Storymania - Iridescent Imagery by Colin Woodward

Iridescent Imagery
Colin Woodward

She was stood at the window naked again, so close that I could almost reach out and touch her. So close. Her auburn hair lay tussled on her shoulders and her fingers ran through the curls then dropped slowly caressing her nipples making them stand up in delight of her own soft touch. I felt myself go hard as I imagined being enveloped in the scent of her body. Feeling the smooth contours of her…..I awoke in the cell, cold and shivering, my only view were the bars that led out to darkness, and I shut my eyes tightly, screwing them up with all of my strength trying to get her back into my mind. An image I could focus, forcing it, but she was gone. Nothing. I cried out in vain. Once this way I thought I had seen God. He spoke to me in a deep calm reassuring way, telling me that everything was okay and was going to be fine. I told him that I didn’t believe in him and that he could go and fuck himself for all I cared. Nothing was going to be alright while THEY were in control. But still his voice made me feel warm and safe but I awoke back here in this hole, sat unclean in my own excrement. I had realised that the warmth was my own piss and shit. The smell had long since stopped bothering me. Many days - years - months ago I had not been alone, and I had watched another prisoner eat his own faeces hungrily with his fingers. After a few seconds he would look up and say

‘Mmmm sure tastes good’, then he would offer me a piece. I had declined, but as the time passed I began to wonder if I was missing something. Maybe he was right, maybe it was tasty. One mourning I awoke to find him dead, blue in the face with shit dangling out of his mouth like a giant cigar. Evidently he had choked to death on his own crap.

Dragged down a corridor. Thrown into a room, light so bright that I can’t see. I close my eyes and feel hands roughly tie me to a chair. There are no voices, just the scratching sounds of the binds as they fasten them tightly. Eyes wrenched open, fastened back with tape. My mind reels with the pain of the burning brightness. White, white, white so fucking white.

‘Time for your medication’ THEY say.

‘This wont hurt a bit,’ THEY say.

Medication is a word that can be used to describe many different forms of persuasion. I knew it, THEY knew it. Torture, medication, torture, medication. Different words. Just words. Same results. I felt the syringe pierce my skin and the warm liquid shoot into my veins. At first you feel nothing and you wonder if THEY have changed THEIR mind. Then WHAM! Like a jolt of electricity it burns and courses through you , and you feel….man to be restrained by a dictionary created by my simple life…..there are no words, you’ve just got to experience it to……experience it. Pain takes on a new form, you can feel it but you can also see it. Tangible, touchable and you can screw it up into a tight ball, flick it to one side. I drift back to the beginning. Jesus the beginning.

* * * *

SIT BACK AND WEEP

Legs pounding, heart racing. Heart pounding, legs racing. I can hear the catchment team gaining on me. I duck down an alley and into a subway beneath the humming causeway. Startled faces flash by like pictures in a zoetrope. For a moment it all slows down and I’m forcing my body through a thick congealed soup. People are like fragments of bread floating past me. The rich shoppers with their breathing apparatus. The Gendolls, half men half women, selling their bodies to both sexes. The insectans with their minds pulsating with delight at the sight of a butter substitute. Then we are back to normal speed, fast wind and I’m darting past stumble bums injecting the latest street craze, and down through the dirty back streets of the city. For a moment I stop, out of breath, chest creased with pain. I cough and splutter out blood mixed with snot. Wipe it all away. Wish everything was that easy.

‘He’s over here.’ Someone shouts.

As I hear the heavy military jackboots on the concrete and the sound of the specially bred dogs I frantically look around me.

Garbage, boxes, bottles, a bundle of newspapers. A grid. A grid. A GRID. I kneel down in a puddle and yank at the iron grating, for a second it doesn’t budge and I regret my stupidity for what must be the hundredth time. I can make out torch-lights scanning the walls down the end of the alley as they carefully hunt for me. I pull harder and the grid moves. Sliding it aside I climb down the service ladder and as my head drops below I pull the grate back. With renewed energy I clamber down and slip on the wet rungs and fall face first into the ankle deep sewer water, scrambling to my knees, I push my way through dead fetid rats and used condoms. Overhead I hear the footsteps of the Catchment unit pass and fuck I’m safe. I escaped the MAN. After waiting until I’m sure they’ve moved on I start to climb the rungs. As I glance towards the grid I see a vehicle drive over it and stop. STOP. Doesn’t the careless wanker know I’m down here. Of course he doesn’t and with anger I drop back into the sewer. Okay choices. Left or right, don’t see what it matters. I head to the right splashing through the water and as I pass under small work lights I can make out what I’m treading through. Bite back vomit as a dismembered hand flows past me, It’s index finger stuck out straight giving a stiff fuck you as it swims on its way.

A noise. I can hear a sound. Rushing water. I turn and watch as a tidal wave heads for me, with no direction to escape I scream. I simply scream sounding like a ten year old boy climaxing for the first time. The water crashes into me, smashes into me like a solid entity. Lifting me up into the air. I’m flying, I can’t breath, I can’t fight it. As the water enters my lungs and seeps through the lifeless veins of my body I begin to die.

The insect wouldn’t stop talking, questioning my political reliability with increasing ferocity as if it mattered to him personally. His six mandibles becoming more agitated as his speech gained intensity. I stared at his ‘voice’ which emanates from a mechanical device installed into his arsehole. His human mouth had been surgically sealed by a skin graft ripped from his lower back, a punishment served out to those known as the WRONG THINKERS. He places a hat on his head which has the name CESS TOWERS written across the front. The voice squawks in my head.

‘Why do you think they never managed to get rid of the drugs? Because THEY need the people to be addicts. Addicts are powerless, thoughtless. All they live for is the drug, and are not a threat to the power base, and with the decline in religion THEY need the people to have a new addiction. Can’t you see it. Religion was also an addiction, the prayer was their fix. Salvation their high…’

It only took three attempts at bashing his head against the wall before the cranium imploded sending a constant stream of yellow puss splurging into the air. Body fluid spread around the room like an ink blot, yet still I could hear his voice from that box. I rip it from his arse hearing the skin tear and smash it against the floor, finally hearing a crackle of laughter fading into the exquisite sound of an intense orgasm.

I find myself laying on the ground face up staring at the thick acrid clouds of carbon that continually drift across the sky. I’m covered in shit that had hardened and caked making me feel stiff as I unsteadily rise to my feet. From the sewer outlet I made my way to the inner perimeter across Palace Park. I needed to get to Zappos before daybreak. Is there a daybreak anymore? The only lighting in the park was the remains of a burning Police car. The naked body of one of the officers was being dragged by a girl of thirteen who was wearing his Police cap, and followed by a gang of four boys of similar age. She was attractive in a dirty scarred street way, and I watched as she began to pour gasoline over the body. With a flick from a half chewed cigar the body and the Police vehicle exploded in a ball of heat and fire. The girl watched and smiled as the body popped and crackled. I quickly moved on before she took an interest in me. Zappos was shut but a quick rap on the door opened a hatchway, and an eye peered through. It belonged to the doorman Abe

‘It’s me. Open up.’ I hissed.

The hatch closed and the sound of locks could be heard, eventually the door eased open. Abe smiled and blinked his one eye.

‘You really look like shit, I mean really, and you probably smell like shit. If I could smell.’ He laughed as he said it. Bandages covered the place were his nose should have been.

‘What happened?’

‘Sold it man. There’s a big business for noses and I had a big nose. Lots of moolah baby fuck.’

‘Miss it.’

‘Nah who wants to smell what this world is shovelling.’

I followed Abe into the club, it was relatively clean and very few glasses had been broken. A couple of tables were over turned, and lumpy blood had congealed on a picture of the Mona Lisa. The neon light above the bar was blinking in disrepair and read zapoo’s. It was always broken in some way.

‘Where’s the boss?’ I asked.

‘He’s in the pool room exercising. Go right in, I’ll fix some goodies.’

As I headed for the entrance I stopped, a thought occurred to me.

‘What kind of mood is he in?’ I asked.

Zappo had a temper like a cyclone. Starts small, kind of contained, then builds into a fury that only stops when the destruction has reached a certain level. He had once lived in apartment in Little Cracow and had to put up with two noisy guys who lived in the place below. They played their music at three, four am. Junk parties. Whore fests. One day Zappo went down and introduced them to his Japanese bread knife collection. He still had the heads. He hollowed them out and still used them as candle holders in the toilet. The candle light flickers through the open eye sockets. So you see I didn’t want to catch him in a bad mood.

‘He’s okay, a little edgy you know, cool for Zappo though bro.’

I grunted a reply and stepped through. The pool room was bathed in a soft turquoise light which was swinging slightly in a breeze from a small dented table top fan. Smoke from a dying cigarette in a trash can was buffeted by the air . The fan didn’t clear the smell of stale beer and reefer, it just circulated it around. A young girl with long curly black hair was bent over one of the tables facing me whilst Zappo fucked her from behind. It wasn’t cold but she was wearing a scarf with smiling snowmen on it. Her face was down with the black hair covering her like a shroud and her hands tightly gripped a red and yellow pool ball. She looked up at me but she didn’t see me or anything else, and I in return couldn’t see life behind her misty brown eyes. Nothing. A zombie lost in a world full of people just like her. Zappo glanced towards me.

‘Hey TV man, I heard you’d been blown away,’

He was white but his voice was pure black street slang. Blond dreadlocks dangled over his sunglasses. As he talked he kept thrusting into the girl like it was an automatic reflex.

‘Nah, pure propaganda Zap, they don’t get me ‘till the fat lady sings.’ My voice was croaky and scratched. I had been out at night too long without breathing aids.

I reached over to the trash-can, pulled out the dying cigarette, and placed it into my lips. The smoke filled my lungs and I blew it out in delight…..pure delight. Zappo laughed.

‘Puff away big Daddy, puff away. Then tell me what you want.’ THRUST THRUST.

‘I need papers to get me through the perimeter and out.’

Zappo didn’t stop fucking but I noticed a change in the rhythm.

‘You are shitting me TV man? Perimeter papers cost money, and that’s one of the many things I know you haven’t got.’

‘I figure you may need something taking across the border, something that you can’t stick a stamp on and post. I perform that for you and you get me the right ID’s to do it. Deal’

‘How do I know I can trust you?’

‘You know I always speak the truth,’

Zappo smiled, his teeth yellow and older than his body. They hadn’t always been his teeth. Then again it hadn’t always been his body either.

‘Yeah I know that TV man, that’s what got you into this shit in the first place. I’m not so sure though, you’ve got a lot of fuzz looking for you and I hope to No-God that you shook ‘em loose.’

‘They didn’t follow me.’ I pointed at my shit covered clothes,’ This isn’t a fashion statement.’

‘Okay. But still…..’

I didn’t want to have to remind him but…..

‘You owe me Zap, remember?’

Zap nodded slightly in time with his body action. Abe appeared silently from my side with a syringe in his hand. He held it up and smiled. Zappo spoke again

‘Get yerself cleaned up in my washroom and relax for a bit. It’ll take a few hours to arrange the docs. Kick back’.

I took the syringe and stared at the small amount of liquid that glistened inside.

‘Thanks,’

‘Yeah don’t mention it. But I have a question TV man, and as I don’t think you are gonna be around long enough for me to ask again.’

‘What is it?’

‘When you were the big hotshot anchormon for CABG TV. Did you ever shag that perty weather-girl with the big titties.’

I couldn’t help but smile as I approached the toilets.

‘No Zap I didn’t,’

For a moment I thought he was going to stop hammering his dick into the girl, but she moaned subtly and he picked up speed. Breathing heavily and in between gasps he asked,

‘Why GASP the GASP fuck GASP not?’

‘Because she wasn’t real. She was a holographic image. None of it was real.’

Zappo stopped and stared.

‘Man if you can’t trust the weather girl who the fuck can you trust.’

I let the washroom door slam behind me. He had a point.

The shower had been cool, refreshing but salty. I found some clothes that had been left for me and began to button up the shirt whilst facing the mirror. I watched Christy in the reflection. She was wearing outfit number 432, and looked stunning. Her hair perfect, her teeth perfect, her breasts……perfect.

‘We were just talking about you,’ I told her.

‘Really,’ She replied, ‘Why do you obsess about the women that you can’t have?’

‘I don’t, I never have’

‘What about Joanne?’ She quizzed.

I didn’t answer, she knew there would always be a Joanne, and she smiled that sarcastic know it all grin that could only come from a computer algorithm programmed in a language convoluted and pointless.

‘What do you call this?’ She pointed out.

I let it drop, there was nothing in it for me.

‘Do you know where you are? Are you trapped in that cell, or on a medical table, or still in the hotel room strung out on junk? Or are you here right now and the cell is the dream? Or is none of it real and you are somewhere else? Maybe I’m real and you are the illusion?’

I grabbed my head as a pain seared through it like a hot crooked knife. She just kept talking, questioning me about my political reliability, about the truth, about the world. On and on and on. Pain.

White, white so fucking white.

‘This wont hurt a bit,’ THEY say.

Christy’s voice rose octaves and she started to screech.

‘Maybe you are jacked in so high that the whole world is an illusion that was downloaded from a super conducted mainframe into your tiny brain. Cell overload, that’s what this…..’ On and on and on. Pain. I could hear the windows smash and the glass tinkled down slowly onto the floor. Each shard danced, pirouetted and I watched as the light refracted a rainbow through the pieces. I turned to hit her but she wasn’t there. No smashed glass. Nothing. The pain receded, fast breathing in fright, slow thinking in confusion. I dropped the empty syringe, Jesus got to stop this life. The door slammed loud as I stepped out of the washroom and Zappo was still banging the teenage whore, must be on a marathon. Abe approached and handed me a small tubular package, and I tried to forget the sound of Christy’s chiding voice.

‘What is it?’ I asked.

‘Bio fibrous chips TV man, high of the future.’ He replied.

‘You wanna run that jive by me again,’

Zappo gave a short curt grunt, pulled out of the girl and zipped himself up.

‘On the street they’re called Mindfucks. Once inserted into the head, they meld with selected parts of the brain’

‘And do what exactly?’

‘Let you run and hide inside your own mind. Live out a dream, a fantasy, a nightmare, the future, the past. To the person who has one implanted it’s as real as this conversation.’

I had heard rumours of these devices before. The military had designed them for soldiers so that they would only see what they were ordered to see. Chemical stimulus had proved too dangerous after a platoon of Dragoon Paratroopers had gone flippo and gang raped a load of nurses.

‘Do they work?’

‘Yeah. I got them from a scientist who needs the money to bribe some influential people after he was caught with a couple of teenage boys. I need to get them to Mama Cess on the outside. Mama may want to test one, they’ll work no probs.’

‘How do I get them past the Perimeter guards?’

Abe laughs.

‘The tubular design of the packaging is not for aesthetic purposes, brother’

For a second I’m startled but I should really have known better. I’d been taking it up the arse in this world for some time now why should this be any different?

‘Jesus, okay. No choice. I just better make sure I have a shit first. What about papers?’

Zapp shakes his head, the dreadlocks smacking him in his eyes.

‘Not here. You know a man called the Messiah,’

I nodded.

‘Sure. Religious freak, lives in a gothic church got about four hundred followers. Most of them women. Thinks he’s some kind of God, or the God. My station did a piece on him once,’

‘Yeah saw it mon. Salvation through sodomy. Can’t believe those religious sects get a tax break. Maybe I should call myself God, get my self a whole belief system going. Do you know banks actually have special loans for setting up your own cult, and tax breaks. Fucking Jew is loaded. Fuck there I go again preaching like him. Anyway he’s got the papers all tidy just go over there and he’ll sort it out.’

It sounded like a sweet plan,. But that’s how my life had been so far. Everything sounding sweet then turning sour quicker than an arranged marriage. You put your hope on something that keeps that heavy pulse beating. Then like a drowning man clinging at a piece of floating wood you watch it drift away.

‘Can I trust you Zap. I gotta ask man?’

‘Hey I’m your best friend.’

‘Friends usually let me down in the end. Best friends just means it hurts more.’

‘Make it neater if we call it business?’

I nodded. He lifts the head of the brunette, and she looks at me.

‘Wanna take a pop before you leave. See if you can wake her up.’

For a second I felt a flicker of sadness for the girl but I had seen her type before. A user of the lowest denominator. You would give her kindness and pity and she would chop your dick off and sell it on the black market by morning. Sadness flicker over.

‘No thanks. I prefer them to be in this world.’

‘Cool. Good luck TV man I hope you find what ever you are looking for.’

As I made my way to the exit, Abe stops me.

‘You might need this for the package.’

Vaseline. Laugh or cry?

* * * *

PRAISE BE

I had to take the tube train through to the Messiah’s church, luckily at this time of night it was pretty empty and uncomfortably I found a sit. I was constantly aware of the package stuffed up my arse. It was an odd feeling that caused me to walk in a waddle like a dancer off the stage. Strangely it was self-consciously comforting because if I could feel it that meant I was still alive. It’s said that the feeling of something shoved up your arse is something that you get used to in prison. If this panned out it was a theory I wouldn’t get to prove true. I studied the complicated tube map, then at the few travellers. An old woman sat down to my right reading a copy of a Communist workers magazine, as she reads she tears each page and throws them into the air. A man tuts and picks them up each time. A submissive sex act that he probably pays for. Two men are stood near the door watching each station that we swiftly fly by. They are dressed identically in black suits with black bowler hats and they each keep taking a gummi-bear out of a packet and eating them. Same time, same colour, orange. A man wearing nothing but a long beard that covers his genitals sits at the end of the carriage. He is reading a book about Zen, and is holding it upside down. No-one stares at him or gives him a second glance. I strain to see the small print of the book cover as the carriage lights flicker due to the undulating electricity. The lights on, off, on…..Off.

Floating on a spongy cloud of white. Believe in the cloud and it keeps you there, hung, suspended. I reach out and touch the sky and it ripples like water. My reflection fixed against it as a dead butterfly is fixed by the glass. Then I’m falling towards the ground but before I reach it my descent is stopped by crashing onto a giant turd. Huge and soaring through the atmosphere. It is driven by a fly dressed like a bus conductor and he winks at me, tipping his hat.

The carriage lights flicker back on and the carriage is empty, except for me and a large fly sat opposite me It is about the same height as myself. He has two huge prism eyes and his wings shimmer in the man made glow. In one hand he holds a bunch of flowers. The other hand rests on a sharkskin briefcase which he taps nervously.

‘Got a light’ He rasps. Then coughs into one of his wings. A hacking smokers choke.

Shake my head.

‘Shit only human I talk to and I gotta pick a health nut,’

Didn’t mean to be rude. Got to back the statement up.

‘They’ll kill you,’

‘THEY will kill everyone,’ he responds misunderstanding me.

‘Cigarettes I mean’ Clarifying the situation.

The fly laughs which breaks into a coughing spasm, and chokes up a thick yellowish green sputum, he leaves it dangling from his chin.

‘What the fuck do I care if they can kill you. Look at me man, I’m a fly I only live in the summer, and now it’s the winter I’m dying. Imagine that for a life.’

Idiot offend him why don’t you?

‘Sorry I didn’t mean…..’

He waves one of his arms in a dismissive gesture..

‘Ah what the hell doesn’t matter,’

Got to be polite, hey say something about the flowers.

‘Nice flowers.’

‘Thanks. I got ‘em for the wives. You think they’ll like them’

‘Yeah they’re nice,’ Okay now you’re doing well.

The butterfly looks around himself and sighs, his antennae wilting in response.

‘Nearly my stop. End of the line. God you don’t know what it’s like to be me. I spend most of my life in the shit that you people leave behind. Which is no fucking picnic I can tell you. but man in my day I was something to look at, I was one for the women. Now it’s all gone. Gone. Days to live, seconds to think,’

The subway train stopped at a station and he got up, and as the doors slid open he looked back.

‘Days to live,’ He called out, and then was gone.

The Messiah rented an old church located in a rundown district known as the Borough. As I approached I could make out light shining through the stained glass windows, orange, red, blue, washing the streets in an amusement arcade of colour. The sound of a choir belting out a jived up modern hymn contrasted with the curfew quiet of the world around. Stood outside on either side of the closed entrance were two dark haired women. Dressed in white thin robes and clearly evident that they are wearing no underwear their black pubic hair pushes against the fabric. The road to hell…….

‘Greetings new born. Enter’ Once of them silkily said.

As the doors open I’m bathed in a dazzling great white light. Music feels my senses, envelopes me and gingerly I enter the church. It is cavernous in size and filled with whirring electric lights, no corner is allowed the sanctuary of darkness. Searchlights scan the curved roofs and the arches. It reflects off of the many statues of Christ. Hundreds of dark haired women (for there are no blondes, redheads or brown. Just black) have their backs to me all dressed in the same white revealing robes. Stood at the front shrouded by the brilliance, the Messiah stands blessing his flock. The music begins to pick up speed as he steps towards them, drumbeats crash into a steady high-speed rhythm. The choir matches this, and the congregation begin to sway in ecstasy. The searchlights rest on him full beam as he throws his hands up into the air. Blessing the Lord. His long blond hair and blond beard seem to almost glow with power.

White so fucking white.

The Messiah begins to chant, sing, and his voice is amplified by a mouthpiece headset. The sound echoes off the brick walls meeting itself in an explosion of noise. As he moves towards his women they reach out and touch his hands shaking with the feel of his skin. They fall back overcome with the greatness that they have been in contact with. Quickly he works weaving his way along the women, and behind him some of his flock carry baskets which credit cards are eagerly flung into. God ain’t cheap. His eye catches mine and he nods imperceptibly towards a door in the cloisters. I nod back and walk towards where he suggested. Another raven haired woman, this time with an innocent Japanese face and figure opens the door for me.

‘Bonjour monsieur ,entrez-vous sil vous plait,’ she urges.

‘Merci’ I reply and step into the office.

The door is closed behind me leaving me alone. The room is darker and it takes a few seconds for my eyes to adjust to the candle lit gloom. I take the time to study the surroundings. An old grandiose oak desk supports a small powerful PC, stocks and shares scroll up the screen endlessly in a testament to the modern world, attached to it is a credit card reader. I turn my attention to a large book case holding various texts on religion and even more on creative accounting. As I flip through one of the books the Messiah enters. I place the text back. He unclips his headset and runs his fingers along his hair before acknowledging me. when he does he stops and stares.

‘I know you,’

He continues to examine me.

‘Devine intervention?’ I inquire.

His face flickers and he snaps his fingers.

‘Nah fucking TV that’s where. Your network ran that hatchet number on me about a year ago. Zappo didn’t tell me you work for them.’

‘Worked. As in past tense,’ I corrected him.

‘Yeah that’s right I remember reading that you got canned then arrested. Now I see why you want the papers,’

I didn’t answer as there was nothing to say. He opened a drawer in the desk and pulled out a small mirror and laid it on the table. He then produced a bag of white powder.

‘You don’t mind?’

I shrugged, ‘It’s your church’

The Messiah rolled up a prayer sheet and snorted the cocaine. In two sniffs it was gone and rubbing his reddening nose he fell back into the desk chair.

‘Ahhhhhhh that’s got a nice feel. So TV man how do you like my little place?’

‘Your beard is the only real thing about it.’

He laughs

‘Who says the beard is real? You can take the Journalist out of the cynic but not the cynic out of the journalist. What’s real anyway TV man? You need me, you should learn to be nice.’

I was tiring of this charlatan, tiring of them all.

‘I just want the papers then I’ll be on my way,’

Messiah picks up his headset and calls to one of his women, seconds later the Japanese woman returns. She hands him an envelope and leaves smiling at me. I watch her exit, and turn back to see Messiah leering at me.

‘See what you’re missing.’

‘Yeah,’ I replied honestly. ‘Have you ever really seen Christ.’

‘JC Yeah I once saw him luring a young girl into a car with candy. Look it doesn’t matter what you think anymore because you’re now one of the little people. A nobody. You’ve not even got an IP address. So here’s your ID card’

I took the card from him and watched the fingerprint hologram dance across the thick lining.

‘How do I get through the barriers?’

‘This’

He held up a polythene bag with a forefinger inside. The finger was hard and blue, and he undid the bag taking it out and sniffed it. Shaking his head he placed it back and handed it to me.

‘First time I’ve ever really given someone the finger.’

I didn’t laugh. He shrugged and sat down at the computer. The meeting was obviously over and I made my way out.

Barriers. Walls. Keep the garbage of humanity out and the rest of the world in. The selected few who had friends in the right places or the money to create friends went between the perimeters with no hassle. If you were THEY you had no problems. THEY were free. Border control was strictly enforced and the penalty for trying to cross into another perimeter without the proper documents was life imprisonment on one of the oil rig gulags somewhere out in the Atlantic ocean. Searchlights scanned the crowds of people shuffling towards the gateways. Lines of travellers, tourists, refugees. Luggage, clothes, children, families piled together like a smorgasbord of human waste. Some were dressed in rags and some were in suits as if being presentable would make a difference. Beyond the barriers was no man’s land, then after two hundred yards was the blockade of the other side. I was nervous. I could smell the sweat of fear dripping down my back. I was sure the guards would recognise me, trap me then slowly beat me to death claiming that I had tried to escape. I moved my way into the ‘DECLARATION FREE’ section and felt acutely aware of the package resting inside my arse. I pushed past an old woman jabbering away in a foreign language and clutching a broken one armed doll. I moved closer to the front trying to avoid eye contact with anyone. A scream a few feet away startled me and I watched as a man broke free from a line. He jumped the barrier and with his legs smacking into the ground he headed into no man’s land. He splashed through puddles as he lunged hands spread out towards the fence that lay two hundred yards ahead, oblivious to the mud splattering onto him. On the other side I could see a woman holding a young girl in her arms urging him, calling what could only be his name. Half way across and the searchlight found him and traced his frantic struggle. At first I thought he had tripped as his body spasmed, but then the crack of a high velocity rifle reached my ears. Still the man propelled by his own desire continued to run. As the second shot rang out the woman began to scream. The full realisation of what was about to happen hit her and she buried the girls face into her chest. Blood spurted from the mans right leg and he fell to the ground, with his hands pushing into the mud he tried to get back up to his knees. Not beaten, not yet. The final crack of the gun tore the top part of his head off and ripped through the bone and brain. For a second there was a silence as the man wobbled on his knees, forehead dangling down. Then with a sigh he collapsed face first into the slush.

Noise started again as the crowd carried on with their own business. No time to weep for him, nobody cared. The woman was helped away by somebody and only I watched the body of the man bubble in the puddle. Who was he? Would he be me?

The surge of the crowd pushed me on to the barrier and a female officer stood on a tower about head height. Her rifle smoked like a man after sex. Dressed in black and jackboots which reached her knees she seemed pleased with the carnage that lay beneath her.

I slipped the bag out of my pocket.

Forced to march between the line I approached the barrier machine. A slot for the card and a pad for the fingerprint. It was simple, if the fingerprint matched the one encoded on the card you were free. If not……

I slipped the finger out of the bag.

The woman in front of me started to shout and wave her papers about. A guard grabbed her. His face was inches away from mine. I tried to remain calm, breathed deeply. Could he hear my heart? He took the card from her and studied it, then placed it in the slot. Grabbing her hand he forced the finger on to the pad and waited. There was an off green light, and an off red light. They watched those lights.

I slipped the card into my free hand.

After a second a light popped on, giving a little ding like a game show correct answer. It was red. The woman began to weep. The guard took the card then dragged her off to… somewhere.

The machine was before me. I inserted the card. It was accepted, and I placed the finger beneath my hand and pressed it firmly onto the pad.

He watched as he waited for the decision that could go either way. The Messiah hadn’t liked him maybe it was a trap to get him killed. Zappo wouldn’t be happy but he wouldn’t do anything about it either. The TV man couldn’t believe his life had come to this. Everything depending on two cheap lights. If it hadn’t been so tragic he would have thrown his head aback and laughed.

The light went ping.

The green light.

Shaking he pushed the card and the finger back into his pocket and went through the open barrier. It wasn’t over yet. No man’s land beckoned and every step was filled with trepidation. You could see the thoughts flash across his face visible like a lit up neon sign. Would he feel the thud of the bullet, or hear the crack of the weapon. Would there be a shout. Shuffling his feet to an unheard rhythm he got closer to the gateway. Trying hard not to look like he was rushing the TV man pushed through the exit and out onto the other side.

* * * * *

FAST FORWARD TO THE INEVITABLE

Mama Cess owns the south-side of the free perimeter. How can you own something that’s free? Shit if you wanna get technical about it. How can you have a democracy were what you watch is controlled by the state? Freedom of choice is a slogan used by corporations so that you’ll simply choose them. There was the smell of money in this side of the city. Plush apartments fought for space alongside crooked business empires, one begat the other in an inbred feeding frenzy. Walkways were clean and every dead body was brushed away. Police men smile and tip their hat, waitresses say have a nice day and really mean it. This was how the other half lived but Mama Cess owned them. She owned them all. Cess towers was the tallest, widest, block in the perimeter. Gothic, overstated, and threatening it watched over the other citizens like a wicked stepmother watching the fairy princess.

I entered the building through gold heavy doors and approached the thick carpeted reception desk. It was manned by a bodybuilder with no mouth. He wore a tight T-shirt with the words ‘PINCH ME’ written across the chest, and he blinked rapidly as I entered. Silently the receptionist guided me to a lift. Expecting me no less. The doors closed behind us automatically and it began to ascend without sound or vibration.. The numbers of the floors blurred past, into tens, hundreds. In the blink of the eye at floor 201. the doors re-opened and the bodybuilder gently pushed me into a huge long dark room. Lights were small and placed over expensive paintings at intervals. Monets, Van Goughs. All of them had long rips across their centres. Expensive paintings defaced without a care. It took a few seconds before I realised that I was on my own. I walked on nervously listening to the clip of my shoes on a polished marble floor. Without warning a light erupted at the end of the room and Mama Cess was revealed in all her staggering glory. She was floating naked in a giant bell jar filled with what looked like water. Her body was massive, fat upon fat rolled in the free environment of the liquid. Her long pubic hair waved like seaweed and she occasionally stroked her vein covered breasts up and down as she bobbed up and down. Her head was completely under the water but a mouthpiece was attached to some machinery outside of the jar, and she was bald.

‘You have the package my dear?’

Her digital voice echoed around me. I nodded nervously in response..

‘Where is it?’

‘It’s in my arse.’

‘Well we need someone to test it. Hmmmmmmm……Who shall that be?

Before I could protest hands grabbed me from behind.

‘This wont hurt,’ THEY say.

Where am I? As I turn I see Christy with a syringe. She grins hysterically and I feel the needle break my pores, and the thin metal push inside the vein.

Bright so fucking bright.

I shield my eyes from the sun as it wakes me from my sleep. Slowly it creeps under the half closed window until it hits me full in the face. I turn away and feel so fucking ill. I’m curled up at the foot of a bed, a needle stuck firmly in my arm and I stare around me at the wrecked hotel room. Coughing and rubbing my face I touch caked vomit that is sticking to my chin. What a drug induced nightmare, Zappo, Mama Cess. Jesus. The skin clings to the needle as I pull it from the vein, almost refusing to let it go. Blood drips from the hole and runs down my arm. I stagger towards the bathroom and shut the door behind me. Picking up courage I study my reflection in a broken mirror. Fuck it’s disgusting, insect like. Hollow eyed and pale. I pick up the piece of shit that’s dangling on the ash tray and take a bite. Tasty.

Banging on the door. Zappo calls, shouting if I’m alright. Gotta take a piss man. Yeah I’m fine. He says that Abe has got the package. The package.

I turn to open the door but the cell is locked, it’s always locked from the outside. I shiver as I feel the cold seep through my body.

‘Shit the bio chips have leaked inside of him’. THEY say

‘We’re losing him’ THEY say.

I rush to the bars and start to scream, scream louder than I have ever done before. Nobody hears, and I slump to the floor defeated. I try to picture the woman naked touching herself but it doesn’t work. There is nothing in my head but a pain so I reach inside my head and touch it, stroke it. Control the pain you can control the world. A bright light fills the cell and I can’t hide from the glare. A man walks out from the light towards me. It’s the Messiah and he smiles and winks at me in a knowing way….I turn away from him and the light quickly vanishes.

It’s another busy day at CABG TV. An official who commited suicide after being found with two boys, three cop killings. A gang on the loose in the park. Just another day in the perimeter. I shuffle blank pages and stare up at the camera, waiting for the red light to turn green. Ping.

I smoothly move into my spiel reading it from the prompter.

‘Hi. You’re watching CABG TV. News from the heart, and today it looks like it’s not just raining in mine. Over to the weather with Christy.’

A voice crackles in my ear piece.

‘Run holoprog 432. You are doing great man.’

Christy flickers into existence.

‘Yes you’re right. Todays going to be damp…..’

I stopped listening almost immediately. The make-up girl rushes over and starts re-applying the touch up that’s dried in the heat from the lights.

‘Have you seen that new VR show?’ She asks.

‘The one that says. It puts you in control.’ I replied mimicking the slogan.

‘Yeah you really become immersed in the scene. You’d like the new story it’s about a TV anchorman that goes on the lam from the cops.’

‘Right. Don’t you think that’s enough mascara?’

She leaves and I turn back to watch Christy. A giant fly is just finishing giving the temperatures, and I blink in horror. No-one else seems to mind but it repulses me.

‘What’s his ratings’ THEY say.

‘Heart, pulse, any lower and we will be going negative’ THEY say.

Got to have high ratings.

The TV man is running along a roof his feet smashing into the gravel covering, as he reaches the end he throws his body over the parapet of the building. The wind pushes against him and sends his hair billowing back, it rips at his clothes and he’s naked, a smile on his face. He breaks through clouds giggling like a child. I can see the ground coming towards me. He can see the ground coming towards him. I can hear the whistling sounds of the wind. He can hear the whistling sounds of the wind. There is a voice carried on that air, a loud opera style wailing that makes me laugh. Opera never did anything for me. Mama Cess is singing, a solo of great magnitude. Louder than the world can contain and the glass of the building shatters and dances to the sound. The ground comes closer, and the TV man hits with a sickening thud.

As I lay there feeling myself die I listen to the singing……….Nothing is real anymore. Christy laughs and says.

‘Told you so.’

I try to laugh back but my mouth is not connected to my head. I see it quivering some distance away. A pulsating mess of flesh A fly lands on it and starts to lay it’s eggs.

‘He’s gone.’ THEY say.

Gone where? What does it matter where I go. Who gives a fuck?

White, white, white. So fucking white.

Then nothing.

Nothing.