Estronomicon Progress 2009

THE OFFICIAL SD EZINE Introduction by Steve Upham Sleepy Time Gal by Jane Frank Angels and Insects : The art of B. A. Bosaiya The Finiteness of Anagrams by Bob Lock One Missed Call : Film reviews by Tony Lee The Curse of the Leper by John T. Carney Bordering Sunset by J. W. Bennett Artist Showcase : Dirk Holzenhauer Stygian Memories by Andrew Marshall The Day Star by Mark Lewis Reading Zone : Books worth checking out!

Mad Dogs and Englishmen by Benedict J. Jones Bad Territory (extract) by Tom Sykes The City of Silence by Neil Burlington

Published by

Screaming Dreams The stories in this eZine are works of fiction. Names, characters, places and incidents are either products of the author's imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual events or locales or persons, living or dead, is entirely coincidental.

Cover illustration Copyright Š B. A. Bosaiya 2006 All content remains the Copyright of each contributor and must NOT be re-used without permission from the original Copyright holder(s).

Thank you. No part of this publication may be reproduced in any form without prior written permission from the publisher.

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STEVE UPHAM

I

t’s been a busy start to the year for me. January just flew fast in a blur of unpacking boxes in the new house, hospital appointments and catching up with a thousand other things. But thankfully the dust is finally starting to settle now so I’m looking forward to a less hectic schedule over the next few weeks.

Of course, that’s not to say I’ll be lazing around the house doing nothing, oh no! I have lots to do at Screaming Dreams, so keep watching.

I did intend to start the full numbered issues of the eZine again this year, with the regular articles included, but as I’m still a bit pushed for time this month I decided to release this shorter Progress Edition to keep things rolling along in the meantime. But hopefully I’ll get things back on track in the next month or two, so please bear with me just a little longer, thanks.

Some of you may be reading this issue in the standard PDF format, but there’s also now an online flipping book version too, courtesy of Issuu. I am hoping this will attract some new readers who are not comfortable using Adobe Reader to view the files. I’ve also converted all the back issues to flip versions, but the PDF files are still available too.

I’ve been working hard on the SD website overhaul lately, but it hasn’t been going quite to plan I’m afraid! I still haven’t settled on a new design yet so it’ll be a while longer before it’s ready to go online. I hope that when it’s ready though it will simplify the ordering process for the books, as I know some customers have had problems with the cart system on the current site.

On the subject of books, don’t forget that the next two SD paperbacks will be going to print soon! Gary McMahon’s stunningly dark double novella is a must for fans of his work, and John L. Probert’s collection will delight readers who enjoy supernatural detective stories. I am hoping that both these titles do well and am proud to add them to the SD lineup.

I realise that the credit crunch will make it tough on everyone this year, but please do try and support the small presses if you can, as some of them have started to disappear already and it would be a shame to see independent publishing struggle to the point of extinction if readers stop buying! We have been lucky enough to enjoy strong growth in the UK small press market over the past few years, so please keep on supporting your favourite publishers so they can continue to bring you more book titles. If every reader just purchased one book from a small press each year, that would make a difference. So go on, spread the word and buy a book!

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JANE FRANK “Generally, we do not encourage people to sleep on a bus for security reasons. We want them to be aware of their surroundings.”

[Candace Smith, a Metro spokeswoman, Washington, DC quoted in the Washington Post, from Sunday Sept. 11, 2005]

S

he was old and her skin was soft and crinkled like a used Kraft paper supermarket bag, and just as dry to the touch, though a deeper shade of mahogany. Even her hair was dry and fly-away, like spun brown sugar, despite weeks without a washing. Her head bobbed on a spindly neck, attached to sparrow’s shoulders, resting on a concave chest to which were attached two spidery arms, folded like bat’s wings, close in. And the whole of her spindly seventy-eight pounds was supported by a blue plastic seat. Her eyes were half-shut.

For almost two years now - she couldn’t remember the beginning of her sojourns, exactly - she had been spending $1.25 a night (including transfers) for her lodging. “This is the end of the line, baby,” the nicer drivers would say, at the end of their shift, some time around 3 AM. “I’m out of service, sweetheart.”

And the meaner ones would make her get off, and then get on again, sometime around 4. They’d poke her, touch her. Shake her thin arms until she dreamed they’d snapped right off at the elbow. But that wasn’t the worst dream.

The worst was closing her eyes, knowing they were following her. Oh, not the stupid ones, the teenagers with their cel phones and pants falling off, and insecurity. They might trip her if she got up to change her seat, but she knew better than that. Nor was she ever afoot. Leave to the men, she thought, to attract the predators by sitting on benches in the open, with newspapers to keep them warm when they finally decided to lie down. She would sleep sitting up, warm and with a protector. But one who could only protect her faltering body, not her mind. And not even her body, when the bus had to be cleaned and serviced, at the end of the line.

On Monday, she had gone to a church basement to shower. On Tuesday, sitting in the fourth row on the bus, someone handed her a bologna sandwich in a ziptop bag. She had trouble getting it open. On Thursday, someone at the shelter asked if she had ‘family.’ And tonight, after a day on a hard bench -2-

JANE FRANK somewhere near the place where they come around with wrapped peanut butter sandwiches, and sweet fruit juice in shiny paper boxes with built-in straws, she had almost been persuaded to miss her bus. But now it’s Saturday, and it’s 10:24 PM and she is nodding and dozing, in the back of the bus so the driver doesn’t see her, when her eyebrows knit together and the frown draws her mouth down.

At first she didn’t know what to make of him, tall, smart and white. He had a moustache, which helped to make him more familiar, but that’s only because she was used to Hispanics. He was more than double her weight, which made him reedy, but no less strong. And he had a cruel look. He sat down next to her, and the first thing she knew, had his tattooed right hand right up her skirt!

It was hard to say which emotion was strongest: the amazement that any man would care to do such a thing, to a skinny old almost black woman on a city bus late on a Saturday night, or the fear which followed recognition that he had.

“Do you like when I do that,” he whispered, in a voice that sounded faintly Southern, to her old ears, “if you spread your legs it would feel even better.”

“I don’t have any money,” she whimpered, thinking it would take no more than one forearm to hold her down, while the man reached across her body with his other hand, to grab at her purse. The plastic was pitted, but it was still serviceable. There was no money in it, as he would soon learn, but for the moment raw fear of having her person invaded had scattered common sense.

In point of fact, the only money she had with her was wrapped in a handkerchief and stuffed into her panties, on just the side he would reach for...

“I’m not lookin’ for payment, honey,” he drawled, taking on a deep Alabamian accent. “I’m just wantin’ you.”

The emphasis on the word confused her. He wasn’t after her money, but then – was he after her for sex? The irrationality of it brought her stomach into even tighter knots. What did he mean, he wanted “her”? She looked out the window. The bus had left Dupont Circle and was moving down 16th St., the old apartment buildings darkened, the churches on street corners shut tight.

She focused on the streetlights at each intersection as they passed, and let the pressure of his hand be displaced by the groan of the bus’s brakes, and the distraction of the passing streets. She didn’t speak. The more she focused on sights beyond the window, the more dreamlike the interaction became. When -3-

JANE FRANK the bus pulled into the depot for servicing, she awakened to find the man gone.

She patted her hip. The handkerchief was still there. As was her purse. But she felt she had been given a warning: it wouldn’t always end like that. She would need to stay alert.

It didn’t happen every night, and that’s what made the dream worse than others: it’s unpredictability. It seemed the more alert and awake she was, the more apt she was to be rudely pursued…. while at the same time, sleep seemed the only way to escape being used by the men who wanted her for sex. The men varied, some tall, some short. Some dark, some fair. Some put their arms around her, some patted her hair, and cheek. She would just set her mind on staring out the window, until lulled into sleep. She wouldn’t hear them, or see them. Until it was time to be bullied into wakefulness by the driver, at the end of the line.

There came an early morning, soon after, when she realized that the quality of her dreams had changed. The bus pulled into her morning stop at 8th St. NE, where she usually got her morning coffee from unsmiling former drug addicts.

Her bones felt brittle, her back ached, and as she moved slowly down the steep bus steps, for the first time she was afraid she would not be able to make it to the ground before the bus lurched forward. There was no one watching, and no one to help her, so she decided to sit and shimmy down the last step. It looked like a grimace, but it was actually a smile, at the sudden memory of herself as a toddler. She had taken three or four small steps from the bus when she realized with a start that she no longer had her purse. She quickly turned back toward the bus doors, but they had already closed and the bus was lumbering forward. All the windows were closed. Her voice, she knew, would never carry to the driver. Gone!

In an instant, tears welled as the shock of her loss sank in. But how? How could she have been so careless? She always slept with it on her lap, her arms through the straps, her hands clasped. The feeling of loss was so acute, she couldn’t move, and let the tears roll down. Humiliation, mixed with anger, kept her standing rigidly in place. Just about all she had left in the world was in that purse, including a faded old hankie she had once “liberated” from a thrift store on U. St. She could have used that bit of cloth right now, she thought bitterly. Stupid old woman!

Drawn by the smell of coffee, she found her way into the shelter and waited -4-

JANE FRANK for someone to hand her a cup. It was always luke-warm from too much milk.

She suspected they were afraid she’d burn herself if she spilled it. The truth was that it was just a sneaky way for them to get a little protein into her. She found a spot on a bench, and, too tired to climb over, asked timidly “please make some room for me at the end.” After she settled herself she began methodically reviewing the contents of her purse.

She recalled the one photo she had kept, dog-eared from handling, that she had made an effort to preserve by tucking it into a used envelope someone had discarded. There was one letter. A small round mirror, with a blue plastic handle. A dusty black men’s comb, that had once come in a kit of free toiletries they had handed out to the indigent one Christmas past. The packet of tissues and small toothbrush and tiny tube of toothpaste were long gone, but she had kept the comb. Two small hard candies she had been saving since Thanksgiving. And her handkerchief. And now she had nothing. She pressed her thin lips together and tried harder to remember getting on the bus, and where she had sat. The thinking wore her out, her hands shook from the effort.

A middle aged black woman came around with a tray of small plates, each holding a molded cup of scrambled eggs and plastic spoon sitting on a small rectangle of a paper napkin. Deftly, the woman handed out the small packages – napkin, plate, eggs and spoon – to every person holding a paper cup of coffee.

The old woman lifted the spoon, so like the ones in children’s play sets, and dug into the small mountain of compressed, now room-temperature, eggs. And then, with sudden insight, she realized what had happened. It must have been the man with the mustache and the nasty grin, he’s the one who stole it! He must have waited until I wasn’t looking, when I was busy with another dream, or looking absently out the window, perhaps, when he snatched it. Yes. On her way out of the shelter she spied a plastic utensil set of knife, fork spoon and napkin, wrapped in clear plastic, one of several in a pile set aside for dinner, and took one. As she stuffed it into the pocket of her skirt she told herself she need to begin anew, assembling a survival kit.

The day passed slowly. She sat on a bench or two and returned again and again to her loss, with each change of scenery. What could she do? Could she lodge some complaint? Did she remember who the driver was? Mickey? Jones?

Fretful, she returned to the shelter and picked at her dinner, determined to confront the driver. But by the time she boarded the bus that night, she was too -5-

JANE FRANK tired for conversation. All she could do was take the same seat and look under it, even though she knew she would be disappointed. She carefully tore open the top of her plastic dinner set and withdrew the knife, letting the rest of the packet drop to the floor. Holding it tightly in her right hand she again briefly considered getting up and walking forward, to tell the driver about her misfortune. Perhaps the bus company had a “lost and found” department? But the bus lurched forward and the thought flew from her mind as quickly as it had come.

Later, well after she had begun her second round-trip, when the white man came to sit by her, she didn’t waste time. “Where is my purse, you shithead,” she hissed, as he adjusted his pants, sticky from his sweat. He looked at her in amazement. And then smiled. It was the moment she had been waiting for. A smile of tolerance, for a little old negro lady on a bus, and she wasn’t having any of it. She fixed him suddenly with a sly, coy smile in return, and watched as his eyes traveled with her left hand, as she knew they would, when she drew it to the top of her faded blouse and slowly undid the top button. But there was no expression on her face, when she asked again, impatiently, for her purse.

“You took it,” she declared, accusingly. When I wouldn’t give you what you wanted, you took it, instead.” His grin looked feral in the soft bluish light of the bus’s interior.

It was late, sometime after midnight, and there were only four to five passengers, all of them sitting up front, impatient to be home. Not like her and her companion, sitting well to the back so as to remain unobserved. “Look down over here,” she commanded, grabbing at his tie with her left hand, and pulling his torso, taking him so much by surprise that he couldn’t help but let her hand have its way. When his head was almost at her knee she quickly drew the serrated side of the plastic blade across the middle of his neck, from the front to the side, as fiercely as she was able. One clean motion, with all the force she had in her.

The blood spurted into her lap almost immediately, and then into the back of the seat in front of them, as he raised his head. His eyes open in confusion and pain, they looked at each other.

He tried to get his right hand up to his neck, but her left hand still had hold of his striped tie, and she wasn’t letting go. The fabric was getting slippery but her grasp was secure, she wrapped the slim piece of cloth around her finger -6-

JANE FRANK and made a fist. The blood looked black in the soft blue light, less threatening somehow. The man’s body slumped and when she let go of the tie he crumpled forward. He was not a big man and slid easily off the seat into the aisle when she pushed him. She smoothed her skirt. It looked dark and wet, that’s all. And the next morning, after the dream had gone, she’d get off the bus and ask at the shelter for another set of clothes. Or, maybe they’d be dry by then. Or maybe none of that was true, if it was a dream, she mused, maybe it would be just as it was before. Only she wouldn’t have her purse. She was momentarily confused. When she looked sideways at the closed window on the other side of the bus she could almost see a reflected face, but it wasn’t her.

The bus rocked as it came to the next stop, and the night passed. She decided her next dream would be less demanding. She looked dreamily out the window at the lightening sky, paying little attention to the shuttered stores and dark cars and wondered how close she was to the end of the line.

Copyright © Jane Frank 2009

Watch for more of Jane’s fiction and the return of her regular collecting column in future issues. Be sure to check out her WoW-Art site if you are interested in collecting original fantasy, sf and horror paintings!

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B. A. BOSAIYA

B

A. Bosaiya is a self-taught, award-winning, internationally recognized and exhibited fine art photographer who specializes in large format photographs of unusual subjects. “I enjoy finding the beauty in the overlooked and discarded, exploring the extraordinary world that is all around us every day. The world is still mysterious and full of surprises; I hope to help people rekindle that sense of wonder.” Bosaiya’s first book of photography Here There Be Dragons, available from Amazon.com and others, includes a foreword by photographic luminary and master printer Dr. Tim Rudman.

In Your Dreams I Am No Longer Afraid : Copyright © B. A. Bosaiya 2005

About the Angels and Insects collection …

My photography is deeply rooted in my love of cinema: Watching Sinbad do battle with saber-tooth tigers in Sinbad and the Seven Seas, the giant -8-

B. A. BOSAIYA

You Will Keep Your Promise In The End : Copyright © B. A. Bosaiya 2006

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B. A. BOSAIYA Harryhausen monsters which inhabited Mysterious Island, Mario Bava’s psychedelic Hercules in the Underworld and the endless onslaught of anthropomorphized denizens of Monster Island sent by Toho to wreak havoc on a curiously unsuspecting Tokyo kept my youthful Sunday afternoons occupied with imaginative flights of fancy. At the same time my father encouraged me to watch movies that were beyond my comprehension at the time and I was steeped in Northern European existentialism, French avantgarde and American noir. Then again he also took me to see Jaws while vacationing in Montauk one summer.

La Resa Dei Conti : Copyright Š B. A. Bosaiya 2005

It may seem odd to make the jump from films steeped in the human condition to photos of magnified insects, but for me the connection is real. I approach my subjects with the intent of conveying all of the emotion and - 10 -

B. A. BOSAIYA

Under The Softest Fur Lies The Sharpest Of Bones : Copyright Š B. A. Bosaiya 2005

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B. A. BOSAIYA expression that I can conjure from them. For me they are creatures of great feeling and contemplation, at least on the surface. The subjects, insects instead of human beings, provide me a way of exploring the ideas and emotions that can be difficult when doing portraiture with a human face – people tend to get caught up in the specifics of the person.

The Pride Of Hephaestus Will Be Our Undoing : Copyright © B. A. Bosaiya 2005

Working in black and white allows me to explore these ideas in an even more dissociated way. With the absence of color comes the appreciation of tone, line and form. The same subjects are rendered differently. In my photographic subjects I use a similar approach – abstracting aspects of humanity through the looking glass of other-worldly creatures, hopefully achieving something more human than human, as it were.

Of course on an empathic level no one is going to confuse one of my photos - 12 -

B. A. BOSAIYA with a still of Klaus Kinski from Aguirre, but my goal – what I strive for, is to capture with my view camera the depth and intensity of the human spirit that Werner Herzog seems to so effortlessly capture with his cinema lens. I’m hoping that the pathos I intend comes through on some level.

The World is Cruel and Full of Broken Promises : Copyright © B. A. Bosaiya 2005

For me there is the idea, the drive, to take things that are almost universally considered unattractive and to turn them into something that can be seen as beautiful. This collection gives me an opportunity to share that view. There is the old optical illusion of a woman which from one angle looks like an old crone but when flipped around mentally looks like a beautiful young woman.

My job is take the old crone and show people how to see the beautiful young woman. She’s there, you just have to know how to look right. From a certain angle and in a certain light all things are beautiful.

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B. A. BOSAIYA

I Have Given You Everything But Still You Want More : Copyright Š B. A. Bosaiya 2006

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B. A. BOSAIYA Equally important to me is what I allude to in my artist statement about the disappearance of mystery from the world. From a young age I took a keen interest in the sciences and could name a line of plastic dinosaurs two rooms long before I could say a proper sentence and I could identify constellations and solar systems before I could cross the street on my own. I studied the sciences all my life and enjoyed the act of classifying and categorizing things in the natural world. As time went on I had a growing feeling inside me that every time I learned something’s name, learned about the species and where it was from, where it fit in with the rest of the animal or plant kingdom, all of the details that you can find in so many books, documentaries and even trading cards, that some small part of my world disappeared forever.

Darkness Falls Like A Shroud Across Your Past : Copyright Š B. A. Bosaiya 2006

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B. A. BOSAIYA I saw the world around me and felt like the mystery that used to exist when both the world and I were young was slipping away like grains of sand through my fingers. There were no unicorns in enchanted glades like in the books I read as a child. There were no gnomes living in toadstools, no sprites in the deep forest nor dragons deep in the sea. Everything in the world had been organized, categorized and put in scientifically proper hierarchical order.

When I made that realization I felt as if I had finally lost touch with the innocence and wonder of childhood. I had raced so far and fast to become grown-up that I had lost all sense of wonder.

Our Love Will Hold True Forever, Do Not Bury Me Yet : Copyright Š B. A. Bosaiya 2006

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B. A. BOSAIYA The first time my children stood and leaned against a tree, feeling the bark under their hands and gazing up and realizing just how BIG those things really were... that was a profound thing for me to witness. To a child the head of a dandelion is not an indication that more weeding needs to be done, rather it is a magical glimpse into the world of the unknown. I felt like I desperately wanted to recapture that feeling. Once I realized what I was missing I was able to touch part of it, it wasn’t gone forever, just buried under a ever thickening layer of jaded dust in need of a good cleaning. These photos help to bring back that sense of wonder for me.

When you look at the creatures in the photos, and they are actual photos of real things - not paintings like on the covers of the dime-store sci-fi and fantasy books I used to lose myself in, and you can see them staring right back into your eyes, those creatures of myth and legend are real. They are inhabiting the world with us. We are not the lone masters of the world, we share it with many other wondrous beings. These photos provide an immediate and accessible window into that world that used to exist for me as a child.

In retrospect exploring the themes of human emotion – particularly sadness and isolation, through the black and white photography of insects doesn’t seem like such a stretch.

Most of my subjects are victims of my front porch light, its bright glow a siren song to the sailors of the night air. Others are found on the dusty, ill-lit, spider-patrolled windowsills of my back steps. Their lifeless bodies are gathered periodically and I begin each photo session by picking through to find the subjects that stand out most to me – sometimes the specimens are perfectly preserved, other times there is more missing than present. I do almost no pre-planning of my photos; rather I find a subject, examine it to find its personality, then place, light and photograph it. The entire process is selfevident and almost automatic, as if the subjects are telling me what to do; I merely facilitate their spectral will. It is very rare for me to use a subject again in more than one photo, although a few of them have shown up repeatedly.

All of my photos are shot on a custom-modified Sinar large format camera using Polaroid sheet film. The ability to see the subject magnified on the ground glass is truly amazing and infinitely helpful. The large format movements allow me to control all aspects of focus and I make considerable use of those movements. The Sinar cameras in particular have the excellent - 17 -

B. A. BOSAIYA ability to easily make the fine adjustments that are so necessary to macro photography. The instant proofing of the Polaroid positive gives immediate feedback and allows me to easily catalog my collections. The slow Polaroid negative is nothing short of beautiful to work with. I have tried using other film in the past but refuse to use anything else until there is no alternative. The world of fine art photography will suffer a great loss should that film be discontinued.

I hope you have enjoyed looking at these photos as much as I have enjoyed making them. You can find more images on my websites at www.bosaiya.com and www.angelsandinsects.com.

The Revision of History : Copyright Š B. A. Bosaiya 2005

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BOB LOCK

I

hate this. I’ve always been a recluse and social interaction doesn’t appeal to me at all, but because of my overwhelming urge to write I’ve been dragged into a meeting which I cannot avoid. Primarily I have written purely for myself, call it an outlet, a safety valve, a need to express myself. If asked to explain why I write I’d probably say it was all of those things. Nevertheless, I didn’t expect any of my little tales of horror to become best-sellers, but they have, and therein resides my predicament. I have to meet some of my readers. They belong to a book club whose preferred genre is horror, my forte. I’m told by my agent that they even role-play some of the characters within their favourite stories. They have an annual election by their members to choose an honorary member, a writer, and this year wish to elect me into their little circle, their little ‘sect’ – as my agent says they like to be called. The word ‘sect’ doesn’t bode well for me and I wonder what sort of idiots they are and what I’m being dragged into.

Although I’ve made numerous excuses I’ve finally had to acquiesce and agree to an evening of book signing, discussion and of course, the obligatory wine and cheese. At a push I think I can manage the signing, perhaps even a short discussion, but wine and cheese? I think not.

‘The car is prepared and waiting, sir.’ Rufus, my driver, said.

I glanced through the shuttered windows at the darkening sky; rain distorted the yellow glare of the streetlights giving the world outside a surreal feel to it. I shrugged off a shiver that crept down my spine and turned to Rufus.

‘Let’s get it over and done with then, eh, Rufus?’

‘It won’t be all that bad, sir. I’m sure of it.’ Rufus replied, smiling reassuringly.

‘Nice try, Rufus.’ I said harshly.

He looked away, his large shoulders hunched up around his thick neck, before replying, ‘sorry, sir. I was only trying to help.’

‘Forget it. Just be ready for when I can’t take anymore and have to flee the building through a window.’

‘I’m positive it won’t come to that...’ he stopped himself when he saw my face. ‘Yes, sir.’

‘Right, let’s get moving.’ I said and walked out the door with Rufus in pursuit.

The rain battered the roof of the car and in my mind’s eye I saw it as if - 19 -

BOB LOCK thousands of manic elves were repairing little boots on its surface. A standard writer’s curse... a vivid imagination. A rumble of thunder was preceded by a staccato of lightning which took me back for a moment to another time, another place. Rufus glanced at me in the rear view mirror and I nodded to him just as my stomach rumbled almost as loud as the thunder.

‘Did you get some fresh food in?’ I asked.

‘I was hoping to go shopping tonight, sir. We do have some produce in the deep freeze, however.’

I frowned, ‘you know how I feel about frozen food.’

‘I’m sorry, sir. If you like I could probably find something fresh whilst you are at the meeting, if you so wish.’

‘Rufus, perhaps you didn’t understand me when I said to be ready for when I need to leave. Must I keep on repeating myself?’

‘Oh... I apologize, sir. Of course, I’ll be waiting outside with the engine running.’

I nodded again and sighed. Finding and training a good manservant nowadays was a pain in the arse. The big man had his faults but I just didn’t want to go through all the trouble of looking for a replacement for him. He was dedicated, obviously, but was not the sharpest knife in the kitchen drawer.

The car slowed to a crawl and finally stopped outside a dark imposing building that nestled down the end of a quiet cul-de-sac in an upper-class area of the town.

‘Homely,’ I said, peering out at the red-brick castellated edifice that sported towers and, I’m sure, a gargoyle or two.

‘Very ‘Gothic’, sir.’ Rufus remarked.

I raised an eyebrow, ‘not bad for a book club.’

‘I understand they are not your usual common or garden type of book club, sir.’

‘Indeed,’ I replied as Rufus exited the car and made his way around to open my door. Security lights flashed on and illuminated us. I turned my face away; the harsh brightness almost blinded me. Then I heard the car door open and Rufus assisted me out. The rain had stopped and there was a clean, washed smell in the air. As we entered the wood-covered porch area the huge oak door swung open noiselessly. I felt disappointed. A door such as this should have - 20 -

BOB LOCK screeched warningly at anyone who dared cross its threshold. A portly man with a handlebar moustache and sporting a smoking jacket and matching smoking hat, set at a jaunty angle upon his head, stepped out and proffered a hand, reluctantly I shook it.

‘Mr. Fuseno, a pleasure to meet you, sir. And all the more pleasure because we understand how privileged we are that you should accept our invitation.

When the election results came in on who was to be our honorary member this year I must confess I did not imagine you would accept. My name is Talbot, Richard Talbot. I’m the chairman. Welcome to my humble abode.’

‘Good to meet you, Mr. Talbot. Please, call me Art. I usually don’t attend functions such as this. However, my agent explained how very important it was for your ‘sect’, I believe you call it?’ I replied and thought to myself, plus the nagging would never stop if I didn’t make this one concession.

Behind him I could see a group of fans milling around expectantly, all of them in various modes of fancy-dress, ghouls, vampires, mummies, zombies and werewolves. I’m sure I even spotted a Van Helsing amongst them. My trepidation grew like a rampant tapeworm coiled around my innards. As if confirming my nervousness, my stomach rumbled again. Talbot raised a bushy eyebrow.

‘Hungry, Art? Well, I think you’ll find our selection of cheeses and water biscuits extremely appealing. And one of our esteemed members owns a number of wine shops so we are well look after in that respect.’

I tried to smile but had a feeling it didn’t turn out well, especially when Talbot’s quizzical look morphed into a frown. He shook himself slightly and stood to one side.

‘Please, come in. Let me introduce you to our members.’

I waved a hand towards Rufus who returned to the car. Upon stepping inside the large hallway the door closed behind me with an ominous thump. It sounded like the closing of a tomb. I swallowed noisily and felt myself being ushered into the middle of the awaiting group who now broke into a badly co-ordinated round of applause.

‘Thank you for having me this evening. I hope I live up to your expectations.’ I said raising a hand in the hope that they would stop the embarrassing ovation. As I’ve mentioned, I am a private individual. I do not like the harsh glare of the limelight upon my person; I much prefer the - 21 -

BOB LOCK tranquillity of shadows, of quietness, of solitude.

‘But we haven’t ‘had’ you yet. However, have patience. The evening is young.’ Said a tall, graceful woman dressed in black. Her skin was pale and the paleness was accentuated by the dark ruby of her lips. Those lips parted now to reveal a pretty smile punctuated by sharp canine fangs. She was dressed as a vampire. She looked pretty good, I had to admit. Her hand was cold to the touch as she took mine and escorted me into the vast library which led off from the hallway. A female mummy extricated a digital camera from within the folds of her bandages and I asked her to stop. I do not allow myself to be photographed.

‘We’ve noticed there are no photographs of you on your books or on your website. You keep yourself to yourself, Art. Oh, and don’t let Mrs.Easterby intimidate you. She may seem a vamp but she has a good heart. Igor should know; he sewed it in himself. Didn’t you, Igor?’ Talbot said with a smile and a nod towards a hunch-backed individual with a face that was pock-marked and covered in a crisscross network of fine scars. Igor gave a toothless smile in return and I watched fascinated as a thin dribble of spittle ran from the side of his mouth and onto his black jacket. These people are certainly fanatics, I thought.

Finally, ensconced in the library, sunk into the depths of an old leather armchair, with Mrs. Easterby perched provocatively on one of its arms, the book signing began. Zombies shambled up to me with crud-encrusted fingers gripping my latest edition; ‘To Quaff the Blood’ and I dutifully penned my signature on the flyleaf, in red ink, of course. These were followed by the werewolves, the ghouls and ghosties, the mummies, all the various other characters, until finally the vampires. Mrs. Easterby was the last to proffer a book.

‘And, Mr. Easterby? Is he here with you tonight?’ I asked as I scrawled my signature across the page.

She lowered her eyelids, ‘he’s passed on, I’m afraid.’ She looked both sultry and demure. I found it a tempting combination.

‘Oh, I’m sorry.’ I said, perhaps with not a lot of conviction.

She smiled her little fangs at me again, ‘thank you.’

My stomach rumbled a reply. I apologised, ‘I should have eaten before coming out.’

- 22 -

BOB LOCK ‘No apology necessary, we could dine now if you wish or would you prefer our question and answer session first?’

I shrugged, they could binge on their cheese and crackers if they so wished.

I certainly would not. I was sure I could wait until reaching home before appeasing my hunger and quietening my grumbling insides.

‘Whichever, I’m afraid I don’t eat cheese and all wine disagrees with my system, but you go ahead, unless of course you’d prefer the questions and answers first?’

Everyone seemed anxious to pick my brains and so they formed a semicircle in front of me and began firing the usual queries. How did I start writing?

Why did I pick vampirism as my particular favourite sub-genre of horror to write about? When was my next book due out? Boring... all questions that had been asked and answered before on my website. Then the young girl from before, the one dressed as a mummy and armed with the camera, asked me something different.

‘Mr. Fuseno, why are your revenants impervious to the usual apotropaics that are used to combat them, such as garlic and holy water?’

I pondered for a moment before replying with a shrug, ‘probably because during my studies I found no conclusive proof that such wards worked against vampires.’

She nodded, ‘so, you think that vampires once truly existed?’

Again I paused for a moment and then answered, ‘I’m sure of it. There is too much that can be called ‘coincidental information’ in circulation to just consign vampirism to the file marked urban legend. Too many unanswered questions. And what makes you think that they existed only in the past, as your use of ‘once’ seems to imply?’

She smiled now and I noticed that she too had a set of small fangs which was unusual in a mummy, ‘oh, I don’t think they only existed in the past. As you say there is more than enough information in circulation to raise questions.

Take for example The Highgate Cemetery incident in 1970 where the graveyard was said to be haunted by a vampire and a nest discovered and destroyed.

Then, more recently in 2005, when police denied that a vampire had been roaming the streets of Manchester and had attacked and bitten quite a large number of people before mysteriously disappearing.’

I nodded, ‘you are very well informed. I know of those cases too.’

- 23 -

BOB LOCK ‘Do you think stakes, crosses and mirrors work? What about direct sunlight?’ She asked.

‘There are many myths surrounding vampires, but I’ve usually found some element of truth in the vampire’s abhorrence of stakes, crosses and mirrors.

However, I believe it is not just direct sunlight that they avoid. Harsh lighting can be detrimental too. Many think that photosensitivity is just one symptom of vampirism. Porhyria could be another, where the condition is treated by intravenous haem. It’s suggested that the consumption of large amounts of blood may result in haem being transported somehow across the stomach wall and into the bloodstream. Therefore vampires could merely be sufferers of porphyria and are only seeking to replace haem and alleviate their symptoms.’

‘Interesting, thank you.’ She replied.

I nodded and waited for another question, none came. From the corner of my eye I saw Van Helsing approach with a tray, at the same time someone behind my chair put their hands upon my shoulders and then from hidden slots in the arms of the chair sprang two stainless steel bands which pinned my arms down securely. I made to rise but Talbot, whose hands it was that pressed firmly on my shoulders, said quietly into my ear, ’now, Art, don’t struggle. We just want to initiate you into our little ‘sect’ there’s nothing to worry about. I promise. All is not as it seems, just go along with the ritual and all will be fine.’

Van Helsing stopped in front of me and lowered the tray to my eye level and there upon it sat a crystal goblet brimming with a dark red liquid and a silver dagger. Igor limped to his side and with a shaking hand lifted the goblet up. A line of red ran down his wrist and he set the goblet down again and licked the liquid away with a white-coated tongue.

‘AB Negative, a rare and delicious nectar. Reserved only for our elected honoraries.’ He said. His tongue, now a dark pink colour, darted around his toothless gums as if seeking out the last remaining drops of blood.

As Talbot and Van Helsing held my head, Igor retrieved the goblet again and drew it close to my mouth. Mrs. Easterby watched fascinated and licked her lips hungrily. The girl in the mummy costume took a photograph, the flash momentarily confused me and I blinked rapidly. When I refocused I noticed she was looking open-mouthed at the camera’s little display. As she began to say something the goblet reached my lips and I spluttered.

‘Don’t make me do this!’

- 24 -

BOB LOCK Blackness overwhelmed me.

Rufus nodded his head peacefully as Albinoni’s Adagio in G Minor played softly in the warm interior of the car and his thick fingers tapped in time upon the steering wheel. A vibration in his pocket startled him out of his reverie and he quickly switched off the radio and answered the insistent mobile phone.

‘Hello, sir.’ He said frowning.

‘You’d better come in and help me. I can’t move.’

Rufus’s frown deepened, ‘immediately sir. Will there be any ‘problems’?’

‘No, just get your arse in here, quickly.’

Rufus nodded, ‘on my way.’ He exited the car and looked up and down the street. The place was deserted; a light rain had begun to fall again and had probably persuaded those who had no necessity to leave the warm cocoon of their homes not to go out into the drizzle-filled night. He approached the large wooden entranceway, checked no one was watching him again and then gave the sturdy oak door an incredible kick with his right foot. The door burst inwards, ripped off its huge hinges, its lock shattered into many pieces. As he strode across the imposing hall he noticed a pool of red seeping from under a door. ‘Oh no...’He said softly.

The door to the library opened slowly and I was relieved to see Rufus enter. I had no need to explain anything to him. A brief look around was explanation enough. Corpses littered the place like huge red leaves that fall before winter’s cold embrace. Blood splattered the ceiling, walls, furniture and drapes. It lay in coagulating pools and small rivulets, but most of it lay nestled within me. I had gorged and gorged and gorged. I felt ashamed of myself lying there on the floor like an enormous tick which had consumed the best part of an elephant.

Oh, the warning signs had been there. The stomach rumbling. The knowledge that only frozen corpses were waiting for me when I got home. But, I ignored them, and I knew I mustn’t blame Rufus. This wasn’t his fault, it was my own lack of self control that had me bloated and bursting at the seams upon the scarlet-soaked floor. Mrs. Easterby’s eyes looked accusingly at me from the leather chair’s arm and I groaned, reached over, and popped them into my mouth. They ruptured between my jaws and the vitreous humour trickled down my blood-soaked throat.

- 25 -

BOB LOCK ‘Get me up and out, Rufus, before I explode.’

‘May I ask what happened, sir?’ He enquired as he lifted me effortlessly to my swollen feet; endowing Rufus with the superhuman powers, that only a vampire of my age and lineage can give, has its benefits.

‘I knew it would be a mistake. Every time I think I have blended in the same thing happens. They even mentioned Highgate and Manchester, damn it!

Perhaps that is when I should have left, but, I imagine my control had already waned too much by then. I should have eaten before leaving home! However, it was when they tried to get me to drink that ridiculous glass of burgundy, and that young girl took my picture, that I just saw red.’ I waved an arm around at the room, an arm so engorged with blood it had to be three times its normal size. My suit sleeve hung in dark red tatters upon it. Rufus took the camera from the girl’s hand, looked at the display and threw the dismembered hand onto the leather sofa.

‘A picture of an empty chair.’ He said.

‘That’s what she said just before I drained her.’ I replied and burped heartily. ‘Well I won’t have to feed for a couple of weeks I suppose. That is one on the ‘plus’ side.’

As Rufus helped me out of the house he asked, ‘are there going to be many on the ‘negative’ side, sir?’

I would have shrugged if I could have, ‘probably. We’ll have to move again no doubt. I won’t be able to write anymore. And I’m running out of damn anagrams of my bloody name. A pity really, I’d grown quite fond of Art Fuseno.’

Copyright © Bob Lock 2009

Bob has released a FREE novella, A Cloud Of Madness, using the cool ‘Flip Book’ format at Issuu, so take a look when you get the chance. Also remember to visit his websites and blog here ... www.scifi-tales.com www.flamesofherakleitos.com bob-lock.blogspot.com - 26 -

TONY LEE

V

iewing the plethora of electronic media (radio, television, home movies, voice mail, Internet chat-rooms, web-casts, video blogs, etc), from the SF angle of ghosts-in-the-machinery, turns uncanny intrusions from spirit realms into a kind of disturbing and menacing virtuality that’s often in sharp conflict with rationalistic perspectives of the world. This is certainly a fascinating and recurring theme, explored in various screen guises from earliest examples like Nigel Kneale’s seminal Stone Tape, continuing with the likes of Tobe Hooper’s visceral spook–fest Poltergeist, Eric Weston’s low-budget macabre horror Evilspeak, Wes Craven’s techno–phobic Shocker, and Geoffrey Sax’s eerie White Noise, not to mention Japan’s original– classics Ring and Pulse, and their numerous remakes or imitators of variable quality.

Takashi Miike’s One Missed Call (aka: Chakushin ari) hops onto the supernatural-digital bandwagon, adding premonitory communications, and much more besides, to existing subgenre basics. For Japan, the world’s most gadget-consumer society, fears of technology have particularly insidious relevance. A belligerent TV reporter catches the weird news stories, and she wants to bring in an exorcist to help solve the rash of mysterious ‘suicides’.

The fatalities all received voice mail warnings from their ‘future’ selves. But what has dysfunctional motherhood of ‘Munchausen syndrome by proxy’, which apparently resulted in the death of the next victim’s asthmatic daughter, got to do with all the creepy killings?

Miike applies considerable intelligence and storytelling nous to compelling themes as physical, virtual, historical and speculative worlds of modernity overlap and converge in a twisty narrative where playback of old home movies on video is not just a window on the past, it’s also just like summoning the dead.

Perhaps, it’s no wonder electronic devices form a conduit for invasive - 27 -

TONY LEE supernatural threat entering the filmic head-space giving the ‘spirit of radiowaves’ urgent new meaning, especially in a medium-in-the-media frenzy where a live-TV séance and death-watch game-show contribute further grotesquery to explorations of existing uncanny lore and imagery from Ring and The Grudge films.

Here, the bewildering complexities of life generate helplessness, so fatalism and bleak pre-destinies of confrontational horror seem like unavoidable doom in a nightmarish sequence where reverse–motion clock hands are like blades scissoring back through time, revealing a hysterical tragedy that was just bound to happen, sooner or later…

Excuse me, there’s another caller. Sorry, but I have to take this… Sequel picture One Missed Call 2 is directed by Renpei Tsukamoto and it appeared contemporaneously with a short-lived Japanese TV series, now followed by Manabu Asou’s trilogy closer, One Missed Call Final (which I haven’t seen, but it’s due on DVD, from Tokyo Shock, on 28th April 2009). Here’s the same kind of viral death sentences, played out a year later. A man answers his daughter’s mobile phone and, predictably, dies in her place.

The same ring-tone heralds a visit by murderous powers from beyond. The mystery-killer’s crime-scene ‘signature’ of coal dust replaces the red sweets of the first movie. A subplot examines psychically-shared pain and trauma of twin sisters. Look, there’s a female demon crawling out of a sack.

Predestined deaths, and countdowns to such ends, reminds viewers about our own mortality in references to common SF notions of time running out. The folklore of gloom under scrutiny derives from acts of cruelty, usually perpetrated by extremely superstitious nutcases, and it marks the return of the - 28 -

TONY LEE repressed all over again. Without the surreal imagination of Miike at the helm, this sequel is nothing more than a repetitive slasher flick, with rather cheap scares, and only an unfortunately crude blurring of reality and fantasy. It’s rather less than gripping entertainment, overall. During the unsubtle explications, tiredly routine methods of terminal dispatch, and predictable revelations, I somehow found time to wonder if the remake was ever pitched to Orange advertising executives.

US remake One Missed Call is from director Eric Valette (make of Maléfique), and stars Shannyn Sossamon (great in afterlife road–movie Wristcutters: A Love Story) as heroine Beth, and Edward Burns (A Sound Of Thunder, based on Ray Bradbury’s story) as detective Jack Andrews, and it manages to reduce the gruesome shocks and metaphysical awe of Miike’s original to just another occult thriller centred on police investigations into mysterious deaths. Aided by a competent supporting cast (Azura Skye, Ana Claudia Talancon, Jason Beghe, and the genre regular Ray Wise) attractive leads ensure this slickly produced film is never boring, yet it offers nothing much that we haven’t already seen done before a dozen times. The accent is on visually polished, weird hallucinations to generate atmosphere, with spiritual disturbances provided by jittery–CGI displays, focused on decay or transformation. There are notably effective character cameos, but the film’s energetic pace and timetabled coherence is achieved at the expense of those unpredictable frissons which make any drama concerned with irrational fears exceptional rather than merely average. It’s good yet far from perfect, though at least this is a much better example of mobile–phone terrors than Johannes Roberts’ dreary When Evil Calls.

Copyright © Tony Lee 2009

- 29 -

JOHN T. CARNEY

I

begin this tale with some trepidation as the truth of it has caused me much anguish and pain. Yet it shall and must be written for the sake of what little attention it may get and for the sake of those who come in contact with the notorious DeSanto House.

It was sunset when I fitted the key in the lock of that accursed house and entered the narrow, shadow-hung hallway. Shadows hung the stairwell, crept along the rafters, and shrouded the floor. Mildew infested the walls and floor.

The house was rank with its stench.

Some said, then, that I was a fool to have bought the house, but the price was cheap, and the realtor had insisted that the place could be fixed up at a minimal sum. Ellen and I could easily scrape off the many patches of mold and mildew that grew along the floors and walls like a pestilence. It made me shudder to look at them. And the more I looked, the more that pestilence took on the semblance of some cancerous disease that riddled the house with contagion.

With an uneasy shrug I dismissed these thoughts and threw my hat and coat across the nearest sofa. Ellen and the kids would be along tomorrow.

There was no sense in thinking such depressing thoughts.

I suddenly caught myself thinking out loud. I say I caught myself, because I heard my own voice come echoing back to me from empty rooms beyond the stairs. It was a vague and hollow echo, so vague that it seemed not my voice at all, but the voice of something equally vague.

Again, I shrugged off these disturbing thoughts and set about exploring the house as I’d done when the realtor had first shown me the place. So long as I kept my mind busy, I knew that I could keep these disturbing thoughts at bay.

The first floor consisted mainly of a living room, bedroom, kitchen, and study, all leading off from the main hallway. At the end of the hall a staircase climbed up into darkness. I set about putting light bulbs in their various sockets in each room. Then, I returned to the stairs and set a bulb in the socket above, having turned on all the lights downstairs.

Slowly, I ascended the stairs. A sudden cold current of air chilled my entire body. I crossed the landing as a great mass of air swept past my feet like an arctic wind. I turned, nearly falling, to see what was rushing down the stairs. It was a cat.

Sighing with relief, I let the poor thing out, and switched on the lights in - 30 -

JOHN T. CARNEY the hallway and the light on the stairs. I, then, headed upstairs. There, in one of the four bedrooms on that level, a shutter creaked in the wind just as the realtor had left it earlier in the day “to air the place out” as he had put it. I closed the window and the shutter, and, and as I did so, a sudden hush stilled the crickets outside. The house seemed as still as a tomb. An electric tension hung the air.

A sense of utter evil and madness overtook the atmosphere of the house.

I turned to the door and sensed it strongly, as if some nightmare were ascending the stairs, as intangible as the wind.

I ran to the door and slammed it shut, thanking God that there was something with which to bolt it. The evil presence drew closer. A hulking shade appeared beneath the door, the shadow of a thing that belonged in neither heaven nor hell. Oh God, what crypt of blasphemy had unleashed it?

The latch shot up and down in a convulsive movement. Again and again, until the very sweat of terror dripped down my face, cold and icy like the ragged moon. Then, the clawing began. The door was thick oak. The thing couldn’t possibly . . .! The clawing stopped abruptly. I heard a vague sound as of dead tissue being rubbed between two fingers. I clasped my hands together until they were white. Because it was sniffing, I tell you, sniffing at every aperture and contour of the door!

I awoke some hours later, dazed and confused, drained of energy, my body drenched with sweat. Whether I had passed out or slept, I knew not. All I knew was that “it” was gone.

I grabbed the pistol from my travel bag and pressed my ear to the door. I heard nothing but silence. I cocked the pistol and flung wide the door. The hallway was empty. Examining the door, I found no signs of disturbance.

There were no marks on the door; no shards of wood littered the floor. Cold bumps of horror went up my arm.

I found myself searching for some excuse, any excuse to explain away the events that had transpired. Or had it really happened at all?

I descended the stairs, thanking God that I’d had the foresight to turn the lights on beforehand.

I tried to dismiss my experience as a nightmare, a hallucination brought on by working too hard and worrying too much. Yet there seemed no solace in it.

Confused, I retired to a bedroom on the lower level which consisted of a canopied bed, a dresser, desk, sofa, and mirror. Gazing out the single window, - 31 -

JOHN T. CARNEY I saw the meadow and the night-hung trees beyond. With a shudder I tore myself away and went to bed, but not without carefully bolting the door.

Sleep had nearly overtaken me when my eyes locked wide open. I found myself staring at that draped window. Something loomed black and shapeless before the outer sill. With the blood pounding in my brain, I rose and walked towards the window like one possessed. The shadow shifted, moved. Ghastly eyes flared through the drapes. The smell of ooze and slime filled the room like that at the bottom of a lake. And, God, that tapping, that tapping on the cold and lifeless pane!

The shape began scratching at the pane as if to remove the caulk, howling and whining like an animal denied a feast of blood. With a crash I tripped over a chair and screamed into the living night. I turned towards the window. The drapes were flung to either side like rags; the window gaped its black maw to the stars. A naked, leprous blasphemy rushed back from the pane into the accursed night. Gasping in horror, I rushed across the room to shut and bolt the window when I saw it.

Across the meadow towards the woods, the thing loped wildly. Its gruesome, mud-caked head nodded beneath the moon, body stooped towards the earth, fleeing towards the night-black trees beyond the meadow.

An awful silence lingered in the hours afterwards, hours during which I could not, dared not sleep. Trickles of moonlight dragged their shrouds across the floor. The tattered moon fled through the gnarled clouds as the hours dragged mercilessly by. The house seemed to hold its breath under the black shroud of night as if awaiting my inevitable flight. And when the break of dawn came, I grabbed everything I owned and fled back to my wife and kids.

I write this manuscript with a full view of the sloping hills beyond the sanitarium. I have been here for some months now. The doctor said that I had contracted a strain of leprosy that he’d never heard of before. Yet they say it is healing. In a month or so, my wife and kids and I will move down by the sea.

The doctor says it will help my mind to recover. The doctor says I was in a fever that night I stayed in the DeSanto House and had imagined the whole scenario that I had frightened my wife with upon my sudden return that next morning.

I had been brought here for immediate medical care. I cannot say that I didn’t need it. It is said that the sea brings healing. I know that it will heal me also.

The doctor ventures no explanation as to how I could have caught the - 32 -

JOHN T. CARNEY leprosy. So this is my constant concern. Or shall I say terror? For I know that this is the curse, the curse of the leper, the horror that I envisioned loping into the trees beyond that accursed meadow.

So whenever the wind howls without and the tall pines sough in the wind; when the meadow looms vacant and forbidding in the far off hills; when black shadows drag their cloaks past my bolted door, my mind spawns again the evils of the night I spent in that hellhouse. Even now, those hideous memories come drifting back to torture me. Yet I know that I shall find rest in memory and dreams so long as I don’t SCREAM AGAIN! Copyright © John T. Carney 2009

John’s first book is now available, if you want to read more of his work ...

The Vampire Sonnets The clouds loom bleakly over an excavation being done somewhere in accursed Wallachia at the former domain of Vlad the Impaler. Miles Brandish, the archaeologist, and his companions, the Andersons, come upon an important find that will curse their lives and change their fates forever. That find, The Vampire Sonnets, is stolen by one of Brandish’s comrades, John Harrison, who flees the site with the Sonnets only to be pursued by the Andersons and their vampire slaves with designs on eventual world dominion and creating a superior vampire race out of the ashes of Vlad’s empire of horror.

Only Miles Brandish and his friends can stop them from attaining their evil designs.

Priced at a very affordable $13.95 per copy, the book is available from Amazon. Also included, is a section of about 50 sonnets on vampirism.

Guaranteed to horrify!

- 33 -

VINCENT CHONG

V

inny is pleased to announce that his new website design is now online. Be sure to check out the stunning new layout and new work on display.

Browse the galleries of his artwork and don’t forget prints can be ordered on request. Hang a few on your walls and be the envy of your friends!

GO TO www.vincentchong-art.co.uk

- 34 -

J. W. BENNETT

A

t the end of a long day, Barbara Overshaw liked nothing more than to stand at her office window and watch the sunset. The rays falling through the blinds, swirling with motes of LA pollution, seemed to kiss the drudgery from her flesh, washing away the insecurities spewed by her clients. Those clients – celebrities ranging from A to Z – would slump in the chair before her pinewood desk and drone out their prayers to popularity, imminent or faded, while Babs consoled them with the latest fashions, the latest advances in make up and hairstyle, tried and tested methods of grabbing attention. Images and concepts of how life could be.

She lived firmly in the realm of the possible and invited her clients there too.

Today had presented the same old challenges, in the same old various guises. A has-been rock star, fresh out of rehab (and judging by the redness around his eyes heading right back there), who couldn’t seem to grasp that as far as the world’s paparazzi was concerned, stonewashed jeans and bleach blond ponytails belonged strictly to the Palaeolithic Era, circa 1984. Then there was the up-and-coming actress with a slight speech impediment, which she had tried and failed to make ‘cute’. And not forgetting the prominent director who had an inexplicable aversion to toothpaste and a penchant for outsized toupees.

To each and every one, Babs offered the same no-nonsense advice, waved photographs under their noses, virtual mock-ups of how they might appear, if they would only learn to listen. Added to this was a plethora of dietary information, exercise regimes, where to go when you wanted to be seen – even fads in conversation for the more social among them.

“A hot topic yesterday,” Babs often warned, “is the car crash dinner party of tomorrow.”

Above all, Image was King, and Barbara Overshaw had certainly taken this philosophy to heart when first starting Medusa Consultants fifteen years ago.

Back then, she had ventured out with a dog-eared handful of makeover books, three suitcases full of slap, a permed head crammed with naivety that LA soon ground to cynicism under her heels and a lease on a small shop on Vine. Now Prada seemed like an old best friend, the perm was a hastily deleted memory and she rented a suite on the thirteenth floor of the Ellroy Plaza, a newly built office block bordering Sunset. These days, when she pealed off her recommendations, she did so without reserve or regret. She Knew What the - 35 -

J. W. BENNETT Hell She Was Talking About And She Was Not Afraid to Say It. Protests from her eminent patrons usually met with fiercer opposition.

She exhibited this stance for the public as well.

“The first thing you learn is that ugliness is stubborn,” she had told Cosmopolitan last summer, as the proud subject of a new featurette, “but that beauty and style are available to all. A blowtorch in the closet often means digits at the bar. In the modern world, skin deep is the only thing that matters.”

The latter became her company logo, printed in blue on her eggshellcoloured card: Medusa Consultants Because skin deep is the only thing that matters Her wares had rolled out. The Benjamins rolled in. The King had greased her purse far beyond her wildest and up until recently, only parking had put her nose job out of joint.

Standing at the window now, petrol-choked clouds dripping blood on the Pacific, Barbara reflected on the exchange that had led her up to this special night.

She had been at the spa with Barney, both of them face down on the towels, as two brawny masseurs pummelled liposuctioned flesh into painful new shapes.

“So you’re bored.” Barney pouted, aiming his favourite Bette Davis impression at the tiled floor. “I guess you’ve seen one loser too many. What you need is to shake things up a little.”

“You think?” Sarcasm was their modus operandi for most communication and Babs upheld the tradition. “Next you’re gonna tell me I need to see a shrink.”

“Don’t knock it, honey. The couch was like my home after Chad walked out.

Staying at the condo sucked warm shit. The scatter cushions were stuffed with bad memories.”

Barney was gay, and boy, did he let everyone know it. Neither his sexuality nor his screaming bugged Barbara overmuch; she was a 21st century gal, after all. The fact that Barney had tried to get fresh with three of her boyfriends – one successfully – kind of did when she thought about it. She propped herself up on her elbows, flapping away the masseur, took a long sip of juice and tried not - 36 -

J. W. BENNETT to think about it.

Bygones.

“The shrink will tell me that I’m overworked, overpaid and in desperate need of an unmarried fuck. There, I just saved myself five thousand dollars.”

“The same amount that Halle’s husband cost you in hotels.”

“Barney, you are such a bitch.”

“Takes one to know one, sister.”

Babs had given up on their chatter. Sometimes, the scripted nature of Barney’s comebacks stifled her, and she would simply fall silent, hating him but relishing the hate, basking in her secret animosity. She hung out with him mostly because she knew deep down she was better than him. Ok, so she was staring down the barrel of the big Five O and her silicone required some restoration, but she was still a woman, damn it, no matter how exhausted Barney made her feel.

On that day, however, Barney had surprised her. He’d lifted his chest from the fluffy white towels, the red streaks of a recent waxing bright between his pecs, and turned Bette Davis eyes in her direction.

“What you need is to branch the fuck out. Movie stars aren’t the only ones begging for a kick up the ass. Think widescreen. Outside the box. Think underground.”

“You want me to overhaul the Mafia? No thanks. I watch the Sopranos. I prefer my stilettos without concrete.” She sighed. “Things don’t feel the same lately, Barn. People look at me like I’m the one in need of an overhaul!”

“Whatever. Look, I met this guy in Venice. Claims to be a magician, though he gets a real hard on for necromancer. Uh huh, I do mean literally. I mentioned you at Paris’s party and he said he could chuck some business your way.

There’s a card in my jacket if you’re interested.”

“A magician?” Barbara’s Botox felt overstretched by scorn. “Oh lord, who the fuck are you fucking these days? Look, forget I said anything. I’m probably just paranoid.”

“No Babs, you’re totally not.” Barney grinned. “Everybody does hate you.”

She had croaked a laugh and flopped down on the towels again so Barney couldn’t see her roll her eyes. Nevertheless, she really was bored, and before they left the locker rooms, she had to admit she was intrigued.

- 37 -

J. W. BENNETT Three days later, a card tapping the edge of her desk, and a telephone call: “Rene Fields. Purveyor of the mystical and weird. How can I help?”

The accent was foreign. Russian maybe. Babs almost hung up. She didn’t do freak shows.

Nevertheless, nothing ventured…

“Hi. Babs Overshaw here. A friend told me you might have some busi-” “Ah, yes, the image consultant. I’m delighted you called. Your friend is quite the salesman.”

I’ll bet he is.

“He has his uses. We all need our little helpers.” She laughed, high and fake.

A chuckle replied. “Indeed. And as I assist my own master, I can only empathise. We all must…”

Master? Is this guy for real? “…for our sins.” Fields chattered on. “I hear that you’re the best there is.

That’s encouraging. My…the client in question has been…how shall I put it?

Out of action for a while… I suppose he desires some modernisation. A touch of updating, yes?”

Another fake laugh. “That’s the name of my game.”

“Excellent. If we are to go back into business, he’ll want to make the right impression.”

“Right impressions are my bread and butter.”

“Wonderful. But before we begin, there are certain… special requirements.

Of course we shall pay you well for your efforts.”

“Is your mas – the client a celebrity? A film star perhaps? Medusa has many an icon on her books so we can easily cater for -” “After a fashion. He isn’t exactly a fan of the movies. Should you meet, I beg you not to mention them. This is all part of the problem. He feels that the media have cheapened his image in the past few years. He dearly wishes to change the situation.”

“I understand. Bad scripts, bad reviews. Many have been there. Many come back.”

“Oh, well, he always comes back. That’s one thing you don’t need to worry about.”

“A Hollywood survivor, huh? This town sure can be tough.” Babs coughed.

“Companies like mine try to soften the blow.”

- 38 -

J. W. BENNETT “Then permit me to tell you our wants…”

He told her his wants. Her eyebrows arched, resisted by Botox.

“Mr Fields, I’m sorry, I don’t usually work after…”

He showed her the money.

“Nine pm Friday is fine. I look forward to meeting him.”

“Thank you. Most kind.” That foreign voice chuckled again. “It is heartening to know we can rely on you, Ms Overshaw. After all, our reputation is at stake.”

Sunset finally surrendered to dusk.

Babs rolled up the blinds and sparked a cigar, opening the window to fool the alarms. She exhaled at the skyscrapers, watching Friday’s darkness wage war with the neon and streetlights below. She took a deep breath and returned to her desk to open the wine when a gentle knocking echoed through the suite.

“May I come in?”

Babs flapped a hand.

“Of course, of course. You don’t need to ask. Please, have a seat.”

The Client gave her a peculiar look but gracefully entered, and she waved him over to the leather chair in front of her desk where he sat with a rustle of settling silk.

Babs popped the cork, poured out two glasses of red, offered him one.

The Client shook his head.

“I am not thirsty…”

“Suit yourself.” Babs lowered herself into her own chair, fingernails tapping the desk. She took a sip of wine, grimaced, and presented the man with a well-practised smile. “Oh dear,” she said, taking him in. “I see we have our work cut out, huh?”

He nodded, fidgeting.

“I’m afraid that modern trends have…rather passed me by.”

He had the same strange accent as Mr Fields. On hearing it again, she realised it was definitely not Russian. German? No, she didn’t think so. She cursed her bad geography. Europe had always confused her in school, especially the Eastern Bloc.

“Don’t apologise, please.” Babs smile was all collagen. “I may be blunt, but self-esteem is at the heart of my work. If you don’t feel any by the time we’re through, I’ll forfeit my fee.”

- 39 -

J. W. BENNETT “A generous offer, but you need not fear. My pride is unshakable.”

She snorted smoke. “Well, honey, to get to the nub of your problem, we’ll have to start on the outside.” Babs wiggled her fingers, a disgusted gesture aimed at his clothes. “Cocktail parties were big in the Seventies. So were beards.

But this is 2008.”

The Client gazed down at himself, pursing his sensuous lips.

“It is really that bad?”

“I’m afraid so. First of all, the cloak has to go. Camp. As. Christmas.” She paused, suddenly inquisitive. “You’re not gay, are you?”

The Client looked up, frowning.

“I am in a… pleasant enough mood.”

“Smart alec.” She laughed good naturedly, but her humour fell short when his eyes failed to catch the joke. She was already tired of waving her hands so she blurted instead: “A Friend of Dorothy’s!”

The Client shook his head, solemn as a grave.

“I know no one by that name.”

Babs sighed, giving up.

“Ok. Well…great, I suppose. Still, the cloak. It’s horrifying.”

In one swift motion, the Client was on his feet. Babs swore she never even heard the leather creak. The man spread his arms wide, revealing the lining inside.

“As intended!”

Another sip of wine muffled her groan. When she put the glass down, the man slowly lowered his arms, looking forlorn at her reaction.

“Listen, handsome. This is a bad start. If you want my help, you’re gonna have to drop the theatrics. It’s been a very long day and by now, I’m usually in bed with a Cuban – and I don’t mean a fucking cigar, you get me?” He obviously didn’t but she carried on regardless, stubbing out the smoke in the marble ashtray. “The cloak goes. And Jesus, your hair – is that Brylcream?”

“My people…we have our traditions. The cloak is a family heirloom.”

“That cloak will land your ass in jail. You’ll make the headlines for all the wrong reasons.”

The Client stared at her for a long moment. Neon from the building opposite flickered in his eyes. Red, black, red, black, red, black. Babs suddenly felt cold and reminded herself to turn off the air con when she left the office.

- 40 -

J. W. BENNETT If she left. Something told her this was going to be a long night.

To her surprise, the Client undid the brooch clipped at his throat and flung his cloak on the floor, his eyes never once leaving her face.

“You don’t get out much, do you?” Babs snapped. “Coats go on the rail over there – and most people enter my office by the door.”

The Client said nothing. Babs finished her wine.

Rattled, she got up and paced around the desk, stooping to pick up the offending item. As she drew closer to the man, a fine frost seemed to cover her skin, an earthy scent spiking her nostrils.

Brut, she thought, but I could be wrong.

Everything about the guy seemed so out of place. So…dated.

As she crossed the floor to where the rail stood, she spoke softly over her shoulder.

“Don’t worry about the tan though. Or lack of it. We have some pretty good parlours for that around here.”

She returned with a smile, hoping to lighten the mood.

The Client muttered something she did not catch.

“I’m sorry, what was that?”

He fixed her with his strange neon eyes.

“It concerned an old dog and new tricks.”

“Oh come off it.” She feigned a punch at his arm. “Have a glass of wine.

Relax. You’re not the first person to spout that trash. Hell, we all want to look good in front of the mirror. And the cameras, of course.”

The man shrugged, uncertain. Then he smiled. She dearly wished he hadn’t.

“Very well. I am a little thirsty, after all.”

It took a second for Babs to realise that the Client was not reaching for the wine.

Another sunset, another dusk. Across town, a doorbell chimed.

A minute later, the door swung wide.

“Babs! What a surprise!” A puzzled Bette Davis pout. “Do we have yoga on Sunday nights?”

Barney peered beyond her shoulder, as though expecting an army of instructors camped out on his lawn. His Calvin Klein dressing gown fluttered in the breeze, revealing his Day Glo swimming trunks. He sipped coyly at his - 41 -

J. W. BENNETT Bacardi and rum and tried to outstare Barbara’s sunglasses. Despite the heat, she had a chiffon scarf wrapped around her neck. Repelled by her pallid face – was that some new kind of beauty treatment? – he scratched at the streak marks between his pecs.

“Fucking stubble. I only had it waxed last week. What the hell am I paying those Mexicans for?”

Barbara grinned. He dearly wished she hadn’t.

“Best news! You’ll never need to wax it again.” The grin became a touch severe. “May I come in?”

Copyright © J. W. Bennett 2009

J. W. Bennett is a British author of dark fantasy and the occasional contemporary fable. His debut novel Unrequited (written under the name James Bennett) is presently available on Amazon and has been nominated for a Best Debut Fiction award by the Lambda Literary Foundation (US).

Visit the author's website for more info at : www.freewebs.com/waxlyrikal

NEW TITLES FOR 2009 SD Books Currently in Progress ...

Different Skins by Gary McMahon Against the Darkness by John L. Probert The Bell by Steve Lockley and Paul Lewis Lake Mountain by Steve Gerlach Raised in Evil by Neil Davies Slow Motion Wars by Andrew Hook and Allen Ashley Keep watching the website for further details! www.screamingdreams.com

- 42 -

DIRK HOLZENHAUER

D

irk Holzenhauer is a digital artist working with programs such as Poser, Terragen and Vue . He creates vivid scenes which combine many different and complex elements. Here are some examples of his work, along with a short interview. For more info be sure to visit his website.

Metro Station 2022 : Copyright © Dirk Holzenhauer 2009

Q : How long have you been working with digital graphics?

A : When I was young, that must be a hundred years ago, I created drawings with pencils and crayons. And then, I don´t know why, there was a loooong break and I had forgotten what it meant to be "creative". It was on September 2001 when I discovered, while surfing around, a website with some wonderful landscapes. But I asked myself: "O.K., it´s nice but who wants to see all these hills?" But then I recognized that these "photos" were pictures created with "Terragen"... and that was the beginning of the end.

Q : How did you get started?

A : I started with "Terragen" and I have been a long time a member of "terradreams.de". But I wanted to get some more, let´s say, "action" into the scenes and I was looking for a program which was able to create people. It took some time until I heard something about "Poser". I believed that this was the - 43 -

DIRK HOLZENHAUER

Back From Hell : Copyright © Dirk Holzenhauer 2009

- 44 -

DIRK HOLZENHAUER right stuff for me. My girlfriend said : "The King is dead, long live the King".

And so I tried to create pics with "Poser". My first community was "renderosity.de". A few years later I heard something about "Vue".

X-TC : Copyright Š Dirk Holzenhauer 2009

Q : Do you have any formal training?

A : No, not really. I only took a short look at the manuals or read a few tutorials.

But sometimes I believe that I could create better pictures if I knew more about all the "secrets" like python scripts, nodes, subsurface scattering and all the different options for atmospheres and so on. But I currently only use the standard features.

Q : What software do you normally use?

- 45 -

DIRK HOLZENHAUER

Different : Copyright © Dirk Holzenhauer 2009

- 46 -

DIRK HOLZENHAUER A : For my "dark", emotional, fantasy scenes it´s Poser. Now Poser 7. And for my landscapes and sunny scenes with flowers I use Vue 6 Studio. For the postwork there are different programs.

Let’s Make a Hallowdeal : Copyright © Dirk Holzenhauer 2009

Q : How much time is required for each picture?

A : Hmm, that´s difficult to answer. When I am creating a scene I do it over several days and it seems that the time is running without me noticing. The fastest pic took about 2 hours. But I think with the final rendering and postwork it´s usually about 8 or more hours.

Q : Can you give a brief overview of your technique?

A : I don´t believe that I have a "special" technique. Most of the time I start with - 47 -

DIRK HOLZENHAUER a lot of tests. When working with Poser I create the scene with all figures and objects but without a texture. So it reduces the render time. After that I make a new scene, take one character and play around with different textures, expressions, clothing and so on. If I believe I have found the right one I use it in the original scene. And then "there will be light". I have to tell you that takes a lot of time though.

Q : What is your favourite picture?

A : Oh, that always changes. At the moment my personal favourites (pieces that I created myself) are "I Don´t Remember" and "Different". But if you want to know my favourites from other artists, I can´t tell you. There are so many great and fantastic scenes that I sometimes believe that it will be better for me to stop with the graphics and use my computer for games instead!

Q : Where does your inspiration come from?

A : That´s different. Sometimes when I am listining to a song and hear a special lyric or only hear the title of a song. Sometimes when I get a new item.

Sometimes when playing around.

Q : Do you have any advice for aspiring artists?

A : I hear a lot of people say that creating pics with the help of computer programs is not art ... but don´t listen to them. Use your imagination, your fantasy and leave this world for a moment. Also, just play around with the programs instead of only reading the theory. Have fun and test them for yourself.

All Images Copyright © Dirk Holzenhauer 2009

This interview was originally from May 2007 when Dirk was selected as "Artist of the Month" at innertraveler. com.

You can view more of his work at : www.timeweleft.de

- 48 -

DIRK HOLZENHAUER

Psycho Killer : Copyright © Dirk Holzenhauer 2009

- 49 -

ANDREW MARSHALL Once again we walk this lonely road There are times that we were wading through the rain and cold We’re lost in memories of what we left behind Relive the dreams; the endless screams of pain inside DragonForce

G

od, I’m bored. It seems like I’ve been wandering forever. Seems like I’ll be wandering forever. Every one of these bloody streets looks exactly the same as the last one. Nothing to do, nowhere to go.

What time is it? Half past four in the morning. Wasn’t it half four last time I checked? The sky’s starry but dark without a moon, the streets are cold and empty and I’m stuck here with nothing I can do about it.

The concert was good through. Big one-day festival on a field beside the castle. Right in the centre of the crowd you didn’t even notice the wind. Bloody noticing it now, though. A relentless arctic tempest blasting off the North Sea. I can feel it split my skin open and gouge through my flesh. Sometimes when I look at my hand I can almost see it biting my bones. Then the rational part of my mind tells me I’m imagining it; that it’s just the cold talking.

Stupid bloody car park guy. “Is this a 24-hour car park?” I asked him. “Yes” he said. Me, being my naïve presupposing self, I assumed he realised I was asking if it was open 24 hours a day. Apparently he thought I wanted to know whether you could park there over 24 hour period because the gates got locked for the night at half ten. Right about the time Therapy should have been coming on stage but didn’t because of Terrorvision. Why was that? I can’t remember.

That’s weird, I only found it out a few hours ago. Why can’t I remember? Must be the cold.

Why’s it so fucking cold? Why can’t I get any shelter? Everywhere I turn, it’s like the wind direction changes with me to keep on lashing into my face. It’s not that it hurts, it's just that it doesn’t stop. I can’t even remember when it started. How did it get so cold? When did it get so cold? It was warm and sunny in the afternoon. I remember drifting off for a bit when InMe were playing. It was really comfortable then.

Dante’s Inferno says that the lustful punished in the second circle of hell are - 50 -

ANDREW MARSHALL forever to be blown about by a powerful wind without any hope of rest. Can’t say I’ve ever been particularly lustful; never really had much opportunity. As far as sins go, I’ve always been more of a glutton. Think they were the third circle. What punished them? Cold rain and hail? Something like that. Well, with the freezingly clear sky there’s not much chance of…

Son of a bitch! Where did those clouds come from? I’m sure I can remember seeing the stars a little while ago. Or is that the cold talking again? It’s like my memories have all been melded together and bits and pieces of thoughts and words are leaping out at random and forming themselves into semi-coherent sentences.

Have you ever been at that point where you feel so overwhelmingly cold that it’s like every last piece of warmth has been driven from your body? The numbness swamps your entire being until the chill itself is all that you can feel.

Where the hell am I now? How do I get to the car park from here? Never mind, someone’ll know. Didn’t I try sitting here at some point? Think I tried to stop walking and sit with my face out of the wind. Didn’t work; the wind’s coming from all directions. That’s not right, is it? I’m so cold, I can’t think straight. Can’t even remember when I got up. Or if I even did. Must have done.

Seeing the classic line up of a band is always a good thing, though. I remember waiting in line at the beer tent and seeing Danny McCormack walking across the arena area and getting accosted by big group of pretty girls, big fucking grin on his face. Bastard. Strange, that was only a few hours ago but feels like so long in the past, like when a distant memory resurfaces and you add in details to make it whole again.

Fuck, this rain is cold. Just when I thought I was numb to the point of my nerves disconnecting themselves, the rain has to come and lash at their endings and remind me that I can still be made to feel even more miserable.

Why can’t I get any shelter? Everywhere I turn, it’s like the rain changes direction to keep on lashing into my face. It’s not that it hurts, it's just that it doesn’t stop. I can’t even remember when it started. It’s like my memories have all been melted together and random parts of words and thoughts are jumping out at random and sorting themselves into semi-coherent sentences.

Maybe I should just start counting. Count to five hundred; count to a thousand. Maybe that way I’ll have some notion of time passing.

Time. What time is it? Half past four in the morning. Wasn’t it half four last - 51 -

ANDREW MARSHALL time I checked? It seems like I’ve been wandering forever. Seems like I’ll be wandering forever.

Copyright © Andrew Marshall 2009

Andrew has had two stories published previously, though the magazine in question no longer exists so please take his word for it. When not working as a whipping bitch for a firm of commercial lawyers he spends his time wandering the soulless empty streets of purgatory, also known as West Lothian, in between engaging in Internet flame wars and amassing a vast library of rejection letters. Do not ask what is under his kilt.

THE SQUIRREL CAGE The Online Journal of Fantastic Fiction

Author Submissions Needed!

The Squirrel Cage seeks work of the highest literary quality with a fantastic edge.

Our definition of fantastic is a broad one. We are looking for works of literary quality which have a speculative/fantastical element. The fantastical element could be horror, science fiction, fantasy, magic realism, slipstream, or any new genre you can come up with.

We are not particularly interested in Hard Sci-fi, fantasy stories with mythical creatures (including hobbits) children’s stories, or romance. Any sex or violence in the story should be artistically justified; no excessive gore. Apart from this, if you think the work has a fantastic element and is your best then send it.

Stories should be a maximum of 10,000 words though stories between 3000-5000 words stand the best chance of being published. Preferred format is RTF. Please prepare your work professionally. Unfortunately as a new venture we can not pay for work at present though we hope to do so in the future.

For further details please visit the website

www.thesquirrelcage.co.uk

- 52 -

MARK LEWIS

“A

nd what if the wildest thing you ever saw in a dream was only a glimpse of the real world, beyond everything we normally understand?” Again, the conversation between Michael Thomas and Dai Williams came around to the supernatural during their weekly drink in the Hanbury Arms.

“I don’t dream.” Dai sipped his pint of Brains SA, and leaned back, enjoying the smooth, bitter elixir. His other hand rested on an object wrapped in a rough piece of cloth. “I saw a scientist on television who explained that dreams are only the mind’s entertainment while you’re busy sleeping. It’s only the mind mulling over recent events, or trying to make sense of past traumas.

There’s no great mystery, no second world you go to in dreams.”

“This artifact you found has not made you at least think again, that there may be more to reality than science knows?” Michael stroked his grey beard.

“It’s just another Roman remain.” Dai shrugged.

“But to find something undiscovered during the years that the archaeologists have searched? That is remarkable. How did you find it?”

“It was behind a large stone, in one of the entrances to the ruined amphitheatre. Just discarded.”

“What makes you think it is Roman, then, Dai?” “Its design. The shape, the runes. It’s clearly an ancient weapon.”

“I don‘t imagine the Romans hold gladiatorial combat that often in this day and age? Lets have a look.”

Dai slowly unwrapped the artifact. It was a roughly-hewn dagger, made of stone and covered in blood red arcane symbols, a red, open-palmed hand, a crescent moon, a stag‘s horns.

“That’s not a Roman design. Too primitive.”

“Well then, maybe it was a more primitive weapon, used by a Saxon captive in the amphitheatre.”

“It hardly looks worn,” Michael picked the dagger up and turned it over.

“If this were centuries old, the colours would hardly be so vivid.”

“I suppose you’ve got a point. You’ve got an eye for this stuff. I was going to take it to the museum.”

“They won’t want it,” Michael said, his hand holding the pint glass shook.

“I’ll buy it from you, but just for my own interest, not for my shop. As you know, I like to collect curios, any found objects that make me think. I’m on a trail, of something, I don’t know what yet. But I can tell you that this is not the first - 53 -

MARK LEWIS object of its type found in this general area, in pristine condition. My curiosity has very recently become all the more furious, because of something my brother told me.” He hesitated and looked down.

“Go on,” said Dai. Michael reached into his satchel, beneath his copy of the Guardian, and brought out a notebook covered in pink fluffy fake fur. “This notebook was found on the dead body of a young woman called Mary Dale found in Wentwood. She had been at her workplace in Oxford Street in London only an hour earlier. The Coroner has been unable to identify any physical cause of death. The journal has been dismissed as the rambling of a deluded mind, but the woman had no history of insanity, and until the day of her disappearance had betrayed no signs of unusual behaviour. But I challenge you to read it and come back to me and tell me again that there is nothing more to life than working at the Inland Revenue, sleeping, drinking and eating.”

“Of course, there’s more to life than work, sleep, drinking and eating: sexual intercourse.” Dai chuckled.

Michael blinked. “Whatever you do, don’t take this challenge lightly. I tell you it is deadly serious, there are warnings there for you. Read it and take note, before one day you wake up at your desk and realise that you have squandered your life on trivia, on tax tables and indolence. You say you don‘t believe in God, but that does not mean the Devil cannot claim you for his own.”

Dai reached for the notebook, and as he held it said, “I’ll read this. If it makes me think twice about there being any more to the world but that which I can see with my own eyes and hold in my hands I’ll buy you a pint.”

Mary Dale’s Notebook I must write down what has happened to me during the last few - hours? Days?

Weeks? I can no longer even be sure of time, every perception of mine has been turned. I cannot know what is to become of me now. I fear for what will become of me, as I am pursued by horrors that I could previously never have imagined.

I cannot allow these remarkable experiences I have had to go unrecorded, so I can only hope that someone finds me, and reads this. Although I fear that I am no longer in the world where I was born and lived my life.

It started on what had seemed to be another standard day at my mind- 54 -

MARK LEWIS numbing web journalism job at News Today. It was not truly living, even now I have been exposed to the terror and ecstasy of the real world, I would not wish to return to the safe boredom of my past life. It was only a husk of a life.

My regular morning task involved trawling the world wide web for news articles to feature on our site, specialising in financial news. News was slow, and my mind only partly focussed on the work. I also had a window open to the Big Brother House. Watching the exhibitionists in the house was like having pet sea-monkeys but less rewarding, a mindless distraction. Dull, but oddly compelling, like everything that I did at that time. I did not live, I simply acted, and I did not even like the character I was playing, of a lowly web hack.

I was awoken from my boredom trance by an unbelievable sound, for our office overlooking Oxford Street. A loud chime, of a church bell, most like that in my home, Caerleon. I looked around, no-one else had heard. I felt a strange shivering sensation inside my head, and I was drawn to the window. Was the sound a call to prayer, or a death knell? The window was cold to the touch. As I looked out, over the busy traffic, the sun flooded through a brief gap in the clouds. I was blinded, for a moment. The after-image of an ornate golden cup, like the mythic Holy Grail remained, and I knew that I had received a call to order, I could not stay in the office a moment longer, searching for trivia, when I felt like my soul had opened up, to a greater perception of the world beyond.

I picked up my fluffy white winter coat and headed out, offering my colleagues only the briefest of farewells, as if I were taking an early lunch. I headed downstairs, then onto the crowded pavement, outside the Zara clothes shop. I did not even stop to look at the shoes, as I usually did, as a pleasant distraction.

Too much of my motivation to earn a good wage came from the idea of buying boots. I crossed the road, dodging through brief gaps, and headed towards where I had seen a glimpse of the grail, and my soul’s possible enlightenment, where only an hour earlier I had not believed in the concept. Now I was drawn to it, like a fly to an electric light.

As I looked skywards, I saw a flock of birds, and marvelled at the way they moved as a single being, full of grace. Another flock passed, the two flocks crossing, in a figure of eight. I was so wrapped up in my new found awe of nature, I walked straight into a passing stranger, scattering her shopping bags on the floor. I apologised and made to help her pick her items up, but she scowled at me and waved me off, as if I were trying to take her property, - 55 -

MARK LEWIS jabbering harsh words at me in a language that I could not understand. I felt like a fool, but could not allow myself to be distracted from my purpose, as I followed my memory of the light down Regent Street. For a split second I had another glimpse of the light. It was more than the blinding sun; it was a joy that made my soul smile.

I walked on, past St James’ Park, through the stately buildings of Westminster, then past the diminished estates of Vauxhall Bridge Road, then over the Thames, via Vauxhall Bridge, onwards through South Lambeth. The sky was a solid grey, the clouds full, broken only by the occasional flash of sunlight, which spurred me onwards, until I lost track of where I was. There were fewer buildings, those around were very run down. Looking back, I could no longer see any of London’s landmarks. I should have still been within sight of Battersea Power Station, I estimated, from the amount of time I had been walking. This time of year, I would expect it to be getting darker by now, but then day had never fully broken, on this gloomy Tuesday. When I looked at my Swatch I found that it had stopped at two o’clock, which is about when I heard the bell, first. I walked on, so distracted by my thoughts that I did not feel tired, the landscape became increasingly rural, until I was walking through beautiful countryside, with rolling hills. In the distance I heard beautiful singing, which at first, I thought was an unknown language. As I neared the source of the sound, a crumbling Abbey, I recognised the language as Welsh. Very few people in my native village of Caerleon spoke Welsh, but I recognise it when I hear it. A glow surrounded the roofless Abbey, and as I walked closer, I saw that the whole building was filled with light and sound. The glow came, again, from a vision of what I believed to be the Grail. I hid behind the wall and peeped around, hardly daring to approach the amazing sight that I beheld.

Surrounding the Grail, was a host of glowing people, male and female, unclothed but too dignified and glorious to be described as naked, rather they were adorned with light and majesty. My soul was filled with joy and light. I was transfixed and I knew I could never go home again. Their song told me of the Day Star, deep within my own soul, that would lead me forward.

The net has been cast, they sang, and declared that if I were pure in heart and soul then I would see the Grail again, and that I would know true love, freedom - 56 -

MARK LEWIS and beauty. I was light-headed, blissfully intoxicated, as I walked on.

But as I walked on I grew fearful, for how could I eat and live on food for the soul, light and glory? To my shame, I turned from the path, and tried to re-trace my steps. I could not, however, find the path or the Abbey again, and walked through unfamiliar countryside, I was surrounded by tall hedges that I had not passed through before. The night was chill, I pulled my coat around myself, but wished I had thought to wear a hat and scarf. I was lost, cold, alone and afraid.

The ecstasy of recent hours gave way to fear. I walked on, for there was nothing else I could do, as I saw so no signs of any electric lights, no sign of any people, and I could get no reception on my mobile and the time had stopped at two o‘clock, just like my watch.

I moved out into a clearing. Beyond was a forest, beyond that were hills: I was reminded of the woods near the Severn Estuary. I thought I saw a large brown shape scamper past me. There was a smell, as well, unpleasant, earthy. In the forest I could make out sounds, again, singing, or rather, chanting. Unlike the songs from the Abbey, however, this was no beautiful choir, but a harsh, guttural chant, again, in Welsh. I hardly dared to approach, for I immediately felt afraid. A figure rumbled past me, pale, naked, covered in wiry brown hair, with horns on its head. I could not be sure if it was a man decked out as a beast, or a beast decked out as a man, or what else I dread to think. The beast looked back at me; he had goat’s eyes, horns and hooves, but a man’s lecherous grin.

He stared at me for a moment, then loped forward, into the trees, beckoning me to follow, with a long cracked nail. I walked on, slowly, then, as I saw I came to a clearing in the trees, where various figures were collected, I stopped behind a tree to watch. I was horrified, but somehow compelled by what I saw now, bestial men, like the first I had seen, and also women with them, naked and wild. There was an altar, with a horned, leering face carved on the pedestal, behind it stood a greying satyr, holding a blade, carved with what appeared to be primitive runes. I remember a red circle, a white phallus. On the altar was slumped a young woman, asleep or dead, I could not be sure, but there was no blood on the ritual dagger. Yet, I paid no more attention to the detail, for I saw that the first satyr was staring at me again, and now approached with a glint in his eye, saliva dripping from his mouth. I ran, as fast as I possibly could, until - 57 -

MARK LEWIS I lost all breath, and collapsed to the floor in exhaustion. When I looked back, I found that I was thankfully alone, for now. I dare not lie down to sleep and I can still see no signs of civilisation, I just hope the new dawn, if there is a dawn in this place, will bring me hope. I have seen that there is real evil just as there are real forces for good and I can only hope that my faintheartedness and reliance on the material world has not put all that is holy out of reach.

The Hanbury Arms Dai bought Michael the pint of Brains SA, as he had promised. The reading had given him pause for thought.

“And so you see my interest in the artifact you found,” Michael said, raising an eyebrow.

“I’d rather you have it than me,” Dai replied.

“I want it for my own collection, I would not offer it for sale in my shop.

Who knows what kind of trouble that piece of bric-a-brac could cause, if my suspicions are correct.”

“Your suspicions?”

“That we are not masters of this land, and I believe that our primitive forebears are not gone forever, but hiding from our own savage ways. I believe and fear that what Mary Dale saw may not have been a delusion.”

“I find that hard to believe.” Dai looked down, into his pint of creamy ale.

“Only because you’re afraid. Put aside the fear and consider the evidence.”

Dai chuckled. “I’ll leave the Occult to you my friend; I’ll stick to tax tables. I do wonder what happened to poor Mary though.”

“Do not fear,” Michael smiled, took a sip of his pint, then continued: “she was found with no marks of physical harm or struggle, on her body or even her clothes. I believe that she found her Grail again, for she was found with the most blissful smile on her face. Her eyes were open as if they beheld the most beautiful sight in the world, and her expression was one of absolute peace and satisfaction with the world.”

Copyright © Mark Lewis 2009

- 58 -

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Rain Dogs The debut novel from British Fantasy nominated author Gary McMahon is still available, while stocks last. The publisher has gone, so this is your last chance to purchase the remaining few copies Gary has left. Be quick!

Rain Dogs : A harrowing story of guilt, redemption, ghosts, monsters and rain.

Signed, numbered, limited edition hardback with an introduction by Conrad Williams for only ÂŁ10 + p&p. Contact : garyzed@hotmail.com to order or for prices outside the U.K. - 59 -

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Science Fiction and Fantasy Artists of the Twentieth Century A Biographical Dictionary by Jane Frank About the Book This biographical dictionary presents full information on 400 artists whose influence and illustrative contributions to the fields of science fiction and fantasy literature helped define the 20th century as the “Science Fiction Century” and helped established science fiction and fantasy as unique and identifiable genres. In addition to providing inclusive biographical data on venerable artists from Chris Achilleos to John Michael Zeleznik, each entry also includes a bibliographic listing of each artist’s published work in the genre.

About the Author Jane Frank is a collector, author, and private art dealer specializing in science fiction and fantasy illustration art. She currently runs Worlds of Wonder, an art agency dedicated to gaining further exposure for the art and the artists associated with the fields of science fiction and fantasy, and lives in McLean, Virginia.

ISBN : 978-0-7864-3423-7 534pp. hardcover (7 x 10) 2009 Price : $135.00 This title can be purchased from : www.mcfarlandpub.com

- 60 -

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The Szuiltan Alliance The First Book in a New Science Fiction Trilogy When Steve Drake, Space Trader, agreed to take on a trade to the Szuiltans, the only truly alien race ever discovered in man's expansion across the galaxy, he had no idea it would land him in the middle of murder, intrigue and an interplanetary war.

ISBN : 978-1-4092-4128-7 This title can be purchased from : stores.lulu.com/nwdavies - 61 -

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Premonitions The SF & Horror Mag Returns in Paperback!

Fiction by Matt Bright, Andrew Darlington, Waldo Gemio, Peter Hagelslag, David Howard, Patrick Hudson, William Jackson, Sue Lange, David McGillveray, Matthew Pendleton, Steven Pirie, Cyril Simsa, Jim Steel, Julie Travis and Fred Walker.

Plus poetry from Cardinal Cox, J.C. Hartley, John Hayes, Steve Sneyd and J.P.V. Stewart. Edited by Tony Lee. With superb cover artwork by Chris Moore and Caroline O'Neal.

New format : 160 pages, A5 paperback : ÂŁ5.95 Nearly 57,000 words of brilliant writing To order you copy please visit : www.pigasuspress.co.uk

- 62 -

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Open Grave The Book of Horror by Jeani Rector

Paperback collection featuring nine short stories (Cat’s Eye, Ebola Zaire, A Case of Lycanthropy, The Burial, Under the House, Ghoul, Monday Night Dive, Cold Spot and Crystal Ball) plus the novella, Open Grave.

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- 63 -

BENEDICT J. JONES

T

he dust on the street was so dry that it seemed to radiate heat. Andy stood in the dust and knew for certain that he wasn’t lost; he knew which continent he was on, which country and which city he was in, even which area.

But he could not find where he was on his oversized tourist map. Selena was tired and brushed a few errant strands of sweaty hair from her face; colour had risen to her cheeks in the Iberian heat. Andy grinned and hoped it was reassuring.

As the temperature rose the city seemed to empty. Cafes, bars, shops and restaurants that had been teeming an hour before were now shuttered and locked. Somewhere in the distance a dog barked. Andy stepped out of the dusty square and into the shade of an alleyway hoping that once he was out of the suns glare he could make better sense of his map.

An old man with skin the colour of dark honey stood in a doorway with a cigarette between his fingers that he had smoked almost down to the butt.

“Perdon Senor. Donde esta... errrr anywhere.”

Andy struggled at the map pocket of his shorts to find his phrasebook. The old man stared at him with uncaring eyes as his took in the last drag from his dying cigarette. His reply came in a barrage of swift Spanish that sailed through Andy’s ears and straight past his brain.

“Por favour...”

The old man flicked his butt into the gutter and closed the door behind as he vanished through it. Andy almost tore his phrasebook in half with frustration.

“Gracias amigo.”

He looked at Selena and she smiled back.

“What did he say And?” “I haven’t got a clue love.”

Selena scanned the sky above the rooftops.

“Look, that tower looks old. It must be on the map somewhere. If we head towards it I’m sure we’ll find a cafe or at least find out where we are on the map.”

“Sounds like a plan, it’s got be worth a try. Come on then.”

Dogs barked. Nearer this time and Selena flinched. She wasn’t a big canine fan back in England let alone here where the spectre of rabies worried her every time she saw a dog off of its leash.

- 64 -

BENEDICT J. JONES As they approached the end of the alley Andy realised he had no wish to step back into the sun. Here in the cool shadows he felt a little relief and could actually think. It already felt like he had sweated several litres of water that morning and he wasn’t sure that he wouldn’t faint if he went back out into that heat and brightness. Damn Spain and damn their Siesta’s! You’d never have these problems back at home. Shops would never shut at three o’clock in Croydon. Somewhere would be open, somewhere here must be open.

Another side street took them closer to the tower. Graffiti covered the high walls of the alleyway. Andy had seen graffiti everywhere since he arrived in Spain; along the railway tracks and on every available surface in the towns.

Some looked like the tags he saw on bus stops and lamp posts back home but others seemed more purposeful. They were painted with house paint and had none of the flourishes that a child of the Hip Hop generation would have added.

“EL PERRO LA TARDE” Andy almost reached for his phrasebook and its reverse dictionary but decided to push on; the sun had moved and was beginning to creep into the alley.

Andy and Selena had not seen another soul since the old man in the doorway and the alley ways had taken on the strange deserted feel of a ghost town. The yapping of dogs came from almost beside them and Selena leapt back while stifling a scream. While the left hand side of the alley was a tall grafittied wall the right consisted of some cheap wooden boards intermittently dispersed by long lengths of chain link fence.

Beyond the fence on a dusty piece of waste ground three dogs snarled and pirouetted, kicking up the dust, as they went at each other. Two of the animals were of the type that Andy had seen several times all ready in Spain; lean beasts with scrubby brown fur and powerful jaws that looked as though they had been bred for fighting and guarding from wild dogs and hunting hounds.

The third was unlike any dog that Andy had seen before. Its dark, almost blue, colouring looked more like skin than fur and the teeth in its snapping jaws seemed longer and sharper than any dogs had a right to be. Selena gasped and grabbed onto Andy’s arm, the force of her grip showed him just how scared she was. Andy quickly scanned the fence for anyway that the animals could get through. The pressure of Selena’s grip intensified and drew his eyes back to the combat in the dust on the other side of the fence.

- 65 -

BENEDICT J. JONES The blue black beast had tossed one of the other dogs aside and it remained where it had fallen, blood matting the fur around its throat. Its companion had backed up and stopped. The dust began to settle and the dark hound stared past its adversary towards Andy and Selena. It regarded them with hard wet eyes the colour of unmilked coffee. Selena moved off first wanting to be out of the alley and away from the scene that was unfolding on the waste ground but most of all she ran to be away from that stare. Before Andy could avert his eye’s he saw the brown dog leap in and attack. It crashed back down into the dust next to his companion. As Andy moved off he saw the blue black creature, for surely it couldn’t be dog, lapping at the blood of his fallen adversaries with a bright wet tongue.

When Andy reached the corner he saw that Selena had already crossed the boulevard and was being sick against the wall of a church that had stood for centuries. He rubbed her back and kept her hair out of the vomit. All the time trying not to retch himself at the sight of her half digested paella lying in the gutter.

A sudden bark from behind spurred them on. Selena wiped her mouth as she ran. Andy looked around for some help or refuge. The bark was answered by another somewhere off to the right. That answer worried the couple more than anything that they had seen in the alleyway. The tower that they were heading for was so close that it was disappearing behind the rooftops. Andy and Selena cut into another alleyway, across another boulevard and down a side street. One street would be bathed in bright sunlight and the next cloaked in cool shadow. All the while the ominous baying grew louder and drew closer.

It was in a side street where the sun’s rays made them screw their eyes tight that Andy fell. One moment he was moving swiftly enough and then the toe of his shoe caught on the lip of a small channel and he fell. Selena was at the corner before she realised that Andy wasn’t with her. She turned and looked back. Her husband was in the process of hauling himself up. He saw the worried look on her face and grinned.

“No worries, we’ll be alright.”

Then, behind Andy, she saw them. Three blue black hounds padded around the corner and increased their pace along the street, along the street toward Andy who was still struggling to his feet. Selena looked for a moment longer and then turned and ran. She had looked just long enough to see one of - 66 -

BENEDICT J. JONES the beasts pounce upon Andy and pull him back to the ground with its teeth deep in the back of his neck. The other dogs moved in and once their teeth tore through Andy’s flesh they dragged him, easily, to the ground. As Selena ran Andy’s screams followed her; they sounded nothing like the man she loved.

Selena ran onto the next boulevard and began hammering on the shuttered shops and locked apartment block doors. Finally she threw herself against a pair of thick wooden doors that stood at least fifteen feet tall. To her surprise they opened a little and she stumbled through. She looked around and had to look back at the boulevard behind her to make sure that the vista before her had not been conjured by her overwrought brain. It was a cool, shaded, courtyard floored with mosaic tiles and centred round a large stone fountain.

A man sat in a large wooden chair next to the fountain. The wooden chair was grander than a mere thing for sitting on, it was more like a throne. A throne cut from some dark wood and detailed intricately with carvings and brass studs.

The man who sat in the throne was short, shorter than Selena’s five foot five, and clad in a simple white tunic which hung loosely over equally simple white trousers. He had flat wide cheekbones that seemed to indicate South American ancestry or birth.

“Please, you have to help me. Por favour, mi husband err, mi husband...”

“Is okay, I speak English better than you speak Spanish.”

“Thank God. My husband is being attacked by a pack of dogs!”

“Dogs? Big black dogs?”

“Si, yes yes. Huge black hounds.”

“Here, here.”

The man led Selena to a small stool and sat her down. She tried to stand but he held a small firm hand on her shoulder.

“You have had a shock. Drink this.”

He poured a glass of deep red wine.

“But we have to help Andy, please call the police and an ambulance.”

The man smiled then and sat back in his carved wood throne.

“Normally my children have to make do with the scraps that these Spaniards call dogs but I guess the saying is true – mad dogs and Englishmen...

Drink the wine Senora.”

Selena heard the padding of paws upon tile and gulped down the wine.

Maybe siestas weren’t such a bad idea after all she thought as she finished the - 67 -

BENEDICT J. JONES last of her glass. She hurled the wine glass at the white clad man and ran for a door at the opposite end of the courtyard. The padding grew closer and she could hear the breathing of the beasts as they closed in around her. Mercifully the door opened and she was through into the dark interior of a large house.

The stone walls and floor ensured that it stayed cool inside the house and Selena welcomed the cold as she searched for an exit. She heard a scraping noise and looked back at the door to the courtyard; a hatch at the bottom was slowly sliding up and she could see the blue black paws of one of the great hounds pushing through. She ran. The first door she opened led onto a long corridor and at the same instant that she opened the door one at the opposite end swung open and revealed the man from the courtyard. Blood dripped from a gash above his eye and in his hand he held a wooden club with several wicked looking spikes that looked like the canine teeth of some great hound.

He was smiling: ‘Run senora it is all part of the game. My children need the exercise.’

Selena slammed the door to and strode deeper into the house. She was determined that she would not die here in an unknown house in Spain. Her heart leapt. Ahead of her was a great door that looked like it would lead back onto the main street. The padding of paws on stone was drawing closer as she pulled the great doors open. She was confronted by a wall of brick. Slowly Selena turned. The man stood rubbing the ears of his pets.

‘You want to run some more Senora?’

Selena shook her head and stuck out her chin. The man smiled and clicked his fingers and the hounds sprang. As Selena fell under their terrible jaws she was glad that she was in the cool house; better to die here than under that harsh sun.

Copyright © Benedict. J. Jones 2009

Ben is a 28 year old writer from south east London who has had short stories published in One Eye Grey and Pen Pusher Magazine. Watch for more of his work in future issues of Estronomicon.

- 68 -

TOM SYKES

T

he Listening Station was located above a florist’s, its existence as discreet as its operations were invasive. Behind its tinted windows and bombproof walls was the capability to view a good proportion of the world’s microwave, satellite, cellular and fibre-optic communications traffic. Pasty-faced lads cruised the conceptual freeway with voice- and optical-recognition programmes, and pulled over whoever they required. A separate team were devoted to liasing with the security services (mainly the US National Security Agency and British Government Communications Headquarters) who had sold them the kit in the first place, and to keep abreast of updates and appendages as they were developed.

If the main purpose of the Station was to glean information about the present, then there were also departments dealing with the past. An older demographic of pasty-faced men, inveterate voyeurs, tended the audiovisual library twenty fours a day, permanently aroused by the extreme images and sounds they classified. There were also electronic caches of medical records, psychiatric reports, bank statements, birth and death certificates, insurance details and criminal records.

The moment he arrived, Reg berated Logistics for giving him migraines. He suspected there was a flaw with the new earpiece he had been guinea-pigging.

They were all too zoned out with lack of sleep to take him seriously. He reminded them of his important work; they all stood to get a pay hike thanks to his creative piece of extortion.

To the debriefing with Sandy Hulston, whose recent diet had done nothing for the sandbags of flab that clinged to her thighs. Her face had the pronounced creases and crusty coarseness of a lifelong smoker. She was an arctic, humourless woman who never veered from the business in hand. Tonight was no exception. She didn’t praise Reg for his good work, in fact she avoided any kind of normative language throughout their meeting. “If you’d like to call Rioche now, we can send him picture messages,” she decided.

Reg did so and got the answerphone. “The bugger’s probably tied up with that cold epidemic,” he said to a displeased-looking Sandy. There was no way they could risk recording a threat, however thickly veiled.

“Sod it,” said Sandy. “We’ll just send the pics of the kid-selling ring in Thailand, the organ trading centres and ermm…”

Reg slapped a memory stick onto the desk. “Him blackmailing a local - 69 -

TOM SYKES government official? I edited my own voice out of it.”

“Naturally.”

Reg nodded and started to leave. “Ahem,” said Sandy.

“Yes?” “Why do the fake psychic stuff ... Alan?”

Reg unbuttoned his anorak and unclipped a utility belt loaded with elaborate gear. After the aerials and wires and microphones slipped down to the floor, he began to scratch off the viscous skin-colouring from his face and removed two stone of padding from his shirt. He was, once again, Mr Alan Lanyard, freelance polymath bastard. “My idea,” he replied. “That rag is filled with horoscopes and predictions and whatnot, and Reamer the editor's a sucker for the paranormal. Plus I thought it'd swing attention away from us.”

A gruesome still from the Station’s research into the slavery ring got stuck in Lanyard's head. “I know what,” he said. “I'll talk to Rioche personally.”

Sandy Hulston crossed her arms quickly. “No you won't. You know how this is done. You wait for him to call and give us the stake.”

“This is different. I think we can do better than ten per cent. Have you seen the financial news lately? Rioche is fucking going places.”

“But Alan, you can’t keep up the Reg cover any longer. Rioche has probably sussed it out by now anyway.”

Their talk was momentarily halted by a plumber clambering upstairs.

“So,” resumed Sandy, on the cusp of ranting, “You suggest we work with him? How could he trust us after we've just tried to blackmail him with info that would send him down in fifteen different countries?” She quietened down to what she hoped would be the voice of reason. “The company's doing well and we don't want to get mixed up with a scumbag like that.”

“I just want to talk to him.”

“No. As your superior I'm saying no no no.”

Lanyard nodded and smiled.

Copyright © Tom Sykes 2009

Tom Sykes is a writer-editor who has published short fiction and articles in magazines in the US, UK, Canada and Southeast Asia. Bad Territory is an apocalyptic adventure set in a near-future Britain gone badly wrong.

- 70 -

STEVE UPHAM

Creeping Death : Copyright © Steve Upham 2009

- 71 -

NEIL BURLINGTON Winter’s hand has crossed her eyes And Nomos become Anomy This is where they go in time Within the City of Silence Gentle sound and pale shadow Forgotten verse and lost days The halls reveal themselves Beyond grieving, despair, and surrender Air and dust and the subtlest thrust of spirit Wanders there, Without a name, voiceless Without a home, homeless Without memory to recollect And unable to foretell The touch of once-dreamed loves Scattered on their skins And wing-beats fallen from their chests As cold as stone As old and impermanent there Within this City of Silence A question rests upon their lips Still it is unanswered A motive moves them, undisclosed To pass, to see, to rest and wonder Where is their beginning If it is to end?

A number uncountable A land that cannot be drawn A tower at its center A vigil carries on And calls them to this hidden land Beyond the bright flash in one instant, a life To the magnetic center To become the dust of winds, the salt of streams, the ancient mould - 72 -