David Garnet - Bikini Planet

Norton held up his left hand, with its full set of fingers.

Then the alien held up its left hand. Three fingers, one thumb.

“Ah, you’re deformed!” said Xenbashka Bashka Ka.

“I’m not deformed,” said Norton.

“You’re an alien, of course you are.”

Xenbashka Bashka Ka suddenly growled, showing its teeth. They were long and sharp, like fangs, and Norton quickly stepped back.

“We know what it’s like to be hideously ugly,” said the alien. “But it doesn’t matter, not here. If you’re from another planet, even the most beautiful alien can look like an ugly monster. Or vice versa.”

Xenbashka Bashka Ka growled again, and Norton realised it wasn’t a threatening noise. To him it sounded like a growl, but to the Algolan its meaning was different. A laugh…?

“Do you want a pair of gloves to hide your deformity?” asked the alien.

“This really is a clothes shop?” said Norton, as he peered around. The silky drapes which engulfed them both must have been fabric samples.

“No.”

“Oh.”

“There’s nothing you can see which you can buy.”

“Oh. Yeah. Then I’ll go.” He kept looking around. “If I can.”

“But we can make whatever garment you want. What would you like?”

“Er…”

“Something like you’re wearing?”

“No.” Norton was still in his steward’s uniform. He could have changed before leaving the ship, but it was the only outfit which was half suitable.

“Something like we’re wearing?” asked the alien.

“No!”

“What’s wrong with it?”

“Nothing. On you, it’s fine.”

Norton didn’t know the word for what the alien was wearing, although presumably there was one in the Algolan language. The garment was a pair of pants that began halfway up the chest and ended below the knees, and it appeared to be made from hundreds of small green bricks cemented together with mortar, each layer of which was a different colour. The alien’s elbows were similarly covered. It also wore a pair of transparent clogs, and Norton could see that each foot had four clawed toes.

“Show me what you want,” said Xenbashka Bashka Ka, and blue fingers touched what looked like a watch strapped to a blue wrist.

The air between them shimmered for a moment, then a figure materialised in the room.

Norton moved away as the shape suddenly appeared. It was a naked biped, still and lifeless. A tailor’s dummy. A full-sized duplicate of himself, in fact. Even its right index finger was missing. As were the genitals. Norton looked down. So did Xenbashka Bashka Ka. The alien’s head rocked from side to side. An Algolan shrug…?

“Pants,” said Norton. “Long, loose pants.”

Alien fingers danced across what wasn’t a wristwatch, and a pair of trousers appeared on the mannequin.

“Down to the ankles,” said Norton, and the pants grew longer. “Waist lower. Around the waist.”

He’d thought he was coming to choose some clothes, not design a complete costume for himself. His favourite outfit, the one he felt most comfortable in, had been his Las Vegas Police Department uniform. Because he was an undercover cop, it probably wasn’t a good idea to wear something like that, even though no one would recognise it, not here, not now.

Norton had another idea. The more he thought about it, the more he liked it. Why not the kind of snazzy suit James Cagney or Humphrey Bogart wore when they were gang bosses?

Yeah, why not?

The Algolan was an expert at interpreting Norton’s hesitant approximations, and very quickly the image became clothed.

Double-breasted jacket, wide lapels, razor-sharp creases on the pants. Belt—no, make that suspenders. Starched shirt. Vest with fancy buttons. Polished spats. Necktie.

“We don’t do weapons,” said Xenbashka Bashka Ka.

“A necktie isn’t a weapon. It’s a piece of material that goes under the shirt collar, then hangs down over the buttons.”

The alien soon designed a necktie which met Norton’s specifications.

“That looks great,” said Norton, studying what had been created.

“What colours do you want?”

“None.” Gangster films had all been in black and white, and so Norton’s suit had to be in monochrome. “White shirt, everything else black.”

Xenbashka Bashka Ka operated the wrist control, and the jacket and vest and tie and pants and suspenders and shoes all became black.

“The customer is always right,” said the Algolan, “but that isn’t.”

Norton nodded his agreement. The outfit looked far too formal. The jacket seemed like a tuxedo. More than anything, the dummy resembled a head waiter.

“What do you suggest?” he asked.

“How about stripes?”

“Stripes?” Norton immediately thought of sergeant’s stripes, but chevrons on the sleeves would spoil the effect.

“Like this.”

The Algolan added pinstripes to the jacket and pants, and wider diagonal stripes to the tie, which diluted the severity of the black. That was how black and white movies looked, Norton realised. They were different shades of grey.

“Yeah,” he agreed, “like that. Now I need a hat. What were they called? A fedora? Like a stetson, but not as big.”

Under his direction, Xenbashka Bashka Ka created a hat that looked almost perfect. But there was something wrong, something missing.

“A band,” said Norton. “It needs a band.”

“You want music coming out of your hat?”

“No, a band of fabric, above the brim, going around the crown. Yeah. Like that. Not so wide. Yeah. Yeah. That’s it. That’s it!”

The perfect gangster suit, straight out of the late thirties, early forties— nineteen thirties, forties, naturally. It was a classic, there had been nothing like it for centuries. Norton gazed at the design in admiration.

“How many would you like?” asked the alien. “Two sets of everything?”

“Two, yeah, why not?” Then he realised why not. “Er, what about payment?”

“If you couldn’t pay, you wouldn’t be on Hideaway.”

“Exactly.” Norton nodded. “Exactly.”

“And if you can’t pay, you’ll wish you weren’t on Hideaway.”

“Oh.”

The alien growled, but Norton stood his ground. A growl meant laughter. Maybe.

A clawed finger tapped the circular gadget, and the no-longer-naked mannequin vanished.

“How long before it’s all made?” Norton asked.

“A few minutes. If you want, we can dispose of what you’re wearing and you can put on your new ensemble.”

“Yeah.”

“Would you like a bag to carry your other new clothes? We can make one in any style you wish.”

Norton thought about it. “I want one shaped like a violin case.”

He’d never seen a violin case, except in the movies—and neither had he ever seen a violin—but he demonstrated what he meant.

“Like this?” said the Algolan, and another manifestation appeared between them.

“More like,” said Norton, gesturing with his hands, “yeah, that, only not as much, yeah, there, that way, with a kind of… yeah.”

The alien’s creation looked close enough.

“We need your name,” said Xenbashka Bashka Ka.

“Wayne,” he said. And immediately wished he hadn’t. “Why do you need my name?”

“So that we will be paid.”

Norton had checked in as Robin Hood, but it was too late to give the Algolan another name—although not too late to give his complete one.

“I’m Duke Wayne,” he said.

“You’re a duke?”

“Yeah.”

“We are royalty.”

“That’s nice.”

“You must already know who we are.”

“No.”

“But you must.”

“No. Why?”

“Because you’re here to assassinate us.”