Cloneworld - 04 (57 page)

Sure. Let's see how long this fucker lasts.

Pippa could not hide her cynicism, nor her bitterness. She'd seen too much bloodshed. Too much horror. Too much death.

She strode up the carpet, head high. On the platform ahead of her stood Queen Strogger in finest regal attire, her three Prime Daughters, including Princess Anklebolt III, looking supremely beautiful in blue and gold furs, their facial cogs and gears polished to a high sheen and inlaid with precious stones. To the right stood General Banks in his smartest military uniform, along with various Ganger Lords of power, there to represent Clone TV and members of Core Government, including the newly elected Prime.

Music blared, and handshakes shook, and Pippa was offered a medal. She took it with good grace, and with a great sadness, descending like nuclear ash - for those not present to share the recognition. For those who had died in combat.

Suddenly, there was a commotion at the great gold doors. The trumpet music stuttered to an awkward halt.

Cursing and moaning, Franco Haggis staggered through the doors, tripped, and sprawled out flat. Muttering, he pulled himself clumsily to his feet, looked around at the shocked, muttering royalty and nobility, frowned, hoisted up his pants, and said in a loud, clear voice, as if speaking to somebody who couldn't understand his language, "I'm looking for the Great Hall of Queen Strogger, reet? Does anybody know where I can find it? What?
This is it?
Oh great! Reet! I'm supposed to be here, I am, you see there's this Award Ceremony thing, and I'm a Guest of Honour, I am, and reet pleased about the whole kaboodling thing..."

A steward approached Franco with hurried, clonking steps and a hiss of ejecting steam. He whispered in Franco's ear. Pippa could hear Franco's reply across the
entire
Hall, very loud, and very clear.

"What? Eh? What's bloody wrong with the way I'm dressed? No bugger said I had to wear a suit, if there's one thing I won't do, it's wear a bloody suit! I mean, just because my shorts are a
little
tattered, just because my sandals are
a little
scuffed..."

"Franco Haggis!" boomed Queen Strogger. "Please approach the stage."

Franco looked up. He grinned broadly, showing his missing tuff, and strode down the red carpet with chest puffed out, whilst the trumpets blazed his fame for all on Cloneworld to know, and hear, and wonder.

Franco took his medal.

He peered around, at the ten thousand faces who had watched his fumbled entrance and amiable acceptance of his Org Medal for Bravery. Franco waved at them all. Grinned. Coughed.

Then said, "Right, then. Where's the damn party?"

"You
still
smell funny," said Pippa.

"I can't
help it.
It won't bloody
scrub off!
"

"Come on, Franco! I thought you would have made a
bit
more effort! I mean, it's not every day you're awarded an Org Medal for Bravery. You could have put some pants on."

"You think the army shorts were a little overdressed?"

Pippa nudged him in the ribs, laughed coquettishly, and sipped her org Firepagne as she exchanged small-talk with local dignitaries. The three orgs moved on, legs clanking.

"Franco, sometimes I think you just don't take life too seriously."

"Oh, I take life serious enough, alright, mate! That's why I'm determined to enjoy every bloody moment!"

"Alice, do
you
think Franco takes life seriously enough?"

"What, after destroying my Fast Attack Hornet?" The small black cube in Pippa's hand flickered with coloured lights. Alice sounded perkier, brighter,
more alive.
"I think he owes me a
big drink!
Either that, or he's got a death wish. I haven't forgiven him yet."

"Hey, that was just a simple accident with a hole in my bucket. Could have happened to anybody!"

Alice chuckled. "If Tarly Winters hadn't hacked my core and sent my IQ plummeting into the tombworld depths, I would have spotted the danger before it happened. She wanted a disaster. She was playing us for fools."

"Yeah. Well. She's dead," said Franco.

"You hope," said Alice.

"Shut up," said Franco.

"Just imagine... she might one day come back to reclaim you as her prize?" grinned Pippa. "You
were
going to get married."

"Shut up," said Franco.

They stood for a while, both feeling out of place. Hundreds swarmed and mingled around the ancient rooms, which stood as testament to a thousand years of org history. Paintings as large as a house decorated the walls, and after a trip to the restroom, Pippa caught Franco studying one with some kind of winged org cherubs.

"Hmm," he said, drinking his Guinness.

"What?" said Pippa, eyes narrowing. Then: "Franco, how the
hell
did you get a
pint of Guinness
in this place?"

"One has contacts," said Franco, airily. "Hey, I'm a bit of a celebrity, y'know? After all, it's not every day a man survives a War Balloon crash by being encased in a dying alien's frisky snake body! Hey?"

Pippa stood forlornly on the remains of the detonation site. The War Balloon had impaled itself atop four skyscrapers, destroying them utterly. The following explosion had taken out nearly three square kilometres of buildings, but thankfully the denizens had seen it coming. It was hard to miss a slowly tumbling War Balloon of such epic proportions. Thankfully, there had been only a few ground casualties...

"Oh, Franco," said Pippa, miserably. She kicked around in the debris until she was waved over by Queen Strogger and ten org engineers.

"We've found something," said Strogger, pistons clacking, her old oil-breath washing over Pippa.

"What kind of something?"

"Something buried beneath the rubble."

"What is it?"

"We don't know. But it's making a racket."

The site had been carefully excavated until they found what looked to Pippa like a human-sized wad of old chewing gum. Hundreds of strands and fibres criss-crossed and wrapped around one another, in a kind of uneven and lumpy ball.

The engineers approached warily.

Pippa frowned.

There came a deep, metallic thumping.

"Let me out!" came the muffled cry. It was weak, but it was angry. Pippa frowned.

"Fuck me! It's Franco."

She leapt forward, and slapped her hand on the ball. "You hang on in there, Franco! We'll have you out in no time!"

That had been a lie, an exaggeration of epic proportions. Franco was encased in the hardened, explosion-baked remains of the Mistress. He was entombed in interwoven strands of cooked alien snake; this was what had saved his life.

Twelve hours later, after six thousand circular saw blades had been worn blunt, the shell was finally
cracked
and, like the rotten yolk of a bad egg, Franco tumbled out, shivering, dehydrated, weak... but alive, baby,
alive!

Pippa grabbed him and hugged him, before he was wrapped in blankets and bundled off, complaining about needing a pint and a big fat woman to take his mind off their incompetent rescue attempt.

Pippa had grinned. Her questions could wait.

Voices. Lots of loud, brash voices. Out on the carved metal balcony, Franco and Pippa exchanged glances over their fluted glasses of Firepagne.

"Eh? What? What do you mean, it's not an official invite?"

"Could sir please keep his voice down?"

"Why? It's a party, innit?"

"Sir, I assure you..."

"You bloody listen to me. If it wasn't for me and my good clone buddies here, you and your org friends would be all, like, detonated and flat and gone, y'hear?"

"I am sure if sir and his colleagues would just like to wait in the vestibule, whilst I garner authorisation..."

"I'm not bloody sitting in no vesty mule, and neither are the lads, eh, lads?"

"No, Franco!"

"No way, Franco!"

"Come on, us lads needs a drink!"

"Onwards!"

"Upwards!"

"Beer and sex!"

"Chips and gravy!"

They poured in. Like a wave. Like a tide. Like a tidal wave. Francos. Hundreds of Francos. Badly dressed. Drunk. Happy. And gate-crashing the party, baby!

Franco and Pippa looked at one another.

And burst out laughing.

"Squawk!"

"Look!" grinned Pippa, pointing. "They even brought your Special Friend..."

But Franco had already disappeared.

It hadn't taken Franco Haggis long to recuperate in the Org Central Hospital. Admittedly, the Org Central Hospital looked more like a landcar manufacturing plant, and the ward on which Franco was being kept "for his own security and health" was filled with a wild and wacky gathering of weird old org scraps, but other than that - and the lack of alcohol and buxom young women - Franco was happy. Happy to be alive, anyway.

"Go on," said Pippa, pulling up a chair, scraping it across the tiled floor.

"Go on what?" said Franco, who was sipping something milky through a straw. There was a colourful paper umbrella in the cup. The drink looked suspiciously alcoholic.

"Spill the beans, dickhead! What happened up there? I thought you were cat meat, dead and gone."

"Did you miss me?" He reached forward and placed his hand on Pippa's thigh. Pippa stared at his hand. Stared hard. Nonplussed, Franco removed the offending article.

"Of course I did," she said, slowly. "You're the closest thing to a brother I've got, although I'll readily admit it, if I had a brother like you I'd fucking hang myself."

"Charming! Well, what happened was this... I'm about to die a terrible horrible death, right, and the Mistress goes all funny on me, and tells me how she used to be a biological computer-type thing, harnessing the very soul of the junks themselves, their computer, like..."

"Wait. What?"

"She was an alien. A biological computer, gone mad, sort of thing. And the 3Core processor was
hers
, part of her, and we needed unlocking codes, and she was sad about the junks and them coming back and being nasty bad guys, right, so she told me where to get the codes and let me climb inside her. Then she wrapped all that horrible snake flesh around me, and I was encased, and she was one tough bastard, I can tell you. When we crashed, I could hear all manner of cacophony, and explosions and everything, but she gave her last remnants of life so that I could live, so I could be reborn from her egg, so to speak, and bring you the codes to unlock the 3Core and help stop the junks. To turn them good again. Like she wanted. It was her final, like, gift. To the Quad-Gal."

Franco beamed, and slurped on his drink.

"Is that booze?" snapped Pippa, as she internally digested Franco's insane diatribe.

"Sure is," he grinned, and tapped the side of his nose. "You gotta have contacts, reet?"

"Give it here!" Pippa grabbed the drink, and they wrestled with it for a few moments before she won. She turned and put it out of Franco's reach.

"Awww," he said.

"So let me get this straight... you were reborn from an egg made of snake flesh - so you're, like, kind of this newly made snake alien's new baby? That's just too weird, even for you, Franco."

"The important thing is we got the chip. And we got the codes. So now QGM can turn back the tide of the invading junks. Right?"

"We'll see," said Pippa, brow furrowed.

It was late. Very late.

Pippa was a little drunk. She stood on a balcony looking out over the city of Org. A gentle wind blew the red dress around her, and it shifted gently, clinging to the contours of her slim, athletic body.

She realised somebody was watching her, and glanced up. Franco - the original Franco, the
best
Franco - was leaning against a pillar, a glass to his lips, eyes locked on her. She smiled at him, and he smiled back: a genuine smile, a warm smile, a smile of love and friendship.

Franco pushed himself from the pillar using his shoulders, and padded over.

"You okay, chipmunk?"

"I'm okay, Franco," she said, tracing her finger around the rim of her glass.

"I expect QGM will pick us up tomorrow, send us off on another crazy-arse mission. Eh?" He grinned at her.

"I expect they will," she said. Then she turned, and placed her glass on a low table made of machine gears. She turned back to Franco, and placed her hands on his shoulders.

"Er," said Franco.

"I want to try something."

"You do?"

"Yeah. I do."

Pippa leant forward, and kissed Franco. For once, Franco did nothing, just allowed the moment to sweep on over him, to hold him, to encompass him, to bury him in an eternal sweet dream.