissa was "the baby,"

Henny

little

in

all

in

at 35.

joined Jill at the bar, side by side.

down here," Marissa said.

so nice and cool

90 outside already and

it'll

get hotter. August in L.A.

"It

must be 85 or

The smog makes

it

worse, too." "You're not going to diss the valley again, are you Marissa honey?"

"No,

it's

that

way

all

over L.A."

"You need a new stash box

box

Jill

her fingers jabbing the blender buttons.

said,

as

Doc

laid

it

down on

there.

the

Doc,"

little

bar.

Henny said, his eyes on the Henny probably wondering

He

was a bigger dope pig than Marissa was; she was just as happy with cocktails, but she'd try anything-which is what she'd seriously, very seriously, told her sister she wanted on her grave-

what

it'd

stone.

be

this time.

Shed Try Anything and

That's what'U

kill

you, too, so

her

it

sister Lizzy

had

said

something

like.

oughta be on there fuh Chris'sakes, and

Marissa had said she didn't need those negative impressions.

When he'd

taken Marissa's monthly psychic impressions, her psychic, Damtha, had said,

"You're definitely getting too

somewhere,

there's a lot for

me

many

negative resonations

to remove, here."

from

And, you know, they

might've been from Lizzy, she could be so negative. So judgmental.

Really, Really,

Weird Stories

190 Brittany? Oh: She's in Translucent Blue

There were

two couples

just the

John Shirley

that afternoon, their kids playing in

the back yard as they got into the party. After Brittany got tired playing

with Donny,

Henny could

take her upstairs for a nap. She'd

Thank God

lunch, she'd be sleepy soon.

needed an afternoon Jill

her

wore a puce tank didn't have the

tits

lift

Spandex leggings fire

they used

Her luminous-orange

his face, so

"Where 'd you get

it is

new.

It's

in

it,

though

too wide, no

was teased

called

like

a

too big for his body,

to Marissa, but he

him when

was

they'd

still

first

blue jeans and san-

t-shirt.

shirt,

in the garage in a

it

still

hair

little

He wore

Led Zep

that antique

Marissa asked. "You find "No,

seemed

at Harry's "Social Club."

and a Jimmy Page/Robert Plant

dals

it

looks almost new,"

box?"

not Led Zep. Page and Plant are doing a solo tour now."

know that." She took a cocktail from Jill. It was one of overly-sweet cherry-tasting things with vodka that Doc liked. She

"Really.^

those

I

didn't

decided not to complain about

Henny was wearing Gap paunch. into a

and

it

what she'd

"a good-lookin' galoot"— that's

met him and Jill

good

hips were

around her head. Doc's head was a

mustache too small for

still

"saddle baggy", and the zebra-patterned

little

didn't help.

Her

to.

half the kid

island of sanity.

little

top; she starved so she'd look

matter what she did, a

windy

and a

at four

was a mother's

lap. It

had her

He had a hatchet face,

little

legs

flat

matching

shirt,

untucked to hide

his

blue eyes, thinning blond hair tied back

pony tail, and a soul patch. Marissa was the chunky one; her arms

were a

short but she had those heavy breasts that

little

that he stared at

dropped

it.

khakis, a

now. She wore a gold

off straight

below the nipples

satin

Doc

liked;

top that clung to them and

to hide her

own

sloppy middle.

"So where's the Mondersons?" Marissa asked, thinking of that big

ropy thing Judge Monderson had

"Not coming," Jill convention

in

in his pants.

said. "They're, like,

Las Vegas.

I

'swung out' for awhile

guess Judge did a

little

too

after the

X or some-

much

thing and freaked out the next morning."

"A

little is

good, a

lot

is

toxic,"

Doc

said, sitting at the bar.

Henny said. Henny was still lookmaybe hoping it was cocaine. Marissa hoped it wasn't cocaine; that made Henny impotent fast, it was "A

lot

of what, that's the question,"

ing expectantly at the cigar box,

embarrassing. You're going to swing, you're supposed to

do your

part.

"Marissa—where's the—" Henny 'd started to say "Where's the kid?" but he remembered not wasn't his kid,

it

tany like she was

was

to.

She got

Luis' kid, but

some

mad when

still

stranger's child.

he said

he didn't need to

"—Where's our

it

litde

Really, Really,

like that. It

talk

about

Brit-

one?" He'd

Weird Stories

John Shirley

Brittany? Oh: She's in Translucent Blue 191

bathroom, maybe checking out Doc's medicine cabinet,

been

in the

when

she'd put Brittany out back.

"Playing out back. Donny's watching her."

"So-how about some music? I like my action with a beat," Henny said. made Marissa think of the ad at that Internet personals club site. How they'd met Doc and Jill. This

LOOKING FOR MR N' AIRS RIGHT! Tired of no-swap swingers? We're believers in action too, and

our action with the big rock beat, wherever light

B&D,

four-ways, six-ways

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we like

take us. Role playing,

and everyone gets some.

If you're

into

it,

so

we try anything? Maybe not—but definitely, make the su^esDoc and Jill, seeking couples between 30 and 45. N/S. Must ex-

are we. Will tion!

change photos, email, before meeting. Mailbox 455895

Jill

bed beyond the rec-room was painted the

black,

bar. In

and dusted with

glitter to

be

like starry space.

Above

big futon, really—was an old black-light poster of people

bed— a

Kama

fucking in an exotic

from

boombox Doc kept by the blue-silk that half of the room the concrete floor

switched on the six-CD-cycle

their joined genitals.

Sutra position, with op-art lines radiating

On

the walls to either side were posters; one

side was Mel Gibson, without his shirt on— that was for Jill— and the other side was Doc's life-size Xena Warrior Princess poster. "I'd love to get that Lucy Lawless in the sack," Doc had said, more than once, gazing

goatishly at Xena.

Yeah, Marissa always thought,

with you

if

like that

could happen. Like she'd sleep

you had a gold plated introduction, a

Perignon and a Plaza

suite.

Dream

bottle of

Dom

on.

Under Xena were two metal rings in the wall that Doc tied the girls to, when the mood was on them, and sometimes himself. There was a ring in the ceiling, too.

The

first

sounded

CD on

like

new Plant/Page album, which made another pitcher of cocktails.

the cycler was Doc's

Led Zep

to Marissa.

Jill

Doc bobbed his head in time to the music as he rolled joints. Henny frowned at the makings Doc was working with. "I dunno, maybe I

should stick with cocktails, pot makes

me

paranoid, sometimes, man."

make him paranoid?" top. Henny watched her small, Jill was dancing, pulling off her mbe him paranoid," she said. "Gomake to going pointed breasts jump. "Not

Doc

grinned. "Jill-this pot going to

ing to get

him high

Really, Really,

as a motherfucker."

Weird Stories

Oh: She's

192 Brittany?

"Those kids going

door

Translucent Blue

in

be okay?" Marissa

to

top of the

at the

said,

glancing at the back

Asking because she feh

stairs.

though she didn't want to think about

"Check on 'em, you want. They're pot

John Shirley

like

she should,

we got a sitter." Henny said. "What kind

"Usually

it.

fine,"

of

is it.^"

Doc

pot plus/'

"It's

said.

owed and

to Marissa

was about

to get loaded.

His eyes were always a

seemed

it

little

too deeply-shad-

when he

the shadows got deeper

like

"Pot plus what?" "Special formula, dude."

Donny was

tightening the strap

"Ow," she It

looked

palm

the

like

on

Brittany, blinking in the bright sunlight.

"That hurt some." She shaded her eyes to see

said.

tree

his face.

behind him was growing out of the top of

his head.

"Oh

shit

it

does."

"Don't say didn't care

if

shit,"

"Shit,

He

why,

Dad Henny

They were alone out huh shit?"

sign of the adults.

Mama

Brittany said, glancing toward the house.

they said shit but

didn't like

There was no

it.

here.

not, shit,

shit,

gave out a long peeling sort of laugh. Brittany watched his belly

button jump

when he

on the

the strap

laughed. "Boinkaboinka," she said.

plastic

carapace a

He

tightened

more. "Not that much,

little

that's

hurt."

He

stood back and looked at his handiwork—he'd simply strapped her

into the laser-target vest, but

wouldn't

fall off,

"Okay,"

said,

"you run around and hide, and

buzz and

He

light

up and

I

"Gross.

"Oh

I

shit,

and

it

you

The

I

it

squinting at the

dimpled the water,

if I

in the

shoot

it,

lazer-laser pistol

little

panel

up with a blue

lit

from point blank flash, faint in the

unpleasant buzz feeling against her stomach.

want

We

to play that.

bet. Spice Girls.

sucked toward a

so

chase you and

touched the panel

No

arfin'

could play Spice

swimming

pool.

uselessly paddling

Girls."

way, okay?"

She stood with one bare foot on the other, and shifted tic vest,

it

win."

made an

don't think

I

a bicycle reflector. "And

like

stood back and pointed the

range and pulled the tri^er. bright sunlight,

He

target, that thing here."

middle of her chest that looked it'll

to get

she was so small.

Donny

shoot that

try to

had taken some doing

it

A

in the stiff plas-

bug with shiny green wings

its legs.

As she watched,

it

was

filter.

Really, Really,

Weird Stories

John Shirley "You going

Brittany? Oh: She's in Translucent Blue 193 to play or not?"

There was a wriggling chain of light

went

into the filter

"Brittany.'^

Her

.

.

in the blue

the light shook

.

You going

itself

.

.

pool water ... the bug

.

to play?"

foot was hurting

on the hot

concrete. She turned

twice, to get into the shade of the house.

"How come

and hopped,

there isn't grass?"

"What?" She pointed. The ground

all the way around the house was green conThe green paint on the concrete was faded, worn away in places. There were a lot of abalone shells, some of them broken now, some pieces of lava glass, some shiny round rocks, a couple

crete with stuff stuck in

it.

of half-broken statues of

men

little

with beards and pointed hats and

wrinkled up faces, the broken base of a bird feeder and, embedded face

up

in the concrete: a silvery Frisbee

with a

lot

magic marker and the numbers i p 8 ^.It was the

house—concrete with

each

little

Mom.

"I

in

an arms' length between

See her reflection in

and put

said

it

your feet on those

reason,

was an

in this concrete

stuff. It

some

mean, she doesn't

work on weeds so she tween the

it.

she did that." For

"It's Jill,

grass

it,

it

way around

the

pushed-in thing. There was a blue crystal doorknob in one

spot; she liked to look at

instead of

things trapped in

of names signed on

like that all

was before shells,

like

Donny

and

blue.

called his

Mom

and they took out

this stuff in

was born. Watch

I

tiny

weeds but she doesn't

art project

and put

it,

it

all

and painted

out, too,

Jill

like to

it

the be-

you can cut

they got broke."

"Okay."

"You going

to play?

She squinted

head

now

at

It

took a long time to put that target on you."

him. There were two palm trees growing out of his

because she and

"You're pissing

me

Donny were

standing in a different spot.

off now," he said. She couldn't see his eyes, hardly,

because of the way the sun was.

She didn't want to admit she didn't know what that meant so she said,

"Okay.

I'll

hide."

Doc bought and about

cars,

restored and sold classic cars.

something about blown hemis.

about fucking football and here of them,"

Jill

just

we

The men were

"Shit next they'll

are with our

tits

talking

be talking

hanging out in front

said.

"I

know, they take us for granted."

"I

take you for very, very

take you for," said Doc,

Really, Really,

good heart-hreakin good pussy,

that's

what

who sometimes talked that way. He used to

Weird Stories

I

read

194 Brittany? Oh: She's in Translucent Blue

Hunter Thompson and

had something

it

John Shirley do with

to

that. Pretty

soon

he'd start with the comedy. Jill

looked

at

kiss. "/

Marissa narrowly and blew her a

take you

seri-

ously honey."

Marissa

made

a kissy at her.

"Me

too, you."

when

But she was always uncomfortable

and playing with her But you had to be

"You

still

"No,

I

pussy.

was sucking on her

Jill

had way more dyke

in her

tits

than she did.

and not get hung up.

flexible,

working out

Jill

at the airport?"

fucking quit," Marissa said.

"It

Jill

asked.

was making

me

crazy,

those an-

nouncements. Selling magazines and candy and listening to those an-

nouncements

"God

I

all

guess.

Blahbuhdahbuhdah

day.

Henny

still

selling software?"

"Yeah, he just sold a whole line to ...

Doc was

I

some big company

don't know,

up the doobies. The

just firing

day."

all

One

specials.

." .

.

for each couple.

The music was—what was that, the guy with the high pitched voice and as soon as they made up their mind what the song was going to be it changed like

they thought that was real heavy.

"What band

is

Doc?" Marissa asked, taking the

that.

joint

from

Henny. "Rush,

that's fuckin'

Rush, are you kidding?"

"Mahogany Rush?" "No,

that's

shit,

ruuuuush, ohrkay.''

is

Rush, rush rush rush-rush

slipped into

some Saturday Night Live

another band,

Doc had

this

though she wasn't sure which one.

character,

a stand up comic. Next would

She drew on the

"God, what

is

come

fantasized about being

a lame joke.

and coughed.

joint

He

It

was

sour, chemical tasting.

that?"

"Okay so God called Bill Gates, Boris Yeltsin and Clinton together—" Doc was saying. "'Here's the deal, boys,' God said um ..." .

"Did you sign that

letter

"And

'The world

is

folks

.'" .

.

'I

He was trying to do

accent over that part of the joke, she could

tell

couldn't hear the accent because of the music. real after

all,

bad news

is

that the world's

goes to the Russian people and uh louder,

on

its

own. She could

hit.

going to end in twenty-four hours' and so

Clinton went to the American people and said

some bad news,

.

from the Swinger's Coalition to Clinton?" Jill

whispered. Marissa nodded and took another said,

.

feel

." .

.

got

some good news and

an Arkansas good ole boy

by

his expression, but she

'". .

gonna

.

good news

end.'

The music was

the weight of

it

So then

is

God

Yeltsin

is

he

getting louder

and

She could

feel

in the air.

Really, Really,

Weird Stories

John Shirley the music

Brittany? Oh: She's in Translucent Blue 195

on her

there at the bar,

wet the

tip

She watched as Jill unzipped Henny's pants,

skin.

and took

thumb and

of his

and

his dick out,

started playing with

started rotating

it

on one of her

it,

right

and he

nipples;

he

had an exaggerated idea of how much she liked that. "And Bill Gates said, 'The good news is the YzK thing is not gonna be .'" a problem but Without anyone touching the boombox the music .

.

rose to such volume that she couldn't hear the punchline but

pain in the butt

when Doc

it

was a

him for the right moment and laughed on cue and he bent over, laughing, pushed his head between her breasts, butted them around. "You think it's funny too, boys?"

He

"Tes we talking

sulked so she watched

asked her breasts and he bounced them to make them nod.

do!'"

He

did

it

in a high pitched voice,

back to him, making Henny bark with

mimicking her breasts laughter.

The

laughter

broke off abruptly as Jill bent and took Henny into her mouth. She was bent over from the waist, legs

straight,

ing herself up with her hands

on the

Doc would come arouad and pull

her butt jutting out behind, holdsides of his stool,

her tights

down and

maybe hoping

slip into

her from

behind, because that's what she liked best from the guys, one in her

from

either end,

and one of the things Marissa

someone suck her husband, which her sister didn't

sister

liked best

thought was weird. But her

understand swingers, said they were sex addicts, and

all

know and now

knew was that it feeling was—ripples of that feeling going through her, could see the feeling, when she looked down at herself—never before

Marissa

got her

off,

the ripples of—she didn't

what the she

was watching

could she actually see

it

but

now

she saw

her body, shining gold-green rings

.

.

it

in rings

moving up through

.

Somehow she was standing, though she didn't remember getting up, and Doc had his head under her blouse and Henny was shouting over That's what the good Lord made the music about hell let's get in bed .

beds for

The

.

.

.

.

.

concrete hurt Brittany's

feet,

where

it

was rough, and she'd broken a

toenail on the lavaglass, but right then she was having fun staying away

from Donny. One of

his feet

was smaller than the other so one of

shoes had extra rubber on the bottom and he didn't wasn't hard for her to stay

away from

move very well

his

so

it

his laser shooter-thing. "You're

from the back, when she went into the front yard and ducked under the bird of paradise plant. She could smell corn and beef cooking from the Mexican house across the street and a Mexican boy was watching her, sitting on his bike and watching her; he was a little cheating," he yelled,

Really, Really,

Weird Stories

196 Brittany?

Oh:

She's in

older than her, he might be in

first

grade, or almost, and he was watch-

but he didn't have a look on his face

ing, play.

John Shirley

Translucent Blue

like

he wanted to be asked to

She wanted to ask him, to have someone

Donny's eyes were

like that

else there,

because

cartoon she'd seen, where the cartoon had

holes instead of eyes-

She heard the uneven slapping of Donny's tennis shoes coming along the side of the house and she got out from under the bird of paradise

and dodged between the

little

islands of things in the concrete front

yard,

around the other side of the house and away from him. This was

easy,

she could just keep the house between her and him.

"You're cheating!" he yelled, which

what he

is

when he

yelled

wasn't

winning, "you are supposed to stay in the back shitbutt!"

Another time but

time

this

Henny

it it

would have bothered Marissa when Henny threw up, seem to bother anyone, it made them all laugh,

didn't

too, as he

threw up into the

little

aluminum

He gargled with vodka as another CD came on,

it

sink behind the bar.

was the

Moody Blues,

Knights in White Satin, and Marissa, lying on her back, could see the Knights in White Satin riding horses across the ceiling as against her, his half-erect dick just

he worked

at

it,

and

making

holding the joint between Marissa's

tits

getting a

lips,

and then

with her naked ass

tits,

sat

on her

to her that Marissa sort of liked,

just

slender

Marissa,

pussy,

like tits

now

on them—

now.

Man

like that

said, "It

she

that dope?" she asked, absently. Skin felt rubbery, plasticky,

distant to her

looked

which

when

making Marissa's nipples wet with her

themselves, nipples growing

The

tits,

rubbing her butt

and groaning, and Marissa could see Jill's buttocks looking

"What was

slapped

harder as

like that, straddling

her weight on her legs instead of on Marissa, and against Marissa's big

Doc

little

gave her another hit of the sour tasting dope,

Jill

was one of the things Jill did kind of rode her big

it in,

in

White

boy she'd

was PCP, angel

sitting

liked

next to her—was he the Knight?

when

she was in high school,

dust, dear lady."

He

Lenny—he

Or maybe Doc said that because

Henny came back to the bed, asking about it. "Oh Christ, dust joints," Henny was saying, "Jeez, Doc." But of course he took another hit. Anytime: Whatever it was Henny took always another hit. She suddenly remembered the time Henny had taken speed. The one and only time; she'd never let him do it after that, or not that she knew about. He'd gone down on a black girl that Jill had brought over and the girl was on some other drug, 'ludes maybe, and was watching TV at the Really, Really,

Weird Stories

John Shirley

the

Rodman on some woman was

Dennis

time,

Brittany? Oh: She's in Translucent Blue 197 talk

same time the

show, and laughing at him, but

playing with her

clit

about the TV, and more than an hour passed that way

Henny's knees were bloody

that

crete floor

.

.

.

.

Marissa saw

until

bloody from grinding on the con-

.

Marissa looked for the

was

.

at

while she talked

Man

in

there, pointing at the wall.

White

sitting

next to the bed, and he

There was a buzzing

in her head, like a

smoke alarm inside her, so loud she couldn't hear what he was saying, but he was pointing at her and Judy Chula, who was Luis' little sister, and they were in high school, way back in high school, senior prom night, they were walking to the prom because they didn't have dates, but they decided to go anyway because there would be guys without dates there too, supposedly,

and they could dance, and you never knew, and then a

Trans

Am

really

know, but she thought one of them was named Charles some-

thing,

and the other one was

pulled up beside them. In the car were two guys she didn't

both of them blond,

either Rafe or Rufus,

cousins, big good-looking guys, major in football at school, but not in

her scene, and they asked

Judy looked

if

they wanted a ride to the prom. She and

each other and got in that car fast The guys were wearing

at

football jackets

and

jeans, though; they weren't dressed for the

you're going to the prom, you're dressed kind of weird for

which made

Marissa cringe,

inside her, she felt

was

trickle a little

it

afraid the trickle

and

periods, sure,

and the cringing made her

that, if

it

would get

when she squeezed

happened, would be the

"Do you remember what

.

"If

said,

tampon

her thighs, and she really full

ultimate humiliation for

.

.

they said?" the

Judy

her

been having these

out, she'd

but the guys were saying something

it,"

feel

prom.

man

with the shining white

face and the long, long hair asked her, as she turned her head to look at Jill's

churning buttocks and

Henny "Yes

the same

at .

but did

.

.

Doc ground

at her pussy.

Jill

was sucking

time.

they said they were going to change pretty soon for the prom,

we want

"Who's she

to

smoke

talkin' to?"

a joint with

Doc

them

first.

asked, laughing.

We

"Whoa,

said okay." she's high.

Come

"

on,

girl

She

...

felt Jill

climb off her, a sudden coolness, then

the wrist, agreeing with

Doc

Henny taking her by

about something she couldn't hear because

smoke alarm sound was up again, and they were leading her ceiling hook, making her wobble through a gelatinous air

the

.

They

.

to the

.

chained her with mink-lined leather cuffs to the chain that ran

from the

ceiling.

Really, Really,

Weird Stories

198 Brittany?

Oh: She's

in

Translucent Blue

John Shirley

I'm a Christmas tree ornament, she thought. This was one of her favorite things,

when people

her, while

sucked on her

Jill

"That's love,"

Jill

it,

learn

was

The sound

in her

head rose and

what you're here

saying.

"Now you're

for, to

make

She was looking over

Jill's

lengthen the

fell.

us feel good,

Doc

rest.

She couldn't

while beside him,

image of Mel Gibson. Mel was

and succeeded though she

squirm away, and she was saying, no, no, job,

up with the

now wearing a high down and give him

mouth onto him by pushing the back of her head; on the grass of the park the other, shorter jock was

trying to force Marissa's legs apart,

you a blow

feel

shoulder at the pictures on the walls—no,

school football jacket, and was making Judy kneel head, forcing her

bitchy

screwing her from behind.

the pictures were in the walls, like holograms, and mixed poster: part of the

little

"

going to ...

rose again and she couldn't hear the

her wrists. She could barely feel

Spanking

him hard again—

chain so she could kneel and get

The smoke alarm sound

that.

Doc would

After awhile

tits.

They

did this to her.

were completely paying attention to her when they did

I'll

give

you a blow

tried to

job,

but he wanted to be able to say he'd gone

all

in Judy's

way

the

with someone, and he forced her legs open and the blood gushed

At the same moment the jock standing gushed

give

I'll

.

.

.

mouth, making

her choke and whimper angrily and she pulled herself away and spat-

Then

they saw the lights of the cop car coming

down

the road into

the parking lot of the park, and they ran, zipping up and pulling up their

pants respectively, sprinting through the brush of the park toward the

Am, and both Judy and Marissa were crying, their prom dresses ruined with cum and grass stains and blood and the two cops came and stood over them and one of them made an involuntary disgust-sound when he saw the blood running down her thigh and the bloody tampon with its little string that had come out when she was struggling away from the shorter jock— Marissa was weeping so Jill said, "Oh gawd. Well, hell, let her down." And they undid the cuffs and she sank down and saw their disappointed faces and said, "I'm sorry. Let's do something. What do you street

where they'd

want

to do?"

"I

don't want to

the fence.

Her

do

foot

left

the Trans

that," Brittany

was

saying, as

Donny pushed

was bleeding now from the broken

her against

shell she'd

stepped

on. That's the only reason he'd caught her. "Just for a

few minutes more," he

said, "I didn't

get the target but

Really, Really,

one

time."

Weird Stories

John Shirley don't care,

"I

I'm

Brittany? Oh: She's in Translucent Blue 199

tired,

I

my

head

don't care,

I

hurts,

I

want

don't like

to lay

want

it, I

my

down,

to lay

foot's bleeding,

down."

Mom.

She was hungry too. She wanted to see her

"Go—run!" "I

don't want to play that anymore."

"You'd better."

"Okay— I'll want her

run." But she ran through the fence gate,

to go, leaving

bird of paradise plant

little

and wriggled out of the

her as she struggled with

and she'd thing.

thrown

just

it

it.

It

aside

was hard

side,

didn't

limping a

plastic vest. It scratched

to get off. Finally she got

when he found

She couldn't make out what he was

She ran around the

where he

red blotches on the walk, and hid under the

her,

and he

yelled

it

off

some-

yelling.

little

now, and through the other

fence gate, and into the back yard, looking for the door into the house

where her

Mom had gone.

"Mom?" she yelled. "Mom!" Donny came into the back yard,

mouth

his

all

looking, his eyes like the hole-eye cartoon guy's.

flattened out, pinched

He got between her and

the back door.

He

pushed her toward the pool.

Marissa thought she heard her daughter It

was hard

and the pillow,

to

tell,

buzzing sound.

silk sheets,

least dizzy, blurry, before they

And him

let

It

face down in the blue Doc and Henny holding

was

far

her up.

the erotic

with

it.

"Crystal Blue Persuasion."

then she saw

Henny

two, another

its

back, running into a long wolflike

her

But she liked to get

tail;

at

playing an

Henny stepping

looking like an inaccurate copy, with a long strip of bristly

down

silk

smothering she

The boombox was

CD, the song

split in

far away.

was making,

was

Jill

with both

down, her hands cuffed behind her. liked-they were careful not to go too oldies

from somewhere

with the music, and the noises that Jill

rising, falling

on the blue

calling,

out of

brown

fur

with eyes like holes

thumbed into the putty of its almost-Henny head. It rose humming, buzzing and growling, to turn, to swim through the air itself, the shining blue air, moving in slow motion up the stairs and out the door and out Henny's to backyard, to the pool-the pushing motions of the original her, into himself drove and down, shoulders and hips as he pushed Jill

movements of the thing that rose from him, the brisde-tailed thing with holes for eyes and a slit for a mouth, that went out the basement door without touching the floor. seemed

to translate into the

Really, Really,

Weird

Stories

200 Brittany? Oh: She's in Translucent Blue

Two of her husband,

one down

one up

here,

the same, the second created from the

"Mama air

first,

moving

into the

back yard—

.

was a whisper

it

right into her ear.

whispering.

down into

Marissa rose from watching Jill being pressed drowniing in door. She

wrong

same and yet not

there, the

." .

But the voice wasn't a distant shout,

The

John Shirley

and found

silk,

herself drifting

up the

opened the back door—it was hard

the sheets, Jill

stairs, to

the back

to turn the knob,

it felt

in her fingers, but she got the door opened.

Marissa looked out the back door into the blazing afternoon. The sky

was so blue

.

The water

.

.

pool so blue

in the

One somehow

.

.

.

bled into the other, the sky part of the pool, the pool

part of the sky, melted together by the sunlight

.

.

.

She remembered Lenny Baer, the big love of her teenage she'd only

gone out with him four

He'd

times.

years,

though

He

recited poetry to her.

wrote for the high school paper, and sometimes he wrote poetry for tra credit in English.

to his waist almost,

and

soft gray eyes

He'd made her understand

things.

ex-

A skinny, big-nosed kid with long brov^ni hair, down and an easy

that

He'd taught her

smile.

poem by Robert Frost about first B in English, writing

choosing the two roads, and she'd gotten her

about

First

it.

Man,

time over a C.

she'd loved him.

He'd written a poem about how he'd seen one of "in the translucent crystal of a

his

dreams caught

raw piece of quartz" he found on the

beach, and he'd had to explain to her what translucent meant, and she

never forgot

it.

But he'd stopped seeing her because

was a skank. Judy, ing her

when

she'd found out.

kinds of guys. His

his best friend

had told him she had enjoyed

jealous of her going out with Lenny,

Dad

heard

"He heard you were

it

too,

I

guess, said

Dad

not calling you and Skank.

Slut.

teaches polyscience. So he just

like

all

the pool.

How beautiful:

demon

.

that's

why he's

Brittany, her baby,

The song still playing. swimming through the sky,

with the bristling

tail

of the

in translucent blue, part

one great piece of translucent

blue persuasion. free, flying,

.

you

in a piece of quartz. Translucent quartz

arms outspread, face-down

of the water,

.

whom

stuff."

Dreams caught

Like the sky; ing,

all

he was disappointed or

something. Said 'I'm disappointed in you but go out with choose, son.' His

tell-

a skank. Fucking

.

fly-

sky, part

crystal beauty. Crystal

How beautiful, it

was

.

was a miracle

her .

.

.

little girl

so

The Henny

and thumb-hole eyes— he was crawling Really, Really,

Weird Stories

John Shirley

Brittany? Oh: She's in Translucent Blue 201

around the edges of the translucent couldn't get into

it,

away from him

flying there to get

She heard Jill shouting angrily ing in her head, each Jill

thump an

.

at

.

to

the basement

"Shhh ...

.

.

.

had gone

Brittany

and with

individual sharply defined ache,

were sharper, harder, and she

went down the

stairs,

back into

.

...

Jill

my head

"You fuck he almost "You're

.

.

please be quiet, so she

tell Jill

.

Doc, and there was suddenly a bang-

yelling like that downstairs the aches

needed

he

blue, yelling something, but

she was safe from him there

all right,

..."

me

killed

...

"

what'd you think, you

like

it

that

me

you told

far,

anyway, you were groaning up a storm—"

"You

shit

I

was

stop—You

yelling to

just get

me

The stuff you gave us "Some other stuff too, dust and something

shit

.

.

is

.

what, and of course the

.

.

the

.

makin'

be quiet

hurts too

else

he told me,

I

forget

.

my head hurts own voice saying

."

shit,

Marissa heard her

.

.

it.

"My head

." .

.

"Marissa little,

."

.

.

a fucking drink. Doc,

." .

"You don't even fucking know? Ow, "Jill

me

sick—fucking angel dust—"

Henny was

." .

.

on

squatting

the floor, his head dipping a

then jerking up, then dipping. "Where's ... the kid."

"Brittany?

Oh:

she's

.

." .

She sank onto the bed, wanting her head to

stop thunking, banging.

"Drink some of

this

honey

..."

Drinking, sucking smoke; they were arguing, the other three; she

threw up. Other sounds from the

ceiling

.

.

.

and Marissa went outside

The them to be quiet, and the policemen put a blanket on on it, though it was rough material, because she was police sirens hurt her head, too,

saw the girl

same

little girl,

on a gurney,

as

size as Brittany,

someone

blue sheet, and they asked

same

clothes

to

tell

her, they insisted

naked.

and

Then

hair,

the

she

little

pulled a sheet over her face, an institutional-

if

Marissa

knew what had happened

They

little

daughter, did she see anything.

said that the

boy said he

on her

to her

didn't

fingers like he'd

push her into the pool, but there were bruises stepped on them when she'd tried to get out and they wondered

if

any-

one had seen anything.

"Who? What "Your

down

girl?"

named Brittany, right? That's what the boy says. Just the blanket's falling off down in the back of the car

sit

litde girl's

...

sit

"Brittany?

.

.

Oh:

Really, Really,

she's in translucent blue

Weird Stories

.

.

." .

.

." .

Ticket to Heaven

Ticket to Heaven

I

never really wanted to go to Heaven. But

me. There was pressure on

morning

I

"Barry!"

met Putchek Gannick

.

said

.

me

to

go

knew someone would make To Heaven. Starting the

I

there.

.

when

I

dragged myself into

his office.

"Meet

Frank Putchek, director of Club Eden." "Hey,"

I

said,

"Howya

doin"'

I

smiled woodenly, shook Putchek's

hand mechanically.

You have

to understand that

it

was

been

3:30. I'd

in the office since

nine—this not being one of your breezy, we're-all-chums advertising agencies

where the idea men are permitted

be prima donnas—and

to

the morning thinking of ways to convince the public

I'd

spent

needs Triple

it

M

brand Hamburger Enhancer. (But of course we'd end up explaining to the world that the three jackass

Ms

should stand for

Mmm! as in Mmm

would have come up with the same

thing,

and Triple

saved a bundle on an advertising agency. But agencies the bad habits of industry

.

.

.) I

in the

a better salary and maybe residuals.

noon

hopes that she'd offer

I'd

spent the

thinking of ways to convince the public

sweetener, one only mildly carcinogenic.

constructing artful

lies

and

mine

thrive

it

first

and two dimensional, threatening

flat

3:30

some mysterious temporal voodoo

certain artificial

3:15,

to fold

I

was burnt,

everything in the office

down

into one-dee.

arrests the clock,

called

me

in to

By

and the pace of

time becomes a hunchbacked old lady with an aluminum walker.

when Gannick

a job

3:00, after a hard day of

fighting the tides of self-disgust,

was

me

part of the after-

needed a

And by

looking at the world through glazed eyes. By

that's

on

spent lunch flattering Jemmy Sorgenson,

from Maplethorpe and Sorgenson, at

like

Good! Any

M could've

And

meet Putchek.

Putchek was a middle-aged guy with a smallish head, chipmunk cheeks, and a seemingly infinite wealth of smile lines around his

Really, Really,

mouth

Weird Stories

John Shirley and

He

eyes.

goofy with

Ticket to Heaven 203 smiled a

lot,

mosdy with

He

his overbite.

was

his

mouth

slightly

open, looking

round-shouldered, wore dandruff-

tall,

flecked wire-rims. But he had a nice blue and dove-gray Pierre

designer I

and immaculate patent

suit,

didn't notice

all this

Putchek-shaped

blur.

He

my

boss,

was

Gannick,

less

spongy handshake and a sort of

his

could've been part of the furniture.

furrowed than usual,

behind

sitting

make him

special chair to

Only

at first.

Hayakawa

leather shoes.

his

desk in

less midget-ish, his

his small shoulders

shirt sleeves,

on

high forehead was a

his

little

almost relaxed, his darting

black eyes for once relatively stationary.

Gannick was happy about something. Putchek must represent a

juicy

account. I

my smile down into something faint but superficially warm, and

screwed

sat across

from Putchek where

could look out the

I

britde spires of Manhattan's petrified forest. Petrified,

window I

at the chill,

thought.

Me too.

"Coffee, Barry?" Gannick asked me.

"No, thanks

"He

doesn't need

Gannick

coffee,"

pretend-confidingly to

said,

Putchek. "Or any other stimulant. Barry Thorpe runs on adrenaline."

grinned to soften the sarcasm.

must've looked

I

He

more wooden than

I

thought.

huh.

Heh

and blinked

tried to get the joke

Putchek

two of

us.

"Oh, uh-

heh."

Gannick

said, "Barry,

Club Eden's Paradise Vacations

count-! guess you've heard rumors-"

something a unusual-"

at the

little,

He

well, unusual,

hadn't heard a

I

ac-

word-"and

it's

our

Barry, are a

and since you,

paused for everyone to chuckle, so

ought to head

new

is

we

did. "I

little,

well,

thought you

this up."

He beamed,

and

I

tried to

my

ing the muscles of

manage

couldn't quite

face

look pleased.

were

It

was

as

if

the strings operat-

stretched out, threadbare, because

the expression

I

wanted.

I

"You OK, Barry?" Gannick asked. "Just tired."

we

summoned

I

a

got a prospectus or a press

"Video of

"The uh, "There

.

.

.

?"

resorts

aren't

and

anywhere on

kit

or

.

.

animation. "Well, have

video?"

or—"

any

resorts!"

Purchek brought

his

hands together as

then did a sort of joyful wringing instead, shifted

said, a little impishly, this planet, ah, Barry."

Really, Really,

.

little

Putchek asked.

he'd clap them, and his chair,

focus, a

little

Weird Stories

if

on

"Club Eden doesn't send people to

John Shirley

204 Ticket TO Heaven was

It

my

sharp focus. I'm

turn to blink in confusion.

They had my attention.

wrong—I know I'm

a

knew,

it

was

manned,

of the

room jumped

at

it

times—but did

I

into

me if

lose twenty or

in the next century alluvasudden? Last

I'm sure of

just 2016;

More

turned to Gannick. "Correct

it.

Interplanetary travel

is

I

un-

still

right?"

manner of

a

"It's

out of

little

Are we

thirty years somewhere.'^

I

planet, per se,"

speaking. We're not sending people to another

Putchek explained. "We're sending them to another

.

.

.

another existential focal point. Another plane, to use the metaphysical jargon. I

We

looked

send them to Heaven"

and then

at Putchek,

sensurround

laser

Gannick said

slowly,

He

guess,

I

Gannick. "Heaven.

some kind of

A

gone someplace.

of

.

.

.

you

sort of mind-trip

electronic stimulation of the brain or—"

shot a glance of polite inquiry at Putchek.

Putchek hemmed, getting ready to haw. look

at

Hke

it

that."

there. Yourself.

He

would

"If ah, if

glanced up at me.

Then you'd

.

.

.

accept

stared at his reflection in his shoes, it

Some kind

"Nuh-ope. They put you in a machine and

really feel physically like you've

through,

at

show, huh?— 360-degree screens, incense?"

and

"It'd really

it."

his

you

He

You

like.

help

if

can, ah,

you went

looked embarrassed,

mouth was shut— as much

shut, with his overbite— and aU of a

as

sudden he worried me.

The next day was Samrday. Under the business-incentive labor laws, most of the population had to work on Samrday. But not me, I could putter around my weekend house with a drink in my hand. Getting gloomier as I got drunker, opaquing the windows and dialing the lights low, enjoying the gloom, hugging the house's darkness. Thinking about

the Club

We

Eden demonstration

send them

supposed.

Heaven,

Some

to

shrugged.

I

went

What

I

go to on Monday.

to

said.

Neurological heaven,

to the picture

was something only a few could

The

spring afternoon was startling,

tastelessly garish after the artificial twilight

Tumbler in hand,

afford.

window, thumbed the button, and the window of

my

I

made my head

looked out over one of Hartford's

urbs. Trees lined the street with

al-

house.

blinked in the unwanted sunshine, and the whiskey

ache.

I

was new?

else

glass rippled into transparency.

most

was supposed

pleasure-inducing machine, perhaps.

at Putchek's prices,

I

I

Heaven, Putchek had

prettiest sub-

newly budded clouds of soft green; here

and there were the bright pom-poms of flowering had no idea exactly what kind of

trees

fruit trees.

most of them were. Really, Really,

I

realized

I'd lived

I

here

Weird Stories

John Shirley for five years,

my

Ticket to Heaven 205

and

neighbor's

But

know what kind of trees were on the

I

didn't

first

name.

knew my neighbor was

I

Passed, in Connecticut Village.

We

Security Passed.

When you

drove

were

all

Or

Security

you showed the

in,

checkpoint guards your Residency Card, or gave a

street.

number. To

visitor's

get a Residency Card, to be passed, you had to have a B-3 credit rating,

and of course no record

as a felon.

It

was a closed community, but not

community

internally gregarious; the fragmentation of true

tended

its

we had had our

where

anti-roots even here,

We

feeling ex-

We had television; we had the Net. We

looked cozy.

and shopping networks;

interactive video lifestyles.

all

had shrugged off the

responsibility that acknowl-

edging strangers brings. Because one stranger leads to another, and not very far beyond the checkpoint was the crumbling border of Hartford's

we

Shacktown, swollen with strangers

didn't

want

And

to meet.

tried

not to think about. I

wasn't always the model resident of Connecticut Village.

some

stuff for

ing; before

The Reformist, before

I'd

Gannick found me. What

teous, foolishly idealistic stuff

.

.

gotten scared into I'd

written

was

I'd

written

money hunt-

pretty self-righ-

.

Like:

Every town has

its

Shacktown, squatter enclaves grown up in

the cracks betw^een the neat units the cities have less,

little

high-security

Urban

the disenfranchised of every profession: those

in industry

and

oil,

who worked

before hands-on industry became an over-

became an obsolete energy

source; those

seas venture

and

who worked

in construction before the contractors

enty-five

Village

become; the refuge of the legions of home-

oil

went

to sev-

percent premolded structures and robotics. Those

without white collar work

skills;

or those who'd failed to

fit

in

with the country's biggest employer, the "service" industry, that great consumer-supply

mechanism so

machine on a poultry ranch

The Shacktowns two

.

.

a chicken feeding

like

.

are tenanted by people

who, a decade or

ago, built the affluence that the privileged feed off of

Jobless minorities are in the Shacktowns, of course. old. Since the

growth

demographic

shifts

of the

of geriatric medicine, the old

mouldering

slice

of the population.

And

late

'90s,

now.

And

the

and the

have become a huge, millions of

them went

discarded, forgotten, cold-shouldered by the post-welfare soci-

Really, Really,

Weird Stories

John Shirley

2o6 Ticket TO Heaven

ety:

the fresh new, shiny world where Entrepreneurs are messi-

ahs,

where those who

Earn are cast into the outer dark-

failed to

beyond the borders of the

ness,

Stuff like that. Foolish stuff.

Anyway, why go on about

it,

profit

margin

.

.

.

The generalization of college journalism. when the response is always the same?

They'll say, "So what?"

And

the Residency

if

Committee knew

The

written that stuff for

I'd

Reformist, I'd never have been Security Passed for Connecticut Village.

Sometimes

I

passed Shacktown on the freeway. Just a sort of smudgy

gray tumble of shanties glimpsed through the hurricane fence. side a microchip-driven car whistling

poor were reduced

came a

visual

smoothly

down

From

the freeway, the

The whole world

to a blur of embarrassment.

in-

be-

shrug at a hundred and ten miles an hour.

knew it when Gannick said, "The FDA's given Club Eden full approval. The patent bureau, everyone, they're lining up to give their blessing." It was the way he said it. Quick, I

knew there was

bribery in

it

somewhere.

with an undertone that warned didn't ask

why

ously, they'd

me

I

not to harp on the subject. So

there hadn't been any newspaper talk about

worked hard

to

keep

it

mum

till

yet.

it

I

Obvi-

was a fait

federal approval

accompli. Wouldn't want any nosy Senate subcommittees to delay approval

.

.

.

It was Monday afternoon, and we were in what was to be the Club Eden showroom. Me, Gannick, Putchek and Putchek's secretary, Buffy. She was a sort of human Happy Face who went by "Buffy" with no outward evidence of shame. The showroom had been the front office of a large travel agency. The

posters and brochure racks and desks and the

with the

snail-shell

only the transport lights in

middle-aged ladies

rig, like

a

hump

now

there

was

of frozen milk under the fluorescent

one corner of the room, and some paint-jigsawed newspapers

around the I

fat,

hairdos had been cleared out, and

looked

freshly rollered walls. at the transport rig

and

told myself.

Take

it

easy;

it's

probably

harmless. It

looked harmless.

seats

you get

stylized, a

into at

It

looked

like

little

an arcade. Except, on the outside

imitation racecar

it

was

all

designer-

sculpmred teardrop of imitation mother-of-pearl. The

door was open. Inside there was a

No

one of those

controls, nothing else.

I

asked,

chair,

"No

and a few

dials

on

little

a dashboard.

helmet? Something to wire into

Really, Really,

Weird Stories

John Shirley

Ticket to Heaven 207

the brain, to create the illusion?

uh—"

thing and,

had

I

paint suffused the shuttered

Putchek cleared

Or do you

just inject

them with some-

to cough; a recent coat of freshly applied blue

room with

his throat.

quivery fumes.

No

"No.

other, ah, fixtures are necessary

mostly automatic."

It's

might be expected, was short,

Buffy, as

haired,

and dimple-cheeked. She had

stubby,

pudgy white

with white

nails

of a test "I'm

fingers

glitter.

pert, faintly

plump, auburn-

and

silver-flecked china-blue eyes

awkwardly extended by three-inch

blue

nails;

She wore a puce jumpsuit, which was her version

pilot's get-up.

ready!" she told Gannick, a

all

Her

too eagerly.

trifle

voice was

breathy and maddeningly affected.

"Have you done "Oh, uh-huh,

this before, Buffy?"

"They're

a kinda test

pi-

monkeys and pigeons"

that,

using pigeons," Gannick whispered to

still

into the machine.

and climbed

asked.

"Mm-hmm, and we had

sure!" she lilted.

and before

lot guy,

I

me

as she turned

She closed the door behind

her.

The

rig

hum.

started to

Putchek

tilted his

dirty spectacles

head back,

washed out

Putchek said absendy,

as

if

listening to

in the light.

some beloved

"One of our

song. His

big selling points,"

going to be a money-back guarantee."

"is

Gannick's eyebrows shot up. "Money-back guarantee? That's a big Frank.

risk,

there are there're

mean, everyone

I

all

met who's

I've

tried

enthused-but

no two

exactly alike.

If

there're even twenty percent

who

don't

the experience—"

like

"I can't

go

into

all

in his shoes again,

the details," Putchek said slowly, looking at himself in his pockets. "But let's just say

hands

nine percent confident that virtually everyone will risk.

But

The

it's

rig's

worth

I felt

chest, a pinching at the

had a peculiar

lieve

me.

And

risen in pitch-and

then the

I

winced

a ripple go through me,

back of

my

feeling that Buffy

Putchek glanced

like

we

it.

are ninety-

There's

some

it."

humming had

the audible range.

I

it is

kinds of people out there. Brain chemistries, metabolisms-

room was normal

at the rig.

passed out of

and a tighmess

around me.

all

it

in

my

For the briefest of moments,

throat.

was

as

It

was

cloying, be-

again.

"She'll be out

in,

oh, five minutes, vacation

complete." I

looked

at him.

"Once we won't be

"What's the

list

get rolling, ah, five

selling the

Really, Really,

machines

at

Weird Stories

price

on

this?"

thousand newbux per vacation.

all,

for at least a decade.

And

it's

We gim-

John Shirley

2o8 Ticket to Heaven

micked so anyone find a glob of "Five I

feel

telling

breaking into one to see

tries

stared at him. "A thousand

I

Gannick glaring

at

Putchek was unruffled. "Only

They think

personalities are.

at

feel like

me

as

will

only

me. Don't offend the

a minute?"

bills

the glare

client,

me.

utes to them.

may

works

its

slag inside"

thousand newbux."

could

was

who

smoking

if

an

It'll

feel

eternity.

to say,

Hke

at

month

at least a

Of pure,

What do you

open mouth aimed

objectively. It doesn't feel like five

months. Depends on

it's

me—if

how

looked,

I

some

has passed. For

He

uninterrupted happiness."

say to TFIAT? His head

I'd

min-

subjective their it

looked

back; his

tilted

could have checked out his

tonsils.

One

of Putchek's technicians came

in.

He

was a blond

samurai haircut; he was wearing an orange jumpsuit,

He

nately stitched onto each shoulder.

thing

I

box of microchips

music. Putchek glanced at

him

needs the guidance chips;

it's

his

in irritation. "Chucky,

it's

He

earphones.

head

to the

not that

rig that

to the rig, snaking his

the other one."

But Chucky didn't hear him. It

or-

sang sotto voce along with some-

heard only as a seashell sound leaking from

carried a small

with a

kid,

CLUB EDEN

He opened

the door of the

rig.

was empty.

Gannick put the scotch down doctor's

We

in front of

me and

said,

"Drink

it."

command.

were

in Putchek's office,

and

was

I

its

foreclaws,

and on the other

glowering. His expression said. You're

He was

in Putchek's chair.

standing solicitously over me, making a motion with his hands cleaning

Like a

side of the desk,

making a

like

a

fly

Gannick was

on

great impression

the client just great.

But the

girl

was gone.

be OK,"

"I'll

I

said. "I just

.

.

.

funny for a second."

felt

I

looked

Putchek, and then rolled the chair back so he wasn't breathing

"Some kind of

He

shook

We

stage-magic cabinet?"

his head. "She's

were going to

let

gone, projected. Sliding between planes.

people believe

it

was

.

.

.

was

all

ears are burning!" Buffy

announced,

We

in the head, for a while.

thought they'd be too scared otherwise. But believe

"My

at

on me.

me—she—

giggling, as she

came

into

the room. She looked flushed, happy as three-year-old with a mouthful

of chocolate. "I'm OK!" she said. "I've been to Heaven."

Really, Really,

Weird Stories

John Shirley

Ticket to Heaven 209 CX3

Sometimes, alone

home,

at

myself into taking the

CX>

00

looked

I

at

my

and

free pass

me

Heaven. Gannick wanted

trip to

tried to talk

to take

it,

for

else w^anted to take All three of my me to get them passes. Tickets to Heaven. Just as if they hadn't called me subhuman, cold-blooded, and the other things I can't go into without my stomach knotting up. Betty and Tracy

promotional inspiration. Everyone

had

ex-wives

cooing said,

me, posing

at

"You owe

But

didn't

I

it.

called, asking

me

as affectionate

go to Heaven myself. Not

for a long time.

was a good excuse, because Winslow

months

after Buffy vanished

my weekdays It

flashed the holo.

spread

its

It

He

hall

C

scary.

is

my place

snarled, "Yeah?

open

it

I

met him night;

I

was

six

in

in Connecticut.

Whatf" And then he

and the 3-D Federal eagle

his wallet,

and across

wallet,

told myself

So when the doorbell

interruptions.

I

I

an excuse.

was Friday

brook

flipped

wings in the

banner: Jeffrey

just

door,

least

I

opened the

I

and came back.

apartment, packing to go out to

was a time when

rang and

Celia, of course

bastard."

was because of Winslow. But no, Winslow was

He

But

little sisters.

and more, you

this

its

was the luminous

breast

Winslow, Special Agent, Food and Drug Admin-

istration.

"Mr. Barry Thorpe?"

"Uh. Useless to deny

Winslow

right?"

it,

didn't crack a smile.

He was

black-suited, with the fashion-

able bureaucrat's triple-tongue necktie-and he tion.

The Ghost

of Bureaucracy Past,

briefcase instead of a ball

He

looked

me

at

and

I

was an

albino.

No

Trespassing sign.

"I'm doing a series of interviews, Mr. Thorpe, to follow up

May I come

porary approval of Club Eden.

want

to talk to Putchek.

appari-

chain.

with an expression stark as a

"You got the wrong guy I'm

An

thought. Carrying an alumitech

just

on our tem-

in?"

the barker;

I

don't

own

the carny

You

Maybe Gannick."

be talking to them again." He waited. The FDA is responsible for more than food and drugs; Club Eden used a machine that affected people physically, hence it was under their jurisdic"I've talked to

tion.

And was

routine.

I'll

hence, Winslow.

Resignedly,

He

them.

all

I

said,

"Come on

questions.

"When you

No

in."

accusations.

And

all

the questions

are they paid for the interview?" Things he already

Until he slung this

Really, Really,

seemed

interview a returned vacationer for an endorsement,

one

at

me

knew

the answer to.

underhand: "Are you aware of any sums

Weird Stories

2IO Ticket to

John Shirley

Heaven

paid by Mr. Putchek or Mr. Gannick or their representatives to agents or functionaries of the

FDA?"

thought: No, they don't

I

tell

anyone but

the

guy

they're bribing. But

said was, "No."

all I

"Thanks very much." "That'll

do

He

stood up and gave

And he

for this time."

it

me

a limp handshake.

left.

This time?

went out

I

"It's

at the

to a bar,

found a pay phone, and called Gannick.

power

struggle

guy Winslow works for the guys trying to

pull off

nothing,"he told me. "There's a

FDA.

the coup.

And

this

They want

to prove

little

bureaucratic

wrongdoing on the part of the FDA com-

missioners, take over their jobs. But they got nothing.

Uh, did he ask

about the Charred Pad Effect? Corporeal Side Effects?"

"No. What side straight

scoop on

Gannick, I'm supposed to get the

effects are those? this stuff

when

I—"

"Hey, we're not holding out on you. Nothing important. Don't worry

about

it;

it's all

Barry: just

knew Gannick's

I

So

buUshit. Hey,

hung up, and

I

God

knows,

was

I

in

I

got a steak burning;

head out to Connecticut and forget

it

my

tried to forget

office,

brainstorming a

new

it.

fifteen-second spot for the hit:

Yoshio Smith: Assas-

Club Eden was a major sponsor for the show.

was watching a video of the writer Alejandro Buckner,

I

his first

Club Eden vacation.

He was beaming,

was round-faced, and normally he looked was

positively cherubic.

biblical

go—Listen,

about Winslow.

sounded good when people described

sin for the CLA.

gotta

don't-ask-questions-if-you-love-your-paycheck tone.

Federal Broadcasting Agency's latest prime-time

no

I

it."

God

Heaven perhaps

"Heaven

in evidence, fill

the

bill.

no

is

like

still

talking

in afterglow.

about

Buckner

a sadistic cupid; today he

not Christian, particularly; there

angels, precisely,

But Heaven

is

though the Prefects of

will satisfy the Christian, the

Buddhist, or the Hindu. Anyone."

"Some people have claimed Heaven looks it

isn't really so. It's

just

depends on which part you tend to get projected

cided by your personality.

Some people

sort of idealized suburb. it

was a

series

to.

And

It

that's de-

are projected into the pastoral

Heaven, some of them into the urban one.

only,

everybody—but

different for

got a landscape, definite topographical features ...

Many

into the

one

that's

a

Me, I'm an unabashed urban Heaven man-

of roof-top gardens; a sort of Hanging Gardens of

Babylon variation of the great penthouses of Manhattan. But of course,

Really, Really,

Weird Stories

John Shirley in

Heaven

there are

Ticket to Heaven

there are

no pigeon droppings;

no thudding

there

no smog, no

is

helicopters, screaming jets—though

acid rain;

you might see

some aerial gliders, impossibly graceful; everything has a sort of nimbus, like when you do certain drugs—but when you look close, you see it's just the shine off that thing's perfection, the natural glow of

you don't get

how

just

Heaven, but sometimes you

tired in

when

its

excellence;

and

no maggots, no

things,

no

defecation,

some-

it's

no mos-

the people around you want to sleep; there are

no venomous

quitoes,

sleep,

halitosis;

more like dancing— somehow it loses all its earthly clumsiness. And it never becomes excessive, even though the orgasms are slow, full, and not enervating. Food

there

is

sex in Heaven, however you

exudes from the tables as you need

like

but nothing

easy,

is

no faux

awkward

pas, or

smells, but

no bad

dull.

is

smells.

mood. There

Heaven

snow—but

is

dies. Every-

when

only

dullards;

and

smells,

not in the

is

soft

least dull.

everyone's in the

contention

is

to be. Perfection

is

contention there, but never acrimony;

is

into gluttony.

Nothing

ill.

There are sharp

silences.

There are storms, and there

fall

fall

There are no conversational

say again that

I

it's

but you never

it,

You cannot break your bones; you cannot thing

but

it,

all

glorious sport, in Heaven."

cant be

It

suspicious, lieved

want

that perfect,

is

thought.

I

improbable, and

when he

said,

"You

I

can't

I

didn't

want

wanted Heaven

do

just

it

be

to

real.

So

I

was

anything you want there.

If

re-

you

to interrogate the other entities-they look like people, but then

again, they don't; they're

you want to ask

all

sort of soft-edged

awkward questions about the

and shimmery-anyway, place, then you've

if

brought

a lot of 'inappropriate psychodynamics' with you, as one of the Prefects said to

Heaven. So the Prefects-they look flies,

All inappropriate in

me. You've brought 'neurotic attachments.'

glows, without the

like firefly

and much larger-they swarm up

to

you and

sort of

fire-

smooth you

your pushiness, your capacity for violence are answered only with a sort of imquestions and your questions. Your pression: that the place is indeed something you're supposed to have

and then you forget

out,

earned. That

enough

about the place I

a 'higher state of

it's

that should be

.

all

communion with

for you. But

there's

something

And

the universe.' else

.

kind of funny

." .

.

leaned forward, sharply attentive.

Buckner said

who

abstractedly,

are native to

snub you

it,

well, they

or anything; there's

benevolent surprise. As

Really, Really,

"The

if

look

entities

at

you

who like

.

are there .

nothing unfriendly.

they sense that

Weird Stories

.

.

all

the time,

um, they don't really .

but there's a sort of

you don't belong there

." .

.

211

The

John Shirley

to Heaven

212 Ticket

tape ended there. Gannick's interviewer hadn't liked the direction

taking, and we had enough "good review" from him anyThe video ended, and the regular transmission on the TV monitor came on— I started to switch it off, but found myself watching. It was a news bulletin. Four tenements had collapsed an hour earlier, in the Bronx. About

Buckner was

way.

270 people were feared injured or dead. "Portions of the buildings

seemed

"Something

saying.

similar

also a low-rent area— and

damage

rain

happened about two weeks ago

we

think

Insects or acid rain or both.

really

thought about

The phone want

rang.

to

will see to

all, I

It

in Chicago— damage or acid

a result of termite

know

it

Oh. An explanation.

So don't think about

it.

that

didn't put

and the black

that

it'll

I

if

be

It felt

Even one that

like that.

was Winslow.

to see the white face

want you

just

it's

to these old buildings."

an explanation for something

you

just

crumble into dust," the housing commissioner was quoted as

to

you want

suit.

to

safe for you.

it, I

him

felt

good to have wrong when

told myself.

on-screen.

"Mr. Thorpe," he

tell

me

said, "I

anything, anything at

With respect

"You're with the FDA, not the FBI, Winslow.

didn't

I

to prosecution."

You seem

to get

them

mixed up." "Let's just say that this investigation

is

a litde special.

If

you can

tell

me

about the Corporeal Side Effects report on the Club Eden phenomena—" "I really

"If

know what you're talking about," I said sincerely. to play that game—fine. But we'll see who wins."

don't

you want

"FDA, Winslow, FDA. The other one

is

the Federal Bureau of—"

He hung up. I

shrugged. But then

and we

don't

know

Don't think about I

I

thought: Either he's a loon, or we're in trouble

it.

it.

It's

Gannick's problem.

went home.

sat in my confoam chair, nestling into its artificial hug, with the windows opaqued and the lights dimmed, playing my hiding game, pretending it was nighttime and dark out; anyway, it was dark in. I sat there I

sipping Johnnie Walker and listened to the

Heaven, and

why

don't

The

I

I

thought: / don't like this

TV

life.

/

talk

about vacationing

don't like

this

in

world. So

go f

Special Report

anchormen

talked about "the Club

Eden phenom-

enon". Described the depression and ennui Club Eden returnees slipped into

when

the afterglow

wore

off.

Noted

that there

was no

Really, Really,

actual physi-

Weird Stories

Ticket to Heaven 213

John Shirley cal addiction,

but there was an indication of compulsiveness. "After you

get over the depression," a returnee told the cameras, "you get back into

the groove of regular tired

and

for a

stiff,

life.

Everything seems kind of dingy and dirty and

while—but pretty soon you

and, you know, you stop yearning for Heaven you've got the

money

again,

Certain psychiatrists,

made

all

start to enjoy life again,

the time. But as soon as

man, you sign upV

whom

I

knew

to be in the pay of

Club Eden,

great, soft-edged, rolling claims for the therapeutic benefits of a

Club Eden vacation.

A few Southern senators muttered darkly about the

religious implications.

Club Eden had stopped

calling the projection

plane "Heaven," but that's what everyone thought

it

was. So the Moral

Majority stamped their feet and pouted.

Senator Wexler called for an investigation into the

risks, stating

it

was

only a matter of time before the transport rigs went haywire and projected if

someone

ocean— or maybe

into a mountain, or the

into Hell.

And

that didn't happen, there was a danger someone might develop "boot-

leg" transport rigs.

Club Eden had

monopoly with

the legal strength that the

all

resisted franchising.

$400

It

held onto the

million they'd

made

could give them. That was a lot of strength. After the Special Report,

I

had

my

third scotch,

announce

regular newscaster dolefully

and

that, yes, the

listened to the

government had

admitted that the country was sliding into a severe recession. Yes, there was a rather unexpected oil shortage, a general energy crunch, epidemic

problems with power plant generators around the country; indeed, around the world. And the Shacktowns were growing. I

rewound the

cassette, so

I

could

listen to

Buckner again, and take notes.

Club Eden was hot. Club Eden was The Buzz. There was suspicion, outrage, and investigations. But Club Eden kept on through it all, and

Gannick and

I

did our work.

Don't take Paradise for granted

And: So you think Pacific beach:

deep blue

palm

trees)

Who

needs drugs f

is

this (a slick

Paradise^

.

.

.

until you've tried

Kodachrome photo of

sky, crystal waters,

You haven't

tried

Club Eden.

glorious South

emblematically perfect

Club Eden. And: Club Eden:

home. Gannick encouraged me to go. Putchek encouraged me. Putchek went himself sometimes. There was a could stay, somelimit to how often you could go, and how long you Putchek went as but thing to do with electromagnetic stress on the body, I

had

my free

pass, locked

up

at

often as the safety regimen would allow.

Really, Really,

Weird Stories

John Shirley

Heaven

214 Ticket to

He said poker at the club with a pretty girl bringing

Gannick didn't go.

the dry martinis was heaven enough for him.

"But

So

I

want you

to go," he said.

my apartment on

sat in

I

"OK, Barry?"

a Saturday evening, a year after Buffy

about Winslow—he'd same.

The Shacktowners didn't

looked

it. I

I

use

couldn't afford a ticket to Heaven. But

it? I

at the pass.

when

That's

had

pass.

almost forgotten about him.

I'd

So why

my

Not worrying come only once more, and it had been more of the

vanished and came back, thinking about using

went

to the safe

I

kept the pass

in,

I

had one.

and opened

couldn't quite—

I

somehow

the doorbell rang, and

I

knew

would be

it

Winslow. Guiltily,

locked the pass away and opened the door for

I

He

stared.

looked different now. The veneer was gone. So was the

badge and the alumitech

and dark smelled I

"Come on

He out.

and he

in

left lens

He wore on

the dark glasses was cracked.

Winslow here and

and have a

drink,"

I

"As

said.

liked

I

if

The clouds

better.

"Gotta

it.

It

was

at this range.

small, a .25,

"No. You come

along a pitted gravel road, under a lowering gray

sky.

horizon were reddening in sunset and beginning to

at the

rain; in the

him

you needed one."

reached into a pocket and took a gun from

would put a hole right through me, Were going for a drive."

We were walking

He

said.

it

shed

a cheap printout paper suit

listed to the right.

different

Winslow

talk to you,"

briefcase.

and the

glasses;

like beer,

was seeing a

but

him—and

red

tint

it

looked as

if

the clouds were bleeding.

We

walked between the shanties of Shacktown, through smells that would have stopped

sive care that

visor—and sation

I

me

a brick wall

like

Winslow was

coat pocket.

if

the gun hadn't been in Winslow's

talking, talking, talking,

with a sort of exces-

only underlined his drunkenness. "Mr. Danville—my super-

received a sort of

anonymous

tip,

a transcription of a conver-

between two lawyers, one for a certain Janet Rivera and the other

working

Club Eden. Club Eden was offering Janet Rivera a

for

ment, a million newbux, and she took the

money and

ran. It

fat settle-

seems that

with a very minor adjustment of the transport rig— or a power surge at the

wrong time— the

Perhaps

He

it's

like this

vacationer will arrive in something very like Hell. ." .

.

gestured vaguely at the packed-in, mud-encrusted, sewage-reeking

shanties; the

drawn

faces peering

from beneath

plastic sheets nailed over

Really, Really,

Weird Stories

John Shirley

Ticket to Heaven 215

He went

crooked doorways.

on, "Perhaps

worse. Ms. Rivera was

it's

Watch out, that dog wants a piece of your thigh. He's wild was a bony yellow mongrel, its eyes cloudy, its muzzle ribbed with a snarl. Winslow took the gun from his pocket and said, "This'U feed some'a these kids." sent to such a Hell. Apparently,

Ms. Rivera barely kept her .

The gun

cracked, making

and

legs buckled,

scurried out

"The

me

jump, as he shot the dog in the head.

An

twitching.

it fell

old

woman, muttering

and dragged the dead dog by the

transcript got us interested,"

down the road.

.

sanity.

." It

into her hut.

tail

Winslow went on

as

we

continued

glanced over a shoulder and saw a small crowd follow-

(I

ing us at a careful distance; a convention of scarecrows.) "And

our chance to pull

we'd had enough.

we

Its

to herself,

didn't expect.

down

the commissioners.

They were

we saw

corrupt,

and

We probed, and probed, and came up with something A correspondence between the increase in Club Eden

vacationers and the statistical deterioration of the living conditions of

people around them. Putchek knew about charring' because they likened the trips to

was

it

it:

Heaven

called 'launchpad

to the launchings of

rocket ships—and the launchpads are charred by rocket-ship engines,

Thorpe. Club Eden's launchpad fects

rich

on

our worid;

its

charring

the side

is

ef-

the world: the worsening recession, the widening gap between

and poor. And

Look Thorpe We had come .

.

."

as

He

it

went on, the exchange became more

shanties

fallen, partly

were

Thick, oily drops

drumming

its

.

.

literal.

soft,

was about four hundred yards

It

could see, coated with fine gray-black dust.

up

to

were

half

freckling the gravel

and

rim; those nearest

its

it

ashen ground.

of rain pattered

down,

tin rooftops, drumrolling faster and faster as the

Under

increased.

I

built right

sunk in

.

gestured at something.

to a pit in the earth.

across, and deeper than

The

is

downpour

impact, three of the shacks around the rim of the

crater collapsed at once, buckling like the shot dog, crumbling like sand

casdes under a wave;

I

heard

human

voices crying out

from the

shambles, a dissonant choir, wailing; glimpsed faces in the muddy ash, faces stamped with resignation. Swallowed up a moment later. "There

more like these, Thorpe. All over the world. They sprang up afgone into these ter Club Eden got really big. Thousands of people have So they Despair. inertia. of ... of pits. They're all caught up in some kind

are lots

don't fight

it.

You can

feel the pit pulling at

you

.

my need

to survive. Pulling

forward, to pitch myself

Really, Really,

me

in.

Weird Stories

apart,

."

He was

right:

I felt

my sense of self-worth, me want to take a step

the pit tugging at me, a sort of vacuum sucking at

making

.

2i6 Ticket

John Shirley

TO Heaven

"There's a Federal coverup of

"Shut up,"

said.

I

all

wrenched

I

this—"

my

Winslow was

gaze from the

throw myself in had almost overwhelmed me.

me

anymore. "Shoot

or not,"

I

I

it

turned and started

I

rain.

Once, he

to fire into the air to disperse the crowd. But in twenty minutes

were

we

in his car.

"Perhaps what happened to effects that hits

haps

mer

to

there

waited for the gunshot. After a

moment he was walking beside me, hunched against the had

The urge

couldn't stand

I

"I'm leaving."

said.

walking back the way we'd come.

saying.

pit.

it'll

hit

who

you, eventually."

the roof.

nothing at

anyone

all.

He

me and

took off

Danville

doesn't

We

visit

part of the pattern of

is

Heaven," Winslow

said. "Per-

sat in his car, listening to the rain

his sunglasses

and focused

his

ham-

pink eyes on

"We were fired. They said we'd gone beyond the confines we had. That we'd made things up. We hadn't." He

of our job, which

tugged idly at a sleeve of his paper

and the

worked on

the acid rain had

suit;

it,

came away in his fingers. "I've run out of money. My on my back. But what matters—what should have

sleeve

clothes are rotting

mattered—" he looked I

He

said,

"Why

"Just a feeling.

thing was

this

way

guess,

I

is

didn't

That

all right.

Heaven when

I

at

didn't say anything.

I

me

"—are those people out there."

was choking on what

you take the it

was going too

That

there are so

it

what

it

boils

many people

down

had seen.

far into

was going too

couldn't look away,

I

trip.^"

far to

in Hell. It

somehow.

It

was

pretending that every-

wallow

in

our private

was always wrong, but

just a step

too

far.

Guilt,

to."

"You had the right instincts, Thorpe. I knew it when I interviewed you— I could tell the whole thing bothered you. I did my homework on you. Read those pieces you wrote a few years back. I know you're not happy about what you do for Gannick; persuading people to squander millions on the poindess consumption of crap. It bothers you. But you were addicted "Mostly

up a had

I

do

what

are

money."

just scared.

safety margin.

to

I

Of not having an income

was scared of ending up

You don't. You saw what you going to do about it?" didn't.

don't have any proof of bribery.

Or

you something: the public doesn't want

want

it

like

enough

big

to save

those people ... So

I

it."

"No, you

"I

to the

was

it

led to

anything

.

.

go

questioned, or fought. TTiey want Heaven, and

So,

And

else.

this thing to

.

sour.

let

me

tell

They don't

damn

Really, Really,

Thorpe—

the conse-

Weird Stories

John Shirley

Ticket to Heaven 217

quences, and they're paying into a lot of senatorial campaigns to see to

chances for Heaven aren't disturbed.

their

"You're wrong, Thorpe.

do a goddamn

can't

I

What you can do

is,

precisely, a

it

thing."

God Damned

'

Thing,

knew what he wanted me

I

away;

I

could escape

couldn't.

I

saw the

I

had

my back on

turn

pit.

my

lost

Having seen

trip to

It

throttle one;

was. it

was

It

was

like

should do

I

that,

moral innocence.

it.

I

could get

I

could

to dust.

I

.

.

felt

was transformed by

I

And knowing:

couldn't

I

to do?"

Heaven."

going to be hard, Winslow had

ever done.

reason

"What do you want me

it.

with a

"It starts

It's

I

No

whose expressions had gone

faces

the suction of the entropy

knowledge.

to do.

could begin going to Heaven myself.

this. I

like

said.

Maybe

someone who

the hardest thing you've

loves puppies being forced to

seeing your mother for the

and then— though you love her—having

first

time in ten years,

to spit in her eye at the

moment

of reunion. It

was

warm,

like

being in Heaven and spurning

like living in

it.

The

vista

an Impressionist's landscape—and,

sionism, never dull.

I

was nude but unashamed;

was sweet,

like great

soft,

Impres-

for the first time

I felt

I was drifting weightless over the treetops, amount of sunshine, feeling the caress of the and reveling in the surge of joy that was arrival: the

nudity without awkwardness.

basking in

the right

just

music they gave

off,

sight of Friends (Friends

I

had never known before) awaiting

me

in the

garden, turning with a luminous gladness in their faces— I

wrenched myself away and began

The like

act brought the Prefects of

Heaven; they emanated from the

trees

a thought from a synapse, and spiraled gracefully round me: soft

lights, living

in

to Seek.

me—but,

thrust

questions.

They drew closer

to assuage the misplaced Desire

with a crackle of lightning that was an expression of Will,

them back. Refused

to let

them soothe me

into

I

Heaven.

What, then? they asked.

Without speaking, For surely

You

are

nizer has

who

I

asked them:

How is

it

we're permitted here at

all?

was something to be earned. permitted here because you have come here. The Great Orgathis place

made

creates

all

this place; the

Great Organizer

orderliness and harmony. You are

is

the living Principle,

here, in Absolute Har-

mony, so the Organizer must intend it. I told them what had happened on our wodd, to the poor. things had worsened. I asked them why it had happened. Really, Really,

Weird Stories

How

John Shirley

TO Heaven

2i8 Ticket

There are Laws regarding the conservation of matter and energy. If

you

a cup from a

fill

bottle, the bottle will

be that

Your privileged are emptying

much

emptier.

Your

out: the others

must

world

is

suffer.

There are machines of metaphysical truth that underlie physical

things.

You have tampered with

the bottle.

the machines.

it

Your wealthy surround

themselves with stolen Grace, with the subatomic essence of orderliness, stolen

from the

the price: so others

This place, then, It is

all

must no supernatural

is

a function of Law:

laws of what you

This place

is

Grace prevents them from paying

exploited. This stolen

all

paradise?

laws incorporating what you

call Science,

and laws your people

a great device; just as in your world a church

construct to represent the idea of holiness, here

call Physics,

haven't learned.

we used a

is

a physical

physical con-

struct to materialize holiness.

Heaven is created by a machine? A machine birthed by the great Machine that is the universe. Then tell me how I can make adjustments, to right the imbalance Yes.

the machine, to arrest the deterioration

The obvious, they "For me,

it

on our end of

in

things.

said.

began with a can opener.

saw a hand holding an

I

old-fashioned can opener, the kind you have to stab into the can. it into my belly, opening it like a lid, my groin; through the pain I looked harder at the, hand and saw it was my own. I could not say that I had no control over I controlled the hand, but I was making it cut me open. I

But the hand was stabbing sawing toward

it.

was no masochist;

I

did not enjoy

it. I

screamed for

it

to stop,

and

I

meant it. After a while the wound went away, but of course, by then I

was making another. Not wanting

paradox sneered screen where

my

at

boy

in Spanish

suffering, in

all

expiation

.

shit

on

it,

and

.

.

.

Later I

I

used

None

of

it

voluntarily.

I

and knew

bought the favors of a

My sensations of humiliation and it

were not diminished brought

me

relief

found gasoline and tools and all

The

was watching the great

I

stupidities replayed,

another screen as

Harlem

familiarity. .

and

their permutations,

by time or .

but doing

me. At the same time

humiliations

my mother watched on small

to,

in the least

or a sense of

glass with

dog

these things to-

—From

an interview with Frank Putchek,

in the security

ward of Bellevue Hospital's Mental Health Really, Really,

facility.

Weird Stories

Ticket to Heaven 219

John Shirley was imprinted

It

in

my mind when

We

came back from Heaven. The

new guidance

ments, the equations for the rig.

I

had imprinted the adjustments: the

Prefects

went from one Club Eden transport

the country,

Winslow and

I,

literal,

electronic adjust-

chips to go into the transport station to another, across

wearing the Club Eden technicians'

jumpsuits I'd stolen, pretending to be doing routine service checks.

Mak-

ing the adjustments.

We

set

it

up so our readjustments applied

exclusively to the

new

ten-

minute vacations, which were available only to the wealthiest vacationers.

The

pires; the

And

industrial barons, their spoiled children; the corporate

vam-

corrupt politicians.

of course, there was Putchek.

had spoken to Putchek,

who had

We

saw

to that. Because

admitted he'd

known

early

Winslow on about

the side effects of granting First Class Tourist passage to Heaven.

Putchek had known, and had not cared. Putchek was the first

first

to go; the

of many.

By degrees, it began to. work: the suffering of the exploited and the abandoned began to be reversed, and some of the garbage pits became gardens.

The

ashpits cleared

up

like

the healing of geological chancres.

The Shacktowners found strength: they organized, and built, and made demands. There was no Utopia there, and never will be. But there was dignity,

We

and soon there was food and

shelter.

The adjustments worked. It worked because sloppy about security. Which meant we were able

restored the balance.

Club Eden had gotten

to send a surprisingly large

number of people

to Hell.

But then again, maybe that shouldn't have surprised

Really, Really,

Weird Stories

us.

Really,

Reallj^^^'y-

^Veird

Stories

Ash

A police car pulled up

to the entrance of the

on

the apartment building,

Casa Valencia. The door

was ahnost camouflaged by the businesses around the stand-out orange

his

his

it,

wedged between

and blue colors of the Any Kind Check Cashing

Center and the San Salvador Restaurant. Ash

and sipped

to

the edge of San Francisco's Mission district,

made

a note

on

his pad,

cappuccino as a bus hulked around the comer, blocking

view through the window of the espresso shop. The cops had shown

up a good

thirteen minutes after he'd called in the

anonymous

tip

Casa Valencia. Which worked out good. But when

on a was

robbery

at the

time to

pop the armored car at the Check Cashing Center next door, show up more briskly. Especially if a cashier hit a silent alarm.

it

they might

The bus

pulled away.

Only a few

cars passed, impatiently clogging the

corner of 6th and Valencia, then dispersing; pedestrians, with clothes flapping, hurried along in tight groups, as

the moist February wind. streets before this twilight

Just around the corner

first

manager from cop

his

in

New

some

cruiser.

they were being tumbled by

dark. first car,

arrived.

double-parking with

its

lights

By now, though, the bruise-eyed

Delhi or Calcutta or wherever was telling the it

was a

false alarm,

probably

The cop nodwindow of Dunkin' Donuts. Ash re-

junkie he'd evicted, just to harass him.

watery sympathy.

SFPD

if

instead by eagerness to get off the

that he hadn't called anyone;

called in by

ded

from the

second police car

flashing, the

hotel

Blown became

Then

The second cop

they both

split,

called through the

off to

Any minute now the armored car would be evening money drop-off. There was a run of check

laxed, checking his watch.

showing up for the cashing after

five o'clock.

Ash sipped the dregs of his cappuccino. He thought about the .45 in the shoebox under his bed. He needed target practice. On the slim Really, Really, Really,

Weird Stories

John Shirley

Ash 223

chance he had to use the gun. The thought made

mouth go

He

dry, his groin tighten.

wasn't sure

if

his heart thud, his

the reaction was fear

or anticipation. This, now, this bery. Pushing

was being

back

alive.

at the world.

Planning a robbery, executing a rob-

Making a dent

in

it,

this time.

For

thirty-

nine years his responses to the world's bullying and indifference had

been measured and

careful

and more or

less passive.

He'd played the

game, pretending that he didn't know the dealer was stacking the

He'd worked

faithfully, first for

Grenoble Insurance, then for Serenity

Insurance, a total of seventeen years.

When

all.

soned

And

it

had made no difference

the recession came. Ash's middle-management job was

much

so

like

at

jetti-

trash.

shouldn't have surprised him. First at Grenoble, then at Serenity,

It

Ash had watched

had been summarily cut off

helplessly as policyholders

by the insurance companies year, gia,

cards.

at the

time of their greatest need. Every

thousands of people with cancer, with AIDS, with accident paraple-

were cut off from

the- benefits they'd

spent years paying

for,

shoved

through the numerous loopholes that insurance industry lobbyists

worked

into the laws.

ten-year-old kid with

do

it

to Ash.

Come

That should have told him:

if

leukemia— and, God, they did

the recession, bang.

they'd it

do

every

Ash was out on

it

to

some

day—they'd

his ear

with the

minimum in retirement benefits. And the minimum wasn't enough. Fumbling through the "casing process," Ash made a few more functory notes as he waited for

the armored

car.

was books about crime and the books had

per-

His hobbyhorse reading

told

him

that professional

criminals cased the place by taking copious notes about the surround-

Any Kind Check Cashing was Lee Zong, Hairstyling for Men and Women. Next to that, Starshine Video, owned by a Pakistani. ings.

On

Next

to

the Valencia side was the Casa Valencia entrance— the hotel

were layered above the Salvadoran restaurant, a dry cleaners, a bookstore. Across the

street,

rooms leftist

opposite the espresso place, was Casa

Lucas Productos, a Hispanic supermarket,

selling fruit

and cactus pears

and red bananas and plantains and beans by the fifty-pound bag. It was a hardy leftover from the days when this was an entirely Hispanic neighborhood.

Two

Now

doors

store, a black

it

was

as

much Korean and Arab and Hindu.

down from guy in a

the check-cashing scam, in front of a liquor

hooded sweatshirt stationed himself in front blocking them like a linebacker to make it harder

dirty,

of passing pedestrians,

to avoid his outstretched hand.

Really, Really, Really,

Weird Stories

John Shirley

224 Ash

That could be me, soon, Ash thought, rm doing the right thing. One good hit to pay for a business franchise of some kind, something that'd do well in a recession. Maybe a movie theater. People needed to escape. Or maybe his own check-cashing business—with better security.

Ash glanced

to the

left,

down

the street, toward the entrance to the

BART station: San Francisco's subway, from the check-cashing

north-bound subway would zip off

At

center.

entrance only one short block

this

five-eighteen, give or take a minute, a

hit the platform,

dowai the tunnel. Ash would be on

it,

pause for a moment, then with the money; escaping

more efficiently than he could ever hope to, driving a car in city traffic. And more anonymously. The only problem would be getting to the subway station handily. He was five-six, and pudgy, his legs a bit short, his wind even shorter. He was going to have to sprint that block and hope no one played hero. If he knew San Francisco, though, no one would.

He

looked back

at the check-cashing center just in time to see the Ar-

mored Transport of with

last

week,

just

on

knight's helmet half black

He'd heard

checked

his watch: as

about

five-twelve.

There was a picture

insignia of a

the side of the truck.

The

rest of the truck painted

which was supposed to suggest police

colors,

Ash wouldn't be intimidated by a paint job. that on Monday afternoons they brought about

fifteen

and

scare thieves.

He

California truck pull up.

half white,

grand into that check-cashing center. Enough for a dovmpayment on a franchise,

somewhere, once he'd laundered the money

Now, he watched

in

Reno.

as the old, white-haired black guard, in his black

white uniform, wheezed out the back of the armored canvas sacks of cash.

Not looking

him. His gun strapped into

its

to the right or

left,

car,

and

carrying the

no one covering

holster.

The old nitwit was as ridiculously overconfident as he was overweight. Ash thought. He'd never had any trouble. First time for everything, Uncle Remus.

Ash watched ter.

He

waddled

intently as the guard

checked

his watch, timing

him, though he wasn't sure

should, since he was planning to rob out.

him on the way

in,

why he

not on the way

But he had the impression from the books you were supposed to

time everything.

A

into the check-cashing cen-

The

reasons would

come

clear later.

bony, stooped Chicano street eccentric— aging, toothless, with a

squiggle of black mustache

and

sloppily

dyed black hair— paraded up the

sidewalk to stand directly in front of Ash's window. Crazy old

Really, Really, Really,

fruit.

Ash

Weird Stories

John Shirley thought.

A

Ash 225 on the

familiar figure

street here.

He

was wearing a Santa

Claus hat tricked out with junk jewelry, a tattered gold lame jacket, thick

mascara and

and a rose erupting a penis crudely painted on

eyeliner,

weathered cheek. The inevitable trash-brimmed shopping bag

made

hand, in the other a cane

in

his

one

into a mystical staff of office with the

gold-painted plastic roses duct-taped to the top end.

As usual the crazy old fuck was babbling free-form imprecations, spittle

making whiteheads on the window

muffled through the

glass.

and now

their

"Damnfuckya

glass.

for ya

his

"Damnfuckya!" came

abandoned

city,

ya aban-

doned city boy yes, damnfuckya! Yoruba Orisha! The Orisha, cabronl Holy shit on a wheel! Hijo de puta\ Ya doot, ya pay, they watch, they pray, they take gods are taking away, taking

like

a bend-over

a bend-over boy ya! EI-Elegba Ishu at your crossroads shithead

like

pendejol sorry!

LSD not

the godblood

now

Damnfuckya be

praise the days!

Orisha them Yoruba cabronesr

Yoruba Orisha. Sounded "Godfuckya Orisha

Maybe

the old

fruit

equivalent of Yoruba,

growth

in Yoruba's

The Lebanese

was a

and

power.

guys

familiar.

sniff 'round,

vamanos\ Chinga

tu

now

he was foaming

madreT

was the Hispanic

Santeria loony. Santeria at the

mouth about

the

Or maybe he'd done too much add in the sixties.

who

ran the espresso place, trying to fake

chic croissant espresso parlor,

it

as a

went out onto the sidewalk to chase the It was time to go

old shrieker away. But Ash was through here, anyway. to the indoor range, to practice with the gun.

On the BART train over to the East Bay, on his way to the target range. Ash

let his

mind wander, and

his eyes followed his

mind. They wandered

foggily over the otherwise empty interior of the humming, shivering train car, till they focused on a page of a morning paper someone had left on a plastic seat. It was a back-section page of the Examiner, and it was the word Yoruba in a headline that focused his eyes. Lurching with the mo-

tion of the train.

Ash crossed the

read the article without picking

Yoruba,

it

said,

it

was the growing

aisle

and

sat

down

next to the paper,

up. religion of inner city

blacks-an amal-

of African and Western mysticism. Ancestor worship with African the roots. Supposed to be scads of urban blacks into it now. Orisha

gam

name

of the

spirits.

So the Chicano it

was

Ishu El-Elegba was

some god or

getting stronger.

other.

had been squeaking about Yoruba because His latest attack of paranoia. Next week he'd be

street freak

warning people about some plot by the Vatican.

Ash shrugged, and the Really, Really, Really,

train pulled into his station.

Weird Stories

John Shirley

226 Ash CO oo oo

Ash had only fired the automatic once before—and before gun

boyhood, when he'd gone hunting with

since his

those days.

hit anything, in

He wasn't sure he

could

that hadn't fired a

his father.

hit

He'd never

anything now.

But he'd been researching gun handling. So after an hour or so—his

hand beginning

head aching from

to ache with the recoil of the gun, his

the grip of the ear protectors—he found he could

a reasonably tight

fire

pattern into the black, man-shaped paper target at the end of the gallery. It

was a

being here,

thrill

The other men along the

really.

hawk-eyed and serious as they loaded and

The

ventilators sucking

He

up the gunsmoke. The

flash of the muzzles.

pressed the button that ran his paper target back to him

wire that stretched the length of the range,

saw he'd It

firing gallery so

fired intently at their targets.

two

clustered three of the five shots into the middle

wasn't Wild

man,

on the excitement mounting as he

Bill

wouldn't

surely,

But would

Hickok, but it,

if

he

be necessary.^

it

it

was good enough.

circles.

would stop a

It

laid a pattern like that into his chest? It

shouldn't be.

He

didn't

want

to have to

shoot the old waddler. They wouldn't look for him so hard, after the robbery, shoot.

He

if

The

he didn't use the gun. Chances were, he wouldn't have to old guard would be

terrified, paralyzed. Putty. Still

.

.

.

smiled as with the tips of his fingers he traced the fresh buUet

holes in the target.

Ash was glad the week was He'd begun

to have

was nearly done. on his nerves had

over; relieved the waiting

second thoughts. The

attrition

been almost unbearable. But

now

it

was Monday

He

again. Seven minutes after five.

sat in the

espresso shop, sipping, achingly and sensuously aware of the weight of the pistol in the pocket of his trenchcoat.

The little

street crazy

with the gold roses on his cane was stumping along a

ways up, across the

armored

car pulled

street, as if

Legs rubbery. Ash

made

frameless backpack, carried

the bash of cold wind. sign,

The

himself get up. it

forehead

gun

like

traffic light

pulled the ski

was

He

The

picked up the empty,

Went out

the door, into

He

took that as a

was with him.

alacrity,

in his coat pocket.

a watch cap.

security guard

meet Ash. And then the

to

in his left hand.

and crossed with growing

grip of the

coming

around the corner.

one hand closing around the

ski

mask was folded up onto

As he reached the corner where the

just getting

mask down over

fat

out of the back of the armored his face.

And he

jerked the

Really, Really, Really,

gun

his

black

car,

he

out.

Weird Stories

John Shirley "Give

me

rehearsed

For a

Ash 227

the bag or you're dead right nowl" leveling the

it,

split

down

shirt,

w^here a

Then

to grimace at Ash.

dropping to the sidewalk snagged

as he'd

belly.

on

hesitated. Ash's eyes focused

in the guard's uniform;

the front of his

seemed

face that

man

Ash barked, Just

man's unmissable

at the old

second, as the old

something anomalous gling

gun

tie

an African charm dan-

should be.

A

spirit-mask

the rasping plop of the bag

his attention away,

gun; yelling, "Back away and drop your gun! Take

it

and Ash waved the

out with thumb and

forefinger only!" All according to rehearsal.

The gun clanked on

the sidewalk.

Ash scooped up the

away.

The old man backed

bag, shoved

it

into the backpack.

guy's gun too. But, people were yelling, across the the cops, and he just wanted away.

call

He

street, for

stumblingly

Take the old

someone

to

sprinted into the street, into

a tunnel of panic, hearing shouts and car horns blaring at him, the squeal

of

tires,

that

was

but never looking around. His eyes fixed on the dovmhill block his

path to the

Somehow he was

BART

station.

across the street without being run over,

was

five

paces past the wooden, poster-swathed newspaper kiosk on the opposite

when

corner,

the Chicano street crazy with the gold roses

cane popped into ing

all

body

his

way around

into the crazy fuck

his eyes,

foam

spiraling

cop

car's

red

from

his

light.

and they went down, one skidding atop the

stinking, clownishly

He

path from a doorway, shrieking, the whites show-

pirouetting, spinning like a

loon's

his

mouth, his whole Ash bellowed somehim and waved the gun, but momentum carried him directly

the

thing at

on

other, the

made-up face howling two inches from

his,

the

cocked knee knocking the wind out of Ash. forced himself to take

one hand and backpack

air

and

wrenched

rolled aside,

in the other, his heart

free,

the throb of approaching sirens. People yelling around him. his feet, the effort

making him

feel like

Adas

And, wheezing, the

and shining

The

crazy

fat guard's face.

He

got to

Then he

down you go

mother-

old black guard was there, gun retrieved

in his hand, breath steaming

sweat, eyes wild.

time in the

fat

in

the world.

lifting

heard a deep, black voice. "Drop 'em both or fucker!"

gun

screaming in time with

was up,

The old

from

his nostrils, dripping

then, flailing indiscriminately, this guy's

gun once more went spinning

away from him.

Now's your But

chance, Ash. Go.

his shaking

hands had leveled

his

own

gun.

Thinking: The guy's going to pick up his piece and shoot

back unless

I

gun him down.

Really, Really, Really,

Weird Stories

me

in the

228

John Shirley

Ash

No

he won't, he won't chance hitting passersby, just run-

But the crazy threw himself aside and the black guard was a

clear-cut

Ash erupted out through his hands. The gun and the old man went down. Screams in the backbanged four times ground. The black guard clutching his torn-up belly. One hand went to target

and something

in

the carved African grimace hanging around his neck. His lips moved. ran. He ran into another tunnel of perception; and down the hill. Ash was on the BART platform, and the train was pulling in. He didn't remember coming here. Where was the gun? Where was the money?

Ash

The mask? Why was his mouth full of paper? He took stock. The gun was back in his coat retreated into its hole. His ski mask was where bag

too, with the canvas

mouth.

The

It just felt

in the backpack.

that way,

on

to be, in his

moving on, stopping

on

Strange thought. Just get fore the city police clattering

it

seemed

it

the people in the platform. Trains

pulling up, feeding,

He

was supposed

There was no paper

dry.

moment,

train pulled in and, for a

feeding

come

was so

it

pocket, like a scorpion

to feed again

He

the train.

.

down

anyone

else

.

that

on

be-

they'd

all

doors closed.

just as the

station.

the train.

No

one looked

at

That was

He

his

didn't look

him. They were

all

quiet.

cops staked out the

when he

was

.

He got off at the next stop. That was his plan—get out before sit

it

over the city

here looking to shoot him.

stepped onto the train

damned

all

would coordinate with the BART police and

imagination; the adrenaline affecting him, he supposed. at

Ash

had maybe one minute

took an unusually long time to get to the next

It

to

and buses

got out of the

station.

the tran-

But he half expected them to be there

train.

He felt a weight spiral

away from him: no cops on the platform, or

at

the top of the escalator.

Next

thing,

farther,

God,

maybe it

go

to

ground and

was dark

out.

The

minutes he'd spent on the

He

didn't

recognize

He'd be conspicuous. killed

night

They'd expect him to go

No

had come so

train. Well, it

came

neighborhood.

the

Hunter's Point somewhere.

You

stay.

much

the airport.

It

quickly, in just the

fast in

few

the winter.

Maybe he was around

looked mostly black and Hispanic here.

matter, he

was committed.

a man.

Don't think about

it

now. Think about

shelter.

Really, Really, Really,

Weird Stories

John Shirley

Ash 229

He moved off down the street, scanning the signs for a cheap hotel. Had to get off the streets fast. With luck, no one would get around to telling the cops he'd ducked into the Mission Street BART station. Street people

at i6th

was

It

bars.

The

didn't confide in the cops.

and flyblown

loafers

and

husriers

and

bar-b-cue stands

corners were clumped up, as they always were, with

and

drinkers

and Mission

open-air discount stores

all

comer

and people on errands stopped to trade

gossip with their cousins. Black guys and Hispanic guys, turning to look at

Ash it

It

he passed, never pausing

as

must be some kind of fad

make much

didn't

in their

in this

sense. TTie blacks

mixed groups, which was kind of especially in the

streedights

All

wearing dark glasses; at night.

and Hispanics stood about

strange.

They communicated

in

at times,

drug trade, but they were usually more segregated. The

seemed a

cat-eye yellow here, but

increasingly misty.

somehow gave

out no

Below

illumi-

it

was a

A leprous mist that smudged the neon

of the

nation—everything above the street

dim and

murmur.

neighborhood to wear shades

level

was

pitch black.

He stared at He must have

bars, the adult bookstores, the beer signs in the liquor stores.

a beer sign as he passed. "Drink the Piss of Hope,"

read that wrong. But farther "Piss of

dovm he

Hope: The Beer That Sweedy

read

it

said.

it

again in another window:

lies."

Piss of Hope.'^

Another sign advertised Heartblood Wine Coolers. Heartblood, now. It was so easy to get out of touch with things. But .

.

.

There was something v^ong with the sunglasses people were wearing. Looking close at a black guy and a Hispanic guy standing together, he saw that their glasses weren't sunglasses, exactly.

house vmidows,

They were

the miniatures of

thickly painted over. Dull gray paint, dull red paint.

Stress. It's stress,

and the weird

light

here and what you've been through.

them watching him. All of them. He passed a group of children playing a game. The children had no eyes; they had plucked them out, were casting the eyes, tumbling them along the sidewalk like jacks.

He

could

feel

You're really freaked out. Ash thought. It'll

the shooting.

It's

It's

natural.

pass.

The

cars in the street

were

lit

from underneath, with

There were no headlights. Their windows were painted a pickup truck filled with dirty,

The crowds is

not

made out neon

of dog

shit.)

In the

Weird Stories

like

light. is

not

a parade

wino sleeping

window

sign shaped like a face.

Really, Really, Really,

out. (That

was

to either side of the sidewalk thickened. It

hissing, flickering

yellow

stark-naked children vomiting blood.)

day; like people waiting for a procession. (The old

doorway

oily

in the

of a bar, he saw a

A grimacing face of lurid

John Shirley

230 Ash

amalgamated from goat and hyena and man, a mask

strokes of neon,

He

he'd seen before.

warmth

the sign's impossible

felt

he pushed

as

through the muttering crowds.

The

meat and sour

place smelled like rotten

beer.

Now and

on

then,

the walls above the shop doors, rusty public address speakers, between

and feedback, gave out

bursts of static

seemed threaded together

announcements

filtered

one long harangue

into

as

that

he proceeded from

block to block.

"Today we have

new

offer

large pieces available

bargains, discount prices

We're slashing

.

.

prices are

.

.

.

.

.

.

.

.the fever calls from below to

.

prices slashed

.

.

.

slashed

.

.

.

from below, we till he saw it was apparently driving offer ..."

.

A police car careened by. Ash froze at

random, weaving drunkenly through the

the

crowd on the opposite

one on Ash's

plowed

The cop

and then plowing

into

side of the street, sending bodies flying.

side of the street

painted-out eyes.

street

more than glanced over with

car only stopped crushing pedestrians

into a telephone pole

and

its

windows

front

No

their

when it

shattered, revealing

cracked mannequins inside twitching and sparking.

Shooting the old guard has fucked up your head. Ash thought. Just stare at the street,

He

pushed on.

look down, look away. Ash.

A

hotel a hotel a hotel.

away from

directions, get

this street.

(That

Go is

somewhere,

in

ask, get

not a whore straddling a

smashed man, squatting over the broken bone-end of a man's arm fuck

it

in the

Go

back of that van.)

to

into this bar advertising Lifeblood

Beer and Finehurt Vodka, Christ, where did they get these brands? He'd never

.

.

.

Inside the bar.

meat and

It

was a smoky room; the smoke smelled

tasted of iron filings

on

his tongue.

One

like

burnt

of those sports bars,

photos on the walls of football players smashing open the other players' helmets with sledgehammers; on the

TV

screen at the end of the bar a

blurry hockey game. (The hockey players are not beating a naked

woman no

bloody with

they're not.)

blood spattering

their sticks,

Men

things (no they're not,

and it's

women just

.

.

.),

of

all

their

inhuman masks,

colors at the bar were dead

and they were smoking something,

not drinking. They had crack pipes in their hands and they were using tiny ornate silver

spoons to scoop something from the furred buckets on

the bar to put in their pipes

and burn; when they

inhaled, their emaci-

ated faces puffed out: aged, sunken, wrinkled, blue-veined, disease-

pocked

faces that filled out, briefly healed,

moments, wrinkles blurring away with each

became healthy hit,

for a

few

eyes clearing, hair dark-

Really, Really, Really,

Weird Stories

John Shirley

Ash

man and woman

ening as each

applied lighter to the pipe and sucked

gray smoke. (Don't look under the bar.)

Then the smokers instantly atromummies who smoked

phied again, becoming dead, or near-dead, pipes, shriveled until the next

gold teeth and white-painted

He

gown.

hit.

The bartender was

eyelids,

stood polishing a whimpering

"Brotherman you looking for de

Hotel—you take a

hit too.-^

a black

man

with

wearing a sort of gold and black

hotel,

skull

it's

One money,

behind the

on de

give

bar,

and

said,

corner, de Crossroads

me one money and

I

give

you de fine—" "No, no thanks," Ash

with rubbery

said,

lips.

His eyes adjusting so he could see under the

bar, in front of the stools-

there were people under the bar locked into metal braces, writhing in straints: their

heads were clamped up through holes

furry buckets in front of each

crovms of

in the bars

smoker were the tops of

their heads, the

their skulls cut away, brains exposed, gray

clamped heads were facing the bartender wriggled, from time to time.

spoons to scoop

bits

who

fed

The smokers used

and pink; the

them something

their petite,

of quivering brain tissue from the

re-

and the

that

glimmering

living skulls

and

dollop the gelatinous stuff into the bowls of their pipes—^^/>ig the brains

women and men clamped under the bars, taking a hit and filling out Was the man under the bar a copy

of the

with strength and health for a moment.

of the one smoking him? Ash ran before he Just get to the hotel

and

it'll

pass,

it'll

knew

for sure.

pass.

the door and past the shops, a butcher's (those are not skinned

Out

children hanging

on the hooks) and over the sidewalk which he saw now

was imprinted with

fossils, fossils

of faces that looked

like

people push-

ing their faces against glass they pressed out of shape and distorted like putty; impressions in concrete of crushed faces underfoot.

The PA

speakers rattling, echoing. ". .

.

avenue, discounts Past a

doorway of a boarding house-was

bulged outward,

door

and bent over sawhorses, every price and every and bargains, latest in designer footwear ..."

prices slashed

flying

open

wood

this the place?

But the door

going to rubber, then the lock buckling

to erupt people, vomiting

them

and the

onto the sidewalk in a

Keystone Kops heap, but moving only as their limbs flopped with inertia: they were dead, their eyes stamped with hunger and madness, each

one clutching a shopping bag of trash, one of them the Chicano street crazy who'd tried to warn him: gold roses clamped in his teeth, dead now; some of them crushed into shopping carts; two of them, yes, all curled

up and crushed,

Really, Really, Really,

trash

compacted, into a shopping cart so

Weird Stories

their

231

232

John Shirley

Ash flesh

was bursting out through the metal gaps. Flies that spoke with the yammering in little buzzing parodic

voices of radio DJs cycled over them, voices: "This

is

Wild Bob

KMEL

at

and hey did we

per countdown contest, we're buzzing with

A bus at the corner. Maybe get in borhood. But the bus's sides were stopped

at the

bus stop

side

.

one money

an hour

three

sale,

the

well

throw

afraid to

go

street:

and when

curly ends of the stumps.

like

melded

"One money

that

waits.

One money and

and chews,

prices slashed,

A piss-in-the-

and pensioned winos. Crammed

the Casa Valencia had been.

He was

(It's

waved

to

skirts

and bulging, wattled

him with

the squeezed out,

not true that they have no

feet, that their

will

buy you two

we

women whose

tongues can reach

two money—" The whores beckoned; the crowd thickened. He went into the steep,

in-

into the sidewalk.)

deeply into a garbage disposal,

A

it

willing people

the Crossroads Hotel.

whores, with crotch-high

and missing limbs

ankles are

on the

in.

Across the cleavages

fed

a—"

in

sink hotel, the sort filled with junkies

between other buildings

it

street.

window smoke

we'll find the paste that lives

money and

buzzzzzzing wizzzz-zzzz—

ride the hell out of the neigh-

underside crushed and sticky-ochre

its

He paused on the corner. There: in

it,

ya about our su-

striated like a centipede

bodies were expelled to spatter the .

and

doorway was wet,

its

waiting at the bus stop, and from

".

it

tell

also have, for

narrow climb up groaning

stairs to

hotel.

the half door where the

manager waited. The hotel manager was a Hindu, and behind him were three small children with their faces covered in black cloth (the children

do not have three disfigured arms apiece), gabbling in Hindustani. The Hindu manager smiling broadly. Gold teeth. Identical face to the bartender but long straight hair, Hindu accent as he said: "Hello hello, you want a room, we have one vacancy, I am sorry we have no linen now, no, there are no visitors unless you pay five money extra, no visitors, no—" "I understand, I don't care about that stuff," Ash babbled. Still carrying the backpack, he noted, taking stock of himself again. You're okay. Hallucinating but okay. Just get into the

maybe send for a bottle. Then he passed over all whose

the

money

print ran like ink in rainwater,

hall to the

room.

knifed into the old

No number on wooden

ena and goat and man. But

room and work out in his wallet

the stress,

and signed a paper

and the manager led him down the the door. Something crudely pen-

door-panel: a face like an African mask, hy-

momentum

carried

him

into the

Really, Really, Really,

room—the

Weird Stories

John Shirley manager

^j^

didn't even use a key, just

opened it-and closed the door beit was a bare room with a single bed dangling naked bulb and a sink in one corner, no

hind him. Ash turned and saw that

and a window and a

bathroom. Smelling of urine and mold. The There were six people in the room. "Shit!" till

light

was on.

Ash turned

now. "Hey!"

grinning at

him

to the door, wondering where his panic had been opened the door and the manager came back to it,

He

in the hallway. "Hey, there's already people in here-"

"Yes hello yes they

live

with you, you know, they are the wife and

man you

daughter and grandchildren of the

killed

you know-"

"What?"

"The man you

you know, yes—"

killed,

"Whatr "Yes they are in you

He gestured,

now at the

as a

who crowded

people,

from foot into

happy

past

Ash

made

at

oh yes—"

at a revival, ushering in seven

to throng the

to foot, gaping sighdessly,

one another

time he

crossroads and here are more,

church usher

room,

shifting aimlessly

whining to themselves, bumping

random. Blocking Ash, without seeming to

him

for the door. Pushing

more

try,

every

gently but relendessly back to-

ward the window. The manager was no longer speaking in English, nor was he speaking Hindi; his face was no longer a man's, but something resembling that of a hyena and a goat and a man, and he was speaking in an African tongue—Yoruba?—With a sound that was as strange to Ash the cry of an animal priori knowledge,

on

as

the veldt, but he knew, anyway, with a kind of a

what the man was

saying. Saying

.

.

.

That these people were those disenfranchised by the old man's death: the old armored-car guard's death meant that his wife will not be able to

provide the

money to

instead into crime

help her son-in-law start that business and he goes

and then

slide into drugs,

and

result they beat

and abuse

to

lose their

life

in prison,

and

hope and then

their

own

his children, fatherless,

their lives

and

as a direct

children and those children have

children which they beat and abuse (because they, themselves, were

beaten and abused) and they sleepwalking automatons

.

.

.

all

grow up

Who

into psychopaths

and

shoved, now, into this room,

aimless,

made

it

more and more crushingly crowded, murmuring and whining as they elbowed Ash back to the window. There were

and then

forty,

and then

forty-five

and

heat and sullen and dully urgent as frame.

He

Maybe

there

looked over

it

his shoulder,

was escape, out

Really, Really, Really,

fifty,

the

thirty in the little

crowded Ash

Weird Stories

window window glass.

against the

peered through the

there.

room,

crowd humid with body

2^^

John Shirley

234 Ash

But outside the window heap. air

It

was an

and

air shaft,

light for the hotel

places like

this; bottles

shapeless sneakers

windows. Air

and bent

syringes

any airshaft he'd ever seen.

moving

in places,

bottles rattling

stinking

modey

strips

of the

and no way

his shooting.

ones

made was

shafts filled

The

cans. It

was

trash

air shaft

weaving

there.

shifting,

subtly seething,

cans scuttling;

or

killed

into a glutinous tapestry.

itself

But there was no space to breathe now,

to the door; they

The ones

than

thicker, deeper,

was a cauldron of trash,

were

piling in

still, all

the victims of

maimed by the ones abandoned by the How many people now in a room

killed.

danger of being crushed out against the

in

trash, in

and mold-carpeted garbage and

up so

for one, people crawling atop people, piling

One

up with

of tar paper humping up, worming; the wet,

by the one he had

lost

drop four floors to a trash

wet sections of cardboard

and

No, he couldn't go out inside,

straight

and paper sacks and wrappers and wet boxes and

condoms and crimped

brittle

in

was a

it

an enclosed space between buildings to provide

much

killing can't lead to so

that the light

ceiling?

misery, he thought.

Oh, but the gunshot's echoes go on and on, the happy, mocking Ishu said.

On and on,

What

Oh no, you can with

Ash

it,

asked, in his head.

merely, white

with your .

.

Ash

this is the city. Just the city.

see

us,

breath

white devil cocksucker man.

this place?

is

new

Is it

Hell?

family,

where he

called

couldn't bear

it.

The

window, and looked once more

his

dying

into

He

into the air shaft;

recomposed

garbage disposal chum, that chewed and digested

The

you with

here

claustrophobia was of infinite weight.

the trash decomposing and almost cubistically

fell

Now stay

.

turned, again to the

that

Now

Where you have always lived.

demon cocksucker man.

itself

into a great

and everything

it.

press of people

pushed him against the window so that the

glass

creaked.

And

then

thirty

more, from generations hence, came through the

door, and pushed their

way

in.

comers pushed, vaguely and

The window

sullenly,

glass protested.

The new-

toward the window. The glass

cracked—and shrieked once.

Only the

glass shrieked. Ash, though,

was

silent, as

through the shattering glass and out the window, shaft,

and

into the innermost reality of the

he was heaved

down

into the air

city.

Really, Really, Really,

Weird Stories

Triggering

It

was one of those

protectiplated

Manhattan brovmstones, rewired

in

the 'teens, every square inch evenly coated with a thin, flexible preserv-

The

ing plastic.

old building was a jarring

balmed.

It

was the

sight,

snugged between the

wrapped up and emseemed appropriate, considering the job I'd been sent there

glassy high-rises.

It

distant past

all

neatly

to do. I

went up the

wooden

railing,

slippery hall stairs,

one hand on the

wondering what unprotected wood

even preserved the quaint twentieth-century bright crimson I

on the faded

pressed z-D's doorbell.

walls:

An

graffiti

NUKE SADDAM

plastic-coated

felt like.

They'd

spray-painted in

and CRIPS RULE.

old-fashioned glass peephole.

The

place

no inspection cameras. The door opened—on real was looking dovm at a four-year-old boy. Behind him was

apparently had

hinges—and

I

He pushed it aside. He glanced at my clingsuit, and at the department's suit-and-tie stenciled

the chair he'd been standing on.

sharply fade),

my

the front (the white hankie and the

and chuckled

duskiness,

showed I

on

and

grimly.

were beginning to

He noticed my dark eyes, my short black hair, me as an Americanized East Indian

his recognition of

in his face: a flicker of suspicion. It

stared.

tie clip

They hadn't

told

me what

was a very

the Tangle was.

began here. With the boy. The boy had curly brown

pug nose, and pursed

lips.

He wore

adult's suit, in miniature. In his

adult expression. I

hair,

a formal spiral-leg

mouth was clamped a

had a

feeling

it

big blue eyes, a suit. It

was an

black cigarette

holder containing a Sherman's Real Tobacco burnt nearly to the butt.

Smoke geysered

A midget?

at intervals

But he wasn't.

"You're staring at

from

his nostrils.

He was

a four-year-old boy.

me," he said abruptly,

carefully articulated, accented almost

Really, Really, Really,

his voice high-pitched

but

some

spe-

aristocratically "Is there

Weird Stories

John Shirley

236 Triggering

man who

reason for this intrusive scrutiny, or are you simply a

cific

tices his

penetrating glance

"I'm Ramja,"

I

said,

frowned

nodding

politely "I'm

And your name?"

Transmigratology.

He

on any unsuspecting

at his cigarette,

I

citizen

prac-

he encounters?"

from the Department of

covered

which had gone

my

astonishment well.

out.

"Care for a smoke?"

don't smoke, thanks."

"I

way you say that. But you Federal men are always self-righteous bastards. There was another here, fellow named Hextupper or something. You're the followup. Very orderly. You can go and dance with Dante for all I care, friend. But if you must know—" he gestured me inside and moved to close the door behind me "—my name's Conrad "Self-righteous, the

Frampton. How-do-you-do, salutations, and

etcetera."

"You're overcompensating about being a

little

boy,"

said, returning

I

his hostility.

He

shrugged. "Could be.

If

you were a

forty^-year-old

man trapped in

four-year-old body, you'd feel like overcompensating, too.

leaping out the

couch, and

"When

I

window now and

then. Believe me."

You'd

He

feel like

me

led

a

to a

sat beside him.

did you die?"

I

asked, watching him.

He made me

nervous.

died in 2002," he said, not even blinking. "Care for a drink?"

"I

"No, thanks. You go ahead."

"Damned

He punched I

right

I

will."

looked around. The

promise

done

There was a low yellow table beside the couch.

for a cocktail

on the

room

table's

programmer.

wasn't antique;

after the outside of the building. It

in various shades of pastel yellow, the

cornerlessly into the concave ceiling; the floor

of the same spongy synthetic.

were

it

all

The

seemed

like

a broken

was a standard decorbubble, curved walls blending

was more or

walls, floor, ceiling,

of a piece, shaped by the inhabitants.

less flat

and

but

furniture

The room spoke

to

me

about those inhabitants.

"Who

else lives here?"

I

asked.

The department had

told

me

about the people involved in the Tangle, except the address.

nothing

It's

better

that way.

Conrad took a silvery cigarette case from a table, his smooth movements; he lit a thin Sherman

struggling for

thumbnail

lighter.

"A couple of degenerates

live here,"

he

infant fingers sulkily said,

with a

blowing

smoke rings, "who call themselves my parents. Fawther is a musician. George Marvell, snooty concert guitarist. Plays one of those hideous flesh-guitars. They're both flesh machine fetishists. Mother works at the genvats, helping make more genetic manipulation horrors. She's not so Really, Really, Really,

Weird Stories

John Shirley bad,

really,

brown

Triggering

though

nauseates

it

me when

she looks at

me

with her big

widdoo Ahmed again. Her They named me Ahmed, but I make them call me by my

eyes welling, hoping

name's Senya.

turn into her

I'll

name."

real "I

take

it

you don't approve of

machine near

flesh

at

hand.

flesh machines."

He made a something-smells-bad face. know which is worse, the flesh guitar or room. They are

I

sensed there was a

A big one. "Soulless things. Ugly.

I

don't

that living pit they call a bed-

soulless, aren't they? You're

from the Department of

on

Transmigratology. So you're allegedly an expert

What's your

souls.

stand on flesh machines, old boy?"

"Depends on what you mean by soul. For us, a 'soul' is a plasma field composed of tightly interwoven subatomic particles, capable of recording its host's sensory input. And capable of traveling from body to body, evolving psychically so that species survival is more likely. It's not religion.

It's

a function of the

tain mystical techniques to

first

law of thermodynamics, but

work with

it.

Training for seeing

we

we

life

use words

that sort of thing. Karma-buildup release. But

if

karma and

Academy of

we'll lose

soul in our reports to the National

our funding.

ing facts, to get "I

don't

them

use cer-

patterns,

took us decades of regressing people, and

It

to admit

it

was a bona

like

Sciences, trac-

fide science."

know about science. But in my current

circumstances

He

." .

.

made a bitter face. "I'm forced to believe in reincarnation." He looked at me. "Why the hell are you here? Level with me." "We had a report of a rather nasty Tangle here. The lines of spirimal evolution tangled. Sometimes a gross emotional trauma from one faces in the next.

The people

circumstances in the next I

considered

telling

life,

life sur-

involved in the trauma are reborn in close

and the

next, until the things cleared up."

him more. I might have

said

I

came because a Tangle

And they sent me, Ramja, specifically, because I'm part Not sure how yet. But I'm one of the few department staff-

needs a Triggering. of the Tangle. ers

who

can't

remember his

computer model connected But I didn't say

much

last life.

it's

repressed irretrievably.

The

this Tingle.

"As for flesh machines,

that. Instead:

so-called soul they have.

partment

Part of

me with

Or even how much

I

don't

know how

awareness.

The

de-

believes that they're part of the evolution of the lower orders.

Animal minds, animal

souls."

I

shook

my

head. "I'm not sure, Conrad,

what do you remember of your death?"

He

shakily

relit his cigarette. "I

...

I

drovmed. Scuba

diving. Sickening circumstances. Trapped underwater.

Really, Really, Really,

Weird Stories

.

.

My

.

uh, scuba-

air

ran out.

237

John Shirley

238 Triggering

my

Big pain in

my

chest. Gigantic buzzing in

ears.

And

a white rush.

Next thing I remember is hearing this sad guitar song. Only it was a flesh guitar; so it sounded like they do— like a guitar crossed with a human voice.

looked around, and there was Senya looming over me, her arms

I

and

outstretched,

And

toddling.

was staggering toward

I

remembered who

self. I

her. It

then the guitar screamed. That's was.

I

.

must have looked

what brought

me

to

like

my-

My real parents are Laura and Marvin

.

Frampton. Were. They died together

in a

nursing-home

fire,

I'm told."

He crossed his small legs and propped an elbow on one knee, his cigapoised

holder

rette

"George would does

We

me adopted. He

room. But then the room

his

he strokes

got up.

is

forefinger.

doesn't like me, and neither

rude to George, too.

It

I

when

shakes

show you the damn thing." followed him to a doorway on the right and

Unpleasantly.

it.

between thumb and

continentally

have

like to

I'll

into the

bedroom.

The room was in pain. The cave-like walls were ing.

room and

Across the

rosy membranes, touched with blue, puls-

all

near the living floor was a blue-black bruise,

swollen and pustulant, a half-meter across. Conrad carefully didn't

look

at

it.

"You're just

the wall there.

He at

Or

turned to

self-defense.

me

I

of

full

hostility,

hitting

me

It

I

can

feel

it

felt

me

It

can

I

sleep! It

been kicking

"If

I

have,

it's

in

feel this thing radiating

wants something from me.

body anyway, and

this thing

makes

it

nagging at me." it

to

make

it

stop. In the

it?"

same

spot. Repeatedly."

Conrad muttered, turning away.

uncomfortable in the room, too.

the walls.

It

room, but

let

this kid's

"What do you know about I

said softly "You've

with something."

won't

I'm half-crazy living in

"And you kicked

I

with a very adult look of outrage.

sleep in the next

even in there.

worse.

it

Conrad."

It

wasn't hostility that

I felt

from

was the shock of recognition.

The moist ceiling was not far over my head, curvingly soft, and damp. wasn't much like a womb. It was more like a boneless head turned

inside out.

The

wall at the narrower end, to

huge unfinished chest.

lucent

The

face.

my

The nose was

left,

contained the oudines of a

there, but flattened,

broad

as

my

eyes were forever closed, milky oblongs locked behind trans-

lids.

The room was panded

to

fill

a genvat creation, a recombinant-DNA organism ex-

an ordinary bedroom. The old bedroom's windows were

Really, Really, Really,

Weird Stories

John Shirley behind the

Triggering 239

eyes; the light

from the windows shining through them

through lampshades, defining the outsize face's lips

were on the

floor,

puckered toward the

the room's bed, disproportionately wide. the size of a single-bed; they would

opening beneath them, no "It

ately

ceiling.

They were

open out

for two.

The

if

The were

lips

about

soft looking,

There would be no

teeth.

was grown from Senya's ground out

as

capillaries in the lids.

cells,

you know," Conrad

He

said.

on the room's

his still-smoldering cigarette

deliber-

floor.

The

fleshy walls quivered.

box Conrad's

controlled the impulse to

I

ears as

he continued.

"There's a tank of nutrifluid outside the window. Personally,

creamre

disgusting.

is

can hear

I

move when Senya

the lips

The room's odor was through

breathe.

I

can smell

it.

think the

You should

see

on them. Ugh!"

briny, smelling faintly of

nose with a gende

its

it

stretches out

I

Woman.

It

breathed

sigh.

Returning to the main room, Conrad

said, "Sure

you won't have a

drink?"

"This time I

I

wdll

Waves of

My heart was beating quickly and irregularly.

swept through me.

fear

The womb-room had shaken me.

have one, thanks."

stood on a secret brink.

a peak, shuddered, and

let

I

focused on them, brought them to

the fear vaporize in the light of internal

self-

awareness. I

sipped

Conrad,

I

my plastic cup of martini, for the moment relaxing. Sitting beside said,

"You

something about George's guitar being

said

Conrad smirked. "George it

won't sing for him.

as

he plays

ine.

it.

He may

"It's

It

won't.

It'll

its

own

volition?

Maybe

guitar."

it's

scream when Senya plays

trance level deepening.

The

allergic to

I

glimpsed ghostly

flickering paths; the apartment's inhabitants

on on

patterns

the room's electric

field.

him."

it."

outlines of the furniture

to hallucinogenically expand, softly strobing. figures

sick."

be better today. But

screaming again as soon

start

have to go back to playing electric

screaming of

my

it

his guitar will

sounds vicious-the most av^l screams you can imag-

"Possibly. It doesn't I felt

is

know

I

hoping

had

I

life just

human

left their life

In those subtly glowing lines

could see the Triggering foreshadowed. "Conrad," I said carefully, trying not to show any excitement,

about your

seemed

before transition. Give

me

details of the

"tell

death

I

me

itself."

waited, breathless.

Conrad was curl

up

pleased.

as he spoke. "I

He

lit

another cigarette and watched the smoke

was a copy

Really, Really, Really,

editor for a

Weird Stories

book

publisher.

I

was a

John Shirley

240 Triggering

good one, but lot

I

was becoming bored with the work.

of vacation time; so

with him and

I

accepted

his friends.

I

felt

accumulated a

I'd

go on a

Billy Lilac's invitation to

sort of funny about

ing an affair with his wife. But she insisted that

it

it,

because

I

cruise

was

hav-

would be good because

we would remain

casual for the duration of the trip—four days— and that

would cool

Billy's

suspicions about us. Billy was rolling in the Right Stuff.

He owned

a chain of fast-food restaurants."

"His yacht had what he called a mousetrap aquarium built into

boat had a deep

draft,

into

it,

along with

Then

times squid or even a small shark.

"There were thirty years

fish

little

and some-

bottom would

the gates at the

and we would watch

close, temporarily trapping the creatures in there,

them through

The

and by pressing a button, he opened a chamber in

would be sucked

the hull. Water

it.

a glass pane in the deck of the hold.

of us on the cruise. Lana Lilac,

five

younger than

teenaged wife,

Billy's

Billy; his secretary, Lucille

Winchester; Lucille's

son Lancer—"

"Who? Who

did you say?

Conrad looked

at

me

The

last

two?"

My interruption was too eager. bunch of us

said impatiently. ''Anyway, Billy asked a

some octopi

scare reef

into the aquarium.

where they were

There were

"And

and Lancer Winchester," he

strangely. "Lucille

quite

We

go down and

to

were over a certain Jamaican

common. So we went down

in scuba gear.

me and Lana and—"

Lucille.

You

three

went down,"

interrupted.

I

My

head con-

tained a whirlpool. Calm. Perceive objectively. Perceive in the perspective

of time. Evolutionary patterns. The mummified hurt. Tonight

"You three went down," gate

where the

I

I

would

opened, good old

hull

resolve the hurt.

when you approached

repeated, "and

opens the gate and makes the current that

pulls things in,

of you were sucked into the mousetrap aquarium.

behind you, and then he stood

And you

ran out of

in the hold, over

He

and

all

three

closed the gate

your heads, watching.

air."

For a few minutes hadn't been

the

pressed the button that

Billy

I

couldn't talk.

I felt

as

if I

were choking, though

me who'd drowned on that occasion. I'd drovmed my own vomit; drug overdose. Years later.

it

later,

choking to death on Conrad's

But

I

irritation visibly

was only

became astonishment.

peripherally aware of him.

teen-year old Lancer Winchester,

down on and

my

the glass floor, watching as

tears misted the glass, but

I

was seeing

myself, as

hands cuffed behind me,

my mother

somehow

drowned.

fif-

lying face-

My gasping

the blur emphasized their

Really, Really, Really,

Weird Stories

John Shirley

Triggering

movements

frantic

as they tried to pry the gate. Their frenzied

Their fingers clawing at the

nals.

While

stood with

Billy Lilac

man mildly amused by a zoo, me,

to

affair

sig-

glass.

his

hands

in his

pocket beside me,

like

a

chuckling occasionally and sweetly chatting

Conrad because Conrad had my mother because she

politely explaining that he'd killed

been having an

hand

with Lana.

And

he'd killed

helped them keep the secret and had permitted Lana and Conrad to use her apartment. kill me. But he simply uncuffed me and put me He knew that my history of emotional disturbance destroyed my credibility. No one would believe me when there were three others testify-

expected him to

I'd

ashore.

ing differently.

He'd bribed

claimed a mechanical Billy

failure

his

two crewpeople handsomely. They

had caused the gate to open prematurely, and

had been on deck and hadn't seen it. They'd been with him the whole and Judy Lormer, husband and wife, were

time. Craig

his crew. Only, after

a while, Judy began to have nightmares about the people drowning in the hold. Judy

came

He

had threatened

me

to

in the

to

go

to the police.

asylum and told

enjoyed talking about

it.

Billy

me

I

knew

in the visitors'

was the

this,

because

Billy

room.

quintessential

son of a

bitch.

drowned Judy in the aquarium in my house. Lancer," he'd said, his voice mild and pleasant. Like a taxidermist talking shop. "You want to explain yourself, friend, hmm?" Conrad said, in the "I

present. I

my own death. after my mother

was thinking about

for the four years

I'd

been

in

and out of institutions

drowned. Treated for paranoid

schizophrenia and drug abuse-the drug abuse, heroin, was

wondered whether I had hallucinated

on on

real-'til I

quiet enjoyment as he stood

the glass, watching the bubbles, forced from exhausted lungs, shatter the pane between his

I

you

feet.

died of an overdose in 2007.

"No in

Lana

coincidences, Conrad,"

your

Lilac

throat.

down

I

little,

and Mother. Strangling under

glass."

to the

paused to clear

I

I

die.

toward the doors,

bedroom. The

twitching, so that

its

first

orifice in the

the drinking."

corners.

Really, Really, Really,

Weird Stories

softly.

the front door and then the

womb-room had

blue-pink flesh

my

said distantly, gazing

down on

advice, he gulped another cocktail, swearing

my my eyes

I knew You and

said suddenly "I'm here because

the corridors of time, "you ought to slow

turned

door

last life.

I

I was Lancer Winchester. I watched you

tranced to calmness. "Really, Conrad,"

Ignoring I

Billy's

showed

at the

contracted a

open door's

241

John Shirley

242 Triggering

I felt its

ing.

excitement subliminally, and

Conrad

felt

But only the

too,

it,

and glanced

womb-room and

at

shared

I

its

half-slumbering yearn-

irritated.

it,

were aware that George and Senya

I

Now

Marvell were climbing the plastic-coated steps to the apartment. felt

them stopping on the landing

ger near.

hadn't quite located

I

"Conrad,"

I

plasglass case

wallowed But

I felt

I

the Trig-

it.

in,

toting something behind her.

like a

She

took to be George were carrying a large transparent

I

between them. Within the pink sea animal.

my

could hardly take

I

to quarrel.

began, "Senya is—"

The door opened. Senya came and the man

and

to rest,

A

eyes

case's thick liquids,

flesh guitar.

An

something

expensive one, too.

from Senya. She was

lovely.

I

had a

disquietingly powerful sense of deja vu, taking in her strong, willowy

shape; a

campy Old Glory

worked

flag pattern

flaxen hair flipped onto her right shoulder.

into the thick spill of

Something

in the gauntness

of her face excited me. There was both curiosity and empathy in her expression, out of place with her black, clinging

gown and

"Who

Addams

Family Revival

her transparent spike heels.

the hell

he^" George puffed, looking

is

me

over as they carried

the flesh guitar's case into the bedroom.

"He'd be the

man from

the

George," she replied offhandedly

umm, about The

had them send someone over about,

Conrad."

vu resurged when

deja

"I

Department of Transmigratology,

wasn't familiar.

The

familiarity

I

The tone of

listened to her voice.

was

in the

way she used

George and Senya returned from the bedroom. In contrast

George was stocky and

pallid, his hair

it

it.

to Senya,

permaset into a solid yellow block

over his head. His smoky-blue eyes swept over me, then flicked angrily at

Conrad. "The distillation

from the

kid's

drunk

again."

His voice, when he spoke to me, was a

of condescension: "So you think you can clear the garbage

kid's

"If there is

head here?" any garbage to be cleared in

this

room," Conrad

coming out of your mouth, George." As George bent to punch for a drink, his motions

rupted,

inter-

"it's

tions containing within them, coded,

all

set off reverbera-

the actions of his lifetime.

And

implications of earlier lifetimes. "Acmally, I'm not here to clear anything said, crossing

Senya,

I

Lancer."

my

legs

my

went on,

"In this lifetime

Her

met mine. She was

eyes

from Conrad

in particular,"

I

and leaning back against the couch. Watching name's Ramja; puzzled.

I

in the last

it

was

hadn't hit the Trigger

Really, Really, Really,

Weird Stories

John Shirley yet.

Triggering 243

smiled at her,

I

me when

a flush of pleasure run through

felt

she

smiled back.

"No, George, I'm here,"

my

continued, trying to keep eagerness from

I

voice, "to deal with a rather

from a

It results

complex transmigrational entanglement.

George,

And

how

karmic equation. I'm not sure

my

sipped

the funny thing

My

do much of anything.

don't really have to

I

pletes the

A memory that

trauma shared by everyone here.

past-life

brought us back together. For Triggering.

"How

drink and asked,

going to

it's

is,

being here comtrigger."

I

did your guitar perform today,

George.''"

George

just

shook

his

head

Senya answered for him.

touched

it."

She looked

at

why anyone would scream "I

close to throwing

me

out.

screamed. As usual! Every time George

George

as

if

she could understand perfecdy

George touched them.

if

rather suspected that,"

He was

me.

at

"It

I

"And

said.

suspect, too, that there's a

I

growing alienation between you and George lately, Senya. Since the day the guitar started screaming— and Conrad appeared in your son."

"What

the bad-credit

tense with

fear.

"The man's

on

He,

right,

do you know about

my coming

George." Conrad put

knows

"The

got nasty.

saw

I

it.

But

guitar's

And

it's

not

may not have more than the brains creep when it senses one. George was

scream came out of

George

It

it.

screaming and

it's

of a

my fault. The but

squirrel,

playing

it,

and

it

this

finally got fed up with the creep."

said suddenly, "If

he jabbed a thumb

He was

then the tension belike

guitar

a

blurted.

grinding his cigarette out

in,

out came close together.

tween you and Senya

damn

George

too, could feel the Triggering coming.

the table, his little-boy fingers trembling.

my, ah,

it?"

you think

there's

some

link

between him-'

Conrad without looking at him "-and what's then maybe you can-I dunno, uh-clear it away so

at

wrong with my guitar,

the guitar works again?"

"Maybe,"

I

A moment

said, smiling. "Let's

later

we

go

into the

bedroom. And-clear

it

away"

were standing around the plasglass case, beside

one end of the womb-room. Senya opened the case and lifted the guitar free as the floor's lips quivered and It was the room's walls twitched. The guitar dried almost immediately.

the bed-sized, up-thrust

lips

at

of human the approximate shape of an acoustic guitar, but composed of the neck The veins. blue showing skin, flesh, covered in pink-white guitar

was

human arm, with the elbow fused so The tendon-like strings were stretched

actually fashioned after a

was always outstretched. from the truncated fingers, which served

that

it

Really, Really, Really,

Weird Stories

as string pegs.

But the

guitar's

John Shirley

244 Triggering small brain kept the strings always in tune.

Where

lower end suggesting a woman's hips.

its

lines

It's

were

soft,

feminine,

would

the sound hole

be on an acoustic guitar was a woman's mouth, permanently wide open, it's

and

lips thin

throat.

Senya held

it

eyes,

no other

in her arms, leaning

on

her right foot propped

an E chord, her fingers brated, and the guitar's

physical suggestions of humanity.

lower end on her

its

the brim of the

at

me, and then

And back

at

me.

guitar case. strings.

knee,

lifted

The

She played strings

vi-

The tone was hauntingly An odd look came over Senya's face.

mouth sang

She glanced up

open

brushing the

lightly

human, melancholy, sympathetic. side.

and

pearly-pink; toothless, but with a small tongue

There were no

at

the note.

Conrad,

who

reeled, drunk, to

one

"Well?" George said.

"You play the

George."

guitar,

the equation are here, in place.

"No, thanks." he

I

said.

You

"Go

play

on.

I

think

all

the integers of

it."

looking at the pink, infant-like guitar in his

said,

wife's arms. I

could

sciously

feel

the lines of karmic influence tightening the room. Uncon-

we'd moved into the symmetrical formation around the

case: myself,

Conrad, Senya, George, and the

over the case, her arms trembling with

its

guitar,

weight.

glass

which Senya held

We

were the

five

points of a pentacle, encircled by the waiting, brooding presence of the

womb-room. "Go on, George,"

said

Conrad, slurring

his

words. "Don't be a simper-

up

ing coward. Play the guitar." Like a defiant midget, he sneered

at

George.

George snorted and took the with a

faint

laxed as the notes

came out

and glanced nervously

on the ceiling walls. The guitar's scream the flesh wall and rippled and from

made me look

normally.

Its strings

contracted

He strummed a chord and reHe strummed again, shrugged,

at the living blue-pink ceiling

and the bruise low

window hidden behind my hands over my ears. The walls

shattered the glass of the

made me

clap

Conrad began

ugly, ripping

sound in fine

crimson

tears.

to laugh hysterically, his voice piping maniacally.

His eyes rolled back, into

George flung the

An

had ruptured. Blood rained on us

eyelids, like

up; the ceiling

guitar struck the

from Senya. it.

somewhere gave a long sigh. Blood ran from the lower

edge of the closed

droplets.

guitar

whine when he touched

his head.

down

guitar

edge of

its

furiously.

case.

It

I

had

to look

howled again

away as the

flesh

something

vital

as

Really, Really, Really,

Weird Stories

John Shirley within

it

Triggering 245

snapped.

room moaned with

moaning. The

It

rolled onto the floor, facedown,

it.

Panic enlarging his eyes, George looked at each of

He looked as if we'd suddenly become strange to him. He was seeing

us.

us differently now,

his self-assurance

all

said, loudly, staring

I

hard

required a major effort at karmic

"You

him

call

Billy

.

justice, Billy."

Conrad

."

.

gone.

George, "Yours was the sort of crime that

at

said, staring at

George.

now you should be remembering. And wondering, maybe, why a man should be punished for things he did in another life. Was Billy the same man as George, really? "Billy Lilac,"

He

said, smiling at Senya.

I

"By

Remember what he did? That sort of The womb-room remembers, on some level. The

the same man, at the root.

is

crime, Billy ... ah!

remembers. Their brains are

guitar

small, but their

memories

are long.

three people, and, perhaps worse, you chuckled while you

You drowned watched. You destroyed my for the

The "You is

here.

It's

I

waited

The floor's lips snapped open and Senya and Conrad listened raptly, their eyes strange.

my mother,

killed

Lancer Winchester."

to hit the others.

down on

red mist sifted

shut soundlessly.

Me? I was

life.

my words

impact of

full

Billy.

us.

But she's here with

us.

Everyone you

going to be a big shock to the genvat industry

them we've got evidence into flesh machines.

that

It will

human

shake up

when

killed I tell

spirit-plasma fields can incarnate

my

department, too.

My

mother?

She incarnated into the room that surrounds us, Billy. And Lana is here in Senya. The guitar woke up in your arms one day and remembered

The guitar is Judy Lormer. Remember Judy? The crewwoman you drowned when she threatened to talk?"

what you had done. So

I

didn't

with Lana George,

mention the

it

screamed.

fact that

young Lancer had been genuinely in

love

Lilac. a.k.a. Billy Lilac,

wasn't listening.

He

was backing

into a

comer,

making funny little subhuman sounds and swiping at his eyes. Overwhelmed by the sudden remembrance I'd triggered. Realization: who he was and what he'd

done and how

it

had always been a shaping influence on his life. in around us. The room itself was un-

The room's walls were closing

dergoing contractions, squeezing slapping us toward the door.

We

us.

We

felt

waves of

air

pressuring us,

staggered.

Howling, his voice almost lost in the room's keening and the dischording of the dying guitar, Conrad struggled on

He

looked

like

Senya and

I

all

fours after us.

a frightened child.

smmbled out

into the

main room, both of us

panic, shuddering with identity disorientation.

Really, Really, Really,

Weird Stories

fighting

John Shirley

246 Triggering Choking,

The

turned and looked through the shrinking entranceway.

I

aperture was irising shut.

I

glimpsed George standing over the guitar

The bleeding flesh guitar yowled at his feet. George swayed toward us as the room got smaller around him, his arms outstretched plaintively, face white, his expression alternating terror and confusion, mouth open case.

in a

scream

lost in the

edges of the

lids

room's

own

clamor. Behind him, the fused lower

over the room's eyes tore free; the

lids

snapped abruptly

brimmed with blood. The room contracted again, and George tripped. He fell against the open plasglass guitar case, facedown over churning liquids. The aperture closed. open.

The

eyes glared, pupils

"Ahmed!" Senya shouted, recovering She was

calling

Conrad by

"Ahmed's trapped!"

name she'd given him. The doorway damp human tissue; it was puck-

the

was blocked by a convex wall of

herself.

tense,

ered into a sort of closed cervix at the middle. But slowly the "cervix" dilated.

The top of a head poked

through. Conrad's head. His eyes were

closed, his face blank.

Gradually the ing.

room

pressed him out.

He was

unconscious but breath-

Senya held him in her arms. His clothing was badly torn and

wet with the room's blood. said nothing, but gazed

withdrawn

up

When

he opened

at her, all trace

to whatever closet of the

his eyes a

minute

slick-

later,

he

of Conrad gone. Conrad had

human

brain

it is

that erstwhile per-

sonalities are kept in.

The womb-room had shrunk

to a bruised, agonized ball of flesh less

than two meters across, clamped

rigidly

died,

mangled by the corners of the big

from

its

own

George,

around the plasglass glass case,

case. It

and inwardly burst

convulsions.

Billy Lilac,

died within

it.

enclosure into the glass case, into

died under glass.

He

He'd been forced by the shrinking

its

glutinous, transparent fluids.

He

died by drowning.

Really, Really, Really,

Weird Stories

When Enter Came

There was no contact. inside her. together.

was no

He

had

his

He was hard,

or hard enough anyway, and he was

arms around

The whole

contact.

was sex

skilled dancers. It

David Letterman was

thing was a

for Buzz Garret

in the

ground, but the sound was

and thought of a .

.

line

He

and

But there

his.

minuet performed by

his wife

TV was

The only

still

Elena Garret. on, in the back-

bedroom was

light in their

and shadow. Garret

from a Lou Reed song: Something

ejaculated,

flickered

meant she was

thought:

He heard

for the career thing. She

rock band, then.

One

the faint plastic

it

was

Elena? is all.

It's

me

much

as

She can't blame

as

me

when we met; I was in a made any money. She had the career

in graduate school

that never

momentum. I never asked her to give up her Physics R&D But somehow Garret became a booking agent, Elena became .

quantum

rat-

getting a prescription bottle. Taking a Xanax.

How did we get this way? Is

her. She's a bit more openly nasty sometimes,

wife, set

and

.

Afterward, Elena went to the bathroom. tling that

lifeless

room. The

off.

videolight, shape-shifting in pixel colors

was gone

tongues worked expertly

her, their

She groaned on cue, and thrust her hips to meet

.

.

a house-

physics aside for the glib comfort of astrology and

mysticism; stays up late reading about the occult, never says a

Garret about what she

really believes

.

.

word

to

.

She came back to bed. "Elena?" he asked.

"Hm?" "What do you

really believe?

the universe is—all

"What the thirty in the

up promptly

hell

I

mean, about what we're here

for,

what

the smff you read about."

kind of time

is

this to

ask me. Buzz?

It's

almost one-

morning, Jenny's going to come prancing in here waking us at

seven—"

Really, Really, Really,

Weird Stories

248

When Enter Came "Okay

forget

it."

mean, I'm too

"I

John Shirley

tired to get into—"

"Okay, okay."

No

contact.

Three weeks and no further sex

"Come

off

it.

later.

Buzz, you love booking bands.

world except maybe astronaut, and

that's

It's

the best job in the

quoting you." Elena

He

said.

like

the direction of the conversation; she stared

into the middle distance

and used her weary, patronizing tone. "You're

could

tell

she didn't

kind of young for a midlife

mean,

I

Christ."

way of saying. Don't talk about it, it makes me him that if he insisted on talking about it, there'd be They had a house to pay off, this was no time for a change in

was

It

Thirty-one.

crisis.

all just

her

nervous. Warning

a

fight.

careers.

They were

back yard,

sitting in the

in

lawn chairs by the lawn

table,

which the bones of T-bone steaks soaked grease through paper

The ret:

brick barbecue gave

up a

faint

plates.

ghost of gray smoke. Elena and Gar-

lounging in the soft California sunlight that went

with any Bay Area suburb, with

on

this

like

an accessory

moderately pricey development in

Walnut Creek. Elena was smoking a

cigarette

tachable filter-holders that strains the

smoke

through one of those

at-

you cut back. She

to help

chain-smoked to compensate.

He

was tempted

to point that out. But

He would

snippiness. Pointless wrangling.

cause he was angry

.

.

Around and around

We

it

would

be using

precipitate it

more

against her be-

.

in his head. Thinking,

could take X, maybe,

like

no

contact,

no

real contact.

Barry recommended, the drug

MDMA,

supposed to get you closer to your spouse. But Garret was scared of drugs, after putting in a year in

know

if

ested in him, not

really.

Buzz. She'd never asked,

But

it

NA

to get off cocaine.

And he

he wanted to get closer to Elena. She wasn't particularly

was short

She didn't even

didn't inter-

know why he was nicknamed

and probably thought

for Buzzard. Because Garret

it

was

had been

like

in

Buzz Aldrin.

one of the

first

West Coast punk bands.

He blue

looked around split level

scenities

He and

at his big yard, his

house, and thought.

under a mohawk, to

How

did

I

get

from shrieking ob-

this?

loved the house, in his way.

his kids.

barbecue, his two-story pastel-

It

was

like

Being punk, by contrast, was

one big baby

like

crib for

being a flagpole

Really, Really, Really,

him

sitter. It

Weird Stories

When Enter Came

John Shirley had a limited appeal.

had contact, of

He

It

was not a career move. But

it'd

had one

could never go back to

it,

of course. But

other kind of deep contact to be had

.

.

maybe

there

They had the prop swords, bought

ing She-Ra, which irritated Elena, identity.

"Oh He-Man,"

"you're so strong, only

made

at Toys-R-Us.

I'll

four year old Louis was saying in a fluting voice,

you can stop

Skeletor!"

turning up the house

like

lights.

voice, said, "Don't

an actor on a stage startled by the manager

Looking around. Distracted.

There was a rumble you couldn't felt

low

help you!"

Louis stopped playing,

Garret

He-Man and Louis was be-

her worry about the boy's sexual

Garret's seven year old daughter, in her best

worry, She-Ra!

was some

.

Louis and Birdy were over by the rose bushes playing She-Ra.

thing. It

sorts.

hear. Elena frowned.

a kind of indefinable dread, coming out of the very bottom

of his gut in slow, diffuse waves of anxiety. Resonating with the unheard

rumble

in the

A subsonic

air.

Garret said, "You feel

whack or

.

.

.

.

shiver.

anything? Kind of like something's out of

The rumble,

and pursed her

herself,

through her teeth.

Looking

at

her

lips,

and

said,

and then gone.

and look around. Then Louis shrugged, and

shiver,

raised his She-Ra sword.

"No." Lying

workroom window.

again. Felt but not heard. Rising again

Garret saw Louis

And

.

r

Elena hugged

in his

.

"HeMan—Skeletor's

coming!"

Garret thought, for no reason in particular. Contact.

mind

"Skeletor

twice, in the voice of is

some mental phone

here!" Louis said. "But so

is

It

sounded

operator. Contact.

She-Ra and He-Man!"

you write poetry when you're a teenager, you probably write bad poetry. Especially if you were young in the late 70s, early 80s, with all the dour, gothic rock people around, and you were sensitive, a bit alienated,

If

fairly

smart. In that case,

Poetry dressed

around

its

eyes

all

you wrote poetry

in black, poetry with

and maybe a tattoo meaningless.

little

that

matched your

silver skull earrings

that said

BORN TO

clothes.

and kohl

DIE.

The day before Enter came. Garret

But bad poetry isn't was going through a box of press clippings in his office, looking for a nasty review of one of his own early bands-he was going to show it to one of the bands he was booking. On top of a thin book of clippings. Garret found one of the high school notebooks he'd filled with bad poetry.

Found himself reading some

Really, Really, Really,

stuff

he wrote one night

Weird Stories

after his par-

249

250

When Enter Came

John Shirley

came home drunk—they always came home drunk, and usually left home drunk. Drunk and snarling at one another. He was the child of alcoholics. The poetry, in consequence, could ents

have been cited in a psychological casebook, with lines

like:

Loneliness comes in concentric circles

Dante's Hell

Like the

circles in

And the

innermost

circle is the

Pretty heavy-handed stuff,

rang true, somehow.

later, it

lot

of girlfriends;

still

had a

was when he was a young

hardest to

see.

he thought. Garish. But now,

He was lot

fifteen years

married, had two kids, once had a

And he

of friends.

wasn't as lonely as

But he was

misfit teenager, no.

still

it

a circle

away from knowing anyone. She came to Garret when he was trying not to masturbate. ing late in his office, upstairs in their house.

He

PC he never machine on the

transparent plastic desk, next to the in

one hand from the espresso

had

He was work-

his feet

up on the

used, a cup of espresso file

cabinet, a

machine

He was making phone calls that simply more calls. He was trying to get the TinTones on the same bill with Wind Window, despite the irritating sound of the dual wordplay names, and at the same time fighting the randiness that had plagued him all week. He was tempted to slip into the upstairs baththat he did use a great deal.

seemed

to breed

room run through one of his repertoire of sexual fantasies, discharge some of the sexual tension. Then get back to work. But he knew it was a way to avoid sex with Elena. Sex they were overdue for. Something she was

getting bitter

and

randiness in for her It

was

.

.

sarcastic about.

So he was trying to hold the

.

happened when he was absentmindedly changing a talking to Chalky, the Brit

telling

him,

"I just

talked to

Bill

who was Graham

light bulb.

Presents,

and

if

concession on the band's paycheck— Hey, Chalky, man,

you can make a

this gig is

portant showcase for the Bay Area because the programmers will there, especially the guys

from

KROQ

with a distant, almost unfelt rumble.

He

the manager of the TinTones,

and

And

KNET— " The

walls

an imall

be

hummed

then, phht, the overhead light

burnt out, leaving Garret in a darkness broken up by streedight glow

coming blue-white through the blue

curtains. It

was

like

suddenly being

put into photonegative. But he kept talking to Chalky on the speaker-

phone

as

he got a bulb out of a desk drawer, stood on a

chair, tilted the

Really, Really, Really,

Weird Stories

John Shirley

unscrewed the dead bulb. Telling Chalky, "You do do one for you—"

fixture aside,

me,

for

And

pal,

When Enter Came one

this

I'll

then a thick, shining, violet fluid dripped out of the empty

light

socket.

Pop.

from

The sound of

his fingers as

The glowing As Chalky

he

on about something, "The

to please than just

my dear,

filmy ribbon of purple

socket, swirling

wasn't smoke. lighting the

and

and dripping,

It

.

in twisty

trouble

got

luv, I've

is,

dear mate Buzz Garret. There's

.

violet

fluid but

plasma was issuing from the gaseous too;

crackled softly and flexed

room

floor. Slipped

."

the promoter, the record companies

A

on the

stared.

dripped in slow motion.

fluid

rattled

more people

the dead light bulb breaking

itself like

like

an

smoke, but

it

Unevenly

idea.

neon

Garret said, numbly, "Chalky,

call

you back." Hit the hang-up button.

Stared at the socket.

Some

kind of electromagnetic peculiarity?

sort of thing?

A hallucination? Was he

Some

swamp

kind of

The ribbon thickened and turned in the air, and took shape torqued, like a figure emerging on a slow lathe. The shape .

He

thought of certain paintings by Georgia O'Keefe.

Judy Chicago.

He

The shape was

gas

that stressed out?

.

as

it

.

And

others by

thought of women. mercurial and

full

of promise.

It

reached octopally

to-

ward him—

He fell off the chair, light

bulb

onto

glass, cutting the heel

hardly noticed any of

growing, getting

big.

nude Mindy Gretch, nineteen year old

this.

One hand went into

his ass.

a patch of broken

of his thumb. His butt hurt from the

He couldn't take his eyes off the shine,

fall.

He

the shape

Big as A/[indy Gretch. Mindy, the ebullient expanse of his first sexual

parmer. She was a two hundred

glitter rocker, into

Bowie and

Alice

and the

pound

Dolls. Davie

was mesmerized by the Niagran fullness of her breasts. Mindy put on a chiUing tough-rocker-chick act, and though the young David Garret identified with her outsider status, he was kind of unnerved when she Garret, at sixteen,

asked him to get

come

over to sneak

some of her

parents' vodka.

drunk and kick him around or something. But

basement she was tender and tentative

She was here, now. Standing

was smaller than the

other;

other enormous. She was six inches

Really, Really, Really,

.

.

one of her

she'd

that night in her parents'

Where was

there, nude,

listing to

too short. Then

.

Maybe

she

in his office.

now?

One

breasts the size of

of her eyes

an apple, the

the side because one of her legs

was

the shape adjusted for parity, like a parade

Weird Stories

251

252

When Enter Came

John Shirley

balloon inflating, and she was symmetrical.

soms

equalized.

Her

and

legs

and bo-

The Venus of Willendorf with Mindy's face. flesh. Her pink skin had

a violet

eyes

She was not quite there in the underglow, and there was a

faint

purple light in the very middle of her,

new bulb he held in his right hand. The for no damn good reason at all, was lit up in

shining like the filament in the bulb, with his

no power

source,

hand. Glowing.

"Mindy?" She'd died, and this was her ghost.

It

was the only thing he could

think of.

He

ought to be scared. Instead he was disoriented and—

And

drunk.

It

came over him

had grain alcohol through him. The

Unseen

room

a wave of drunkenness, as

like

A

intravenously.

rubberiness,

rippling with

that passed through everything

that purple

glow

it

if

he'd

a pliancy, rippling

too; a rumbling

around them.

wave of The

emanated from

It

at the center of her.

The drunkenness that was more than drunkenness kept him from when she closed in around him. Pop. The other light bulb hitting the floor, as Mindy clamped home around him like the jaws of a gende bear-trap. A great soft pink and vioscreaming

let trap.

He was

surrounded by Mindys. Six of them,

how, seamlessly joined

Mndys

at the hips

and

rolls

all

of

interconnected someher middle; six

fat at

facing inward, a circular accordion of Mindys, pressing against

him, naked and reeking deliriously of flesh and female lubrication,

enormous Adindy

pairs of

breasts

.

.

six

.

His hard-on hurt him.

The drunkenness cid or

numb

him inhumanly

left

or tired the

She peeled

way booze

his clothes

loose, but didn't leave

did. This

from him.

He

Should

Mindy

I

in.

Would

rationality left to

she even be able

be screaming? he wondered, as he squirmed close to

apparition,

felt

her embrace

flac-

was being drunk on Mindy.

had enough

wonder what Elena would think if she came to see it? If Elena saw it would she scream?

him

on every

part of him,

all

this

'round.

Closing in on him so he could barely breathe. Succulently warm.

Embraced by her

at

360 degrees of the compass, the

Mindys around him, blended together six faces, six pairs

at their hips

six interlocked

and arms and

of breasts, six vaginas: six two hundred

legs;

pound women

symmetrically arrayed like fleshy petals, like the inner parts of a Claes

Oldenberg flower, and

for a

moment he had

a hideous, frightening

Really, Really, Really,

vi-

Weird Stories

John Shirley

When Enter Came

sion of himself sucked into a venus flytrap

woman, sucked down

into

some

made

of this all-encompassing

sickening tube and slowly devoured

.

.

But then she reached down, under her hugely pliable belly, and two of her hands guided his cock into one of her vaginas. Smoking with sensation as he entered her. Drunk with euphoria, a wallowing in woman .

.

.

Contact. Hello.

His erect cock was a phoneline to All lines are open, she said. Call

and the phoneline was open. our 800 number her,

.

"What?" he asked. In a gasp; pumping into at the

.

.

her. Into the purple shine

mysterious heart of her.

Contact, she said,

"Who

...

oh

You wanted contact. ."

Christ

.

.

Feeling like he could go

Standing here, making love to her.

To

on doing this

forever.

Hands exploring

of her.

six

all

other orifices as his direct line to her jacked into the vagina directly in front of him. ... Six tongues,

"Who? Are

.

didn't exactly think

of them, but tive

at him.

.

You're asking, about

Identity.

from one woman, lapping

all

."

it

was

my

identity.

it,

and she

at

him. She formed concepts and he became aware

as

if

they were occurring to him with a kind of cogni-

synchronicity he shared with her

She answered

She didn't say

it

his question,

.

.

.

though he didn't know

it

for a while.

She

shifted. Closer, she said.

woman stretched like an image on silly putty, for one second;

Picture a

picture a strangely iridescent taffy in a transparent taffy-pulling machine, for about

two seconds. Then the

translucent matrix of

a shape in the

light takes

vaguely reminiscent of a

becoming

less

over you

.

.

This time

human

taffy loses

its

palpability,

becomes a

for another incandescent second; then the

light,

air like

an

iris,

a six petaled

iris,

each petal

woman, some undefined woman. The woman

but more palpable, more physical, as she flows

.

it

was an

effort not to scream.

But he was afraid that

screamed, he'd disrupt the rapport, break some

fragile

if

he

balance between

them, and he wanted desperately for what was happening to go on. The contact was an unspeakable

relief.

So he didn't scream when she enfolded him like a cocoon. His eyes were open, when the cocoon closed completely

and what he saw was something but

made

out of the faces of

like

the patterns in peacock feathers,

women, women

he'd never known, overiapping, sliding one

knowledge and. perception; a depth of Really, Really, Really,

over him,

Weird Stories

he'd

knovm and women

into another. Faces lined in

feeling he'd only

glimpsed be-

253

254

When Enter Came He

fore.

John Shirley

thought of making love to

radio tower, and

it

them—his

sucking, nibbling, kissing; an organ that

drew

was

erection

was transmitting—and the women's

his erection into

it.

as rigid as a

blossomed,

lips

was both a mouth and a vagina

His hands skied the curves of waists, the

full-

ness of hips and thighs, the roundness of arms; every epidermal inch of

him coming

into contact with her: with them.

over collarbone, the exquisite slithering chain of

damp

labia

silk

drawn past

padded room of buttocks and

breasts

and

down

his shoulder,

A bouquet

his torso;

glittering

a

pano-

of mouths sweeping

was wet but nothing was uncomfortably

past his genitals. Everything

was redolent of

tautness of skin

embracing him; a

ply of eyes looking piercingly into his.

sticky;

With the

stretched under a jawbone, a sweetly

sweat and lubricant, and

flesh,

effluents melted together into a symmetrical

all

those scents

harmony

in

keeping

with the kaleidoscoping visuals of her. She was an endlessly reproduced variant

on

pattern, like the ornate embellishments of the

ace decor, but none of

none of lated

it

it

was simple decoration;

was fragmentary;

it

was

all

it

Sun King's

pal-

was expression. And

of a piece, symphonically articu-

by a guiding mind.

She was around him

body the penetrating orhim was charged with radiant intelli-

like a great vagina, his

gan, but the organ that enclosed

gence, and was at the same time the electric piquancy of

moved

all

He

sexuality.

pumping through her. When he thrust out his tongue, a tongue arose to meet it. When he squirmed away from one vagina and thrust his cock in another direction, another opened to receive him. Breasts filled the hollows of his body. peristaltically

He swam yet she

between them.

He

could breathe, he could

move

freely,

light

and

to escape

flesh

and

phone was

at the

same time yearned

to stay within her.

began to intermix.

Light and flesh were one,

was

all

around him (somewhere, the

ringing, ludicrously ringing again

and

again,

scam on him),

the waves of

some

office

answered by the an-

swering machine. Chalky yammering after the beep, wanting to try stupid

and

was everywhere.

He writhed And

within her, his entire body

sliding against him, interpenetrating his

own

some on

skin

exotic electromagnetic field, stimulating each of his nerve

ends so that he was sweedy feeling everything, not with sensory overload but with sensory renewal. His erogenous zones beaming

The boundaries began clearly

where

his

whistled through

own

to dissolve.

flesh

He was no

from

longer able to sense

ended and hers began.

him—and then was absorbed

tion of reassurance

like klieg lights.

A

shattering panic

into a long slow undula-

her.

Really, Really, Really,

Weird Stories

John Shirley You

When Enter Came

not be destroyed in me.

will

He believed her. He let go. Felt himself turn head over heels. Saw himself

from the outside

And

.

.

.

she shifted again. She was a specific someone, now. She was Jane

Wasserstein.

When was

it?

had jumped a grade. Jane, the she'd broken down and .

And

put out.

barbarically sexist

girl

was

eighteen, she

was seventeen,

he'd dated for five

months before

.

of expression was that, "put out?"

It was both and touchingly resonant of an adolescent boy's wist-

Put out: put

fulness.

.

What kind

He

1975?

to the outside. Give, in a

it

way

that

makes

insiders

of outsiders.

Here she was. Jane. girl

with asthma,

blinked rather often, as

more frames per second than everyone

ing in

premonition of the underglow in

David you Jane,'" she'd

to

go to the

on

said,

before he would have said

me

her quick

else.

we

He

He'd make a pass and she'd

snort,

The undefined woman had

Eyes

mind was don't say

'Me

second

"You going

to ask

going to work up to that?" She was

he was playing chess with

felt like

"Oh

Garret and Black Glass Productions.

cocoon which had become Jane, Jane all

listen to

now,

shifted,

somehow

said,

tak-

a blue-violet

like

their first date, a breathless half

Second date she'd

it.

drive-in or are

in a circle, but

if

this creature's skin. "Just

always a step ahead of him.

formed

A half-Jewish

Slender, curly blond, sylphlike Jane.

who

in 1989, in the office of

Mindy had become all

her.

him!"

Buzz

the shifting

'round him, Siamese sextuplets

variations of one,

and not a con-

fined joining of many.

He knew

Something she'd

David you

school.

big

money

ding

body

me

at

with

it

No, he

re

her was

stiff

like

as

or Jane. But drove himself into

if

triggered by a

when

mnemonic answering ma-

they were both seniors in high

misfit,

and

you'll probably

make

Cooper or Frank Zappa. But you re not kidall you really want is for every-

Rimbaud of rock act, which

is all

told her, that's not

in '89, his

becoming

as

a professional

how I am. I want

Now,

Mindy

contact. Hello again.

said to him,

like Alice

this

to love you,

matter

made

coming on

Jane's voice, chine.

wasn't

this creature

the nearest Jane, and

that

every Joe all.

I

much

Normal

want them

wants, too

to love

me

.

as

.

I

.

am.

No

acceptance.

tongue brushing Jane's small, hard breasts, her nipples little

.22 bullets, the electric contact of his

a switch triggering

more

astrally

tongue on

recorded memories.

Buzzard Garret, punk romantic. Jane's words, riding on a sneer, as she broke up with him in their freshman year at UCB. Two weeks beReally, Really, Really,

Weird Stories

255

256

When Entter Came

John Shirley

You always had a feel, David, for what women wanted to hear. They invariably thought it was endearing, too, that you were a punk romantic who could leave silverspray-painted roses on a doorstep, quote morbidly romantic stuff from Verlaine in a letter, talk about psychic union in lovemaking, and still go out on stage and tell the world you hated it. That made you a tragic figure of romance, rights So why'd you do it, Buzzf Just to get laid? That was never enough. You insisted they had to fall in love with you. When I gave up the nookie, it wasn't enough. You had to make me say I loved you. You fucking pig. fore he

dropped out

to focus

on

rock.

He saw

She'd gone right to the heart of him.

himself, through this

He needed them to be in love with him. He needed them to believe he was in love with them. But he couldn't be, not really. He could say all the right things and make the right moves. Contact, as she had seen him:

Could

give

them a good semblance of sexual passion. Surprise them call them funny pet names. Could even marry

with romantic gestures,

them. But he could never

them under was

safe

And

really,

honestly love them. This way, he had

thumb. This way he controlled them, and

his

this

way he

from abandonment.

all

the time he thought these things, he kept plunging into Jane.

Who

was not Jane anymore. She was Sandy. Pleasantly plump, busty, spray of freckles across her cleavage. The same exact pattern of freckles

reproduced on Because

six linked manifestations

if you don't want

ous about living life. You're

to

full

of Sandy

all

have a baby, Sandy'd

around him.

said,

you're not seri-

of yourself and you'll never live that way.

She'd wanted kids, and he hadn't, and they'd broken up over that he'd dated

he'd

it.

After

women a week for three years, and then

sometimes three

met Elena while he was booking a

college

where she was working in

the student affairs office, he was blown away by the crystalline vastness

of her love.

intellect,

the subdety and intensity, alternating,

Her odd combination of

Tao of Physics

ruling their

spiritual

lives.

when

she

made

emphasis and hard science. The

She'd got pregnant and informed him

she didn't believe in abortions.

So okay, babies and marriage. Their conjugal lovemaking was good up to a point

ever

till

now that

more than Withdrawing more and more

she realized he was holding back, holding back

he

felt

as the resentment in

trapped by marriage.

him

quietly grew. Elena sensing

it

and withdrawing

to protect herself.

Communication between them became casm and acrimony. They were caught up

businesslike or brittle with sarin the vicious circles

Really, Really, Really,

of quietly

Weird Stories

John Shirley

When Enter Came

angry marriage, endless reflections in a

were funhouse warped

And

.

.

hall

of mirrors-mirrors that

.

suddenly, now, standing

up

in his office,

he found himself making

love to his wife. Six of her, at

first.

Then, the

Elenas collapsed into one

six

woman.

Like a string of paper dolls folding up into one.

He

was making

love to an Elena with a violet

underglow to her

trans-

lucent skin, and a purple orb shining at the center of her.

He wanted

to run. But then he looked into her face,

and saw none of

the sophisticated hostility that Elena normally kept there like a falcon in

a cage.

He

saw only the

basic Elena, perceptive, vulnerable, curious, pri-

and more emotionally complex than he'd ever guessed. The impulse to run faded. He sank into her, more deeply

vate

yet. His hollow of her back, her buttocks, finding them

fingers tracing the entirely

new; and finding that

hands were dipping into her

his

shallowly sliding through her skin as

charged

And

He

if it

were a

skin,

fur of electrically

flesh.

then he struck gold.

drove deeper into her vagina, and the electrode of his organ

contact with the electrical receiver of hers, receptivity.

some

inner

made

node of sheer

Contact.

Hello.

"You're not Elena," he said, ludicrously trying to identify her even as he feverishly

pumped

into her.

This time she spoke aloud. "Yes and no. Call

I'm trapped in

this otherness,

me Enter. I need your help. my husbandside. I'm

trying to get to

trapped—" All the time both of them copulating deliriously, joyously, as she

gasped into

"What

his ear:

"Need your help

getting through to the free level."

are you?"

"A consciousness; a body of different principles but

woman.

A connection to women,

"Where do you come from?" "An otherness. Not this world; not with roots in

"How

can

similar essence.

A

from your viev^oint." this plane;

not

this universe.

But

it."

I

help?"

"Don't come."

"What?" "You're about to have an orgasm.

The

panies the reproductive discharge will

David. Don't orgasm. Wait. Timing

Really, Really, Really,

is

electrical discharge that

come too

crucial."

Weird Stories

accom-

soon. Don't come,

257

258

When Enter Came He saw gasm

it

rolling

He

John Shirley

a tidal wave

like

withdrew from

her, just in time.

on

faded, stayed aching just

He

acted

on

intuition, or

him through the through her, as

if

ting,

.

.

him

He

stepped

and

there.

But she was

still

here,

on the

floor. Skin

lubricant.

a radio antenna.

his office, his erection

Opened

The room

she kept for her hobbies.

got there.

No

one near

was almost a

to complete the favor.

standing nude in his office. Clothes heaped

like

orgasm slowed,

.

plasmic. Feeling a shock that

with sparks under his touch. Walked

He

build of

he went. Coming out on the other side know-

as

walked to the door of

still,

or-

perhaps following some instruction she gave

he looked back, she wouldn't be

slippery with sweat

He

An

she were a door. Walked through Elena; through Enter,

unseeably, waiting for

He was

The

connections they'd explored.

secret

burn sear through him if

mind's eye.

his

the brink of his groin

who became amorphous and ing that

on the horizon of

toward him with the inexorability of a force of nature.

to

open

the door, the

down

wagging, transmit-

doorknob crackling

the hall to Elena's studio.

The door opened

for him, before

he

it.

stepped through. Saw Elena lying back on the rug, naked, her

clothes sweat.

heaped

Her

untidily

Between Garret and

his wife

cate design of copper

made

about

her.

She was panting, glistening with

legs apart.

and

was a low metal

silvery metal,

some

table.

On it was

sort of occult

an

intri-

ideogram

of metals, wired to the electrical socket overhead. Shimmering

with violet glow.

With some strange combination of quantum physics and ancient female witchcraft, his wife had invoked Enter, drawn her from another

And drawn someone else too. The husbandside. The male one. The one

world, channeled her through this one.

He

could

feel his

presence.

Enter was trying to rejoin. He'd been here, making love to his wife, even as Enter

had been making love

to Garret.

Like Enter, he was gone now, from the visible world; but he was here.

The wave of

intuition that

had brought Garret

room

to this

filled in

Found herself Blocked. Neither of them could

the blanks for him: Elena had been desperate for contact.

unable to break through to him

directly.

bear the humiliation of a marriage counselor. So Elena had tried something exotic and indirect, a quirky synthesis of physics and ancient

magic, never expecting

it

to work.

Some

personal

ritual,

performed for

psychological reasons, which had translated into objective

Really, Really, Really,

reality.

Weird Stories

When Enter Came

John Shirley Don't question

He went to

it,

Garret thought.

Elena, lay

down

beside her.

The

true Elena.

He lay beside

her and then with her, entering her very soon after the embrace began. Feeling the

first

orgasm buck through him. Breaking down the

between worlds. Enter passing through her part passing through Garret to her. Enter joining

and passing on, freed now,

to him; Enter's

barrier

male counter-

and Husbandside meeting and

into their

own

world. Having

left

Elena and Garret transformed behind them.

had

Garret

a

glimpse

of

something,

Husbandside passed on. That Enter and her

Enter

before

just

lover

were one

and

creature,

with two aspects; two sides of one coin, meeting here where dimensions intersected.

And

they

had

connections,

interfacings

consciousnesses—with Garret's, and Elena's. With Garret

And

made

all

love to his wife several times that night.

each time-

Contact.

Really, Really, Really,

Weird Stories

with

others.

other

259

Skeeter Junkie

It

struck him, then,

and powerfully.

How consummate, how exquisite: A

mosquito.

Look at

the thing.

No fraction of it wasted or distracted; more stream-

lined than any fighter

any sports model.

more elegant, for Hector Ansia's taste, than moment, sexier—and skinnier—than any fashion

jet,

car; in that

A mosquito.

Hector was happily watching the mosquito penetrate the skin of

his

right arm.

He

was

in his El

Fruit of the

The

place

Loom

Paso studio apartment, wearing only his threadbare briefs

because the autumn night was hot and

was empty except for a few books and busted coffee

sofa, the only things

he hadn't been able to

sell.

sticky.

table

and

But as soon as he'd

slammed the heroin, the rat-hole apartment had transformed into a palace bedroom, his dirty sofa into new silk cushions, the heavy, polluted air became the zephyrs of Eden, laced with incense. It wasn't that he hallucinated things that weren't there; but what was there had recast into a heroin-polished dimension of excellence. As he'd taken his shot, he'd looked out the windows

at the refineries that

studded the periphery of

El Paso, through the lens of heroin transformed into Disney casdes, their

burn-off flames the torches of

He'd ter,

just risen

some charming medieval

out of his nod,

like

festival.

a balloon released under heavy wa-

ascending from a zone of sweet weight to a place of sweet buoyancy,

and he'd only now opened length of his

arm over

his eyes,

and the

first

thing he

the side of the old velvet sofa.

saw was the

The

were

veins

distended because of the pressure on the underside of his arm, and

way between

his

elbow and

his

hand was the mosquito, pushing

ganic needle through the greasy raiment of his epidermis It

was so

.

.

half-

its

or-

.

fine.

Really, Really, Really,

Weird Stories

John Shirley

Skeeter Junkie

He hoped the mosquito in him.

and

The

could

feel the

sun of benevolence that pulsed

china white was good, especially because he'd had a long

cruel sickness before finding

it,

and he'd been maybe halfway to

clean again, so his tolerance was down, and that to hit the

smack

fold

in, to

and she was washing

it

so

much

better

into himself.

it

Mama's hands on him. He was

Stoned, he could feel his old,

made

his

back

as

he

sat in a

times she would kiss the top of his head.

He

warm

could

three years

bath,

feel

it

and some-

now. That's

what heroin gave him back. She hadn't touched him

had come

friend

kicked

Mama

something he cried

.

in

.

head and

in the

and

Just looked at

called her a

that skeeter, now.

The mosquito was thing

in.

He

.

.

feel a

boy-

looked

his fourth birthday.

Made Hector want

it

was

at

him blank when

.

fucking his arm, wasn't

A proboscis, what

could

new

whore, and the kick broke

after that she just

him

Heroin took him back, before

way back. Look at

her

fucked up on reds and wine, and the boyfriend had

in her brain,

.

when

after his fourth birthday,

it?

Sometimes

to fuck, looking at

Sure

it

the

it.

was. Working that

called.

thudding from somewhere. After a long

was sure the thudding wasn't

all

his pulse;

it

moment he

was the radio dovmstairs. Lulu,

listening to the radio.

Lulu had red-blond old Beades movies, lips.

hair, cut like in

its

the style of English

girls

from the

points near her cheeks curled to aim at her

She had wide hips and round arms and hazel

eyes.

full

He'd talked

to

her in the hall and she'd been kind of pityingly friendly, enough to pass the time for

come

maybe

a minute, but she wouldn't go out with him, or even

Because she knew he was a junkie. Everyone on

in for coffee.

Selby Avenue

knew

a junkie

his Liberal Arts B.A., her.

No use trying to

but

they saw one.

SSI

He

wouldn't matter: he'd

explain, a degree didn't get

might as well draw your

be a

it

when

and

sell

could

still

be

you a

tell

just

life

her about

a junkie to

anymore, you

your food stamps; you might as well

junkie.

Lulu probably figured

money, and maybe

if

she got involved with Hector, he'd steal her

give her AIDS.

She was wrong about the AIDS-he

never ever shared needles-but she was right he'd steal her money, of course. The only reason he hadn't broken into her place was because he

knew

she'd never leave any cash there, or anything valuable, not living

downstairs from a junkie. He'd never get even a ten dollar bag out of that crappy little radio he'd seen through the open door. Nothing much

Really, Really, Really,

Weird Stories

261

John Shirley

262 Skeeter Junkie in there. Posters of Chagall, a

flowing clay pots shaped

like

framed photo of

burros and turdes.

She was succulent; he wanted her almost

He watched If

he

as

much

as her paycheck.

the mosquito.

lifted his

He

not.

Sting, succulents over-

could

arm

up,

would the mosquito stop

He hoped

drinking.^

a faint ghost of a pinch, a sensation he saw in his

feel

mind's eye as a rose bud opening, and opening, and opening, more than

any rose ever had Careful.

petals.

He swomg his

mosquito didn't

stir.

inch, so as not to

feet

Then he

on the lifted

floor,

the

arm

dismrb the mosquito.

With excruciating

without moving his arm. The

It

up, very, very slowly, inch by

kept right on drinking.

languor. Hector stood

up

straight,

motionless except for the slow, slow act of standing.

because the dope

carefully,

went

clopedia

The

He was

set.

on

lettering

pretty loaded.

no one had bought

the book-backs oozed one It

was good

smff.

just as slowly, his right

the sofa.

hand

left

He

it,

word onto

stiff,

his precious

.

the next.

He

so as not to disturb

guest—he returned to

riffling pages. .

.

.

(There was another shot ready on the coffee

.

now.

He sat dov^mi, his right arm propped on the arm of the sofa, his

Mosquito

Make

shelf to

of the old ency-

forced his eyes to focus, and

arm ramrod

beloved—the communion pinch,

his

hand onto the edge of a

his left over the dusty tops

M book out.

then pulled the

Moving

glad

Then—walking very

the floor feel like a trampoline—he

to the bookshelf. Easing his right

keep the arm steady, he ran

was

made

keeping the arm

table.

Not

yet,

pendajo.

it last).

.the female mosquito punctures the skin with equipment contained

in a proboscis,

comprised of six elongated

stylets.

One

verted trough— the rest are slender mandibles, maxillae,

stylet is

and a

tube. After insertion, the tube arches so that the tip

and saw through

make a

can probe for

blood about half a millimeter beneath the epidermal surface the stylets are serrated

in-

stylet for

the injection of mosquito saliva. These latter close the trough to

rough

an

.

.

.

Two of

the tissue for the others. If a

pool of blood forms in a pocket of laceration the mosquito ceases move-

ment and sucks Mosquito

the blood with

two pumps located

saliva injected while

creates the itching

in her

head

.

.

.

probing prevents blood clotting and

and swelling accompanying a

Hector soaked up a pool of words;

here, a

bite

.

.

.

puddle there, and the color

pictures— how wonderfully they put together encyclopedias!— and then

Really, Really, Really,

Weird Stories

John Shirley he

let

Skeeter Junkie

the volume slide off his lap onto the floor, and found the other

syringe with his left hand, and, hardly having to look, with the ambidex-

of a needle freak, shot himself up in a vein he was saving in his

terity

right thigh. All the time not disturbing the mosquito.

He knew it was

too big a load. But he'd had that long, long Jones,

mirrors reflecting into one another.

out on the sofa again as the

hit

It

should be

all right.

He

like

stretched

melted through him, and focused on the

mosquito. Hector's eyelids

Making

lars.

ing

slid

almost shut. But that worked

come

the mosquito

was

standing by an

this variety.

watching

oil derrick,

the zone of sweet weight

From

.

.

.

it

see-

her head, slicked back

.

looking

.

.

human

stubby oiled

like

it

was,

a

like

up from the deep

An Anopheles gambiae,

level— there were brisdes

and he could see

hair,

had

fallen in a

forward to drink, as

legs, cantilevered

red vsdth blood it is

like

from the

which

allowing her to take in as

her

bites,

much

if

.

.

that the

in obeisance

.

.

her rear

.

.

abdomen

He had an intimate relationship with He could feel her tiny, honed mind,

frail-

abdomen glowing

distends enormously,

as four times her weight in blood

him.

on

loop away from the

skin, its see-through

a litde Christmas light

the female

man

places,

her tapered golden body, resting on the long, translucent,

Hfted, a forty degree angle

,

oil

ha ...

thirty-weight,

sheath-like covering of the proboscis stylets

pump

magnified perspective the mosquito's parts were

this

rougher than they appeared from the

.

he was

like

under a microscope now. Like he was standing—no, floating—float-

it

ing in front of the mosquito and he was smaller than

.

binocu-

like adjusting

in closer, sharper. It

mosquito.

like

one of those minute

It

.

.

.

was entering

this

paint-

on the head of a pin. He sensed her regard. The mosquito was dimly aware of his own mind hovering over her. He ings obsessed hobbyists put

could close in on the tiny gleam of her insect of an electric watch-and replace

egant

was

nod

like to

He

that

would

drink his

could do

it.

mind—less than the "mind" What a rare and el-

with his ovm.

be: getting into her

own blood

He

it

head so he could

feel

through the slender proboscis

could superimpose himself and fold his

.

what .

it

.

own

con-

sciousness up into the micro-cellular spaces. Any mind, large or small, could be concentrated in microscopic space; microspace was as infinite,

downwardly, as

wasn't

interstellar space,

being's consciousness. God's

mind could

it? fit

God

experienced every

into a mosquito. Like

all

on a symphony going through the needle of a record player, or through the tiny laser of a CD. The stylet in the mosquito's proboscis that music

was

like

the record player's stylus

Really, Really, Really,

.

.

.

Weird Stories

263

John Shirley

264 Skeeter Junkie

He

could

circle,

and

and

close in,

a soft ridge of topography.

participate,

could

.

.

of his

was drinking from. Himself; perhaps

formerly.

he was inside the mosquito.

levolent miracle:

He

and become.

own arm stretching out in front of him, He could see the glazing eyes of the man he

... see the rising fleshtone

It

was a wonderfully ma-

He was

own more-evolved

senses altered and enhanced by his

His blood was a syrup. The mosquito didn't

taste

it,

the mosquito.

Its

prescience. as such; but

Hector

could taste it—through his psychic extension of the mosquito's senses, he

supposed—and there were many confluent and

globin.

Her

And

very

faintly,

heroin. His eggs

Keep your

eggs.

tastes in

it,

mineral and meat

charged waters and honeyed glucose and adds and hemo-

electrically

would be

well sustained—

identity sorted out. Better yet, set

own

your

firmly atop hers. Take control.

Stop drinking.

More.

No.

Hector. Who's in charge, here? Stop drinking and

Insist,

imagine!

To

fly.

Just

take flight-

Almost before the retraction of her proboscis was completed, he was in the

he

air,

making the wings work without having to think about hard to control the

tried too

His

flight,

path was a herky-jerky

flight

it.

When

he foundered; so he simply

spiral,

flew.

each geometric section of

it

a

portion of an equation.

His senses expanded to adjust to the scope of

movement: the great cavern, the massive organism himself. Hector's

human

body,

left

new

his

his

He

wing energy, and thought:

small crack

But he

.

let

.

of

bottom of

it:

at the

behind.

Hector sensed a temperature change, a nudge of the crack in the window.

possibilities

air:

a current from

pushed himself up the stream, increasing I'll

crash

on

the edges of the glass,

it's

a

.

the insect's navigational instincts hold sway, and he was

through, and out into the night.

He could go anywhere, He went downstairs.

anywhere

at

all

.

.

.

Her window was open. From couch

a distance, the landscape of Lulu in her bikini underpants,

was

glorious, lying there

and nothing

were great slack mounds of cream and

else.

One

the

breasts

cherry. She'd fallen asleep with

the radio on; there were three empty cans of beer

by her head.

Her exposed

on

of her legs was drawn up,

on the

tilted to

lean

Really, Really, Really,

little its

end

table

knee against

Weird Stories

John Shirley

Skeeter Junkie

the wall, the other out straight, the limbs apart enough to trace her

open

labia against the blue silk panties.

Hector

circled near the ceiling.

words and

taffied

just faintly,

The

radio

boom

was a distorted

of

He thought that, TV waves washing over him,

industrial-sized beat, far off to port.

he could actually

passing through the

He wanted Lulu.

and

feel radio

air.

She looked

asleep.

But suppose she

felt

him, suppose

she heard the whine of his coming, and slapped, perhaps

just in reflex,

and crushed him—

Would he die when the mosquito Maybe that would be all right. Hector descended to

down, an

flight-path

died.^

her, following the

unseen

aerialist's

broken geometries of insect

staircase,

asymmetrical and yet

perfect.

Closer— he could

feel

could the skeeters bear

He

her heat. God, she was

a lake of

like

fire!

How

it?

entered her atmosphere. That's

how

it

seemed: she was almost

planetary in her glowing vastness, hot-house and fulsome.

He descended

through hormone-rich layers of her atmosphere, to deeper and more personal heats, until he'd settled Jesus!

It

But up

was

revolting. It

this close;

on the

skin of her left leg near the knee.

was ordinary

human

skin.

hugely magnified by his mosquito's perspective

was a cratered landscape, orange and gold and

It

.

.

.

in places white; here

and there the

flakes of blue, where dead skin cells were shedding away. In wens of pores and around the bases of the occasional stiff stalks of

hair

were puddly masses of pasty stuff he guessed were colonies of bacte-

ria. The skin itself was textured like pillows of meat all sewn together. The smells off it were overwhelming: rot and uric acid and the various compounds in sweat and a chemical smell of something she'd bathed

with—and an exudation of something she'd been eating Hector was an experienced hand with drugs; he

from revulsion to obsession, immersion that

came

him

.

.

to delight in the yeasty completeness of this

in the biological essence of her.

to

.

shifted his viewpoint

then, affecting

And

there

him the way the

was another smell

sight of a

woman's

cleavage had, in his boyhood. Blood.

Unthinking, he had already allowed the mosquito to unsheathe her

and

stylets

rooted,

drive

them

moving the

into a

slightly

damp

pillow of skin

cells.

He

pushed,

arched piercer in a motion that outlined a

cone, breaking tiny capillaries just inside the epidermis, making a pocket for the

blood to pool

in.

Really, Really, Really,

And

injecting the anti-coagulant saliva.

Weird Stories

265

John Shirley

266 Skeeter Junkie

Her blood was much

but he could taste the femaleness of

like his,

the hormonal signature and

.

.

it,

alcohol.

.

She swatted him.

He

felt

giant hand, before

and the hand wasn't

rigid

air

and he withdrew and .

.

to hit him, the

a

like a lid for

at

him

palm was

moment.

pressure flattened the mosquito, and Hector feared for his

spindly legs, but then light flashed over

air

She struck

struck.

it

enough

cupped. But the hand covered Hector

slightly

The

wind of the

the

in her sleep,

him again and the

lid lifted,

wings whining, up a short distance into the

flew,

.

She was mostly quiescent now. Looking from here shrub-furred

hills

you saw

smoothly into the next,

and

rattlers

tarantulas

He

.

And from up

here her thighs looked so sweet

left

he could see the tracery of her labia

The

dragons under a

silk

He

woods of pubic

could see the

Enough. Eggs,

He was

When

at last

canopy.

thigh skin hair

like

was only a litde

material

the shadows of sleeping

was a

smoother,

little

the slope a

paler.

litde.

He was

going to get closer

.

.

.

he reached the frontier of Lulu's panties, and stood be-

under a wrinkle lips,

down

from

inside thigh, not far

The

outside.

in control.

tween two outlying spring-shaped

vaginal

blending

.

.

dipped down, and alighted on Lulu's

No.

hill

you got close and saw ant colonies and

the pale blue circus tent billow of her panties. stained;

one

the rolling,

between the clumps.

She hadn't awakened.

and tender

in parts of California:

until

like

stalks

in the elastic at the

he was paralyzed by

of red-brown pubic

monumental This was a

fear.

vertical

hair,

gazing

furrow of her

great temple to

some

subaquatic monster, and would surely punish any intrusion.

With the

fear

came a sudden perception of

now, and an unbottling of gargantuan in both

size

his resentments.

a hatch in his brain, and a set of

and

as

A sudden He

own

relative tininess,

and arrogance.

But he had learned that he was the master of

grip,

his

She was forbidden, she was

new

his reality.

controls that

fit

He had found

namrally to his

he chose. darkness, then; a

wind-

sprang up, narrowly escaping the swat. Hearing a sound

like

a

jet

on her of misshapen words. The

breaking the sound barrier— the wind of her hand and the slap thigh.

Then

a

murky

roaring, a

boulder-fall

goddess coming awake; the goddess speaking.

Really, Really, Really,

Weird Stories

John Shirley Something

Skeeter Junkie 267

like,

"Fucking skeeter

Oh,

yes?

The

fury swelled in him,

and

as

it

.

.

.

little

shit

.

.

.

get the fuck out ..."

grew-Lulu shrank. Or seemed

to, as

rage pushed his boundaries out like a parade balloon, but unthinkable

She shrank to

fast.

woman

once more

size,

desirable.

She screamed, of course.

He

glimpsed them both

A man-sized mosquito,

in her vanity

mirror

.

.

.

poised with slender but strong front

Lulu

legs;

screaming, as he leaned back onto his hind legs and spread her legs with the middle limbs and drove his piercer through the fabric of her panties

and

into the forbidden temple of the goddess, into the tube of what

now only the tender little He thrust the thirty-inch pulled out a stasy

.

He

.

little;

outer

membrane of her

proboscis

he thrust

in

.

.

.

stylets

was

reproductive organs.

deep into the vagina.

He

feeling her writhe in a disgusted ec-

.

might go the next

and beyond

to

an

step.

artery;

Thrust through her

cervix, into the

womb,

suck her so hard she turned inside out and

atomized and sucked whole into him, making him three times bigger.

But he held

off.

He pumped

his proboscis like a dick

In her delighted revulsion, she struck at the mosquito's

The pain was

realer

and— compound

and more personal than he'd expected.

eyes.

He jerked

back, withdrawing, floundering off the edge of the bed, feeling a leg shatter against the floor

The pain and

and a wing crack, one of

the disorientation

his eyes half blind

.

.

.

unmanned him. Emasculated him,

As always when that happened, he shrank. The boundaries of the room expanded and the bed grew, around him, into a dirty white plain; Lulu grew, again becoming a small worid to herintimidated him.

self

.

.

He

.

Her hand

sliced

threw himself

down

at

him—

frantically into the air, his

stochastically; the wings'

damaged wings ascending

keening sound not quite right now, his

trajec-

tory uncertain.

The

ceiling

loomed; the window crack beckoned.

In seconds he

had swoim upstream against the night

air,

and managed

to aim himself between the edges of the crack in the glass; the lips of the break like a crystalline take on her vagina. Then he was out into the night,

and regaining some greater control over

That's not That's

how

how

it

was, he

his

realized: she, the

they'd gotten through the crack

wings

.

.

.

mosquito had control.

and out

into the night.

Let the mosquito mind take the head, then, for now, while he rested his psyche and pondered. That great yellow egg, green around the edges

Really, Really, Really,

Weird Stories

John Shirley

268 Skeeter Junkie with refinery toxins, must be the moon;

tar buckets

jumble of what seemed sky-

this

must be the pipes and chimneys and discarded

scraper-sized structures

of the apartment building's roof.

Something washed over him, rebounding, making him shudder air.

Only

after

it

departed did

it

in the

register in his hearing: a single high note,

from somewhere above. There,

an

in

it

came

more defined and

again,

about

alien certainty

its

The mosquito redoubled

pulsingly closer, as

its

wing beats

Hector

down between

circled

streetlight

Another,

.

.

Enemy. Go.

the old brick apartment buildings, to-

even more purposeful note

air.

hit

shadow draped him, and wing

nating him, and then a

on the

fear.

.

slightly higher,

tympanically

He

superimposed against the

Hector, reso-

beats thudded

for

one snapshot-clear moment,

dirty indigo sky.

Hector knew he should de-

saw the bat

tach from the mosquito, but the outspread wings of the bat,

and wet snout, caught him with

ears

perfect, poised against the sky, as the his

arm.

It

growing

and there was an

in reaction,

urgency that was too neurologically primitive to be actual

ward the

if

purpose.

its

its

pointed

heraldic perfection—it

was

as

mosquito had seemed, poised on

trapped him with fascination.

Sending out a

final

sonar note to pinpoint the mosquito, the bat struck

head forward-

its

But Hector was diving now, under fall

for a

He

ways

just to get

the

most

it,

swirling in the

letting himself

air,

distance.

glimpsed the hangar-like opening of a

window and

flew for

An

sensed a body inside and newly flowing female blood.

He

it.

even bigger

woman.

He

had

to rest

first.

He

found a spot on a wall near the

ceiling.

Some-

time later there was the sound of a radio alarm coming on to wake the sleeper

below him, the radio

And

this is the

KRED

mit.

Look out

for

KRED

radio

in

mid-monologue

crack-of-dawn-news,

your hamburgers,

from Lubbock where a

.

all the

.

.

news

that's fit to trans-

comes

to

shot by a burger

It

folks, that's the story that

woman was

seems that some twisted soul has been putting .22 caliber

ground meat sold the burger

Lubbock supermarkets. The

was cooking

wound from

last

night

a bullet fragment

.

and the woman .

.

exploded while

bullet

suffered a

Chrysler has

minor facial

announced two new

and plans to lay off some ^^ 000 people an hour and we'll give you the first KRED morning

plant closures oh,

at

bullets into

.

.

.

Give us about,

traffic

Really, Really, Really,

report

.

.

.

Weird Stories

John Shirley

Skeeter Junkie 269 00 00 00

When Lulu woke,

she had cramps. But

that bothered her.

There was a taintedness lingering on her

nightmare of the giant mosquito had

mone on

her.

it

left

was the

aftertaste of the

dream

skin, as

if

the

a sort of mephitic insect phero-

She took two showers, and

ate her breakfast,

and

listened

to the radio, and, by comforting degrees, forgot about the dream.

When

she went downstairs the building manager was letting the ambulance

tendants

in.

They were

in

no

hurry.

He was dead. No one was surprised. He was

It

was the guy

upstairs, the

at-

manager

said.

Next day Lulu was no one was looking.

a junkie. Everybody

scratching the skeeter bites,

Really, Really, Really,

Weird Stories

knew

that.

whenever she thought

What JoY! What Fulfillment!

Henry was It

a bit disappointed by his suicide.

wasn't, he told himself, that he'd really

wanted the spectacular

of suicide he'd once imagined for himself, just eleven years before,

sort

when

he'd been a seventeen-year-old role-playing gamer in Covina, California.

He'd pictured strapping dynamite gress

and blowing them

all

to himself, then walking into

up along with

himself.

Con-

No particular political

grudges involved; he'd simply wanted a suicide that would earn him a place in history.

And

neither

friend Lydia

had he wanted the melodramatic

had genuinely pulled

chest, outside her parents'

off:

hanging

herself,

bedroom door one

morning they'd opened the door

sort of suicide that his

with a sign on her

night so that the next

to find their fifteen-year-old daughter

dangling crookedly, hours dead, bearing a sign that read:

THIS No. Too

IS

WHAT YOU WANTED, ISN'T IT?

over-the-top, even

had he

childish motivations for suicide. it

It

was the

first

step through the Gate,

was cosmically motivated,

Marshall had

said, a

still

entertained those kinds of

His suicide wasn't first

step in a journey to a reunion.

in the true sense. It

Anyway, he thought, now, as he waited for

was a

purification,

it

his

had been done

journey to really begin,

right.

He'd

carried

it

off

He stood—if stood was the word—gazing appreciatively at his body

lying there, in still

all:

transcendance.

simple though the suicide was, perfectly.

really a suicide at

its

orange robe, v^th the candles about

it,

the ritual incense

smoking. His face hadn't contorted; there was no spray of vomit from

the mouth. His pudgy late-twenties

had been

as

Marshal had said

it

body had never looked

would

be, quite painless.

better.

Take the

the toxified Jell-O, drink the wine. Wait for the sleeping

pills

to

And

pills,

do

it

eat

their

work, and so they had; he didn't even remember losing consciousness. Then

Really, Really, Really,

Weird Stories

WhatJoy! What Fulfillment!

John Shirley the poison had stirred

itself into his bloodstream, completing the recipe, and was not even a sense of wrenching in the parting. His spirit had slipped out of his body as easily as he'd shrugged out of his bathrobe before

voild; there

the ritual cleansing in the Motel 6's shower. It

wasn't perfect, though, not

really:

he'd had to go solo, having

left

them ready. And he'd never had as some of the others had. He'd

the Passengers before Marshal declared the courage to remove his

when

been there pers.

The blood,

it

testicles,

had been done

the

little

to Jerry.

The

drugs, the garden clip-

He'd gotten

splash into the bucket.

dizzy

and

And the sight had led to his leaving them; running home to Mother. Who, of course, was pained to see him back at home. "Pain when you first came out, a pain in the ass when you walk back in, almost thrown up.

too," she'd said, sipping her dry Manhattan. Thinking herself funny, too.

That was the amazing at the

Women's

thing.

But she'd been humiliated when someone

Creativity Circle

had

said she'd seen

him interviewed on

TV as a 'cult survivor'. He wished she could be here now; wished she could be here with him spiritually,

The was

and

far wall

just

see, just see, really see for herself—

of the motel

room was

When had

gone.

it

vanished?

It

dark there, a sucking darkness, a smiling, hungry darkness-

Then he was spinning through it, flying through was The Tunnel! And through The Tunnel to .

.

space, through-yes,

it

.

A kaleidoscope of his past, all osterized together: getting kicked out of Boy Scouts ter

PE

for masturbating;

Mr. Smith taking him into the showers

af-

and playing vsdth his thing; birthday with his Dad, good feelings

because

his

Dad had

really

loved him; his Dad's death; the funeral;

school and school and school and smoking hash after school with

one who asked him if he believed in UFOs; seeing Close Encounters and believing he saw himself going into that spaceship with Richard Dreyfus; getting laid and feeling sick afterwards

Buddy who was

the

first

Mother telling him he was "a mistake who keeps on making them;" Dungeons and Dragons, and he saw the characters in real beings; all the role-playing games there before him, as real people, in colfailing games and games and games; miserably realizing he was lege; the flying saucer he'd seen, a shining oblong that his brother had

and the

girl

laughing;

insisted

was

just

a blimp catching sunset

light,

but Henry had

known

.

.

was them. And they were looking for him Buddy telling him about Marshal. Marshal, the old man with the sexPassengers, to less, eternally smiling eyes, welcoming him to the

It

Heaven's Gate

.

.

.

.

Really, Really, Really,

Weird Stories

.

.

271

272

What JoY! What Fulfillment!

John Shirley

But now, as he hurtled through the curtains of eternity where were the stars?

Had Marshal

said anything about this kaleidoscope of

was

memories?

Henry Where were the stars? Where were the stars that Marshal had promised? Where was the comet that accompanied the great Mothership of the Space Angels, those beings of light who appeared to human beings more like oversized didn't think so.

to think.

It

all

.

.

.

who—

newts, but

There!

was hard

It

The

As

stars!

them, there were the

had summoned

his expectation, his seeking

if

stars,

the nebulae, the majestic planets, marbled

And

with color, whirling by; and there—yes, there! There was the comet! beside

it

.

.

.

That Samrn-shaped vehicle of shining

encrusted with energy gems

.

.

.

silver, its

power-ring

The Mothership!

A starship, yes—but with a whole other spirimal dimension to just as A starship with its own aura, propelled through it,

Marshal had described

it.

space by the divine energy of the space angels within

He was

falling

flying along

you

fell

toward

it

without an up or

toward

it

.

.

.

And

so

it

Would

it

admit him? Or would his brother

to

.

it

.

be

thing

was now, the Mothership seeming

low" him, getting bigger and bigger

away from what

it.

how in space you seemed down but when you approached a

now. Funny

"be-

.

turn

him away, because he'd run

had sneeringly

called a cult, because he'd

refused to keep the faith?

"Marshal!" he shouted, but the shouting was soundless here in the

vacuum of

space.

And he

didn't have a

mouth,

really, to

shout with— did

he? But he kept trying. ''Marshalllir

Then he saw Marshal

like

a ghostly giant against the stars; Marshal in

a shimmering robe, a translucent projection of Marshal emanating from the giant Mothership

And

lo!

.

.

.

Welcoming him with open arms!

Heaven's Gate opened for him!

A great

hatchway had rolled

back on the curved surface of the giant starship below him, and a shaft of golden light shone up

drew him

on him from

closer, like a tractor

beam

within,

in Star

and

it

caught him in

it,

Wars, and he passed the

glittering outer hull

of the starship and was drawn through a corridor of

silver-flecked glass,

diamond

walls flickering with the inner fires of the

ship's divinely energized stardrive.

Then he passed through—just

as

Marshal had described

it!— the Rain-

bow of Purification, which removed the last stains of sin and doubt from him, making him

feel ecstatically

buoyant, the lightest element in the

universe!

Really, Really, Really,

Weird Stories

What Joy! What Fulfillment!

John Shirley

And

two great golden doors swung back for him

then,

music

tial

the

filled

and a warm sea

you could

a music

you

.

.

and a

.

celes-

a spray of cool mist

feel like

breeze, a music that carried

A music with

updraft ... It

air,

like

a butterfly

on an

a beat!

reminded him of a John Tesh song he'd heard once, a kind of Age dance song

sort of

New

Maybe John Tesh had been an alien,

But of course-there he was, Tesh

alien!

dancing with the others! Hundreds of others!

in person,

dancing together on and above a

mered with rainbow

And

light to the music's

beat

.

.

Human

and

dance floor that shim-

.

was Buddy! And Linda, and Drew and Luce and Wendy

there

and Hassan and a grey alien

crystalline

.

.

.

there

who wore

a

was Marshal, up on

crown of

that dais, standing beside

an

tiny stars caught in

The Queen of the Galaxy herself! Then he was down among them, with all his old

little

web

of

antigravity forces.

around him, and the joy was incandescent enormous.

had

It

all

been

true!

in

friends whirling

him, and the

And he danced

relief

was

beneath a weighdess

floating chandelier of light, within high walls of mother-of-pearl, floating

over the glassy, shining floor: the ballroom of the gods.

And

so they danced in the travelling disco of the

stars, to

the rave music

human beings in shimmering robes dancing with the litde grey aliens who moved like spiraling smoke to the music, loving greys laughing like elves, and his human friends, too, dancing around him smilof the spheres,

and Buddy and

ing, Jerry

"Isn't this great? It

all

was

all

the

girls

...

He

spoke to Buddy

arms over

"Buddy?

He

.

just

danced and waved

his head.

Hey Buddy!

shouted

people would

.

true!"

Buddy's happy expression never changed, he his

.

it

Isn't this great?"

now, leaning

Not

nearer.

how

sure

physical these

someone josde him. expression on the face of a bot,

be, though occasionally he could feel

Buddy turned him a happy look, like the some character in a computer game. A computer animated face, almost. Then he saw another Buddy's face-beneath Buddy's face. AnBut .

.

.

other face behind the outer one.

looked anguished. For a

It

pushed through the membrane of the screamed and he heard the scream

in his

outer,

moment

smiling face and

it it

mind:

They're doing something to us, Henry we cant get out of them! out beforeget to Henry try they're But then the music changed; it was as if someone had taken the coher.

.

.

.

.

.

ent stream of music in sonic hands and twisted

Really, Really, Really,

Weird Stories

it,

like

a wet towel, and

273

274 WhatJoy, ripped

What Fulfillment

John Shirley

and another music was revealed within the

it,

first like

Buddy's

anguished face within the happy one.

when Henry

That's

noticed the aliens were growing; the

happy

little

Gumby, fleshing out, swelling like balloons, becoming taller than the humans—and then each one embraced one of the One of them had embraced Buddy and now Buddy's outer humans face simply fizzled out and was gone, and his inner face, the true face, screamed soundlessly as the thing drew him into itself the way an amoeba sucks in a smaller organism, and Buddy was inside the thing, pushing on its now-transparent skin from within its hollow innards, like greys stretching out like

.

a

man

bery

.

.

inside a balloon pushing to get out

sac;

and the grey began

to shrink,

its

and not able

to break the rub-

face changing,

its

body

shrink-

wrapping over Buddy's—and others doing the same to Luce, to Jerry, all

the others

.

.

and yes the queen was doing

.

it

to Marshal!

And

to

the

music had become a triumphant cacophony, and the mother-of-pearl

had cracked, began

walls

tering

with

bits

carrot

and pieces of human bodies

floating in

down two more

now

that extruded maggots, each

transformed greys and

And now one of down at him and he he sank down— upward,

tiny eye

on

it

howled with

the creatures tried to

laughter.

must be a

at

him and

he tore himself free and rocketed

spirit

by pure

will, jetting

on

the fuel of ecto-

in the ceiling-

heard Marshal wailing after him, screaming at him to it

one of the

was looming over Henry, grinning

run but the soupy floor sucked

flying, carried

But then he was

that the de-

it

tried to get out of the interior of

plasm toward the spewing tube

to have faith,

this

with pendulous tongues and eyesockets

maggot with one

But with a huge effort of the

He

used

and Luce—Henry'd had such a crush on her!—

see,

screamed and clawed and

straight

who

spirits

as they really were: sadistic mockeries of

faces, grossly diabolic,

used to

were

was

stomach to break them down so they could consume

them, and he saw them

human

it

it

and

luckless late-coming suicides;

a giant stomach, and the aliens inside

great external

mon

and giant sections of

it,

and chunks of half digested meat, and the chandelier had become

a tube that spat all

to issue yellow pustulence, to leak red like fes-

wounds, and the floor had become a glutinous, bubbling acid

test, it

must

in the ceiling tube,

come

back,

be!

ascending up

it

like

a bird flying up

a well, spiraling, his lower parts burning, exhaustion pulling on him gravity,

but up he went—and burst out through a vertical

hide of the thing

.

.

wound

like

in the

.

Really, Really, Really,

Weird Stories

What Joy, What Fulfillment

John Shirley

And now that he was free and hideous and

eternally

of the mothership he saw that

hungry creature

knew

thing of gray scales and ooze, and he

Asmodeus

amongst

floating not

stars

itself, its

it

was a great

a bloated,

name:

wounded

ASMODEUS

tweenness of limbo, and he knew that he and the others had seen

Had Had

seen

.

.

.

.

expected to

afterlife that they'd

Marshal had coached them to

afterlife

.

conscious, for those

who waited, there, who followed their

see.

see, until the

had broken through the decaying consensual

the hungry creatures

who

only the

first,

They'd seen the

those

.

.

seen, at

truer afterlife

.

.

but in a gray nothingness, the be-

and

vision;

for the mindless, for the unfears

and petty impulses,

for

followed stronger minds from birth to death: these hungry

ones had made use of their group

had finally closed and the

fantasy, held

moment had come

them

in

it

until the trap

and

for their wholesale

salacious consumption.

Henry ascended

still,

much

trying to put as

distance as possible be-

tween himself and the hideous creature he had once thought a "mothership"

Then

.

.

beautiful

.

a whipping

pseudopod

issued

from the crown of tortured

ten-

drils on the giant head of Asmodeus, and it gripped Henry about the middle and drew him close to its vast, stinking mouth and he tried to remember a prayer, to prepare himself for the death within a death .

But instead

your

first

provocative

.

.

.

Just

enough

lure insisted

on

mistake

Now if you

.

.

gain, small

.

believing his

and showing

initiative to

own

itself

make you

lies-hut you,

would be other than

.

.

.

Beginning with

again with your useful

you

.

.

The other

make that make your bar-

will

digested,

.

before the Great Revelation

not

name

to go with

it:

reincarnated for twenty-eight earthly years

came he was

to him.

now

He now

had another body,

Ervin Holmes,

knovm

to

as the Penultimate Prophet, teacher to the twenty-first century's

Lost Generation, and until Sitting in the dressing

few hundred

was

moment

dressing

at this

room

mirror,

glass as in the gray

this

room

to speak to a It

sec-

one ..."

Henry had been dead and another

independence here

little

escape from the trap,

ond attempt

.

spoke.

it

7 perceive a

.

own

moment-

of the

little

auditorium, waiting to go on,

followers.

that he

saw

his real mission.

he saw Asmodeus

betweenness of limbo.

Really, Really, Really,

some

Weird Stories

Looking into the

himself, floating in the silvery

275

276

What JoY! What Fulfillment! "Now, small one

And

so he went

cTOwd, and he

to contemplate.

And

on

.

bring

stage,

me

food, or

become food

yourself

." .

.

and smiled, and a hush descended over the

have good news for you. You don't have to stay in

world anymore. The Space Angels have spoken to

and they are ready

"What

.

said, "I

this dark, brutal

"Oh my

.

John Shirley

to receive

you

... the transition will

be a

me—

bit frightening

But once you get there ... oh, once you get there—"

friends—"

joy,

what

fulfillment!"

his followers cried out in glad assent.

Really, Really, Really,

Weird Stories

19961997199^

She was a small soft thing walking

under the

sullen gray sky of a

in the shadow of great hard things, November morning. She was in North

Central California, and she was quite alone. She was Little Connie

Depthcharge, taking a walk into the year 1996. That's of

how

she thought

Every second, she reasoned, took her further into the year.

it.

year

was unfolding around

fice

of decay.

place.

Not

The

all

her, bleak

year 1996

was a

Connie was nine years

no

none

(the

children's

"My

a

had perceived the world

it.

Now she saw that the world had

Perhaps there was some great sucking whirl-

visible.

pool of events somewhere,

Reader

is

blossoming symmetrically out from her; she

herself at the center of

panned

relendess, pervading this edi-

Connie thought. This time

old. Until this year she

had imagined

she'd

the

times are places, not so you'd notice, but this one was.

as a sort of efflorescence

center, or

and

place,

And

like

the black hole in that old Disney movie

in the videocassette section of

column was

called

her column for Weekly

"The Cinematic

newspaper had gone yellow

Bitch."

Now

that the

tabloid, with blaring headlines

Mom

Has Sex with the Vacuum Cleaner and I'm, Like, So Embarrassed," it had room for Little Connie's penetrating if spiteful

like

analyses.)

Connie was thinking about these things

as she

walked along the weed-

thatchy railroad tracks. She was walking through the old industrial park.

Much

had been closed continuously since the Dream Plagues. The smokestacks were streaked with rust, marbled with cracks; the acid rains had pitted the gray and black walls of the monoIt

was closed

lithic

today.

buildings squatting

because the place had

of

it

on both

sides of her.

She liked to walk here

a dreary, cinemaverite quality that she

found

reas-

suring. It had no affect. It could be trusted, she thought, to remain itself. She was weary of the unpredictable, since the Dream Plagues; since the

Really, Really, Really,

Weird Stories Don't you remember when

all

this

happened?

John Shirley

278 199619971998

War

of the Weirdos; since the jarring sight of the people spinning by

overhead, high on antigravity drugs

.

.

Here, at

.

there were

no

seemed too cold

for

least,

surprises.

A

her by scuttling from a hole.

lizard surprised

be about. The

lizards to

blooded

was a

lizard

from another

another, darting

things, rats

hole.

leathery

And

through

this industrial vein,

feet.

then the warm-

in the ridges of cinders to

moving

in the dusty foun-

like

a fear

hormone

scrambling randomly about, ignoring her, and

she read the signs for what they were. She could feel the soles of her

And

shimmying from the cracks

dations of the old factories, small living things

Then

here and gone.

sizzle,

another.

and mice, oozing from holes

either side of the rusty tracks,

It

it

herself, then: felt

In that spot, the place in her foot that

Mother

it

in

said

contained a gland of some kind. (Poor crazy Mama; poor dead Mama; she'd insisted

was,

on a coffin shaped and painted

like,

so embarrassing. But

it

a Deep Space Nine lunchbox.

like

was her

funeral.)

Staggering to remain upright. Little Connie

up from some epicenter below the matched

ripples to either side as

become confusion ing

Mama's

the vibrations ripple

felt

railroad tracks;

saw the dust

traveled outward;

as the vibrations collided

from the opposite

chines and

it

rise in

saw the symmetry

with quake vibrations com-

She thought of blenders and

direction.

It

taffy

ma-

candy-striped vibrator.

She was too fascinated,

just then, to

quake, and she thought of

it

be

afraid.

This was her

earth-

first

storm in the earth, weather underfoot,

as a

and, swaying, she sought to find

its

groove, the

taught her. "Every storm has a groove,"

way her mother had

Mama had

said.

But then the buildings began to move. They weren't

they

falling,

They were moving toward one another. The newer ones were moving faster, she noticed. They were moving with an im-

weren't caving

in.

possible ease, sailing the

the earthquake or

made

ground to

like ships across water, either

move by

making

the earthquake, thunderous but ab-

surdly graceful. Like improbably swift icebergs,

coming together

.

.

.

and

she was going to be caught between them.

But

still

the terror refused to come. She

wondered

at its absence. Per-

haps she was numb; perhaps resigned to death. She was alone in the world.

Why

Closer. gravel, fantails

not?

The

open ground, plowing up the prow making a wake in the dirt, raising

buildings sailed across the

coming corner

first like

a

of dust, shrieking with the grind of metal and concrete

ghost in chains. Closer, looming over her; she could smell sparks rising

like

spray from the

prow of

these industrial ships

Really, Really, Really,

like

a

friction, see .

.

.

Weird Stories

John Shirley

Maybe

199619971998

was

this

hallucination, she told herself.

all

Plagues were over, and she

No,

knew what that felt like.

But the Dream

Hallucinations had a

was no dream, she knew,

as a chunk of rock, smashed by one onrushing building against another, flew apart and a

distinctive quality.

fragment

No,

this

hit

was

this

her cheek. real.

It

stung

nastily,

and blood ran along her

jawline.

Objectively real.

The buildings loomed over her and then the corners of the buildings had pushed past her on either side, grinding the railroad steel into tangled .

ribbons that whipped through the

.

.

air

.

.

.

She dodged a cobra of torn

steel

and, staggering in the Shockwaves cracking the ground, she stepped into the interstice between the two onrushing prows, where outthrust bulkheads, passing one another, made, a sort of alleyway a few feet wide

The

buildings stopped moving; cacophony gave

She waited, breathless, as the dust

settled.

The

way

.

.

.

to eerie silence.

buildings

on

either side

had moved together, leaving only a few gaps here and there, like the gaps between wrongly fitted jigsaw-puzzle pieces. She was safe in one of these, for the

The

moment.

buildings

had moved very

nudged by some geologic randomness. She knew That's

it

separate buildings

as,

met mouth

overhead, a set of smokestacks from two

mouth and, somehow, locked together. The windows of the buildings shattered.

to

tortured metal squealed.

Connie ducked

is

it.

the smokestacks tilted over and began to snake toward

one another. She watched

The

Who

wasn't over. She could feel

when

Not like things moving them? Why?

deliberately, she thought.

flying shards of oily glass as sections of

themselves through

windows and moved

creak, together, locking into unity like

machinery thrust creak-

click-click, snick-snick,

the smokestacks: sections of pipe

and wire and gauges and robotic arms and struts and more wire and tubing and gears and cogs and the rollers from conveyor belts and metal

hooks and stamping

units

cate variations of metal

and

and

and a thousand

intri-

and rubber innards she couldn't

iden-

stainless-steel presses

plastic

themselves, grindtify; self-animated, they began to rewire and reconstruct making a process, the in ing and caterwauling and moaning and sparking mazelike roof of odd machine parts a few feet over Connie's head .

"Right this way. voice,

Little

melodious and

Connie! Big

warm and

sale

on

small favors!"

It

.

was a man's

perhaps a touch unctuous. But a voice

She crawled toward the sound, under the writhing nest of living metal. Half expecting to be caught up by the wires and incorpopipes, forced into the woof of their rigid weave, crushed and to inspire confidence.

rated in living death.

Really, Really, Really,

Weird Stories

279

John Shirley

28o 199619971998

No. She emerged from beneath the

ceiling of the living unliving,

and

on her knees before a doorw^ay at the end of the alley. It W3S found a cobw^ebby old back door of one of the factories, and standing in the open door was a sign shaped like a man. One of those cardboard cutout herself

life-size

photos you see promoting things

in a supermarket.

But then

it

moved and she saw^ it wasn't a sign, it was quite three-dimensional and human. Some quality of absolute emblematic expression—as if this man were only semiotics—had made him seem artificial at first. Looking at his face, the fixed expression

and

idiotic grin, the

of

unwavering diagonal of the ordinary brovm pipe

clenched in teeth so white and even they looked perfect quizzical

drugged eyes

faintly self-deprecating glee, the

of a piece ... the

all

brows and immaculate swept-back short black

hair

.

.

.

Looking up into that face she once more had the sense of emblem, of semiotic absolutes

And

.

.

.

mouth moved; the pipe bobbed-some noxious smoke in the air—his head tilted

then he spoke. His

herb in

it

tracing a wavery line of blue

.

but the expression remained the same. "Connie," he

move

The Prototime

quickly.

you prefer

to die horribly,

She blinked. It

was

As

if it

jet?

as

if

He

upon

us.

Am

I

right?

were a

You coming? Or do

hadn't asked the question sarcastically, or facetiously.

viable option, like,

"Lead the way," she

saw-puzzle pieces after

factory

would you

till

and behind her the buildings closed up they

fit

itself

around them.

perfectly together.

The

right

jig-

all.

was reconstructing

thesis, antithesis, synthesis,

metal pandemonium.

horribly.

prefer to take the train or a

said.

the door

the gaps, sidling and edging

another factory;

.

to

by remaining here?"

he sincerely thought she might actually want to die

They went through

The

is

"we have

said,

The

and the

feverish self-redesigning

It

was merging with

synthesis

was

was heavy-

clearly guided,

conscious—but what consciousness was the guiding force was a palpable mystery Connie could taste in her mouth and smell in her

nostrils,

along

with the stink of random lightning bolts and the ancient scent-of uneasy

petroleum and tortured metal and ozone.

She walked timeless

suit,

in the lee of the briskly striding stranger, a

her eyes stung by the

smoke from

his pipe.

tall

man

in a

They plunged

through a mechanical Armageddon, as machines threw themselves through the tions

air at

merged

one another—but instead of crashing the machine

perfectly;

signed to interface

sec-

machines that could not possibly have been de-

somehow tilted and gyrated to

interface.

Really, Really, Really,

She thought

Weird Stories

John Shirley

199619971998

again of puzzle parts. All this time the puzzle parts have lain about us the table and we didn't know they fit together. To make what? .

.

on

.

Sparks flew, smoke belched, wires whipped, pipes clanged, things flashed past, moved in a blur in search of unity, a dance of death all around them, and somehow, miraculously, they walked through the gaundet untouched. The man never seemed to look around, never

seemed

to

watch where he was going

and somehow, so

far,

at

all.

He

just

blundered through

was unhurt. Once, a year before, looking through

window of a factory, she'd seen a mouse run along a conveyor The conveyor belt carried bits of soft metal to stamping presses the

stamped the metal

belt.

that

Dabney the Poodle doorbell ringers, a faddish The mouse ran under the stampers-and past them, nar-

novelty item.

into

rowly avoiding getting crushed

five

times before

it

leapt free. Just the

luck of the very stupid, she'd thought.

Was that what was happening now.'^ Not for everyone. She glimpsed people—maybe workmen, maybe takers—caught in the machinery, skewered and crushed

care-

cockroaches

like

caught in a garbage disposal ... she couldn't bear to look, to think about it.

She

tried to think of

something

man

to talk to the

mind off what she'd seen. "How'd you know my name?" she

asked, shouting

about, to get her

it

over the uneven

racket of the place. "It

was written on your pstench!" he shouted.

"I

whiffread

Your

it!

mom had coded into your DNA so could find you!" A lunatic, she thought. But he had saved her "What's your name?" it

I

life.

He

stopped and turned to

An enormous

her.

razor-edged

pendulum

of metal swept by in the spot he would have been in had he kept going. It

would have pulped him, she thought,

just then.

He

who'd come shook

his

thrust out a

to the

hand

door once.

is

marks around

hadn't asked

him

(Mom had broken the guy's

hand. Feverishly warm.

"The name

if I

name

his

to her, like an encyclopedia salesman

Possibilities

fingers.)

squirmed under the

She

skin.

Dobbs!

J.R.

"Bob" Dobbs!" You could hear the quotation

"Bob.''

He

turned and swept onward, plunging recklessly

through the storm of flying metal. She followed, trying not to look around, tasting the fear now.

Up

ahead, a conveyor belt was taking cryptically shaped segments of

crystal

up an

incline,

toward the

ceiling,

and through a hole

in the roof.

They stepped

off the conveyor belt, onto the roof. Beside them, the

sized irregular

chunks of crystal

Really, Really, Really,

fell

off the belt

Weird Stories

and

fist-

rolled with effordess

281

John Shirley

282 199619971998

serendipity to

fit

To

perfectly into irregular holes pocking the roof.

the expanse of tarpaper

left

was unbroken. "Bob" strode

When

of the roof; Connie followed.

the

off to the edge

she got there she saw with a flush

of embarrassment that he'd unzipped his pants and was peeing off the

edge of the building. With

his free

hand he gestured sweepingly

at the

great world. "Behold, the Prototime!"

She gazed out over the

The

city.

buildings

on

beyond the

the Strip,

edge of the industrial park, were moving and changing too. They were

and chains of some

franchises

all

PetroPup, In-n-

sort: 7-Eleven, Soy-Boy,

Out, PigeonPie, Pioneer Chicken, Colonel Sanders, McDonald's, Carl's Jr.,

Horse Habit, ArtiFish

'n'

places like Kragoffs Soviet

They were

Chips, and the discount department store

and Target and Bozo's Re-Cycled Goods and the other

chains, K-mart

moving

all

Auto

Parts

wards, leaping together, or stumping

and

together in

falling

seemed

some

and normal

natural

Chicken and PetroPup

fit

.

.

neady into

drive-in

.

on

an explosion run back-

were crutches

their signs like they

once achieved,

cryptic organization that, .

because they

all fit.

K-mart

with Pioneer

fit

with Carl's Jr., they locked together

door

parts, signs snicking into place in

ting

.

.

together, like a film of

windows,

all

slots,

machine

like

oddly angled roof peaks

fit-

the jumble of architectural ineptitude

wondered about suddenly made sense when they were

she'd always

locked together, and an w^^rbuilding came about, the gestalt fevered mating ... an

enormous

fruit

quasi-crystalline structure that

of this

reached

out multicolored limbs of fiberglass and plastic and impossibly flexible roofing

tiles

park,

trial

to interface neatly with the reconstructed shapes of the indus-

The

of

all

environment

.

.

it

becoming One Thing, some minatory

self-contained

.

clangor and roar of it resonated the surface of the planet

like

a cymbal.

Afraid, feeling so tiny in the sight of this mighty reconstruction (and see-

ing that "Bob" had put his majestic privates back in his pants

them "

up). Little

"Bob" ... "No. But

This

is

is it it

Connie took "Bob's" hand and moved close beside him. happening everywhere?"

will

happen everywhere, unless we stop

it.

Little

Connie.

the Prototime, the precursor to X-Day, Connie, the Con's prep for

July 5th, 1998. They're setting a trap for us, so

charismatic strangers set

and zipped

from Planet

we

will

be

lost to those

X when they arrive on Earth ...

a trap

by the Conspiracy and triggered by the Malign Sendings of the

Yacatisma!

What you're

seeing

is

the Conspiracy preparing the

Yacatisma (not to be confused with Yacatizma)

from interceding with the

Xists.

who

The Conspiracy

way

for the

seek to prevent

me

hid this one from us,

Really, Really, Really,

Weird Stories

John Shirley Connie

.

.

199619971998

they hid

.

it

from us using the power of the Smog Monster, who

The poisons

blanketed the Earth with toxic complacency. the

air slowly, subtly,

and we accepted them. The

manity found a thousand fought them

.

.

intelligent

See into the Higher Wire a chic

smoke

ways to

and they affected our minds.

.

blind, just

little

spread through

among huthem—so no one

'intelligent'

rationalize

Made

even those of us

who

enough so they created a

psy-

screen, enabling the Conspiracy to plant their submolecular

nanotechnological machinery in the paint and insulation and plastics and

went unpredicted.

lubricants of these structures hence, this

Fuck!

The Smog Monster

sending of

.

.

.

fooled us

GBROAGFRAN!!!,

Smog Monster is a God from Deep Space!" With

was

thing that

on an

driving to Kragoffs Soviet Auto Parts to see

would work

amplified reverb

been possible only with recording-studio equip-

quality that should have "I

Connie.

... for the

all

the Rebel

the uttering of this arcane name, his voice took

ment.

Little

as a

water

pump

for a '57

if

they had some-

Smdebaker,

when

I felt

the submolecular Conspirals of self-organizing quantum-mechavibrational

systems in the Material Reality Underpinnings—and .

knew we'd been

Smog Monster is creating an enormous mechaniz/ed concamp for the processing and subjugation of SubGeniuses and

snookered. The centration

non-Normals of all kinds! We should have guessed, seeing the franchises and chain stores scab up around the periphery of the cities, like ringworm, like

an encamped army around

us, tightening

the noose, subjecting us to

bombardments of mind-numbing consumer-conditioning symbols. should have guessed they were simply preparing the ground for this

I

.

."

He

paused to

stuff a

the pipe never quite side of his

wad

of multicolored herb into his

went out

as

mouth, chattering

he did

rapid-fire

this

.

.

Puffing, talking out of the

.

but offhandedly the whole time:

came to investigate. Lucky for you is a child, that makes the mealymouthed prayers of the 'Holy ." Vatican smell like a dog fart, my Little Connie "Lucky for you

I

.

"All

of this"-Connie looked out

for

it

has a

"You

blessing, dear

Father' in the

.

at the gigantic artifact building itself

some kind of prison?" A Conspiracy concentration camp ... a camp without guards

around them-"is going "Exactly.

.

pipe-somehow

life

to trap us?

It's

own ... it is its own guards like my Mom," Connie observed.

of its

talk just

.

." .

my

"Did you know

Mom? Betty Furnace? She used to talk about the Yacatisma and used you did say 'not to be confused with Yacatizma' just the same way .

"Bob" turned

to her

and

hand on her head, ruffling her allowing ashes from his pipe to drop

laid a

he said tenderly, her eyes, "Yes, I knew your mother. Betty was-"

gently. "Yes,"

Really, Really, Really,

Weird Stories

to ."

.

hair

into

283

John Shirley

284 199619971998

He was

interrupted by an explosion.

There was a narrow section of ground—narrowing more as the concentration

camp

construct creaked and shuddered nearer—four stories

beneath their roof edge. violet

and

had erupted, a

smoke

sulfur-yellow

towered over them

It

like

opening

fissure

in

that geysered upward, a furious

a Djinn

.

.

.

and a

sort of Djinn

it

was

to gout

it

spew .

.

Connie and "Bob" staggered backwards ("Bob" had a

Little

that

.

quality

about him of having planned to stagger or stumble though he couldn't possibly have planned

of the

stink

.

.

as

it,

.),

Connie

clinging to "Bob," choking in the

rotten-eggs-mixed-with-semitruck-smoke

the

thing,

chamber stench of

it

its

rolling

mass shaped into

.

gas-

.

.

AH'OOGAH!" "Bob" shouted. "Hie Smog Monster!" "YOU MUST NOT INTERFERE WITH THE GESTATION!" came a "It is

the one called

voice from within the foul whirlwind.

It

was a voice belched from

"TRY YOUR

haust pipes and smokestacks ... a voice without a muffler.

FAMOUS LUCK OUT ON DEATH ITSELF!" And AH'OOGAH swung toward them like

ex-

a tornado wielded as a

hammer— —as "Bob" grabbed Connie's hand and stumbled with her off the edge of the roof.

She was

And

falling.

then the

She was his

The Earth rushed up at her Earth was above her. The ground was .

falling

up

to

"Bob" was beside

head thrown back, the pipe clenched

her,

.

.

still

a sort of ceiling

holding her hand,

in his teeth

gushing a loco-

motive cloud of blue (and green-sparkled) smoke that surrounded

them, made her choke with she inhaled

it,

cloying incense

.

.

.

but

somehow

as

a certain ethereal clarity created a magnification lens

and she saw that "Bob," through the medium of

for her perceptions, this

its

envelope of smoke, was clearing a path of some sort for them.

All this she perceived in the half-second

to the

And

ground

.

.

it

took them to

lessly

all

matter, mostly

and the space came together around them so they passed harm-

through, and

emerged—

—in the midst of a

city.

was hung from above

like

glued to the

The

them,

upward

then they struck the ground, which was, despite appearing un-

yielding as concrete, a mist, an atomic illusion like

space,

fall

.

ceiling.

down toward

Downward

into an upside-down

one of those

trick

city.

The

city

rooms where the chairs are down. They fell past

buildings were upside

the sky.

And

then her stomach flip-flopped,

Really, Really, Really,

fol-

Weird Stories

John Shirley

199619971998

lowed by her perceptions,

as suddenly sky

and they were ascending,

levitating

They ceased ascending,

alighting

corner,

where

of them,

it

blocked

smoked an

Feeling detached

traffic

and ground changed places upward from the ground. on the roof of a bus laying over on a

and the crosswalk. The

driver,

unaware

angel dust joint and massaged his crotch.

and

and weirdly bodiless-and yet not at all dreamlike-Connie looked around, and knew that the city had been viviobjective

sected for her.

The

skin of

its

consensus

the pulsing inner organs of ships,

and she recognized

"Where's the

reality

had been peeled away; she saw

the skein of

it,

hidden organic

its

it all.

Smog Monster?" Connie

"Hundreds of miles from

asked.

"Bob"

here,"

"We took

said.

a shortcut

through the Luck Plane. By the time the Rebel Gods find us

With

late.

now

relation-

it'll

be too

luck."

"Luck cuts both ways, "Bob","

Little

Connie

said.

"Litde Connie, you were always too old for your age," "Bob" replied,

through his ceaseless

was

grin. "I

Where two and

there.

Can you not

feel

my hands

was absent when you grew up and

my name,

three gather in in

your pockets?

.

.

.

am

there

I

yet

I

also:

Notice anything about

this place?"

Connie was the great

mus

city,

staring at a

crowd of people

milling

on the sidewalks of

people on their way somewhere, oblivious of the

of Sales and his charge atop the bus, and she saw

of coruscating lines were connecting

some of

now

Ipsissi-

that a series

the people in the crowd;

they were like translucent puppet strings of energy, defining relationships the people in the

crowd were

entirely

to herds within the herd; to culmral phyla

what they supposed

whose

of.

They belonged

attributes

to be their freewheeling impulses.

closer at those people she

them

unaware

saw past

governed

And

looking

their superficial semblances,

saw

as they could not see one another: as they really were. There were

men who were ten-foot giants from women who were revealed as twisted harridans, and hunchbacked, shrunken old women who were acmally the stately winners of beauty contests; there were bankers who were acmally tall

men who were

Hell; there

giant

dwarfs and short

were beautiful

worms with lamprey mouths, and

who were

really

werewolves

there were smiling, friendly cops

in Nazi-SS uniforms; there

was a

priest

who

was a mincing drag queen and there was a mincing drag queen who was a genius of dizzying mathematical perceptions. She saw four men in tailored suits

coming out of a Hilton, approaching,

Really, Really, Really,

Weird Stories

their forty-foot eight-

285

John Shirley

286 199619971998

who wore

wheeled limousine. They were surrounded by bodyguards

black suits and sunglasses; looking beyond their veneers she saw that the

men

in the suits

and oozing their

were hideous slug-bodied things of palpitating

suckers,

hungry

aliens

tendrils

with the mouths of giant horseflies;

bodyguards were robots, she saw, things of sheer intent and noth-

ing more. She shivered, and

was

grateful that "Bob's" psychic cloaking

screen protected her from being seen.

Then "Bob" took her hand, and blew a plume of smoke above them, which somehow drew them with it into the air. Like a sex-changed and depraved Mary Poppins, Dobbs drew Little Connie higher and higher into the sky,

till

they reached the thirteenth-story

There they

level.

drifted along, paralleling the impatient procession of traffic, gazing

down

at a

whole new web of

interrelationships.

greater height, the oscillating blueprint of the

on

Connie saw, from

this

Luck Plane superimposed

the street. She saw which cars were likely to collide (but weren't nec-

essarily destined to)

and which were

likely to

make

it

home

she saw which individuals would

fall

into the conditioning quicksand,

and which would instead

in

unscathed;

with drug addicts and be sucked

fundamentalist preacher or the deadly programming of network sion; she

would

.

.

televi-

saw which ones would accidentaUy become wealthy, and which .

Wait. There ships as

a

likely fall to

it

was something more: She saw the skein of

stretched out to the event horizon

.

.

interrelation-

she saw something

.

hideous and something glorious taking shape out there

.

she saw

.

.

.

.

.

Saucers.

She blinked, and looked back

saw a few who were making havoc of the

at the present.

Amongst

crowd she

the

like self-propelling steel balls in a pinball

rules,

others strove for regimentary order. There was something about that

game,

introducing a Brownian motion where the

them

reminded her of her mother—could they be the ones Mother had

described?

The other

race hidden

amongst the humans ... the

privi-

leged and divinely aberrant ... the SubGenius? "I

see

Untribal. "I

you perceive your

Do

you

tribe,"

also see the

"Bob" told

webs of

her.

"The

tribe of the

probability.'^"

do."

"Then keep your eyes on them and we're dive-bombing the Luck Plane!"

And

learn. Little

Connie

.

.

.

because

with that "Bob" dove down, straight down, rocketing headfirst

ward the bus

they'd alighted

ing the stream of

traffic.

on

earlier.

The bus had moved

And now they entered

on,

was

to-

enter-

the bus through the roof—

Really, Really, Really,

Weird Stories

John Shirley

199619971998

passing through

as

it

were the skin of a soap bubble. "Bob" came to a

if it

screeching stop in the

over the driver, floating beside a sign that said,

air

"PINKVILLE VOCATIONAL

SCHOOL IS A STEP UP TO MORE WORK!" "Bob" reached out and tapped the back of the man's head w^ith his pipe tapped it precisely. In a particular spot. .

.

.

The man shuddered, and the flow of

"Uh car.

oncoming

oh!" "Bob" said, grinning.

and jerked the

vs^heel to

the

left into

"I

made

a mistake. Accident.

Wrong

We're going to cr—

Crash, as the bus ling

giggled,

traffic.

so

it

it

rammed

was shaped

like

the forty-foot limo they'd seen a boomerang.

buck-

earlier,

The limo spun and struck a power station

semitruck, which swerved and drove through the wall of a

enormous transformers, causing a short circuit which caused a mighty power surge (Connie could see all this taking and crashed

into a set of

shape on the Luck Plane

like

a video animation) which roared through

the wires to an airport a hundred miles away garbling the transmissions

of the

crammed with

who went into

wrong

signals to

be sent to a

undersecretaries of the Trilateral

Commission

air traffic controllers

Learjet

causing the

a screaming panic

when

the plane,

its

computer controls

confused, veered wildly and went out of control, going into a

nosing

down

.

.

tailspin,

crashing thunderously into the industrial park where

.

Connie had met "Bob." The cargo of nanotechnological submolecular reprogramming proteins the undersecretaries had been carrying to Washington exploded along with the hundreds of gallons of

fuel in the

plane's tanks, spreading in a diffuse cloud over the living concentration

camp

the

construct,

nanoprogramming molecules

with

colliding

submolecular guidance systems for the minatory mechanism, reprogram-

ming

it-quite by lucky accident-into a complete reversal of the process,

so that the living concentration

camp began

to deconstruct itself

.

.

.

and

in so doing released another cloud of deprogramming nanotech molecules that drifted over the land, reversing the process wherever they

encountered

it

.

.

.

"Whew!" "Bob"

"That was

said.

"Young Miss, how would you

lucky."

like to visit

He

turned to

Little

your brothers and

Connie. sisters in

Malaysia?"

"Brothers and

"Not

at

all.

sisters?

You're

But I'm an only

my

daughter.

child!"

You have hundreds of

brothers and

products of the Supreme Seed, thriving in Dobbstown, learning, would you like to meet them?" awaiting X-Day sisters,

.

"You're

my

.

.

.

.

.

Dad?"

Really, Really, Really,

Weird Stories

287

John Shirley

288 199619971998

"Yes!" "Shit!

The

What a disappointment

.

.

eternal grin almost wavered.

"You'll like

your brothers and

spectful as

you

And

so,

are.

.

Mom told me you were a rock star." Then he

sisters,"

"Bob"

ruffled her hair tenderly. said.

"They're just as disre-

Care for some 'Prop?"

borne on a purposeful plume of green-sparkled

blue, they

rose from the twisted wreckage of the traffic accident, oblivious to the

screams of the approaching their

way

sirens,

and hurried on

into the year 1996,

on

and 1998 unfold where, clearly and far away,

to a date with destiny, seeing the years 1997

ahead of them,

like

a place in the distance,

the Saucers were landing

.

.

.

Really, Really, Really,

Weird Stories

Preach

The

following was recorded as the tragic events of February loth, 1999,

New Gate

unfolded at the

sermon of a tive

Chapel, near Redding, California, during the

visiting minister.

The Reverend Johnny

Ess.

observations are interpolated by a recording engineer with literary

pretensions,

one Marzo Deafstein:

The Reverend Ess was a

lean, fiftyish

man, with a rumpled

snakeskin cowboy boots, a day's growth of beard, a hands, a

He had

.

whole

TV

here to talk about sin

channel

.

.

.

But he could

got

suffer

damn

and the payment

sin,

hick. it's

Dodge up on

bad our own

No, no need true,

lickin'

sure,

with great

your

for sin.

And I know

I

lips.

sin, I

look out

Now

at

it's

Really, Really, Really,

all,

nights

though.

We

makes us

all

each to his best and deepest capacity.

y'all,

the

tests us

my Daddy

some

My situation wasn't so bad,

ask you,

I

you can

wince of embarrass-

I'm an Arkansas Po'bucker;

special way; the Lord

particularity,

with some of y'all,

for that

cinder blocks in front yard, and

Tests us and tests us. There ain't

Now, when

preach, right

still

He started out saying, 'Tm

My name is The Reverend Johnny Ess, E for Every, S

to steal chickens to eat. it

.

.

Lord knows

kept a rusting

.

for sssssssssertainly. Sure, that's kind of funny,

and S

laugh, I'm just a folks,

.

." .

I'm here to talk about

know it intimately.

we had

.

seen better times, having lost his one-time multimillion dollar

ministry, a

ment,

suit,

tremble in his

rounding of his shoulders and something singularly alive something that kept pulsing its way to other parts of him

through an accent thick as rancid butter

for Sin,

little

little

in his hips,

all

General narra-

no cheatin' on that test. and I say sin, some of you is

are almost

that the appropriate response?

way it was with me:

Weird Stories

there's

no

Why

relief with-

John Shirley

290 Preach out sin and there's no real party as

from bigtime

trates first in this part tell

is

bereft of

be.

No

Are you thinkin' ings about sin ...

fun,

my babe, no

And it,

relief, it

comes

fun that concen-

NO FUN—and

life is

me not

fun.

redneck Biblethumper don't

this

it's

know

turkeydropp-

?

[At this point the Reverend this as

on

of the body and then that part. Well now: Let

you something, our sweet Lord's eternal

supposed to

relief.

fun, fun with weightlifter muscles

became

We

increasingly agitated.

took

a tent-revivalist working himself up to a passion of charisma

and outpouring. But

was something jumpy, twitchy about it. was reminded of something: When I was a kid my parents used to take me to a gas station and at this station was a menagerie— they used to allow this in the '^os—and there was some moth-eaten monkeys and one truly miserable leopard. This big cat had been in a cage about as big as a Volkswagen Bug for twenty some years and it showed a certain twitchiness, a certain exotic fusion you knew it would of advanced decay and bottled, boiling energy kill people if it ever got out I used to whisper to it, 'Td do it to ."] them for ya if I could there

Watching the Reverend Ess

I

.

.

.

Let

me

sinned.

I

tell

you,

my

have been up to

and the discharging of the

I

.

.

.

.

friends,

Brea Tarpit of Life—and

.

oh

yes,

good Lord

forgive

my neck in SENSE-YOU-ALITY, senses;

it is

me

yes

I

have

in the charging

have sunk myself in that particular La

I

only thanks to our sweet precious Lord that

have escaped that ravenous suction, that tarpit suction that seemed to

on my lower parts and suck and SUCK until it drew the LIFE OUT OF ME. Yes, I know sin. I won't tell you what my sins were— oh yes, I could talk about my time as a counselor at a girl's camp hell, fourteen, fifteen year old girls, soft as little kittens, out there on the aching side of that mountain where the smell of the pines seemed to call me out every night to prowl the fasten itself

.

cabins like a cougar will

I

.

.

.

But no.

.

It's

.

best that sin remains hidden. Neither

befoul your ears with the long nights in bars and brothels, yes and

of rutting with marijuana dreaming whores in puddles of vomit— I can-

not bring myself to mention

name

is

LEGION

[The Reverend

back and forth,

cried the

is

it.

Those numberless

Whore

faceless

WHORES—my

of Babylon!

ignoring the microphone on the podium,

his voice really

is

strutting

booming— then going soft all of a sudden Really, Really, Really,

Weird Stories

John Shirley .

.

we

but

.

Preach

could hear every word, though there was

in that fairly sizeable church

...

.

.

every whispered

.

five

word

.

hundred of us .

J

never think of those whores now; those whores of argent hair

I

and ebony pubes, of eyes

wander the space between you

that

like

And YES I KNOW THE DEVIL'S SNOW! YES YES I KNOW THE DEVIL'S SNOW! that crystal LILITH, that medicinal tasting temptresss COCAINE, yes LORRRRRRD, I know cocaine-preferably cocaine cut with a little smack-and I have flown through CLOUDS OF COCAINE and yes, yes, yes I know sin and midges.

.

I

cannot

tell

you about

New Orleans condo,

it.

.

That night on the

tar-roof of Bluesteak Billy's

and

that crazed mightily-pierced teenyboppstress

I,

on angel dust— the irony of that name angel And mad wdth peeceepee driving my degraded engorged manhood again and again into that hysterically laughing

the both of us gone wild dust,

but

can you imagine!

punk rock lightnin' I

will

whore—1979

bitch

unzipped the

not

tell

it

was— as

the rain lashed us and the

sky!!

you of

But you can take

it.

my word

for

it.

I

know

sin.

know the DEVIL PERSONALLY. And you feminist ladies, you pomo homo feminist ladies, you think there's a PATRIARCHY here on Earth—you don't know phallocentricism till you get to HELL because Satan is a gonna make you dance around a steaming phalAnd

I

postmodern

lus in the

green and gold flames of RETRIBUTION.

Satan, ladies,

is

no

sensitive Berkeley male.

But get up to Heaven—and you find that Jesus and Mother Mary are

and don't you, don't you, don't you fool yourself into no money in Heaven—was there ever anyplace worth

receiving equal pay

thinking there's

being for long without money? You see unit of the other.

Money is

money and

a unit of faith and

if

faith—wellsir,

you

one

is

a

give the Ministry of

the Reverend Johnny Ess one dollar then you have one dollar's worth of faith;

and when you

faith;

and when you

him

give

give

five dollars

him

five

you have

hundred

five dollars

dollars that's

DRED MOTHERFUCKIN' DOLLARS WORTH OF

worth of

FIVE

HUN-

FAITH redeemable

at

the gate of Heaven.

As

in

Luke verse

unto Simon, "Seest thou gavest tears,

me no

"And mrning

forty-four,

water for

this

my

woman?

feet

and wiped them with her

hath not ceased to KISS

I

to the

entered into thine house, thou

my feet with me no kiss but

but she hath wetted hair.

Thou

gavest

MY FEET."

Folks that's nothing less than the right attitude.

Really, Really, Really,

woman he-Jesus-said

Weird Stories

her she

291

John Shirley

292 Preach

And

you think a Faith Payment

if

and gendemen you forget

that

I

a questionable investment ladies

is

have the God-given power to SEE

INTO

YOUR SOULS and—right here I can see your heart before me like a devil's dinner on a plate and I can tell you—you sir!—that the heart I see within your breast, the soul quivering on that plate—it .

.

.

MAKES ME SICK!

It

Imagine seeing a quivering cube of Jell-O and instead of

fruit salad

there are maggots, the maggots of sin, quivering in that cube of Jell-O

LORD HELP ME TURN AWAY! Yes you And you young lady

and

.

.

.

.

.

.

I'm a lookin' into your heart young miss and YES

THAT POWER PRAISE GOD FOR IT, naked

the

power

HE HAS GIVEN ME

to see the

naked

... the

truth.

And in your heart, young lady I see-LORD NO, I MUST LOOK AWAY, demon's face

for that grinning, quivering bearded clam of a

and

laughin' hysterically at

on a

tar

And

cuse

[A

me

.

.

.

spit,

while

I

it

away!

see a quivering bucket of tarantulas

I

see an eel pie with

I

overflowing with

livin' eels

and

in this

like

silence

.

.

And yet

between the walls

a sonic

.

.

hope. There

.

boom

And yet

is

I

.

He

.

.

.

.

.

.

.

.

soft

but audible even

She

is

here, she

is

for

you

here with me,

for wimess, I'm askin'

tell

you

.

.

who

to take

.

that there

is

I

cleans the heart

up

life

loves force

and force

is

There

sinful rear

AC/DC

is

and you do

God's grace again!

can transmit her to you, and I'm

you to get up off your

CLEANSING CURRENT and

help.

and take and take

the power, the nonsatirical power, the

for

the

.]

I'm hear to

now

and

and then thundering through

a Heavenly housekeeper

she's here right

see a spitoon

stares at the floor boards

not have to pay taxes for her Social Security, because she

and

in

retch.

then looks up, begins again in a quieter voice

room

one

and

phlegm, cigar butts and marijuana roaches!! Ex-

moment of shaken

to the creatures

a laughin'

me like a punk rock bitch with her legs spread

take

man's heart

in this

one

this

LORD NO,

roof

is

askin'

ends and wimess

electricity

of God's

NO NO NO don't you fear the trade in lives

loves

life

for this

wedding in heaven was made

with the victim as bride to life life itself, yes I'm OD'd on life, ETERNAL UFE OF THE GOOD LORD JESUS CHRIST ALMIGHTY! I can feel him, I can FEEL HIM, I can feel his power in this room with right now and it's lightin' up my spirit like a Christmas tree GOOD in Hell

the

us

Really, Really, Really,

Weird Stories

John Shirley

Preach 293

GOD THANK YOU for pulling me out of that sucking pit of eternal desire and I'm begging you

right

now lord to

help

these sinners right here up from that

me pull and pull again

same

.

.

.

pull

stinking black tarpit that

is

ROOF OF HELL, Lord let your power rise up in me RIGHT NOW, Lord let me pull their souls from the pit and lord let me TOUCH THEM DEEP WriHIN THEIR MOST PRIVATE RECESSES-CAN YOU FEEL IT my friends there's hope here tonight—TOUCH ME AND FEEL IT, the

TOUCH ME AND CHRIST and [As leave

.

.

FEEL

FEEL

IT,

FEEL

IT,

IT, praise Jesus

some disgusted twentysomething who'd come for a

lark decides to

.]

.

.

FUCKING

.

Now

waitaminnut

now where

the

you goin' you young

Hell

X piece of ephemeral human trash! You come up here and TOUCH ME and you GET A CFL\NCE AT ETERNAL SERVICE or BY GOD you will pay the price RIGHT NOW and wait a GODDAMN MINUTE, you two! You are offended, reckon, that sourpussed Generation

is

I

[The Reverend hesitates thing

.

Well

.

.

.

seems

.

to

make up

his

mind about some-

.[

FUCK YA!

Because you're going

straight to

HELL with the rest of us!

[A final hesitation and then he speaks with meth-amped rapidity

I

folks,

AND WE

ON

.

.

J

and payment-tonight money won't be tonight we pay in lives! We pay in LIVES and in BLOOD

spoke of money and

enough

it?!

faith

for our SINS because

PAY

and neither can you, the

hypocrites with

me

least

straight to

I

I

cannot,

can do

I

is

cannot,

take

I

CANNOT GO

some of you fucking

HELL—

Reverend pulled the M-16 with the custom doubleclip from inside the back of the podium and opened up on the audience, screaming at them as he fired, killing some two dozen people

[And

it

was then

the

before the Sheriff burst

in, firing

as he came,

and

the

Reverend shouted

something about sucking the Angel Gabriel's bluesteel member and behind stuck the gun in his mouth and blew his brains all over the cross the

podium

.

.

.[

Really, Really, Really,

Weird Stories

Preach: Part Two:

The Apocalypse of The Reverend John Shirley Truly,

seen

I

it;

say unto you, in a

paper have First

I

I

seen

into

I

have seen

it:

THIS

in

one aspect

see under a

many

dome,

is

dream of I

seen here

sticky sheets

women and

whom some

damaged with

and

THE CON-

call

Industrial

swimming

children, blackened

I

foretell:

ALSO: Military

lo,

have

in the daily new^s-

it;

in a welter of yellow cloud,

Complex;

dipping

its

heads

in terror in those

shriveled with cancer

toxins,

and

in great suffer-

were boiling the war-mutilated, and the

in other troughs

bombed; and the heads of the glasses,

and some wore dark

capped

teeth,

trils

Beast,

called

they were; even were they brain

And

in a

troughs round about, and

troughs were

ing.

it:

HAVE SEEN, and

I

saw the many-headed

SPIRACY, and this

I

golden haze of sacred frop have

M.I.C. Beast

glasses,

wore toupees and dandruffed

and designer

and Rolex watches pierced

and some had

shirts,

their nostrils,

even those nos-

marked with much drinking of good Scotch; and on

were golf caps and yet were they without arms, and

truly

their

heads

without dicks

except that their heads were dicks, but had only the bodies of serpents,

and tongues

were whips of many

that

name: Pension, was one Salary a third; "Shut

other marked, and

And one and

its

up or

we'll

of these heads was called, in those days. General Electric;

eyes were of television sets, of to the

lies

NBC

daytime and night-time pro-

number

five million.

of these heads was called General Motors, and Ford by some,

and by others Chrysler; and metalflake raising

from the rectum ertheless

each lash with a different

truly.

gramming, and here were

And one

lashes,

Group Health Insurance was another; blow your fucking brains out" was an-

called;

itself

that

I

saw

this

head of chrome-plate and

so to vomit laid-off workers even as

was

knew murder;

also

also

it

its

mouth

it

laughed, and

excreted faulty tanks, which nev-

excreted faulty cars, and a great

Really, REALLi', Really,

smog

that

Weird Stories

John Shirley

The Apocalypse

Preach: Part Two:

choked the world, and brought the world

.

.

.

into a slow roasting like unto a

barbecue chicken, which in those days was called Global Warming.

And

who

laughs even unto the

pesticides

and herbicides sicken

another was called Chemical Industry;

bank as children

and whose

die in Bhopal;

the land, and produce great famines,

And another of these and was

called

heads was

whereupon the people

shape of a pentagon,

five-sided, to the

ROACH BRAINED SHAMBLER;

starve.

head reached beyond

its

on a mouse, end was almost bigger than the mouse, and a repugnant

the trough to suck the strength from the land, like a leech

which

in the

sight withal.

which were

And

tongue was also a rectum, and poisons

its

in those days called military toxic

waste and nuclear waste

and hidden radioactive contamination, and these

spew of paperwork, the

who

offspring,

all

and

in

its

which

And and the

its

skull are the

tooth had truly it

one

will

this,

and other

atroci-

and Pz Nazi conspiracy network

of secret intelligence, also called

much power and

And

who

machine men,

greets with great joy.

called also Israeli Intelligence,

killed these

was

was a garbage

men buried alive in trenches, and burned alive, and

not a

spawn Death Squads and

and

brainless

its

then another head there was, called CIA/Russian Intelligence,

world

too

it

are

throat

a great foul laughter will rise up within the Beast at ties

concealed in a great

who

Eternity Lieutenant Calley throws a switch to

grind up the innocents, and in

order other machine

it

nests of featherless birds

are called Bureaucrats;

wherein for

disposal,

excreted,

it

many

its it

and

years ago, forever

name:

was

clue, truly,

torture,

and these

trough

shall in their

in their jaws

I

see a President,

ground between molars,

each

as

Department, and FBI, and CIA Black Ops

Justice

also

in

by some Bumbling Idiots with

CRACK COCAINE CONTRAFUNDING, and

also

called Mafia Connection, and Secret Nazi Power.

sprouting beside this head, and in obscene congress with

called

and one

Cocaine

Cartel, in

called Heroin,

whose trough a

and others of

it,

was

million children suffered;

their like,

and they were

CIA, and yet had they agendas unto themselves, and

like

unto

much murder and

bloody masturbation.

And I saw these heads

also

on

the Beast:

Who is called Vatican; who is

Muslim Fundamentalist Lunatics; who is called Media (the Blinding One, the Liar who makes Satan look like Mother Teresa); who is called

Multinational Oil Conglomerates; and try;

who is called Congress,

who

called Health

Care Indus-

Whore and

Harlot; and

the slut Politicia, the

International Arms Trade; and Mindless

the Servants of Mao, and Pol Pot,

Really, Really, Really,

is

Communism known

who wallow in

Weird Stories

to

men

as

butchery; and the body

295

296 Preach: Part Two:

The Apocalypse

.

John Shirley

.

known

of the beast did also have a name, and was

as

who

he

is

the Stu-

Common Man, and under its belly will the children Man sleep, and sleep will hold them in bondage. Common

pefaction of the the

And Uz

shall play a benefit,

barrassing ineptitude

on

its

whereupon the Beast

clawed

and

feet;

also

will

of

dance with em-

Guns

seen to play, and even unto the one called Sting, and others

N

Roses are

who

shall

be

known as hypocritical ass kissers. And the Sacred Motorhead shall not be asked to play; nor the Saint Iggy Pop; neither Henry Rollins nor The Band That Dare Not Speak Its Name; nor Captain Beefheart, nor the Frank and the Zappa. But there

one not

shall

just party,

in the

be two

and one

shall

burning

mud

outside the

be joyous, and

will

their divine toxicity,

it,

come with

stir-frying,

and yet

latter will

sky,

and

will

party

which with

yet their death

exquisite contortions in the throes of

even as their

astral

forms are released, and they

thereupon enter the waiting saucers of the

dome

and these

dome, and under the

them even unto

Beast trapped within the

be within the dome, and

will perish first,

but will party the hell out of

ultraviolets shall scorch will

parties;

and the one outside the dome

outside;

will perish

Xists,

and know

that the

without rescue: The Beast

with one foot upon the golf course and the other upon the Resort which is

called

Palm Beach, and

its tail

upon

Beverly Hills and thence across

Moscow, and its Lowermost Rectum (for it has of

the pesticide-slain sea to Tokyo, even to Peking and

groin resting

on Manhattan, and

these a multitude) pierced by the

its

World Trade Center, doubly and with

hemorrhoids to the number ten thousand, and ness and blandness flourish, and this mediocrity itself,

which

in this party shall dull-

become

a toxic liquid in

and choke those who sport with the Beast

will thicken

be-

dome itself—this I have seen, verily—prevents with its ovm hell-wrought insularity, who might

neath the dome, while the the entry of the saucers

have rescued Privilege like

some few

in their mercy, but

by the

were prevented, and so those beneath the

Robert Alton Harris

in the gas

chamber, or

Dome dome like

of Class and

perished, even

unto obscenely

squirming termite queens in poisoned walls.

These things

I

have seen, before the

the Sacred Scribe record them, and

end times approach, and

fact,

let

and outside of Time; and

Pink

Men

let

take warning: For the

they're just the beginning, dumbshit.

Really, Really, Really,

Weird Stories

Modern Transmutations OF THE Alchemist

She struck him

as precisely

now. The musician

would

sit

on

in her

pitch as he can: exactly thus, precisely

hand had

little

and

tell

say,

"Now, you see

on swallows

that curveted like

beauty, hear music in

and then he would compose feel the

what you

lax with

one of those long-legged

brunette.

The

was huddled

rat

little

in

its

itself like

see, as

his fa-

stunt planes,

He would

Papa used to

escorts

a rat finishing a maze

so, like fix

himself a martini and

from

re-

Marseilles, preferably a

who pokes its nose over his shoulder,

sharing his drink,

cage in a nondescript corner of the pet shop behind a

revolving rack of collars

and

leashes.

It

wrapped the stench of

the cloak of a rodent king as

soaked sawdust on the

tin floor.

it

cage

its

rolled in the excrement-

The cage was bare except for the mason

of water in one corner, and a handful of sawdust and droppings

heaped before the wire-mesh seen another

rat. It

gate.

The

occupant had never

cage's sole

had been separated from

its

parents and family be-

had opened, a measure the shop ovmer thought necessary prevent the cannibalization of the rat by its mother who had eaten her

fore to

from

drastically uninspired jazz. Afterwards,

need to reward himself;

with a drink of sweetened water, he would

jar lid

villa (a gift

himself that he should be inspired to music by them.

he would

around

confidence in himself; he

with the Symphony de Paris) and watch the slow billow of

clouds or the light fading

say,"

on

the balcony of his Mediterranean

ther, a soloist

who

in the face with the deliberation of a musician

makes each note

its

eyes

other offspring

alive.

The only

indication given the rat of the existence

of other sentient beings was the occasional face at chirrupings of other

sounds

it

rats;

and though

responded to them with

white snout wriggled and the daily arrival of yellow

Really, Really, Really,

its

its

it

did not

its

own meager

scaly pink

tail

cage door, and the

know what made peeps, while

rasped.

It

dirty

did not associate

mash through the door with the

Weird Stories

its

the

care of a living

298

Modern Transmutations of the Alchemist presumed

creature. It

it

to

tions in temperature that

John Shirley

be a phenomenon

made

fluff

it

up

its

as natural as the fluctua-

when someone

coarse fur

opened the door of the shop in cold weather. After a while it did not answer the rat-calls from the contiguous cages, so their hollow squeaks

man who was

vibrated alone in the thin tin walls like the jaw of the

The man

slapped with the deliberation of a musician.

closed his eyes, putting his hand to his face almost as

if

flinched

and

to clasp the fin-

handmark left by the blow. He stifled a welling curse that he knew would only make her angrier. Instead, he decided to lower his gers of the red

eyes as

her

if

he were martyred. She crossed her arms over her chest and

lips to

keep from

vulnerable. She

still

therefore

drew

cheek-hollows year.

Her

all

crying.

She did not want him to

had gray-blue eyes which

phin.

made up gaunt

felt

the

like

first

had hoped

ocean foam around a

embrace of the Mediterra-

cliildren.

She

to

lie

there awhile to rest, but with a start

rigid,

almost motionless mercuric brushstroke darted from her

into her lungs, using

them

series of

two more quick

memory

it,

breaths,

She raised

to press the second offspring free as her

blew them sweetly

air

body

out, like the musician blow-

With two quick breaths the

gave birth to the second run of his latest improvisation.

wring each note for

American

belly.

she sucked cool

tympanic throbs. She trembled, relieved, and took

ing tunes through his flute.

Frellen, the

he leaps

blue hide

her back arched, straightened and an

her blowhole above the water-line and, dilating

tion:

lover:

silver

Mediterranean parted for her torpedo blunt snout).

spaceship body went

ing, trying to

re-

lay in the shallows, her

cymbal clash with the sun. The image broke from her

shook with a

dol-

a long time in Arctic waters but had

pangs of labor (and a searing image of her

as the surface of the

Her

that

she ducked her head the

out of the green face of a cresting wave, his scaleless striking a

and

the paler sand, her blue dorsal fin just six inches above the

bluer water. She

she

when

in the uterine

turned to her birthplace to have her

on

German models

in the fashion of

eyes were incised with eyeliner;

The dolphin luxuriated The dolphin had been

pale belly

reflected nothing

other eyes to them. She had high cheekbones and

copper of her hair boiled round her face

nean.

bit

know that she was

its

guitar player,

moisture.

He

jazz

He

musician

was sweat-

paused, and saw that

had the audience's complete

atten-

grandstanding as usual, gyrating about the stage. Frellen invariably

stole his thunder,

then had the nerve to weep on his shoulder about yet

another fight with his wife.

"I

hope she

to himself. His bitterness distracted

him again tonight," he said long enough to make him catch up he caught a dishearten-

slaps

him

miss his cue. As he frantically sought to

just

Really, Really, Really,

Weird Stories

Modern Transmutations of the Alchemist

John Shirley

ing glimpse of the band's manager scowling at

look on Michel's

rodent with that look—gave the rat

to

chasing

its

own

one corner of

him from the wings. The

face—the son-of-a-whore could make you

fat

tail

in panic.

flutist

The

a sensation in his stomach

squealed

rat

cage, turning to lash at the

its

pink thing, the hand that clutched

at

feel like a

it.

The

its

terror

and

like

a

scuttled

monstrous five-headed

rat hadn't believed the uni-

verse could be breached; that the vague fluttering in the non-existence

beyond the bars could be concretely nervous

trill

of a

flute,

claw, awful in furlessness, to

the universe.

The

rat

and gleaming metal. its frail

a

scoop

was plunged It

real.

With a gut sensation

the rat fainted long it

enough

up and

fly

beyond the confines of

into a kaleidoscope of

brown cardboard box. The its

rat

responded

red eyes, and shivered.

this one barer than the

first.

gratefully to the enclosing

From one Universe

woman's hips

and forth

in her black dress as she

in the apartment.

to another,

A lid clamped over the box and the rat sank

into a rhythmically pendulous darkness just like the

mind

gawking faces

saw, briefly, the universe from the outside, until

perceptions began to dissolve. But the hand lowered the rat into

walls, closed

haired

the

like

for a massive pink

motion of a red

walked impatiently back

Waiting for her husband to return home, her

seethed; but one thought recurred clearly: retribution. Frellen

left

her alone for two months four times this year to tour with his band as

its

would

in-

lead guitar. terfere

He

had refused

to take her along, claiming that

with his dedication to the band. But at

he had promised to go away no more. plans for parties, to

them.

And

make arrangements

He

if it

"I'll

show him

just

what he

two of

were only an inconve-

be leaving again "for a short tour,"

would

must be canceled.

much argument, to make

had allowed her

for trips to Paris, just the

then he'd told her offhandedly, as

nience, that he

last, after

it

is,

to treat

and

all

plans

me

as

if

my

I'm a dog to be kenneled." She stamped her foot,

needs are nothing,

like

her

silver slippers

jumping

slid

around the

like

baby dolphins. The dolphin's offspring

flute-player's legs as

he stood in the surf

in his stiff tux-

edo, stiff with drunkenness, holding a bottle of sherry and a long platinum flute that flickered in the sunset like the flashing fin of a fish. He did not see the dolphins yet, as they zipped his knees.

Nor

like electric

toy trains around

did he notice the protective bulk of their

a few yards away.

He swayed, murmuring

threatening to force

mother basking

to himself (that bastard Frellen

him out of the band). And suddenly the

flute

seemed a threat, and its touch repugnant to him. Hating himself, he threw the flute into the sea. He watched it disappear into the blue waters like a fading smile.

Really, Really, Really,

He

Uirned to stagger up onto the deserted

Weird Stories

299

300

Modern Transmutations

of the Alchemist

beach, suddenly wanting a bed to hide

when something sharp,

steps

and jerked

in.

a broken

John Shirley

He had taken several unsteady cut his bare foot. He yelped

shell,

and made

arms of the

his foot up, lost his balance, fell into the

water closed over his head, burned his eyes with his

formal

backwards and he

suit

slid

a burden.

salt,

The

surf.

chafed his lungs

A swift undercurrent

siphoned him

downm the slope of sand. His head

swam from

drink and he drank the sea, sobered but despairing as the twilight was

sucked into darkness and he was sucked downward. But he

pushed him

felt

thing

thump him from beneath,

face,

and then onto the sand above the lapping tongues of

as the dolphin

coughed, spat saltwater and laughed:

up

to death. But the sea

had sent

on

its

He

water.

fine a musician to waste;

laughed. But the laughter froze real

had pushed him from the

turned and looked into the sea, seeking out his rescuer.

TTien the old

in the sunset, rocking like

man opened

mother and two dart surf,

He

he remembered: something

waves neoned red

His eyes were dolphins,

They followed one another in the shallow

He

describing a lazy figure-eight with their wakes.

his pockets,

black

suit.

shorts,

The

an old man's sleepy head.

his silver-blue eyes.

children.

He

surf.

He was alive! He had given himself

had thought him too

servants to rescue him.

his face as

some-

to the sur-

put his hands in

laughed to find a small crab, and then peeled off his soaked

He was warmed

by the evening breeze. Stripped

he threw the soggy clothes away

like his

down

to his

anger at Frellen and

work with the band. He looked at the dolphin and tried to think of some way to ask her why she had saved him. As he watched her he saw something bright flashing from her snout. The dolphin came nearer and he saw that she held his flute in her mouth. Placing his steps very carefully, he walked into the surf and took the flute. The dolphin seemed unafraid and watched him with curiosity as he dried the flute with the bow tie he had thrown on the beach, before he'd gone into the A4ichel, his

water.

He

He

tried the flute;

sat cross-legged

blew a

fluteplayer's eyes closed,

He

just

As he put down

news tin.

He gaped

looks

just like

and

tails,

He

began

and the percussion of the

Frellen's

to play.

at her in real

you," she

his

open the door. She

on her long

she said, "Welcome home.

child."

The

and opened the door. His wife

the expression that he'd anticipated

had your

surf.

hand closed on the knob of

Frellen sighed

his guitar case

for you. I've

it.

hesitated there, dreading to

would never understand. was there with

water out of

by the surf for many hours, swaying and playing to

the strobing of the dolphin's

apartment door.

little

Her voice was

the scratch

amazement and she was

went on. "Here, your

face.

good of claws on

I've

got

pleased. "In fact, he

son." She picked

Really, Really, Really,

up a

card-

Weird Stories

Modern Transmutations of the Alchemist

John Shirley board box and reached threw beach.

it

at him.

The

inside,

She ran from the apartment, out the door that led to the

faint trilling

Frellen looked

plucked out something that wriggled, and

down

of a distant flute came through the open door.

at the

dead

rat at his feet. It

swift death of fright.

Really, Really, Really,

Weird Stories

convulsed from

its

301

Really,

ReaUy,

AVeird

Stories

Just Like Suzie

Perrick

is

in his

silently to talk

forties

who

underwear, standing in the middle of the room, trying

himself out of slamming crank. He's a paunchy guy, early

looks ten years older than he has

weekly rates hotel room

in

a piss-in-the-sink room, as the

moment. He's used

double

life

in

San Francisco.

it

It's

to,

and knows

He's in a

it.

not boosh-wah but

has a small bathroom. Perrick

it's

not

lives here, for

to these rooms, because he's lived half of his

them, but he's not used to sleeping

in

them; not used to

the shouts in the hall at night, the heavy tread of cops, the shrieking fights of the

two junkie gays downstairs. But

this

Bedlam

is

genteel,

of his neighbors assures him, compared to other weeklies on the

The room is

lined

up

on which

contains, besides Perrick, a double bed, a dresser

aftershave, cologne, a

box of

tissues,

one

street.

a man's comb, a cheap

chrome-faced radio. There's a lamp table by the bed, with a squat lamp

on

it,

a wastepaper basket

below

A window onto the street. A raincoat

it.

hanging on a hook. Perrick

is

alternately pacing

a syringe, already

himself.

up

it

to the light, puts

Of two minds about

and goes

to the

Damn, come

on,

to a table

and capped up, and a spoon.

filled

at the syringe, holds

and going over

it

on which

there

is

He nervously pokes

down, whines a

little

to

He picks it up again, puts it dovm He calls through the door, "Suzie!

using

it.

bathroom door. girl!"

Suzie's hoarse voice

from the bathroom:

man, you gotta get your understandin' about

me

stuff

in

"Just take a fuckin'

you so you be a

little

chill-pill,

fuckin'

getting' mine!"

me He yells at the door again. "Come on baby let's do it!"

"Heroin," Perrick mutters to himself. "Sick bitch. She's gonna give

AIDS or something." Suzie emerges

bleached blond

from the bathroom—she's hair,

a white

girl

skinny, with

who's affected a

bad

lot

Really, Really, Really, Really,

skin, thin

of the local

Weird Stories

John Shirley

Just Like Suzie

homegirl mannerisms, mixes them

SouthernCal roots. "Your princess steadily

on her

and

heels,

up with her white

all

is

here, dude!"

when you came in!" "That was like a down payment thing." She "I

little

un-

my money?"

paid you

bed and fumbles a der strap

.

Perrick rippin'

.

.

me

"OK

cigarette out

"The fuck

was!

it

time—my

off last

fuck

.

deliberate as she lights

you

can't believe

it.

pullin' this shit after

fuckin' credit cards—I can't believe I'd

go for

.

I'm goin',

this,

back on the bed.

"OK OK

I

on her shoul-

is still

."

I

don't need

me, fuck you." She

dissin'

sinks onto the edge of the

from her purse, which

Her movements become slow and

yells,

you again but you

She walks a

nodding a touch. "You got

she's

Valleytrash

fuck

no

accusations,

you

totally

illin',

starts to get up, sways, falls into sitting

"Shit."

it.

He

Here."

gone almost before

more money down beside

slaps

hits the mattress, into her purse

it

.

.

.

her,

it's

then she

comes out of it, shaking herself. "Wow. Shit's good. Let's do the Thing. Before I nod out or something. You want it like before?" droops a

nodding

little,

.

.

.

Perrick nods, unzips his pants, then hesitates, takes his wallet out of his

back pocket and puts

it

of the dresser.

Then goes

Buttons

He

it

up.

he doesn't notice

where he can keep an eye on

to the raincoat, puts

it

on

it,

in the

over his

middle

underwear.

goes to her, taking up the syringe. Perrick makes as

He's looking

her.

at the ceiling

if

and humming absently

but breathing rather rapidly. Suzie, in a practiced

pen

if I

ing me!

looked inside

little girl's

this

My goodness!

I

voice:

Feels around.

"Oh

what the big man

will

wonder what's

wonder what would hap-

in here?" his coat

and puts her head under

nummy yummy!

what's this

do

I

big grovm-up man's coat when he's not watch-

She unbuttons the bottom button of it.

"Oh!

Mmmmm!

I

wonder

!" .

.

.

him head, her own head bobbing. drags back his coat sleeve and fixes, reg-

Perrick gasps as she begins giving Perrick snatches

up the

syringe,

immediately. His back arches and his jaw quivers as he rushes. Never as good as the first rush he had the first time he did it and every isters

time he does

it

he

feels a little

more

strain

that this time the ticker goes blooey but is,

enough

to

make him

go:

"Oh

jeezus

on

still

oh

his heart

and he

he's riding

yes

half

hopes

what rush there

little girl

you bad

dirty

oh yes take it take it oh yes you ripped me my credit cards but I forgive you because you are the little girl who loves me loves to oh yes-" Faster and faster as the drug takes hold. "Good off you dirty

little girl

Really, Really, Really, Really,

Weird Stories

little girl

305

John Shirley

3o6 Just Like Suzie

good meth

crystal

and had

to

tell

bad

me

you ripped

back with you, you caused

can't believe I'm little girl

little girl

my wife found out me out and here I am you got me kicked out bad and

off

her the whole story and she kicked

little girl

it,

." .

.

His movements are convulsive as he grabs the back of her head ...

his

repressed anger emerging in the violence of his hip thrusts and hands

tal-

oned on the back of her neck.

Faster

and meaner. She's gagging. Choking.

He's oblivious. He's gasping, "... Shouldn't do

made me bad

me

want

didn't

I

little girl

to

don't

I

know Andrea left me

you made

.

.

.

with vicious thrusts into She's

gained

shouldn't

Your

now

do how'd

to

your—"

fault

her. ''—fault!

gagging, choking, but

still

was the

know what

your

it

do

but you

it

me buy the stuff made me buy you made I

get into

He punctuates faultl

The heroin

more than she

strength,

its

words now

the

Your faultr

only resisting feebly.

synthetic stuff, hard to gauge

don't

it I

bar-

for.

Perrick's singing idiotically.

"Heroin and speed, you and me, heroin

and speed, you and me, you

dovsni

me

and

up, never quite enough,

make her bleed make her sorry she stole from me—" choking more and more. He holds himself deep in her, forcing a

heroin and speed She's

now

sustained deep throat—her struggles are

mock motions

like

of a

sleeper acting out a dream. Perrick's babbling

show

dick

He

moving. got too

He

.

.

"Bad

you're sorry

."

.

slumps over

He

.

her.

away from

Shit

Hugs her her.

you got

give

heart take .

.

my

stops

.

to his groin. "Fuck. I'm sorry

"Hope

I

didn't hurt

you

I

." .

.

Frowns. Sees he's stuck or she's not

my

I

was

sorry.

nuts in your

Come

mouth too

now: "Hey! Suzie? You're hurting me, posed to

my

As he orgasms and she

otherwise totally limp.

Perrick muttering: "Said

me.

SHIIIIIT!"

straightens up, panting.

tries to pull

letting go. She's

ripoff artist broke

girl little

.

you more money or—"

on. Let go. You're hurting .

.

.

He

how'd that—?"

What

seriously!

stops, grimacing with

Yelling

I'm sup-

is this,

clamping

pain at his groin. Bending to look under the coat. She's beyond unconscious. slack.

He

Already tinged blue.

bunched with a balls,

both

A

can see the profound emptiness of her.

beyond

And at the corners of her jaws the muscles are

signature of

in her

slackness

finality.

She's

clamped onto

mouth, her teeth clamped

his dick

and

his

a sadist's cock-ring over

like

the root of his maleness. "Jesus fucking Christ! Suzie! Don't be dead,

come

on, that's a fuckin' bitchy thing to

checks her pulse at her throat.

"I

do

me! Don't be—"

to

don't fucking

.

.

.

She

is.

He

She's dead.

Shit shit shitr

Really, Really, Really, Really,

Weird Stories

John Shirley

Just Like Suzie

He tries to ease her off

.

.

.

when

that doesn't work,

himself Stay Calm, as he attempts to yank shiiiiiit!

It

free.

makes an

effort, tells

"Awwwwwwwwwhhhhh

Fuuuuuuck!"

hurts.

He Then

deep breath. Forces a measure of relaxation into

takes a tries

his limbs.

again to wrench her loose.

Searing pain.

He

Then he

yowls.

hanging from

stands there, panting, feeling the weight of her

his genitals.

He's holding her up by

head more

to try to get her

He moves

his genitals.

work his thumbs between her teeth, try to pry her off. PushesCrunching pain. Some sorta death-reflex. She's crunching down harder on him every time he tries to pry her loose. Like punishment for the attempt

"CKvww

.

.

.

fuck goddamnit!"

A banging at the He recognized "Yo!

in the light, then attempts to

You got

door.

Buck's geeky voice coming from outside the hotel door

Suzie in there! Say hey

you got

my lady in there,

"Oh

Perrick mutters breathlessly to himself,

shit

it's

Then yelling at Buck, "No, no man she— she split!" "Hey bullshit! Come on, man! Get over here, open

dudeski?!"

her fuckin' pimp!"

this

door!"

Whining, Perrick grabs the corpse under the armpits and drags

it

along with an awkwardness that seems a weirdly apt choreographic

parody of

door

his

path through

When

life.

he gets to the

vicinity

of the

wrong way, she'd be visible if he opened not enough room for a 'U-turn' so he has to bend

he's got her turned the

the door, and there's

over—grimacing horribly— and grab her hips, so her

back

is

skirt

humped, and he does

hump-swivel hump-swivel move,

'til

a

and

little

sort of

Now Perrick's

sideways with respect to the door, the body behind

Unlocks the door and opens

it

it.

some— trying

composure— and opens the door only enough so around the side of

her at the

he gets her turned round.

whines some more as Buck pounds the door.

raincoat.

lift

capering hump-swivel

He

He

standing

adjusts the

his best for fake

that he's peering

it.

There's Buck. He's emaciated, his blond hair in a white boy's approxi-

mation of dreadlocks. Under lot

of cartoony stickers on

it;

his

he's

arm

is

an expensive skateboard with a

wearing Levi jacket sans

sleeves, stupid

looking surfer shorts, tattoos. Perrick attempts: "Hey. Buck.

pipe an'

hittin'

I

paid her, man. She's out

the needle, slammin' your money."

Really, Really, Really, Really,

Weird Stories

hittin'

the

307

John Shirley

3o8 Just Like Suzie

"Heeeeey dudeski, the bitch does that again

memory

an' she

Perrick

and the

Was

knows

"You hear me,

Perrick.

she hears me."

He

shouts past

bitch?!'

holding her up with one hand to take the weight off his dick

is

strain

is

hacking away at his veneer. Can't take

much more.

she going to bite through? She can't— she's dead. Right? Right?

Buck's saying, laughin'.

can

is. I

And I hope

that.

gonna be a bad

she's

"I

feel

it.

laughing right

bet she's in the bathroom doin' up

know when

always

I

me no

she's laughin' at

Right now. I'm

like,

some

Her mouth's open and

psychic.

whimpering and

He

hysterical laughter.

Mother Earth. Buck ignores him,

howl and he

and wham, bangs

tries to

this is cute, right

He

it

And

into the corpse again

desperately to get out of the

way

until.

when I'm

and Perrick

expresses

with a long

making a

is

its

the

room

in a

kicked again

is

and Perrick howls

At

Buck pushes

last

head under

talkin' to

again, tries

you

in

and past

his coat.

you head,

she's givin'

I

bitch-slap you, let

go of

ass over here!"

hot-coals kind of dance, his face a rictus of pain, trying

from being pulled off—starts following Buck's

to prevent his dick

little

itself

yanking at the body to get her out where he can slap

starts

and get your

Perrick

fucking bitch

into the corpse

her around. "Tryin'a pretend you're not here, that shit

between

he has the weight of

edge aside but the door

him, mrns and sees the body with

"Oh

she's

"—And I'm gonna KICK HER ASS

he's shouting,

he kicks the door, smashing

so that the pain dances through Perrick

dude!"

feels like

The pregnant mass of the

the planet hanging from his dick.

ululating

and

now—"

Perrick ventures, "I don't think so." He's walking a line,

FOR IT!" And

shit

matter where she

pull

around

Chinese parade dragon effect with the body, making funny

marching shuffles with

Perrick yelling,

"No no

his feet like

a kid playing choochoo.

don't you don't—no wait!"

Suddenly Buck stops and

stares.

Looks

at the

body. Lets

it fall

limp.

Steps over to the panting Perrick and peeks into the coat. Takes a startled step back.

"Jeezus!

You

fuckin'

murdered

my old

lady with that

puny little dick of

I"

yours!

Perrick's sobbing, "I didn't

out and kinda

I

guess

mad

I

at her

anyway so

what was happenin'— and she

on

there

mean

it.

Buck she

got carried away on I

just— she

crystal

was

and

I

was kinda chokin' her and

just

some kinda deathgrip

some

croaked, man!

reflex thing

And

and I'm

all

nodded I was

guess I

didn't see

she clamped

fuckin'

Really, Really, Really, Really,

down

smck, man!"

Weird Stories

John Shirley "The

Just Like Suzie 309

balls too?"

"Yeah yeah yeah. Yeah. ."

"This this

is

.

.

Buck shakes

gonna cost you

I

got carried away, you know?"

really

his

head

as

if

moral judgement. "This

in high

He thinks, He sees

Perrick suddenly feels a cold melty feeling in his dick. first,

she's bitten right through.

"Oh

shit.

"Well,

Oh

.

.

extra."

But then he checks

no. I'm losin' feelin' in

you oughta be

out.

it

.

.

.

"

not hurting.

it It's

at

glad, dudeski!"

"You don't fucking understand!

If

I

can't feel it-that

means

it's

dyingl

MY DICK'S DYING!" Buck crosses

his arms, considers the strange

union of the corpse and

the dick with a philosopher's judiciousness. "Yo, calm down, there's a

way ... we make a deal, we get you out This is so totally gnarly." Buck starts moving around, looking at the thing from different angles, .

.

.

sniggering behind his hand. Perrick

"Sure

yells, "It ain't fuckin'

it is.

funny. Buck."

You know what else? This

just like Suzie. It really

is

is.

And you

know what else} It was in all the signs today, man." He takes out a glass crack thumbs

pipe, blackened with use,

rock and

in a

fires

up, poofs in a

it

thoughtful way. Buck's head seems to expand slightly like a toy balloon. exhales

and

chatters, "Astrology,

man,

they're

all

fucked

signs.

know, I'm kinda psychic

Somedays

planets,

And it was in the smog colors. You ever read smog tea leaves? And the way people was walkin' in the Mix, I always

up with her lunar colors. Like

was her

it

He

there's

wack

like that,

I

see the patterns in the Mix,

shit in the air that just gets a life

of

its

you know?

ovm."

on the gelatinous rim of the Grand Abyss called Hysteria. "Stop hittin' on that fuckin' pipe and get her the fuck off me!!" Buck blows white smoke and says, "Hey don't be comin' at me like Perrick's

that, dudeski, "I

's

bullshit."

got a few thousand dollars in the bank,

can get you two hundred

I

fifty

bucks right away, get you two thousand tomorrow, you get her off

me.

It's all I

I

left

could get out of the joint account

her but you can have

Buck's interested now. the corpse:

"Maybe

"No no you do

I

"Two

It's

still

all

man. Just grand?"

get a screwdriver

stuff like that she

reflex thing or something.

knife because

it all

And

I

I

He

.

I

had with

Just

.

.

.

my wife when

shit

." .

.

looks speculatively again at

and pry her jaws or something?"

clamps

dovm

harder.

Some

kinda

don't want anybody to get crazy with a

my fucking DICK is

swollen up,

.

.

in there,

you know what I'm saying^

don't want just anybody cutting around in

there— I got to have a surgeon."

Really, Really, Really, Really,

Weird Stories

John Shirley

3IO Just Like Suzie

"But you go to the emergenq^ room, the cops

come

will

He does bullet work and shit.

around.

I tell

do it and you what. I know he won't roll over on you. He's good. But we can't get you to him with that thing hangin' down there and he don't make housecalls no matter a doctor.

what—he don't never go "So

.

.

what

.

He's a speedfreak worsen you. Totally

out.

He

But he cuts good.

tweakin'.

He'll

smells

bad but he

cuts

good

." .

.

you saying?"

are

"Gotta cut off her head

." .

.

Perrick stares at him. "What?"

"I'm waiting for another idea, dudeski. Cut off her head first—or, anyway, cut off her body

with

."

it

ishes

.

it

.

.

.

He

guess— do

I

we can

quick,

from

his

get

you out of here

pocket and opens

flour-

it,

.

Perrick hesitates.

how his genitals

Hands

jittering as

are doing. "I don't

And

I'm gonna get gangrene.

Buck

it

takes a big buckknife

he pokes

know

.

.

.

at the head, trying to see

it's all

purple.

Oh God.

I

.

.

." I

gotta piss.

can't

I

.

.

suggests, perfectly seriously: "Heeeeey, wait'U

we

get the head

separated from the shoulders, you can piss out her neck."

He

hits the

pipe again. Perrick retches at his eyes shut

.

.

this,

a retching from deep inside

him

... he screws

then he takes a deep breath and manages: "Just

.

.

.

.

Just

her body. Her head. You know." do it, just do it. Cut off her Buck laughs, "Me?! NO way, Jose! Fuckin A no-way!" He folds up the .

knife I

and drops lose

.

in Perrick's coat pocket. 'That's

it

paid eight bucks for a

just

gonna

.

good organic

vegetarian lunch

"Hey

look, seriously,

I

come back

chauffeur:

I

ain't

can't—"

"You wanna lose your dick? You did her man, I

and

it!"

Perrick protests,

sibility.

your jobby, kimosabe!

Oh

later.

first—"

He

it's

your fuckin' respon-

takes her ankles.

As

if

to a

"To the bathroom, James."

Clumsily, each step risking Perrick's ability to reproduce, they carry her

between them just like

do

it

her ...

to the

bathroom. Buck chuckles.

was gonna

I

kill

her myself

that way, wouldn't trust the bitch

In the

bathroom Perrick

removes

his coat

think about

it,

and

is

tell

"I

swear to

God

you the truth but

I'd

this is

never

." .

.

standing in the mb. Takes out the knife, then

tosses

it

on

the floor next to Buck. Trying not to

he opens the knife and begins to saw

"Yo yo yo yo whoooooa!" Buck

wanta get outta here before you

blurts. .

.

."

at her neck.

"Wait a motherfuckin' minute

He

I

backs out of the bathroom,

Reaixy, Really, Really, Really,

Weird Stories

John Shirley

Just Like Suzie

grimacing, heads for the hall door, pauses to take a hit from his pipe,

goes out the door stage whispering

bathroom,

in the

loud enough for Perrick to hear

just

be back, man,

"I'll

some rock but

got to cop

I

I'll

be

back, take you to that doctor, a thousand bucks and that's between you,

me and

the rollers

Perrick

sawing. Sawing and sobbing.

still

down

biting

you don't come through

if

do

thing,

ing

it.^

.

He

expects her to react by

harder but— though blood spurts and then levels

wells out of her, she doesn't react cians

." .

Just

.

sawing

.

.

and

that's horrible.

off,

How

simply

can morti-

someone. They should scream or some-

at

dead or not. Maybe she was clamping harder? There was no

down

How

there now.

throw up on she's biting

her.

This

is

could he

...

"Oh God oh

can't feel a thing

I

Oh God

through

tell?

now I

no. I'm

think

...

I

feel-

gonna I

think

." .

The blood making hollow

.

spatters

crackly noises as he goes through

and dripdrops

into the tub.

Wet

the spine. Letting his eyes glaze, his

hands seem to know the work. CRICK-CRICK-CRACKLE.

SPLURT Thump. The body thumping down onto the tub. He drops the knife onto it. Turns quickly because he can't keep it down anymore: the vomit. Painful vomiting. Then he turns on the shower. Vomit and blood going down the drain.

He

mostly finished

its

draining.

The

bluish yellow now.

It's

the head more. Cheeks sunken. His dick, where

above her teeth, her

head

steps out, dries himself off—and dries off the

hair.

angry red and blue.

is

What the

Give her a shampoo.

while he's at

He

it

wonders

fuck.

shows

It

has

at the root,

Maybe brush her teeth

too

it.

steps through the

groin.

It

he should wash

if

Crazy thoughts. Control yourself. Walk your ass through

He

too.

eyes sunken into

bedroom door with

the head dangling from his

ludicrously as he walks.

bounces

Perrick.

it,

A

bloody towel wrapped

around the neck stump. The head's eyes are open now and looking up at him. Once more he's wearing the raincoat and underwear. Raincoat isn't

and the underwear is scarlet brown and his legs are streaked. He looks somewhat relieved and yet in shock. Staggers over to his rig, his syringe, draws some crank from the

blood soaked but

spoon. Looks

stomach

his

down

nothin

I

had some

you. Don't worry,

down

there

.

spattered

at the head. Starts to giggle.

Says to himself, "Wish

some with

is

.

.

Hey

.

I

.

Suppresses

don't have to pee .

Really, Really, Really, Really,

it.

horse. Like to take some. Share

no more,

close your eyes, Suzie

Weird Stories

." .

.

I

can't feel

He

reaches

311

John Shirley

312 Just Like Suzie

down and "OK,

He

know

.

A friend. this is

if

"Speed

got to

He

.

.

.

thinks: I'm losing

He

He

.

.

A

looks

."

a marriage or a divorce it."

it.

.

Need champagne for—

ain't right for this.

Magic Words: "Fuck

says the

work nervous GIGGLE have some communication."

doesn't

.

of garbage in his head.

tail

at the needle.

don't

.

we

understand, sure:

I

peacock's

I

them

tries to close

.

.

Rushes.

injects the speed.

Giggles. Sobs. Giggles. Sobs. Babbles. "Suzie

.

.

.

Suziebitch talk to

me,

tell

me:

this

is

.

.

this is

.

your way to—"

He's interrupted by a delicate knock on the door.

He

hears a fluting female voice, sort of

silly flirtatious

Oh

"Andy!

Annnn-dyyyy!" Perrick at

first

thinks this

is

down

Suzie's voice. Stares

at the head.

It's

pulsing from the drug rush. Emanating.

"Suzie—How'd you say that with your ing both as he says

The

fucking wife

He up

it's

coming from the

The Pakistani lady at the front deh-esk said more normal voice: "Come on, open up,

A

let's talk!"

who

sinks in

It

cry-

it.

"Annn-dyyyyy!

hall door.

Laughing and

full?"

voice again and this time Perrick realizes

you were ho-ommme!" hon,

mouth

this

is.

His wife. Andrea.

don't even—but

I

starts to giggle

and

He

My

mutters, "Jesus Fuck.

."

oh yeah sure— sure uh-huh makes sense

.

.

tosses the syringe into a wastebasket, buttons

his coat over the head.

Throws a bedspread haphazardly over the

amount of blood on the floor that dripped through the towel. Funny head-hump hobbling under the coat as he goes to the door, opens small

the door for his fairly straight wife

who

looks around with distaste. She's

Jewish, well dressed.

She

"This place even smells horrible,

says,

the door and

comes toward him. "You look

ing?

You ready

and

I

drugs. to

to

come home?

I

thought about

don't think you would've gone to that I

mean, you weren't

in

I

mean you

or otherwise

.

and no pants?

"No

I

.

.

.

.

really ."

It's

Got

She

us-

and thought about if

it

you weren't on the

your right mind, and we're gonna take you start

over—if you're

And no more women. "Why are you wearing a

will-

have to be willing.

Paid for

stares at his legs.

raincoat

a head.

I

Ahead of

.

.

.

myself." Trying to keep

on the coat before the

Andrea looks around this ...

So—you've been

not even raining. You got shorts on under there?"

crazy half giggle. "Put

on any of

it

whore

one of those twenty-eight day programs and

ing

Listen—" She closes

doll.

awful.

skeptically.

"Where?

pants. I

don't

mean, do you launder any of

Come on,

down sit

dovm."

know if I want

this

the

to

sit

bedding?"

Really, Really, Really, Really,

Weird Stories

John Shirley

Just Like Suzie

"The bed's OK. his throat as

Just

.

.

.

head over

he gestures to the bed. She moves to

"You threw the bedspread on the

YOU

"You're walking funny,

HEAD down

She gapes

He

at him.

lump bobbing under Perrick

it

and

sits gingerly.

nice.'"

He walks awkwardly toward her.

HEAD

out

it

in this world!" Fairly

you don't keep your

snorts, "If

Very

in

got a back ache?"

now, getting

Perrick's close to tears

your

floor?

"Head to."

Perrick giggles moronically.

down

here." Laughter creaking

spastically.

"Got to keep

barking the word "head."

down, you've

HEAD

He

pal!"

it,

begins to laugh hysterically. She looks at the

"Whatever have you got

his coat.

.

.

.?"

sobbing openly now, breaking down."H£ADN'T THOUGHT

is

ABOUT FT!" And

then the towel dislodges and

Andrea

gives a rabbity

falls

doing something again. Something

.

It

let

just

earnest. Seeing a crepuscular ray

woman. Talk

to her for

me. Con-

go."

might work.

Andrea

been

.

of hope. "Andrea— talk to her. You're a vince her to

wet bloody lump.

to her feet. "You've

."

madly

Perrick approaches her, feeling

to his feet in a

and jumps

shriek

little

It

might.

backs away, the bitch, whenever you

pull shit like this

.

.

need them they

really

.

She squeaks: "What?"

Woman

Perrick pleads, "Talk to her!

Yeah: Tete a

Blood

tetel

Andrea bursts

woman! What do

out:

down

his leg

.

.

.

"You don't have

door. "You really don't have

to.

he to

starts to

open

But he opens the coat and

if

head

she's

as she sees Suzie.

open

it

woman!

If

Andrea,

you want

.

just get

.

.

and uh-"

off. Andrea's eyes are

.

.

pingpong balls

touches her throat with her hand smiling, idiotically appealing:

dovm

there

and jaw with

her!

could-"

He

to talk to her face to face

bends over so the head

.

She takes a long noisy breath that sounds as

Perrick approaches her, weeping, it,

his coat

don't-I mean, everybody should have

I

flings

choking on something

to her about

call it?

that!" She's angling for the

their personal space, the marriage counselor said that

in her

they

Talk to her—!"

dripping

is

to

sort of half dangles

I

between

.

.

.

"Talk

Woman to squats

his legs

.

.

.

and he's

he goes on: "-and you could, you know, go around behind me and put your face under me there-if you don't mind, just-" I mean, you always said I had a cute msh-you could

quite serious

and sincere

as

Andrea's backed into the door. She turns and claws at it. Yanks it open with a sound of animal fear and sprints out into the hall. Perrick stares

Really, Really, Really, Really,

Weird Stories

313

John Shirley

314 Just Like Suzie

after her, a

disappointed but already forgetting about

little

it.

He

turns

away from the door and begins to caress the head, to move his hips dancing. Then Buck appears against it, not like fucking but more like .

at the door, staring

down

"Yo dudeski your old

He

breaks

on

dresser, turns

.

geeking out behind—"

lady's really

seeing Perrick dancing.

off,

.

the hall at the retreating Andrea.

the radio.

It's

As Perrick dances over

"Cheek

playing

to the

Buck looks

to Cheek."

ill

and disgusted. Perrick

is

".

cerely.

.

.

tenderly dancing with the head, singing along, badly but sin-

when

we're out together dancing cheek to cheek!"

Buck murmurs, "Oh wow. Dudeski."

The music

swells in Perrick's head.

Buck looks

now. Then goes to him, drapes the coat over still

dancing— to the door. "You know what? Your old

the cops

.

.

.

let's

get out of here

.

has your bank account frozen but

To

Perrick, the part of

about,

all this is

him

.

Get

.

we

like

to that

goes along with him

it

A vacant

lot.

A half-dozen

around a

lazy blue

black guy

calls

lady's

ATM life

from behind a

down

him—

...

going to

the stairs

and

call

bet that cunt

I

." .

drive his

trick mirror.

.

body

He's

just

He watches without

watching as he body dances out the door with Buck. feeling as

calculatingly

got another wheeze maybe

that used to plan his

seen detached,

him

at

his shoulders, leads

and down the

street.

neighborhood homies and dudeskis hanging

flame in a rusting

himself Hotwinner,

is

oil barrel.

One

of

this

arguing with Buck. Saying

group, a "I

say

it's

a load of fuckin' bullshit."

Buck

shrugs. "Put your

money down and check

out. I'm lying,

it

I

pay

off three to one."

Hotwinner

says, "I get to

Buck nods. "Rockin'." "You got it. Just don't five

look close."

pull

any

gafflin' bullshit—"

And he

forks over

bucks.

Buck

Two

says,

"Anybody

others

pony

else?"

up. "Yeah here,

fuck it—you goin' to pay off or

it's

a waste of

we keep you

good wine money but my dog to have his

ass fo'

dinner—"

Buck Let's

No

yells at

do

the rickety van parked at the curb.

"Hey

yo, Perrick!

it!"

response. Buck makes a sound of irritation, husdes to the back of

the van, drags Perrick out. Perrick's wearing his long coat over the bulge. Perrick

is

giggling.

Mumbling to

himself—".

.

.

telling

me

all

Really, Really, Really, Really,

the secrets so

Weird Stories

John Shirley

Just Like Suzie

hard to understand what she's saying sometimes but she knows it all ." she's a Head of her time hee hee knows it all Buck brings him to the firelight, pulls back Perrick's coat, exposing .

.

.

Suzie's purulent

down from

.

head

clamped on

still

his dick

the skull, dangling next to his

and

.

balls,

one eye hanging of the scalp

testicles, jigsaws

now and

rotted off, pig bristles of hair remaining, maggots dripping then, squirming

.

.

.

halfway to a skull

.

.

.

"That's a pig head or somethin', that ain't tests,

no

bitch!" a dudeski pro-

but Buck draws him closer, makes him bend and

backs away making phlegmy sounds in

his throat as

others,

"OK, dudeskis, take a good look, you paid for

people

drift

want a look?

over to check

it

out.

really look.

Buck it."

He

says to the

A

few other

Buck covers the head. "Anybody

else

Five bucks!"

Buck taking more money, murmuring

to vacant eyed Peffick, "This

is

way cool, the bitch still workin' for me, tha's, like, loyalty to the max, you Lemme knooooo? I mean, it's just like Suzie to hang in there, dude count the money dude .

.

.

.

".

Really, Really, Really, Really,

Weird Stories

.

.

315

Cold Feet

Didn't like the looks of the wheatfield beside the apple orchard. wheatstalks looked

The

and uncompromising, and she suspected that

stiff

they were actually sharp rods of yellow-painted steel which would impale

her

if

she tried to

wheatfield.

And

introversion.

At

down. But he had

lie

said to wait at the corner of the

her doctor had told her to start seeing men, escape her

meeting with Clancy wouldn't be as boring as

least, this

the usual drive-in dates. She tossed her red corduroy coat onto the wheat

and

lay

down on

wincing

it,

at the feel of crushing wheatstalks brittle

underneath. She looked around nervously for insects, shading her eyes

summer

against the glare of the Indian

sun. Clancy

was approaching

through the apple orchard, taking bites from a bruised yellow apple.

Clancy couldn't be

He

name, she thought.

stood over her, tossed aside the apple, his silhouette blotting the

sun into a halo. "I

his real

He just stood there, watching,

knew you'd come," he

said in a

trying to

seem

confident.

measured monotone.

"Pretty sure of yourself?" "I didn't

come

here just for myself, you know."

He sat down close to her.

"Well," she said, in a conscious effort at unnerving him, "Let's dis-

pense with ask

me

ogy.

to

The

all

game

the

meet you

grass

"You're kinda

in a

high,

is .

.

playing

."

She removed, with

and get down

rimalistic

a neat pile and waited for

A lies,

didn't

is

around."

cleared his throat. "Well, that's fine with me."

aplomb, her purple wool

pink blouse, leaving only pink see-through

rees.

You

secluded place for a discussion about psychol-

and no one

He

to brass tacks.

him

to

remove

briefs.

his blue

She

laid

skirt

and

light

her clothes in

workshirt and dunga-

She closed her eyes and daydreamed: neatly furnished

room, with couches,

and pre-Raphaelite

prints. In

easy-chairs, coffee tables, doi-

one corner a very average-looking man

Really, Really, Really, Really,

Weird Stories

John Shirley

Cold Feet

of middle age in a dark business pletely

stood perfectly

suit

cherubic buder in coat and tails—entered,

dusted

still.

He

was com-

man-a chubby and humming to himself. He

unmoving, unblinking, unbreathing. Another

all

the furniture with a large feather duster.

man

the immobile

as

began to dust the

though he were a

right arm.

man. But

strips

brushing.

The white was

suit

He

then approached

of ornamental armor and

There was no response from the frozen

of white were produced in the wake of the buder's

man

the shirt under the coat of the

being

dusted. In a few minutes the coat and trousers had completely vanished,

having been brushed away by the feather duster wall. The butler continued

ward calm

as the shirt

matter-of-factly,

The

breaching none of his out-

heaping gray particles between

and epidermis. Brushing

his hair

back, peeling

him

into dust

his polished

moved or changed

expression). Whistling

removed the second

in

equanimous

candy-stripe away, the buder left an

man (who

oozing red surface on every inch of the frozen

the buder

fell

butler raised the cocktail duster to the stationary man's

head and dusted away spirals, front to

paint darkening a

and underwear of the stationary man

at the lightest feather touch,

black shoes.

like

"It's

layer of flesh

a

Long Way To

still

hadn't

Tipperary,"

under the outer

skin, leav-

membrane with the tendons and muscles The buder dusted inexorably through tissues of crimson dampness dovm to fat and flesh. He exposed underlayers of veins and cartilage without inflicting damage on them when brushing the layer directly above. He chafed down to the muscles and glands,

ing a filmy blue transparent clearly outlined

underneath

it.

and veins which hung loosely from the skeleton like baubles on a Christmas tree. Though the heart was not beating, nor the lungs filling, the organs seemed soft and fresh as if premelting

down

served in the

The

buder,

to primary organs

amber of an

still

instant's hiatus

between beats of metabolism.

whistling and stepping carefully around the multicolored

heaps of dust on the

floor, said to himself, "Tsk,

I

should have put

down

some newspapers."

He brushed away layer after layer until only the skeleton remained. He took out a rag and applied furniture

polish, shining the

bones for some

minutes.

The

sunlight

story like light

eyes

and saw

danced on

seemed

to

want

from a movie that Clancy

to pierce her eyelids, insistently telling a

theater's projection booth.

still

wore

his pants.

She opened her

A

peculiar expression

He

arrested her fingers

his thin nervous face.

She reached casual fingers to unzip

his jeans.

with his sweaty palm.

Really, Really, Really, Really,

Weird Stories

317

3i8

John Shirley

Cold Feet "What's wrong?" She asked

"No.

name

is

I

should

Avram.

tell

And

irritably,

"Getting cold feet?"

you though, Clanq^'s not

my

real

name.

My

real

I'm not here for dreams."

She reached back to brace herself against the ground; and gasped. She

had stabbed her hand on a wheat

was

flecking

from

its

wiry

stalk. Stiff

and

metallic, yellow paint

shaft.

Really, Really, Really, Really,

Weird Stories

The Peculiar Happiness OF Professor Cort

was three minutes before the lAMton explosion, and Professor Brian Cort was finding it difficult to concentrate. It

Cort was a

tall,

neath

stooped, balding

He wore

foggy gray eyes.

Cort's wife

with worry

the traditional white lab

the traditional rumpled

it

man

was bothering him

around

lines

his

smock and under-

suit.

that day; his wife bothered

him the way

other people were bothered by rheumatism or migraines. Cort was in his lab at

Pennyworth College;

his wife

was

at

home, probably

totting

up a

new list of grievances. But Cort felt as if an imp-sized ghost of Betty were on

sitting

his shoulder, fussing into his ear. Sneering.

harangue that morning had been so piquant, so barbed, he

Betty's

could hear

and

chrome and

overlit, ticle

it still,

it

was maddeningly

white-tile

distracting as

lab— to concentrate on adjusting the par-

gun.

At a minute and a

half before the explosion

ing,

Cort was wondering why he stayed with

ery?

Maybe he

He the

he strove—In the

deserved

he didn't

his wife.

know was com-

Why cultivate mis-

it.

accessed the particle-gun gradiation program, absently tapped out

first

few designations;

sighing, recalling

what his wife had

said to

him

that morning.

"What

I

sor in the

why

I

don't understand. Professor-' she'd said, calling

most

biting

remain with a

part of

and

script.

ignores

My

my

emotional needs.

ticle

gun

to

Maybe

it's

therapist says-"

remembered what her therapist said, Cort series of digits, programming the parwrong the tapped out an excess of both tangency and acceleration.

Gritting his teeth as he distractedly

Profes-

skeptical of her repertoire of nasty tones, "is

man who

my transactional

him

In consequence: the explosion.

Really, Really, Really, Really,

Weird Stories

320

The Peculiar Happiness of Professor Cort It

was a strange explosion, because

did

it

John Shirley no

damage. Nothing

real

broken, or burned. Cort simply heard a sort of high-pitched screeeeeeee, a spiteful heat and a malicious

felt

A profound

go through him. Saw only

chill

and a peacock one. More colors than were

light,

light.

perceiv-

able engorged the outpouring of light, that brilliant explosion.

For a

minute

full

Cort was

after the explosion,

blind.

He saw

only a

sort of light-infused Jackson Pollock painting wherever he looked.

then the

and contours of the room leached back

lines

looking gray and black in contrast to the asserting themselves,

filter

and the dazzle faded.

And

into the painting,

of unbridled color, finally

He looked down at himself—

he was unhurt, unchanged. But the room had been materially

was seeing some

sort of after-image,

nerve-ends. But no, he realized: this objectively. Everything

crusted nail

The

altered.

was crusted

At

some

Cort thought he

first,

distortion of

was the way

damaged

things looked now,

in iridescent crystal. Like a zircon-

file.

iridescence

On

was everywhere.

the lab tables, the instrument

on computer consoles and spectrographic analyzers and the And on windows, ceilings, floors. He was inside a gem-walled box. It was like some variant of an Egyptian treasure tomb—jeweled renderings of what the dead physicist will need in panels;

other arcana of a particle physicist.

the next world.

His mind his

reeling,

Cort

tried to grasp

mental effort were the stimulus, the

Now, slid,

what had happened—and,

room changed

overlapped, folded symmetrically into

He

crust.

diagrams

.

He

on lAMtons. before,

if

every surface crawled with pictures. Kaleidoscoping imagery that

glimmering tions,

as

again.

.

.

saw

itself,

and recognized

it all

as material

from

his

like.

Not

the stuff ... a simple-minded

He saw

.

.

ovm research

like this.

dismaying experience with lysergic acid

think of Susan Pritchett, the dizzy, bleached blonde

than Betty

his

thought: Hallucinations. But he'd taken LSD, once, years

and he knew what hallucinations were

Remembering

appearing within the

photos of fog chamber events, equa-

charts,

girl,

who had

but one who'd have

made him him

given

made him

happier

.

Susan Pritchett walking toward him, out of the

smiled—but then

Betty's

image materialized, and warped to encompass

Susan, devouring her; Betty

Cort closed

his eyes

became an

and thought:

attacking antibody.

Sister

Mary Jane. He opened

eyes and saw, within the wall like a penguin locked in amber, the

who'd courageously

He

wall.

tried to teach

him

his

nun

to play piano, thirty years before.

Really, Really, Really, Really,

Weird Stories

John Shirley "Oh, the

I

see,"

The Peculiar Happiness of Professor Cort Cort said to himself.

open door leading out of the

He

turned away and walked toward

keep

lab, trying to

his eyes

focused on

that door, not wanting to see his unexpurgated free-association pro-

jected

on the

walls, the ceiling, the floor

.

.

.

He stepped through the door, blinking, into the April sunshine, and looked out at the park-like grounds of Pennyworth College. "Oh, no," he

Oh,

yes:

And now, ery. It

yet

Now, was

it

as

too.

things began to reshape physically.

early

Sunday morning. The campus was almost deserted. And

was thronged. To

it

example, was the burning bush.

his right, for

"That expression of mawkish, gaping surprise on your burning bush

said, as

"is

unbecoming

burning bush was waist-high, with dark green its

for a

is

its

all. I

age."

The

nondescript bush

burned but was not

Cecil B. DeMille voice,

really inappropriate, Cort.

area with lAMtons, after

Layman: 'lAMtons

in

man your

foliage; a

fluttery sheath of bright red flame. It

consumed. The burning bush went on,

"And your confusion

face, Cort," the

Cort stepped onto the blacktop walkway that led

across the lawns to the street,

except for

said.

The crystalline crust; the cinematic collaging. he watched, it became more than projected mental imag-

was here

You've irradiated the

quote from your lAMtons Defined for the

are a hypothetical subatomic or superatomic particle.

Essentially, the essence

of awareness ... the particles

work in

collabora-

tion with the inherent electrochemical actions of the brain to produce a psychically holographic entity, the Self; real awareness

is

impossible with-

out them; they are our link to the Universe's reservoir of collective awareness;

lAMtons, further, act as

reflective mirrors for the informational in-

put of the perceptual organs—'"

The bush paused

to clear a throat

it

didn't have. "In

my

case, the in-

tense, localized concentration of lAMtons released by the explosion

dently induced in

me—and

in other plants

psycho-reactive state, the particles of

evi-

and substances hereabouts—

raw awareness

reacting with a kind

of psychological echo to the electromagnetic influence of your brain,

drawing on the paradigms of your subconscious to—"

Cort had ceased to

listen:

he was staring

at the large abstract sculpture

that stood a few paces from the burning bush.

The

sculpture

had always

struck Cort as an idealization of vagueness rendered in marble, suggesting at times a cloud solidified in the act of changing shape; at other times,

when

the light was different,

it

might have been a rendering of a

multiple amputee break-dancing. Today, irradiated and interpenetrated

with LAMtons, the sculpture's knobs and whoris and flowing contours

Really, Really, Really, Really,

Weird Stories

321

322

The Peculiar Happiness of Professor Cort reacted to Cort's

mind by writhing

new

into

John Shirley configurations.

becoming more

topography divided and subdivided,

abstract

Its

intricate, re-sculpt-

ing into shapes that emanated a sinister familiarity.

He

He

stepped onto the grass and crossed to the sculpture.

himself staring at

it

And on TV,

screen.

from two as

feet away, looking into

it is if it

found

TV

were a

were, was his least favorite show: Cort, the Boy.

it

Within the sculpture was a

vivid,

three-dimensional moving image of

the precocious Brian Cort at seven years old, sitting in his room, turning the pages of a

book

written for twelve-year-olds, and looking bored.

Looking bored and pale and neurasthenic. And

lonely.

A voice from the real world. Cort turned away from the image

"Cort!"

in the sculpture, to see

Bucky Mackenzie standing on the tarmac,

blink-

ing at the burning bush and the image-rippling sculpture. "So you see

He was

too?" Cort said.

afflicted

still

the clarity of his perceptions, "I

do

all

with a nagging doubt

it

that, despite

of this was hallucination.

indeed," Bucky said breathily. "Lord!"

"Lord?

Not

this time," the

burning bush

said.

"I'm dreaming," Bucky said. Bucky was the head of the physics depart-

ment;

just

over forty, he was slender but, unlike Cort, his slenderness was

down

compact, neatly proportional. His close-cut black hair was teased into short, spiky bangs, a style intended to risky.

immaculately manicured, and faddishly

Bucky was a climber, a glad-hander, a

fit.

first

to

He was scrupulously tanned,

and could be counted on

blame

if

a project

that

results that

something

.

has,

guarded

his

ovm

flank

up so there was someone

else

.

and back

to the shifting shapes in the sculpture

Bucky murmured

had the

man who

to set things

went awry.

Looking from Cort again,

be youngishly hip without being

.

ah

absently, "I

that you'd

was

hoped

coming over

just

for and,

ah ...

it

to see

if

you

would appear

." .

.

now replaying with

Noting that the sculpture was

embarrassing exacti-

tude a certain very familiar sexual fantasy, Cort stepped between the sculpture

presence

and Bucky and

said,

will prejudice the,

uh

"I'm conducting an experiment and our .

.

."

His voice

the water sprinklers. Bucky was staring at

The up,

sprinklers

on

he stared

at

too.

the other side of the walk had automatically started

and were spraying the

water was no longer

trailed off as

them

lawn

.

but the

sprinkler's outpour,

and the

crystal-crusted grass of the

.

.

itself.

Bucky was standing nearer than Cort to the

up-fanning water, evidently affected by the ambient field given off by the

lAMton concentration, was

arcing higher, warping

itself

Really, Really, Really, Really,

to

conform

to

Weird Stories

The Peculiar Happiness of Professor Cort

John Shirley

some emanation of Bucky's unconscious. As if shaped on a lathe spun into a translucent

replica of what

Cort thought

at first

the water

was a

ten-foot-

high bowling trophy and then perceived to be a giant version of the

Pursbinder

Award

for Bccellence in the

Progress.

was the

figure of Broderick Pursbinder holding a globe out in

It

Encouragement of

Scientific

DNA molecules and atom-symbols a clumsy representation of the Wodd Of Science.

front of him, the globe configured with

and EEC Bucky,

lines,

of course, had been angling for the Pursbinder, having

"shepherded," to use his

which the

later

work

came

to

ovm modest

be regarded

as "seminal."

come up with

on, nor had he

expression, a

the

None

number of

studies

of which he'd done

initial ideas.

But he'd swoing

the grants for them. His success rate in swinging grants was Bucky's equivalent of a record-breaking

home run

average.

Bucky took a mesmerized step toward the high Pursbinder award—it looked rather

with an expression on his face that

like

rippling, aqueous, ten-foot-

an unstable

made Cort

ice sculpture—

think of John the Baptist

experiencing a vision of Paradise.

So see

it's

not

just

what Bucky

me, Cort thought. Other people see them too. And

I

sees.

He turned back to the marble abstract, was relieved to see the image had until he was what it had shifted to shifted. He was relieved, that is,

That day his

.

grade school; the crust of iridescence gave depth,

of real

life

to the figures so that, after a

once more,

When you're

startling

moment, Cort

semblance

forgot he

was

was engrossed in remembering. He was stuffy office on a wet October morning

He

watching a simulation. there,

.

in the principal's office. Himself, his mother, the principal at

in that

.

eight years old,

wet

is

wet; scary

is

scary.

.

.

Outside the school

dovm the window behind Mr. it was wet; raindrops made Jameson, so it looked like a herd of snails had stampeded down the glass. Inside the room it was scary, because Brian Cort was in trouble. leaden patterns

Brian and his mother sat to the right of the door; across from them

Mr. Jameson

sat

behind

his desk, his big, thick, hairy-knuckled

hands

on the desk's flawless glass. Brian was sitting on an orange plastic chair. He was gripping the plastic seat to either side of his Wrangler jeans, rubbing his thumbs on the almost slimy plastic, and he was staring at Mr. Jameson's forehead. If you stared at the duck-shaped mole on Mr. clasped

Jameson's forehead, you could give the impression you were looking attentively at him, without really having to look him in the face. Jameson's wide, froggish face was

slightly

cockeyed; one of his eyes was

Really, Really, Really, Really,

Weird Stories

glass.

He

323

324

The Peculiar Happiness of Professor Cort

John Shirley

maintained a look of patronizing amusement,

my

lily

pad

Cort—Brian here has been

frog of his face, as he said, "A4rs.

and

the

like

for the

my

delight

disappointment both. He's two grades ahead of his peers, and

on top of his classes, but sometimes—it's kinda funny—it's like the bottom will drop right out of his motivation, and he'll do just nothing for two weeks at a time—" he's

still

right

"Brian," his

mother

His mother was

an almost

tall

"what have you got to say to that?"

said sharply,

and

birdlike,

her neck too long, her

lips

pressed into

her mouth; those wing-frame glasses making

invisible line in

her small, bitter green eyes weirdly malevolent. She wore a crisp gray kept her olive purse clenched in her

dress-suit;

She leaned forward

lap.

toward Brian over the purse, her knuckles white on looked

him.

at

He

imagined her turning into a bird

its .

.

brass jaws as she .

Professor Cort, staring into the sculpmre's animations,

ment of the

cartoon-like sardonicism of the

saw a

reenact-

young Brian Cort's imagina-

His mother was transforming, the purse melding to her neck to

tion.

become

part of a buzzard's wattles, her shoulders narrowing, arms grow-

ing feathers, becoming wings, chin sinking into her face, her small sharp

nose lengthening, getting sharper, harder, becoming a beak, her gray

becoming

dirty gray

plumage

.

.

.

crack the boy's head, to redden her beak with his brains

Fighting nausea, Cort looked self,

trying to shiver the

mind

off

suit

the mother-bird darting her beak to

He

.

.

He

shook him-

watched Bucky

to take his

away from the sculpmre.

image loose.

.

it.

Bucky was dancing with a crowd of young, semi-transparent

co-

Young coeds are always semi-transparent in a way, but these were girls made of flowing water contained, now, in sheaths of crystal iridescence. They were life-sized, and nude, and their various parts were deeds.

tailed in frothy bubbles;

down

their

backs

water ran out of the back of their heads and

like long,

flowing silvery-blue hair

tures of nubility, impossibly

buxom

.

.

.

.

.

.

They were

carica-

They were dancing with Bucky

around the giant Pursbinder award; Bucky was stripping off

his shirt as

he pranced, dancing to a sort of libidinous perversion of Mozart that

seemed

to emit

from the giant award.

Bucky looked entranced, Cort noted. More than entranced, he looked positively

drugged.

Cort suspected that Bucky's immersion

lAMtons—now and then he made a grab right

for a water

through her—was sticking lAMtons into

in

the

baby and splashed

his bioelectric field,

Really, Really, Really, Really,

where-

Weird Stories

The Peculiar Happiness of Professor Cort

John Shirley

upon they went, quite literally, right to his head. It may yet happen to me, Cort thought. I'd best get well away from

memory sculpture,

But he turned back to the

found himself gazing

The young

once more

it

swer

his

Brian f

"Um, Mom, like

was going

me

stay

up

to

see,

to

uh

fall

.

.

.

those times

asleep

all

.

and

What do you have

I

couldn't

work I just got tired, felt I mean you make

mean, dammit Mrs. Cort—if you'll

so darn

much

.

.

to see

that's just the

him waste

well, in order to

.

it—"

fulfill all

that

harder,

and a

litde

unpleasant fact of the matter.

What

have

Mrs. Cort, he's got to push himself a

and

ex-

potential—"

"Oh dear, I know, Mr. Jameson—it's sad "I mean he's basically a good boy but often,

to say to

the time or something.

rattling on, "I

my lingo—this boy has

you got to

.

smdy so—"

But Jameson was

more

her

invisibly tugged,

.

.

mother's acid-dripping question.

potential,

if

Brian Cort, sitting in the principal's office, was trying to an-

that,

cuse

into

as

little

eh?"

say, Brian,

"Uh, well, the problem is—" think he understands, Mrs. Cort, don't you?"

"I

"I certainly

a glare, but little

secret,

me

was,

his

own

hope

so."

somehow

She gave Brian a look that was too reserved to be cut

it

Mr. Jameson.

"Make

When

sure Brian

sake. That's

all I

Even Jameson looked a

more deeply than one.

works hard

ask

"I'll let

you

his father died, the last thing

on a

in

he said to

be everything he can be— for

to

." .

.

little

embarrassed hearing

this. It

was too

obvi-

ously a fabrication.

Brian was certain his father had never said anything of the didn't matter.

His mother made him

feel as

if Dad had

said

sort.

But

it

it.

Professor Cort took a step backward from the sculpture, blinking,

He

breathing hard.

felt

strange. Like his skull

had gone

soft as the skin

over Jell-O. Like the blood in his brain had gone ice cold.

Something drew

his attention to the grass at his feet.

lAMton

encrusted with

began to rearrange

itself

iridescence,

into

words

and

it

The

grass

was

reacted to his cognizance,

eight inches high:

CORT, PSYCHIC

PARADIGM SEQUENCE ENGAGED: LOOK AGAIN.

He him.

snorted in disbelief and

The

grass

was

But he looked

telling

irritation.

him what

the grass was talking to

to do.

at the sculpture again.

Really, Really, Really, Really,

Now

Something kept pulling him back

Weird Stories

325

326

The Peculiar Happiness of Professor Cort to

it

.

.

.

Some

hospital,

mind nagged, "For Heaven's

part of his

sake, Cort, get to a

have yourself checked out for radiation burns, arrange to get the

lAMton

lab's

John Shirley

irradiated material analyzed—it could

advance your career! Act responsibly!

be

invaluable!

Look away from

But he couldn't look away. Seeing himself as a boy gripped him.

was

It

as

if it

some mental

closed

rooted to the spot by a kind of psychological

It

could

the sculpturer .

.

electricity.

the sight

.

and he was

circuit,

And

he gazed

as

gazed into it— the configurations shifted again.

at the sculpture—no,

He

saw and remembered. Brian was

tired.

But he

felt

good.

old today, and he'd aced the he'd stayed up stay

up and

all

It

trig

was

his birthday,

study, but

Mom had been adamant.

Winter had sealed Cincinnati under three squeaked through the

muddy

wooden

small, rickety

feet of

snow.

The

late af-

crust. Brian's black

rubber boots

up the

drive of the

rut as he turned

house, thinking. Today's

my

birthday

and

I

tests.

Fifteen years old today, for half a

and already a senior

in high school.

buy a used it

He was up

dozen scholarships. Mr. Greensburg, the boy's counselor, had

Maybe

get a job,

But today was

his birth-

suggested Brian take a year off before going to college.

God

fifteen years

night studying for. Probably hadn't been necessary to

ternoon sunlight sparkled the snow's

aced the

he was

and Introduction to Philosophy tests

car,

"enjoy being a teenager."

sounded good.

day, today he'd

done

Mom wouldn't like

well.

it.

She wouldn't be able to say no.

The warmth of the kitchen tingled his nose and ears as he came in the back door. The room smelled Hke mentholated tobacco. Mom was sitting in the small breakfast nook, smoking, talking on the red wallphone. She put her hand over the mouthpiece and shot him one of Those Looks. "Brian you're tracking slush

on

all

over

the back porch. For such a smart

Sometimes

He

I

looked

think you're an idiot savant." at her,

But as he took over:

Sometimes

Sometimes

I

I

then at his boots. Shrug

his

how well

think you're

"Okay,

still

on

it

off,

Brian.

boots off on the back porch, he heard over and

an

think you're

kitchen, though, there

mother was

my floor. Take your boots off

boy you can be so thoughdess.

an

idiot savant.

idiot

.

.

No humor in

.When he came back

was a gift-wrapped box on the wooden

the phone.

He

her voice. into the

table.

His

sat at the table, waiting to tell

her

the tests had gone. I'll

see that he's there, Horace. Six o'clock sharp!

Really, Really, Really, Really,

No,

he's not

Weird Stories

The Peculiar Happiness of Professor Cort

John Shirley

he should be—but

as punctual as

make

I'll

She hung up. "That was Horace Cress

sure he gets there!"

at Cincinnati

U, he says

be no problem with your getting into school there next thinks the plan for you to go to Stanford for your Masters

She clapped her hands together once,

And

ous. Let's just

He

looked

hope you don't blow Brian,

open

it!"

did, slowly, thinking

framed "I

.

.

the ticket."

announced

that

Vm

finalit}^.

pleased but dubi-

it.

Rolling her eyes.

about the

new

shoes he had were too small and they were at school

way

to say,

is

there'll

and he

at the gift.

"Go ahead,

He

in a

seemed

smiled, the smile that always

fall,

.

shoes he'd hinted about; the falling apart,

embarrassing him

and the package came apart and— three pamphlets, and a

certificate.

The framed

thought you'd

like to

have

certificate

that.

was

his father's

Give you a

little

Master degree.

incentive."

The pamphlets were things like, Your Career in Research Chemistry! "There's good money to be made in that field, working for those big deodorant corporations, Brian. Judy Clapper's brother-in-law Tony works

And

at Glass Bell Toiletries.

He

helped invent Pore-Plug, you know.

Glass Bell's not even one of the big companies, and he makes—"

Mom,

"Jeez,

don't wanta spend

I

my life making

"Pore-Plug has been very good to Tony.

If

deodorant!"

you—"

Desperately changing the subject, Brian put

"Mom—don't you want

in,

know how I did on my term tests?" "I know how you did. I called your teachers. You want you to know I'm very disappointed in you."

to

I

He

stared at her,

She went on,

"I

lege.

You could

"Mom, "What "I

good

I

spoke to Mrs. Gilmore and she says you take no

on your record

join

inter-

you should get involved, those

when you're

looking for a job after

col-

some school clubs—"

don't have time, I'm taking extra classes-"

else

have you got to do with your spare-"

don't have any spare time!

had some-but

Mom,

on both. But

numbed.

est in extra-curricular activities. Brian,

things look

got A's

I

want

And

Mr. Greenburg suggested

I

don't

Mom,

to find out. I

know what

jeez,

I

money

do

to

from school

if I .

.

.

after

I

buy a car and maybe,

I

take a year off

graduate and, uh, get a job and use the

else I'd

need some time to

don't know, go out or—" "I can't

believe

it.

believe you'd All

do

that,"

Her

dangerously-flat voice. "I can't

our phns-phhbt! You'd do that to your mother-to your

fatherf"

Really, Really, Really, Really,

Weird Stories

327

328

The Peculiar Happiness of Professor Cort "Mom,

it

lity.

"I just

.

.

He knew, He'd go

to

my GPA—

wouldn't hurt

"I really can't believe .

can't

it."

Shaking her head with exa^erated incredu-

believe

.

.

.

then, that

it

summer school of some kind

He saw a vista

She stared Stop

it,

"My God—you're

him.

at

after high school, to "give

it.

him

crying!

At

.

.

.

fifteen!"

he told himself. Stop crying.

She went

pitilessly

on. "I mean,

Cort, the adult,

had

not enough that you don't have the

it's

in extra-curriculars,

Your father would be

you have

to

be a cry-baby

just plain disgusted."

to look

away from the

scene.

The lawns had humped up and reshaped themselves saw. They'd disgorged rock

and

and agate

soil

into a sort of instant alloy of simulated metal, life-sized

let

through into college. At fifteen

straight

of drudgery opening up before him

gumption to get involved too.

it."

wasn't going to happen. She just wouldn't

an edge," and then to college, years old.

John Shirley

that'd

for Bucky,

Cort

melded together

and formed

itself

into the

shape of a Lincoln Continental. The earthen luxury car carried

Bucky around and around the giant Pursbinder trophy, and around the quivering translucent

girls,

with a kind of rimalistic redundancy; minia-

mre mansions grew up from the ground, formed of the local silicon, into fantastic shapes somewhere between miniature golf casdes and Bucky's fantasy of the perfect

A

home

.

.

.

couple of students had discovered the

lAMton

concentration, one

of them screaming in horror as the earth erupted his phobia—which he'd just

been trying

made

legs in a

The

to

come

with in the biology

to terms

of roots and silicon, rats the

Disneyesque square dance

size

girl

.

.

lab:

of dogs, capering

on

white their

rats

hind

.

smdent with him was backing away from an enormous baby, a

house-sized baby of yellow

clay.

a gardener's wheelbarrow so

it

The

elephantine infant playfully slapped

arced up, over the roof of the lab and

struck a chimney with a lovely clang, showering sparks and bricks; the

baby giggled earthshakingly. Cort closed

his eyes,

took a

series of

deep breaths, and once more

heard the nagging disembodied voice, "Cort! Get to work on

The

explosion could be a breakthrough!

playing mind-games with your memory.^

But

after a

moment he found

this thing!

Why are you wasting your Get back

time

to work!"

himself looking at the living sculpture

once more.

Saw

himself within

it:

as a

young man

at his

mother's funeral.

Really, Really, Really, Really,

Weird Stories

John Shirley Saw

The Peculiar Happiness of Professor Cort on

the expression

can do what

his face

and knew what he'd been

thinking: /

now.

I want,

Then came the wince of guilt. How can you be glad she's dead^ Your would be disgusted. Telling himself. There's no reason I

father

.

.

.

should feel guilty. I'm not glad she's dead. But since she cer came along well it's not as if I gave her cancer .

.

Reply: But she implied

made

is,

since the can-

.

her prone to

it

my fault,

was

that all her

worrying about me

it.

Around and around,

guilt

and resentment

like

snakes devouring one

another and endlessly regenerating and devouring again.

Cort looked away from the

what

I

He at

chemlab position

didn't take the

would

give

Within the

and he pursued that

in research:

to

do one

inter-

alive,

whispering to him

Winslow Garland's

.

.

taking

softly

fessors, assistants, deans, a

living

three dimensional shape,

party. Celebrating the grant for the

Bach playing

big clamshell-shaped

on

.

iaturized particle accelerator. Garland's

evening.

Pennyworth College.

contoured stumpy torso of marble, the

softly

filling his eyes,

mer

went on

defiance of his mother's dying wish. Ending up at the one place

hieroglyphs were again coming

Dr.

I

at Glass Bell Toiletries or the

interested in particle physics,

him a free hand Where he met Betty.

that

But

wanted.

Dow. He was

est, in

sculpture, thinking:

shabby

little

from the wheezing

new super-min-

backyard, that sum-

stereo;

groups of pro-

few students most of them clumped near the

bowl of cloying wine punch on the checkercloth-cov-

ered cardtable; chatting, drinking the awful punch. Betty was helping Mrs.

Garland

who was

lay

out fresh canapes. But

He'd seen Betty watching him,

on him. He could

she'd decided

him

at the party, hadn't

small talk around

Go

now and

then she glanced up at Cort,

standing alone at the rose-twined back fence.

him

wound

calculating

feel

it,

and predatory. Somehow

though she hadn't said much to

her coils of precious, dryly flirtatious

this time.

on, he told himself. Talk to her. You're lonely. She's interested.

You're a research prof at a minor college and you can't expect starlets or

even sex-hungry coeds to

anyone more Replying

attractive

to:

But

I

come

nuzzling up to you.

You

can't

hope

for

than Betty.

tried

it,

pratdes, she pretends to an

dated her twice and she annoys me. She

I

interest in physics she doesn't have, she

Really, Really, Really, Really,

Weird Stories

329

330

The Peculiar Happiness of Professor Cort

John Shirley

doesn't like the opera, she doesn't like the theater only because

go

to

sit

in

them

see

means things

"why pay

an uncomfortable seat and watch those things when you can

free

she'll

on

be

public television?" She's tight with her

which means

get married,

I

with mine. She's

tight

can

she'll

feel

be

selfish

and

it,

I

about

all

money which

about a thousand

selfish

little

the big things. She wants to

my

don't want to spend

life

with some-

one who annoys me. She was coming over to

Cort thinking: This her. She'll leave

me

talk to him.

my

is

alone.

these people don't like

But that voice again,

chance to put an end to It

Looking

at the miniature

.

.

It

does matter. Her uncle if

is

you married

Joshua

her.

Do

.

re-enactment in the sculpture, Cort shuddered,

seeing something jarringly out of place in Impossibly, his

simply snub

anyway.

him:

Pennyworth. You'd be advancing your career

something right for once

I'll

doesn't matter what she says about me,

me much telling

it,

mother was

it.

there, at Professor Garland's part/. Years

after she'd died.

Mother was standing beside the image of Cort at the party. No, she was standing in him. Half in, half out of him, almost like a Siamese twin. Her image was semi-transparent; his was solid. She wasn't there, really— but the lAMtons were showing him the psychological reality, this time.

And when he

walked, he walked strangely— "the Cort shuffle," he'd

overheard one of the students calling

it.

He

saw now

oddly because his mother was merged into his

And

way.

beak into

you

leg.

that he walked

Was

tugging

it

her

she was bent over him, her face gone birdlike as she dug her his ear

and whispered, "Don't be an

idiot. Betty's perfect for

." .

.

He knew the voice

now. The voice that had

said,

Do something right

for once. His mother's voice.

She looked out of the sculpture

at

cobbled grotesquely onto the miniature, at

him. His mother in miniature, earlier Cort.

Mother, gazing out

him with contempt.

Cort turned away from the sculpture. Stomach churning, he lurched across the grass to walk, looked around, trying to re-orient himself.

Bucky had collapsed with exhaustion, was his

lAMton constructions had degenerated

geometrical cut-outs that took

lying asleep

on

the grass;

into fuzzy-edged abstracts,

on anthropomorphic shape from time

Really, Really, Really, Really,

to

Weird Stories

The Peculiar Happiness of Professor Cort

John Shirley time, then

fell

back into component geometry; they shimmered

in

and

of children had run out onto the lAMton zone and were

gid-

out of free-associative definition, reflecting his dreams.

A group dily

helping the Coyote chase the Roadrunner, the figures three-dimen-

sional

and

child-sized

and

giving every appearance of being alive; the

children laughed every time the Roadrunner

Bunny looked on, his rifle, looking

went

heep-beepl.

around tensely for some

real action.

Cort thought: Vd better get out of here before I get caught up thing I can't get out of .

He moved

down

off

The

stopped, staring. familiarity.

.

the path between a

it

rearranged and recolored

reproduction of his wife Betty.

and shadows conspired

to

"You

said,

become

eyes.

He

I

felt

can

feel

Betty's sulky lips;

holly

through her nose, as always: .

green-furred with buds, whipping

tree,

itself

".

.

.if

and the

.

.

its

into a likeness of his mother.

your father was

and, "I'm very disappointed in you

Betty

bush bent over

me anyway and now and oh yes, I know you don't

His mother was traced in the sky with a willow-twig

.

nose— so Hke

beak-like

The

the requisite stab of guilt—and then heard another furious rus-

long, drooping branches about, shaping

."

becoming a

you not caring—"

turned to see a willow

tling,

itself,

me, but you married

didn't love

have to suffer because of your hypocrisy,

me,

small trees—and

A Betty twenty-eight feet tall.

form her

Mother's— and her sunken, accusatory

I

row of

were writhing, re-shaping with nightmarish

Berries in the holly bush rearranged to

love

some-

A squat holly tree was bulging here, contracting there, rustling

pointillistic

him and

in

.

trees

with the movement as

leaves

Bugs

GI Joe, squatting besides Bugs, cleaned

jeering, while

."

alive

filigree,

droning

he'd be disgusted

and on, and on.

Mommy Dearest

droning on the other,

grass rustling, shifting, the blades bending

and bunching to form

yammering on one

side.

two-foot high letters in green: lAM CORT AND lAbA DISAPPOINTING MM NOT UKE MY FATHER ... lAM A BAD HUSBAND ZAM A FAILURE, 1AM A LOSER ... As the sidewalk before him humped up, buckling, .

.

.

.

.

L\Mton-impregnated concrete that should have cracked, instead going rubbery, elastically bulging, reddening, pulsing ... a great red boil waisthigh, swelling

on

the sidewalk before him; splitting open, glutinously

erupting a slime-coated, inchoate

human figure emerging from it as if from

a soft egg: Cort himself, but a Cort deformed, a dwarfish parody, rigid mask of self-pity; its hunched back striped with welts.

Cort saw

yond

it

it

for

what

it

was: his

own

he saw the ground rippling

Really, Really, Really, Really,

guilt-deformed self-image.

as the roots of the willow

Weird Stories

its

face a

And

tree

be-

nosed

331

332

The Peculiar Happiness of Professor Cort like

enormous earthworms across the

grass,

John Shirley

under the walk, through the

ground to the holly tree, to "Betty," to entwine the trunk of the Bettyshaped

tree.

And he saw

the roots of the holly tree elongating, stretching

to entwine the base of the willow;

and he saw

that the wife-tree

and the

mother-tree were bent over the twisted image of himself, incanting at

and he saw deforming Seeing

him

mind

mother she was It

and

as his

that his

.

repulsively toad-like

mother had planted

.

in

him had pushed him

into

mold him. He walked

it.

The

And exposed

as absurd

it

lost all its

past himself, past his guilt-ridden

self,

behind.

Light as a soap bubble, he could laugh at the wasted years. great,

knew

around with him had recognized Betty for what

horribly, laughably absurd.

left it

.

.

.

to

.

mother had. Because the nagging, deriding part of

that he carried

was

power

becoming more

enacted, he knew: He'd married Betty because he

all this

it,

reacted to their accusations, their condemnations, by

it

further,

she'd treat his

that

shuddery wave of sheer

relief

And

a

swept him almost running out of the

campus, past the area of lAMton impregnation—which was already beginning to disperse with entropy. He'd think about the scientific implications of

all

finding a

the

first

And

this later. First,

new place

he had to get

to live— a place

his life in order.

where he'd

live

Beginning with

alone, really alone, for

time.

as

he passed a church on that Sunday afternoon, the people

ing for services

stared

at

arriv-

him—and wondered why he looked

so

goddamned happy.

Really, Really, Really, Really,

Weird Stories

Tahiti in Terms of Squares

Now: I'm going

Go

to

tell

you something-

right ahead. Parent paid for

—and you'd

better

you'll

begin to see

things

work

it,

it,

not me, so talk away.

strict attention. First

I'll tell it

to you, then

way

manifesting before you. Because that's the

here.

Okay. I'm Listening

be paying

listening.

good enough.

isn't

If

you want

you must

to see

give

me your

complete attention. Concentration. All right! I'm paying attention.

Good. This concerns

Tahiti.

offer a cinematic exegesis in arbitrarily

I

selected stages of that continuum.

Which continuum? That one

.

.

.

over there.

Oh, okay. I'm with you— Before phlet.

I

coming

I

begin, read off the pertinent points of the introductory

want

to

here.

Why

be

The Between?

Ummm

away.

.

.

I

.

utterly assured

the Between

is

you know

exactly

pam-

what we're up

to,

useful to us.

don't need to read the pamphlet. Anyhow,

what we're doing here

I

threw

it

is-

away the pamphlet^ After the agency spends invo-

Threw it awayf Threw Karmas to have those pamphlets 'grammed! I hardly think that's aDoesn't matter, I memorized it. More or less. It said this field trip will

luted

enable

me

to "attain objectivity in the antiduality perspective achieved

through the externalization of Parent thinks

Parent

is

it's

parity".

.

.

which

is

so necessary to adopt. Privately

so anti-Subjectivist. Anyhow,

it

I

said I've

one of those attimdes don't understand

why

been brought to

this

curving walls vast, clammy, pearly-white place with the two definitionless could I have a drink off your bulb? I didn't bring one. so .

.

.

Really, Really, Really, Really,

Weird Stories

Go

John Shirley

Terms OF Squares

334 Tahiti IN

why were you brought

on, go on;

Oh. So

I'll

here?

A lesson

learn something by graphic example.

the mechanics utilized in the insemination of zones of

pamphlet claimed. Something

like that. Personally,

me

sumes the whole thing will engender

in

losophy or some such nonsense

I'm dry after

.

.

.

concerning

reality.

So the

think Parent

I

as-

a reactionary Objectivist phithat ranting, can

all

I

have a drink off your bulb? Ah, thanks—

"Some such nonsense"!

Puerile half-weaned!

It is far

from nonsense.

This exercise will help to assure you never get lost while plane-sifting. In the Between

we

can objectively observe the means with which zones of

from archetypal cusps,

reality radiate

after

sphere of wavelength-specific influence

Yeah, sure.

Got

.

which everything

Got

patterned.

else in that

it?

it.

Hey—don't drink it all. You Now. Let me here it is Look—right

is

,

.

could have exchanged for your .

Come

over there.

.

this is

.

Prime

own

bulb.

A for Tahiti Continuum. Now look where I'm

a few steps this way.

pointing. See him? There.

He

glanced

watch said

at the

his left wrist. The face of the The watch had no hands or dial, noth-

watch strapped on

noiselessly: "It's time."

ing but two pale rubbery lips set into the face and he read the lips as

would a deaf person, though he wasn't

He might as well have been

deaf.

deaf because he was alone in the abode of silence and as far as he there

was no one outside of silence's abode

surely

at

all,

and even

no one would be capable of breaking in through

And he

if

knew

there were,

silence's

unspeak-

comprehend speaking except in terms of squares you'd have thought the room that contained him was about fifty feet square with three yards between floor and ceiling. No furniture.

able defenses. .

He

.

didn't

didn't

.

need

furniture,

and although he possessed a human body he

didn't sleep or rest or ingest or digest or excrete (except in the rial

terms of the squares). The palpitating

ness of his

human

excrete/excite but

frame ately

in

was ready and waiting

none of those

into the flicker

Yes,

his

I

to sweat/eat/spit/digest/

own power

.

.

.

It

had been

deliber-

between two heartbeats, between two

moved about and he had that's all

stands as an individual, except

nonmate-

the anticipatory wet-

reactions were indigenous to the time

which the body was ever-presently coded.

coded

breaths. But he

under

flesh

tissues,

if

the false impression that

you need

you want

to

it

was

to know about him, as he know what he looked like.

rather would.

He

had an average

era, Tahiti

continuum; he

Really, Really, Really, Really,

Weird Stories

Oh. You would? Troublesome of you. But

all right.

man's body, for the middle twentieth cenmry

John Shirley

Tahiti in Terms of Squares

was

English, Caucasian, six foot

and

extra-soft

brown

and one hundred

strange to the biological refractions patterned after

and head were

that of an infant of three weeks,

and inchoate, vague

sapiens baby, soft

When

his

watch told him

was time which

it

it

periodically

did—

can see him! Over against that curving wall, by aU those checker-things in—

Why else would I be explicating him? Verbal description

Obviously, idiot. is

homo

a baby though the volume of the head was pro-

eyebrows?

None. I

would have looked him because his face

body

portionate to his

No

like

pounds, sparse

sixty

watery-blue eyes. But he

hair,

the token for this vending machine.

restrict

As you can

see,

he

is

and was

...

I'll

my narrative to past tense because past tense here sparks the present

tense there, which

Or maybe

the apropos mechanics of that locale—

is

you're just nostalgic and sentimental.

Shut up and

Now: He was alerted by the watch to the necessity squares. You can see the squares on the walls, there.

listen.

of palming the

Squares in a variety of colors, yeah. Pastel shades.

Each square a foot

Yes.

evenly patterning the walls. I

and

in diameter

None on

six inches

ceiling

others,

and floor—

can see that for myself.

Shut up,

it's

to the walls

necessary for

and pressed

the palm of his surface,

it is

his

Where were we? Oh: He went palm against the light brown square. When

me

to say

it.

uncalloused hand-his right hand-pressed onto the

soft,

adhered

gently,

with a sticky commingling-

Hey! You're narrating that

in the present tense!

You

.

adhered

.

Ah, thank you. Very kind of you to bring that to kind. Naturally I'd have noticed Naturally. But It's

said "/s

."

gently

.

.

.

it

my

attention.

Very

myself in time.

why can't you narrate

this scenario in present tense?

dangerous.

Dangerous!

Laugh

if

Oh

you

suppose

I

really—

like. It is

What happens I

from the

if

dangerous.

you narrate

can demonstrate

this scenario in if I

do

it

present tense?

in a very cautiously controlled

manner. Observe:

He self to

smiles, enjoying the it

further

onrush of physicalized data, abandoning him-

a death-dwarf-junkie to a rush, he sighs and presses his arm immersed to the wrist, to the forearm, elbow, until the arm is

like

in,

in the smff, vanished into the wall, his

head grows rubbery and

and

pliant as

Really, Really, Really, Really,

his

it is

shoulder begins to sink also,

sucked into the square-

Weird Stories

335

336 Tahiti IN

John Shirley

Terms OF Squares

Hey! You'd better cut that out. He's disappearing,

Hie longer

do

I

see, the

image

tion of

him

it

the

in the to

is

difficult

it is

half in the square,

head

his

to reverse.

Now,

is

as

precipitous

its

going.

you can

consump-

halted because I've stopped narrating altogether. But

were to continue, the to proliferate

he

frozen,

is

more

its

if I

which tends

inertia of the present tense narration,

own future because its inception in now causes a hollow

he which must be

filled since

time follows the path of least

resistance, like everything else.

Well— can you get him out of there? I

can now; the

inertia didn't build

gone too

Listen: Realizing he'd

up

far,

to the degree that

he drew

square, slowly, letting the data-dew drain cleanly

source, as his

head and limb returned

tive in his rate

of induction.

hand pressed onto the mingling.

aroma,

is

Now

.

to .

.

its

He

time more conserva-

When the palm of his soft, uncalloused right

surface,

it

was adhered gently with

he experiences the tea

aware of

this

dun

the

away and back

normal aspects

to their

stood back, stretched, sighed, and began again,

lost control.

I

arm out of

his

its initial

texture

on

com-

sticky

gustatorially, smells

boiled

its

his lips.

Hey, aren't you narrating in—

Don't interrupt again, you're distracting me.

have to concentrate.

I

Keep your eyes on him; how else do you expect to learn? Heed: The drink is silvery, it is earthcolored, it is velvet, it is mischievously

He

steamy.

on. His

does not linger amongst these superficial sensations.

hand slowly

sinks into the

brown

He goes

square, the edges of tea-data

brinking his flesh seeping up, around his knuckles and over the back of his

hand, creeping over his wrist. to the shoulder into the

commodate

If

he chooses, he can press

arm up

his entire

brovm square which would then expand

to ac-

the remainder of his body, the other squares shrinking to

compensate. But he sinks only up to

his

shoulder

.

.

.

Comprende^

Solid. Yeah.

So

this provides

between the

him with an

of Thea Sinensis. Tea.

and

his

aware

back is

He

rigid, his

is

into his spine by

aware of the tea in every

it

that tea

and pore now,

He is down

unbroken but

oscillating channel)

forms of the plant identifiable as a

came

cell

strains

coursing his fingers and arm, traveling

relative to the latest flavor in the

how how

whole matrix

and the conclusions of various

eyes rolled upward, as he relishes the trance.

(in rippling fibrillations

earliest

orderly immersion into the

origins, the empirical

strain of

of the etiology of the

Thea

manifold tea hybrids,

to cross-pollinate into yet another

was discovered and savored

its

form of

in turn

Sinensis,

its

taste

genetic makeup,

tea,

and another,

by a clan of naked

Really, Really, Really, Really,

sav-

Weird Stories

John Shirley ages,

Tahiti in Terms of Squares

how those

savages were affected by the tea, the trading of that tea to

other tribes and the articles for which

on the other

tribe,

parative hybrid phases

and

dentally by these tribes

and by the

and the and

on

histories of

all

civilizations

engineered by their progeny

books written about

tea including recipes

and

on every

society into

which

cells,

their configurations in

panoply of a

the plants viewed through the

dimensions, the

rituals

and

various historic derivations of tea, the

who

person

ever used tea

and the

last

traditions

names and

who

filter

cross-

of the fourth

stemming from the

life

stories of the first

ever will-

and more?

All this

But the information, somatically calibrated data, does not

Exactly.

ger in the brain

cells

of our babyface;

the flame an instant after

recollects

measured. His arm

clean

is

it

When

it is lit.

from the square he

lights the

when

it is

babyface extracts his

arm

he's just experienced

and

at last

none of what

removed. The brown substance

memory. And the

tion eschews internment in

up

as

if it

lin-

lamps and then snuffs

(physical realization of data) does not cling to his skin,

closes

life

introduced, the col-

it is

and flower and

textures of the leaf

section of tea-plant fifth

names and

tea manufacturers, plantation owners, connoisseurs; the

all

botanists' schematics, the microscopically discerned

and the

effect of the tea

the various complementary additives, the

cultural effect of tea ors, scents

was traded, the

related species developed deliberately or acci-

status of tea therein,

treatises

it

the cultural reverberations of the tea, the various com-

had never been disturbed

.

.

and

its

informa-

surface of the square

.

Hey, you've changed from past—

Don't interrupt! Watch him!

walk

down

Hey,

the beach.

listen,

Shut up!

He

Now

having finished tea

it is

time for a

goes to—

should you have changed from—

He goes

to the next square in line, to the

left,

which

is

pastel

shades of sunset red and tropical sky blue and beach-sand white and bamboo yellow and palm-trunk brown, all gently blended strata. He places his

palm against

the wrist.

He

is

this

polychromatic square and sinks only up to

no longer aware of

his

arm

as entering the square,

now

rapport with the sensory-eidetic organ-music of data; surrounding and permeating this beach in Tahiti about is confluence. He rapmres

he

is all

atomic structure of "1910 A.D.," relative to this confluence. He of raptures in the atomic strucmre of sands and wavelength dissection in the

photons

poems

in refraction

with sea spray and contrasted with the various

written about the tropics (read in alphabetical order) and theses

concerning Tahiti written up

till

January

Really, Really, Really, Really,

i,

1910.

Weird Stories

337

John Shirley

Terms of Squares

338 Tahiti in

Ah, as with tea but more so? Just so. I

But

see.

Quiet!

still

you've changed your—

Now he glances at the watch on his left wrist—he does this with

that part of his reflexes specially reserved for that action— and registers:

"Time

So he begins

for lunch."

to

withdraw

his

arm, shedding cogni-

zance as he does, preparing to depart to the beach square so that he can progress to the lunch square that

ham and and

that

node of perception.

Hey! I'm trying to

What?

the absolute fact of a sandwich, a

cheese sandwich on stale imported rye and

I

.

.

tell

He

draws

gone and done

I've

the verbal realizations, catch up, slow

didn't

it

tell

me

down

now. I

strike off

can keep up, overtake

I've

on

own. Ah,

his

arm

is

on

it's

going to

fly

the wall quivers under the pull.

is

pleasant, brittle.

I

He

mgs, a

He cannot disengage his fingers from the

don't like this feeling in

Something getting loose

Quiet! I'm losing ground,

off,

the edge of the

otherwise dispassionate face, and

his

damn

it!

inside

it

a furious yank. This

(Oh damn

it all!)

my

guts.

A

chiU.

Un-

me. I—

Ah, a crackling sound and a por-

tion of the seemingly unbreakable wall

chipped

on

sound—

a crackling

cold inside.

out of its groove

the interior of the pastel shades.

furrow of frustration invading

feel all

the

emerging—was emerging.''—from

inner edge of the wall-frame and, angrily, he gives

I

Why

horses, at this point.

I—

this before

got to concentrate or

its

square, the inner edge

time there

Get control

to past tense.

the square and suffers a spasm, his fingers get caught

little

That'll result in a

tried.

I

Never mind.

and

you

it

maddened

again. Like trying to harness

I'm sorry.

arm out—

and rupture the membrane unless

stress pattern

Monitor

his

you, you've gotten into present tense!

Oh damn,

.

the background

all

minute and macrocosmically unfolding

layers of sensation infinitely

from

is

and the

comes loose

in his fingers,

liquid inferential being in the

square comes pouring out of the gap and splatters bab\face about the feet.

He

staggers,

he turns to run but

is

overwhelmed and vanishes from

view as the section of the square that was green-yellow

pands

like

bamboo

a

fire in

a match factory and the

room

licks

begins to

out and exfill

up with

shoots shooting and leaves unfolding. Quickly after comes the

brown and

the blue

palm

and billows of sky-gas and the room

trees

and the white formulating into magically upspringing

pacity with shifting arabesques of sand

the bursting point as babyface

is

is

suddenly

and water and

filled to ca-

foliage,

exceeding

compressed and annihilated, processed

Really, Really, Really, Really,

Weird Stories

John Shirley

Tahiti in Terms of Squares

into seminal droplets

which

fertilize

the soil of the frenetically proliferat-

ing island paradise growing like a self-inflating rubber raft and I

oh damn

can't catch up, I've lost the reins—

What's happening?

I

can't see!

a boiling of liquified leaves and

It's all

sandstorm and there went a swordfish! The wall white

.

.

coming out here. making a break for it, spilling

Hey! It's

to

crackling, the walls of

is

.

It's

compensate

itself

damn—hold

belt—oh

"Harold!

into the Between,

now, engender a plane your breath,

Look at those two on

in

going to have

it's

which to root the

tropical

attempt an—

I'll

the beach up there. In the shade of those

palms."

He

shrugged. "Just a couple of beachcombers, dear,

any trouble. They look a ''Dazed

"Ah

.

.

do

we'll

is

of

they'll

be

dazed, don't they?"

hardly the word. Harold they're naked!"

yes indeed. So they are

.

.

.

.

Well bother!

Come

about, dear,

well to turn back. We'll complain to the desk clerk at the Cap-

tain Bligh. nists

trifle

doubt

I

He

some

said the riff raff sort,

had been cleared off the beach. Hedo-

by the look of them.

And

white, too!

Oh, do stop

crying, Emily."

help

"I can't

you

it.

They look mad. We've got

"Of course. But I'm .

.

.

to hurry.

And

I

shall

expect

was

sort of

to complain to the consulate."

ah

.

.

sure they

diffused about them.

.

.

.

.

quite harmless.

And

I

The

light

could swear that neither one had

."

a nose

.

.

Shading her eyes against the sun's tropical glare she gazed timorously over her shoulder.

She shrieked. "They're coming after us."

(Running footsteps, heavy breathing, curses from the

man

as

he stumbles. His wife

valiantly pauses to help

Excuse me, said one of the odd, them,

how

/

wonder can you

to get

about

nience, I

He

back from

all this.

direct us

pallid

back

here. Frankly,

The world.

men

to the

were

as

British gende-

him

rise.)

he caught up with

Between^ We've no idea

quite

lost.

Terribly sorry

Spilled something. Sorry. Dreadful inconve-

know.

said

it

in a language that

anyone anywhere

instantly have understood.

Really, Really, Really, Really,

Weird Stories

in the universe

would

339

Equilibrium

He

doesn't

know

know me,

that he has

but

I

know

been impotent for

six

news and TV at the same

tening to the

He

him.

has never seen me, but

I

months, can't shave without

lis-

and mixes bourbon with

his

time,

And

coffee during his afternoon coffee break.

is

proud of himself

for

holding off on the bourbon in the afternoon.

His wife doesn't know me, has never seen me, but I her husband as "something to put up with,

know that she regards having your period"; I know

like

that she loves her children blindly, but just as blindly drags

every wrong turn in their

of her

when

relatives,

I

and companions of her starring:

have one) but

children.

Lana Louise Hobbes

and Robin Hobbes

as their

The

I

photograph

family of

the birthdays

we were ago.

Marvin Ezra Hobbes. Co-

and introducing Bobby Hobbes

sons. Play the

theme music.

there to help train the anti-rebel troops. like

it if I

talk

about the

I'm not the sort of person you'd write things,

to personally deliver really

...

I

even."

If

to his family (no,

really didn't

Robin always

home

and even entrusted a it

stationed

We were supposed to be there for "exercises" but

The CIA wouldn't

good many

family

and hobbies

know Robin Hobbes and he knows me. Robin and I were

together in Honduras.

a

Charlie's

knows nothing of my

know

as his wife,

two

them through

addresses of each one

and what she does with her brother

she locks herself in the bathroom. She

(I'm not admitting that

I

know the names and

lives. I

.

.

.)

just in case

said that he wouldn't

I

It

was a couple of years

details

much.

me

about. But Robin told

letter to

me.

I

was supposed

never did have a family

.

.

.

anything "happened" to him.

complain as long as "things turn out

a rebel shoots Robin's pecker away,

Robin doesn't complain

as

long as a rebel gets his pecker blown away. Doesn't even have to be the

same lish

rebel.

But the war wasn't

egalitarian. It

remained for

me

to estab-

equilibrium for Robin.

Really, Really, Really, Really,

Weird Stories

John Shirley Robin

Equilibrium

want

didn't

had been raining

It

was

It

was

when he

for three days

told

one and the

first

interfering one,

rain

had

to get strips of tin

but then he

it.

I

make

steamed

It

you

They'll get

Thing

sure.

Make

ticket.

He

the house.

earnest,'

to

my

worth

new

whole new debt.

join

buy a new

cause he was supporting us

a

my dad is,

all,

dad, gaye car,

and

I

whole

day,

coming out of the drone of the

gonna

start

now. Then you can write your

car,

was

"'They're

it.

said. 'You're just the right age.

My dad wanted me

a deal with the recruiter.'

wanted

what renewed living:

do

to

tire

platinum ring

litde

said anything for a

almost the same tone, almost generated by

and

and

My fingers were

in there.

had to take off the

Robin hadn't

just started talking, his voice

draft for real

as-

a third place inside

because the tent fabric didn't keep

tent,

swollen from the humidity, and

own

The

it.

to

with the equal (=) sign on

up the

about

had

in.

out the rain after a couple of days.

rain,

me

We

one we were

rubber and put them over our

was

his parents' idea.

another place, a whole different part of the world, trying to

like

sert itself over the

the

to enlist.

just

him a sense

out of

and he couldn't afford

it

be-

another expense. That was

that

life

had a goal and was

every few years. Trade in the old one. Get a

My mom was afraid I'd be drafted too.

in the Marines, liked to act like

he was a Big

Man

had an uncle

I

with the

real in-

the-know scuttlebutt; he wrote us and said the Defense Department was preparing for war, planning to invade Honduras, going to do some exer-

down that way first ... So we thought the war was coming for real. Thought we had inside information. My mom wanted me to join to save cises

my

life,

she said. So

could choose to go to someplace harmless,

I

Europe. But the truth

is,

Charlie use to hang around in his dress uniform a stud.

She was the only

woman

I

knew who

ever

didn't pay attention during the action parts; thirsty.

She liked to see them displaying

their spit

and polish and marching

she sort of went didn't defend

all

glazed

me when he

my

about

It's

raining,

"Yeah,"

I

it

lot.

liked

Looking

their stripes

suggested

later I

I

like

a

war movies. She

and

their braid

and

guns sticking up ... So I

join the

Army and

started putting the guilt pressure

assignment and here

like

uncle

wasn't that she was blood-

in step, their

when Dad

not getting a job and two weeks lied

My

she always was wet for soldiers.

she

on me about

was recruited and the bastards

fucking am, right here.

It's

raining.

man." said. "It'd

be nice

much sun or something. Has

if it

wasn't raining. But then we'd get too

to balance out."

"I'm sick of you talking about balancing smff out. raining."

Really, Really, Really, Really,

Weird Stories

I

want

it

to stop

341

John Shirley

342 Equilibrium

So

The next

did.

it

camp. Like the

day. That's

when

the rebels started shelling the

had been waiting on top of the clouds and when

shells

they pulled the clouds away, the trap door opened, and the mortar

rounds

fell

through

.

.

.

burned the

letter

Army Clerical

Unit.

Immediately after something "happened" to Robin,

Then I was

he'd given me. I

know, deeply and

placed

me

transferred to the Fourth

was no

intuitively, that the transfer

an ideal position to

in

I

accident.

It

the balancing of Equilibrium

initiate

and was therefore the work of the Composers. Because with the Fourth Clerical

I

wounded

was

I

came

Robin Hobbes's

killed.

it.

His parents never knew,

destroyed jokes.

in charge of dispensing information to the families of the

or

I

Jokes are always

across

true,

even

till I

when

and promptly

report,

played out

they're dirty

my little joke.

A Psych Tech. My

call

He

likes to see

took the job

bang

to smell

if

rest

of the time he's what they

friend at the sanitarium likes the truth.

particularly

it,

at the sanitarium

heads bloody

their

men who

it,

would be

where a friend of mine was a Meditech who

worked admissions two days a week. The a Handler.

like

lies.

juggled the papers so that Robin Hobbes, twenty years old,

sent to a certain sanitarium,

I

when

it

makes him

with the eighteen-year-old

you don't

tie

He who

gag.

autistics

them down and with the older

have to be diapered and changed and rocked

babies and

like

with the children whose faces are strapped into fencing masks to prevent

them from lips

eating the wallpaper

and

to

keep them from pulling off

and noses—he took the job because he

likes

it

there.

He

took

their it

be-

cause he likes jokes.

And he took good

care of

Robin Hobbes

for

me until it was time. I am my

compelled to record an aside here, a well-done and sincere thanks to

anonymous

friend for his

enormous patience

in spoon-feeding

Robin

Hobbes twice daily, changing his bedpan every night, and bathing him once a week for the entire six months interment. He had to do it personally,

because Robin was there

illegally,

and had to be hidden

in the old

wing they don't use anymore. I observed the Hobbes family. They have one of those new bodyform cars. It's a fad thing. Marvin Hobbes got his new car. The sleek, fleshtone fiberglass body of the car is cast so that its sides are imprinted with the shape of a nude woman

Meanwhile,

lying prone, her

the

arms flung out

Cannon beach towel

from her

girl.

in front of her in the diving

The doors

ass. She's ridiculously

motion of

are in her ribs, the trunk

improportional, of course.

Really, Really, Really, Really,

opens

The whole

Weird Stories

John Shirley thing

wildly kitsch.

is

Hobbes car.

Equilibrium

was an embarrassment

It

badly in debt behind

is

Rammed

a Buick Marilyn

Monroe

and Marilyn's arms, tangled when

into a John

And

Mrs. Hobbes.

to

because he totaled his

it,

first

Wayne

bodyform

pickup. John

bumpers slammed, were

their front

lovingly intertwined.

Hobbes took the

loss,

He is indifferent to

and bought a Miss America.

Mrs. Hobbes's embarrassment. To the particularly judgmental way she uses the term tacky.

Mi. Hobbes plays

little

jokes of his own. Private jokes. But

I

knew. Mr.

Hobbes had no idea I was watching when he concealed his wife's Lady He knew that she'd want it that night, because they were in-

Norelco.

vited to a party,

Hobbes sang

a

and she always shaved her

little

song

tuneless

bending over to look

shaver,

legs before a party. A4rs.

as she quested systematically for the

in the house's

drawers and cabinets, and

behind the drawers and cabinets, peering into

we

burrow-places to regard

appreciate

Once

.

.

.

I felt

the secret nooks and

was so thorough

came

I

a sort of warmth, then:

I

can

thoroughness.

a week, he did

mirror, her

can see

forget a house has; her search

as the product of mania.

it

all

makeup

it

case.

to her.

He'd temporarily pocket her magnify^ing

Then

he'd pretend to find

it.

"Where any

idiot

it."

Bobby Hobbes, Robin's younger brother, was unaware that his father knew about his hidden cache of Streamline racing-striped condoms. The elder Hobbes thought he was very clever, in knowing about them. But

know about me. Marvin Hobbes would pocket

he didn't

snuck sounds of muffled laughter feverishly searched

Hobbes would going

if

you're

way? Can

I

and rechecked

his son's rubbers

in his sinuses as the red-eared teenager his closet

and drawers.

innocently saunter in and ask,

gonna make

and make snuck-

"Hey-you

better get

that date, right? What'cha looking for any-

help?"

socks. Missing." no thanks. Dad. Just some As the months passed, and Hobbes's depression over his impotence worsened, his fits of practical joking became more frequent, until he no

"Oh

.

.

.

uh,

.

.

.

longer took pleasure in them, but performed his practical jokes as he would some habimal household chore. Take out the trash, cut the lawn,

hide Lana's razor, feed the dog.

Hobbes, driven by some undefined desperation, attempted to relate to his relatives. He'd sit them at points symmetrical wife thirty degrees to (relative to him) around the posh living room; his I

watched

as

Really, Really, Really, Really,

Weird Stories

343

John Shirley

344 Equilibrium his left, his

youngest son

thirty

degrees to his

Then, he would

right.

re-

late a personal childhood experience as a sort of parable, describing his

hopes and dreams for

his

little

family.

"When I was a boy we would The wild blackberry bushes were hours to

carve out tunnels in the briar bushes.

very dense, around our farm.

them with

clip three feet into

It'd

take

the gardener's shears. But after

weeks of patient work, we snipped a network of crude tunnels through the half-acre filled with brambles. In this way,

with the world as a whole.

knowing

perfect comfort, but

we

learned

how

to

cope

We would crawl through the green tunnels in that

if

we

stood up, the thorns would cut

us to ribbons."

He paused and sucked several times loudly on the pipe. It had gone out ten minutes before. He stared at the fireplace where there was no fire. Finally

he asked

She shook her

"Do you understand?" Almost whining it. head ruefully Annoyed, his jaws bruxating, Hobbes his wife,

slipped to the floor, muttering he'd lost his tobacco pouch, searching for

it

under the coffee

table,

under the

sofa.

His son didn't smile, not

once. His son had hidden the tobacco pouch.

Hobbes went

about on the rug looking for the tobacco pouch

scurrying

in a great dither of

confusion, like a poodle searching for his rawhide bone. Growling low.

Growling to himself. Speculation as to

Hobbes

family

life

how

came

I

prove as

will

know

to

futile as

these intimate details of the

Marvin's attempt to relate to

his relatives. I

have

my ways.

I

learned

my techniques from

Presumably, Composers belong to a

tacit

other Composers.

network of

free agents the

whose sworn duty it is to establish states of interpersonal Equilibrium. No Composer has ever knowingly met another; it is impossible for them to meet, even by accident, since they carry the same

world

over,

charge and therefore repel from each other. I'm not sure just invisible

Composers taught

states of Equilibrium.

simply can't articulate I

To be

me

how

the

their technique for the restoration of

precise,

I

am

sure as to

how

it

was done—

it.

have no concrete evidence that the Composers

exist.

Composers

perform the same service for society that vacuum tubes used to perform for radios

and

amplifiers.

And

the fact of a

vacuum

tube's existence

is

proof that someone must have the knowledge, somewhere, needed to construct a

Now hair

vacuum

picmre

this:

tube. Necessity

Picture

me

is its

own

evidence.

with a high forehead crowned by white

and a square black graduation cap with

its

tassel dangling. Picture

Really, Really, Really, Really,

Weird Stories

John Shirley

me with

Equilibrium

a drooping white mustache and wise blue eyes. In

lot like Albert Einstein, in this picture.

gown, and clutched I

my right hand

in

don't have a high forehead.

Not even eyebrows. Einstein.)

I

and

I

me

But picmre

that

way

On

I

Corps patch on the

am

slightest.

who

I

own

don't

a gradu-

vertical

of the

first

camera.

On

nod my head

I

The young

is

playing a TV-tennis is

given a

missing.

blip,

the 'tennis

ball'.

paddle and scores a point. JabI

indicate that the

sagely.

right dials with

But

this

both hands

game

game

is

side.

mysterious young

at once. (If

you look

until fifteen points are

never scoring a point for either hand.

wrist-flicks,

never wins, he never loses, he establishes perfect equilibrium.

practical joke

his family. Is

agents of Karma.^ No. There

Composers

are necessary.

in establishing the

vengeance—we

winks, the young

was programmed

Robin Hobbes and

But

is

He nurtured his skill until he could play against him-

The movie ends, the professor mrned to face the camera.

My

hand

long hours, beeping a white blip with euphoric monotony back

and forth between

He

de-

in the interactive poles of his parity.

designed to continue incessantly

scored by either self for

is

The index finger of his right hand is missing, too.) Being leftwhen he first began to play himself, the left hand tended to win.

But he establishes perfect equilibrium TTie

one

a field of blank gray the two

closely at his hands, you'll note that the index finger of his left

handed,

knob

racket',

snapping the dash/racket up or down, one

blip past the other electronic

man manipulates left and

He

video games. Each player

bing here and there at the movie screen signed for two people.

man who Army uniform with a

white dash designating the 'tennis

dial,

screen with

right shoulder, half peeled off.

white dashes bandy between them a white

knocks the

No mustache.

a projection of a young

is

wears a tattered

to each half of the television screen.

flick

look a

pointer.

all.

home movie

pointing at a

home movie

game. This was one of the

With a

wooden

don't have any hair at

the screen

has his back to the

which controls a

I

don't have blue eyes. (Probably, neither did

I

has shaved himself bald and Clerical

a long

fact,

a black graduation

never completed a college course.

official pointer.

man

is

don't look like Einstein in the

ation gown,

my

I

am wearing

I

is

To

it

man

has at no time

compose an Equilibrium Karma? Are the Composers to

no such thing

as

Karma: that

redress the negligence of

Equilibrium-something

far

more

is

God.

for

the

why the

We

try.

refined than

invariably create another imbalance, for justice cannot

be precisely quantified.

And

the

Really, Really, Really, Really,

new imbalance Weird Stories

gives rise to a contra-

345

John Shirley

34^ Equilibrium dictory inversity, and so the Perfect

and Mindless Dance of

Equilib-

rium proceeds. For there to be a premise there must somewhere

exist

contradiction.

its

Hence

present

I

my

Hobbes encrypted

clue to the

in a reversal of the

actual situation.

In the nomenclature of the Composers, a snake symbolizes an octopus.

The octopus has

is

eight legs, the snake

is

legless.

The octopus

is

the

the greeting, the

worm

selected the following document, an authentic missive

illicitly

greeting, the snake

is

the reply; the centipede

is

the reply.

And

so

I

obtained from a certain obsessive

my

clue offered in

My dear, You D.,

fairness; the inverted

recall,

Hobbes,

to the

as

foreshadowing:

Man

assume, that Perfect and Holy Union

I

my dominion and Wife

were obligated

and

Having excelled

myself R,

unseeing eyes of the Order, they

means of devotion and worship, in acspecialties and proclivities. I advised

own

to joindy undertake the art of Sensual

the Animus,

I

High Priest— the marriage of

as

in the

to seek a

cordance with their

them

it

dear Tonto,

ordained, in

and

all

and mailed

cult,

they did, and

this

still

Communion

with

they were unsatisfied.

in the somatic explorations that are the founda-

tion of the Order, they were granted leave to follow the lean of

own

their

Degree

inclinations.

in Jolting, the

Thus

liberated, they settled

on the

fifth

mastery of self-modification. They sought

out a surgeon who, for an inestimable price, fused their bodies

They became Siamese side. They were joined at

woman

joined to his

into one.

twins; the

right

the waist through an unbreak-

made sexual The obstacle,

able bridge of flesh. This grafting

coupling, outside

of fondling, nearly impossible.

as

Order,

is

the object. But R.

we

say in the

was not content. Shorn of normal

marital relations, R.'s latent homosexuality surfaced.

male lovers and

men, forced

his wife

was forced

to observe everything,

and advised

receiving,

latex

condoms. At

si-

first

in the fullness

flesh

which linked them she

and then more strongly, her way she was vicariously fulfilled of time no longer objected when he took to

faindy at

husband's impressions. In

and

on

to keep her

her brimming with re\ailsion; but she became

aware that through the bridge of

was

took

to lay beside the copulating

lence except in the matter of insisting this stage left

He

first

this

Really, Really, Really, Really,

Weird Stories

John Shirley

Equilibrium

a homosexual bed. R's lovers accepted her presence, as

were the incarnate

their inner clockworks.

new complacency was

ished.

It

she

of the frustrated feminine persona

spirit

which was the mainspring of their

if

became necessary

But

when

established, the obstacle dimin-

to initiate

new

somatic obstacles.

In-

woman was added to the Siamese coupling, to make it a tripling, a woman on R.'s left. Over a period of several evitably,

another

months more were added,

after the

proper blood

tests.

Today,

they are joined to six other people in a ring of exquisite Siamese

The juncmring travels in a circle so the first is joined to the eighth, linked with someone else on both sides. All face inward. There are four men and four women, a literal wedding multiplicity.

ring. (Is this a

romantic

Arrayed as they are in an

story, Tonto.^)

unbreakable ring, they necessarily go to great lengths to over-

come had

practical

and psychological handicaps. For example, they

to practice for

two days

to learn

D.'s Learjet. Four, usually the

how

women,

to collectively

ride in the

board

arms of the

other four; they sidle into the plane, calling signals for the steps.

new

This enforced teamwork lends a

mundane

daily affairs.

Going

most

perspective to the

to the toilet

becomes a yogic

cise requiring the utmost concentration. For but one

exer-

man

to

pee, each of the joined must provide a precisely measured de-

gree of pressure

each

man

turns, the

.

.

.

They have been

can copulate with the

man

diagonal.

one coupling at a time nal to

surgically arranged so that

woman

or, in

Homosexual relations are limited to members of the same sex are diago-

since

one another. Heterosexually, the

neously

opposite him

The surgeons have continuated

cell

has sex simulta-

the nerve ends through

the links so that the erogenous sensations of one are shared by all. I

was

privileged to observe

robatic orgies.

nude

I

one of these highly practiced

ac-

admit to a secret yen to participate, to stand

in the center of the circle

and experience

flesh-tone pis-

ton-action from every point of the compass. But this is below my Degree; only the Fiigh Priest's divine mount, the Perfect and

Unscrubbed Silver, may know him

carnally

.

.

.

Copulating as an

anemone

capturing a ocmplet whole, they resemble a pink sea wriggling minnow. Or perhaps interlocked fingers of arm wresders.

Or

a letter written

all

in

one paragraph, a

single unit

.

.

.

But suppose a fight breaks out between the grafted Worshippers? Suppose one of them should die or take sick? If one conReally, Really, Really, Really,

Weird Stories

347

John Shirley

348 Equilibrium

tracts

an

should

went is all

until

come down with

ultimately

illness, all

die,

it.

And

if

one

they would have to carry the corpse wherever they

it

rotted

away— the operation

is

irreversible.

But that

part of the Divine Process.

Yours

very, very affectionately.

The Lone Ranger Mrs. Hobbes found the it

with

visible alarm,

the mailbox, and

letter in

and brought

to her husband,

it

yard, preparing to barbecue the ribs of a pig.

printed with the words,

FORGET was

lit

letter,

given

He was wearing an

apron

almost obliterated by a rusty splash of sauce.

Hobbes, read the the letter

Seeing

She read

it.

DON'T FORGET TO KISS THE CHER The word

letter,

frowning.

get crazier with this junk mail

He

opened

who was in the back-

on

fire

and used

smiled with

this, I

all

"I'll

be goshdarned," he

the time. it

relief,

Goddamned

If

softly said: "Click!"

from the sanitarium,

A letter for a

Robin Hobbes had

Mr. and Mrs. Hobbes had discerned the

cation of the inverted clue

I

"They

to start the charcoal.

and

equilibrium for the destruction of the letter

me in Honduras.

said.

pornographic."

would have been forced

to the custody of the

to release

impli-

Robin

Army.

When the day came for my joke, I had my friend bring Robin over to my hotel room, which was conveniently two blocks from the Hobbes' residence. It

should be a harmless gesture to describe

don't disclose his name.

Meditech friend

is

Not

is

Composer

friend, as long as

in face but

one

pudgy and square shouldered. His

they're too thin for his body.

and there

a

my

His hair

is

in spirit,

legs

look

I

my like

clipped close to his small skull

a large white scar dividing his scalp, running from the crown

The scar is a gift from one of his an unguarded moment. My friend wears thick wire-rim glasses with an elastic band connecting them in the rear. Over Robin's noisy protests I prepared him for the joke. To shut him of his head to the bridge of his nose.

patients, given in

up

I

considered cutting out his tongue. But that would require compen-

sating with

some

erly devise.

So

I

act restoring equilibrium

which

I

had not time

setded for adhesive tape, over his mouth.

And

to prop-

of course

the other thing, stuck through a hole in the tape.

Mr. Hobbes was driveway.

The

at

home,

his

front of the car

Miss America bodyform car

filled

the

was crumpled from a minor accident of

the night before, and her arms were corrugated, bent unnaturally

Really, Really, Really, Really,

in-

Weird Stories

John Shirley

Equilibrium 349

ward, one argent hand shoved whole into her open and battered mouth. Suppressing sniggers-I admit

olds—my friend and

We

like

two twelve-year

dashed to the nearest concealment, a holly bush undulating

faint It

we were

this freely,

brought Robin to the porch and rang the doorbell.

I

summer

was

shortly after sunset, eight-thirty p.m.

returned from a long Tuesday at the office.

commiserating with ring,

his

Mss

abused

and Mr. Hobbes had

He

America.

was

silent

Two

had

to bite his lip to keep

humor had

quite

and grumpy, in hand.

from laughing out loud. But

gone out of the moment.

It

just

minutes after our

Marvin Hobbes opened the front door, newspaper

friend

in the

breeze.

for

My

me, the

was a solemn moment, one

with a dignified and profound resonance.

Mrs. Hobbes peered over Marvin's shoulder, right hand;

hidden in

Bobby, behind

his left

electric shaver in

her, stared over the top of her wig,

her

something

hand. Simultaneously, the entire family screamed, their

instantaneous timing perhaps confirming that they were true relatives after

all.

They found Rob

as

we had left him on the

doorstep, swaddled in baby

blankets, diapered in a couple of Huggies disposable diapers, a pacifier

stuck through the tape over his mouth, covered to the neck in gingham

one of his darling stumps peeked through). And equipped with a plastic baby bottle. The shreds of his arms and legs had been cloth (though

amputated shortly his chest

after the

was a note

(I

mortar attack on Puerto Barrios. Pinned to

lettered

thought would reflect the

mood

it

myself in the crude handwriting

of a desperate mother.)

PLEASE TAKE CARE OF

Really, Really, Really, Really,

MY BABY

Weird Stories

The note

I

said:

What Cindy Saw

The people from shell,

the clinic were very nice.

and people w^ho

electric football

number of v^ay

the

the shell often behaved nicely, and w^ith

like

the

little

magnetically-moved toy players on

game. They seemed very

quirky details making

Doctor Gainsborough

of his eye, for example.

them

And

the

and they had a

sincere,

much more

ever so

w^as alw^ays plucking things

forever rubbing

allergies.

Doctor Gainsborough admitted, with every appearance of

was mysterious and

The

realistic.

from the corner

way Nurse Rebeck was

her crusty red nose and complaining of

that, yes, life

on

course, they lived

on

uniformity of purpose,

an

Of

lived

ultimately

sincerity,

Cindy might well be

about the way things were under what she called "the

right

Doctor

shell."

Gainsborough couldn't be sure that she was wrong—but, Cindy, they said,

we

have our doubts, serious doubts, and

sider our doubts,

and our reasoning, and

we would

give

like

Doctor Gainsborough had known Cindy would respond of politely considering her ideas. Cindy was, after

And crazy

she simply refused to respond at

and seeing

Yes, Cindy,

it's

best that

fair-minded.

when people

said,

you could be

we keep up

told her she

was

But

we

right.

still,

the treatments. All right?

and taught her how

Stelazine

she stopped talking about the

clinic's pet. It

shell, after

a while.

make jeweky. She became the

to

was Doctor Gainsborough himself who took her home,

after "just three

months

this time,

and no shock treatments."

off in front of her parents' house,

window

all,

to his pretense

Doctor Gainsborough.

So they'd given her the

And

to con-

things.

Doctor Gainsborough

have severe doubts, so All right.

all

you

our viewpoint a chance.

to shake his hand.

and she reached

She even smiled.

He

in

He

let

her

through the car

smiled back and

Really, Really, Really, Really,

Weird Stories

John Shirley

What Cindy Saw

crinkled his blue eyes,

and she

stepped onto the curb.

He was pulled away down the street; pulled away

straightened, took her

hand back, and

by the car he drove. She was ing toward the house. She

was climbing the the shell

left with the house. She knew she was turnknew she was walking toward it. She knew she

steps.

But

was so subde

that

all

walking and climbing, when pulled through

the time she

you could

But best you think

She had practiced

and

it

at

all.

you.

it's it,

from

pull

turning

You were being

wasn't you doing

it

The

know Vm

the time you weren't.

all

those motions, so

all

the pull.

felt

think: /

amongst the obstacle course of the now, and she manage to suppress her

that steering

mind's free associations. She did

it

sense of the pull.

She .

.

.

felt fine.

just

trees.

She

normal.

fine because she felt nothing.

felt

The house looked

like

though.

like

The house seemed unusuone home? And where was Doobie? The dog

Picture-book house, picture-book

ally quiet,

Nothing much. Just

a house, the trees looked

No

trees.

wasn't tied up out front this time. She'd always been afraid of the Dober-

man. She was

relieved he

was gone. Probably gone

She opened the door—funny,

door unlocked.

It

wasn't

like

their

not being

off with the family.

home and

Dad. Dad was paranoid.

He

leaving the

He even admitted

Mom

smoked pot and listened to old Jimi Hendrix records and, when they thought Cindy was asleep, screwed lisriessly on the sofa. it.

"I

smoke Paranoid

"Hello? Dad?

Good. She

Pot,"

Mom?"

felt like

style

it

at

said.

called,

home

No random

that weren't harmless.

scope:

Cindy

being

nothing to cope with.

he

was constantly

Watching

and

now.

No

alone. Playing a

CD, watching TV,

factors, or scarcely any.

TV was

of intricacy, but there was never anything

And none

looking into a kaleido-

like

going through

shifting,

answer.

its

motions with

really

own Or al-

its

unexpected.

most never. Once Cindy had turned it on and watched a Japanese monster movie. And the Japanese monster movie had been too much like a caricature of the shell. Like they were mocking her by showing what they knew. What they knew she knew.

Now,

she told herself. Think about now. She turned from the entry-

hall to the

archway opening into the

In the living

had been sofa.

room was something

in the

rec-room of the

Here, though,

it

living

room.

that looked very

clinic she'd

much

like

a sofa.

have been quite sure

it

If it

was a

twilight of sat corpulent and dusty blue-gray in the

the living room, scrolled arm-rests a litde too tightly

Really, Really, Really, Really,

Weird Stories

wound;

it

sprawled

351

352

What Cindy Saw ominously

John Shirley

ral in its texture. It

had a graininess she'd never noticed before. Like one

of those ugly, irregular scraps of thing

whose

stickiness has given

it

was shaped

like It

membranous

the seashore, a

jellyfish at

Even more disorienting was the

tumescent.

room. There was something unnatu-

in the very center of the

a coating of sand.

sofa-thing's ostensibly familiar shape. It

a sofa. But there was something bloated about

was

just

a shade bulkier than

it

it,

something

should have been. As

if it

were

swollen from eating.

So

that's their secret,

she thought.

It's

the sofa. Normally

thing unusual about it—because normally

She wondered

Maybe

it

who it had eaten. One

had eaten the whole

wouldn't be

home when

I

don't catch

of her

it

sisters?

don't notice any-

I

just after

it

has eaten.

The house was

silent.

But then Mother had said that they

family.

she got there: she remembered now.

nurses had told Doctor Gainsborough. Sometimes the Stelazine

One of the made Cindy

forget things.

They had gone out to one

last

dinner.

They wanted

time before Cindy came home.

dinner with Cindy. Cindy had a

denouncing

things, Cindy,"

pain in the ass

when you do

and then maybe the

Dad

It

to

go out to dinner, probably,

was embarrassing

way of denouncing

"You ought to mellow

said.

that shit."

she would say eamesdy,

know

like

a

TV

on the

harmony with our environment

earrings, "but you're

my

his

talking

is

about terrorism.

an attempt to delude us

that isn't there at

dad would

say,

all."

brushing

beard or maybe tugging on one of

his

a pain in the ass."

still

could be," Cindy said aloud to the sofa, "that you've eaten one of

sisters. I

you

waitress,

table that reveals the deception,"

commentator

you're precocious, Cindy," her

crumbs of French bread from

"It

to

out. You're a

Cindy would denounce the

"This constant imposition of symmetrical pattern

"I

go out

tables, the tablecloths, the folds in the tablecloth. "It's

the symmetry in the checker-pattern

into a sense of a

to

things. "You're always

that

Still,

don't really

mind

you are not going

that.

But

I

must

hastily

and firmly assure

to eat me."

she wanted to find out

more about

the sofa-thing. Cautiously.

She went to the kitchen, fetched a can opener and a

flashlight,

and

on the polished wooden

par-

returned to the living room.

She played the

light

on

the thing that sat

quet floor.

The

sofa-thing's legs, she

seemed

to

saw now, were

be growing out of

it.

seeing was a kind of blossom.

It

clearly fused to the floor: they

Cindy nodded to

must have roots

herself. far

What

she was

underground.

Really, Really, Really, Really,

Weird Stories

John Shirley The

beam

sofa-thing quivered self-consciously in the

With the head

What Cindy Saw

light,

of her flashlight.

hand-she could have turned on the overbut she knew^ she'd need the flashlight for the caverns be-

flashlight in her left

neath the shell-she approached the sprawling, blue-gray thing, careful

not to get too close. In her right hand w^as the can opener.

seemed

All the while, she

to hear a backseat driver saying: This isnt

You should go upstairs and watch TV and move from moment to moment thinking safely, steering around the obstacles, part of the program.

turning the wheel

away from

tending you don't

know what you know.

the dangerous

clumps of association,

pre-

Her Stelazine was nearly worn off and the couch had starded her into a wrong turn, and now she was on a side road in a foreign suburb and she didn't know the route back to the familiar highBut

was too

it

And

way.

late.

there were

no policemen she might

ask,

no mental cops

like

Doctor Gainsborough.

So Cindy crept toward the couldn't hurt her unless she sat

sofa-thing.

on

it.

If

She decided that the sofa

you

on

sat

it, it

would

curl up,

enfold you. Venus's-flytrap.

She knelt by

from

cushions.

its

Sensing her intent,

its legs.

It

it

bucked a

dust rising

little,

contracted, the cushions humping.

made an

It

awful sound.

She began to work on

worked

eight minutes she

The

sofa-thing

its legs,

made

where they joined the

floor.

For

thirty-

busily with the can opener.

a series of prolonged, piteous sounds.

Her arm

ached, but the can opener was surprisingly sharp. Soon she had the cavity under the sofa partly exposed; you could see it under the flap-edge of the

Cindy took a deep breath, and prised the flap so it opened was dark in there. Musky smell; musky and faintly metallic, like

shell.

wider.

It

lubricant for a motor.

And

a faint under-scent of rot.

By degrees, working hard, she the sofa. Nature

parquet floor

was

till

rolled

back the skin of the floor around

ingenious; the skin had looked like a

now.

hardwood

and appropriately

had been hard and The skin was hard-but not as hard as it the bark of a tree, if you were patient like back solid

It

grained. Marvelous camouflage.

looked.

and

You could peel it mind aching fingers. Cindy

didn't

didn't mind.

keening rose to a crescendo, so loud and The had to move back and clap her hands over her ears. sofa-thing's

And

then, the sofa folded in

muffled

like a

on

itself.

Its

shrill

Cindy

sirening folded too,

scream trying to escape from a hand clamped over a

small child's mouth.

Really, Really, Really, Really,

Weird Stories

353

354

What Cindy Saw The

sofa

was

ished, sucked floor.

John Shirley

into a dark

The house was

Cindy shined the

anemone

a sea

like

down

closing up;

wound

it

deflated, shrank, van-

in the center of the living-room

once more.

quiet

wound.

flashlight into the

It

was damp, oozing, red

The house's blood didn't gush, it bled in droplets, The thick, vitreous underflesh shuddered and drew

flecked with yellow. like perspiration.

back when she prodded

it

with her can opener.

She tucked the can opener into her boot, and knelt by the

wound

for

a better look. She shined the flashlight into the deepness, into the secret, into the under-shell

.

.

.

The house supposedly had no basement. Nevertheless, beneath the room floor was a chamber. It was about the same size as the living room. Its walls were gently concave and slickly wet—but not organic. The living

wetness was a kind of machine lubrication. In the center of the chamber

was a column, the understem of the her house. thick stalk

strands in

creature that

stalk.

She wondered why the house hadn't struck all

as

The column, she reflected, was actually more of a stalk; a made of cables. And they wound about one another like the a powerline. The sofa must have been sucked into its natural

hiding place, compressed within the

them

had masqueraded

till

today.

Why hadn't

it

got

while they were sleeping? But probably the undershell people, the

programmers, hadn't bred

to

it

be a ravenous, unselective

there for the elimination oi select people—she realized this

nation for the disappearance of their houseguests.

such people

home

in the last

two

years,

carnivore.

It

must be the

was

expla-

Mom had brought four

bedded each one on the

sofa,

and

each of them hadn't been there for breakfast. Aw^fully curious, awfully coinci-

Cindy had thought, every houseguest deciding to

dental, fast.

Now Cindy knew that they hadn't left the house at

part of

it.

They'd become

all.

Mom usually

Probably that was what had happened to Doobie—

him

wouldn't

let

her

Belinda sometimes

sister

leave before break-

sleep in the house, let

dog must have snuck onto the

and never allowed him on the

Doobie

in after

sofa.

But

Mom had gone to bed; the

sofa for a nap, the sofa's genetically pro-

grammed eating hour had come around, and it had done to Doobie what a sea anemone does to a minnow. Enfolded, paralyzed, and digested him. Cindy didn't mind. She'd always hated Doobie. She floor

lay face

down, peering into the gap

was about fourteen

feet

beneath

the sub-world, to explore. Cindy

them what

A

in the house's skin.

her.

The

under-

She considered dropping to

shook her head. Best go

for help.

Show

she'd found.

funny feeling

in

her stomach warned her to look up.

Really, Really, Really, Really,

Weird Stories

John Shirley

The

What Cindy Saw

living-room archway was gone.

gone.

A

It had sealed off. The windows were had grown over them. She had alarmed the So it had trapped her.

sort of scar tissue

creature, cutting into

Cindy made a

it.

small, high uh!

sound

to the nearest wall, pressed her like

hard

like

wet

plaster, clay.

a

itself like

juices

but

it

against

She stood, and went

it.

It

should have

felt

The house would ooze

in a mudslide,

from her and

flat

depressed under her fingers, taking her handprint

Softening.

hill

in her throat.

hands

and

it

in on her, collapsing on would pulp her and squeeze the

drink.

She turned to the gash she'd made paper becoming ash. But

in the floor. Its edges

were curling

up

like

on

the flashlight, knelt, and wriggled through the opening, dropping to

the floor below.

it

The impact stung

was

closing, too.

the balls of her

She got a good grip

feet.

Cindy straightened, breathing hard, and looked around. Tunnels opened from the chamber on both

sides, stretching as far as

she could see. She stepped into the right-hand tunnel. just

two

feet overhead;

it

The

ceiling

was curved and smooth. She walked

feeling her way with one hand, shining her flashlight beam at the The darkness was rich with implications, and Cindy felt her nerve

She had a vice-squeezing sensation electricity in

and

floor. falter.

and a kind of greasy

at her temples,

her tongue. She tried to picture the

raygun's laser, straight

flashlight's

beam

brightly furious, burning the darkness

Gradually, though, her eyes adjusted, and the darkness

tant.

At

intervals the

oblong of

light

hardly

room

ing this

seemed

less

like trans-

plastic wires

came

spaced sheaves of eight or nine. Sometimes there was to squeeze

way and

that.

guitar string, but with

between them. Then, she'd

When

she brushed a wire,

an overtone to

desert insect. She sensed, in the

The

afire.

longer impor-

picked out what looked

parent fishing lines passing from floor to ceiHng. in irregularly

beam no

as a

away—

but the light was weak, and set only a small patch of the darkness

dense, less oppressively pregnant, the flashlight

was

slowly,

somehow,

its

hum

it

that

that the wires

upper world. They certainly iverent

sidle through, twist-

would resonate was had

installed

like

like the call

to

do with

by the

a

of a

events

utility

com-

pany, she said to herself.

She came to a place where the wall was transparent, a clear patch big as her two hands put together. It was a little cloudy, but Cindy could see through

it

into another chamber;

two men

sat in there at a

metal

table.

white rectangles in their hands

They were playing cards, the little marked with mazes and mandalas instead of Really, Really, Really, Really,

the usual kings and queens

Weird Stories

355

.

356

.

What Cindy Saw and

jacks

man was hunched over his hand, deep in One sat with his back to her. He was the smaller man; he

and spades. Each

concentration.

had gray

The other was a round-faced man: brown beard streaked with white. The

hair.

weight, his

rumpled

John Shirley

and trousers of a contemporary

jacket

many decades

threadbare suit

There were two bunks, a lying

under the

outdated.

toilet, trays

table. "It's

lightly.

He

little

man wore

bigger

cut; the other

The room looked

over-

like

a

a

wore a jail cell.

of half-eaten food, empty beer cans

your bid. Mister Fort," said the bearded man,

with humorous formality "Right you

man

stocky, a

are.

Mister Dick," said the other

slapped a card face-up on the table and said, "M.C.

Escher against Aztec Maze." The other

man

sighed. "Ah, you've locked

You win. It's not fair: you had decades to practice, playing against ." Dammit I wish they'd let us smoke Cindy banged on the glass, and shouted, but she couldn't make them hear her. Or perhaps they pretended not to. She shrugged, and went on. Another ten strides further something glimmered on the left, reflecting again.

Bierce.

her

.

flashlight's

beam.

It

was a

The mirror

into the wall.

ludicrously elongated.

.

long, vertical, rectangular mirror, set flush

making her seem

distorted Cindy's reflection,

She reached out to touch

it,

and

accidentally

brushed one of the wires; the transparent wire thrummed and her image in the mirror

shimmered, vibrating in and out of

visibility in

a frequency

sympathetic to the wires quivering. She struck the wire again, harder, to see

what

it

would do

and vanished, and

mundane

in

image

to the

its

place

was

street scene, children

in the mirror.

a flickering

walking

Her

reflection fluttered

image of the upper world.

home from

VW Rabbit driven by an elderly lady

impatiently behind a slow-moving

On a hunch, a hunch that became an impulse,

A

school, cars honking .

.

Cindy struck the mnnel

wires repeatedly, as hard as she could.

The mirror—really out of control, the

a kind of

TV monitor—showed

the traffic careening

VW Rabbit backing up at great speed, ploughing into

the others, the children losing control of their limbs and flapping haphazardly at one another.

Cindy

tittered.

She took the can opener from her boot and slashed ing the "mirror"

And

in the

all

the while.

The

with a protesting whang.

upper world: children exploded, cars began to wrap around

one another, suddenly becoming telephone poles ... a great buildings

strings parted

at the wires, watch-

away

.

soft

and

pliable, tying

invisible current

swept the

themselves round

street,

washing the

.

Cindy smiled and went her way down the

tunnel,

randomly snipping wires.

Really, Really, Really, Really,

Weird Stories

What Cindy Saw

John Shirley 00 CO 00

Every few hundred yards she came to an intersection of tunnels; three

opening to the

right, three to the left,

Sometimes Cindy changed direction lowing her

intuition, vaguely

grovm up

to

what looked

at these

continuing

on ahead.

subworld crossroads,

into a circular

room

thick, red-yellow stalk; a corded,

merge with the like

own

fol-

aware that she had a specific destination.

At length the tunnel opened out which was another

her

ceiling.

in the center of

man-thick

stalk,

But here, the walls swarmed with

oversized aphids. Mechanical aphids, each big as her

hand, and the color of a blue-metal razor blade. They clung to the walls in

groups of twenty or

thirty,

only a hand's width between each group; the

aphids crawled methodically on small metal legs thin and numerous as the

on

brisdes of a hairbrush;

the right-hand wall they

swarmed between

TV monitors. She switched off her flashlight; there was enough from the TV screens. Standing at the monitors, spaced more or less

banks of light

evenly,

were a score of dusty blue

of newspaper. Looking

was

in

some kind of

closer,

fellows, vaguely

inscrutable cipher, quite unreadable.

photos showed only half-recognizable

For the

first

human wearing jumpsuits

Cindy could see that the newspaper print

And

the

news

silhouettes.

time, real uneasiness shivered

pieces of fear, like irregular hailstones, rattled

and

bits

and

dovm through

the

chill

up

in her,

focal-heart of her sensations.

Fear because the

men

without noses, without eyes. that's

And

at the ears.

monitors were entirely without mouths,

Each had only

large, blinking, watery-gray

fear because: with Cindy's arrival in the

what they were, began

to

move

room, the aphids,

feverishly-but

if

somehow purpose-

mandala patterns over the walls, rustling through a thick coating of shag-rug cilia: the cilia, she saw now, covered the walls everywhere. It was the color of a throat with a bad cold. The mouthless men used three-fingered hands to manipulate knobs on fully-in

the frames of the

TV

monitors.

Now

and then one of them reached up

and brushed an aphid; something in the touch galvanized the creature so that it scurried furiously up the wall, parting the cilia and altering the symmetrical patterns made by the collective motion of the other aphids.

The TV with inset

pictures

were black-and-white. The floor was

silver wires;

alabaster, patterned

the wires were arcanely configured, and occasionally

sparked at the touch of the metal shod feet of the aknost-people.

them almost-people. light, and she saw that in the small of dim Her umbilicus. The long, attenuated black an each almost-person's back was Cindy had decided to

call

eyes adjusted to the

Really, Really, Really, Really,

Weird Stories

357

358

What Cindy Saw

John Shirley

umbilicus drooped, then rose to attach to the base of the thick red-yel-

low

much

chamber,

stalk in the center of the

as a

May Day

reveller's

ribbon attaches to a maypole. Cindy supposed that the umbilici

mouths and noses unnecessary Cindy was trol,

So

afraid,

made

for the almost-people.

but that always put her on the offensive. Take con-

she told herself. just to see

what would happen, she went about the room and—with

her can opener—methodically clipped the umbilici severing the almost-

people from the

stalk.

The almost-people stopped what they were looked

Cindy wondered

how

they

felt.

outraged or hurt? She couldn't

One by one twitched,

they

fell,

Were they alarmed or

felt

clutching their spindly throats.

making the wire-patterns on the floor a

little

surprised or

tell.

Cindy supposed that they were choking She

doing; they turned and

at her.

They writhed and and

spit blue sparks,

to death.

sorry this time. She even said so. "Oh, I'm sorry."

After a few minutes, they stopped moving. Their big eyes shut. Breathing shakily, Cindy stepped over the corpses and screens.

She was careful not to step on the

was sure she'd be electrocuted

The TV

screens monitored

life

silver

went

one of the

to

TV

wires in the floor; she

she did.

if

on

the upper world. Reticulating charcoal-

and-chalk video images of houses and motels and

traffic

and dogs.

Junkyards. Traffic lights changing. Farms. Seaside resorts. Canadian hikers.

Rock singers. ily

trying to

A teenage boy with stringy blond hair and a thin chest shak-

fill

a syringe from a rusty spoon. Jazz players. Masturbating

children. Masturbating

gazed for a while

at a

men and women.

Masturbating monkeys. She

TV showing two people

copulating in a hotel room.

They were both middle-aged and rather doughy. The man's hair was thinning, and his paunch waggled with his hip motions; the woman's hair was as defined

and permanent

Impulsively,

in shape as a hat.

A bell-shaped hat.

Cindy reached out and twiddled the monitor's unmarked

black-plastic knobs.

The

picture shimmered, changed: the

woman's head

warped, bent out of shape, reified—it had become the head of a chimpanzee.

The man screamed and disengaged and backed

woman

clawed

away.

The

at herself.

Cindy made a moue with her

lips,

and

tilted

her head.

She reached up and prodded a number of the metallic aphids with her can opener. They scurried, frightened at the unfamiliar touch, and set

Really, Really, Really, Really,

Weird Stories

What Cindy Saw

John Shirley the others to scurrying clinging to the hysteria, their

rounded

more

frantically,

ceiling

TV

at the

the thousands of aphids

were reshaping

symmetry of pattern

Cindy looked

till

in the cilia in

monitors.

Now

they showed only crowd

scenes. People at football games, looking confused

they'd

all

flailing,

gone blind and

and

deaf; they staggered into

or tripped, went tumbling

down

distressed, as

down toward

crowding

it,

the playing

and began

field.

if

one another, arms

the grandstands, upsetting

move

cohe-

They streamed onto the

field,

other people—but, as Cindy watched, the people began to sively

swarming

obliterated.

to arrange themselves according to the dictates

of a spontaneously reconceived psychic schema: people wearing white or yellow shirts

moved

together, people with dark shirts congregated,

the bird's eye view of the stadium

showed

till

the crowd spelling out words

with their re-ordered color scheme. They spelled out:

ZEITGEIST and then

LOVE TIMES DEATH EQUALS ACTION and then

LACEWORK REBELLION Cindy turned away. She approached the

stalk in the center of the

room. With the can opener stuck in her teeth, she began to climb. going was slippery, but she was determined, and soon reached the ing.

Arms and

legs aching, she clung there and, with

The ceil-

one hand, began

to

carve an opening.

The toil

skin parted

more

easily

from the underside. Ten minutes of painful to climb through. Cindy dropped the can

and the gap was wide enough

opener and

wormed

her

way upward, through

She broke through a second

layer,

the

wound

gnawing with her

in the ceiling.

teeth,

coming up

through the skin of another seeming-floor.

She found herself under what looked like an ordinary four-legged wooden table. Around her were four empty wooden chairs, and a white floor-length tablecloth.

She dragged herself out of the wet, shuddering slit, and onto the floor. Gasping, she pressed aside the tablecloth, which had so far concealed Really, Really, Really, Really,

Weird Stories

359

360

What Cindy Saw

John Shirley

her from those outside, and crawled into the upper world, once

atop the

shell.

She was

in a restaurant.

Mom and

Dad and

more

Belinda and Barbara sat at

the next table.

They stared

at her,

open-mouthed. "What the

The

you, Cindy?" her father asked.

girls

hell

looked a

Cindy was coated with the wemess, the

have you got

all

over

little sick.

stickiness, the

halfblood death

essence of underplace things. Still

crawled out

Her upset

down and wound shed

breathing hard, her head pounding, Cindy reached

lifted the tablecloth aside, revealing of.

This time, her family saw

father got it,

and

the ragged, oozing

his

up from the wine

it

too.

table rather convulsively, so that

He

glass splashed his wife's dress.

and, fumbling for his pot-pouch, staggered toward the

had covered

Mom's

face

their eyes.

exit.

They sobbed. Her mother was

was changing; the eyes growing

her skin going dusty-blue. So, then.

he nearly

turned away

Her

sisters

staring at her.

bigger, the lips vanishing,

Her mother was

the one they'd

planted in the family. "They're not under every house," Cindy tried to explain to her

sisters.

"They

where

Her

to look. TTiey sisters

keep us blinded with

false

how

symmetries."

followed their father outdoors.

Cindy turned away. "Fuck them subworld eyes on her back as she the table. She

You might dig to look. Not

aren't always there to find.

under our house and not find it—you have to know

slid feet-first into

all,

fell

the

then," she said. to her knees

She

felt

her mother's

and crawled back under

wound, and dropped

into the

room

below. She searched through the monitors, and found a screen showing

her dad and her

sisters getting into

the

car.

She turned the knobs, and

laughed, seeing the car rising into the sky Hke a helium balloon with the string cut turning

end over end, Belinda

father screaming as the car deliquesced, that

hung

in the air

and then burst

spilling

out of

it

and

falling,

her

becoming a huge drop of mercury

into a thousand glittering droplets,

fall-

ing to spatter the parking lot with argent toxicity.

Really, Really, Really, Really,

Weird Stories

The Almost Empty Rooms As images seen

in

a dream, thus should one see

all things.

—Vajracchedika Sutra

Part

I

of Primary Syntax

AIR RVID ALERT It

was on

television at 8:36

A.M. when no one expects catastrophes.

AIR RAID ALERT LISTINGS OF LOCAL FALLOUT SHELTERS/ALPHABETIC ORDER (Alphabetical shelter listings for the county. Screen flickers, distant siren.

Blank screen.)

My wife made a blank scream: Nothing came out of her opened mouth. She ran to get the It

children. Charles

and Andrea had

just left for school.

was a pleasant morning, other than for the alert, and the sky was and crisp. I felt no apprehension, seeing the TV announcement. I

clear

had expected

it; it

right

wheelchair, looking out

ous to see

The

all

on

time.

and was wheeling between kitchen and study

I'd just risen, tric

was

first

in

my elec-

one window, then another, mildly

curi-

the neighbors were running in and out of their houses.

children had laughed, watching the ludicrous scene through the

window. The neighbors flung themselves their front lawns like

tawdry

into cars or scurried about

on

rags caught in a dust-devil, huffing in circles

about the mounds of furnimre, clothing, and appliances, quibbling over

what less

to take.

I

gazed over their heads:

it

was

crisp

and

chilly,

the cloud-

sky was hollowed out turquoise.

FALLOUT SHELTER LIMIT OPTIMUM: EQUIVALENCY OF 500 POUNDS PER REGISTERED FAMILY OF TWO PERSONS IN POSSESSIONS

OR RELATIVES

said the stark letters

sage played over and over.

matic replay and gone

The men home to

at the

on the

TV screen. The

TV station had left it on autofamilies. No one

their respective

TV station, but the machines there still told AIR RAID ALERT/CML DEFENSE COMMAND 56648.

remained

at the

Really, Really, Really, Really,

mes-

Weird Stories

us to run.

362

The Almost Empty Rooms

John Shirley

went outside to see what was keeping my wife and children (but I knew). I had no intention of taking them to a fallout shelter (though I'd known). It would do no good, not a bit. As I rolled onto my ramp I

by the front steps

heard a roar, clutched

I

my

at

The

wheel-rims.

ground shuddered. I

the

looked up:

My

stark against the sky. X-factors

ered up there: in abeyance. stinctively waiting, to catch

I

shaded

was not light,

day

my

and

this

my

It

I

waited with

them

as they

boy were

in

A great gust of

be seen.

my

arms outstretched,

But they never

fell.

in-

fell.

the east.

and sudden

my face

But

as a labor pain.

was penetrating; the atomic

eyes did not melt nor

was— I had

moment.

I

eight-year-old

to

like plastic kites. They became crosses on a blackboard, my children. They hov-

eyes. Light, piercing

blinding.

my

My wife was nowhere

wind had picked the kids up

A great light from

and

six-year-old girl

overhead.

far

air,

flash

scorch.

I

was a

it

revealing

remembered what

shut the eroding calendar out of

my mind

till

that

had stopped up expectancy with self-hypnotism. This day was

February 10, 2048. I

had expected

The

all

of

this.

nuclear vortex reared up black-bellied with scar-white plumage.

White-hot lathing wind cut our flesh from us in

lessly. It

I

was

bath.

ent

was almost disappointed.

didn't hurt, not even for a

mother undressing a

skins didn't fly off in crazy bits

spirals,

from a

It

as loving as the fingers of a

Our

spiral strips,

and ragged

a slack minaret above us, whirling us

spindle), faster, faster until

my

bone, molded by centrifugal force.

It

a caged songbird.

We

borhood children (those rooted each

were

now

at

ash.

unwinding

like toys (yarn

skeleton fused into a single long

was

all

quite painless.

my

were not blown away and up

thirteen

moment.

child for the

pieces, but in coher-

sciousness never ceased nor faltered, but fluttered in like

but— and

amazing grace, the happy surprise—gracefully, smoothly, pain-

here's the

and under).

And

con-

fused remains like

My neighbors

the neigh-

and

I

were

our special point, afloat above the lawns whose grasses

We

resonated from the explosions which detonated har-

moniously, complementing one another pleasantly, their force snatching the ground neatly upward like a pickpocket

artistically

plucking a wallet.

There was no pain or discomfort, even when our bodies were only vague memories. There was to be no pain at

all

in this surgery. It

was

performed by professionals. Part

I

of Secondary Syntax

Really, Really, Really, Really,

Weird Stories

I

The Almost Empty Rooms

John Shirley

Hypothesis: Events are animals. Events are living creatures, vv^hose com-

anatomy and

plete

functioning

Corollary:

If

fleshly

dimensions are

invisible to us,

because

ignorantly but efficiendy comprising their

cells

we

are

body make-up.

an event could be predicted and confirmed according to

the characteristic metabolic cycle and inductive-excretive requirements of the event-organisms body, then

it

might be possible to

alter the

course of

anticipated incidents through working with the event-creature's nervous

system to I I

shift its actions in

was going to

midcourse. Confuse

try to interfere

it,

perhaps.

with a certain sad but small-scale disaster

had predicted would take place on the afternoon of August This was to be a If

I

could stop

Simon For

this small-scale

Chelsez, then

events, to divert I

11,

2047.

test.

I

mishap concerning a young

might use

World War

knew: World War

this

model

man named

for the manipulation of

III.

would

III

arrive

on

the

morning of February

10, 2048. If

the experiment with

my way

Simon Chelsez was

successful,

End of

Humanity^, and

would

trace

clusters of event-organisms busily con-

through the interacting

structing the foundations for the structure they called as the

I

Fun and we knew

there, at the nexus of the crises, intercept

World War. complex and circumlocutionaty ludicrous

the gestation of the Third

The

origin of this

series

of

endeavors was disillusioningly simple: I

didn't

want

to die.

Part

II

of Secondary Syntax

In form Astral, with sensations Subde,

I

conducted myself along the

damp

web-work of the incident-neural system to the apartment of a young man and his mother who lived across from the elementary school. I traced my

way from

a teacher's repressed

memory of a child's death (ghosdy reenact-

ment) to the young man's recollection of the accident: a teacher had seen a child killed on the street corner on which Simon Chelsez and his mother

Simon had seen the truck hit the little girl, watching from his bedroom window, and it had not moved him. The litde girl had been nearly divided in half by the truck's right front tire. The child's blood left a Ror-

lived;

schach inkblot on the white concrete, the

blot's

him of a knight killing a dragon. The teacher was an acquaintance of mine,

red configuration remind-

ing

code down. She was connected

eternally with

Really, Really, Really, Really,

I

had her vibratory

identity

Simon, though she'd never

Weird Stories

363

364

The Almost Empty Rooms met him

face to face,

by

accident; together they

from one person to the

Simon was gazing

cuits. I

in

which they lived.

other:

astral

at a

worked cell

room with Simon

mnemonic

in the

my way, psychically,

to the next.

Chelsez.

holographic programmer, trying to decide

He was

play.

I

from one brain

invisibly sharing a

which program to with him in

mutual cross-referenced recollections of the

their

were functioning memory-cells

bank of the event-animal

And I was

John Shirley

form only

I

completely unaware of me, since

I

was

secluded myself amongst programmer

cir-

Observing him through the reticulating eye of the event-organism,

perceived his surface thoughts clearly as plays and flares of polychro-

matic tions

crown of the sinuous tube of incident-composi-

lights defining the

marking

All of his

his

wake of

passage.

holographic movies starred the same hero: Captain Horatio

Alphonso. The holos were projected onto the center space of the almost empty

room was

room through

fifty

by

fifty feet,

center. Nineteen-year-old

programmer, was a

lenses set flush into the ceiling.

empty except

Simon Chelsez,

short, stocky,

Alphonso, Simon knew

all

Alphonso appeared

you'd walked into the

The white in

its

exact

owner of the holo-

the Alphonso holos by heart.

hummed,

in the

the present

bed

and muscular Chicano. Like Captain

the program-selector, leaving the setting

overhead laser-projector

for a single

large,

He punched up

on Pride and Punishment The

fell silent,

as the

middle of the room,

room without knowing

image of the heroic

at the foot of the bed. If

that

Simon owned an

ex-

pensive holo set you'd have thought that Captain Alphonso was actually there.

He

was three-dimensional

in that

you could walk around him,

him from beneath, always without interfering with the focus or proportionate volume of his body. If you approached Captain

look up

at

Alphonso from behind, you saw a holo reproduction of you walked around

formed

his back;

when

were perfectly

into his chest without a seam.

Simon his

to his front you'd see that his sides

fidgeted impatiently as

Alphonso waited,

dashing black toga with the

shoulder, arms outspread as

if

silver Liberator's

stoically

immobile

arrow on the

in

right

holding up the ghostly words which

floated under his forthright jaw:

PRIDE AND PUNISHMENT A REALER-THAN-LIFE PRODUCTION STARRING ESTEBAN MANTABLU AS CAPTAIN ALPHONSO Really, Really, Really, Really,

Weird Stories

John Shirley

The Almost Empty Rooms

PETULA ANKENY AS LIDIA PAUL CHELSEZ AS VORGAS COPYRIGHT ©2039 3-D LTD. Simon possessed a complete collection of the Alphonso series. He had inherited it because his late father, Paul Chelsez, had played the role of Vorgas, the Villainous Arch-Foe of Alphonso, in each of the

thirty-

nine episodes.

Simon and Alphonso were remarkably

And

alike in physique.

as the statuesque hero vanished, Lidia appeared, reclining

silken air-turbulence

smoggy cobwebs.

bed

was peacefully

Lidia

on a

an apartment hung with streamers

in

asleep.

like

Alphonso entered from

the balcony and stood beside her, gazing deep into the vacant eyes of his

slumbering beloved. In keeping with the glamor fad of that period she slept with her eyes tive

opened,

fluids sprayed

from

gleamed

in the bars of

She had

set the

their

tiny

rainbow

Dreamtone

membranes bathed

in artificial protec-

hoses attached to her head.

for

light

Her

Fanning Reds, guaranteed

to color her

dreams with scenes of passion. Her passionate dreams were about

made

concrete

reality

personification of

all

eyes

from the overhead DreamTone. to be

with the coming of Captain Horatio Alphonso,

that

is

gallant

and debonair. Bars of vermilion lumi-

nescence played over her delicate features, making her blankly-staring blue eyes red as small forges.

Simon,

who had

waited beyond the border of the holoscenario,

waded suddenly through

the projected image, without disturbing

it,

and

slipped into Alphonso.

He merged

with Alphonso's every action, striding the archetype's

strides, a fraction

blurring

its

of a second behind in the hob's choreography,

outline.

slightly

His limbs and head were one with Alphonso's,

smug

his

expressions.

moving in the same Simon had memorized the holo so completely his voyeur enactment developed into a self-hypnotized reflex. He knew all the words, mouthed stereotyped holo's

features

them with

perfect inflection

and precision

timing.

He could act it all out

without a single mistake. For the hundredth time.

He

even

made

love

when Alplonso

did.

Which Alphonso did

fre-

quently. While involved in the holoscenario Simon believed that he was

Captain Alphonso, Guerilla Hero of the sion

was complete enough that he could

his imagination.

Silver Liberators. fill

So he had orgasms when Alphonso

did frequently.

Really, Really, Really, Really,

The visual

illu-

in the rest of his senses with

Weird Stories

did.

Which Alphonso

365

366

The Almost Empty Rooms It

John Shirley Simon

hadn't been difficult for

Alphonso

series. It

was

to

memorize the tapes

for the

very primordial and basic, each Alphonso

all

holo lasting no more than twenty minutes. Alphonso would make love to Lidia, or begin to, Vorgas

would come

in to interrupt with his kidnap-

ping attempt on Lidia, and Alphonso would defeat Vorgas and spend the remainder of the holo

making love

to Lidia.

Simon/Alphonso stepped onto the sunken bed, dling Lidia like the Colossus of Rhodes.

Then he

standing, strad-

still

knelt gracefully beside

DreamTone with

her and she woke: stretching luxuriantly, removing the

a delicate sweep of her jewel-bangled hand, squeezing her eyes shut and

then opening them with a euphoric giggle. Purring, Lidia reached for

Alphonso/Simon.

Simon could feel Lidia's slim body in his arms. Almost. Enough. There was a real bed onto which the holo bed was projected, supporting Simon over his loving mirage. But he was forced to slip slightly out of synch with Alphonso in order to keep himself from incorporeal form of the naked Lidia as he

falling

mounted

her.

through the

The

outline

wavered, stained.

Alphonso threw

on

Lidia

.

.

.

his toga

and

briefs aside

and bestowed

moments. Vorgas

the scene, as he always did at those indelicate

looked very

much

like

Simon, though thinner,

was played by the man who had leased holo-projector shortly before his death.

shroud that contrasted sharply with

sunken lanky,

and

He

features.

corded arm

silvery.

at the

his

this

gun

naked but magnificent body

.

.

at

He was wrapped all

fours

.

and unfurled a

paralysis-gun, dart-shaped his

.

Alphonso was supposed

out his handy paralysis-ray reflector concealed in the .

in a white

Alphonso who shielded Lidia with

... at this point in the holoscenario

/

also

older because he

long black train of hair and dark,

end of which was a

the

much

apartment and bought the

toward the bed on

slithered

He pointed

within reach

his affections

After a few minutes of her spider embrace Vorgas crept into

to

whip

utility belt lying

.

hand of electric charges traveling I changed what he saw. I concentrated on the narcharges traveling his audio nerve. I changed what

concentrated on the narrow

Simons optic nerve. row band of electric be heard.

Instead of the usual reiteration of Vorgas's defeat, Alphonso screamed

and flung himself away from Simon, toppling, paralyzed. Simon stood up, uncertain, split from his vicarious self-image,

and watched

in

grow-

ing horror as Vorgas leapt onto Alphonso's bare breast

and plunged a

Really, Really, Really, Really,

Weird Stories

.

John Shirley

The Almost Empty Rooms

needle-dagger deep into his throat. Alphonso spurted blood, squealing like

a pig at slaughter.

Simon covered

He

his eyes

and whimpered.

staggered to the wall panel and flicked the holo

holoscenario faded

room ached with

the blotchy after-image of a bright

like

The The

off. light.

near-emptiness.

Simon's face was calm, almost empty. There should have been surprise or

fury.

was becoming worried. The eventual organism's neural predilection was cloudy. I levered, see-sawed, bounced from and was pumped into /

.

He opened

a door,

went down a

.

mother's bedroom, ap-

hall to his

proaching her soundlessly. She was lying under a sunlamp and listening to the radio

"Simon?"

on

earplugs.

his

mother

just

about to go to

Simon reached up and he intoned

"Hey, turn that

peered

down

at

him.

face,

why

hair, in

don't you

come back

later?

But while you're here shut off the will

deliberately

histrionically,

you?"

made

the

sunlamp

brighter.

"Cameras!"

you? She switched off the eye

off, son, will

Her

dear,

sleep.

my DreamTone,

sunlamp and turn on

"Lights!"

flicked the radio into silence.

her eyes wide open, sprayed by protective

had been. "Simon,

fluid as Lidia's

Mother was

He

said,

filters

and

sharp hooks around her puddly, watered-

had the exaggerated gloss of

synthetic implanting, plastic

sky-blue.

Simon's face was ingenuous, eyes-wide. "You've been playing the holo again, haven't you?" Mother accused. "I'd prefer you didn't, Simon. Re-

You know why. Doctor Hannaly warned you. It's best Paul." Her bland, middle-aged feamres creased meridians of

ally.

to forget blue-gray.

Self-consciously, she tried to relax her face; strong facial expressions

were said to promote wrinkles. mother,

Simon murmured, throwing

."

"Lidia

.

.

who

resembled Lidia only

his

arms around

his

plump

in the lack of facial expression.

He

her terrycloth robe.

dumping from His mother was profoundly shocked. She allowed her forehead to

kissed the breasts

wrinkle. "Stop

He

it!"

She slapped him.

stood up and his look of naivete became cunning. "So you are

Vorgas, with a

new

ploy!

Lidia for long, Vorgas!" his

You could

He

hardly think to disguise yourself as

bellowed, with a melodramatic flourish of

hand.

His mother

bit

her lower

lip

and

leapt clear of the bed, flinging herself

at the door.

Really, Really, Really, Really,

Weird Stories

367

368

The Almost Empty Rooms

John Shirley

Simon caught her under the throat with his right arm and with his left hand tugged the cord of the sunlamp from its socket and wrapped it around her neck. His face tightened into a

snarl exactly

when

his

tightened the cord. His mother gurgled briefly, thrashed, then limp, a

up

cumbersome

He let her fall onto the bed. Then he stood

weight.

to wait for the credits for the next episode.

Blood from

his mother's parted lips

flowed enthusiastically and

tered the pillow with a red Rorschach inkblot.

sembled a small /

hands

became

girl

To Simon

spat-

the inkblot

re-

run over by a truck.

couldn't bear to watch

any

longer. Failure.

And now cathartic

tides

of the event-organism's cleansing organs swept me away. I allowed myself to be sucked into the undercurrent that led back to my body which

my

waited in cataleptic torpor on

A manganese

office

couch

.

.

.

blue light poured thickly through the

blurred the spare furnishings in

my office

window

slats

and

into the viridian gray of things

seen underwater. I

sat up, feeling

numb around

my

adjusted slowly to

the edges, and

physical husk.

I

my eyes

concentrated, raising

pressure, accelerating breathing, quelling dizziness.

arms was an

I

I

locked

was in,

up a bauble

fitting

agonized for a while.

I

I

I

would

first,

my

blood

moving

steam

my body like Simon into Alphonso's.

I

didn't eat for a try

III

of Secondary Syntax

had nightmares about the murder of Simon's few

days.

I

agonized and decided.

once more.

I'd listened to

tory identity code

traced

A

vir-

her solo performances

and memorized the recordings of her own compositions.

arriving in:

But

my resurrections.

tuoso musician, Phylla Bertran.

I

my

penny arcade game. For a vertiginous

had projected another mishap, concerning a young woman, a

So

I

thinking of myself as arms, legs, torso, head, and tolerating

Part

mother.

in a

myself into

the erection which plagued

I

At

indirect process, like manipulating the handle of a

shovel to pick instant

cleared some.

I

had her vibra-

down.

my way large

through the neural channels of the event-animal,

and vacuous room, empty except

thick strings of metallic black stretching

for the four taut,

from the center of the con-

cave ceiling to the coastered fixture firmly magnetized to the black plastic floor.

The

walls

were contoured

fied resonance of any string,

when

to

throw back a greatly ampli-

struck.

The

entire

Really, Really, Really, Really,

room was

the

Weird Stories

John Shirley

The Almost Empty Rooms

hollow body of a huge acoustic bass musician inside

was

Phylla lips.

viola, large

enough

to contain

its

itself.

red-haired, with preoccupied blue eyes

She wore a skintight leotard and

tights

clipped and minced, to the upright strings.

and

thin, impatient

and walked with footsteps

The door hushed

shut auto-

matically behind her. .

.

.

And I was

Except for me, she was alone.

membrane of the

serving via the optical

chance to

test the

corollary to

only there in

spirit,

ob-

event-organism. Waiting

my

my hypothesis one last time

.

.

.

She pressed the chrome stud on her bracelet releasing the wheels for the string-pickup carriage

mounted

remote-control device in her

from one part of the room

into the ceiling. Directing

to another.

and when Phylla brought the

ther end,

traveled to the larger

end of the room

The room narrowed

strings there, they

that constricted space to a higher pitch.

it

with a

she could coerce the strings

silver bracelet,

When

at the far-

were tuned by

the perpendicular strings

their tone

became more

bass.

Fingers strumming like running children, she played the encompassing

instrument and strings as

if

lightly

danced to and

fro,

one arm looping the mobile

they were her dancing partner. She played expertly, each

note as deep and pronounced as a church rapidity of artillery

fire.

bell

but with the thunderous

For a while she dashed through her bass viola

solo in the Bartok piece she performed with the

New

York

Philhar-

bow and own com-

monic. But she couldn't complete the composition without a

anyway she was happy positions.

rhythm

Her bobbing

in intimate

belly of the

... for

in improvisation, embellishing with her

huge

and short

breasts

tosses of her hair

marked

wavelength as she pirouetted and furled through the

bass.

me the music was filtered through the membrane of the event-

organism, emerging as a ghost of its actual tone. But its echoes, reverberations of a lonely woman, made the body temporarily abandoned

by

my

mind, waiting, dreaming

in

my

office,

shudder

I

waited and

watched for the high-water mark of those intimate wave-lengths Phylla

her was

was an

.

.

.

enthralled artist, internationally applauded. But a part of

numbed by supernumerary

desires placing the pinnacle of the

music, her personal essence just beyond her reach. Never quite satisfied,

though

critics vainly insisted that

her interpretations were letter-perfect,

she wanted the whole cup, every drop.

To

room customized into a musical instrument her own self-expression. For a month she'd always closer, not quite: not

this

bass-

designed to envelop her in practiced here, ever closer,

just yet.

Really, Really, Really, Really,

end she had the

Weird Stories

369

370

The Almost Empty Rooms

Now strings.

she was

John Shirley

scarlet, sweating; yet

Each finger dipped into the

her fingers nimbly flakked the

scale like a

surgeon seeking a special

nerve within an incision. After thirty-two minutes Phylla was nearly sated. But not quite. .

.

and I knew

.

of the room and

the limitations

hoped

to forestall

for the second

now,

on uninterrupted she would exceed

that if I let her go

would

test.

If I

it

inevitably

could

toss

would not be enough. And what I come about. The time approached

a mental probe into her impressions

altering, amplifying, enlarging her capacity for receptivity to her

own

compositions. Satisfaction, perhaps

She moaned. chased beyond

She

sat

strings

The

/

reached out

.

.

.

.

.

.

She made the cry of an exhausted deer

its limit.

down

on

heavily

hummed

the floor.

The

fading reverberations of the

mournfully, like a departing

jet.

four strings in their metal fixture rolled

silently,

with

finality,

to

the center of the room. Phylla .

.

.

/

was

left sighing.

sensed the mercury bursting from the cap of the thermometer

up

unsteadily,

was

positive. It

Phylla stood

and taking her steps

.

.

.

carefully, left the

room. .

.

The

.

test

might be possible to avert

Phylla returned with a stepladder

.

.

.

which she placed by the four

strings.

...WorldWarlll... She climbed to the stepladder and fixture

on

tied a silver-white

the ceiling. She fixed the other

around her neck. She pressed the

cord to the metal

end of the cord

bracelet's

in a

loop

remote control for Auto-

matic Response.

The

toward the narrow end of the room, yanking

strings' fixture rolled

Phylla off the stepladder. She sagged

from the slim cord, making not a

spasm, towed wherever the strings bounced, here and there in the echoing chamber.

As she swung, a pendulum, her dead

mottled with purple, she

bumped

into the strings,

face bloated

which gave out a

and dis-

cordant thrumming.

She was dragged about the room, gyrating the strings, played a .

.

.

/

melody

had been unable

to

my

doing. Only.

negated twice

.

.

noose, body striking

change the predicted event-organisms' meta-

bolic reaction: Suicide, as I

wasn't

in her

as void of predictable structure as death.

had projected

Only

.

the corollary

.

.

OK, nobody's

perfect. It

of my hypothesis had been

.

Really, Really, Really, Really,

Weird Stories

John Shirley

The Almost Empty Rooms Part

So you I

see,

I

wasn't at

had done what

quences;

all

of Primary Syntax

II

unprepared

had redefined the word

I

when

had done the night

I

hours of the I

which had no human hand the

happen. The FBI I

in

I

its

knew

had seen the conse-

I

had drugged myself and

I

family could have the last six I

had done what

I

had done.

myself as a note in a symphony

composition.

TV said AIR RAID ALERT. convince anyone that Armageddon was going to

I'd laid off trying to

anyway.

my

of self-determination.

illusion

had seen the consequences.

And

before;

failure;

hypnotized myself to forget, so that

TV said AIR RAID ALERT.

the

laughed.

just

suppose

I

had some

It

wouldn't do them any good to know,

illusions

about the world going out in the

dignified splendor of fatalistic comprehension. Still,

for a while,

I

sought out fissures or weak spots in the skin of the

event-organism enclosing me, through which

and regard

my own

it

impartially.

A

lungs ripped their

I

might pass to stand apart

nonsense proposition. That would be as

way from my

rib

if

cage to stand outside and

survey me. I

gave up trying to escape.

at the calendar.

Jesus, for a

up on

that, too.

trifling

got drunk for a week.

experimented with heroin.

weekend.

wife asked why,

As a

I

I

I

I

I

stared, soddenly,

discarded that and went to

faith-healing failed to revive

all

the calendars from

my

my

house.

legs

I

gave

When my

told her to shut up.

hobby,

Sometimes they come

Those take place

When

removed

I

I

studied the social habits of the event-organisms.

together in the equivalent of committee meetings.

as devastating earthquakes or

wars or gold rushes.

amongst themselves. Those take the form (from our narrow viewpoint) of interchanges like the Olympics or the United Nations General Assembly or midnight on New Year's eve in

Sometimes they have

fights

Times Square. every 500 millennia or so, events have festivals. World's Fairs. They get together to have fun and enjoy themselves,

Once

and from our viewpoint this takes the persona of Wodd War III. Their system, for Feblatest Wodd's Fair was scheduled, in terms of our time ruary 10, 2048.

Fancy

that,

I

said,

when

the firestorm's prologue of hurricane winds

swept our children half a mile into the

on about what glory he would

sky.

find as a

My boy, Charles, had babbled

jet pilot. I

Doctor of Metaphysicis. Really, Really, Really, Really,

Weird Stories

wanted him

to

be a

371

372

The Almost Empty Rooms

A

John Shirley

throat of spasming energy.

neatly,

with

sterile,

plastic toy bricks

The

nuclear

fire

took our

rubber-gloved fingers. Like a child carefully removing

from

his play-casde

now that the game was

the leaves of the trees were stacked as neatly as dollar sury.

Everything in

landscape.

phone,

The

cities

apart

city

its

place. Japanese floral

done. All of

bills in

the Trea-

arrangement with the entire

explosions were metallic notes and the nation was a xylo-

ringing euphoniously

Fireworks heralding the

where

steel missiles

commencement

of the

impacted.

festivities.

Part FV of Secondary Syntax

All right then,

perhaps

my attempts

Simon had caused them. But

it

to intercept the deaths of Phylla

couldn't be

my

fault.

There are no

and acci-

dents.

Something nagged trying to decide

Whether or Something

at

what

me.

It

was three days

around

the muffled sounds

it

back of

in the

bumping

unidentified things

if I

February tenth.

I

was

not. rattled

rolling loose in the trunk of a car,

der

till

to do.

as

I

and

as

I

my mind

turn corners,

makes. Slowly

I

like

some

object

drive along, listening to the try to

I

decipher

it

from

got the picture and began to won-

was a dupe.

Because there

is

simply no such thing as an accident.

And

it's

a

damn

shame. I

sat in the study, stoking the fire

hotter though

it

a plush chair

was already hot

chair.

I

from the

central heating.

I

sat in

me.

got in bed next to

My wife,

the permaplast hearth, hotter and

and sweated and went without dinner but the answer

didn't sweat itself out of Finally

on

in there

my wife.

Elaine, tried to

I

hug me.

lay in I

bed looking

shrugged her

at

my wheel-

off.

"What's wrong?" I

decided to be honest with her for once.

intuition

Maybe

would make an appearance. For once.

the legendary wifely

"It's

the event-organism

thing—"

She made a small sound of weariness. "Oh, cut

it

out, will you?"

She put her head under the

pillow. "I'm sick

Not muffled enough. "You made an ass of yourself when those FBI agents came to our house. You were always big-mouthed with rhetoric. Like the first time I met you of hearing that crap,"

came her muffled

in that ludicrous transfinite

geometry

voice.

class.

I

was impressed then. But

Really, Really, Really, Really,

Weird Stories

John Shirley

The Almost Empty Rooms

what about your

children? Are you going to explain your theories them? Can you philosophically explain why you ignore them?" "I

don't ignore them.

I

bought them those

to

plastic kites yesterday,

didn't I?"

"Big deal.

Do

you know what your son does,

of Bernie Backsterr the American

goddamn

thing about that

moron

like that I

He

collects tapes

every

He

takes

Backsterr and imitates him.

notes about what Bernie Backsterr's rearranges his

lately?

Dreamer and he memorizes

room

looks

on

like

the holo set and

own damn room to look exactly the same way. He dresses

moron, wears

couldn't repress a shudder.

began to wonder

.

.

It

connected too closely with Simon.

I

Charles contained hidden antipathy for his mother.

if

Andrea, though only her to play viola

same way—"

his hair the

six,

akeady wanted to be a musician. Elaine wanted

.

makeup was smeared on the mauve pillow. She always put on her makeup just before she went to bed. Eye shadow, lipstick, glitter. She'd wash it off directly on getting up the next morning. It was an idioElaine's

syncrasy like her aversion for Chinese people. She wouldn't go near Chi-

watch

nese restaurants; she wouldn't allow a Chinese

in the house, or

them on TV.

woman, a promakeup on for me. But

It

was a

fessor of English. I

I

used to think that she put the

suppose she wore

it

sionately in her sleep. lables I

I

peculiar prejudice for an educated

which sounded

for

whoever

When

to

was who made her moan so

tried to sleep.

choke down an omelet for

breakfast.

I

nants of breakfast lisdessly about the plate with

My

pas-

mumbled monosyl-

distinctly Chinese.

mrned my back on her and

had

it

talking in her sleep she

herded the greasy rem-

my fork.

daughter, Andrea, sat or rather teetered madly, across from me.

Charles had gone to school. Andrea was

soming. She was one of those children

six,

who

healthy, blonde,

and

blos-

explode outward, looking at

as many things simultaneously as practical. She fashioned her unfinished breakfast into tiny casdes with her knife. If she didn't like something she

always found a child like I

some kind of use

this,

I

for

it.

Nothing was wasted, with

thought, should not be wasted

looked at the giddy stammer-play of her

on

lips as

her.

And

radiation poisoning.

she sang a TV-jingle;

I

that ran through my calculations again: eighty-nine percent probability my involvement in the metabolic gestation cycle would cause the war.

That

left

eleven percent.

I'm not sure

if

the

man

I

influenced was the Secretary of Defense.

Really, Really, Really, Really,

Weird Stories

I

373

374

The Almost Empty Rooms

John Shirley

knew, through the jack-o-lantern buttered the footprints of meteorites that this

light,

veined and notched with

was the man who was about

a decision about a certain debacle with the Chinese. the cusp, the ence.

one whose

He

was

problem made

interpretation of the

to

the

all

make

man

at

the differ-

He was the living turning point. He made a phone call from his desk

in his cozy, simulated red-velvet office to

the President.

The

was a

caller

someone who might have been

tight-faced

and an out-of-place black toupee. In

man with

little

his right

a gray mustache

hand he gripped the

leather

handle of a briefcase, unobtrusive except for the handcuffs chaining

They rattled out a code

his wrist.

few of

pret very

I

couldn't understand.

his thoughts: his

output was sparse.

I

thinking about his ulcer and about calling his mother.

phone and placed the

briefcase

was

I

it

to

able to intertell

he was

He hung

up the

could

on an empty desktop.

He unlocked the handcuffs with a murmur of satisfaction. He opened the briefcase. Inside was a sheaf of papers, figures on

the

owned by

the

build-up of nuclear arms bases in certain strategic regions

Chinese.

I

scanned, selected what

I

wanted

saw something out of the corner of

I

and Simon's mother. They were files

on

to change.

my

there, with

event-animal's eyes: Phylla

me, though

could see the

I

the opposite wall through their denseless forms.

They wavered

but remained, expressionless, but trying to say something. I

looked back

down .

.

.

the /

at the

column of

man who

little

figures

.

changed what he saw Part

.

.

.

.

III

couldn't see me, his eyes running

.

of Primary Syntax

The entire world was caught up in the nuclear devolution. The bombs only fell on select cities, but those were mere

torches

illuminating the field for the event-animals' construction crew. Fallout shelters

were

shelters

neady from the ground and unpacked them, laying everything

utterly

without value. Fingers of nuclear fission plucked

out primly on the picnic

not

levitated,

it

table.

was more

like

Each individual person was suspended— hanging from an

above the naked, flattened earth, where

invisible

we were spaced

hook—a

foot

out evenly from

one another. Half of

us,

my

half,

were stripped of our

symmetrically arranged.

Like

a

flesh, quite painlessly.

And

mother unwrapping her Christmas

present while conscientiously saving the wrapping for next year, our clothes, skin, muscles, tissues, cartilage,

and

vestigial

Really, Really, Really, Really,

organs such as

Weird Stories

John Shirley

The Almost Empty Rooms

amazement were side. Empty skins

cleanly

all lifted

away and stacked one by one

discarded wetsuits were folded

like

on one

pile;

to the

organs

placed neatly in transparent receptacles.

We

couldn't see exactly

erything

we saw was

who was

responsible.

On

the other hand, ev-

responsible.

Our bodies were gone, our minds

(stripped of initiative) remained microfilmed onto long white rods of pure ossified perception, rods which trembled with every wayward stimulus, like tuning forks for sight

and smell

The

as well as sound.

other people were

their bodies,

in

dead but

World War mid-jump.

paralyzed, always

would be-locked

no one was

into

killed

III.

All of us: frozen in

still

seeing, corpses with feeling. But

No

above the ground

like

shadows blotted the

leaping ballet dancers crucified

frozen, ash-coated earth.

Light from everywhere.

No We

sun.

No

houses.

No

horizon.

No

argument.

could not see farther than— ahhhh,

through the eye of the event tastefully

it

it

seemed

might have been

five

but then,

five miles,

thousand. Gray haze

presented the grounded verge of the vast transparent hemi-

sphere that was World

War

Ill's

interpretation of the sky. Inside our

hemisphere, pleasing arrangements of cones and cubes and pyramids

were constructed of the stripped houses and parks, of rough, prosaic

wooden

texture or rust-flaked metal offsetting mathematical spareness

of geometry. All the city's children floated,

pavane

in the sky

Those who

still

rods

like myself.

hum

sings:

We

I

above

us.

bobbing about one another

A cloud

in

an aloof

of babies.

possessed flesh began to revolve around the calcium vacillated faintly, like

an antenna

aerial.

An

ultrasonic

Fim Fun Fun Fun Fun Fun Fun.

rods formed an axis

fleshed; like

like

a circular picket fence circled by the

maypoles surrounded by dancing

A

virgins.

carrousel of

weighdess, stark humanity comprising the nuclear merry-go-round,

we

the nucleus, they wooden-horses electrons.

There was no sound for that detached time-space. And no wind. Everywhere was the colorless light. The light that never warms. Final Segment of Primary Syntax, in Present Tense

This place

is full

with motion, but nearly empty.

we'll revolve like this, or

if

measures

Really, Really, Really, Really,

I

don't

know how

in duration apply, or

Weird Stories

what the

long

event-

375

376

The Almost Empty Rooms

John Shirley

animals intend for us after that.

envision myself chasing an ice cream

I

am a small child. I am lured by the jangling bells of the ice cream truck. I've run six blocks to catch up with the cruising Moby Dick white Good Humor truck, but it outruns me and my lungs ache and my knees shake. I clasp a quarter so hard in my fist it hurts my pahn. I can almost truck.

I

cream and

taste the ice

my

bleached color of

my ears.

I

color mixes and

and the

hear the jangling and

memory. But whirls faster

I

and

texture melts into the sun-

chase

on

after the truck: within

and counterclockwise

faster

of paralyzed folk

sides

and

who

light

is

me,

in

and resonating bone

faster within the larger

stare straight ahead,

with their arms at their

above them. There are no shadows,

their children floating

now, for the

its

tropic steam of perspiration behind

externally the inner circle of rods

circle

I

its

hair

everywhere.

cannot follow the organic twine of events into the

future,

now. I'm

perceptually fixed in time, pinning the function of this organ of the

event onto the present ity I

ing

moment with my calcium

nail.

Time, the continu-

of motion, revolves happily around me, riding the carrousel. get the impression that

Time

is

the World's Fair of Events.

this,

an

entity.

Time

ing blue ribbons to the best exhibits.

I

is

am

He is

a high officiary attend-

judging

World War

gratified: Detroit

III,

attach-

a winner!

is

On one side I see, flashing by, an immense rectangular glassy construction resembling an oversized aquarium. In this container, dutifully recy-

again and again, are the events which led up to

cling, recurring

War

III. I

lives

of Phylla and Simon. Whizzing past,

can see myself over there.

murdering and each of them.

World War mother

III. I

watch

in the

as

I

I

can see I

my

catch a glimpse of Simon's

can see myself floating wraithlike over

make

the fatal decision to attempt to avert

me, deliberately muddling

wrong

set

World

interference with the

see the cerebral scan-projections of Phylla

distracting

adjusting the

man

Phylla's suicide. I

I

my judgment.

and Simon's I

see myself

of figures, inadvertently influencing the

cozy office to conclude that

it is

little

best to attack China before

they attack us. I

glimpse missiles ejaculating from the

to missiles of retribution

Phylla myself,

on

their

and Simon's mother made

USA which wave

a friendly hello

way from China. I try to perceive why me do it all, and I catch a glimpse of

my submerged personalities, laboring while I sleep, conjurmy magically endowed wheelchair-talisman the visions of Mom and Phylla, placed to confuse me at that crucial instant: I

one of

ing through

Simon's

deliberately distracted myself.

And

(without eyes) that the steps

I

I

chuckle (without a mouth) as

I

see

took to prevent the projected deaths of

Really, Really, Really, Really,

Weird Stories

The Almost Empty Rooms

John Shirley Simon's Old Lady and Phylla Dedicated vent the Third World

War were

as a

and the

Artist,

final effort to pre-

whole predetermined

to the signals of the event-animals of

which

am

I

a

reflex-reactions

the

cell;

same kind of

inexorable spasms which led to the destruction of the civilization call

Lemuria and the uncountable

societies the event-animals allowed hu-

it

had personally

built prior to that. If a

car accident (Fun

Fun Fun), why,

that

manity to think

man (as a child I

we now

man

killed in a

is

seems the sheerest chance; but that

loved to play with marbles) had, perhaps even genetically,

every intention of getting himself mutilated.

made me

a cripple.

Simon

Chelsez's

went

I

willfully into the car

The captain of the Hindenburg steered into that tower deliberately; Dewey wanted defeat at the hands of Truman (I enjoyed games of chance, especially as a means of escape; never chess, accident that

always dice) and

mother spent her

entire

life

preparing to

be strangled by her son. Unconsciously,

But why not? out to be a ful festival

And why the

it

in that

me

I

hell not?

of fun.

jolly affair, lots

of events, and

impulse possessed display

had every intention of

I

I

igniting

Now that

I

World War

mull

it

over,

can see the beginning of

III.

it's

turning

this delight-

cannot (Fun! Fun!) imagine what errant kill-joy

to try to put

it

off. It's

a dandy, lovely show.

They

huge aquarium over there-there-(or Time or one of the

other visiting dignitaries should they chance to stroll by. Fley! All kidding aside,

I

feel

and now: and I'm recording I

suspect I've hit

affair:

And

on my

shamelessly giddy!

It's all

happening here

it.

assignment,

my role as part of this gay,

carnival

I'm a recording device. also a broadly smiling

Streamers of radiation tickertape. I'm

fall

Master of Ceremonies.

golden from the sky

plumage on a parade

float.

like festival confetti

and

I'm performing, a clown in

the center of three rings.

From

here, there

is

(Fun Fun Fun) nothing wrong with World

War

III.

Nothing sad about Armageddon. present tense. Like Everything, symmetrically right now, performs in the straining every fitense, extremely is a burglar alarm ringing. The present of ripping it. point the bubble sky's sumptuous fabric abiost to the

ber of

Fine and good.

The

tension

is

Really, Really, Really, Really,

half the fun.

Weird Stories

377

Ten Things to be Grateful For

In this fickle world

.

.

.

and cloying world

In this coy

In this the best— can

it

.

.

.

be true?—of

all

possible worlds

.

.

.

One must butter one's bread on the sunny side of the street. One must keep a stiff lower grip. One must One must remember: there are things to be thankful for. We have so much to be grateful, to be thankful for. .

.

Here

.

are ten things to be thankful for.

I.

Be thankful that you minding your

own

are not strolling through a park

corporate head-hunter back, to

pee badly and

there's

park, a bushy park, fore,

and you

when you find

nowhere

to

ment under

home,

the

it's

a big

ferns,

way and they

teU

you

you step off

watching them

and see two

that you've just

because there's a homeless encamp-

embankment, and you complain of entrapment but

not applicable and

it's

the

that liberty in the park's bushes be-

the stream, and you finish and turn

their mattresses,

call

you have to pee, you have

embankment, through some

standing there blocking your their

that

sort of enjoy the occasional outdoors pee, so

bob with the impact of peed on

a pretty spring day,

go within a quarter mile, and

and you've taken

the path and pee off an

men

on

mind, and thinking about whether or not to

no good and you

try to feint to the left

it's

and dart to

the right but they are used to people trying to dodge past, they're not your average homeless joes, they're predacious street people, and one of

them

grabs you and so does his smell, the smell of a whole cattle-car of people in

one man, and you can see the

face as he bear-hugs you,

lice

squirm

in his

and you can look

beard an inch from your

into his eyes,

one of them

skyblue and the other the color of a spat phlegm; and the second guy

Really, Really, Really, Really,

Weird Stories

John Shirley

Ten Things to be Grateful For 379

who's lean and blue with tattoos from the waist up, he kicks you at the base of the spine again and again as you try to scream but the bear-hugger beard in your mouth and with a strangely high-pitched

stuffs his

he always does

says

your

own

feebleness,

workboot

kick, the

your mind

made you

that, as

is

ground of the

amazed not

telling

at his strength

but at

crack with another practiced

there's

of jagged radiating three-dimensional arrows

with weight, and the bearded one

more

ravine's lip

falls

on you

the ravine, and that feeling

as

cracking and crackling as you hit the hard

and your head

is

hanging over the edge of the

embankment, and the other guy grabs onto your neck and jumps

off into

a spin-painting with only the colors black

is like

and green, and the vertebrae come

and neck

giggle,

meaningful crack of your spine and the pain that in

like a picture

back and

struggle

and then the

of rusty iron, pain

fall

you

apart,

and he swings from your head

as the other guy, drooling with laughter, holds

brae pull farther apart and you remember

on and

when you were

the verte-

in kindergarten

you drew a picture of a bear jumping over a fence only no one could make out what ing, to

it

was you'd drawn, and now other tramps come

laughing, hoot-

swing on your head and neck and the vertebrae part completely

and when they get bored they kick your body like a bean bag amazed that you're still alive, but you're not alive for long. That could happen to you. Be grateful that isn't

happening to you.

It

could be.

It's

not.

Be

thankful.

2.

Be

grateful that you're not a child in Thailand

to a

Bangkok

you goodbye

child-brothel,

as

if

who's sold by

and you're amazed

you were going

to visit a relative, as

if

his parents

mother kissed

that your

you would see

her again, and you thought that they would take the money from the man and then tell you to run away with them but they didn't even look

back as you are led weeping, the weeping bone-dry, up the creaking wooden stairs in the narrow alley in back of the building, a squeezed and building that would fall over but for the buildings on either side, then they beat you the

first

time

just to

introduce you to beatings and to

of your subservience but really

magnimde hearted beating compared to the second time when you

initiate

you

into the

it's

a

half-

refused to

let

man

tall skinny the fat American fuck you in the ass while his friend, a he's being tenhimself convincing if as who coos at you in an undertone

der, shoves a stubby thick

member

in

your mouth and makes circular

though you stomached that, when you felt ran to hide under the penetration from behind, you wrenched free and strong, flipped and squat the bed and wouldn't come out till Kimaritchul,

motions with

his hips and,

Really, Really, Really, Really,

Weird Stories

380

Ten Things to

be Grateful

For

John Shirley

began—with a

the bed to one side and

strangely

tience in his eyes, like a horsetrainer, kicking expertly, so as

anomalous look of

you

pa-

in the soft parts, very

not to break anything but so as to introduce deep, deep

movement

bruises that hurt with your every

all

night long, each stab of

pain speaking with Kimaritchul's unspoken voice, as you

let

men

the two

do what they wanted with you, after the skinny one made noises as if he disapproved of what the guard had done to you, and then goes on to fuck you

till

you choke and

don't die, not

throw you

you

lose consciousness, but unfortunately

two years

till

later

when your kidney

ruptures and they

something to be grateful

in the canal. That's

for: that's

not

happening to you.

3.

Be

grateful that you're not recovering

tion, leaving

you one limb, your

left

from your

third diabetes amputa-

arm, while the nurses, especially

the one with the harelip and the dyed-blond with the long neck and

slumped shoulders,

human less

give

you

mentally

filing looks, they're

detrims that hasn't been picked up

yet, filing

and meaningless and simply a bothersome

filing

you

as

you under hope-

fulfillment of duty, that

duty dwindling, on no one's instructions, day by day, the sponge-baths

going from once a day to once every two days to once a week, the

mrning

for bedsores following precisely the

clinical planning, the kindly ies falling off to visits

it,

almost none, the eye contact vanishing

from the doctor

days, the

since

food which,

down

also after

all,

sponging without

twice a day

now and

once; the television

you

if

left

and then they say the

on

TV

the lack of available beds, hearing, their

skill at

to

if

you

start

if

whining about anything

broken when if

entirely, the

they'd bring

it's

not,

comes only

it

gone off the

air for

and the

talk

good about

only one would open up, within your

indirectly conveying a sense of

some imagined

personal injury, their indifference to your tale of the night orderly

comes

in

and holds down your remaining arm and

look of slack-mouthed concentration, four or footsteps

five

the doctor she's forgot your insulin, the

you smell the decay growing

to

be thankful

for: that isn't

in

coma

who

you with a

slaps

times before hearing

and hurrying away, the nurse outraged when you

as

by

bed: the food coming only

a channel that has

oh

if

inquir-

can't reach every part of your-

falling off the

is

as

once a week, then once every ten

you can feed to yourself

you have one limb, even

self for a

same declension,

remarks and encouragements and

try to tell

creeping up on you

your remaining limb

.

.

.

just

Something

happening to you.

Really, Really, Really, Really,

Weird Stories

John Shirley

Ten Things to be Grateful For

4.

Thank your

large parasite

growing

in

on a tapeworm, but

thing with jawparts like

of grasping, and

some

to grab lately

you it,

are not completely convinced, ut-

convinced, granite-pillar and steel-brace convinced, that there

terly

ant

you

particular deities that

it's

your

stubbier

and thicker and

pushed

its

can't urinate,

it's

to you, to persuade

and somehow this pleases

it

can take words from your mind

you not

to whisper there are

survival adaptations,

to fight

many

people, as everyone knows, flora the doctors isms,

and there

and the fellows for

if

you

if

you're quite

I'll

still

me

just

as.

and

let

trusting,

you're contemptuous of

its

freely

I'll

all

eat

dead skin

electrolytes

from

love you,

I'll

push

genitals,

in

and

but only

you must surrender completely, and you It

whispers such things to you, but

sluggish efforts at persuasion,

the lower orders and cannot persuade like a

and

one of its

them, micro-organ-

and they

reach out of your ass to caress your

and

that's

another step, another kind of benign para-

me move

must not scream when you see me.

as well as

it,

parasites within

your intestines help released trapped

in

relax

out of you, and

call

are mites living in your eyebrows,

food and think of site,

sometimes your spleen,

liver,

are swelling

at times, as

it

a wormish

rubbery, capable

to squeezing your bladder shut because

and your ankles

them back

a

grip through the tissues of your intestines

moved on

and you can even hear

is

a mutated vari-

is

intelligent,

human fingers only translucent,

inner organ, sometimes your

you suspect

to give

intestines, a parasite that

some commercials anyway,

it is

TV commercial

perhaps, and

it

a thing of

can, or not

cannot be trusted,

as the doctors are in denial, out of sheer ineffable horror, refusing to

acknowledge the presence of the

open with what fight

your

own arm which

the layer of

thing,

you must, of course, cut yourself

over-the-counter topical anesthetic you can manage, and

membrane

tries

not to cut any further as you penetrate to

over the intestines, but which you, in the

unshakeable determination of your absolute

will,

overcome, triumphing

the bathtub naked and trying to staunch the blood with towwith your free hand, you cut with shaking fingers a long jagged rent in

as, lying in

els

the large intestine, for a

and find the

full

fourteen inches, and lay the intestine open,

parasite within ...

is

bleed to death you think you hear ful that isn't

you.

Be

it

gone,

is

somehow

gone, and as you

whispering from the drain. Be grate-

thankful.

the terrorist thankful, too, that you're not trapped in the rubble after stone, ragged of clinker bomb has reduced the building to a shuddering

Be

Really, Really, Really, Really,

Weird Stories

381

382

Ten Things to

be Grateful

For

John Shirley

two days now, and the sounds of rescuers are very, very, very distant, eloquendy distant, and you're in a chamber that was not made for habitation,

under many tons of rock, with your arms and

ken!—in odd Jerry-Lewis postures,

like

angled— unbro-

legs

a dancing Keith Haring drawing,

only you're losing sensation in your legs because circulation

is

cut off by

a stone that presses just hard enough, but your arms are aching with sen-

when you move,

sation, and,

lower,

the rocks above nudge a

and small scavenging beedes begin

rattling legs

and you

on

can't feel

you can hear

to appear,

them brush them begin on your legs,

the stones, feel

closer, a

little

little

their

past your mouth, your ears, there's

no

but there's a sense of something flowing out of you

circulation there,

down

there, a cold-

ness that seeps up from your calves to your knees, to your thighs, as you

hear the child suddenly wake up and begin screaming for

you open your mouth

to try to speak

chitinous climbs into your

its

mother, and

words of comfort but something

mouth and chokes you and ... Be

grateful,

thankful, that isn't you.

6.

Be thankful

for

what you have; be

and you might be

a bag with holes punched in pursuit, feeling the

one of them after us,

we're

say,

it,

van lurch

You might be

listening to the

left

and

a child of ten

two men

free ... as

and make you claw

talk

about police

to see the license

ain't

nobody coming

number, no

pursuit, Joe,

you hear that the implications come

at the

bag and

room,

right as they turn corners, hearing

with the joy of a lottery winner,

was nobody there

home

grateful:

that child in a leather bag, tied shut, hardly any

try to

alive in

you

scream through the tape over

your mouth and one of them slams you through the leather with that

two by four you saw

just

before they pushed you in and

it

knocks

all

the

breath out of you and as you're getting breath back, each breath stabbing

now, he

says

something about you better hold

still

in there,

glad you're in that bag there and not out here with

me

you better be

you

little

peter-

him no more'n you have to I don't want to have to gag him after we take him out, I want his mouth free after I take that tape off. But they're taking some kind of drug, you can't tell what, you hear them say crystal, and after they make those snorting sounds you can tell from their voices they're losing what control of themselves they have and you feel an icicle become part of your back pusher, and the other

and

realize

sticking

it

it's

that

one

sharpened screwdriver the red-headed

through the bag

just a half inch in

says don't scare

here,

at

random here and here and

and an inch there and

it

man

had, he's

there, into you,

scrapes off your

Really, Really, Really, Really,

Weird Stories

John Shirley

Ten Things to be Grateful For

shoulderblade and he's laughing and his friend says wait, wait

till

we

get

woods, and when they do, when they take you out of the bag their faces hurt more than the tools and soon you beg them please, please kill me, but you don't quite die before they shovel the dirt over to the

your eyes. But then you do. Be glad ful.

We

have

much

be thankful

to

not you, be

that's

grateful,

be thank-

for.

7 Be thankful

how

it

sinking as for

you're not running

feels, as

you run,

you run

as

fat

open

chases you across the

never relents, the pickup

man and

loudest of

all,

a

as

on

legs that are losing their bones; that's

the bones in your legs are melting, you're

into the street, because you've

two miles and you're

with a

if

woman

you

fall

been running

and you're not a kid anymore

desert,

this

way

as the truck

under a sun that never takes a breath,

just ten feet

behind, driving you ahead of

and three children

in the cacti,

naked

in

it,

in the cacti,

run on, and on, stumbling and running, your

it,

the children laughing

and get up and

feet ribbons of flesh,

your

heart almost louder than their voices and the gunning engine and they are calling

you Mexi-nigger, Mexi-nigger you'd

bones have dissolved completely the kids, even the hips and buttocks

and the there's

fear

till

girl,

one of the

nothing in

all

can't get up and Dad lets on you, they shoot you in the

feel

slugs hits

it

much

your

because of the exhaustion

pelvis

and

splinters

it

and then

the universe but those splinters chewing out of your

hip, nothing, anyway,

till

they lock the chains to your ankles and begin to

drag you behind the truck, talking about

going to be

up but your

now and you

practice with the .22

and you don't

better get

now son whoa look at

startin' a fad, here,

Mexi-nigger's guts look

like,

Consider: that's not you.

It

how I

that

could be you.

those

want you and

It's

ol'

boys in Texas

to see

his shit

not.

Be

what a

fat

too—

thankful.

Yes be thankful, you'd better be absolutely grateful that you're not in the bus when it goes off the bridge and fills with water and your little girl, eight years old, beside you,

somehow you've made

this

is

looking at you with amazement because

happen and

you'll

never have time to explain

like this that, despite pretending all her life that you could prevent things something time, from happening, in fact, my litde love, I was lying, all this

could happen anytime and only some perverse and unmappable grace prevents it from happening more, it's amazing when we're barreling along by the millions at sixty, seventy, eighty miles an hour on our steamlike this

Really, Really, Really, Really,

Weird Stories

383

384

Ten Things to

be Grateful

freeways that

ing, tarry

it

For

doesn't

John Shirley happen more,

it's

amazing that cancer

and plane-crashes and murder and war don't happen even more than they

my little

do, given that people are just mandrills with clothes on,

you should not be surprised, and I'm sorry this

passing through your head in a

didn't prepare

I

you

second as you see that look

split

face right before the bus hits the estuary, slams the both of

bus with bone cracking force, and since your

ceiling of the

shatters

you have only your

open window within reach

who

man, the one

said

right

arm

as water

sweet, so

for this; in

you off the

left

shoulder

to try to get her through the

fills

all

her

one

the bus, but there's a ferret-faced

he was a lawyer, who's pushing your daughter out

way so he can swim through, who's kicking you in the face to keep jerking him back from the vmidow to let her through, and both of you are fighting underwater and beyond him you glimpse more than a of the

you from dozen

pallid faces

with bubbles surging up from their mouths as they flap

arms and you claw at him

their

to try to get

get her through that window but she

ing at your eyes, your eyes in her terror,

own

is

clawing at you in desperation, claw-

child without

and then the darkness

has nothing reassuring, nothing restful in tiness

and

that isn't

.

.

knowing gouges out one of your

.

.

down on you both and

closes it

at

Count your blessings, because

.

you

him out of the way so you can

all,

but

that could

it

a shattering emp-

just

be you: be grateful

.

9-

Be

thank your ancestors, thank your

grateful,

strapped tinct,

down

stars, that

in the metal chair, that you're

you're not being

not seeing those two

dis-

sharp-edged expressions, either one or the other, on the faces of

the people watching through the glass, either studied indifference or a fascination that's less than pornographic but not so very

there are people to be

choked

murmuring

to

you

just as if

fact,

and only you have, all

that you're innocent,

someone

looks a that

after

tomorrow or the

you

really are innocent,

be believed that you raped and strangled two

you never saw or heard of after

it

the unblemished, untarnished certaint)^ that you

say they're innocent," but authentically innocent, it

stole

little like

till

you were arrested

your car and used

you; not only will

it

you are a murderer, but your

mother will

and

they care that you're about

don't actually care and they won't think about

"they

less,

to death with chemicals, but they don't, not really, they

next day, and the

only will

much

believe that

you are

it

and

that not

women whom

for supposedly

in the crime,

doing

history,

wife, your children, your father

even though they

it,

someone who

be believed by the public, by

guilty,

not

and

made cardboard

Really, Really, Really, Really,

Weird Stories

John Shirley

Ten Things to

be Grateful

protestations to the contrary, ultimately they will believe

children will blame you for abandoning them, and truly sorry, except will

maybe

be sorry that you are

clicking shut, the last time

the children,

now you

who

and so the

it,

no one

For

be

will ever

no one

will also hate you,

hearing the sound of the chamber door

will

hear a door shut, that you are hearing

the sound of the cyanide capsules hitting the bucket to release the poi-

son into the last

no one

air;

clean breath

left

will really,

not

really care that

and that the next one

is like

you have only one

an animal clawing into

your lungs as you shake and choke and shake and die knowing you are innocent and being killed for nothing. Be that could have

been you. And

grateful,

show some

gratitude:

not.

it's

10.

Be

thankful, breathe a sigh of relief

and nod your head

tude that you're not a neurotic fan of perverse dark

crime or dark fantasy, a reader, stimuli that

one of your few

is

this-all-there-is in

your

life,

in

humble

literature,

grati-

horror or

at least today, of the obsessively-etched

releases

from the smothering sense of

is-

on

that you're not that sort of person, reliant

occasional corrosive chemicals or puerile graphic images for relief from the inarticulate and undefined and never acknowledged knowledge that

you are being hunted, something tions

own

is

hunting you: a

irrelevance,

fear;

just

you sock

your

skull,

in

you

you mock

circle

of your percep-

meaninglessness, your soulless,

like a

monkey-mas-

bad videogame even

another quarter, as your brain turns slowly, slowly inside

scanning for an exit in an exidess world, as you lurch onto the

next half-satisfying stimulus ver; as

ovm

your trappedness in a dead-end,

turbatory, mazelike civilization that as

out of the

a fear of your

realize that

like

the dying cocaine rat that pushes the

your understanding of the unknovm sculpture

leis

really only of the chisel-scrapings at the foot of the sculpture, and you

never have seen the sculpture, and that you're culture that, despite your arch

really truly

trapped in a

commentary, your well-honed

irony,

media-fed sardonicism, has conditioned and programmed you

your

just as

thoroughly as any shopping channel fixated Tennessee housewife; that despite your creative conceits you're probably going to degrade yourself for the opportunity to die in an upscale old-people's

an

SRO

instead of in

probably of a painful and under-medicated cancer, after burned up in media dreams and gossip that has a life of its

hotel,

your youth

own and cars,

home

is

relationships that jar

and sputter and

circle blindly like

and the loneliness of the long distance consumer, a hollow

hollow society of equally hollow people-Be glad and grateful Really, Really, Really, Really,

Weird Stories

bumper life

in a

that's

not

385

86

Ten Things TO .

.

.

that

Oh.

.

.

.

not

.

.

For

John Shirley

.

see.

I

Oh, I

not

it's

BE Grateful

I

.

.

.

wasn't thinking. Ah.

It is?

Well

.

.

.

I

.

.

.

Sorry.

Well anyway. There

are,

you know, other things

... to

Really, Really, Really, Really,

be thankful

for.

Weird Stories

The Sea Was Wet As Wet Could Be

Mary did not

expect to survive so long after the airplane began to break

up. But she did survive as she w^as pitched through the crack in the bulk-

head, as the fuselage

split in

the screaming

air

and people clung

to each

other in despair. She survived to

fall; first

serendipity of her flailing— to

spread-eagled, like a skydiver w^ith

fall

spinning, but

then—by some

no

parachute.

She

w^as falling

toward the

They hadn't been so very

sea.

high,

She could breathe. She was conscious.

had been only a mile from the

reducing elevation in preparation for landing, but they were

still

airport,

over the

Then the bang, the crack, the screaming of air and children. Somehow the bigness of what was happening overwhelmed fear. There

sea.

was nothing

How alive sible to

on

I

left

am,

but to drink in these I've

be so awake?

definition.

And

never been

last

few seconds alive—thinking:

this alive, this

awake!

Was

it

she thought she might survive

if

she went into a diving

posture and aimed her fingers, with the hands together as

dovm

at the water. If she cleaved the

together and aimed herself straight

Then it

last

in prayer,

down and

way She

thought:

I

put her hands

might—

thought before she struck, the word might.

she struck the water. There was a flash of sensation so powerful

could not be identified as pain. There was a white

shooting

words

if

water sharply enough, she thought,

she might survive. She tried to angle herself that

That was her

always pos-

Now she saw the sea rushing up at her, waves taking

down

that

it

light.

Then she was

dovm and out, thinking without had somehow cleaved it so fine that

through the water,

had worked,

that she

she had survived, even though she'd always heard that from that high up

water would be as hard as concrete It

was

true that her

when you

body was behind

her,

hit

it.

was spread out over the top

of the waves, liquid to liquid, parts already nourishing ambitious seagulls,

Really, Really, Really, Really,

Weird Stories

388

The Sea Was Wet As Wet Could Be

John Shirley

but she had kept going—like the time her brother had dived from a pretty high diving board and he'd been wearing Dad's

swimming

him; and he was naked in the pool, and everyone laughed. only

that,

But

was

on

vast

its

it

was her body

no—she and

that

had been pulled

weU

fish

as bigger things

on her body, and

within

moving

that

it

it

It

little

right off

was

like

it?

quite clearly.

supported

It

birds,

she could feel each

She

and she knew

felt oil

that she

was pronounced over and over again with

waves and currents, a long name with an it

it;

it

in her depths.

ships cleaving her back,

had a new name, a name

and the speaking of

wasn't

feel

lapped on the shore nearby;

and a million million as

off,

her body now. She could

feel

shifting. It

surface,

and every one slicks

could

a

suit,

too big for him, and the dive, the slap of the water, had pulled

was never

infinite

number of

syllables,

finished.

Really, Really, Really, Really,

Weird Stories

OO OO

Really, Really, Really, Really,

CX3

Weird Stories

About the Author AND THE Stories

John

been weird for

Shirley has

as long as

he can remember and, for that

matter, as long as anyone else can remember.

whether fourteen will

boon or bane to novdsSilicon Embrace (Mark V. this

has been a

be reprinted

(Mark V.

Ziesing),

some debate

is

Ziesing)

is

the

over

He's written

most recent; two

(Alexander) and Wetbones

this year. Eclipse

been four previous

Tliere have Butterflies

There

his literary career.

(Leisure).

collections as well, including last year's Black

which was selected

as

one of the "Best Books

of 1998" by Publishers Weekly and included the International Horror Guild

Award-winning short

story,

As

far as

proving

and

screen-

how weird

just

now makes most

"Cram." Shirley

from writing not-always-weird

of his

living

teleplays.

he is—the

stories included in this col-

The earliest story collected maybe second) published story

lection alone are proof enough, of course.

here

is

early

indeed—Shirley's

first

(or

("The

Word 'Random'

cent

as recent as possible—a story written

is

in to the publisher ("Brittany?

material) involved,

each story had

it

Oh: She's In Translucent

first

work

and book

in triplicate

and who

carefully

who

have tidy

interesting

John

he's led this

periodically (until he

found the

ago), etc. Just to find copies of

keep data concerning pub-

Shirley

weird

life,

is,

well, weird.

moved

a

lot,

right one, Michelina,

some of

He

didn't

had them

in his

changed wives

the stories collected here,

files.

One

story

al-

about eight years

to turn to Shirley publisher/archivist/friend-for-years Steve

are thankful)

of

files full

along with duplicate copies of every magazine

they've appeared in,

ways keep track— plus

who (we

re-

this

October

Blue,"

been published (or not) would be both

informative. But, unlike other authors

lished

turned

I

was thought information about when and where

filed-by-date manuscripts

had

two days before

With such a timespan (and wealth of never-before-published

28, 1998).

and

most

Deliberately Repeated," 1973)— and the

we

Brovm,

came from

a

yel-

F&SF provided by devoted

lowing

fan Shikliar Dixit.

Many, of course,

w^ere in manuscript (or the digital equivalent) only, including

had

told

me on two

form of

ten the highest But,

we

one

Shirley

different occasions to destroy. (Disobedience

did the best

is

of-

loyalty.)

we

could here in our

own weird

way.

—Paula Guran

Really Weird Stories '"I Want to Get Married,' Graffiti, ed. Jessica

"Will

The

"Tapes first

Chill":

Universe

%

22 and

23":

12, 14, 15,

& James Van Hise, Warner, 1992

ed. T. Carr, Doubleday, 1979

Gothic.Net (www.gothic.net),

is

published here for the

"Kindred

Door Twenty-three": Martin H. Greenberg, DAW, 1992

Spirits"

is

published here for the

time

first

Five, Building Seven,

ness, ed.

Dracula: Prince of Dark-

first

time

"The Word 'Random' Deliberately Repeated": Clarion Scott Wilson,

"Voices"

published here for the

is

appeared

in

.

And

revised

first

ed.

Robin

time

from a story written

some Penthouse

Really, Really, .

III,

NAL, 1973

"The Last Ride":

".

July, 1998;

time in print here

"Don't Be Afraid" "Lot

Says the World's Smallest Man": Midnight

Horsting

in

November 1989

that

publication in 1990.

Weird Stories

the Angel with Television Eyes": Isaac Asimov's Science Fiction

Magazine,

May

1983

"The Sweet Caress of Mother Nature"

is

published here for the

first

time "In the Cornelius Arms":

Pawn Of Chaos:

Tales of the Eternal

Edward E. Kramer, White Wolf, 1996 "Quill Tripstickler Out the Window": The Magazine of Fantasy ence Fiction, November 1981

Cham-

pion, ed.

"I

Live In Elizabeth": Fieatseeker,

"Morons

at the

Speed of Light"

Scream

is

&

Sci-

Press, 1989

published here for the

first

time

"Silent Crickets": Fantastic, April 1975

The Magazine of Fantasy

"Screens": "Brittany?

"Ticket

Oh:

& Science Fiaion, April 1989

She's In Translucent Blue"

is

published here for the

To Heaven": The Magazine of Fantasy

ber 1987

&

first

time

Science Fiaion, Decem-

Really, Really, Really,

Dead End:

"Ash":

Weird Stories

City Limits, ed. Paul

F.

Olson

& David B.

Silva, St.

Martin's, 1991

"Triggering":

OMNI, January 1982

"Skeeter Junkie":

"When

New Noir,

Enter Came": Yellow

"What Joy! What

Black Ice Books, 1993 Silk,

Fulfillment!"

is

1990

published here for the

first

time

"199619971998": Three-Fisted Tales of "Bob", ed. Reverend Ivan Stang, Fireside,

1990

The Edge #4, 1997 "Preach, Part Two: The Apocalypse of The Rev. John "Preach":

Shirley":

is

pub-

lished here for the first time

"Modern Transmutations of first

the Alchemist"

is

published here for the

time

Weird Stories "Just Like Suzie": Cemetery Dance, Summer 1991 "Cold Feet": One Dollar Magazine, February 1974

Really, Really, Really, Really,

"The

Peculiar

"Tahiti in

Happiness of Professor Cort":

Terms of Squares":

Fantastic,

New Pathways,

Fall

1988

October 1978

"Equilibrium": Heatseeker, Scream Press, 1989

"What Cindy Saw^": Interzone #5, 1983 "The Almost Empty Rooms": New Dimensions Silverberg, Harper & Rowe, 1977

7,

ed.,

Robert

"Ten Things To Be Thankful For": Gothic.Net (ww^w.gothic.net), No-

vember

1998;

first

time in print here

"The Sea Was Wet As Wet Could Be"

is

published here for the

first

time

oo oo oo

About the Type

Really, Really, Really, Really

Weird Stories

is

set in the typeface Savoy, a

vaguely weird digital adaptation of Sabon. Sabon w^as designed by Jan

Tschichold in 1964 and was,

in turn,

century designs of Claude Garamond. title

and chapter

titles

weird Chapbook, a

on

based on some of the sixteenth-

The logotype used

interior pages

digital face

is

for the

book

the somewhat-more-definitely

designed in 1996 by Feorag NicBhride

and based on the rough-hewn type of mid-seventeenth-century printed works. The logotype seen on the front cover was the work of the peglegsawingly weird Alan ing.

Book

M.

Clark,

who

design and typesetting

John Tynes, wot wot.

is

incorporated

it

into his cover paint-

by the merely colorfully eccentric

.

p

SCIENCE

ABOUT TEN YEARS AGO, William Gibson

Ficmm

(US) $16.95 wrote:

".

.

.

in

some weird way,

always,

I've

thought of Shirley's writing as music. think the vocabulary of

I

don't

i

best describes

iit-crit

the things John's fiction does best. Sometimes, reading Shirley, like there's

o'-soufld

can hear the guitars,

I

some monstrous subliminal

chewing at the edges of the text

his stories

are rock, in

well up from the

is,

that

.

.

some primal way. They

some dark sea

and adrenal frenzy, and that

wall-

you can't have special,

I

',r^< special ... But

mean ."

.

whatever

it's that,

makes them very

without having strange

of backbeat

.

not really,

oo And some

ofj

the strangest was yet to come, oo Here are

^

the weirdest of the weird, the strangest of the strange. John Shirley's Really, ally, Really,

Weird Stories

Redly, Re-

slip

out of the

constraints of whatever labels have to

them-science

erotica, cial,

fiction,

suspense-ond

been put

fantasy,

into his

horror,

own very spe-

indefinable, extroordinary literary uni

verse, ©o There's nothing

m con do

pare you. Nothing safe about

it.

to pre-

No seat

beltj

or crash helmets can protect you from the reality-shifting, thought-provoking, flat-out

en -"% .%

tertaining stories of John Shirley.

NIGHT SHADE BOOKS MOUNTAIN VIEW, CA ISBN l-flT23flT-D2-T

51695

9

781892'^389022 ^07l :f:\:r^

*

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