Outsider (26 page)

The drums roll and the guitars are unleashed
on the willing audience. Sid's eyes track the guitar moves, the
music leaping joyfully, bouncing off each musician and
reverberating in rippling waves of pleasure and excitement through
the crowd.
Music is an ocean, let your mind swim like a
fish.

Something is wrong; it suddenly jumps at Sid.
She takes her fascinated eyes away from the charismatic musician
running her cordless electric guitar all over the stage, and scans
the audience. After such an onslaught of music, Sid is more
susceptible to spontaneity. She sees the vampire from the Breakdown
and rage gathers in dark clouds all over her field of vision.
Hungry, Dee-Dee's one-track mind is taking her focused feet to
innocent victims.

Motionless, Joy watches Sid suddenly bumping
into punters, carving a path through the crowd. She has been aware
of her fellow blood drinker since the act before the headliners.
She is curious about Sid's new strength as a psychic vampire. Rage
can be such a powerful fuel. Joy is as confident, as arrogant, as
any vampire left unchallenged for too long. She can be there before
you finish snapping your fingers once.

Hungry and expectant, Dee-Dee greets surprise
when one impudent past victim steps in front of her intended
dinner. The eyes are as dark as a stormy sky. Something very
powerful tugs and pulls at Dee-Dee.
Not again
. However, the
creature is more powerful than she remembers and pain is edging its
way through her nerves.

* * * * * * *

Toni is older and, if not wiser, more
knowledgeable. She takes flight over the crowd mesmerized by the
legendary rock band. And gets bumped off by an unprecedented
missile before slamming into the psychic vampire.

"Hey!" Complains the punter she squarely and
ungracefully landed on. She does not even bother contemplating his
good-natured outrage, she breaks his neck with one swift hand.
Another brawny punter attempts to jump her but only impales himself
on the same swift hand.

The band keeps on playing. The bass player is
the first grey eye to stare, soon wearily, at the skirmish quickly
getting out of hand. Well, it is actually in Toni's deadly, swift
hand.

People unhappily bumped into join the fight,
while Toni tries to get to Sid. To do so, she needs to get past
Joy, while Dee-Dee simply would like to get to her dinner, but it
is rather tricky with this creature staring at her and sucking out
her energy. She can just about resist the pull, but cannot break
the eye contact. They are both aware of the chaos raging around
her. Frank and Tracee are not quite sure what to do. So far, mayhem
is happening around them and without them, but there is not
apparent exit.

The song ends in the clamour rising from the
audience. It is a mixture of enthusiasm from the punters still
untouched by the rage, and screaming and shouting from the fighters
crowding the melee. The wandering guitar player looks at the bass
player, who looks at the other guitar player, who looks at the
drummer. The security people look rather overwhelmed. Riot is
threatening to reach the stage. Consensus is established in a split
second: playing a bloody riot is not in their contract. They
run.

"Children, children," Death sighs, sitting on
the edge of the stage.

"Yes, children," Life's sigh perfectly echoes
her workmate's.

"Shall we?"

"Let's."

Freezing time happens to be a prerogative
they rarely use. They choose to interfere only when other powerful
beings ─in this case: usual troublemakers the vampires─ threaten
the balance of beliefs or the order of the future.

Struck by the sudden silence, Toni and Joy,
only ten feet from the ground, lose their hold on each other, drop
off the air and look around. The psychic link between Sid and
Dee-Dee is broken when the mortal looks at the tall woman with
long, blond hair who ruffles Joy's black and white long, mohican
while strolling by, and at Death smiling in the frozen chaos. Joy
throws a venomous look at the stranger.

"Children, children! What are we supposed to
do about you!" The copper-skinned woman exclaims with ironic
nonchalance. "I am Death", she says for Toni's and Dee-Dee's
benefit. "This is Life. We work a lot together," pointing at the
newcomer.

If truth be told, Vampires are out of their
jurisdiction, but they have always kept this detail under
wraps.

Toni, squaring up to Death, throws her rage
into the relaxed face: "And what the hell do you want?"

"She used to be so sweet," Death tells Life.
"Remember? It was not easy for her in the late 1780's when she was
still human. Such pity some vampires can go mentally unstable."

"Yes," Life replies, as deadpan as her
colleague. "There is only so much we can do."

"Now, seriously," Death redirects her
attention. "We have several problems to address, one being that
there is no reason for Sid to be a psychic vampire. Yes, I know,
Sid, you'd rather be a werewolf. But it is not a question of
choice."

"We also have Dee-Dee who'd rather be dead
than be a vampire but, survival instinct is such a bitch!" Life
picks up the thread.

"Toni is insane."

"Joy is depressed. Hence her name."

"And we are in a public venue, at a public
event, in the middle of a frozen mayhem. Bear with us, children;
for us, being here is like having a tea break! We can get so bored
with our work."

Irate, the scarecrow lunges at Death, but her
lethal hands only catch empty air.

"Behind you, child."

She whirls around, only to find herself flat
on the ground, face in the sticky dirt, and one leather boot as
heavy as lead on her back, in less than a blink of an eye.

"I am Death, and even if you are not directly
under my dominion, I can do whatever I want to you." There is iron
in her voice.

"We'll have to spread them over the
planet."

"Yes." Turning to their unwilling audience,
the supposedly Grim Reaper addresses them with a grin: "Spread, but
do not multiply!"

Dee-Dee stares down at the enraged vampire,
wordlessly. Joy looks away pointedly. Sid sighs; it is her human
prerogative. Around them, punters are like statues of stone. It
almost looks like an easy-watching, American TV series. In fact,
the writer is pleased to see Death again, but this time she keeps
silent.

"Time travel?" Life suddenly suggests, just
for the fun of it.

"It would be only temporary."

"Parallel universe?"

"You have too much spare time!" Death catches
on the humorous streak.

"We'll have to, then."

"Yes, we'll have to."

Death and Life stare at each other in serious
silence. It is a most radical solution.

"Do what?" Sid eventually queries for herself
and the vampires.

"I'll take Toni," says Death.

"I'll take Dee-Dee," says Life.

"Sid?"

It is like shorthand. It is actually a
language they speak regularly between them.

"What?" The mortal asks.

"In her case, it might disappear the same way
it appears. It is just a question of fulfilling her destiny."

"Behave yourself," Death tells the writer
with a gentle smile. "I'll see you soon." She grabs Toni by the
collar of her jacket, while Life rests a strong hand on Dee-Dee's
neck.

Mayhem suddenly unfreezes around Sid and
Joy.

A novel by W.
Freedreamer Tinkanesh

“
And drowning in the flood

Of the sea’s angry sorrow

That pulls me with the tide” (Jane Timm Baxter)

PROLOGUE

Reader, tread carefully……. You might, or
might not, desire to know what happened a few years later……. At any
rate, watch your step…….

THE ENVOY

BY

W. Freedreamer Tinkanesh

“
Because who knows how the water is
designed?”

(Wrong Lane Jane aka Jane Lawson in “The
Enigma”)

An Envoy’s existence requires regular
time-outs. It’s tough, it’s unpredictable, it’s demanding, it’s all
over the place. Unfortunately these days, free time is a luxury and
we have to keep on call twenty-four hours a day, no matter what.
The boss herself is working triple shift. We can blame it on the
increase of the suicide rate.

So, there I was, enjoying the nice summer
night in a biker café, looking forward to the main act (an
uncompromising rock band going by the name of Never The Bride), and
in the meantime enjoying the support act thrown as a sacrifice to
the avid crowd of fans. Girls On Top were a very distinctive
punk-rock outfit and the audience could only welcome the vociferous
singer and delight in the infectious music.

When my pager vibrated painfully in the back
pocket of my leather jeans.

I fished it out to check the number:
666.There was no escaping from that one. I gave the band a last
wistful look and walked through the tight throng of mostly leather
maniacs.

My Suzuki Intruder was peacefully waiting for
me among like-minded motorbikes. Helmet safely fastened under my
chin, I roared my proud machine into life, action and night.

When I walked into her office, Death looked
up from a monitor with a harassed look blemishing her magnificent
features. Dark eyes, copper skin, long raven hair. She hadn’t had
time to turn into skeleton lately. Way too busy. Life, as blond as
she generally chose to show herself to us, was standing by her
side. A 666 that required Life’s presence? This was serious
business. They looked equally exhausted. My boss handed me a floppy
disk over the ebony desk.

“Rikki, you’ll bring her directly to me.”

I read the name on the proffered item: Sid
Wasgo……. I was put in charge of the legendary Sid Wasgo! Well, she
is legendary among the Envoys of Death, believe me. Death and Life
had been keeping her alive as long as they could. Death had even
shown up before Sid’s eyes a few times. Envoys gossiped about the
connection between the mortal and our boss. Envoys knew it was not
Sid’s appointed time yet. So, could it be that eventually, Sid was
succeeding where she had failed so many times: suicide, to
eventually join Death.

Sure, there were many mortals head over heels
for Death, but this Sid Wasgo was special, very special, to our
boss. Who right there and then interrupted my train of
thoughts:

“All the details you need are on the
disk.”

And it was a red disk. Was she out of black
ones?!

* * * * * *

I walked into the first available cubicle to
transform into whatever programmation was required especially for
Sid Wasgo, wondering why Death wasn’t collecting this mortal in
person. Stupid me, she certainly wanted to, but she was probably
too busy cramming three hours into one. Busy to a point she had to
delegate senior Envoys to recruit potential new Envoys. Back in the
seventies, it was slightly easier. Just slightly enough for Death
to show up before my heart stopped beating, and offer me the job of
a lifetime. Yes, I was no stranger to suicide; this was how Envoys
were recruited. A chance to do something, “Something” with a big
capital “S”. As a suicidee, I had nothing to lose.

And there I was, turning into the next best
thing Sid Wasgo wanted to see in her dying moment: a tall 5’7’’
with strong elegant muscles, green mohican smartly standing out,
Haida-inspired tattoos down every arm and leg, Navajo designs on
back and front, a Smirnoff tarantula on one side of the neck, and
scars in place of breasts. I knew what was the real her and what
was the ideal fantasy. She never had the money for a
double-mastectomy and could never identify to any of the official
genders, while still sticking to her political guns, painfully. The
world didn’t have to do much to kill her; she was too weak to
survive.

I was provided with a black studded leather
outfit fitting for a Hell’s Angel, over a black T-shirt sporting a
colourful Chinese dragon, a couple of thick chains criss-crossing
around the hips, a matching belt, and biker boots with red flames
eating at the toes. This writer had read too many books and not
lived out enough…….

* * * * * *

Dusk, appointed hour to the wolves, is an
ideal time for the collection of a dying soul. Especially one as
contrasted as Sid Wasgo’s. I parked my modified Suzuki Intruder in
the paved front yard of the five-storey building, next to Sid’s
black Kawasaki Eliminator for company.

Locked doors, security or closet, were no
problem for Envoys, we simply walked through them, immaterial. No,
we couldn’t fly. At least, not without a motorbike.

The stairwell reeked of sadness and
damnation. It looked forsaken by cleaners. Someone had adorned a
wall with a now indecipherable haiku. At the second floor, a door,
whose anonymity was lost to my uninterrupted and purposeful steps.
I heard a blues song ending in ad lib:

“
Track number five, she is yeah she is,
the siren, never calling your name, oh you wan it so, you want her
so, you want her so…….”

I stopped to contemplate the Haida-inspired
artwork on the bedroom door. The writer was also an artist. The
song started again its perpetual loop, sharply biting my ears.
Second Look was her favourite band. A band she had followed for a
few years, striking friendship with them. Their music had kept her
alive for a long while. She had also tried computer games, but
depression was a deceitful illness. You never knew when it would
hit you again.

Sid was lying on her bed, a hard mattress
directly on the black carpet, wearing an identical twin of my
T-shirt, vaguely tucked into faded blue jeans with worn-out knees.
I could see the ends of her leg tattoos sticking out on her bare
feet.