“Yeah, but,” Billy said. The toughness of his own voice surprised him. “You think I’ve got knowledge I don’t even know about, right? Well, I don’t know why, but I don’t like it. Alright?”
“That’s not nothing, Dane,” said Wati at last.
“Listen,” he continued. “I’ve got stuff to tell you. You remember that list of the porters we reckon could’ve took the kraken? I been looking into it.” Wati’s voice that day was thin and marble. “Simon, Aykan, couple of others, remember?
“There’s skinny on all of them, you hear what they like, who they’re working for, what they’re good at and not good at, all that. If we thought of this you can bet your arse everyone else who knows about the kraken did, and they’re looking too: we heard from Aykan’s old flatmate that the cops tried to get hold of him. But they’re not thinking right. Simon’s the dark horse.”
“Simon Shaw retired,” Dane said.
“He did-that’s the point,” Wati said. “I was thinking about methods. Rebecca uses wormholes, but she needs a power source, and it leaves pissed-off particles. You said the police couldn’t find anything?”
“I don’t know what they were looking for,” Billy said. “But I heard them say there was no sign of anything.”
“Right,” said Wati from a Madonna. “Aykan uses Tay al-Ard, great method…”
“It’s the only kind of porting I’ll do,” said Dane.
“I don’t blame you,” said Wati. “But even if he could shift something as big as the kraken, some of the irfans would have felt it. Like you say, Simon hasn’t been on the scene. But here’s the thing: he does have a familiar.”
“I didn’t know,” Dane said.
“Honest truth is neither did I until one of the organisers reminded me. It ain’t like most assistants. Simon made sure it paid dues-it never had the mind for much, but it pushed a bit of energy our way to cover subs. He wasn’t bad to it. He loved the bloody thing. But we should still have had a connection, and no one could feel the link. I had to go hunting.
“I don’t know how long it’s been faddling around. Found the poor little fucker eventually, in a landfill. It’s only here because it trusts me.” What familiar didn’t?
“Here?” said Billy. “Here here?”
The statue whistled. From below a scraggy bush next to them there was a rustling, again.
“Jesus Christ,” said Billy. “What the hell’s that?”
Snuffling amid the cigarette butts and the ruins of food, a hand-sized clot of mange and clumpy hair whimpered and whispered. There were no features, only a matting of dirt and sickly flesh.
“Oh what?” said Dane.
“He had it made from scratch,” Wati said. “It’s clotted out of him. His parings. He had a lifesmith clay it together. The fur’s from a vet: it’s dog, cat, all sorts.” The thing had no eyes, no visible mouth.
“What use is this hairball?” said Dane.
“None,” Wati said. “It’s not smart, it’s a rubbish guard, it doesn’t have the focus for knacks. He made it anyway. Out of him, so the poor little bastard has a link. A bit buggered, but you can still feel it. I don’t know what, but something scared Simon off working a couple of years ago. And judging from the mood of my little brother here, something’s happened more recently, too.
“You know what we found it doing?” The thing shivered, and Wati made the reassuring noise again. “It was gathering food-sort of folding itself over it to drag it. I think it’s for Simon. I think it’s been trekking for days to get stuff, trekking back with it. I think it’s on its own initiative.”
“Why would Simon want something like that?” Dane said, staring at the pitiable threadbare oddity.
“Well,” said the Wati-statue. “You know how Simon used to dress. Don’t you ever watch telly, Dane?”
“How did he dress?” said Billy.
“Pretend uniform,” Wati said. “Little sign on the chest.” His voice was arch.
“Why does this matter?” Dane said.
“No,” said Billy suddenly, staring at the bizarre familiar. “Oh you’re shitting me.”
“Yeah,” Wati said. “You got it.”
“What?” said Dane. He stared at the statue and at Billy. “What?”
YOU HEAR ALL THE TIME, BILLY TOLD DANE-AND HOW GOOD IT was for him to be telling Dane something-about the influence of pulp science fiction on real science. It is an admission both shamefaced and proud that some large proportion of scientists claim inspiration from variously crude visionary blatherings they loved when young. Satellite specialists cite Arthur Clarke, biologists are drawn to the field by the neuro- and nanotech visions of entertainers. Above all, Roddenberry’s leaden space-pioneering meant a demographic bulge of young physicists attempting to replicate replicators, tri-corders, phasers and transporter rooms.
But it was not only the hard sciences. Other professionals grew up with the same stuff. Sociologists of the network went rummaging in old imaginings. Philosophers stole many-worlds, grateful to alternative-reality merchants. And, unknown to the mainstream, such invented futures were the seminal viewing for a generation of London’s mages, and they were no less keen to imitate their favourites than were physicists. Alongside technopaganism and chaos magic, Crowleyism and druidical pomp, there were the reality-smiths of the TV generation.
Ornerily, it was not the fantasies that inspired most knackers, not Buffy, Angel, American Gothic or Supernatural. It was the science fiction. Time travel was out, the universe not having fixed lines, but sorcerer fans of Dr. Who made untraditional wands, disdaining willow for carefully lathed metal and calling them sonic screwdrivers. Soothsayer admirers of Blake’s 7 called themselves Children of Orac. London’s fourth-best shapeshifter changed her name by deed-poll to Maya, and her surname to Space1999.
There were those magicians who expressed allegiance to more recherché series-empatechs who would not be quiet about Star Cops, culture-surfing necromancers hooked on Lexx-and a younger generation naming themselves for Farscape and Galactica (the remake, of course).
But it was the classics that were most popular, and just as for NASA technicians, Star Trek was the most classic of these.
“Simon’s familiar’s name,” Wati said, “is Tribble.”
Chapter Thirty-Nine
“’COURSE I’VE SEEN STAR TREK,” DANE SAID. “BUT I DON’T KNOW what a fucking tribble is.”
They were by London Bridge. Simon’s last-known address had been empty for months. They hunted.
“Well, it’s one of those things, basically,” Billy said. He was back in silly student getup too young for him. He peered into the plastic bag he carried. Within shivered Tribble. Billy stroked its dirty fur. They passed slate-top figurines and plaster statuettes on buildings. Ill-clothed mannequins. From each of them came Wati’s whispered voice, soothing Tribble, keeping the un-animal calm.
“We sure we’re going the right way?” Billy said.
“No,” said Wati. “I’ve been trying to track the link backward. I reckon it leads round here. If we get close enough I’ll feel it.”
“What is the fucking deal with this tribble thing?” Dane said.
“That’s what I’m trying to tell you,” Wati said. He spoke in little gusts from all the statues. “Simon was totally into that stupid show. He went to conventions. Had the collections, the figures, all that stuff. Half the time he dressed in that stupid uniform.”
“So?” Dane said. “So he’s talented, made money and pissed it away on tat. He’s a beamer who made himself Mr. fucking Spock.”
“Scotty,” Billy said. He looked at Dane over the top of his glasses, schoolmarmish. “Spock didn’t beam anything.”
“What? What? Whatever. Listen, there’s different ways of porting, Billy. There’s folding up space.” Dean scrunched his hands. “So places far apart touch each other for a moment. But that ain’t what Simon does. He’s a beamer. Disintegrate whatever it is you want, zap its bits somewhere else, stick them back together.”