Hallucinating (5 page)
"Weather'll beat us, you wait," Nulight mutters to Kappa.
"Trust the Earth," Kappa cosmically replies.
"Has the guitar got a case?" asks Nulight.
"Of course," Lefebvre replies.
And what a case. It is air cushioned, soft and furry inside, an aluminium skeleton the middle of the sandwich; airbags outside. The whole looks like a porpoise.
So all that is left to do is pay up. Nulight asks what the final damage is.
"Twenty six thou," comes the reply.
Nulight transfers thirteen thousand digitally; he has already coughed up the other half. Then they leave. Evening has come, so the walk back is more scary, as there are no town lights, just a few sodium lamps set up by local co-operatives. Cars thrum on distant B-roads and they hear the honk-honk of a passing train. Outside the town they pull off the branches, leaves and camouflage plastic that covers Richard's car, which is driven to the St Albans RailTerminus. Then they are safe on the 19:05 to Bath, waving goodbye to Richard, hoping to be back above the crystal shop at the latest by midnight.
There is a surreal discussion concerning where Sperm should call down the aliens. Kappa says, "I reckon somewhere around Avebury, maybe inside the smallest circle, or maybe at the top of Silbury Hill."
Nulight considers. The amp wattage will be huge, but they intend doing a simultaneous radio and internet broadcast. Certainly no villager can be near. He says, "Stonehenge for preference, it's way out in the open. Man, now the Army have been kicked out we'll have the place to ourselves. All the tourists will've long gone."
Kappa agrees after some persuasion, though she points out that they may attract a human audience of travellers as well as aliens. Nulight clicks open his mobile and tags in a security unlocker. Then he dials an Exeter number. "Yo, Sperm, that you? Nulight. Got a bit of a weird one for you..."
...the 'Henge gig...
They time the calling event so that the guitar will be at the correct temperature during the hours of dark. Luckily southern England comes under a hot greenhouser, and two hours before dawn on August 20 the conditions are perfect.
Nulight and Kappa stand hand in hand outside the trilithon ring, a regular Glasto couple, he in rainbow kecks and a GUILFIN unbleached cotton T, she in tie-dye dungarees and lace-up DMs. Nearby stand the roadies, on this occasion the rest of Hanging Gardens Of Fungus who have declared they will not allow Sperm to perform the solo gig unless they are present. Calmer is the engineer, Rich is in charge of vid and the internet links, while Djo is recording the whole thing direct to CD.
Sperm stands alone inside the megalith circle, a three metre stack of Marshalls behind him, alongside one multiwave radio transceiver and one satellite dish pointing to the heavens. The generator is a Cornish Superslick windmill doing its nut in the south-westerly. Sperm is naked. He has a phobia about hair. Not a single one on his body. His skin is oiled and he looks ready to rock. The guitar is strapped on, a fake leather belt studded with gold pyramids over his right shoulder.
Nulight is trembling, as this is a cosmic moment. Everybody here understands that they could be signing their death warrants, since they are asking to be abducted.
It is time.
The five thousand year old monument vibrates to Sperm's first tentative strums on the auton tuned guitar, an attack of off-key harmonics and low frequency distortion. This is the first time the auton key has consciously been played by a human being. Logged on netfreaks are already having orgasms as the now multiplying notes trigger their crudely wired limbic systems. Sperm is really going for it. Having found some chords he is hunched over his instrument, wringing the neck for all it is worth and generating a flux of Hillagesque arpeggios.
Nulight looks into the sky. Soon their elaborate screening system will collapse and local authorities will notice them. He glances back at the two MegaVans, their rear ramps down, waiting to convey them and their gear down the A303. Rich is bobbing his head as a rhythm becomes apparent, manipulating the internet links so there is enough bandwidth for full transmission. The vidcams move on little wheels as the computers controlling their shots make changes. Sperm looks good, glistening in the moonlight.
Again Nulight looks up at the sky. Have the aliens received their radio transmissions? Come down to us! Buzz us! He takes a mindpill so he will be able to see more clearly, as through his mind run riffs from that classic first Shpongle album; the gorgeous acid-squelch of Vapour Rumours.
There is a gust of wind at his back, and his hair flutters, as if something whizzed by him. He is not sure if it was just a gust or something flying. He saw nothing.
Kappa is gripping his hand, then she shouts, "Look!" as she points upward.
"What, what?" Nulight asks.
Something dark shoots toward him, pinpoint lamps of red to either side of a compact grey object. Something, now gone...
He spins around, receives the briefest impression of a dark blue flower with a tall creature on top.
They are here!
Now the whole area is galvanised into action. Sperm, though he is staring at his fretboard, is aware that something is happening since he is manically spurting hammered-on trills and spinning arpeggios from the guitar. Kappa is running. Rich is running. Djo has left the mixer and has primed her autofocus digi-cam. There is a series of flashes as she takes pictures.
But of what? Nulight is panting by the Heel Stone, waiting for something. Waiting.
From between two upright stones another craft comes, then another from his left, then two from his right, and suddenly Stonehenge is alive with craft that whizz, but silently, as if buzzing them with non-sound. It is like an invasion of lotus flowers, for the craft smell of blossom and they have leaves at their edges that point upwards. On top of each rides a creature, too dark to see clearly or masked by alien technology, yet staring down with glittering eyes.
And it is
them:
seen before.
He staggers away, sure he is about to be abducted.
"Ohmybuddah, I'm hallucinating, I'm hallucinating," he gasps. "Leave us alone!" He manages to duck as a flower craft comes close, hovers above him for a second, drops perfume, then shoots away at the speed of sound: and there is a crack, a sonic boom. There are ten, twenty of the craft now, each piloted by an alien. They can travel at immense speed but they can stop at will, as if they have anti-inertia.
But they are difficult to spot. They only have small lamps. You feel their rumour first. They can appear out of thin air, or so it seems.
Sperm's calling music has now ceased, and he is running out of the henge to the vidcams, three of which have been knocked over. Nulight makes to join him, but then Sperm, touching one of the devices, screams and reels backwards, clasping then shaking his hands. He has been burned. The vidcams are smoking, and then one bursts open with a shower of sparks.
The mixer explodes. It is all going crazy.
No sign of the lotus flowers, now.
But, yeah, these were blue aliens with sparkling eyes—
and four prominent ears.
This is proof beyond doubt that the aliens exist. More than that, they have come down to the surface of the Earth before—they have been planning contact for
ages.
Rich—white-faced, eyes staring—rushes up to Nulight and shouts, "The pigs! They're on their way!"
"What?"
"Our e-spy caught their net trail. It's the Plains Police plc. They'll be here in minutes."
Kappa shouts, "Chuck everything into the vans."
The aliens have gone. Could they have tipped off the pigs?
"Retreat!" Nulight yells at the top of his voice.
At least they have planned for this moment. In goes the remains of the mixer, in go the smoking vidcams, now only warm, in goes all the radio gear and the satellite dish. Sperm puts the precious guitar into its case and straps it into the other van. They have to leave the Marshall stack.
Nulight does a headcount. He, Kappa and Rich go into one van while the two band members take the other, with Calmer at the wheel. In his van Nulight leaves Rich to drive. The polydiesel engines wheeze, then scream as they race away from Stonehenge, sending mud and grass flying, and then they are bouncing across the tourist car park and screeching onto the road, jolting Nulight enough for him to crack his head on the unpadded roof. He knows that if the pigs catch them everything is over.
"Go, go, go!" he yells at Rich.
"I
am
going," Rich yells back.
Twin lights appear atop the hill behind them. Nulight and Kappa see them. Both swear. But they have rehearsed this moment too, though they never imagined it would happen. Nulight straps himself into the roofmesh, waits until Kappa has done the same, then flings open the back door. Warm alky air rushes in at him. The pig cars are closing. Luckily the road is narrow and the verges have been built up over time. Nulight grabs a pack of expando wadding, positions the zip away from him, then pulls the cord. A glittering bundle of fibreglass blades explode out, sticking to the road like glue then expanding into a barrier that cannot be passed. The pig cars screech to a halt, but one does not make it and crashes into the barrier, its roof opened like a tin can by the hideous blades.
Rich accelerates so that their van draws up to the one driven by Calmer. Through the window glass Nulight signals what to do next. They look for a suitable spot. After five minutes they come to a hedgebound layby, and there they stop. Nulight jumps out and looks into the sky.
Chopper!
They have minutes only. He and Kappa pull out their roll of thermoneutral clingfilm; the others are doing the same. This pig chopper will be scanning the ground with thermal imaging equipment. They have to get cool, they have to get to the same temperature as the ground. Soon the MegaVans are covered with clingfilm and they all roll underneath. A pig car screams past. And another. Choking from residual fumes, aware that this will be their stiffest test, they wait. Nulight and Kappa are hugging one another. Nulight says, "Man, if we're caught now the aliens will just stroll on in. Earth'll be as good as lost."
"Don't," Kappa chides.
"But—"
"Don't!" She puts her hand over his mouth. "I don't want to hear it."
The chopper is nearing, following the road. When it is overhead Nulight closes his eyes and, though he does not follow the religion, prays to all the Bön deities he can remember from his childhood.
The thrumming becomes quieter. The chopper has missed them.
After another minute they get out and stand up, dusting off their clothes. Nulight flicks a V to the departing pigs. But now it is time to reverse their direction. Using electronic maps they plan a route along C roads and lanes back east, hoping this will confuse the chase. But dawn is very near. They will have to hurry. More than one chopper will be searching once the sun is up.
Nulight hopes the Plains Police plc have messed up this year's budget. After all, they have their shareholders to think about.
"Almost the Second Battle of the Beanfield," he mutters. "C'mon, time to go."
Sitting uncomfortably with Kappa in the back of the van, bouncing when the vehicle bounces, Nulight begins to wonder what will become of them. Shock has turned to fear and he feels cold and unhappy. Kappa is holding him, but that is not much help.
After some moments of misery he becomes calm again. "I'll tell you what we're gonna do," he says. "We're gonna blow up that Berlin club."
Kappa grips one of his hands. "But the risk?"
"We've got the money," Nulight counters. "Obviously auton is the crux of the matter. The aliens can't stand it if we play around with it. If we blow up that club, we'll set them back twenty years."
"Maybe they'd come down, guns blazing."
"Maybe, maybe not. Something tells me they're more subtle than that. They want secret control, manipulation, they wanna do it on the quiet—they enjoy buzzing a few people, but I don't think they wanna be exposed to the world. And guns ain't their style, I know that 'cos of what I saw in Tibet. They wanna drop their net over the world in one swoop."
Kappa hesitates, then murmurs, "When you say blow up the club...?"
"I mean blow up the computers."
Kappa nods. "Then the Gesang Der Junglinge has to go. Of course, it can't be a job for me. I'm still Dean. I need that position."
"Agreed," Nulight says. "This is a job for me and a hit squad. But I think I know a man who can provide the kind of squad I need."
"Who?"
"A certain canine friend of mine."
...MSSG SECURE? CODE...
*
to N******
*
from *********
Nulight tells the computer, "Please decode."
*Sure.
"Now give us the message."
*Re: the hack of major astro corps and sky watchers.
*All the big observatories have nothing, not even stuff buried under ordinary data. I know the feel of people hiding stuff, and there's nothing there except a crowd of ufo nuts, anti-skeptic groups, and ongoing Fortrean Times type people.
*The global corp hack turned up a few people doing side projects, but no major results. I could have missed something, but I doubt it. Global government hack produced nothing except the usual array of mathematically coded files, and even I can't undo their laces unless I'm given a few months.
*So there you are. 99% probable that nothing BIG has been spotted—except by us, of course.
*Remember you're an initiate. See you soon. Continue the good work.
CHAPTER FIVE
...dogtastic...
Nulight takes a leafbuster (ie. non-UK) train from Bath up to the big smoke, where he walks pale pavements all the way from the railway station to a basement office half way down Denmark Street. The front door of this office features an air-brushed mutt with spiral eyes. Moss, leaves and rusty guitar strings clutter the narrow space in front of the door. He plays
knockety-knock,
then waits.
An old man opens the door. He looks at Nulight.
"Yo, Michael," Nulight says, offering his hand.
The pair shake hands. "Come in stranger," Michael says, leading him indoors.
The Dog's office is open-plan, one huge room filled with computers, papers, CDs and such. "Been a while," Nulight remarks. "Two years?"
"Make it ten."
Nulight's eyes widen. "Buddah, that long? What you been up to?"
"Feeding my head."
Nulight nods, then pulls out a packet of minibongs and offers Michael one. "Okay, so you wanna know why I turned up?"
Michael nods. They sit down in canvas-covered easy chairs.
Nulight continues, "I need a job doing in Berlin. No blood, no mess—that's why I first thought of you—but the squad has to be
good.
Like, no tech footprints, right?"
Michael puffs maryjane. "You came to the right man. Peace and tranquillity is what I deal in."
Nulight chuckles. "Bancoesque. But I'm afraid ground zero is the Gesang Der Junglinge."
Michael raises his eyebrows. "That's going to cost you, Nulight." He leans forward to add, "What have you done to upset Dieter?"
Nulight replies in a cold voice, "Actually it's the other way around. And it isn't just me."
Michael relaxes into his chair. "Dieter's no pushover." He glances at Nulight. "Well, I know the perfect squad, but I'll want my cash up front."
Nulight shrugs. "I'm not playing monopoly here," he says. "The money's yours, we'll sort out the details later."
"Are you
sure
you want to go ahead with this? There might be consequences for you—I want to be certain that this is what you want."
"Good and bad consequences. I dig."
Michael nods. "Well, there won't be any mess, don't worry about that. I vet all my coverts. It's politics, you see?"
Nulight understands. "Peaceniks forever, and the green revolution." He grins. "Everybody knows you ain't no gangster."
Michael takes a piece of paper and writes on it.
EUFemism.
Nulight smiles. "I've heard good things about these people."
"They're quick, they're quiet. Ned Ludd would be proud of them."
...Danish pastries...
In Copenhagen, Nulight contacts the European Underground Foundation. He explains the task to the hit squad. There is to be no thuggery, no murder, just computer destruction. The squad understand this as they are influenced by the Zen Artisans of the Pacific Rim, pacifists who loathe technology. Also, Michael Dog has primed them. But the price agreed is large, and Nulight begins to wonder how much he has left of the label funds. He has kinda lost track...
Arriving 9pm Berlin Airport, the team walk through alleys into the city so as to avoid the urban securicam system. There are four of them, plus Nulight: Franc, Zipperdie, Kermita and Gloria. Despite the season it is freezing, and they splash along the pot-holed streets wearing hooded anoraks and greased boots. The gap between public and private in the neu Deutschland is great, and landlords have turfed out all those who cannot pay. As a result street culture is based around the tent and the black market, a mini-environment of claustrophobic poverty; tents ruined by acid rain, grime-streaked, packed tight, leaving only narrow channels through which people must risk walking. In streets with car access it is worse, as there are running battles between beggar gangs and alky-taxi gunpersons, with many people wearing the new fashions, the bulletproof vest and the helmet. Unfortunately even this protection is no protection when you are up against Far Eastern coherent energy weapons.
So the five scramble through the morass. Nulight, knowing private alleys, takes them through passages devoid of tents, but since some of these are gang haunts and drug thoroughfares he carries that symbol of local protection the analogue synthesizer (genuine, eighty years old) so people realise they are coolstuff and not to be molested.
About eleven they approach the alley in which the Gesang Der Junglinge lies. It is time for the hit.
"Remember," Nulight says, "no violence to people. Such violence is uncool. We're hitting the basement computers. There's to be no deviation from the plan."
The four have put on their UHF helmets. Laser-wiggles flash before their stern faces. It is like dealing with robots. Kermita nods at Nulight and says, "Sure," but with trepidation he sees her fiddling with the semtex croissants in her pockets.
Nulight jacks the UHF lines into his headset, then pulls tight his anorak hood. "OK," he says, "go for it!"
The four run down the alley, Nulight following just behind. They duck under the club door and enter reception. Telemusik just has time to draw breath to scream before a gob-rag is flung into her face, and she falls to the floor. The rest of the hallway is empty. Nulight watches from the front door as Gloria bungs the interior doorway with Almax, the glitter paste frothing up then setting like rock.
So far so good.
But then two men clatter up from the basement. Their heads appear over the top of the stairs. Franc hits them with gas helmets that shrink over their heads like suicide bags, but then he attaches O2 capsules. Nulight nods.
Franc, Kermita and Gloria descend the stairs at top speed, Nulight following, while Zipperdie is left to deny entrance to new clubbers. He is wearing a Schulze Audentity T-shirt, so he looks the part. Down one flight they encounter resistance, the first of the Zyklus Mensch, and Franc is wounded in the arm by a gunshot. Gloria takes out both guys with her Blinderama, but the lasertube wheeze alerts others, and they can hear Teutonic yelling. Franc bags the ZM pair, then they all crouch down to wait.
After a few seconds it goes quiet. The music upstairs is in spaced-out mode, no beats, so down here in the stairwell they can hear enough to make them worry. A lacuna seems to have developed.
Nulight orders them, "Down, now. Go get 'em."
The trio go forward into the dark. A shot. Another. They reply. In a few flicker frame seconds Gloria has been shot in the thigh, but the Zyklus Mensch are all on the floor. Gloria slaps a morphinoplug on her wound, grunting as the chemsoup kicks in. Then they go forward, and see at last the door to the computer nest.
Inside is not what Nulight expected. It is lit green—Evil Dead style—and spooky, with lots of cables and hardware arranged around the walls. But centrally a crouched figure watches him. At first Nulight thinks it is the last of the Zyklus Mensch, but then he sees movements that suggest... maybe not human? He falls back, uncertain of what he is seeing, freaking out. Hallucinating?
"No, no!"
The figure is floating towards him.
He orders the others, "Get outa here!"
Paranoia grips his mind like a clammy hand on his scalp. The person, creature, whatever it is, speaks over the frantic noise of the others escaping. Nulight cannot see much as it has gone quite dark, but he glimpses a mouth moving in a blue head.
"Nulight, this is not for you. This is ours. If you remember anything at all, remember our compassion, our concern for you back in Tibet. Do not annoy us any more."
Raving, drooling, Nulight staggers back to the stairs; then he runs up, shrieking. An alien! Fear and pain and trippy paranoia make his limbs as efficient as a robot's. In seconds he is topside, out in the streets. The others have vanished. Makes sense.
Nulight runs down the alley. He passes people. Some of them seem to be aliens and they laugh at him, high-pitched sniggering that seems to accentuate his loss, his failure. Ha ha ha ha! they go, as he goes.
...doing the free festi circuit...
Summer.
Wales, Scotland, bits of England.
It is hot and it is the time for psychedelic bands to come out of their mushroom-fuelled studios and stand, or more often lie down, in the sunshine. This is the great rhythm of the passing years for many such, overwintering technopolitan style, summering out in the open. An Earth rhythm, Celtic, natural, perfect. Release an album once a year just like plants release seeds.
(Not so Mystery Trend. They have legal hassles.)
(Just so Henge Of Astral Stone. They have completed "and then we picked up our musical instruments and really played them, until they bled, and their blood drops dripped over the staves and became notes that were all the better for being yellow," which is the long-awaited follow-up to the difficult third album "The Difficult Third Album".)
The failure of the Berlin hit makes Nulight think long on what course of action to take, until, after many cups of herbal tea, smokes and freakwater, he has a brilliant idea. It is summer. The weather is greenhousing. Why not form a band?
This scheme is augmented when, one evening, as Nulight and Kappa are drinking in a Glasto watering hole, none other than Zhaman arrives, his dreads filthy, his clothes dusty, his boots holed. Nulight at first shies away from him, for this is the keyboard maestro of Mystery Trend—the enemy—and maybe a battle is in the offing. But Zhaman grins and raises his hands, and they are empty.
"Peace," he says. "They've sacked me."
Nulight grabs Zhaman and sits him down with a pint of Crippledick. The music of Henge Of Astral Stone is on the jukebox, and all is cool.
"So spill the beans," Kappa says, rather suspicious.
Zhaman grins his disarming grin, tying his dreads into a bundle with a ribbon. "It's all getting a bit heavy," he says. "Chantal threw a wobbly and I got sacked. She says you're going to drop them from the label?"
Nulight shrugs. "There's been mentions."
"Hey, I hope you do let go. She's obsessed with this alien stuff, like she's been hypnotised. The rumours that are going around..."
Nulight has taken a decision. "Rumours, rumours. Look, Zhaman, this is what we'll do. My LA people will nullify the Mystery Trend contract then let Chantal know. I'm starting a band to play festi music. Wanna join?"
"Hey, yeah," Zhaman says.
Nulight is pleased. It was Zhaman and Morwenna Icecool Flak who wrote most of the Mystery Trend tunes, though Chantal orchestrated them, and provided the lyrics. Zhaman is a muso, head high in the sky, in fact, way out into space, as he is a disciple of T McKenna. Nulight continues, "Me and Kappa are in already, and now you. There's a rasta dude called Partzephanaiah who I'm gonna ask. It'll be heavy auton music."
"But all our keys will be wrong—"
Nulight raises his hands. "Like... you know Terry Riley's "Shri Camel" from nineteen eighty? He retuned an old Yamaha keyboard to Indian scales. We'll get some electronics geezer to do the same. I got the frequencies, man. It'll be easy. We just go out and slay them."
"Sounds a tad freaky to be true," Zhaman remarks, "but I'm in. All my 'boards are in Zurich, but I can haul them over—"
"I'm flush, leave it to me," Nulight says. Kappa looks worried, but Nulight ignores her expression, saying, "Don't worry, I'm not on self destruct, it'll all work out."
"And the Berlin computers?" Zhaman asks, "won't they stop you?"
"That's the point, man. They won't know at the start. The idea is to attract the attention of certain people, maybe get them in a position where we can trap them, but at the very least expose them."
"You mean aliens?"
"It's true, man. We did it at Stonehenge." Nulight decides not to mention the fact that the alien told him not to be so annoying. He needs action, he needs a
resolution.
"I heard gossip on the net," says Zhaman, "and I've seen the vidclips, but I wondered if some sadboy had rendered up some fake footage. In fact, that's what everybody is saying, that it's a classic hoax—"
"It's as true as you're sitting here," Nulight says with considerable emotion.
Zhaman is stunned. He is a big bloke, but sitting back in his chair he seems crumpled. "Hey, that's, that's..."
"Save your head," Nulight says. "You'll need energy when you play. We gotta be perfect, man, just perfect."
Suddenly Zhaman is animated. "I'm
totally
in with you, but, listen up, the aliens won't just
arrive
when we gig. They'll have a plan. They'll be subtle."
"They've got high technology," Kappa remarks.
Nulight shakes his head. "We've gotta draw them down, we've gotta make them appear so nobody can deny they exist—even more than we did at Stonehenge. Then we've really blown their cover. Then they can't do what they wanna do. You hear about the Gesang Der Junglinge? That was us too. The aliens are protecting their own, that's why we couldn't complete the hit. That music is about to explode out of its basement, you get it? So we gotta force the alien hand."
Zhaman nods, seduced by Nulight's verbosity. Nulight, when he is on form, has the gift of the gab.
So the plan is put into action. Over the next few weeks Nulight calls in all his favours, contacts all his friends, all the organisers of free festivals, all those in co-operatives and musicians' matrices and free information nets, and after only a week has put together a tour of fifteen dates, from the first to the thirtieth of September. The band are to be called SemiAutonatic. It is a dreadful pun, but it says what is meant to be said. And it says, 'We are here again'.
All the band's keyboards are set to respond to the alien music scale. This is a difficult job and it costs Nulight dear. He is trying to forget that the Mystery Trend album that was meant to pay for all of Marcia E's creative accounting is now dead. He realises that they must record their early gigs and release a livemix album, since there is no time to sit down and record stuff. The publicity will need to be steaming, however, or else the sales won't cover the deficit.
But there is hope in that direction. Just before the first gig Kappa turns up a software defector from Ukraine, a tall, thin, pale dude called Grigory, who is cool enough to have heard of Hanging Gardens Of Fungus. Grigory claims he can design them a soft pack that will mutate their initial auton riffs and store them as multitracked AIFF's, so that with just the flick of a virtual mixer they can create a master file with all their live tracks done studio quality. In other words, live feel plus studio sound. This is most pleasing. Nulight feels he can go ahead with confidence.