Errata: Twentieth Episode: Power Vacuum

Garibaldi ‘the Nappy’ Figgs, Chimpy Dolenz, Miguel the Moneylender and latecomer Brother Umberto stood amongst the fake date palms of the Pavlov Casino roof garden, watching as City Hall fell in upsurge of dust. The death-rumble reached them moments later. A further ten seconds went by, then a hot gritty wind rushed at their faces, susurrating through the phoney palm fronds, twirling the verdigrised weathervane.

The wind dropped, and they stood in silence for a time.

Chimpy was the first to speak. ‘Did that just happen?’

‘This has gotta be some kind of trick,’ said Figgs.

Miguel was clutching the safety rail. ‘Does this mean the Governor’s, uh… y’know…’ He trailed off. Amongst the men an unarticulated dread flourished.

‘The City’s still here,’ said Figgs, inflecting it like a question. ‘We’re still here.’ He lit a Lucky Bonobo. ‘Something ain’t straight.’

Chimpy scratched at the cocoa fur under his hat. ‘Guess it takes more ‘n a nasty fall to do in the Big Guy.’

Clad in the pinstriped robes of his order, Brother Umberto had rocked up after the Tarot Poker game, full of sour wisdom. He coughed into his fist then spoke.

‘Now you boys know what a miserable cynic I am.’

The old monk was right – his wretched grimace knocked butterflies clean out of the air. Long ago he had ordained as a Stockpriest, relinquishing control to the divine whims of the Index – a neverending string of numerals believed to be The Perpetual Word of the Creator. Adherents spent hours in silent contemplation, directing their thoughts towards sevens, eights, and transcendent nines, but really they were just marking time before the next Crash – the dizzying streak of zeroes that presaged the End of the Universe. Whenever the Index bottomed out, Stockpriests all over the city ritually defenestrated themselves in a last lunge at atonement. This blood sacrifice was always enough – every Crash to date had ended with the Index spiking back to life like an ECG blip, the Creator apparently sated.

Dying under such circumstances was considered a fast-track to Paradise, but some impulse had always stayed Umberto’s hand. Three times he had found himself poised in a window frame, watching peers drop like loogies into a tarmac horizon; three times he had failed to jump.

On the third occasion Bishop Credulous was there to clasp a pedagogical palm on his shoulder as he stepped down from the precipice.

‘Ah, young Umberto,’ Credulous had purred, his voice a potent cocktail of amusement and disdain, ‘another one who thinks he’s too good for suicide.’

‘I guess I have trouble committing,’ Umberto had said, and though he’d punctuated the sentence with an apologetic smile, his mood had sunk to an endless street of noughts.

The following day, Umberto renounced the priesthood and joined the Order of the Perpetual Crash – a mournful church offshoot for heretics, fallen, and glassy-eyed blowouts.

Figgs tilted his head back, cigarette hanging from the corner of his mouth. ‘What’s on your mind, Brother?’

‘Death, Figgs,’ said Umberto. ‘Sooner or later, all buildings topple. City Hall collapsed in line with expectation.’

Chimpy rolled his eyes. ‘For a guy expecting it you sure looked surprised.’

Umberto folded his arms. ‘I always look surprised.’

Again, the monk’s assertion was true. Years ago, he had taken part in the sacred Stockpriest rite of arse-candling: a penitent neophyte had bent over a slab while a long, hollow candle was inserted about an inch into the youth’s rectum; once lit, the flame drew oxygen up through the candle’s hollow centre, extracting as it did so the evil that Stockpriests believed resided in a man’s anus. Umberto had lit the wick and stepped back when a bright pennant of flame burst from the candle-tip, searing his eyebrows from his face. The neophyte had broken wind; Umberto later discovered that this happened all the time – hence his peers’ keenness to grant him the honour of sparking the sacred candle. Though the flame had long been quenched, Umberto’s ire continued to burn, and, as if in furious testament, his eyebrows never grew back.

‘Tell me,’ he said, ‘what did we just witness – the fall of the final domino, or the fall of the first?’

Figgs pinched the humpbacked bridge of his nose and looked vexed. ‘Ahum. You’re an honourable and holy man, Brother, but I ain’t got a spook of a clue what you’re jabbering about. Do us humble guys a favour and unpack your metaphors.’

Umberto smoothed out a crease in his robes. ‘We’re all asking if this is the end of our lives – but perhaps it’s the beginning. Someone fired Senor Bartholomew. That means the LawNet must be down.’

For a few seconds, his colleagues gazed into the middle-distance, absorbed in whirring cogitation.

‘Does this mean…’ Chimpy began.

‘… we can use guns?’ said Miguel.

The two men stared at each other, their faces cracking open with terrified joy.

‘Boys, boys…’ Figgs held his palms up like a street mime. ‘Happy days ain’t here again. If the Net’s down that means the Accord’s been breached… and you know what that means.’ His eyes drifted to the east.

Brother Umberto cracked a sardonic grin. ‘Perhaps the Chorizo will return. Perhaps they won’t. Either way, there’s no harm in possessing a little firepower.’

‘What’s a gun supposed to do against the Ritz?’ said Figgs. ‘They’re bullet-proof.’

‘Oh really?’ Umberto rocked back on his heels. ‘Then why did they insist on the LawNet in the first place? Gentlemen, City Hall has fallen. Can’t you feel the power vacuum sucking at the pit of your stomach? Laws are a kind of mass hypnosis – the Government decrees, “You cannot do this,” and lo, we accept the suggestion, never testing it against reality. It’s time to wake up. Reach out and tweak the bars of your cage – they’re made from cake frosting or some such, brittle as mummy-flesh.’

Miguel was gazing out across the city. ‘Isn’t there a guns and ammo exhibit at the Hokum Museum?’

Chimpy’s eyes widened. ‘Hey – that’s right! They must have upwards o’ fifty shooters stowed behind glass!’ He turned to Figgs. ‘Good gravy, Nap, we’ve gotta raid the joint!’

‘Now hold your horses Chimpy…’

Umberto shook his head. ‘Mr Dolenz is right. He who hesitates last catches the worm. We’re lowdown criminals. Misery and disarray are our optimum operating conditions.’

‘That’s right!’ Chimpy slammed his fist against the flat copper face of the casino sundial. ‘We nab those guns, we can take this town! Yo, Miguel!’ He looked at the Moneylender and held out a palm. ‘Pass me the phone, will ya? I wanna mobilise some muscle.’

‘No problem.’ Miguel crossed the dayglo shuffleboard court, then stooped and opened a brass-latticed chest at the foot of one of the bogus palms.

Chimpy waited with his hairy arm outstretched, flashing Garibaldi Figgs a cool, imperious grin. ‘I tell ya Nap, this ain’t the time for half-measures. Somebody’s gotta grab the reins. Either we get ready for another decade and a half o’ sucking up to the Man, or we seize this opportunity and become the Man, ya know?’

Miguel returned. ‘There you go, Chimpy.’

Chimpy put the receiver to his ear. ‘Hello? Operator? Put me through to the Catalano Pool Hall. Hello? Operator? Hello? Anybody there?’ He turned to glare into the mouthpiece, only to discover he had been speaking into a banana.

Miguel doubled over like he’d been slugged in the gut, laughing in great whooping barrages. ‘You tell ‘em, Chimpy! You grab those reins!’

Figgs and Umberto exchanged amused but decorous glances.

Chimpy’s countenance darkened. ‘Oh yeah? Well screw the lot of ya! I don’t need you assholes no more!’ He thumped the breast pocket of his suit jacket. ‘I’m Chimpy Dolenz, d’ya hear? I’m gonna take this city on my own!’

‘Now Chimpy,’ Figgs began, ‘don’t go doing anything-’

‘Stupid?’ screeched Chimpy. ‘As that what you were about to say? You calling me stupid now?’ He took a step towards Figgs and puffed out his chest. ‘You wanna settle this here, Nap? You wanna go toe to toe?’

Figgs took an unhurried drag on his cigarette, then stared back at Chimpy, mustering the coagulation of scar tissue and sensory organs that comprised his face into a disappointed frown. ‘Ahum. I was going to say: don’t go doing anything you might regret. Seems you got other ideas.’

Chimpy seemed momentarily mesmerised by Figgs’ expression, then snapped out of it. ‘Whatever. I’m outta here.’ He looked round at Miguel and Umberto. ‘The next time we meet, I’ll consider all you guys my enemies. Don't say I never warned ya.’ He tucked the banana into his pocket, tugged at the brim of his fedora to make sure it was on tight, then turned and dashed at the guard rail with a kind of loping scramble.

‘Aw Chimpy,’ said Miguel, shaking his head, ‘you don’t have to do this. Look, I’m sorry. I’ll get you the phone. You can make a call.’

Chimpy cleared the rail with a clean, athletic bound, then dropped out of sight. The three men ran to the edge of the roof garden and looked down.

Their former colleague was swinging from one of the casino’s huge neon signs by his prehensile toes. He braced himself, then pumped his legs and leapt, falling a good ten metres before catching hold of a telephone cable that spanned the street. He began to advance hand-over-hand towards the fire escape of the building opposite.

Miguel looked at Figgs and Umberto. ‘I think we made him mad.’

‘Mad enough to be dangerous?’ said Umberto.

The Moneylender shrugged.

Figgs ground out his cigarette against the guard rail. ‘Well I ain’t prepared to sit here like a putz waiting to find out. We’ve got to get to the museum before he does. Come on, boys – let’s haul ass. This government ain’t going to overthrow itself.’