Cargo Cult (20 page)

“Hey, everyone. We’ve got
company.”

They all turned to look up the farm
road where John was pointing. A huge cloud of dust was moving
towards them. At the head of the cloud was a luxury coach, looking
strangely gigantic in this odd context. Behind the coach, the cloud
flickered blue and red from the lights of the many police cars in
pursuit of it.

With a roar of engines and crashing
of brakes that drowned all further speech, the bus pulled up
outside the door of the farmhouse. The police entourage formed a
line well away from the farm, as if they were nervous about being
welcome. For long moments nothing happened. The bus sat there
silently. The police sat there silently. Nobody got out and no
sound was made.

The Receivers of Cosmic Bounty
regarded the bus curiously. They had been expecting a space-ship,
of course, but a bus might be OK—as long as it had an interstellar
drive or something. At least luxury coaches had loos and air
conditioning. Two or three people started singing
Show Me The
Way To Go Home
, perhaps as a reflex response to their
expectation of a long bus ride. Others looked back at John and
Drukk for some sign as to how to respond. Without doubt, the silent
presence of the police cars, their blue and red lights still
flashing, was making some people very nervous as they
surreptitiously dropped small plastic bags containing variously
coloured powders and pills, and kicked dirt over them.

The silence was broken by a loud
crack and hiss and the bus door slid smoothly open. Inside, they
could see the bus driver, gawping out at them, or, rather, at
Drukk, in open-mouthed astonishment. Then Loosi Beecham appeared in
the doorway and began to disembark. A murmur of shock and amazement
went up from the crowd as she descended to the ground, long-legged
and beautiful in a white satin and lace wedding dress.

-oOo-

Chief Inspector Sheila Sullivan
sent word to the Commissioner that the bus had arrived and fired
off orders in all directions to find out who lived at the farm and
what terrorist organisation they might belong to. She cursed
Barraclough roundly for not being where he was supposed to be,
ordered a helicopter to take her there and spoke to the Senior
Constable she had arbitrarily picked to be in charge at the farm
until a more senior officer could get there.

Senior Constable Kelvin Potter was
a tall, lean man in his late thirties. His face was sun-tanned and
craggy and his eyes narrowed to slits as he peered through the
bright afternoon sunlight at the scene in front of him. He had his
car door open and he stood behind it, just in case any shooting
started. Potter didn’t like what he saw. A couple of dozen hippies
were standing outside the old farmhouse and a handful of people
stood on the veranda. One of these appeared to be Loosi Beecham. He
had to admit she was looking hot in that short, tight dress. Coming
down from the bus, one by one, were more Loosi Beechams, looking
like they were modelling clothes in one of those freaky modern
fashion parades. God these people made him sick! Hippies and
show-business types had no business out here. Kelvin Potter had
devoted his life to keeping ordinary, decent people safe from
freaks like this and he exalted in having the chance to round up a
whole bunch more of them.

The Chief Inspector was still
whittering away on the radio. What did the silly cow want now? Why
didn’t they put a bloke in charge and let her get back to her
domestic violence unit or wherever they’d dragged her out from?

“Sorry Ma’am,” he said, in his
slow, insolent way. “Reception’s real bad out here. I can hardly
hear what you’re saying.” He grinned and winked at the others, some
of whom grinned back but most of whom just looked anxious. Kelvin’s
reputation as a one-hundred-percent, dyed in the wool bigot, didn’t
exactly strike them as best qualifying him to handle this delicate
hostage situation.

“I said,” said Sullivan, “the
negotiating team will be there in thirty minutes to take over.
Until then, I want you to keep your distance. Don’t aggravate them
and don’t approach them. Don’t even talk to them unless they ask
you a question. Have you got that, Constable?”

“Sorry, Ma’am, what do you want me
to talk to them about?”

This raised a small laugh from some
of the guys although the rest were variously holding their heads or
pretending they hadn’t heard. He saw one bloke—that creep
Polanski—lift his radio mike to his mouth as if he was going to say
something. If Polanski dobbed him in, he’d be in real trouble. He
spoke into his own mike.

“Oh, yeah. Sorry, Ma’am. I copy
now. All understood. I’ll expect the negotiators in thirty
minutes.”

He looked back at the freaks as the
stupid cow started whingeing on again. No-one seemed to be armed.
What was to stop him just marching in there and rounding them all
up? He had thirty armed police with him. That should be enough to
take care of a few hippies and fashion models. He shouted over to
one of the guys to get him a bull-horn as he watched the group from
the bus approach the group on the ground. Thirteen women, one of
them pregnant. Twenty-odd hippies and the four on the veranda. It
would be a piece of cake.

-oOo-

“Drukk!” shouted Braxx, stopping on
the edge of the crowd of humans.

“Braxx!” Drukk was genuinely
pleased to see the old fraud. “I have told the humans everything.
They seem quite pleased to see us.”

“Then they are receptive to the
message of the Great Spirit?”

Drukk shrugged. “Sort of.”

John, the guru guy, dropped to his
knees. “Sky People! Sky People! We welcome you to Earth. Give us
your Cosmic Bounty! We are your Receivers. We have waited for you
to come.”

Then the other Receivers also fell
to their knees. A babble rose from them and they made the “gimme,
gimme” gesture with their outstretched hands. Some thought they
should be chanting something like “We have waited! We have waited!”
but no-one had had the foresight to prepare a suitable chant. So
they were all just saying whatever they liked, which, in the
opinion of some, completely ruined the moment.

Braxx, nevertheless, was well
pleased. Beaming broadly, he led the Vinggans up the steps to the
veranda, the crowd of worshippers parting before them. “Drukk, you
have done well! You will be given a high position in the Church for
this day’s work!”

Sam and Wayne watched the arrival
of Braxx and the others with open-mouthed astonishment. Sam, in
particular, was completely shaken. “There are fourteen of them!”
she gasped. It being the only fact about their arrival that she
could just about start to deal with.

“Fifteen, actually,” protested a
muffled voice that seemed to come from about waist height.

There was a sudden violent screech
and then the amplified voice of Senior Constable Kelvin Potter
blasted at them from the police lines.

“All right you hippy freaks. Now
you listen to me.”

Everyone turned to stare at the
policeman with the microphone in one hand and the other hand
resting on the butt of his police revolver.

“Who are they?” asked Drukk.

“They are called ‘police’,” Braxx
informed him. “They have been most friendly and helpful during our
journey here.” He gave an amused titter. “They seem to enjoy
following us about, poor creatures.”

Drukk saw that, apart from the one
speaking, the other ‘police’ were hiding behind their cars and
pointing what were probably weapons at them. Some had moved up to
hide behind the bus, or even under it. “Braxx...” he began to say,
but the amplified policeman cut him off.

“I want everyone on the floor now.
Throw your weapons well away from your body. Anyone resisting
arrest will be shot.”

There was a stunned silence and
then everyone—except the Vinggans, who were still trying to work it
out—started protesting at once.

“Shut up!” boomed Potter but the
babble continued. “Shut up!” he bellowed and this time the noise
subsided.

Into the relative quiet, Wayne
stepped forward and yelled, “Don’t shoot. There’s something really
strange going on here. I think we may have been visited from outer
space. Shit!”

This last exclamation was partly
because Sam had grabbed him by the scruff of the neck and dragged
him back and partly because Senior Constable Potter had fired two
shots into the air with his revolver.

Wide-eyed with alarm, Braxx
shouted, “They’re attacking us!” and raised his blaster. The
Pebbles of the New Dawn instantly followed suit.

Almost simultaneously, a scrawny
bloke in a bus driver’s uniform ran off the bus yelling, “Everybody
get down! They’re going to kill us all!” and threw himself onto the
sandy ground. Fortunately, many of the Receivers of Cosmic Bounty,
not to mention Sam and Wayne, followed his example or the carnage
might have been awful.

The police, anxiously watching for
signs of resistance, saw the Loosi Beechams reach into their large
handbags and pull out what seemed to be small sticks. They
immediately, and, strangely enough, correctly, assumed they were
about to be fired at and got in first with a deafening volley of
rifle and handgun fire. The Vinggans, no slouches when it comes to
shooting first and apologising later, returned their fire with
gusto.

From her spot on the wooden floor
of the veranda, where she was holding Wayne flat against the
boards, Sam saw half a dozen police cars explode into flame and
policemen everywhere flying though the air or running for their
lives. The back and front ends of the bus were blasted to pieces
too, making the policemen under it scrabble out and take to their
heels. The few shots the police had managed to get off at the
Vinggans rattled ineffectually against invisible force shields
which sprang up automatically around their targets as the
projectiles approached. “Jesus God!” she said. “They really are
aliens!”

It was all over in a few seconds.
The police, of whom quite a few survived, didn’t stop running until
they were well out of sight of the farmhouse. The spot where Senior
Constable Kelvin Potter had stood was marked only by a smoking
black heap.

“I thought you said they were
friendly!” shouted Drukk at a rather bemused Braxx.

The religious leader shook his
head. “They are the most peculiar species I have ever encountered.
So unpredictable.” He sighed and shrugged. “Ah well. Everybody up
now. We have lots to do. The Great Spirit’s work won’t wait.”

Drukk’s eye was caught by a sudden
movement from the bus. “What’s that?” A white flag—actually a
lady’s half-slip tied to a walking stick—had been pushed through a
shattered window and was being waved backwards and forwards by a
trembling, liver-spotted hand.

Detective Sergeant Barraclough was
on his feet again and free of all bonds. His monstrous captor was
like a demon magician. It seemed that its merest word or thought
could control invisible forces or conjure things out of the air.
Barraclough sat now on an invisible chair in front of an invisible
table spread with a Kentucky Fried Chicken Family Feast that the
Agent had apparently just willed into existence.

“This is like super-science,
right?” Asked the detective, his mouth full of fries. “I mean,
you’re not really a magician or anything?”

The Agent’s face was deadpan but
it’s deep voice smiled slightly. “Your primitive superstitions are
amusing,” it said.

“So you made this then? You made a
Kentucky Fried Chicken Family Feast, complete with little salt and
pepper sachets and extra-flexible plastic fork and all?”

“Ho, ho, ho!” said the Agent. At
least, it could have been that.

“Or is there a Mrs Agent in another
room somewhere who specialises in whipping up multinational
fast-food-chain delicacies for people you abduct from odd planets
along your way?”

“I have no mate, human. Agents do
not breed. Our masters produce us when we are needed.”

“And you don’t feel the urge
to...”

“Our minds are not disturbed by
thoughts of mating. We are free to focus on our objectives.”

“Doesn’t this Master-Slave thing
ever bother you? Don’t you ever want to just go fishing, or
whatever it is Agents like doing?”

“My life is one of purpose and
achievement. I am well satisfied.”

Barraclough wiped his fingers on
the tiny paper napkin that had been packed in with the meal and
took a swig of cola from a large paper beaker. He tried not to
imagine the reaction between the cold, chemical-flavoured drink and
the warm greasy food in his stomach.

“I live alone too,” he said,
remembering all the fast food he’d eaten in his life. “The job
doesn’t seem to leave much time for socialising.”

“You are a hunter,” the Agent
affirmed.

“I’ve got a case to solve. So, will
you help me out or not?” The remains of the food disappeared as he
tossed the used napkin onto it.

“It seems our objectives are
closely aligned,” the Agent agreed. “I must find the Vinggans and
you seek a group of ‘Loosi Beechams’ which I believe to be the
Vinggans in disguise. Can you help me find them?”

Barraclough smiled. “Easily. Will
you help me arrest them?”

“Once I have interrogated them, you
may do with them as you please.”

“Then it’s a deal, mate!” He put
out his hand to shake on it.

The Agent studied the gesture for a
moment then smiled. “A deal,” it said and reached out its own hand.
Barraclough looked at the gigantic black talons he was being
offered and almost took his hand back but, swallowing hard, he
forced himself to take the creature’s great claw and shake it. The
Agent’s hand was cool and dry, like snakeskin but its handshake was
surprisingly gentle. Standing so close to it, Barraclough felt like
a small child in front of an enormous adult. Trying not to show his
nervous relief, he retrieved his hand, feeling lucky to still have
it in one piece.
What on Earth must the masters of this monster
look like?
he wondered.