Michael Moorcock: A Cure for Cancer

Captain Brunner pushed back his hood and pointed to an intersection and a hotel called The Jolly Englishman which stood beside a garage. 'That's where I left the car.'

Pulling the sled behind them, they made for The Jolly Englishman, followed by the pack of dogs.

Jerry checked his watches. They were ticking perfectly. He was relieved, though there were still a great many uncertainties.

It was difficult to work out in his head just what side-effects Beesley's attempts had initiated.

A counter-revolution, after all, was a counter-revolution.

They carried the equipment to the big Duesenberg and stowed it down by the back seats. Captain Brunner got into the car and started the engine. Jerry sat beside him and slammed the door.

The dogs began to howl.

'Faithful buggers,' said Captain Brunner, 'but there's nothing else for it, I'm afraid.' He turned the car on to the M4o and drove towards Oxford.

'It does you good to get out of London occasionally,' said Jerry as the evening sunlight touched the red leaves of the elms lining the road..

'Especially at this time of the year,' agreed Captain Brunner.

'Have all the Americans gone home now?'

'I think so. Beesley's messing about didn't help matters, of course. A general panic over there, by the sound of it. Just as things were settling down nicely, too.' Captain Brunner turned on the tape machine and got John, George, Paul and Ringo doing She's Leaving Home.

Jerry relaxed.

Captain Brunner pulled off his furs and stretched himself out on the yellow silks of the bed in the Oxford underground pied-a-terre.

This is a bit more like it. Hasn't changed much, has it?'

'Some things don't. Not very often, at any rate.' Jerry poured two glasses of Pernod. 'You're still fond of this, I hope.'

Captain Brunner extended an arm that glowed with energy. 'You can bet your life. Thanks.' He sipped the Pernod. 'I'm not particularly thirsty, of course, but it's nice just to taste.'

'I know what you mean.'

'Could I have a last look at Catherine, Jerry? Would you mind?'

Jerry felt a pang of jealousy. 'Of course not.'

They walked down the corridor together, entered the morgue, opened Catherine's drawer and looked down at her lovely face. 'As beautiful as ever,' murmured Captain Brunner. 'It's been a long time.'

Jerry patted his shoulder.

'I wish...' Captain Brunner turned away. 'Still, I shouldn't be here at all. Maybe it wasn't wise...' He walked swiftly from the morgue, leaving Jerry to put the drawer back and close the door.

When Jerry returned to the room, Captain Brunner had taken off all his clothes and was sitting on the edge of the bed staring at the console and tapping his knees.

'Can we get it over with now?' said Captain Brunner.

Jerry lifted the box and put it between them. He slid back the slot covering and with his red silk handkerchief he wiped it carefully. Then he stared straight into Captain Brunner's crimson eyes. 'Cheerio. Thanks for everything.'

'Cheerio, Jerry.'

Brunner put his hands together and shoved them quickly into the slot. His lips parted over clenched teeth, his body began to sag, his complexion to dull, his hair to lose its lustre. He breathed more and more slowly until he stopped, but his hands still remained in the slot until his flesh shrank and his skin turned yellow and there was little more than a skeleton lying beside the machine.

Jerry picked the corpse up and carried it in one hand to the morgue, filing it in the spare drawer farthest from Catherine's. Then he went back and inspected the machine.

Brunner had been carrying a huge supply of energy and the machine was charged to capacity, but the energy in itself wouldn't be enough to bring Catherine back for more than a few minutes. Much more energy had to be released and then channelled to give Catherine the few days of life Jerry wanted her to have.

It would require a massive build up and release of energy and this meant speeding up the time cycle (or what was left of it). Only those with their identities firmly established would survive the spin.

He felt lonely as he prepared the machine. But then he forgot his loneliness in his anticipation.

He brought Catherine in and laid her on the bed. He bolted the box to the bench he had assembled. He ran a thin pipe from the box to Catherine's throat and secured it with a piece of surgical tape.

He checked his instruments carefully.

Then he turned on.

Jerry increased the power and checked that all dimensions could be phased in at the right moment. He synched Jimi Hendrix in. He began to sing Third Stone from the Sun very loudly. It was all part of the ritual; all part of the spell.

And it was a tense moment.

He twisted his head to look at Catherine, and set the pointer to Automatic.

Things began to hum.

Swiftly Jerry increased the entropy rate to maximum, preparing himself for the ensuing dissipation.

He began to feel dizzy as he gave the universe a whirl. For all the shielding in his lab, he wondered if he were safe after all. He blinked and could see the leaping cord that led to Catherine's throat, saw Catherine's body tremble.

He adjusted the identity stabilizers and locked in the coordinates. There was now a golden mist swirling everywhere and the box had become very hot When everything was on Full he fell backwards and onto and then through the bed and continued to fall.

He pulled himself together as best he could. It didn't matter about the extent of the dispersal so long as he kept everything in the right order. He began to flood through the universe and then through the multiverse, to the sounds of the Beatles singing A Day in the Lite, throbbing in time to the cosmic pulse. Universe upon universe; dimension upon dimension; they spread out together and the extraneous energy released in the explosion poured into the box and into Catherine's body.

Faster and faster flew the particles and Jerry hung on. Framed against the spreading gases he saw other human shapes and he knew that some of the transmogs were managing to resist the conversion of the universe.

He looked about him and waited as Helter Skelter echoed through the infinite. It was quite a nice trip.

At last maximum diffusion was reached and everything became a little unreal. He felt a moment's concern before the switch clicked over, Jimi Hendrix started to play Are You Experienced?, and things began to come together again.

Soon he would know if the experiment had paid off.

Jerry took a deep breath, opened his eyes and saw springs moving. He was under the bed. He rolled out and there was his machine steaming on the bench. Its circuits appeared to have fused. He activated the TV monitors and got the surface.