crucial repairs on the building. As “General Manager,” Marilyn keeps morale ticking over—writing her annual reports (each of them a fiction since she has no idea what happens upstairs—she kips on the ground floor in a sleeping bag). So when I arrived at The House, I was hired as a general housekeeper and became self-titled Queen Momma of the building. Aside from running the drug operation, this entails making sure the other staff members—janitors, food-servers, and so on—are content with their mostly tedious lives. These people who aren’t chained to desks and have innocuous blue-collar occupations seem to me the most free. I made a home for myself on the roof, paying a simpleton named Gerald (more on him later) to construct a small cottage overlooking the wastelands of Crarsix. If I tilt my head heavenwards on summer nights, I can glimpse a rogue star through the carcinogenic layers of toxic silt, and my heart is almost happy.
A Better Life
2
H AVING survived the stock-dump fields, I emerged onto the roads where the ScotCall buses prowled. I hadn’t expected the barbed wire laid over the ditches—it was my intention to crouch there when the buses appeared. I had nowhere to lurk when the first bus came and the two operatives approached. I made it five minutes along the road before the bus stopped five paces before me and the operatives leapt out with their plastered smiles and blank clipboards, launching straight into their smarm-drenched spiels. “Howdy, traveller! Don’t you think a Better Life awaits you in the ScotCall compound? We offer our phone operatives a secure package and opportunities to explore the range of things available etc. . . .” I decided to attack. I could see the bald one making a move to cup my arm and the blonde one ditto. I took the bat and swung for the bald one’s shiny head. I brained him on the occiput and delivered repeated blows to his forehead until he was dead. I had to remember it wasn’t a person I was killing but a ScotCall vessel who would never think an original thought ever again and so was dead inside anyway.
The blonde one sprinted for the bus which sped off in panic. I improvised a solution. I changed into the ScotCall shirt and tie that the dead thing was wearing and headed along the road faking a cool exterior, despite the natural terror I felt at facing the Scot-Call cops when the helicopter or whatever descended from above to airlift me to whatever ScotCall rehabilitation prison centre existed in the bowels of their compound. A police car was on the scene in two minutes and despite my nervousness I kept up the façade. “Reports of a psycho with a baseball bat resisting ScotCall assistance?” he asked without the slightest glint of suspicion. “Yes officer!” I beamed. “I managed to overpower the thug and pulp his cranium. He is on the ground back there, hopefully feeling jolly remorseful for his actions!” The officer volunteered to drive me back to the ScotCall HQ, straight into the beckoning digits of the enemy. Since I had no reason to be lurking on the road four miles away, I agreed. I was to be delivered into a position of power in ScotCall with the one hope that I might be able to bluff my way to freedom, if I could think up a single convincing reason to go outside.
The policeman escorted me to the same compound where I worked before as a phone operator being lashed by malfeasant bugs. I used the dead thing’s pass to gain access to the building and reported to the manager for duties. The man who had witnessed me bashing in the head of his partner was there. He failed to notice that I had a different face. I had gained access and was wearing the proper outfit. This seemed to be enough for him.
The
Farewell, Author!
Conference
2
F IRST to arrive, a frenetic Adam Thirlwell. One of the youngest at the conference, at 68, Adam retained his frazzled appearance, his eye luggage weighing in heavy, his intellectual Pete Doherty vibe still
A Better Life
2
H AVING survived the stock-dump fields, I emerged onto the roads where the ScotCall buses prowled. I hadn’t expected the barbed wire laid over the ditches—it was my intention to crouch there when the buses appeared. I had nowhere to lurk when the first bus came and the two operatives approached. I made it five minutes along the road before the bus stopped five paces before me and the operatives leapt out with their plastered smiles and blank clipboards, launching straight into their smarm-drenched spiels. “Howdy, traveller! Don’t you think a Better Life awaits you in the ScotCall compound? We offer our phone operatives a secure package and opportunities to explore the range of things available etc. . . .” I decided to attack. I could see the bald one making a move to cup my arm and the blonde one ditto. I took the bat and swung for the bald one’s shiny head. I brained him on the occiput and delivered repeated blows to his forehead until he was dead. I had to remember it wasn’t a person I was killing but a ScotCall vessel who would never think an original thought ever again and so was dead inside anyway.
The blonde one sprinted for the bus which sped off in panic. I improvised a solution. I changed into the ScotCall shirt and tie that the dead thing was wearing and headed along the road faking a cool exterior, despite the natural terror I felt at facing the Scot-Call cops when the helicopter or whatever descended from above to airlift me to whatever ScotCall rehabilitation prison centre existed in the bowels of their compound. A police car was on the scene in two minutes and despite my nervousness I kept up the façade. “Reports of a psycho with a baseball bat resisting ScotCall assistance?” he asked without the slightest glint of suspicion. “Yes officer!” I beamed. “I managed to overpower the thug and pulp his cranium. He is on the ground back there, hopefully feeling jolly remorseful for his actions!” The officer volunteered to drive me back to the ScotCall HQ, straight into the beckoning digits of the enemy. Since I had no reason to be lurking on the road four miles away, I agreed. I was to be delivered into a position of power in ScotCall with the one hope that I might be able to bluff my way to freedom, if I could think up a single convincing reason to go outside.
The policeman escorted me to the same compound where I worked before as a phone operator being lashed by malfeasant bugs. I used the dead thing’s pass to gain access to the building and reported to the manager for duties. The man who had witnessed me bashing in the head of his partner was there. He failed to notice that I had a different face. I had gained access and was wearing the proper outfit. This seemed to be enough for him.
The
Farewell, Author!
Conference
2
F IRST to arrive, a frenetic Adam Thirlwell. One of the youngest at the conference, at 68, Adam retained his frazzled appearance, his eye luggage weighing in heavy, his intellectual Pete Doherty vibe still
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