Journal #34: A Twist on a Twist (The Luckiest Man in the Universe) November 10, 2009

‘Oh fuck, you really have killed her…’, says Moppy, the colour draining from his normally so happy face as he slumps down in his seat, ‘they’ll throw away the key this time Smally. You’re completely fucked…’

‘Firstly, she’s not dead’, I tell him, crouching down and tugging at the hair at the nape of her neck, ‘and what’s more, she is not even a she, she’s a he’. I unroll the paint soaked wig and latex from Mrs Wolf’s head, nodding at the business card that Slight is still holding. ‘Howling Wolf Media Group. I know that this is

quite incredible, but these are the very people I’ve been ordering the masks from.’

‘Slight! He’s pulling her head off!’ yells Moppy, turning a violent shade of green.

‘What masks?’ Slight asks me.

‘These masks’, I tell them, holding up the gelatinous Mrs Wolf face in the light. ‘They’re so lifelike aren’t they? I was using them for months on the ship. Actually ordered some new ones not so long ago, but haven’t had a chance to try them on yet…’

‘So who is he?’ asks The Amalfi Glow, pointing down at the old man with clipped grey hair and a trimmed beard, now stirring on the floor and groaning groggily. Were it not for the fact that he is soaked in black paint and wearing a woman’s business suit, you would be tempted to say he looked distinguished.

‘I’m guessing this is James McLymont. That was quite the story he spun back there, wasn’t it? I very nearly believed it myself until I twigged on the whole Howling Wolf connection. Good call being on Moppy’s side eh? Some of his luck must be rubbing off on us…’ I nod at our caped comrade, grinning with half-shut eyes like he has been washing some very serious drugs down his throat with potent moonshine. ‘I wouldn’t touch any more of that coffee by the way. Judging by the looks of Moppy, I think like he was trying to drug us. Anybody got something we can use to tie him up?’

‘I’m starting to wonder who we need to tie up first, Moppy or the guy on the floor’ says Slight.

The Amalfi Glow goes into his bag, ‘This any good?’

‘A Celtic scarf? Why did you bring a Celtic scarf?’ I ask him.

‘I just thought it might come in handy’, he says, Moppy falling out of his seat with a thump behind him.

‘You all right Moppy?’ asks The Amalfi Glow.

‘Yashabbashabbashooyabasta’, says Moppy, crawling across the floor on his hands and knees.

‘Yep, back to normal’, says Slight.

As James McLymont continues to come round blinking stars, we tie his wrists together tightly behind his back with The Amalfi Glow’s green and white striped scarf, and lower him into the executive chair behind the desk. He looks back at us groggily trying to work out what has just happened. Meanwhile, Moppy is trying to mount a filing cabinet in the corner of the room and it crashes down, throwing up a blizzard of paperwork, sheets and sheets of strange symbols fluttering to earth. ‘Itwasnaeme!’ cries Moppy, falling down behind the toppled cabinet.

‘Ah Chrisht!’ foams the old man, head lolling on his neck as he finally realises the situation he’s in. Seeing his papers scattered all over the floor, he yells ‘Thatsh thirty fucking yearsh of work there you fucking idiotsh!’

‘Whoshafuckinshabashabaidiot! Not me! Not me!’ pipes Moppy from the floor behind the cabinet.

‘Say…’, says The Amalfi Glow, eyes narrowing as he gets a good look at the old man. ‘You’re Sean Connery…’

‘Don’t be fucking ridculoush!’, snaps James McLymont.

‘No… you are’, says The Amalfi Glow. ‘I’d know that face and voice anywhere’. He turns to me and asks, ‘You don’t think that’s another mask do you Smally? Underneath the Mrs Wolf mask? I mean, he was pretty fucking convincing as a woman, and he’s just as convincing as Sean Connery’.

‘Itsh the coffee talking’, says the old man, ‘I put enough shedativesh and meshcaline into that coffee urn that a cup of it was enough to knock out ten horshes. That hippy friend of yours who is TRASHING MY FUCKING RESHEARCH should be in a fucking coma…’

‘What’s a horsh?’ asks Slight, cracking open his last can of beer, froths spilling onto the plush carpet and pushing his own cup of coffee away from him.

‘Wheresahearse? (hic)’, slavers Moppy from behind the cabinet, waving a wilted leaf of surrender.

I look at James McLymont, hunched in the seat, glaring at us and have to admit that he does look EXACTLY like Sean Connery. He sees me staring at him and asks ‘Okay then, what ish it you want? Hmm? I shupposhe you’re looking for the Plum Necklash. Well you’ve come to the wrong plashe. I’ve been searching for it for the lasht thirty yearsh. It’sh a pipe dream. A cashtle in the shky…’

Slight clears his throat. ‘Listen, I know you’ve got a speech impediment and everything, but could you lay off the s words, it’s starting to get on my tits.’

‘Tits!’ shouts Moppy, still waving the leaf around.

‘If the Plum Necklace doesn’t exist, then what are all these sheets of paper?’ asks The Amalfi Glow, picking one up. ‘Looks like someone’s been trying to crack a code if you ask me.’

‘Good question Ritchie’, I say.

‘Thanks Smally. Also, what about that little x on the volcano on the map up there? Coincidence that it’s in the very place your little office is set up?’

‘Another great question Ritchie. You’re on fire!’ I tell him.

‘I know’, he says, ‘I’m your psychiatrist. It’s what you pay me to do’, he says.

The old man sits quietly for a moment like he is weighing up the next move in the tense early stages of a chess match and finally says, ‘Lishen, I’m jusht a simple mashk-maker. I’ll prove it to you if you let me show you…’

We press the only button on the inside of the elevator and feel it lurching down. James McLymont stands in the middle, a look of sheer disgust written across his face as Moppy rests his head on his shoulder, drooling and staring at their reflection in the spotless mirrors that surround us. It’s been a while since I’ve seen a mirror and we look a million times more ridiculous than I originally suspected we looked. ‘Are you taking us to the tits Sean? Huh Sean?’ asks Moppy, looking up at him with abyss-like black eyes.

The lift glides to a halt, the doors slide open and we step out into a laboratory of some kind. A small rectangular room with a spotless blue carpet and windowless white walls. In front of us are two long tables where various beakers, test tubes, surgical implements, rolls of plastic and trays of purple liquid sit idle. To our right about fifty mannequin heads of various features and skull sizes eyelessly stare from the tops of different length metal poles. The lift it would seem is the only way in or out of the room. ‘Shee’, says McLymont, nodding at the room, ‘it’sh jusht like I told you. I make mashks.’

‘You don’t make titsh?’ asks Moppy.

‘NO… I DON’T MAKE… TITSH!’, says McLymont emphatically.

Ever the scientist, Slight has walked around behind the first desk, places his can of beer on the counter and is dipping his finger in the purple tray of liquid. He holds it up to nose and sniffs. ‘It’sh a type of phoshphor’, says McLymont, ‘growsh at the bottom of the volcano… combined with the laytexsh it formsh a shkinlike shubshtansh.’

‘Shrubshtansh?’ asks Moppy, checking the leaves on his shoulders and walking directly into a wall with an ‘Oof!’

‘Sounds a bit fishy to me’, says Slight.

‘I agree’, says The Amalfi Glow, over at the mannequin heads, spinning one curiously at the top of its pole, ‘there must be another room in this place…’

‘We should blow it up – all of it. Then we’d see…’, says Slight, ‘I’ve still got plenty of leftover bomb ingredients in my rucksack.’

The old man eyes him nervously as Slight grins and ambles back to his bag, starts unpacking the Tupperware boxes and rolls of magnesium out onto the desk. ‘Wait!’ shouts McLymont, so urgently that it causes Moppy to dive for cover over the table at the back of the room knocking two racks of test tubes and several beakers to the floor. ‘Okay, I’ll show you… for all the good it will do.’ He nods back at the lift. ‘Lift up the floor panel. There’sh a hatch and a ladder leadsh down. It’sh quite a way so you’ll need to untie me…’

‘Oh I think you’ll be all right Sean’, I tell him. ‘We are idiots. But we’re not idiots, if you know what I mean.’

Actually it takes more work helping Moppy down the twenty foot ladder in the dark than it does James McLymont with his hands bound behind his back, our increasingly frantic friend screaming as he descends. ‘Moppy! Fucking calm down!’ shouts Slight from the bottom, where he and The Amalfi Glow are helping the mask maker off the ladder, ‘You’ll be all right!’

‘I just feel like I’m climbing into a vagina!’ yells Moppy.

I drop from the ladder at the bottom onto a concrete floor with a short dimly lit stone corridor leading down to a metal door at the end on my left, and reach up to help Moppy down. ‘I am sperm’, says Moppy.

‘Come on then sperm, let’s go’, I say, holding him up at the shoulder.

‘Fellow sperm’, he dribbles, ‘how many sperm years are we away from our destination? (hic)’

The Amalfi Glow opens the door up ahead and we walk into a small, brightly lit cubic room. The walls, ceiling and floor appear to be the harsh grey jagged insides of the volcano, and directly in front of us on the wall is a giant grid of small black cubic blocks (about the size of a Rubik’s Cube), each one inscribed with the same mysterious symbols that we saw on the sheets of paper upstairs in McLymont’s office. ‘There she ish’, he says.

‘What the fuck is it?’ asks The Amalfi Glow, going immediately up to it. ‘Can I touch it?’

McLymont nods and he runs the palms of his hands over the grid. ‘One hundred cubesh’, says McLymont, ‘each one of them has six shymbols obvioushly. Go on, you can pull them off…’

Moppy shuffles over starry eyed to the grid muttering ‘What a curious thing to find inside a vergina…’, while The Amalfi Glow lifts a block from near the centre and turns it over in his hands.

‘It’s a code of some kind’, he says.

‘No shit Sherlock’, snorts McLymont. ‘But unlesh you can read the shymbolism of some long losht shivilisation, then do you you know how many poshible permutationsh there are? No? Well it’sh 6.53318624 x 10 to the power of 77.’

‘How do you know that so exactly?’ I ask him, watching The Amalafi Glow carefully place the cube back into the wall. It slots in with a soft click.

‘I’ve shpent thirty fucking yearsh going through the combinationsh. That number is burned into my brain’, he says.

‘Why don’t you just blow it up?’ asks Slight.

‘About twenty nine years ago I tried exactly that’, replies McLymont, ‘but there’sh a forsh-field around it. Jusht like the forsh-field that preventsh anyone from drawing a map of this island. I’m not an idiot either you know.’

‘I knew that wasn’t fucking magnets!’ I say, watching Moppy attempting to hug the grid and accidentally pulling one of the cubes out.

‘So why keep going?’ asks The Amalfi Glow. ‘You could be here all your life and never find the right combination. Why not give it up?’

McLymont’s head drops and suddenly he seems almost human, almost likeable. ‘Becaush who says I’m not going to find the right combination on my three hundred millionth attempt. It’sh not imposhible…’

And as he says this, Moppy mutters something about igloos and places the block back into place, only this time rather than the click that it made when The Amalfi Glow returned his part of the puzzle, it makes a thundering clunking sound, and we watch amazed as his bare arm crashing straight through the wall, and before anyone can move, first his balaclava clad head, then his leaf coated body, then his spindly legs are disappearing with the crumbling blocks, clattering down a smooth stone ramp. ‘HE FUCKING DID IT!’ roars McLymont in crazed amazement, ‘With the very firsht cube he touched!’, half-laughing, and half-weeping as his legs turn to jelly beneath him. ‘How… how did he do it?’ he gasps.

‘Because Sean, he’s the luckiest guy in the universe’, I say, running to the hole in the wall to see where he’s gone.

 

 

Journal #33: Mrs Wolf November 10, 2009

 

This is going to sound weird, even to me – but I miss the sea. I miss the ship. I miss waking up and stomping around on the deck hoping that someone will wake up. I miss walking into a room and thinking ‘It’s shit in here’ to myself, then going and fetching a scrench and dismantling things for the fun of it. Six months at sea and I’m still no sailor – we’ve got a temperamental supercomputer called Niko to sail us through the straight and narrows. All that’s required of me is to punch in some numbers into the navigation system and away we go. And I don’t even get that right sometimes.

What I’m trying to say is that we’ve been on this fucked up island too long. The ground beneath our feet doesn’t sway like it should. There’s no place to call your own like a cluttered old bunk. Everywhere you go, you are hemmed in by things – you can’t climb to the top of the world and just gaze out at the emptiness of the ocean. And it’s because of this feeling that I dig fucking deep when we’re climbing that volcano. I’ve climbed a few hills and mountains in my time, but the Plum Island volcano is as punishing an ascent as I’ve ever experienced. Being Scottish, the four of us know our hills. Where we come from nothing is flat. Streets undulate, fields fight back against the roller, you go up, and you go down, and you never blink once while you’re going. That’s how we attack the climb.

The first day we make good progress. We walk in bursts, covering ground quickly, and resting briefly before pushing on again. Slight and Moppy are unusually serious and focused, and The Amalfi Glow makes for good company, gritting his teeth while I fire the occasional legal question at him. ‘What if I can get the satellite back, do you reckon they’d drop the charges? Could we pin it on someone else? How’s the Peruvian/Rongovian situation bearing up? Did my two weeks in space take the heat off or am I still wanted as some kind of revolutionary?’

‘Fuck knows’, he says, sweat dripping from his brow and he stands, hands on knees and looks back down the slope, ‘how long do you think this is going to take?’

‘Couple of days at least’, grunts Slight from above us, corduroy jacket tied around his waist, breathing hard.

We walk in the darkness for a good couple of hours that first night, allowing the moonbeams to guide us, but pretty soon the terrain becomes more jagged, scree tumbling away from us beneath our hands, and we decide to call it a day. I sup a warm can of Slight’s beer (dished out begrudgingly) and think about the endless permutations and possibilities of this adventure. It feels fucking nuts pinning all our hopes on some magical necklace that probably doesn’t even exist, but it’s all we’ve got. I try to imagine how Team America are doing on the eastern side of the volcano. By deduction having not encountered the old man, I feel seriously concerned that maybe they’ve already come up against him and I wonder if we’d hear the sound of gunshots over on this side? I look at my three amigos, quietly contemplative, drinking to the stars and their own personal daydreams and grin at the thought of Jon, Warchalking and O’Flanahanaman walking together. If the old man doesn’t get them, then there’s every chance they’ll do the job for him amongst themselves. Poor little Sam. And then I fall asleep. For the first time in a week I think. The climb and the beer combining, and before I even realise it, I’m being kicked by Slight’s booted foot and am staring up at his face in the sun, saying ‘Come on Smally. If we push on we can make the summit before it gets dark tonight. I don’t fancy trying to negotiate THAT in the moonlit, that’s for sure’. He points at the crooked, rapidly ascending face of harsh grey rock above us.

He was wrong of course. Come nightfall on the second day we are still climbing, and it must have been dark for several hours before the four of us haul our exhausted bodies up over the lip of the volcano, panting hard, muscles on fire from the intricate and perilous climb. The Amalfi Glow lies flat on his back inside the lip and groans ‘Fucking hell. There was at least seven or eight times I thought I was going to die doing that…’

We are all too tired to laugh, hunched against the rockface, and then, at exactly the same time we see it below us. The basin of the volcano stretches down a good couple of hundred feet and there, built into the rockface is quite clearly a building of some type, its polished angular walls in such stark contrast to the volcanic rock that seems to cradle it in its belly. ‘That’ll be old McLymont’s house then’, says Moppy, nervously chewing his bottom lip.

‘I always imagined he would live in a cave of some sort’, I say, lighting a cigarette.

‘Smally! What the fuck are you doing?’ Slight asks. ‘What if he’s looking up and sees your cigarette glowing?’

I stub it out reluctantly on the rock. ‘No sign of Team America’, I say looking over to the other side of the crater.

‘Maybe they’re there already’, suggests The Amalfi Glow, and this time we can’t help but laugh. ‘So have we got a plan for this part?’

They all turn to me. ‘Truthfully I thought we’d just make it up as we go along’, I tell them, picking up my rucksack and beginning to climb down towards the building.

As we get closer, it seems to change. From high above it looked like a house of some kind, but as we carefully scale the rocks down the side of the crater, you can clearly see that it is more like an office block of some kind, single storey, shutters drawn on two windows either side of a sturdy looking metal door, and no lights on inside. Eventually we creep across the levelled man-made path directly in front of it and move towards the door. ‘How are we going to get in?’ asks The Amalfi Glow, his voice sounding strained from exhaustion and the jangling nerves of the moment.

I put my hand to the door handle and gently turn it. Somehow I’m not surprised when it clicks and opens. I am surprised however about the deafening crash of glass to my right, ear-splittingly loud, rolling around inside the great volcanic bowl. We turn to see Moppy grinning at us in the moonlight in front of the shattered window, clapping the dust from the rock he has just hurled through the glass pane from his hands. ‘What the fuck did you do that for?’ I screech in a whisper, ‘The fucking door is open!’

He tugs shamefully at his balaclava and whispers ‘Sorry, I got carried away’.

‘You have to think before you do something man! That was loud enough to wake up the whole fucking island! If there’s anyone in there that didn’t know we were here, then they fucking do now!’ I tell him.

‘There’s nobody here’, says Slight behind me, having ghosted past me and into the dark building.

I follow him and The Amalfi Glow inside, Moppy shuffling along behind me, whispering ‘Sorry Smally.’

We find ourselves inside a large low-ceilinged and very dark symmetrical room, blue moonlight pouring in to our right illuminating a giant boulder that our overly keen friend just used to smash us inside. The strangest thing about the room is the smell. It smells new; sterile like a modern office block, leather and flowers, gleaming chrome and mirrors. ‘What the fuck is this place?’ whispers The Amalfi Glow somewhere to my left in the darkness.

‘Welcome to Wolf Productions’, says the voice from the furthest end of the room, and a light switches on. Sitting at what appears to be a reception desk in front of a gleaming chrome elevator is a woman in her late sixties, with angular silver hair, and broad shoulders inside a business suit. ‘My husband was hoping you wouldn’t stumble over our production suite, but…’, she smiles with a flickering head shake, ‘you’re quite the stars you know’, pointing to a CCTV camera high up on the wall to our right.

The four of us trade glances. This is too fucking weird. Amalfi and me in our Flower Company football strips, Slight in his white t-shirt and jeans, corduroy jacket tied around his waist, and Moppy in his pants and balaclava, cape of tattered leaves wrapped around his shoulders, all four us filthy from our climb. Behind us the dirty great boulder that Moppy threw lies in amidst the shards of glass on the otherwise spotless cream carpet of the office. ‘I’m sorry’, I say, completely bewildered, staring back up at the CCTV camera with its little red light flashing on top, ‘but what the fuck is going on here? Who are you?’

She smiles again, two rows of gleaming teeth and stands up from behind the desk. She’s a big woman, close to six feet tall and built like a Romanian shot-putter, but her facial features are quite contrary – this was once upon a time a very beautiful young woman. She pads on flat shoes towards us, speaking in that deep accentless voice that moments ago had freaked the living shit out of me in the dark. ‘Oh how rude of me’, she begins, ‘I can’t imagine that this will be easy for any of you to take in right now. I honestly can’t believe that you actually climbed the volcano… my husband was so sure that you would turn back. Of course he’s out filming your friends as we speak, your “Team America” – I think for comedy value alone he felt like he should concentrate the hand-held shots on them -’

‘How do you know about Team America?’ I ask.

She laughs and shakes her head, ‘Oh Smally – I can call you that?’ (I nod wondering how the fuck she knows my name), ‘Actually we know pretty much everything that has been happening here on Ua Huka…’

Slight laughs to my left and stares at me, ‘What? She just said you-a-hooka… that’s fucking funny.’

‘Come this way boys’, she says, heading for a wooden door to the right of the lift, ‘my husband’s office is in here and I’m sure he won’t mind if I put the kettle on and try my best to explain what’s been happening here.’

I look left and right at Team Fifeclub, still none the wiser as to what is happening to us. Slight shrugs, The Amalfi Glow scratches the stubble on his chin pensively and Moppy says ‘A brew sounds pretty fucking good to me’, shuffling in his leaf cape after her.

We sit down in comfy leather armchairs in the large office, while the woman pours us steaming black coffee from an urn, sitting down in the executive chair behind the desk. The Amalfi Glow nudges me and points at a large yellow mounted map on the wall behind the desk. ‘Is that…?’ I ask, pointing up at it.

‘Plum Island? Yes’, she says, ‘though on all the maps of the world you’ll find it under the name Ua Huka…’

Moppy snorts and whispers to Slight, ‘I only just got it man. That IS fucking funny’.

The woman continues unfazed. ‘I’m sorry, I should really introduce myself. My name is Meredith Wolf and my husband is, as you’ve probably figured out for yourselves, James Wolf…’ My mind flashes back to Tharkey on our walk around the island, howling at the sky and smiling.

‘I thought his name was James McLymont?’ says The Amalfi Glow.

‘Well in a way it was I suppose. You see, my husband is a film maker. We were here on location about to start filming “The Legend of the Plum Necklace”, when your ship showed up. Took us quite by surprise actually. We were in the middle of shooting a scene out on the trash island when one of your crew sailed out with one of the cast who had gotten extremely drunk. There was a fight between them and our camera crew – oh, you should see some of the footage, quite horrifying, but at the same time so… well, so REAL. My husband instantly saw an opportunity, a change in direction. Instead of the big budget action adventure he’d been planning on making for the last two years of his life, he threw everything at this new improvised version of the film. We placed hidden cameras all over “Pit Town” and had an emergency meeting with the cast, instructing them to adapt to the situation as it unfolded. And boys did it unfold!’

‘You mean… this is a fucking film?’ I ask, so stunned that I feel like falling off my chair.

‘Yes!’ she cries orgasmically. ‘Within days of the ship’s arrival you’d shown up with your crazy story about flying to the moon and back and some cook stuck in the belly of a white whale. I mean, this was movie GOLD. Thankfully your sense of direction is so bad that Kiko – um, that’s Tharkey to you – was able to keep you away from the real town on the other side of the island. Plus of course we had Sean, our little inside man pulling the strings so to speak…’ – she beams smugly at this.

‘Sean?’ I ask.

‘O’Flanahanaman’, she says, the name like a baseball bat to my head. ‘Actually if it wasn’t for his quick thinking adopting this character and winning your trust, I suspect we could have never pulled this off. As soon as my husband gets back you MUST see some of the footage. The soccer match – oh! It was exquisite!’

Moppy slurps from his coffee cup and asks her, ‘So how does it end?’ She points at another CCTV camera in the corner of the room as if to say ‘like this’ and he says, ‘So there’s no Plum Necklace then?’

She bursts out laughing and leans across the table, says ‘Moppy, you are a star. You WILL be a star… you all will…’ and turning to Slight says, ‘That was quite the stunt you pulled back there with the home made bombs Mr Slight, thankfully we knew about it in advance obviously keeping a track of everything that was going out through the twins laptop and phones. We were well prepared put it that way…’

‘Wait, the twins?’ I ask, suddenly feeling my guts giving way. ‘How much did you… I mean, what exactly did you see when I was in the cell?’

‘Oh Smally… we saw EVERYTHING. Quite literally’, she says, eyebrows flickering.

‘Wait a minute!’ I snap, ‘I’m really struggling to get my head around this…’

‘Perfectly understandable. We’ve flown in a team of psychiatrists to make sure everyone comes out of this intact. And of course a lot richer…’

‘…no, I mean… this just can’t be right. What about the two scientists? What were their fucking names again? Hilary and Harmison? They were shot…’

‘You actually saw them dead?’

‘No… but… you’re saying that the card game… everything… wasn’t real?’ I ask.

‘Oh come on Smally! Four kings and four aces in the same deal? Even you aren’t THAT naive. EVERYTHING you saw was orchestrated. EVERYTHING. Sure, there was some improvisation here and there, but you didn’t seriously believe that there was an island that couldn’t be drawn on a map -’

‘My hand didn’t move!’

‘Very powerful magnets’, she says.

‘What about the ghosts – Jazz Monk… I know…’, I pause… spinning away, ‘…you made that up. You dressed someone up, and the girl… you fuckers. You read my journals. You knew me inside out and played me like a fucking idiot. You fucking fuckers!’ I spit, standing up from my seat.

She continues to smile impervious while The Amalfi Glow grabs my arm and lowers me back into my seat. ‘Just chill out man. To be honest I’m just thankful right now that there’s no crazy old man with a rifle running around…’

‘Actually between you and me he is a crazy old man. But it’s true Ritchie, there’s no rifle. You’re all perfectly safe’. She stands up slowly while Slight fumbles with some business cards that were neatly stacked in a plastic holder on the table. ‘I’ll go and call James now and let him know you’ve arrived. We’ll have you air-lifted back down to the town before you know it. And truly boys, I AM sorry. But please… reserve judgement until after you’ve seen the footage. I promise you that once you’ve seen it you’ll know that we did the right thing.’

‘Shit, does this mean I’m going to have to watch me making a tit of myself at the football?’ asks Moppy, slumping back in his chair.

Meredith Wolf begins to skirt around the table and I sink my head into the palm of my hand, eyes falling on the business card still nervously twirling in Slight’s big hands. A black silhouette of a wolf and the words HOWLING WOLF MEDIA GROUP emblazoned beside it -

- and it all happens so quickly that even after it has happened I’m not even sure if it really happened or not. I haul the tin of face paint from the rucksack at my feet, hurdle over an astounded Slight and plant the tin with a horrific thud on the back of Mrs Wolf’s skull, watch her fall face down on the floor unmoving while the black paint streaks like tears down the walls, and pools in reflective puddles on the spotless cream carpet around her head.

‘Smally! You fucking killed her!’ yells Moppy, leaping to his feet spilling his coffee all over the desk, pointing up at the CCTV camera in the corner of the room.

I stand there, hands trembling and smile.

 

 

O’Flanahanaman’s Journal #1: Team America Progress Report November 9, 2009

“I think a line has been crossed sir” – me to Warchalking, earlier this morning.

I write this journal by the light of the silvery moon, close to the summit of a volcano, on a tropical island that is literally nowhere, wearing a sweat drenched pink cotton t-shirt and matching pink sweaty hot pants. Everyone else on the ship seems to keep a journal, so I thought that I would try too.

My life in the last two weeks has been something of a blur, and gets blurrier with every passing day. From my scientific research on the trash island, to the position of Company Secretary, from a kickball match I instigated, that ended with us escaping into the jungle, to yesterday morning seeing my two ex-colleagues shot dead before my very eyes. It seems like only a few days ago that for the first time ever I actually felt “useful”. Now I just feel very, very scared.

Every time I close my eyes I see Hilary and Harrison and replay the incident in my mind, wondering if there was something I could have done differently. They are standing in the grove, pulling brightly coloured fruit from a tree at the edge of the volcano, both dressed in the same black uniforms as the little Tharkey kid. They smile when they see me and laugh about the hot pants. We shake hands. And then a small black bloody hole appears in Hilary’s forehead and he collapses to the floor. I hear the gunshot, like my brain is playing catch up with my eyes. Harrison’s face turns to me, contorted with confusion and he drops to his knees as a second shot is fired. The bullet exits his head above his right eye shooting a bright red tear of blood across his face, and he folds like a rag doll. I turn on my heels and run.

It’s hard to know what to say about them. We didn’t work together long, assigned by the same organization from different branches to carry out the tests. Two weeks camping in amongst the trash beneath the Pacific stars. I wish I’d gotten to know them better, stopped and asked them more questions about their lives instead of being so busy all the time. But I can’t help myself. I wonder if they have wives and children back home. I wonder if I’ll make it out of this alive so as I can call our head office and tell them what has happened, even though I don’t really know what has happened.

Darkness fell at the end of our second day walking and we stopped an hour from the lip of the volcano’s crater. After splitting from “Team Fifeclub” at the edge of the jungle, our “Team America” doubled back through the trees in search of Flowpoetry, but he was nowhere to be seen. The idea that one of our crew is missing in the jungle on this mysterious island, while a psychotic rifle-toting madman is on the prowl, and a posse of machete-wielding islanders are hunting us down, seems to bother me a lot more than the rest of our group. For all the Flower Company are generally pleasant and without question the most interesting people I have ever met, their flagrant disregard for one another’s safety is something that appals me. Personally, I thought locating Flowpoetry should have been top of our list of priorities, but the rest of them insisted that we press on with the mission to steal this map and find the Plum Necklace. I find it strange the bizarre collective belief in this story that Smally has spun about a magical artefact that is somehow going to miraculously right everything that is so wrong. Even if such a necklace existed, and we somehow survive to find it, it won’t bring back Hilary and Harrison. And if it doesn’t exist, what then? A war against the Plum Islanders? I played paint ball once at a stag-do and spent the entire afternoon hiding in a hole until someone found me and shot me repeatedly.

I worry as well about Warchalking. He smokes so much that he even made us take a detour yesterday that set us back hours to visit a section of jungle where towering grass plants grew. He chain smokes these pure grass joints and the Tharkey boy seems to hang on his every wasted word. The fourth member of Team America is this Jon of the Atom fellow. I find him to be quite the precocious individual. Sullen and withdrawn one minute, and then full of beans the next, niggling me while we climb by singing lines from a Doors song “Five to one baby, one in five, no one here gets out alive…” If I’d had my way I’d have gone with Team Fifeclub. I’m sure they’ll be at the top by now.

The east face climb has been treacherous to say the least, and damn hard work. Several times we’ve had to turn back on ourselves after finding precarious ledges that wither to impossible dead ends. Free climbing has never appeared on any list of things I’d like to do before I die, and at this rate there is every chance that I’m never going to get a chance to do the things I would like to do. If I live to see the other side of this misadventure then I promise the first thing I’ll be doing is enrolling myself for trumpet lessons.

The thing that is bothering me the most though, is the feeling that we’re being watched. Thankfully there has been no sign of old McLymont and his rifle, but every now and then I get the horrible sensation that something, or someone knows exactly where we are and is crawling along in our footsteps. And yet whenever I look back down the steep rocky slopes we are climbing, all I see is emptiness and chalk it up to a combination of hot sun and paranoia. There is no doubt that if Vink really has gotten a posse together then they’ll already be scaling the volcano in pursuit. Real or not though, the sensation persists.

So perilous has the climb become, that we have stopped for a second night. The air is much cooler this high up and we huddle together in the crevice of jagged ledges. Even Jon seems subdued, picking at the leftover husks of fruit that we brought and have already consumed. Warchalking has told us that at first light we’ll be making the final push for the top. Who or what awaits us is anyone’s guess, but I suspect that whatever it is, it’s not going to be much fun. Nights like this you find yourself wishing that people like Becky and Simon had come along – they at least have a sensibility about them that drags the feet of madness making it impossible to fully topple over the edge. But with Smally and Warchalking spearheading this mission, I cannot help but feel like we are doomed. With the best of intentions, our Not Captain seems to be leading us from disaster to disaster, always trying to unpick a previous knot while getting more and more tangled in insanity. And as for Warchalking, well, the word “unpredictable” doesn’t even come close to explaining how unpredictable he actually is.

I sleep tonight with a heavy heart, wondering if this journal entry in a paper notebook might very well be my last.

S. O’Flanahanaman

 

 

Journal #32 – Ramifications of an Ill-considered Escape Plan November 9, 2009

Jornal #32 – Ramifications of an Ill-considered Escape Plan

We hunker down in the roots and leaves at the edge of the jungle with the base of the giant rocky volcano ripping out of the ground behind us. Pretty quickly, the quiet sound of snoring and sleepy murmuring rustles through the still, moonlit night. Up above me, hidden in the branches I can vaguely make out Warchalking’s shadowy form and the glowing sizzle of a joint, smoke rings puffing up towards the stars. To my right, Slight snuffles on his corduroy jacket pillow, clutching a near empty bottle of whisky to his chest, rucksack of leftover weed-killer, icing sugar and magnesium strips by his head. To my right, Moppy stirs in his pants and  the black balaclava that Warchalking gave him, suddenly sits up startled, staring around, and sees me looking up at him. ‘Ah feck…………….. I’ve done it again, haven’t I?’

‘You weren’t to know those toasties were spiked’, I tell him.

‘Toasties?’ he asks, looking down at his lack of clothes. ‘Shit, why am I only wearing pants? And where did this balaclava come from?’, scratching at his head.

I’ve known this guy all my life and have seen that bewildered sheepish grin countless times before. Once he told me that he dreaded a day when he suddenly would recall every trashed black-out and the depravity that his brain seemed to be protecting him from by keeping it blank. ‘What exactly do you remember?’ I asked.

He lies back down and rolls over to face me. ‘A helicopter ride… I was supposed to be playing in a football match I think, and something about a rooster?’

I laugh quietly and tell him about the game against the Plum Island Violets. Now I’ve played in a few games of football in my time, but nothing, and I mean NOTHING compares to what happened out there on that air strip. It was less a game of soccer and more of a battle, an all-out war. There were times when I was lying on the dust of the pitch, exhaustedly smoking, that I felt like The Mardi and everything on it was slipping away from us. I proceeded to tell Moppy how he’d eaten the spiked toasties before the game, had caused us to have two goals disallowed for talking to the penalty spot and waving a corner flag around, had fallen off our goal posts, and scored an accidental and crucially important header while passing out, and how he’d been sent off in the closing minutes for invading the pitch in his pants. He rubbed at the bruising on his spine and concluded that perhaps it was lucky for all of us that he’d kept his pants on.

I went on to tell him all about the game. How Jean Claude the rooster had done a runner delaying the match, and how Flash had been sent off in the very first minute for a Kung Fu kick in Rob Vink’s face, breaking the Dutchman’s nose. How I’d been horrified but at the same time secretly felt that an inch higher and he’d have taken that scumbag out for good. I described how we’d gone in at half-time five-one down and looking like there wasn’t a hope in hell of us ever getting a result, and how we’d seriously considered making a run for it through the tunnel in the changing room floor. I’d been slumped in a corner with my head in my hands while everyone argued it out amongst each other. To be honest I would have been tempted to go. Collectively we were all over the place – Moppy causing havoc while the hallucinogens coursed through his skinny body, Simon Piler uncharacteristically distracted, and O’Flananhanaman hadn’t done a single thing right except not reacting quickly enough to get his privates out of the way of a penalty kick in the closing minutes of the first half. Really, only my little brother Chris, The Amalfi Glow and Becky N with her weird golden boots and a stunning strike from the halfway line had done anything to give us anything positive to say about our performance and chances of turning things around.

So I’d listened, and finally it was the shrill little voice of our secretary turned goalkeeper with throbbing balls, who shouted over the top of everyone that he was sure we could do it if we just kept going. ‘It’s not just that we CAN do it’, he’d said to the suddenly quiet room, ‘it’s that we HAVE to do it’. The Plum Islanders were already beating down our portacabin door at this point, and Jon of the Atom reluctantly kicked the tunnel cover back down.

And we did do it. Although I’m not really sure how. An early headed goal by The Amalfi Glow turned the game on its head, as Plum Island took their foot off the gas and tried to protect their three goal lead. If only  they’d kept attacking us then I’m sure we would have lost. We grew in confidence and despite that goalkeeper of theirs (The Spaniard) making save after save, the balance of power had shifted and we sensed that the game was there for the taking. It wasn’t a surprise when Jon of the Atom scored two to bring it back to 5-4 (although it was perhaps surprising that it was Jon who scored), and got sent off for celebrating by taking his shirt off. Then in the last ten minutes it almost went pear-shaped – a breakaway goal scored by the broken-nosed, burned and battered Vink who ran away leering like the game was done. Just before the end of ninety minutes we grabbed one back with Moppy’s vomit header to make it 6-5 and we kept on pushing. And while the Plum Islanders ran onto the pitch in injury time and the Judge put his whistle to his piggy lips, Becky N jumped in the box and scored another wonder goal, this one an overhead kick in slow motion, and the game went to penalties.

‘I thought you said I got sent off?’ asks Moppy.

‘After the final whistle’ I told him, ‘you weren’t in any fit state to take a penalty anyway, so it wasn’t a great loss’.

We’d sat at the side of the pitch, in various shades of wonderful exhaustion, stunned to still be in it, but knowing that with their goallie being The Spaniard (arguably the man of the match before a penalty had been kicked), and ours being the midget O’Flanahanaman (whose second half performance had been only  marginally better than his first), that the pendulum was already swinging back in Plum Island’s favour. I nominated our penalty takers – Chris, The Amalfi Glow, Warchalking, myself, and golden boots Becky. But she wouldn’t take one, telling us that “Geshe-La never told me how to take a penalty”. Incredulous at this refusal but realising that no amount of persuading was going to make her change her mind, I asked for a volunteer but the only one who stepped forward was Simon. Given that his entire game has been a catalogue of catastrophes from start to finish, in my mind at least he was the last name I wanted on the list, but requests for alternatives saw only much shoe and skygazing. Our first four penalties were all saved by The Spaniard and it looked like we could have blasted shots on target all day and wouldn’t have beaten him. Thankfully their first four penalties were missed (I’m sure Tharkey winked at me after he placed the ball past the post). That left Simon Piler for us and fucking Rob Vink for them. Simon ran up and as he went to kick the ball he slipped. The Spaniard had read every one of us up until that point and saw that he was aiming to shoot to his left, but when he slipped he connected with the ball and we watched it agonisingly trundle over the line to the right with the big goalkeeper struggling to get back. Mirculously we were one-up and if Vink missed, we’d won. He struck the ball so sweetly and it curled towards the top corner. I remember thinking “Fuck, there’s no way O’Flanahanaman is going to get to that” and closed my eyes. When I opened them again everyone was screaming in delight all around me and our little friend was picking himself up off the ground while the saved ball rolled away.

Then the Judge came out with his shotgun, said he was taking me and Warchalking into custody. That’s when everyone stepped forward saying they were the captain. We were allowed to go into the changing rooms to discuss it and Warchalking started yelling while guiding us down into the tunnel. Behind us I heard Slight’s home-made bombs exploding on the air-strip (I’d messaged him through Facebook on the morning of the game asking him to create a diversion of some kind in case the toasties and carpet bomb plans didn’t pan out). I hope nobody got injured. Actually that’s a lie, it doesn’t really bother me too much if the Judge and Vink got it. We came out the tunnel in the middle of the jungle and both Simon and Becky walked off in opposite directions. I don’t have a clue where Simon was going, but Becky said something about fixing a plane and that she’d catch us up. Also we lost Flash and my brother – apparently they’d arranged to be picked up by a helicopter after the match. Slight caught up with us and those of us left hiked through the jungle in the dark with Warchalking leading the way. He’s been hiding out here for the last week and seems to know his way around. We’re going to wait until dawn before climbing the volcano.

Moppy puts his hands behind his head and stares up into the canopy of trees. ‘Why are we climbing a volcano?’

‘To find the Plum Necklace, if it exists. People say that if you wear it you can stop and start time at will. We need it to rescue our cook, Bobby, who is trapped inside a white whale at the bottom of the sea somewhere. Anyway, there’s an old man lives up there called James McLymont. He’s armed and dangerous, but he has the only existing map of this island. We’re going to steal it from him, find the necklace,  rescue Bobby and get the fuck out of here on our ship.’

He silently chews this over in his head for a few moments, while above us Warchalking starts scaling down the tree. ‘Wait a minute’, says Moppy, ‘assuming we get the map from this guy, and find this necklace that stops time, now that we’re all effectively fugitives with the bomb attack and everything, and if we’re escaping on that ship… surely they’ll have alerted other people off the island and the second anyone sees the ship they’ll arrest us.’ I go quiet as Warchalking lands on the ground, extinguishes his joint and urgently scans the trees. ‘Smally?’ asks Moppy, ‘Are you still there?’

‘Shhh!’ says Warchalking, ‘Someone’s coming’.

My senses leap to attention. My first thought is that we’re rumbled. My second thought is that maybe it’s the crazy old Scottish man from up the volcano. Then I find myself hoping that it’s Becky and she’s done whatever she had to do with that plane. I hear the rustling of branches somewhere behind us and wait breathlessly until the little figure bursts into the clearing. ‘Sam?’ asks Warchalking, ‘What are you doing here?’

I stare at Warchalking’s little protégée who was helping him steal his own dad’s chickens and borrow a goat, big black Nepalese eyes, still wearing the purple strip of the Plum Island Violets. ‘I came to tell you that they’re getting a posse together. They’re going to come looking for you guys first thing in the morning’, says the little boy in perfect unbroken English quite unlike his father.

‘Say, that was an awesome game you played against us today’, beams Warchalking, patting the kid hard between the shoulder-blades. ‘You really ripped us open with those runs’.

‘Thanks’, says Sam sheepishly.

‘What’s going on down there Sam, is everyone all right? Did the helicopter get away safely?’ I ask him.

‘Yes, everyone is okay. They ran for cover when the bombs came out of the jungle and the helicopter got away. The Judge’s hair went on fire and he started raving – he’s not been the same since. They had to lock him in one of the cabins by the air strip, he’s gone cuckoo’, says Sam.

‘That’ll be the toasties’, I say.

‘With the Judge locked up, Rob Vink is pulling the strings. They’ve got everyone off your ship – just some Russian guy selling sex pills and a woman selling fake diamonds. Vink has got Dolly and Moses, Pretty Boy, Santiago Lopez, Bernie and Cedric Bedlington, and Noah Blake all with him – they’re armed with machetes and Vink’s got the Judge’s shotgun, Bobby Dillinger’s using it to guard the two cabins. My Dad and The Spaniard and old Edson Da Silva refused to help, so they’ve been locked up too along with those guys with the big computer under the umbrella that were at the game -’

‘The Atom Band? Oh no!’

‘ – and also those five funny looking guys in the green and blue tracksuits that were doing the star jumps and singing the “Becky Becky” songs during the game. Everyone else is too afraid to come out of their houses.’

‘That’ll be the Frat Boys’, I say. ‘What are we going to do?’

‘We’re going to get some sleep’, says Warchalking, ‘and first sign of light we’ll move out of here. Actually I’m less scared of those guys catching up with us, and more of the old man up there. I’ve seen him a few times this week stalking round the jungle and it’s true what they say about him being armed. He carries a rifle with him everywhere he goes. Looks crazy too with his big old beard and wild hair, wearing rags – I wouldn’t doubt for a second that he’d use that rifle on us.’

I watch him and the little Tharkey kid climb their own trees on either side of the clearing and settle down high up the moon-drenched branches. I try to close my eyes, even though I know that there’s no chance of me getting to sleep tonight. ‘You’ve got me mixed up in some pretty weird shit before Smally, but I think this is taking the weirdness to a whole new level’, says Moppy drowsily, rolling over away from me and instantly falling asleep.

 

***

The sun rises quickly, and I feel the heat from the new day as Warchalking climbs down from his tree again with bloodshot eyes and we assemble the troops. We’re a ragtag bunch – the two of us, little Sam, Moppy making himself a cape of jungle leaves, Jon of the Atom grumbling, The Amalfi Glow stretching his aching legs after yesterday’s game, Slight taking an eternity to get up and cracking open a can of beer from his backpack, Flowpoetry rolling up under a tree, and O’Flanahanaman bustling about looking for something to keep himself occupied. ‘Did anyone bring any food? I’m starving’, says Jon, rummaging through his rucksack.

Everyone looks at each other, shaking their heads, while I reach into my backpack and pull out sixty cigarettes and a tin of black face paint. ‘There’s a little grove about fifty metres up that way’, says Warchalking, pointing through the trees, ‘loads of kiwi fruit, coconuts and shit’.

‘I’ll go get some while you guys figure out a plan’, volunteers O’Flanahanaman.

‘Just be careful’, says Warchalking, ‘don’t be straying too close to the foot of the volcano in case that old man gets a look at you’. O’Flanahanaman salutes and vanishes into the undergrowth. ‘Man, he’s good. We could do with another five of him’, says Warchalking.

‘What’s the plan then?’ asks The Amalfi Glow, yawning.

All eyes turn to me. ‘Well I guess we climb up there and steal the map’, I say. ‘Anyone got any suggestions how we can go about it?’

‘I reckon we should split up into two groups’, says Warchalking, ‘half of us climb the volcano from the east and half of us from the west. The old guy must be living somewhere inside the caldera, or in a cave somewhere high up. He can’t be in two places at the same time, so if we’re coming at it from two different directions then we stand a better chance.’

‘How long will it take us to climb that thing?’ asks Jon.

‘That’s at least a day of walking. It’ll be dark by the time we reach the summit’, says Slight.

All eyes turn to the volcano. ‘Well, let’s split up into two teams’, I say, ‘I’ll take one group that way and Warchalking can take another group that way. Just a case of deciding who goes with who.’

‘Why can’t I be in charge of a group?’ asks Jon.

‘Because we’ve been around the island and you haven’t', I tell him, ‘you can pick who you’re going with. How about that?’

His eyes scan the group. ‘Any time today mate’, says The Amalfi Glow.

‘I’m just trying to figure out who is the most expendable’, says Jon, ‘like in Star Trek you know. Who are the guys in the red jerseys… or yellow jerseys, I forget which. So as I can be on the other team. I mean obviously Smally is Kirk, and Warchalking here is Mr.Spock -’

‘You take Jon’, I say to Warchalking, daubing the black face paint across my nose and cheeks and passing the tin around. ‘I’ll end up strangling him if he goes with me.’

‘Not if I strangle you first’, says Jon.

‘Why don’t we just split up Fifeclub and non-Fifeclub?’ suggests The Amalfi Glow, ‘Smally, Moppy, Slight and me go one way, and you five go the other. That’ll save us arguing over it. Plus I don’t want to be in the same team as Jon either.’

‘The feeling’s mutual buddy’, says Jon, ‘You just watch who gets to the top of that volcano first. Team America is going to kick some ass!’

‘Isn’t O’Flanahanaman Irish?’ I ask, ‘And Sam here’s a native Plum Islander’.

‘Yeah, well, we’ll be showing them the USA way, isn’t that right fellas?’ says Jon.

But nobody gets a chance to answer. A single gunshot rings out in the direction from where O’Flanahanaman walked off, reverberating through the trees, and a second shot quickly follows. Everyone jumps for cover as seconds later the sounds of crashing and tearing branches begins to move menacingly towards us. I dive for cover behind a tree, getting as low to the ground as possible, until I hear O’Flanahanaman’s shrill voice shouting, ‘They’re dead! Oh God! They’re dead!’

Our faces appear from our various hiding places around the clearing. ‘What happened?’ asks Warchalking, grabbing the sobbing little man by the shoulders.

He looks up at us, trembling with fear. ‘It’s Hilary and Harrison. They were there picking fruit…’ – he can barely get the words out. ‘He must have seen us from up the volcano. He shot them both! Oh God!’

‘You saw him?’ I ask, ‘It couldn’t have been Vink and the others?’

‘No, I didn’t see him, but the shots came from up the slope, I… he shot them both in the head and I ran… I ran away…’

‘Okay, we need to get moving’, says Warchalking, ‘I’m sorry O’Flanahanaman, those scientist buddies of yours were good guys and we’ll retrieve the bodies when it’s safe, but the plan hasn’t changed. Now we know how dangerous this McLymont character can be, so we need to move fast, and discreetly. O’Flanahanaman, I’m sorry to do this to you, but you’re on Team America…’

He tries to protest but everyone is grabbing their rucksacks and forming into the two groups, anxiously looking through the trees expecting to see the grizzly old man bearing down on us with his rifle. ‘Hey, where’s Flowpoetry?’ I ask.

‘He went that way, through the jungle’, says The Amalfi Glow, ‘if he’d run that fast on the football field then he’d have been the quickest man on the park.’

‘Well, Team America will head back that way looking for him and double back round to climb the volcano. I don’t know about you guys but I don’t want to hang around here any longer than I have to’, says Warchalking.

We shake hands and I say, ‘See you on the summit’.

‘We’ll be waiting for you’, says Jon, grinning.

 

 

PLUM ISLAND VIOLETS Vs THE UTICA FLOWER COMPANY – LIVE TEXT COMMENTARY November 6, 2009

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PLUM ISLAND VIOLETS   6 . 6 THE UTICA FLOWER CO

The Utica Flower Company win 1-0 on penalties

(half time 5-1 to Plum Island Violets)

Hiano 3, 44

Becky N 36, 90 (+3)

Piler o.g 9

The Amalfi Glow 48

S.Tharkey 22

Jon of the Atom 73, 77

The Spaniard 30

Moppy 86

Rob Vink 82

________________________________________________

IT’S ALL OVER! THEY’VE DONE IT! GRABBED A VICTORY FROM THE JAWS OF DEFEAT! QUITE UNBELIEVABLE!

Utica Flower Company fans shuffle happily and still mightily bewildered looking onto the pitch while the players collapse with happy exhaustion and nerves. Nobody can believe it. Rob Vink kicks Dolly in disgust and The Spaniard flattens Vink with a haymaker.

The Judge steps forward with his shotgun and points it at Smally and Warchalking, “Okay, you two are coming with me”, he says, grinning.

“I’m not going”, says Smally, “I’m not the captain of the ship so I’m not responsible for the satellite”.

The Judge snorts. “Who are you trying to kid son? My instructions are to extradite the captain of the ship back to the USA tomorrow morning. If you’re not the captain, then who is?”

“Actually none of us -” starts Smally, but Warchalking silences him and steps forward.

“I’m the captain”, he says.

“Well, well. The Black Fox. I might have guessed. Well come on son…”

“That’s not true, I’m the captain”, says another voice and Becky N steps forward. The Judge’s nose wrinkles and he stares at her golden boots.

“She’s not the captain”, says Simon Piler, sauntering over, “I am”.

“I’m the captain”, says Flowpoetry, winking as he lights a joint.

“I thought I was the captain?” says Jon of the Atom, “Seriously, I did”.

Behind them a wave of voices all saying the same thing. “I’m the captain”.

The Judge looks at the Flower Company and his piggy little eyes narrow, finally his mouth curls up in a grin. “I’ll tell you what I’m going to do then. I’m going to give you all two minutes to talk amongst yourselves and decide to the Goddam captain of your ship is, and then I’m going to present them with this Elephant Teapot before hauling their ass into jail. If nobody takes the Teapot then I’m giving your precious little ship to Robin Vink here, and I’ll extradite every last one of you”.

“That’s not fair!” shouts Becky N.

“Who said that the Law had to be fair?” leers the Judge.

The Utica Flower Company look at each other until finally Smally says “Can we talk about this in our changing room in private for five minutes? We’ll decide who the Captain is…”

The Judge opens up a picnic hamper lying on the table beside the teapot and says “If that’s what it takes to sort this mess out then go right ahead”, picking out a mushroom toastie and shovelling it into his mouth.

The Utica Flower Company move slowly towards the visitors portacabin and close the door behind them. The Judge hears raised voices from inside and smiles to himself, tucking into a second toastie. Five minutes pass and the portacabin is silent, the Judge now on his third toastie motions for Edson Da Silva to open the door and watches the old man turn the handle and go inside.

Seconds later his face is at the door and he is grinning, “You’ll not believe this, but they’re gone”.

The Judge chokes on his toastie and suddenly all around his head are flying fizzing plastic juice bottles. He looks up and thinks he can see a guy in a corduroy jacket just inside the trees hurling them. He picks one up and sees the white powder sizzling away beneath a magnesium strip and howls, “Run! They’re bombs!”.

And then the bombs begin to explode.

Penalty Shoot-Out

THE AMALFI GLOW       SAVED by THE SPANIARD      6-6

THARKEY          MISSED wide of the post     6-6

SMALLY          SAVED by THE SPANIARD     6-6

HIANO          HIT THE BAR     6-6

CHRIS SMALLY         SAVED by THE SPANIARD     6-6

ALEX SHULAEV     MISSED over the bar     6-6

WARCHALKING     SAVED by THE SPANIARD     6-6

DOLLY          MISSED so wide it just about landed in the sea     6-6

SIMON PILER     SCORES – trips over his own feet sending THE SPANIARD the wrong way and the ball agonisingly dribbles over the line     6-7

ROB VINK          Curls the ball towards the top corner but it is SAVED by the outstretched fingertips of O’FLANAHANAMAN – how on earth did such a little guy like that get all the way up there?     6-7

_________________________________________________

Full time

90.00 (+3) Goal! 6-6

But it’s not!

Goal kick by O’FLANAHANAMAN headed on by THE AMALFI GLOW, picked up by WARCHALKING plays a one-two with CHRIS SMALLY and motors to the byline, chopped by a last ditch tackle by DOLLY but he picks himself up and swings it into the packed penalty area and…

BECKY N rises off the ground, just like Pele did in that movie “Escape To Victory” and in slow motion overhead kicks it into the back of the Net

There’s the final whistle. We’re going to penalties folks, and I don’t know how much more of this I can take. The Plum Islanders on the pitch look like complete goobs as the UFC players rush towards Becky looking at each other to figure out what the etiquette is when the only girl in a team scores such a dramatic late equaliser. They pile on her anyway.

Except for MOPPY, he has run back onto the pitch wearing only his pants and has tried to pile onto the referee but bounces off him and is sent off for ungentlemanly conduct.

90.00 (+2) There’s some Plum Islanders on the pitch. They think it’s all over…

89.40 Turns out that wasn’t a diving header, MOPPY has passed out and been sick in the Plum Island goal mouth. He is being helped from the air strip by WARCHALKING and presented with a black balaclava. The referee is looking at his watch – 3 minutes of stoppage time.

88.22 But wait…

Goal! 6-5

SMALLY gets up off the ground and stubs his cigarette out, sprints across the air strip, pinches the ball, plays a one-two with CHRIS SMALLy, then a one-two with THE AMALFI GLOW, then a one-two with WARCHALKING, then attempts a one-two with SIMON PILER but SIMON PILER misses it completely, SMALLY collects it on the other side of him, back flicks it over MOSES and lobs THE SPANIARD for MOPPY to do a diving header into the net

85.00 The UFC seem defeated, with Plum Island keeping possession, great interchange of passes between HIANO and ROB VINK while everyone stands around waiting for full time

82.42 Goal! 6-4

THE SPANIARD punches the ball clear and it falls to the feet of SAM THARKEY, the little kid sprints up the pitch, nutmegging SIMON PILER twice on the way and rolls it into the path of a bloody and bruised ROB VINK who slots home despite O’FLANAHANAMAN’s valient efforts to trip him up

81.05 Penalty appeal for the UFC turned down – referee points out to MOPPY that he is inside his own box and the play is happening up the other end of the air strip

79.00 JON OF THE ATOM sent off for taking his top off, leaves the field saying “Only the fucking Brits could invent a game where you can’t even take your fucking shirt off when you’re happy”

77.51 Goal! 5-4

Plum Island are in a state of shock. The UFC continue to pepper the goal until WARCHALKING charges through two players and lays it off to JON OF THE ATOM who sends THE SPANIARD the wrong way and wheels away twirling his shirt above his head.

73.52 Goal! 5-3

Apologies for the technical problems folks. It’s to be expected.

You haven’t missed much – the game has descended into a scrappy affair with the UFC having most of the possession, the strings being pulled by CHRIS SMALLY in midfield. The only notable event was MOPPY using his own crossbar as a climbing frame and falling off, landing on his back. He seems to be okay, got up with a smile and a wave to the small huddle of supporters on the faraway touchline.

Finally the UFC get the breakthrough. 20 shots in the last five minutes alone as they mount a blitz on the Plum Island goal. SIMON PILER jumps like a salmon at the front post and the ball bounces off his shoulder, lands at the feet of JON OF THE ATOM making gestures at the twins on the Plum Island side of the pitch, and he looks up and drives it through the crowd of players into the bottom corner.

57.57 After much scrappy play the UFC get an amazing chance – cross ball by CHRIS SMALLY and BECKY N hits a peach of a curler that floats over THE SPANIARD’s head and looks goalbound… until JON OF THE ATOM attempts a leaping header and somehow nods it over the bar.

52.25 DOLLY booked for chasing JON OF THE ATOM the length of the pitch claiming he “twisted my fucking nipple”

50.32 The game is restarted after referee at length checks THE AMALFI GLOW’s shoes for springs but can’t find any

48.38 GOAL! 5-2

From the resulting corner SMALLY crosses right onto the napper of THE AMALFI GLOW who looked like he had springs in his shoes – ball travels so fast into the net that the fishing nets have fallen off.

47.34 CHRIS SMALLY leaves four Plum Islanders for dead only to see his raking shot tipped over the bar by THE SPANIARD.

46.08 Left foot shout by BOB DILLINGER from the edge of the box miraculously saved by O’FLANAHANAMAN (back in goals) who didn’t know much about it but somehow deflected it away after tripping over his own bootlaces.

45.00 Both sides are back on the pitch. No explanation for why the UFC are late. UFC kick off attacking the goals to our left.

45.00 The second half is delayed as The Utica Flower Company have not come out of their changing room – officials are attempting to kick the door down

45.00 (+2) The referee blows for half-time

44.43 GOAL! 5-1

SIMON PILER attempts to throw the ball as far as he can and lands it directly at the feet of HIANO, who rolls it into the empty net.

42.41 Penalty missed – ROB VINK blasts the ball straight down the middle of the goals and it hits O’FLANAHANAMAN in the crown jewels. SMALLY clears. O’FLANAHANAMAN is stretchered off and SIMON PILER goes in goals.

39.42 Penalty to Plum Island!

Long free kick is nodded into the box by ALEX SHULAEV and SIMON PILER dives full stretch to catch it. “I thought I was playing extreme frisbee”, he says. THE AMALFI GLOW is restrained by WARCHALKING and SMALLY.

38.01 Free kick to Plum Island after MOPPY attempts to rugby tackle THARKEY – says he was just “trying to give him a hug” – free kick to be taken by NOAH BLAKE

DOLLY (head heavily bandaged) and ROB VINK rejoin the game

36.06 GOAL! 4-1

CHRIS SMALLY tackled by NOAH BLAKE and the ball rolls to the feet of BECKY N who booshes it 47 yards into the top corner of the net. Nobody moves for several seconds.

35.45 Breakaway from the UFC – O’FLANAHANAMAN goes to punch the ball but punches ROB VINK in the head by accident. SIMON PILER boots the ball up the pitch, picked up by CHRIS SMALLY who runs forward with it.

34.14 Long range effort from ROB VINK hits O’FLANAHANAMAN in the face and FLOWPOETRY lazily kicks the ball out for a corner. THE AMALFI GLOW tells the keeper “That’s much better!”

32.51 THE AMALFI GLOW given a final warning for wrestling his own keeper to the ground and telling him to “get his fucking act together”

FLOW POETRY ambles onto the pitch after ambling over from Cabin 6

30.39 GOAL! 4-0

Long kick from THE SPANIARD bounces over everyone’s head and THE AMALFI GLOW leaves it for O’FLANAHANAMAN  who is talking to a mysterious character in a corduroy jacket behind the goal, the ball ends up in the back of the net.

29.50 Mazy dribble by SIMON PILER and cross by SMALLY, flicked on by WARCHALKING and JON OF THE ATOM misses an open goal

28.29 PRETTY BOY sent off for throwing a punch at WARCHALKING and missing by a mile

26.43 Play stopped after mass fracas in the Plum Island goal mouth – somebody has bitten off DOLLY’s other ear and the Plum Island players are claiming it was WARCHALKING but the referee didn’t see it – WARCHALKING over at a bucket on the faraway touchline and DOLLY is carried off screaming

25.18 Goal disallowed – Direct free kick ricochets of JON OF THE ATOM’s foot and goes in but referee has stopped the play as MOPPY has pulled one of the corner flags out and is waving it around

24.20 Free kick to the UFC – foul on WARCHALKING by MOSES who clumsily sits on him – free kick to be taken by CHRIS SMALLY

22.05 GOAL! 3-0

SAM THARKEY runs the length of the pitch unchallenged (SIMON PILER slipped on his backside while chasing him), rounded the goalkeeper with ease and slots the ball into the empty net

21.36 Close range “header” from MOPPY (it doesn’t look like he knew a lot about that one) easily saved by THE SPANIARD. Plum Island break with SAM THARKEY in possession.

20.38 Long range effort by CHRIS SMALLY spectacularly saved by THE SPANIARD

Corner to UFC, to be taken by SMALLY

19.54 Mazy dribble by SIMON PILER – barefoot in the right direction this time

18.20 PENALTY MISSED!

ROB VINK hits the post – goalkeeper rooted to the spot, THE AMALFI GLOW clears the rebound

17.47 JON OF THE ATOM booked for being cheeky to the referee about his shorts

16.31 PENALTY! for Plum Island

SMALLY booked for accidentally burning ROB VINK with a cigarette during goal mouth scramble and a penalty awarded

15.49 Corner kick to Plum Island to be taken by HIANO

14.47 Goal line clearance by THE AMALFI GLOW after a shot from inside the box by ALEX SHULAEV – goalkeeper nowhere to be seen

13.43 WARCHALKING and THARKEY squaring up to each other – both are yellow carded – apparently an argument about “chickens”

12.05 Goal disallowed for The Utica Flower Company – cross ball from WARCHALKING blasted in from 25 yards out by CHRIS SMALLY, but MOPPY judged to be offside lying in the penalty area talking to the penalty spot

9.51 GOAL! 2-0

HIANO’S free kick rebounds off the crossbar hits SIMON PILER in the face and dribbles across the line – goalkeeper standing there looking bewildered in pink t-shirt and hot pants

8.32 Referee stops game and demands to see SIMON PILERS shoes – they are covered in glue – free kick to Plum Island and SIMON PILER booked for unsporting behaviour – free kick to be taken by HIANO

7.46 SIMON PILER still going in circles with the ball glued to his feet

6.45 Continuing mazy run by SIMON PILER towards his own goal

5.45 The game restarts, ROB VINK returns to the field with a suspected broken nose, mazy dribble by SIMON PILER

3.56 GOAL! 1-0

Free kick taken by HIANO – wall ducks out of the way and the ball ends up in the top left corner – goalkeeper doesn’t move

3.05 ROB VINK carried off on a stretcher – free kick to Plum Island to be taken by HIANO

1.47 THE AMALFI GLOW booked for dissent

0.29 FLASH sent off for kung fu kicking ROB VINK in the face

0.00 Plum Island kick the game off attacking the goals to our left, The Utica Flower Company by process of logical deduction are attacking the goals to our right

0.00 Play has been delayed while several players and match officials attempt to catch a runaway rooster

Kick off 10.15pm GMT

Attendance – to be confirmed

In the event of a draw, the match will go directly to penalties

Team Line-Ups

PLUM ISLAND VIOLETS

1 The Spaniard

2 Pretty Boy

3 Dolly

4 Noah Blake

5 Moses

6 Tharkey

7 Sam Tharkey

8 Rob Vink (c)

9 Alex Shulaev

10 Hiano

11 Bob Dillinger

THE UTICA FLOWER COMPANY

1 O’Flanahanaman

2 Flash

3 Flowpoetry

4 Simon Piler

5 The Amalfi Glow

6 Smally

7 Warchalking

8 Chris Smally

9 Moppy

10 Becky N

11 Jon of the Atom

(mascot: Jean Claude the rooster)

Pre-Match Team Talk November 6, 2009

[Imagination zooms you to an unchartable tropical island somewhere in the South Pacific:

Two newly constructed portacabins sit side by side next to the air strip,  the magical dipping sunlight of Plum Island reflected in the glass curtained windows. In front of the portacabins is a pasting table, covered with a white tablecloth, and sitting resplendent on the table, with purple and green/blue ribbons tied to its handle is a badly faded and extremely battered yellow plastic Elephant Teapot. The worn dusty air strip itself has been transformed into a football field, with fishing nets strung from actual football posts, splashes of white painted lines, and corner flags hanging limply in the windless evening. At the side of the pitch closest to town, the residents of Plum Island have turned out in force wearing the purple colours of the home team. There is Mrs Judge in her wheelchair draped in regal purple robes, her two minxes of twin daughters pushing one handle each. There is the entire Da Silva family sitting in deckchairs - seventy year old Mama Da Silva smoking stogies, with her dazzling grin and crooked back, her daughter Maria and her good for nothing son-in-law Santiago Lopez. Bernie and Cedric Bedlington stand in the sunlight, arms folded while Jonny Gallo bores them to death about a boxing match from 1977 that probably never even happened. On the ocean side of the strip, a handful of people hang around in green and blue scarves, looking like they don't know how they got there, let alone what they are supposed to be doing. Outside the visitors portacabin stands Edson Da Silva on guard, a seventy three year old handyman with whith hair like snow, the spring of a seventeen year old in his step, and a rusty shotgun in his leathery hands, watching carefully to make sure that Smally doesn't make a run for it. The Judge, all in black, overly tight shorts that he dug out from the bottom of a dresser, belly hanging out over them slaps the elderly gent between the shoulder blades and booms so that everyone can hear 'Now remember Ed, if that son of a bitch tries anything funny, you have my permission... shoot to kill Ed, shoot to kill'. His pompous voice carries over the airstrip where The Atom Band are busy attaching a giant umbrella to a hulking whirring supercomputer on a trolley. There is not a single cloud in the sky.

Inside the Visitors portacabin, Smally has no intention of trying anything funny. He is standing at the door facing the various members of the Flower Company who have assembled on a ring of wooden benches around the rectangular hut, some laughing and joking amongst themselves, others sitting quietly, bewildered staring at their hands as if they are wondering if they are real, and a couple appear to be fast asleep. Smally is fucking useless at speaking in public, but somehow in this moment he needs to find exactly the right words to send this beautiful bunch of misfits out onto the field, feeling like they are a collective unit and absolutely anything is possible. He clears his throat and speaks...]

Smally: Okay, settle down folks. Is everyone here?

O’Flanahanaman: Just Warchalking still missing sir.

Smally: Shit. Well we’re running out of time, so I’ll say what I’ve got to say and hopefully he’ll show up sometime before the match starts… [shaking his head] Right, does everyone know why we’re here? [murmured confirmation that a few of them do, but most of them don't] Okay, well I’ve not got time to go into the full story again or we’ll be here all day, and tomorrow, and the next day, and the day after that… but in a nutshell I lost The Mardi in a game of cards, and we have to play a game of football against the locals of Plum Island to win it back [Jon of the Atom raises a hand] Yes Jon?

JOTA: What’s The Mardi?

Smally: [in disbelief] The Mardi is our ship. Didn’t you get my message about this?

JOTA: I did, but I didn’t read it properly. It was too long.

Smally: Did anyone read the message I sent about why we’re here?

O’Flanahanaman: [enthusiastically] I did sir

Smally: Apart from people that were already on the ship? [silence] Okay. But you do all know that you’re here to play a game of football, right? [more silence] Anyway, right now hardly any of you know each other, but by the time we’ve finished doing what we’ve got to do out there on the football field -

Flash: [holding a large nervous rooster] It’s more of an air strip than a field [murmurs of agreement]

Smally: …well then on the air strip…. [long pause] shit, it’s no good, I forgot what I was going to say next. O’Flamihanigan, pass me that bin bag there would you?

O’Flanahanaman: Certainly sir

Smally: Well without further ado, here are your shirts that O’Flemigan here has been hand-stitching for the last forty eight hours [ripple of applause, O'Flanahanaman blushes, Smally pulls a green short-sleeved shirt from the bag with a number 2 and "FLASH" embroidered beautifully above it] Flash, this is yours [throwing shirt and a pair of blue shorts over to him] you’re playing right-back and your rooster Jean Claude will be our mascot.

Becky N: Awww, I thought Elvis was going to be our mascot!

Smally: Becky, Elvis only lets you go near him and the last thing we need is a fucking elk high on hot-tub water running amok in Pit Town. Any questions Flash?

Flash: Well first of all I’d just like to say if anyone tries to eat my rooster, I’ll squish em. Then I’d like to know what a right back is? [Simon Piler raises a hand]

Smally: [to group] Nobody touch this rooster, you all got that? [silence, someone sniggers] What is it Simon?

Simon: I’d just like to ask our Medical Officer where he has been for the last five months, ever since he jumped overboard with a surfboard?

Flash: Chicago

Smally: Does that answer your question Simon?

Simon: Weeeell, not rea-

Smally: ‘Right back’ is exactly what it says it is. You play at the back, on the right hand side. Make sense? [reaching into the bag] Next, we’ve got number 3, our left back – “FLOWPOETRY” [looking round] where’s Flowpoetry? [everyone looking at each other wondering which one is Flowpoetry] Shit, he’s not here.

Simon: He’ll be smoking in his cabin for sure.

O’Flanahanaman: I’ll go and get him sir.

Smally: Cheers, okay next shirt we’ve got is number 4 – “DR SIMON PILER” – Simon, you’re playing at the centre of defence. I must admit that I always thought you would make an excellent winger, but on this occasion I’m going to trust your judgement on it.

Simon: Centre of defence! That’s where I was hoping to play![long pause] What does centre of defence do exactly?… Ah wait, yes, don’t tell me. I think I just worked it out for myself. Egads, I’m starting to get nervous and rambling! I apologise. Carry on Smally, you’re doing a fine job.

Smally: Thank you Simon. Okay, number 5, also centre of defence “THE AMALFI GLOW”.

Ritchie: Ah feckin knew you’d put me in defence [shakes head in disappointment]

Smally: Ritchie, we need someone at the back who knows what they’re doing and will hold it all together. Think Cannavaro. And watch your metatarsal when you’re warming up.

Jon of the Atom: [to Jean Claude] Who’s he calling an arsehole?

Smally: Oh yeah Ritchie, any luck on the whole me stealing a satellite thing by the way? Found some legal loopholes I can crawl through in the next hour and a half in case things go spectacularly tits up?

Ritchie: Eh? [dawn of realisation on his face] Ahhhh… so that’s what that call was about…

JOTA: [to Jean Claude] See, now he’s doing it too.

Smally: Cool. Okay, next – number 6, “SMALLY” – that’s me in case anyone didn’t already know. I’ll play defensive midfield, amble around and hopefully get enough space to smoke a few cigarettes. What’s next? Number 7 – I love how O’Flarmagan put all of these in order, he’s got a touch of the OCD about him hasn’t he? Anyway, number 7 “W”…

[at this very moment a crunching sound comes from beneath the portacabin floor and a flashing handsaw starts to cut a perfect circle in the middle of it]

Smally: What the fuck!?

[the cut circular disc of wood pushes up and a figure emerges all in black, with black face paint across his nose and cheeks and a black balaclava]

Simon: It’s The Black Fox! The most wanted man on Plum Island for stealing two chickens and borrowing a bicycle and a goat! Haha! [Jean Claude starts flapping furiously]

W: Hey kids. Everyone ready to go?

Smally: Warchalking, what the fuck are you doing?

W: Escape plan. I dug a tunnel that will bring us out in the jungle. Come on, we should all go now before they catch us. [several people stand up and move towards the hole] What are you all doing here anyway?

Smally: Wait! Everyone sit down! [general confusion, some sitting people stand, some standing people sit, and some just seem very confused neither standing or sitting] We’re about to play football against Plum Island, to try and win back the ship… if we escape now then we’ll lose The Mardi! We need to play this game folks. And win!

W: Soccer? Awesome. Can I play? [emerging fully from the tunnel, shaking the earth and sawdust onto the ground, while Smally hands him the number 7 shirt] We can escape after the match is over I suppose. Or at half-time if things are going against us.

Smally: I think we’ve already got an escape plan covered with magic mushroom toasties and a carpet bomb diversion haven’t we Simon? Simon?

Simon: [looking up from his shirt] Huh?

Smally: The carpet bomb diversion?

Simon: What carpet bomb divers- ahhh, that carpet bomb diversion. Oh dear.

W: [lighting a joint] What position am I playing?

Smally: [rubbing his eyes with exhaustion] Attacking midfield, left side. Just try and make a nuisance of yourself. Shouldn’t be too hard considering your recent track record.

W: [sitting down] This’ll be fun.

Moppy: Nice balaclava man

W: Thanks

Moppy: I’ve got a blue one at home

W: Awesome

Smally: Well we’ll figure out the escape plan later I suppose. What are we up to? Number 8 “SMALLY” – this is yours Chris [throws shirt]

Flash: Smally? I thought you were Smally?

Smally: Yeah, he’s Smally too. Everyone, this is Chris my brother. He’s younger, fitter, quicker, saner, and much better looking than me. Have you got your juice bro?

Chris: Gotmajuicerightherethenoobroawthoughahdinnaekenexactlywhitsgoanoanherebutyouknowmeah’llgieitago

JOTA: [looking down the line] What’s that he’s speaking, mandarin?

Chris: Ishetakingthepishootaymaccentanthespeedahmtalkinganthere’smetryintoslowitdownyeken

JOTA: Or maybe Taiwanese? Does he speak American? Do… you… speak… Americano?

Smally: Chris, just drink your fizzy juice and let your feet do your talking on the pitch. Support our strikers when you can and cover for the defence if we’re in trouble. Also try to see if you can push down the wings, both wings. Basically cover every inch of the air strip.

[across the bay O'Flanahanaman opens the door of Cabin 6 and is engulfed in a fog of thick white smoke]

O’Flanahanaman: [coughing, waving hands in front of his face to see] Uh… Flowpoetry? Are you ready to play kickball?

Flowpoetry: Sure man, when?

O’Flanahanaman: Well, right now actually, here’s your shirt. You’re playing left back I think.

Flowpoetry: Hey thanks, this is pretty cool. I dig the hand stitched numbers man. I’ll just have one more bowl and be right down. Say, who are you anyway, and what does a left back do?

[back in the visitors portacabin]

Smally: Number 9 – “HOT SHOT HAMISH” – this one’s yours Moppy, centre forward. Hey, what are you eating?

Moppy: [chewing on a mushroom toastie, mouth full] What this? It’s a toastie. Mushroom I think with a hint of jam. I got it out of this hamper basket over here in the corner.

Smally: [panicking] What hamper basket? That one? Becky? Is this the trojan hamper basket with the hallucinogenic toasties in it? Please tell me it’s not!

Becky N: [mumbling shuffling foot alternatively across floor] Wax on, wax off, wax on, wax off… huh?

Smally: Is this the trojan hamper with the toasties spiked with hallucinogenic mushrooms that we were going to send in to our opponents before the game!?

Becky N: Oh shiiiiiiiit….

Smally: Has anyone else eaten any of these toasties? [silence] Okay… that’s good. Don’t anyone eat them. That means you as well Moppy.

Moppy: It’s a bit late for that, this is my third. In the last five minutes I’ve noticed that my vision has started to become much clearer and my foot is itching like it’s wanting to blast rocket shots at the opposition’s goal -

Smally: Excellent, well that’s something at least. Ok, shirt number 10 -

Moppy: – only my legs feel like they’re the same leg and they’re made of jelly and I keep seeing this rooster sitting over there on that guy’s lap.

Ritchie: That is a rooster bud.

Moppy: I thought we were playing football?

Ritchie: It’s the mascot apparently.

Moppy: Does it talk? [to Flash] Alright mate, does it talk? The rooster?

Simon: We’ve got rats on our ship that can talk.

Moppy: You’ve got a ship? Nice one. What’s it called?

W: [to Moppy] Here Hamish, have some of this weed. It grows out there in the jungle. It’s good stuff.

Moppy: Cheers [laughing] don’t mind if I do.

Smally: As I was saying, number 10 is Becky N, our other centre forward. here you go golden boots [throws shirt]

Becky N: [muttering] I fucking hate organised sports. I can’t believe I’ve been roped into this. Where do I stand?

Smally: Near the opposition’s goal. Your job is to put the ball in the net. Just don’t get caught off-side.

Becky N: Sounds simple enough. [long pause] What’s off-side?

Chris: [laughing] Icannaebelievethiswe’rescreeewed!

JOTA: Definitely mandarin.

Smally: Number 11, “JON OF THE ATOM”, attacking right midfield.

JOTA: Can I be a different number? What about 13?

Smally: No, the numbers and names have been hand-stitched onto the shirts. It’s too late to change it now.

JOTA: Can I be the captain then?

Smally: There’s no captain Jon. We don’t have a captain.

JOTA: Well can I be the captain then?

Smally: I mean we deliberately don’t have a captain. We’re a unit. Nobody is of higher rank than anyone else.

JOTA: How do YOU get to decide what number everyone wears and what position they play then? If we’re really all equal then I’m deciding that I’m going to be number 13 and be left… uh inside… attack defender… half.

Smally: That’s fine Jon. You can be number 13 and left inside attack defender half in your head. But you’ll be wearing this shirt with the number 11 on it. The reason I picked the numbers and positions was because if I didn’t do, then nobody would have done it, and we’d be ship-less.

Moppy: [pulling another toastie from the hamper] What’s all this stuff about ships?

Becky N: Although technically it’s your fault we’re in this mess with your poker hand of four kings.

Chris: Yehaudapokerhaundofairkingsaye?

Smally: Yeah, I bet the boat on it and lost to four aces.

Chris: [laughing] Unlucky!Mindyouanyonewidhuvbetyerboatoanfairkingstobefairbro

Smally: I know… okay, last shirt, number 1, our goalkeeper [pulls out a bright pink shirt and bright pink hotpants]. We were a player short when I woke up this morning and I realised we still needed a goalkeeper. I thought about it a lot. We needed someone dependable, someone who would throw themselves into the thick of the action without fear for their own personal safety. I think you’ll all agree that there was only one option…

JOTA: [whispering] Jean Claude

[Smally slowly revolves the pink t-shirt that he borrowed from the twins as the door to the portacabin opens and O'Flanahanaman enters]

O’Flanahanaman: Flowpoetry’s just coming. He’s going to smoke one more bowl. What’s happening? Why is everyone looking at me? [he sees his name crudely drawn on the back of the t-shirt in black biro reads "O'FLANAHANAMAN" and bursts into tears] You spelled my name right! [long pause] What is it though?

Smally: You’re our goalkeeper.

O’Flanahanaman: Oh fuck… I thought I was the magic sponge man!? I’m crap at kickball! Even crapper in goals!

Smally: You’ll be fine. Okay everyone. Listen up. We’re running out of time so I’ll make this brief. I did get a dossier on the Plum Island Violets from the twins, but to be honest it wasn’t much help. It had a lot of facts about men in the town’s favourite sexual positions, fetish preferences, and locations of birthmarks and moles, but absolutely nothing about how good they are at football.

JOTA: I’d still quite like to see it. Actually I’m more interested in seeing it now than I was when I thought it was about football.

Smally: Luckily old Edson let me pick his brains a bit. The Plum Island Violets will probably be lining up in a 4-4-2 formation [blank looks as Smally pulls a sheet of notepaper from his pocket]. The players to watch out for are Rob Vink obviously…

JOTA: Obviously.

Smally: He’s an ex-pro but got done in a match-fixing scandal. I’m sure he can still play a bit though, expecting him to line up somewhere in the midfield. He’s the guy I lost the card game to, so if anyone gets a chance to put a foot in early on without making it look too obvious, then go for it. Apart from him Edson was telling me about his grandkid called Hiano. I don’t just think it was family pride talking, and the old man seems to know his football. Apparently this Brazilian kid’s amazingly tricky on the ball and can score goals for fun, so we’ll need to keep an eye on him. Let’s see, who else is there? Oh yeah, there’s Tharkey the Nepalese Sherpa… anyone who knows him will know already that this guy will just keep running all day and night. Their centre forward is a kid called Shulaev, the tat maker. [laughter] You’re laughing now, but Edson was saying that if this lad gets a sniff of goal then he’ll bury it, so we need the defence to shackle him. Simon and Ritchie, you guys need to figure out how best to deal with him.

JOTA: Why can’t I deal with him?

Smally: Their goallie is meant to be pretty shit hot too. A guy they call “The Spaniard”.

O’Flanahanaman: I met him this morning. He was certainly an impressive character.

Smally: Apparently he’s got no real weaknesses. In fact the only real weakness I reckon is their defence. The Violets are top heavy with quality, but it looks like they’ve packed their back line with some of the dirtiest fuckers you’re likely to come across, but not great players. We all know Dolly – he’s the guy whose ear Warchalking chewed off.

W: I did? Woah. I have no recollection of that at all. [laughing]

Moppy: What did it taste like?

Smally: There’s his brother Pretty Boy and the barman Moses – both are built like brick shithouses, and probably Noah Blake the Aussie pilot with the drink problem -

Flash: Sounds like he’s on the wrong team.

Smally: Anyway, if we can get stuck in about them and rattle them a bit then we might stand a fighting chance. Let’s try and keep it clean though – that Judge has got it in for us and he’ll be wanting to stamp his authority on the game, so don’t be giving him any reason to be flashing the cards early on. Keep it simple, see if we can go at least the first half without conceding and we’ll take it from there. Everyone got that?

JOTA: I didn’t understand a fucking word you said.

Smally: Okay Flower Company! Let’s get changed and ready to go!

[folk start peeling off their clothes]

Becky N: [coughing]

Smally: Shit, sorry Becky. Okay everyone out so Becky can get changed and then we’ll swap over. [everyone begins to file out, immediately outside the door five Frat Boys are clumsily attempting to form a pyramid with little success and cursing at each other]

Becky: Wait, where’s everyone going? I was only coughing! Ahh…

[The Elephant Teapot sits in the sun... and kick off is only moments away]

Journal #31 – 4 Kings November 6, 2009

Smally’s journal entry he gave me this morning. I forgot to post it. Too bust sewing and making packed lunches.

 

SATURDAY CONTINUED

Where was I?

Oh yeah. I was crying. Not just regular a couple of tears darting around the cheeks crying, but full blown hysterical sobbing on the verge of wailing. I never cry like this. The sudden movement of Tharkey’s hand patting my shoulder strikes me like a shot of electricity and I wail even louder, my guttural anguish booming in waves from the round grassy top of Knob Hill. ‘Jaaaaaaaazzzzzzz Mooooooooonk! Whhhhyyyyyyyyyy?’ I am howling down the slope beneath me, but the words are hopelessly lost in snotty sniffs and breathless sobs against the blood red evening sky.

From the cliffs at the northern peninsula of Plum Island, Tharkey and I had re-entered the jungle and began to make the long walk back across the undulating dense undergrowth back towards Pit Town. We skirted around the foot of the volcano and I stared in awe at the jagged black peaks spiking and funnelling up towards the invisible volcanic basin at the top. I imagined James McLymont, a bearded, lupine man, framed against the sky looking down at us through the canopy of leaves through binoculars, pawing at the earth, rifle flickering in his hands. I was fucking exhausted, delirious almost, but Tharkey seemed to sense this and slowed his pace accordingly. We’d gotten off on the wrong foot thanks to Warchalking and the chickens, but in spite of this I found his quiet, unassuming company startlingly reassuring, and I sensed that he felt the same about me. From the little he said I gathered that his role on the island was that of a trapper and small-time farmer, selling eggs and goat’s milk, hunting wild boar and other unimaginable animals scattered across the radius of this mysterious place.

By the time we reached the south west of the island and the small grassy hill appearing suddenly and quite out of place in the thick of the jungle, the afternoon had had already started to fade into the colourful yawnings of dusk. We tramped to the top of it to look out over the great bay back to the beach and the houses of Pit Town that looked from this distance like they had been randomly scattered like seeds. Beyond the town I could see The Mardi, a tiny black speck on the glass surface of the ocean. I sat down with my knees up to my chest, trying to catch my breath and wondered what everyone was up to. And then for some reason I started thinking about the Jazz Monk again. I don’t know where it came from, but suddenly it was like I was back in the rocket, staring at his gloved paw as it pounded and came to rest, fingers splayed across the glass of the circular window, his pleading eyes like two moons, and all over again I saw the lightning rod of rapidly cracking glass, and the bright red blood of his head exploding, mixing with the bloody red sun to my right. I blinked a great salty tear of guilt and there, about halfway down the hill I saw a figure, shadowy and hunched behind a green skull mask, with the same big watery eyes staring furtively back up the slope at me. Pinned to the figure’s cloak was a name-badge that simply read “Bob”. Tremors of pure terror froze like ice in my veins and I felt like screaming out, but my mouth was like fingertips frantically scrabbling for hold and finding only air, and before I knew it I was crying my heart out while the hunched figure began to lumber away into the cover of trees at the foot of the hill. Just within the lip of the trees I’m sure I see a young woman, wearing a fake moustache and super sunglasses. She smiles at me, takes the monkey in the skull mask’s hand and leads him into the shadowy undergrowth. That was when Tharkey’s hand patted my shoulder and I wailed.

He waited for my tears to subside before finally asking, ‘A ghost?’

I sit there quietly, contemplative until the sentences finally begin to pour from me like fiery chunks of molten lava. I told Tharkey all about our epic and ill-fated moon-mission, about how it had been my idea and the problems with the fuel line, and then how I’d persuaded Jazz Monk to fix it, and his madness over Nate, and his head exploding. I do not know how much of my convoluted snivelling story the Nepalese guide understood, but throughout his warm eyes smiled and he nodded his head allowing me to finish. ‘ Do you see them too?’ I asked him.

He shook his head and stared back out across the bay at the little white houses and said quietly, “No Smally. I see Zheng. She is Tharkey’s ghost…’

I listened carefully while he explained in fractured sentences how they’d grown up on either side of the Nepalese border, had run away together at the tender age of seventeen, saving up their money to fly to South Africa where, neither of them had been able to find work. He went on to tell me how a chance encounter in a bar with a young Australian pilot had led to a conversation about Plum Island and the Plum Necklace, the pilot offering to take them there when he returned and the three of them would look for this legendary artefact together. ‘We be here ever since’, said Tharkey, ‘many years and every day I look in Zheng eyes and she is sad. Zheng want a real life. Real school for her beautiful children. Real fields for animals.Tharkey always see Zheng when he sit at Knob Hill.’ I noticed that he was crying himself.

‘It’s a strange life Tharkey’, I said, patting his damp back.

‘Yes Smally. A very strange life’, he agreed, smiling back at me and wiping his eyes on the sleeve of his t-shirt.

 

SUNDAY

I returned to Plum Island the following evening, said hello to Moses squatting behind his beach bar and he predictably blanked me, tapping away at a hand-held games console. The rucksack on my back, packed with my journal and various items removed from storage clanked and clunked as I walked towards Pit Town. In front of the second house on my right I noticed a woman who looked slightly older than me with deep red waves of hair, sitting on the wooden porch of her medium-sized single-story white house, festooned with colourful flowers in hanging baskets. I smiled at her in an attempt to be friendly and she smiled back, but without any hint of emotion, as if she was a wild animal of some kind acknowledging that each of us were going about our own separate business. I stopped at Tharkey’s to give him the the two ornately beautiful jade statuettes I’d taken from the ship and even before he saw the compensation for his two missing chickens he greeted me with a brotherly smile and beckoned me in. I tried to say no, offering for a second time to give him back the old brown boots he’d loaned me, but once again he declined with a grin and a shake of his head. When Zheng saw the two statuettes, I didn’t have any choice but to go inside, her kind and fierce little eyes lighting up as she twirled them carefully in her hands, shepherding me to the kitchen table and gleefully showing them to their little girl (Lottie) who had been playing with some plastic dolls in their homely cluttered living room. The four of us ate a steaming and very satisfying bowl of vegetable broth at the little table in the kitchen and we talked light-heartedly about Scotland and my own family at home. Throughout the meal Lottie kept trying to steal my bread with a mischievous grin. I can’t say that asking them about the Plum Necklace didn’t cross my mind, but somehow it felt like it was the wrong thing to do and the wrong time to do it. I felt strangely sane for the first time in months, sitting there in the Tharkey’s kitchen, pretending to whack little Lottie’s knuckles with my spoon while her parents fretted about their seven year old son Sam who hadn’t come home. ‘I don’t know what has gotten into that boy lately. He has too much brain for this island’, said Zheng, pitching a steely glance across the table at her husband.

‘Boys will be boys’, said Tharkey, ‘I speak him tonight when he home’.

As the darkness quickly dropped like a curtain outside the kitchen window, I made my excuses, thanked Zheng for the meal and said goodnight. Tharkey saw me to the door and shook my hand. ‘Want me to help you look for Sam?’ I asked.

‘Boy will be fine’, he said, shaking his head. ‘We all have own adventures. Boy no different to Smally and Tharkey’.

I smiled. ‘Listen, if those statuettes don’t make up for the chickens then you’re welcome to come out to The Mardi tomorrow and take some more stuff. To be honest our storage is bursting at the seams with tat – it would be great to find some of it a good home.’

He shook his head vigorously. ‘Statue make up more than two chicken Smally’, he insisted. I couldn’t see how, but I at least believed that he believed this himself.

‘Well if you change your mind… say, we’re having a tour of the ship soon if you want to come along? Bring Zheng and the kids?’ I said as I clumped up the path in the old brown boots.

‘Yes, sound good’, he said, calling after me as I headed towards Dolly’s house with my rucksack still rattling, ‘Be careful with cards Smally. These people are cheating bastards.’

I don’t know what I laughed hardest at, the fact that I had just heard him swear, or the fact that it sounded like Tharkey had just tried to make a joke. I saluted and fumbled with a switch inside my mind. Time to move into business mode.

…

I stared at the four kings and the eight of diamonds in my hand. Dixie music played in the background and smoke drifted languidly over the table from a couple of cigarettes flaming idly away in an ash-tray. A smile began to tug at the corner of my mouth and I had to use every ounce of energy in my body to pin it down into blankness. I looked up as Dolly to my immediate right reluctantly tossed his cards into the middle of the table beside the blind. ‘Old Dolly’s muse has well and truly deserted him tonight’, he whined. Directly opposite him a dark-haired, heavy-set thirty-something with such a square jawline you could draw a right angle around it, and bright blue cock-eyes that were far too close together, guffawed, baring the same crooked gap-toothed grin as his older one-eared brother. ‘Fuck you Pretty Boy or I’ll tell them all what our Mama said the day we left Galveston’, snaps Dolly.

‘What, again?’ quips a well-dressed dread-locked Dutchman called Vink, sitting directly opposite me, his cards sitting snugly in one perfectly manicured hand, and the other toying with the ends of his carefully clipped moustache.

Noah Blake, the Australian pilot, sitting in between Dolly and his younger brother, sporting several days of stubble beneath a shock of shoulder-length grey-blond hair leans forward cradling a bottle of his home brewed beer imaginatively called ‘Brewhaha’, and snorts, ‘What did she say Dolly?’

Dolly sits back in his chair and lights a roll-up. ‘She said Dolly my boy, take care of your brother. God gave you brains and good looks, but all He gave Pretty Boy was you’.

Nobody laughs except for Pretty Boy. ‘Are you in or not Smally?’ asks Vink.

Of course I’m in. In all the games of poker I’ve ever played I’ve never been dealt four of anything. I’ve never even seen four of anything in one hand before. Add to that the fact I’ve got my lucky card – the eight of diamonds, and I feel a surge of adrenalin. Okay, so we’re playing winner takes all for useless trinkets, and if I lose I only fofeit a curious puzzle depicting scarabs, but still I can’t deny there is a thrill when I reach for my stack of dwindling chips and toss them into the middle of the table saying “All in”.

Eyebrows raise around the ring and to my left, Santiago Lopez, a forty something Mexican with a bulging beer gut, white shirt unbuttoned down to his chest hisses through his teeth and throws his cards away. ‘And there was me thinking you got no balls kid’, he says lazily, laughing an annoying high-pitched little cackle.

The ball’s in Vink’s court. Up until now I’ve watched him cleverly boss both the game and the table beyond it, this ragtag bunch of misfits that have gathered in Dolly’s house to drink the pilot’s endless supply of beer and make cruel jokes at the expense of one another. Rewind a couple of hundred years and put them in eye patches and stripy trousers and these guys would be living breathing pirates, vile human beings and ready at the first sign of shiny tat to slit the guy sitting next to them’s throat for a cut. I gulp and look at Dolly, winking at me and then down at the bottle of Brewhaha on the table. My plan seems to have gone a bit drink-shaped. I’d intended to have a few drinks, get to know the locals a little better, and once they’d started loosening up, to get them talking about the Plum Necklace like Dolly had done back at the bar the first day I came ashore. In reality, I’m starting to feel fucking drunk and instead of me craftily pulling the strings of information, I’m getting well and truly tangled in muddy psychological warfare. While Rob Vink looks down at his cards for the millionth time and continues to fawn at his facial hair in thought, I realise that this is about a lot more than just tat.

My eyes drift dizzily to the open doorway leading through to the kitchen, directly over Pretty Boy’s shoulder, and I’m convinced I see something move. ‘Okay’, says Vink finally, and shoves his pile of chips into the middle beside mine with the back of his hand. The others recoil gleefully in unison. ‘I’m all in too’.

‘Fuck that’, blows Pretty Boy, and flips his cards over. I don’t even see what he’s got because I’m too busy staring at the little boy, tiptoeing across the kitchen floor, dressed all in black with a black balaclava and his face masked in black commando paint.

I open my mouth to say something, while Noah Blake scratches his chin and complains that ‘It’s a bit early to go out all guns blazing isn’t it fellas?’ – pitching his cards back onto the deck. But I don’t say anything. The little boy has turned around and looks directly at me as he reaches the fridge, and I know that face… because I was with that face most of the day yesterday, and just a couple of hours ago. Even behind the face paints I can tell that I’m looking at seven year old Sam Tharkey.

‘Okay’, claps Dolly from a million miles away, the dixie music swirling around the room as Sam silently opens the fridge and starts to remove several bottles of Brewhaha, cradling them in his arms. ‘I guess this is the moment of truth’.

‘Hold on’, says Vink.

‘Kid?’ – Dolly is clicking his fingers in front of my face and I jump back into the moment. ‘Too late for second thoughts now…’, he leers, Pretty Boy guffawing again.

‘I said hold on’, snaps Vink, and I see that he is staring directly at me, searching my eyes for signs of weakness. I grin to myself thinking that perhaps he has misread the panic-stricken look on my face at the sight of Sam as something to do with the cards. I see that he sees me grinning and he laughs nervously. ‘How about we make this bet a bit more interesting?’ suggests Vink.

‘What do you mean Rob?’ asks Noah Blake, getting up from the table. ‘Anyone want another bottle?’

‘NO!’ – it’s out of my mouth before I even realise I was going to say it. The whole table seems to sense this uncharacteristic outburst means something more than simply no and all eyes are suddenly on me. I steal a glance at the kitchen and there is no sign of Sam. ‘I mean… shit sorry, this is strong stuff’ I say, pointing at my near empty bottle.

‘You’re bloody right it is!’ exclaims Noah with a proud grin on his face. ‘Took me the best part of eighteen years on this bloody island to perfect it’.

‘You were saying Vink?’ asks Dolly, hunched forward in his seat.

Rob Vink shrugs and smiles the most horrific smile I’ve ever seen in my life. It oozes arrogance. It is the kind of smile that makes flowers wilt and stars implode. ‘I was just saying let’s make this more interesting. If Smally here wants to. We all know why he’s really here after all…’ he says, rocking back in his seat.

‘Streuth! Have we drunk that much already?’ shouts Noah Blake through from the empty fridge.

Again the others eyes all turn to me, their tipsy sneering faces suddenly serious and curious, searching my face. ‘He’s here for the Plum Necklace’, says Rob Vink.

‘I don’t know what you mean-’ I try to protest, but he cuts me off with a smug flick of his wrist.

‘There’s nothing wrong with that’, he tells me, ‘I mean, to a man that’s why we’re all here. That’s why Pit Town exists. There have been people searching for that fucking necklace from before your parents were born, and there will be people still looking for that necklace long after we’re all in the ground. So I’ve got a proposition for you Smally. I’m prepared to wager you… information, on the whereabouts of the Plum Necklace. Something I’ve never told another person in all the time I’ve been here’.

Suddenly all eyes are on him, Noah Blake leaning on the kitchen door-frame looking remarkably sober, the smirk wiped from Pretty Boy’s face, Dolly leaning even further forward, and Santiago fidgeting nervously in his seat. ‘If you know where it is, then why haven’t you found it?’ I ask him.

‘Who says I haven’t found it already?’ he snaps back, still smiling that smile.

‘Have you?’ I ask, the heads around us flashing backwards and forwards like a gawking audience at a ping pong match.

He snorts. ‘Do you really think I’d be sitting here playing this card game with all of you if I’d found it?’ he asks me.

Fucking hell, this is even worse than the poker.

‘What would I want with information that can’t help you find it?’ I ask him.

‘Who says it can’t help you find it? Maybe it’s a riddle. A puzzle of some kind. Maybe I’ve spent the last decade trying to work it out and will spend the next decade doing the same. But maybe you can work it out. Maybe this riddle wasn’t meant for me to solve. Maybe it was always meant for you…’

All is silent apart from the dixie music, banjos boring into the skull.

‘What’s the bet?’ I ask.

‘If you win, I give you the information. If I win, I get your ship’, he says.

‘It’s not my ship’, I tell him, our eyes clashing like sabres.

‘But you’re the captain’, he says.

‘No I’m not. We don’t have a captain’, I tell him.

He shrugs. ‘Well in that case we should turn over our cards’, and makes to put them down on the table.

The four kings and the 8 of Diamonds wink up at me from the sweating palm of my hand. It is impossible for these to be beaten. Impossible. There is only one hand in the world that can beat this hand, four aces, and the chances of one set of four showing up, let alone two in the same deal… well there’s more chance of you floating in a rocket through space and being swallowed by an incredibly fast white whale. ‘Wait!’ I shout.

All eyes on me. The pirates and the kings. And Bobby’s eyes, blank behind shades, behind a space helmet at the bottom of my mind. I nod my head saying ‘I’ll take that bet’ and we slowly place our cards face up on the table.

…

I fall to my knees, face in my hands in the moon kissed dust outside Dolly’s gate. Behind me the swell of laughter from the Plum Islanders carries on the muffled twang of the dixie music. I look up at the lunar face, and she smiles, sadly saying ‘Oh Smally, what have you done?’

My head is dizzy with drink and the terrible sense of fate. I am just like Midas turning everything I touch into shit. It takes several seconds before I digest that someone is whispering ‘Psst!’

Look around the dark, lifeless town, eyes scan the shadows in between patches where the full moon’s rays fall, and I hear it again, an audible ‘Psst!’ and to my left I catch a flurry of movement, a dark figure hunched down at the corner of Tharkey’s flaking white fence, head and shoulders visible in an alleyway between the houses. ‘Smally!’ he whispers again, an urgent order. ‘Over here!’

Warchalking.

I pick myself reluctantly up from the floor and walk past the house immediately adjacent to Dolly’s, another single storey white building with all the lights turned off, watching Warchalking still crouching, furtively looking up and down the street to make sure nobody is watching. ‘Hey man-’ I begin, struggling to haul myself out of the awfulness of losing our ship in a card game.

He hushes me with a finger to his lips and I blink at his appearance in the shadows. He is dressed all in black, wearing a black balaclava, black war paint smeared across his nose and cheeks. ‘I need your help’, he says, turning and running low to the ground up the avenue.

At the rear left corner of Tharkey’s garden I see little Sam in the same get-up as Warchalking, standing at the fence. Lights shine from an upstairs curtained window onto the garden and I see two other men, also all in black carefully carrying one of the two goats over to the fence. ‘Fuck! What are you doing?’ I ask, slapping my own forehead in complete bewilderment.

‘Shhh, keep your voice down’, he says, ‘or we’ll get caught. Here, give me a hand with this goat…’

The two men in the garden (I recognise neither of them) are lifting the puzzled looking goat over the top of the wooden fence. ‘What are you doing man?’ I whisper, and turn to little Sam, ‘And what’s he doing with you?’

‘What does it look like we’re doing?’ he says, grabbing the goat at the chest and nodding for me to grab the hind legs to ease it over. ‘We’re borrowing a goat’.

The three of them are struggling with it and its rear end scrapes across the top of the fence causing it to kick and bleat sharply. ‘Why? To eat it? What’s wrong with you?’ I ask him, grabbing the furry kicking legs and helping him lower it into the avenue.

‘Eat it?’ he laughs, ‘What are you talking about?’

‘Like the chickens’ I tell him, watching the two men clambering up over the fence and dropping down beside him. He ignores my question and does military style hand gestures to the two men who nod in unison, wrap a rope around the goat’s neck and lead it away into the jungle behind him. ‘That’s Hilary and Harrison, two of the scientists from that trash island. It’s cool, they’re on our side. Okay, let’s go’, he whispers to Sam and the little boy nods, ‘are you coming Smally?’

They dart past me back up the avenue in the direction of the town, keeping low to the ground. ‘Where are you going?’ I half whisper, half shout after them, before kicking my heels and scuttling along in their wake. I can’t believe what’s going on here and I don’t even know what’s going on here. I have a good mind to just grab the little kid by the collar and march him straight to Tharkey’s door, as I follow them skirting flat along the smooth stone wall of the largest two storey building at the centre of the town, disappearing around the corner ahead of me.

When I round the edge of the building I am horrified to see Warchalking bunking Sam up through a small open window on the ground floor, his little legs and feet wriggling as he vanishes inside. Warchalking immediately doubles back past me, eyes flitting both ways up the street as he looks over his shoulder and urges me to follow him with a cupped hand. I turn around and find myself looking both ways up and down between the houses, but all is lifeless apart from the faraway sound of dixie music and another muffled blast of Pretty Boy’s laughter from across the street. Directly in front of me little Sam has opened the front door of the building and Warchalking disappears inside. I’m starting to understand why the islanders have taken to calling him “The Black Fox”. His head reappears at the doors and he whispers to me, ‘Well come on then!’

We are inside the big dark house, tiptoed soundless steps, past a winding carpeted stairwell, Sam then Warchalking then me, staring at lush romantic paintings that loom on the night blue walls. Into a large kitchen and the two of them creep softly over the creaking floorboards to the fridge. The door opens and light from the little bulb inside illuminates their shadowy forms as they begin lifting items out, filling black rucksacks on their backs. I make to turn around and walk headfirst into two shrieks, ear-piercing banshee wailing that rips at my ear drums and someone drops a bottle behind me, glass smashing on the floor. Two young blonde women in the dark, pale with shimmering limbs while Warchalking yells ‘Smally run!’

A heavy object flashing in the dark, strikes me on the side of my head and I fall over, crashing into a wash basket spilling clothes. A key sound in a lock as the girls scream in unison ‘Daddy! Intruders!’ A rush of cool air as the back door is forced open and footsteps above my head, all tangled in damp towels throbbing. The kitchen light switches on.

A trigger clicks as I fight with the washing attacking me. Suddenly drunker than I remembered being as a male voice booms, ‘Don’t move you little shit or I’ll blast your ass to kingdom come!’ I instantly stop struggling, lying back against the basket, heart pounding. ‘Girls!’ booms the voice, ‘Go get my handcuffs!’

A slippered foot kicks the towel away from my face and I blink looking up at a fat red-faced man pointing the barrel of an old rusty shotgun right at me. ‘What’s your name boy? Speak!’

I close my eyes and cease to be. ‘Midas’, I tell him.

[Chase's Journal] “Sojourn” November 5, 2009

“Transmitted electronically to the Mardi Collective Journal Archive from Niko Super Computer. Author: Chase, Time: Tuesday, 11:00am, Location: Unknown/Cannot Lock On, Error in portable console’s homing device. Error. Error. Cannot access locator. Accessing protocol file. Accessing Protocol file. Accessing protocol file. Manual override found. All actions done by systems, portable console will be notified. Text located. “Niko, like I said, I will be keeping you busy. Just a little precaution in case you try to kill them off while I’m not there watching you. -Love, Chase.” Portable console can only access main systems on Mardi through manual input. Error. Error.”

A fat boy from the North sucked on a pop as big as his bulky cheeks. He spat and laughed and said, “You dirty Malay! Beggar! Stop browning our golden grass with your soiled feet!” He sucked and cackled on and on. There were silver bars. They rose up from the ash beside my feet. They rose and curved into grand gates that separated us. The clouds were soft. The sun blacked my eyes when I looked at them, wondering why they were still on such a windy day. Then there were people, in coats and frocks and gowns so lovely. They were dressed for Sunday mass. The men came out like phantoms and led their fanning wives down the street before returning to their lovers in the alleys. The children played tag with the stray dogs. Their wraith figures jostled the air around. Mad dashes. And all the while, this fat boy, from the Fourth Isle I think by his Sunday white coat, just sucked and laughed. “Dirty Malay! Dirty boy! Don’t speak for your earthly mouth stinks like fish!” he screamed. I was agitated. I snaked between the bars of the gates because I was a sickly, thin child they say. I walked, clenched my fist and struck the fat boy down. The place erupted. The clouds were not still anymore but fell, surrounding me in a mist of spinning chaos. It blurred my sight until they reformed into the smooth, brown walls of the inn and I awoke again sweaty and demented on my bed where I jumped out of my sheets.

“Oh, Mister Chase! Je suis désolé! I was just preparing your vêtements. Look how clean they are now!” said Nelly, the housekeeper. She waved my white coat, now as white as winter, from the table where she folded my things.

I looked that morning to my nightstand where Niko’s portable console was still black and quiet. Out of character for the arrogant computer. He switched off unexpectedly right after Molineaux dropped us off at the Seventh Isle’s harbor. “We might have a problem…” he blurred out before his pixel face disappeared into blackness. It was a rainy midnight. It seemed, that night that the darkness and water never ceased and never changed since I left The Mardi. But some things haunt you like unsatisfied ghosts. One must hunt them, deep in the recesses of your heart for the cure, the answer to their previous life’s injustice. But that night of our arrival served too muggy for any hunt to begin. I was forced to take refuge in one of the French Inns lining the first streets after the harbor.

Nelly was reluctant to hand me the key. Who would be? I dropped a stack of green bills held together by a rubber band while her eyes leered up and down at my mud stained clothes. “What are you about, rebelle curieux!” she said. But it didn’t take long before she got a phone call and was instantly acquainted with the man that has been paying her husband handsomely for compiling and delivering shipments up the mountains. “Je suis désolé! Je suis désolé, Mister Chase!” and she ushered me into a furnished room in the 2^nd floor.

The morning went fast for I was too unsettled by my night’s dream that I could not bare to be stationary. Nelly pushed in a cart full of pancakes and eggs for breakfast before disappearing to her other guests. Deen, Nelly’s husband, peaked his head through the door’s opening and said, “Mister Chase! The supplies are on the truck and accounted for. I’m ready when you are, sir.” I drank the last of some wine and went for my coat and things. As soon as I clasp the my knife belt around my waist, a beeping sound rushed forth in the room and Niko’s electronic face showed in the portable console. “That piss-shit! How dare he try to shut me down! Shut ME down!”

“Smally’s back then?” I asked.

“Those imbeciles actually did make it back! Impossible! That bitch of an Engineer must have done something to my circuits to compute the wrong numbers! My predictions cannot be wrong!” Niko’s muffled shout said.

I took Durheim’s rifle leaning on the wall by my bed and slung the strap on. Smally’s return was never in any doubt I thought. Not until The Mardi was still afloat. The two seemed bound in their fates to be separated now, in the middle of their journey. I sent Deen to the harbor to tell the repair crew Molineax hired to inform him as soon as the ship came in. If they did at all. The Mardi’s shipmates seem too uneasy at my presence and might have already worked their influence on Smally to make good on the amenity I gave them. I would return eventually. But not now. And knowing those absurd musicians turn sailors, a throng of unearthly adventures awaits them enough that a small repair crew here would be the least I could do for them. At least until I return.

“And where the hell are we bloody going, Chase?” Niko asked.

“Wuthering Heights,” I answered as I grabbed the console and stuffed inside my coat pocket.

I went down the flight of steps leading to the driveway behind the inn. Deen was already sitting inside a green, military truck. The boxes of supplies were neatly packed in black crates and stacked inside. Deen was smoking a cigarette, already relaxed inside the driver’s side.

Niko was quiet. I heard only the hums and whispers of his hard drive running. I’ve grown accustomed to do machine not trusting me. Every inch of water and soil I’ve stepped on so far, Niko knew of.  No doubt, he was scouring the networks of the world for any information on the Seven Isles and Wuthering Heights. But of course, machines go just as far as their human creators. A fact that has surely escaped the psychotic computer.

“Are you trying to fool me, you changeling? Emily Bronte! It’s a bloody novel!” the computer shouted.

I went up the passenger side of the truck. Niko mumbled some curses at The Mardi and me under his muffled speakers but we rode off, the truck’s engine flaring down the morning streets before the shops came to life. The mist rose to about knee height. The sun was asleep still behind the last of the night’s clouds. The blue and gray buildings rose forth against the gray morning, unwilling to yield its luster. They were like boxes with the windows, big doors, and stepped stoops. The homes and shops were all neatly aligned like a row of rainbow-colored boxes and it was a wonder, at least to me, how much life here was well and growing. There were markets, clothing shops, restaurants, and all the small amenities one would not expect on such a tiny, out of range patch of land. We drove through the city until the shelves of buildings finally scattered and coconut trees and shards of jungle appeared more often in our sights. Deen was uncaring. He drove through, as we ordered him to so many times before. He smoked his cigarette without a hint of disapproval. The shock of unexpectedly meeting in person on of his mysterious employers had worn off past the fifth or sixth hour of driving. Niko hummed in annoyance. At some point, I think that morning; he must have given up on trying to search out any data regarding our destination. Someway, I feel as if the computer was both insulted and intrigued. The machine said nothing until the truck halted to a stop in front of an old bridge above an old river.

“You have GOT to be kidding me. Chance of us this heavy truck crossing that old, rickety bridge is about 33%! 33%!” Niko yelled.

The bridge WAS old. Its balustrade’s wood was the color of wet soil, old and decrepit. Once, Deen said, it was part of an old railroad that helped the islanders cross the thick forests to get to the other shore. Though, this lasted for only a few years. Many of the former French colonists had given trying to plow through the heavy forest and build some more houses and buildings. The railroad was abandoned. Now, uneven boards of wood cover the train tracks to form a makeshift road for the few drivers to pass on.

The truck roared slowly, dipping hard as it moved down the level of the bridge from the road we were on. We moved slow and careful. Every bang, every crack, every screech of the birds above, echoed against the truck’s silent steel.

“Chase, want to hear something funny?” Niko asked.

“If you’re calculating what are chances of survival are on this rusty old bridge again I already heard you. 33%.”

“No, no, well, yes 33%. But guess were your old friend, Smally is?” There was a hint of sarcasm erupting from his higher tone. Knowing the background of the bloody computer, who already tried to shut destroy the Mardi a couple of times, I was more nervous for the ship than the old truck I was on that could potentially crash down onto the river below. But I had to take Niko’s word for it. The only word. Niko was my only link to the happenings of the ship while I’m away.

“What do you mean? I thought his back on The Mardi—“

“—Jail! Hah! That piss-shit is in jail!” the speaker yelled.

“And you tell me this now? While we’re in the middle of a jungle? You really don’t want anyone ever helping him do you?” Niko’s pixel face grinned as I held the console in my palm. I tried to think of a way to help the man. But how? No doubt, someone from the ship or Smally himself have insulted or wronged or embarrassed the islanders of that shantytown, Plum Island. But there was nothing. Deen smoked on. The clouds of smog erupting from his cigarettes blew past my eyes and reminded me of the task at hand. I looked at the crates stacked behind me seat. Food, medicine, clothes, they had to make it to Wuthering Heights. Those pirates that kept hijacking our shipments before will pay ten fold if even one soul dies of hunger or fever. But that was farther down. We had to make it. At least make it past this old bridge. There was nothing I could do for the Mardi right now. Again, I thought of Becky. I remembered that night before I left, how her hand grasp that metal pipe so gracefully aimed for my head I thought, for her suspicions of me. Should I have left? Was I wrong to abandon them now? Smally was back at any case. Simon Piler should be with him. And when those two are concerned, the old ghosts of the ship should surely spring to life again.

I was relieved of my worries when I felt the front of the truck rise up and we were back again safely on the old road.

“So much for your predictions again, Niko,” I said, but the machine said nothing. I heard the roar of its hard drives spinning at work again, busy with calculations and contemplations at what I assumed was a Mardi erupting to both life and disorder.

Yoga and ghosts November 5, 2009

After almost squashing Buckley, the ship mouse, with a book, I walk up to the deck and watch the dark night sky. There are no clouds, only beautiful, twinkling stars. You know, I think to myself, even though this is really, really annoying to have to do, it’s actually an ideal night for meditation. It could be lovely.

 

O’Flanahanaman hands me the food he’s packed me, which is very thoughtful of him. I check I’ve got everything else…The most important thing, yes. I’ve packed an old walky talky I found in the storage. I’ve been tinkering with it for the past week, ever since Smally went to jail. I managed to fix it up and amplify its signal so that rather than connect to another walky talky, it transmits straight to the Mardi’s Communications Room. That way, I can leave it on and if I run into any trouble, at least someone will hear what’s happening. On the offchance that Niko is feeling nice, I’ve told him to patch me through to Smally if he rings again. I feel like I’m going to need some help on this one.

 

I climb down a rope on one side of the ship, and lay back into the calm water. It’s only a couple of feet deep, but I still let myself feel weightless for a moment. The stars like dotted lights…

 

I get up, and wade back to shore. The air feels thick and humid around me, and quickly dries the water off my clothes and body. I can see the hill in the distance, and I snort trying to stifle a laugh. There’s no doubt about it, that’s Knob Hill.

 

The trek up through the jungle is calm and uneventful. I keep looking down at my bare arms, expecting the hordes of mosquitoes that usually adorn them in any place with a hot climate. Nothing. No annoying whine, no itchy white marks. No sign of any stinging or biting insect. I can hear crickets, with their miniature symphony, but that is all. If it weren’t for everything that has happened here, this might be a paradise, I think to myself.

 

Anyway. I make it half way up Knob Hill before I get bombarded with spirits. That’s right, physically bombarded. The walky talky transmition is as follows:

 

S1: WooooOoooooOOOOOooooo!

 

S2: YeeeEEEEeeeeEEEEeeeEEeeeee

 

S3: NaaaAAAnnAAAaaaAAnnAAAAAaaa

 

B: What are you all doing?! Leave me alone until I get to the top of the hill, I need to meditate.

 

S1: LoooooKKKKK out thHHEEeeeEERRRReeeeee

 

B: Out where?

 

S2: (rushes past me and turns me in the direction of a plane crash, a little way out in the jungle.) ThhHHEEEeeeeEEEErrrrRRRREeeeeEEE

 

B: Alright alright. I just don’t see what I have to do about it. Are you guys the ghosts of some plane crash? I don’t really know how I can help you…I need to learn how to play football. Actually, I need to be an expert at it.

 

S3: IIIiiii waaaAAAsss aaaa ppprrooofffessioonallll plaaAAyyyyEEERRRRRR whehhhnnnnn III waaaassss AAAaalliiiiveeeeeee

 

B: Ok yes. Gosh you take a long time to say things. Up we go. Let me get into the lotus position before you start imparting knowledge upon me.

 

S2: Buuutttt ttthHHHEEeeeee PppplllaAAANnnneeeeee

 

B: I’ll deal with that once I’m an expert at football. Deal?

 

S1: Ddddeeeeaaaaaallllllllll

 

(silence while I meditate and the ghosts just whoosh around, teaching me about football.)

USE FOR LASER-EYE November 5, 2009

I schluff back from the bar, somewhat disappointed with my first impression of Pit Town. It’s either deserted or everybody is hiding from our blue pants & green shirts. Sure didn’t take them very long for the folks of Plum Island to turn on us. And nobody serves soup. Rats.

But the jungle, on the other hand, was extremely fascinating. I like to look at the wide floccules of leafy substance as I walk. They move ever so gently; it’s a delicate dance, really, through the shear angles of direct sunlight. As I retraced my path to The Mardi I found myself veering steadily towards the growth.
I trudged up the outer layers of dune, first. They are populated with a long, wispy grass. The edges are very fine; I accidentally cut my finger while inspecting the blades. My hand lens shows a lining of robust, white hairs along the lower surface of the leaves.

The edge of the jungle is a bit like standing on a precipice and looking down. The transition from scorching beach is only a matter of a few paces; the palm trunks become thicker, more densely situated. Other species sprout in tangles. And then you’re cloaked in a deep shade. Even at the peak of the tropical afternoon.

I manage to travel a short distance between each botanical stop. It’s rejuvenating to spend some time around plants, especially considering the heavy yoke of dream I’ve been hauling these past few days. While sniffing an orchid a peace descends over me. I begin to ponder and I stare into space.
“Yeah, I was just going to say hello to yuh, but I thought, jeez – is this guy sick or something? Hahaha-hahaha!” I jump a little, but the tacky, goodtimin’ laugh somewhat softens my start. The voice belongs to a short, stocky man of about 40. He’s standing in the clearing of what appears to be a cabin. I hope I’m not trespassing. In any case, he seems friendly.
“Well, Hi there!” I reply, and give a little wave, though I’m not really in the mood for a conversation.
“Come on over here, guy, so I can take a look at yuhs,” he chortles, beckoning with an extremely hairy arm. I take a more careful look at him too, as I approach – he’s dressed pretty well for a sweltering island – khakis, a collared shirt (unbuttoned to the third button and revealing an ample gold chain), and remarkably, a leather jacket. “He must be absolutely cooked,” I think, “But he doesn’t appear to be perspiring at all…”
“Oh. You’re one uh dem ship guys, huh? You know I used to sail on quite a few ships in my time. All over the world.”
“You’re a sailor?”
“Nah, I’m a banker. Anyways, whats your name, guy?”
“Oh, sorry. Simon Piler, I’m a scientist and the ships qua-”
“So you’re one of these types uh guys that is always trying to figure out different stuff?”
“Yeah, I guess you could say that. I mostly have been working on ship repairs late-”
“My cousin, in Sarasota, he’s a craftsman. He get’s paid 10,000 dollars a POP to work on these rich guys yachts. 10,000 a POP!” He enunciates the word with such a force that I’m afraid he’s going to start into a boxing routine with it. I start to wonder who this guy is. He certainly seems to like to talk, which is fine, I suppose. I certainly don’t feel like talking much today, but I don’t mind listening a little.
“I’m serious. You don’t believe me?” he asks, even though I never gave him any reason for concern. “Oh, yeah,” he continues quickly, “the name’s Gallo. Gianperlo Gallo, but most folks round these parts just call me Jonny. It’s just that it’s a lot easier you know what I mean?”
I’m beginning to gather that (1), Jonny is from the tri-state area, and (2), he doesn’t care for silence much. “Well, pleased to meet you, Jonny. Is this your cabin, here?”
“This?” He seems a bit incredulous. “Nooo, this here is Ol’ Man Murphy’s cabin. Well, dat is, it used to be his. He went and kicked the bucket few years back. Kinda one of these quiet, figuring types. Hell, I bet you would’a liked him.”
“A scientist?”
“Yeah, you could say that. But…” He slaps his huge arm around my shoulder and pulls me into a close, two-man huddle. “…They say the secret is that this guy used to study ghosts! Can you believe that!? I mean, a guy way out here is studying ghosts.”

I’m wholeheartedly surprised by the information. It was the most interesting fact I’d heard in months. “You don’t say! WOW. Actually, that’s very interesting. I also study ghosts, in part. You see, I’m a Professor of Noumenolo-”
“Yeah, there’s lots of ghosts on this island. Plum Island has lots of ghosts because of – from the heat from the volcano.”
“Wait. I thought the volcano was inactive.”
“No, it’s active. You can tell ‘cuz that’s the only place that this kiwi stuff doesn’t grow.” He points at a ripe breadfruit hanging from an overhead branch.
“Hold on,” I say, “That’s Artocarpus, I mean, breadfruit.”
“No,” he says, “dat’s

kiwi,

you can tell by the color. Terrible stuff for you. Makes your hair fall out.” I hold my tongue.

It seems that Jonny has a knack for making things up. The scary part is that he seems to believe what he is saying is true. I feel a splash of pity, and then an immediate twinge of guilt for pitying him. “He doesn’t know that he’s wrong, of course,” I think, “but it’s a bad habit to speak about things you don’t know.” And then I begin to consider all the things that I don’t know, and my willingness to hypothesize about them.
“But at least I’m open to the possibility that what I propose might be wrong,” I mutter aloud in my most common method of reasoning. Jonny looks at me like I’m a fried egg smothered in blueberry jam. “Hey, Simon, are you doin’ alright, there?” he asks. I think he’s actually a little worried, and I am somewhat touched by his concern, however misdirected. After all, he’s only known me for a matter of two minutes or so.
“Oh, yes, Jonny, I’m fine,” I reply, “but, uh, I gotta get going.”
“Back to your ship? Aw, you know I could get my air mattress and you could stay here if you wanted.”
“Your air mattress? I’m sorry. I guess I don’t understand…” He suddenly becomes very frank, almost instructional. His words come out in accentuated bursts – they’re delivered in a such a way as to make sure I understand every syllable. “You see this cabin? Yeah. There’s nobody livin’ in it right now. And I got this big air mattress,” he holds out his short arms, “and I don’t mind letting you use it, you know. Just I’ve got to get the bike pump from Vick and then I could bring it back here and fill it up for you.”
I’m starting to wonder if he’s joking. “No, man, it’s alright. I’ve got a bed back on the ship!” I give him my best non-rude smile, but now I’m starting to get worried about him. “I’ve really got to get going, Jonny. It was nice to meet ya.”
“Hey Simon, anytime, anytime. Hey! If you want to stay at this cabin at all, you know it’s open. Might do you some good to get off that ship for a while.”
I’m slowly working my way into the forest again. “Okay, Thanks Jonny! I’ll keep that in mind.”
“Okay, see you around, Simon!” He shouts at the tree trunks and branches that have swallowed me.

***

When I get back to The Mardi, it’s sunset. The water is calmer along the harbor that on the open ocean, and the view is creating quite a commotion with the Band.
“Move over, Spark, you’re crowding the window!” Says Brendon. He’s trying to take a picture, but the Lieutenant has set his obstinate mind on seeing the ‘green flash’ in it’s full splendor. Matt is dutifully soldering away at a circuitboard and Em is resting on his bunk. Scarytoes and Def Mute are shocking each other with low-pitched electrical glissando. One of them is also beatboxing; I’ll assume this is Scarytoes.
I set a few breadfruit to rest on the dresser. “Hi there, gents. Gad, what a day. What a jumble!” I get a few heartfelt nods of agreement. I smile and remember how great it is to have friends when things get tough. Where would I be?

Swinging my feet under my desk I plop down in my chair. THUNK! “Oooh, OW…” I wince. My toes have found the smallish wooden crate that O’ Flanahanaman brought by the other day. Those guys must have moved it under my desk.
“Did anybody open this crate, yet?” I ask, almost sure someone has.
I receive two “no’s” a “nuh-uh” and scattering of head-shakes in response.
“It’s got one of the strangest locks I’ve ever seen; we couldn’t fathom it, man. Now that’s something even I’m surprised at,” says Scarytoes. He is moving a small receiver back and forth. Def Mute’s eyes change color.

Upon inspection, the box did seem simple enough; and beautifully designed. It’s boards were raw, unfinished wood. But the bindings were fashioned of a different color entirely; a rich, brownish-red. The lid had a single bronze plate, into which was pressed an unusual shape. I looked for a second or two, until I made a realization. I gasp.
“Who sent this?” I think to myself, as I reach up and remove the Raven Magic Hat from my head. Affixed to the band is the small silver raven icon that Emerson gave me so many years ago. It fits perfectly into the recessed plate.

I hear a click, and the lid of the box pops open slightly. And then the whole thing shakes from my grasp and falls to the floor. The lid pops open all the way, and climbing out of the crate black hair flowing is none other than Madame Datura.

“Madame! Oh, allow me,” I offer, a bit too late, offering a hand. She’s already stepped into Cabin 5 in a cloud of rippling empty air. She looks around the room quickly, thoroughly, and then turns an intense gaze on me.
“You left me for a rather long time without any word.”
“Ah, M-Madame,” I stutter, “I didn’t think you even wanted to speak to me again.”
“When we met the other night, you didn’t think I’d want you to respond?”
“But that was just a dream!” I yelp. When I realize what I’ve said, I feel my knees grow weak.

“Simon, you’ve changed.” She cuts right into my side.
“Madame…”
“You were so passionate, so responsive. You were real. A person worth knowing, worth loving.”
“Madame, please, don’t you think we should step…”
“And now,” she continues, ruthlessly scrutinous, “Now, simply look at you. Flimsy. You’re a husk.” Every joint in my body bends under her pressured lenses.

I don’t know what to say; and behind me it’s become very silent. Even the smoke from The Champion’s electrical flux seems to be transfixed by our conversation. It’s hanging in empty space. My cheeks are very flushed. I hate to admit it, but I’m embarrassed. Most of the good fellows met Madame during our brighter days, but they are probably in a powerful state of wonder at her sudden appearance.

“I’ve found a good place, here. The ship provides incredible avenues for research.”
“What is it you research?”
“I… Uh, we’ve been making rocket fuel, for starters. Madame, please, I know you. Please be kind.”
“Be kind! Have I offered any harm to you? Any words untrue? Look at how flimsy the man is in my absence! He quavers like a saccharine leaf on an overextended petiole!”
She’s indirectly addressing The Atom Band. They’re still staring, and I think Matthew’s soldering iron is burning through his circuit board.

I am beginning to feel a strange mixture of old and new emotions drawn to the surface of my small sphere of understanding. A scab has been pulled clean off. She is looking me hard in the eyes and I have to look away. (She used to do that before she kissed me. We’d sit for a long time and just explore each other’s pupils. To this day, I do not know a more intimate way to understand a person than that.) But I know now that my ‘profound understandings’ were only an illusion cast over these cloudy, short-sighted eyes.

“Madame, I am only a small speck,” I say. And I mean it.
She pauses for a moment, and then solemnly responds, “There are still remnants of Simon Piler that remain, I see.” It is in these moods that I am certain she is both an unquenchable, all-consuming sheet of fire and a supremely cold, detached observer. There is some gravity that is produced across such a gradient. Along the perpendicular I am drawn towards it. But I am not a fool enough to speak.

“I suppose you think yourself wise to leave me. You consider it a grand declaration of renewed masculine strength and independence, don’t you.”
“Listen to what you’re saying,” I respond, “Have I ever put much weight on masculinity? Or strength?”
“You called yourself a shaman, you fool! Do you think you can walk away from something like that?”

A motion of lightning. L L L L L R P (+) /\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\ (-) ZZZZZZAP! (Use for laser-eye.)
I breathe in. There is a great oceanic space. The cabin is just a cardboard backdrop; my bones are little plastic flutes. It’s funny and so I laugh. My body is an illusion, and though I’m moving, I remember that there is no place to move. I breathe out. Madame expands; she is very close to me. We interact like ripples.
“Wait. I remember,” I say. “I remember, now.”
“Simon,” she says, and she is a breath of air dancing, “I am going to be waiting for you at the cabin in the jungle just north of here. I believe you know where it is. Please meet me there when you can.”
“Space is so intimate…”
But she’s gone.

We all sit on our bunks and bend like paper wasps. I feel one great, hypothetical ray burn a scorched, wide swath through my heart muscle. A thin trail of smoke alerts me to the carbon crisp. I find myself crying, but it’s not out of sadness. The warm, fat drops squeeze from my tear ducts. Their kin follow along the ladders of cohesion. Their kin tumble in ruts down the size of my cheek muscle. It is Love!! My eyes are closed. I breathe in.

I’ve got a choice to make.