Prophet Margin (20 page)

On Ombud-Pol, there were a ridiculous number of junior committee members, sub-ministers, trainee council-advisors, elected clerk's deputies and quasi-whips who would do anything,
anything
, to get a promotion. On Ombud-Pol, a youngster with a decent supply of cash, a pragmatic attitude towards social climbing and a skilled assistant in, say, "retirement policy", could do very well for themselves indeed.

The man in the surveillance craft had stayed there for just half a day, during which time he'd earned more than enough for his purposes. Somewhere in the nebulous morass of what passed for his moral code he'd attached himself to the idea that it was all right to kill criminals for money. Killing other things was eminently doable as well, but involved all the tedious business of having to try and cover your tracks.

The way he saw it, killing politicians for money was only two shades-of-grey away from doing the same to criminals.

Speeding to YoCassok in the rented Voidstreaker
Slinky II
, he'd hired the sensor-rig for a week, spending the plentiful remnants of his murderous windfall on ammunition for his JaegerMagnum Blastard
^TM
. And now here he was, a mile above his targets, watching them as clear as day on a bank of needle-sharp monitors.

Stix scowled, and watched, and waited. The boy was going to be a problem.

Stix's elation (which was perhaps too strong a word for a man whose heart wasn't so much made of stone as fossilised, coated in ice, wrapped in steel and blasted into space) at seeing the mutant shark had been considerable. In as much as he had dreams, many of them revolved around the death of Johnny Alpha. The green-wearing-idiot had received one too many "best-hunter" awards, had successfully claimed one too many of Stix's contracts, had demonstrated his infuriatingly honourable code once too often. Not that Stix hated him, particularly. It was simply that, as a consummate businessman at the top of his rarefied field, he regarded the concept of aggressive competition entirely right and proper. Watching Alpha die was a delicious - and lucrative - prospect.

He'd followed Alpha and his motley crew all the way from Everyone's mansion. It was ever his way, why waste effort and time on a laborious hunt when some other idiot could do it for him? All it took was a sense of timing. He could simply wait until Alpha had his prize then spring some devious trap to claim it for himself.

To begin with, the hunt for Grinn had seemed no different, but Alpha's hunt was rapidly becoming a catalogue of disasters. The exploding mansion. Everyone's escape. And now this: a hypermutated predator with every intention of eating the white-eyed freak and his chums alive.

Stix had decided that having to do the legwork, having to pursue Stanley Everyone and Grinn off his own back, was certainly an effort worth making if it meant watching Alpha die beforehand.

And then the boy. The snecking boy. The boy was going to be a problem.

Down below, rendered on various screens in a variety of colourful fashions, the boy was screaming. Cupping his hands, directing his angry shouts towards the shark, he stood at the centre of a rippling halo: the air itself shuddering beneath his vocal barrage.

The shark didn't know what had hit it. It broke apart and reformed, curling in on itself, writhing in the open air. A cloud of glittering blood, effervescing and fading, pumped from the air into its gills. It looked like a firework stuck in "reverse".

It tried to turn the assault, popping out of reality to reform with teeth and tail thrashing, but the boy was always ready, belching out destructive syllables like a human howitzer, blasting the predator back into the ether. It was like watching a hologram falling apart.

Stix silently congratulated himself on switching off the audio feedback. Whatever other properties the boy's voice had, it was loud. Very loud.

Down on the ground, the shark pulsed like a supernova in a bottle. It gnashed its teeth, rolled its goblin eyes, flicked its shimmering pectorals with a highly localised lighting-storm, and vanished. And then there was nothing.

The youth clambered from the well-mangled howdahcab and punched the air in triumph. Stix was only slightly gratified when the boy noticed the two bounty hunters he'd just saved were both busy being unconscious on the floor.

Stix curled his lip. It was too much to hope that they were dead. He turned his attention back to Stanley Everyone - his landcar speeding away across the swamps - and scowled.

In the padded comfort of his Skodashrike's cockpit, streaking across the marshlands towards the tiny but functional private spaceport he maintained, Stanley Everyone was sharing many of Stix's sentiments: the boy with the freakish voice was becoming a royal pain in the arse.

Still, Scheider would deal with him. Scheider could deal with anything when there was food involved. In fact, Scheider's relentless hunger was becoming just a little too tricky to control, behavioural-command implant or not. Even hidden away out here, keeping the creature as far from trouble as possible, still the critter had managed to sneak-off to the city for a Tramp Sandwich or fifteen. It was a lot cleverer than it looked.

Everyone fished a remote control out of his pocket, jabbing the key for a status response. Wherever the creature was, the gizmo deep inside its cortex would respond to the signal by running the full gamut of hormonal responses through a tiny AI, interpreting them appropriately. Ironically, it was a similar technology to that which controlled Alpha's clumsy Dilûu - albeit far, far more sophisticated.

Normally one could be reasonably certain that the readout would illuminate with the word "Hungry" or, for brief periods, "Feeding".

"Fleeing" was a new one on Everyone.

"What the sneck does that m-"

Thump
.

With a particularly fine burst of sparks, Scheider materialised in the car's hold. The hov-lifters struggled against the sudden redistribution of weight.

"That," said Everyone, glowering into the mirror, "was a lot quicker than expected."

Hurts
, the readout flashed, then:
Angry
. The word pulsed like the centre of a fire.

"Aw, sneck." he muttered. "The boy survived, then?"

Yes
.

Angry
.

"Yeah? Well ditto. And imagine what the boss is gonna say."

A thought occurred. Everyone's viscous brows dipped together with a syrupy slurp.

"You didn't... you didn't kill Alpha, did you?" there was a tinge of hysteria in his voice. In the mirror, the creature's expressionless black eye glared back.

No
.

Everyone breathed out. "Well, that's a relief, at least."

The readout flashed, lights twinkling.
When
?
Want him
.

"Soon, Scheider. You got to be patient."

Angry
.

"You said. Don't you worry, my little horror. You'll get your chance."

The Dilûu was not looking hot. Dribbling a soupy paste of (probably) blood, it honked in pain, great ragged gouges hanging open across it. Worse, some of the bites had been inflicted with such violence that they'd torn completely through the brute's blubber and punctured its gasbladder. Now every time it inflated its stricken body sung with a chorus of hisses and squeals: air escaping through the frayed holes.

"He's buggered," announced Kid Knee, self-proclaimed Dilûu expert. "We'll be lucky if he gets us back to the city."

And therein lay the other problem. As buggered as it may be, the Dilûu was still under the complete and total control of its behavioural collar, and after a good deal of snuffling about in the swamp water it had indicated with a surly toss of its head that Stanley Everyone had fled in completely the opposite direction to that from which he'd arrived.

"We follow him," Johnny said. "That's what we're here for."

The Kid shook his head/leg - dancing a little jig. "We should go back to the city. We don't know how far he's gone."

"He could be just over the hill!"

"And he could be on the other snecking side of the planet! At least we know where the city
is
. Fido can get us back there, I reckon." He patted the Dilûu's side affectionately, treated to a grisly splattering of bladderjuice for his troubles.

Johnny crossed his arms. "If we go back now, he'll escape."

"So what if we get halfway and Fido carks it? Then he'll still have escaped, and, oh, small detail, we'll be stranded hundreds of miles from anywhere!"

"It's a risk worth taking."

"Listen, I've got just as much right to say what we do as you."

"Since when?"

"Since we're supposed to be partners."

"Yeah. Supposed to be."

"What's that mean?"

Johnny pinched the bridge of his nose, sighing. "Nothing."

"You're saying... You're saying I'm useless, aren't you? You think I'm just some overweight piece of-"

"No, Kid. I'm not saying that at all. I just... I vote we should go after Everyone. That's why we came here, snecksakes."

"Well, I vote no." The Kid crossed his arms and pouted out his lower lip. "It's bloody suicide. Better stony-broke than stony-dead."

They eyed each other, scowling.

"Well," said Johnny. "Toss a coin? Tic-tac-toe? Or maybe we should just ask Roolán?"

The boy looked up at the sound of his name. Johnny had only recently finished a grumpy session of finger waggling, annoyed at the youth's disobedience in coming to their rescue, and he was still indulging in some pouting of his own. As far as Roolán could see, if he hadn't disobeyed Johnny and Kid Knee would be dead by now. Johnny apparently saw this as a minor issue.

At any rate, Roolán had suddenly become the unwitting centre of attention.

"Him?" Kid Knee retorted. "What's he got to do with anything?"

"He's along for the ride," Johnny said. "That means he gets a say."

"It's his fault we're bloody out here! If he'd kept his mouth shut back at the mansion, we wouldn't have thi-"

"Yeah, and if he'd kept his mouth shut a minute ago we'd both be dead. So I figure he's earned it."

Roolán resisted a smirk.

Kid Knee almost howled. "Johnny, he's just a kid!"

"Well, you should know."

Apparently having exhausted their lines of debate, they both turned to regard him - one staring down, the other scowling upwards.

Johnny nodded encouragingly. "What do you say, Roolán? You still want to be a Strontium Dog?"

Roolán barely paused to think, pencil scratching across paper.

We follow Everyone.

"Well, sneck," said Kid Knee, unscrewing his hipflask.

FIFTEEN

"Be thou made as unto a child," the book said, "in purity and simplicity unsullied." Abrocabe had never understood that part.

The prophecy's other elements were, if not simple, then at least straightforward. The appearance of the four holy omens, for example: when they arrived their credence would be unquestionable - incontrovertible proof of the Great Boddah's righteousness. The Book didn't bandy its words on their timing, either: the omens would coincide precisely with the Great Sacrifice, distracting Ogmishlen for a split second, and would therefore herald the End of Time.

But that one line, the commandment of the Great Boddah to his flock, had perplexed Abrocabe ever since his wife Sianne introduced him to Boddihsm. It was the God's way of ensuring that his chosen ones would be ready for their reward: the transcendence of reality and re-emergence into heaven. After all, the Second Reality was going to be a simpler affair, sharper, more pure - and the commandment was seen as the Boddah's way of ensuring his flock would fit in.

"Be thou made as unto a child, in purity and simplicity unsullied."

But how the sneaking sneck was that supposed to happen? Particularly when the "thou" in question was a fantastically wealthy individual with all the dubious claims to morality that that entailed. Innocence was in short supply amongst the Boddah's faithful.

On Splut Mundi, alone in his white cabin, far away from his droves of servants, wives, rare pets and novelty pornography, Abrocabe Zindatsel was experiencing something of a crisis of faith.

"It's... it's doubt," he confessed to Sianne, his trunklike nose flushing in shame, when she came to his cabin that evening. "I have so much to lose, and no guarantee of any gain." He winced, aware of how materialistic he sounded. But then, he'd spent his entire life primarily concerned with matters of wealth and breaking the habit was harder than he'd anticipated.

"Everyone has doubts, my lord," Sianne smiled, blushing slightly. "Even me. That's the beauty of all this. We have nothing to lose."

"Nothing?" he spluttered. "My dear, I'm losing everything! My fortune, my reputation, my bloody life!"

"Ah, but not until the proof has emerged. The omens come first, my lord. Then the sacrifice."

Abrocabe considered this. Up from the back of his characteristically suspicious mind, an appealing thought came bubbling through the cotton candy of faith. "S-so, so if the omens do not appear-"

"They shall."

"Yes, of course," he waved his hands dismissively. "But, ah, hypothetically speaking, if they didn't."

"Then you'd lose nothing. None of us would lose anything. Without the omens, without the mountain of fire, there won't be a sacrifice."

She brandished one slender, perfect wrist. Fastened around it, in a bland grey that perfectly matched her cassock, was the small strap they'd all been given upon their arrival. On its upper surface a tiny panel brightened and darkened in time with its wearer's heartbeat.

"Only when the heart stops," she smiled.

Abrocabe grinned, immeasurably reassured. It really was the most deviously businesslike religion, the metaphysical equivalent of a "no win, no fee" policy, and just like every other financially astute member of its burgeoning faith, Boddihsm appealed to Abrocabe like no other religion ever could. Unless the omens manifested, unless the whole reality sized caboodle came crashing to a halt, the vast and personal sacrifice that every member of the faith had been called upon to make simply would not happen. It was brilliant.