Jeff Noon: Vurt

I listened to the van settling its rust deposits.

The Riders were looking at me. Even the Beetle was twisted around, his eyes full of jam; "Nobody said anything, Scribb." But then I got it again, that voice.

"Scribble… Scribble…"

And I got where it was coming from; the Thing. A gash had opened in his flesh, a set of black gums peeled back from crumbling teeth, and a tongue of lard moving there, between them.

"Scribble…"

But only I could hear. Why was it only me, and why was he using that voice? That beautiful voice…

Beetle broke the mood; "Let's do it! Inside!"

I heard an owl calling, from the Platt Fields. Real, Vurt, or robo - who can tell the difference any more?

No matter.

It had a longing to it.

This week's safe selection, my kittlings. Status: blue and legal.

THERMO FISH . You went swimming in the Seas of Pitch. But now you're back on Earth and you're feeling slightly queasy. It can only get worse. Because the Thermo Fish of Pitch have invaded your system. Your blood stream is a river home for them. They love those passages. You're feeling the heat inside, the biting heat. One thing to do; buy yourself some nano-hooks, some pitchworm bait, go fishing for a week. You know the Game Cat doesn't lie.

HONEY SUCKERS are out to get you. They want you for supper. Six legs, four wings, two antennae and a demon sting. They'll cover your body with bites and turn you into a swarm. Only quork juice will save you. It turns the Honies to pulp. You better find some, and soon, because those bugs are coming. Trouble is, quorks live on the planet jangle. The Cat says squirt those suckers!

We had to drag the Thing-from-Outer-Space out of the van, his fat sack of a body clinging to the tartan rug, glued by the juices.

Beetle opened the van's doors. "Come on, lazy fucks," he shouted, reaching into the back to gather the dropped feathers from the van floor. One of them, the black, he slipped into his baccy box. "I feel like tripping out somewhere." He was walking fast towards the house.

The pad was on the top floor of the Rusholme Gardens. Sure, it was in Rusholme but no trace of a garden. Just an old-style block of flats on the corner of Wilmslow and Platt.

The doorcam reacted to Beetle's image in a loving way, opening its gates in a slow, seductive swing. Brid was back in shadow mode, sleep-walking to the step-light, so that left me and Mandy holding the can. The can was the Thing and he was like Vaz between our fingers. Oh boy, Thing was hot; totally adventurous. Respect to that.

"Let's move it, Big Thing," I said.

The Desdemona calls had stopped. Now he was rambling in his own language. Xa Xa Xa! Xhasy Xhasy! Stuff like that. Maybe he was travelling the Vurt-waves, looking for a new home. Maybe I'm some kind of romantic fool, especially when the Manchester rain starts to fall in memory and I'm scribbling this down, chasing the moments. Bridget used to say that the rain around there was special, that something had gone wrong with the city's climate. That you always thought it was just about to start raining, but it always was, anyway. All I know is that looking back I swear I can feel it falling on me, on my skin. That rain means everything to me, all of the past, all that has been lost. I can see big spots of rain on the gravel. Over the road the black trees of Platt Fields Park are whispering and swaying, receiving the gift of water gratefully. The moon is a thin knife, a curved blade. Miles from there, and years and years later, I can still feel that slow struggle towards the flat door.

Thing-from-Outer-Space wasn't really from Outer Space. Mandy just called him that, and we'd all latched onto it. Well then, what would you call a shapeless blob that didn't speak any known language and that had come into your world by a bad accident? Tough one, huh?

"Stop dropping him!" hissed Mandy, her voice heavy from the exertion. The rain had plastered her red hair flat to her brow.

"Does it look like I'm dropping him?"

"His head's on the floor!"

"Is that his head? I thought it was his tail."

Mandy was getting angry at me, as though I should enjoy carrying aliens over wet gravel, in the dark, in the rain. As though I should know all the various techniques of carrying aliens.

"Keep a hold of him!" she screamed.

"Keep a hold of what? He's all slippery."

Just then a shadowcop flickered into life, broadcasting from the Platt Fields' aerial. He moved like a fog, the starry lights of his mechanisms going on and off, on and off, as he drifted through the trees. I told Mandy to get a move on.

"Look who's talking about speed," she replied.

We had to bend the Thing into a strange shape to get him through the house doors, a kind of Mobius knot variant. The Thing didn't mind; his body was super-fluid anyway, from the embrace of Vurt. A quick glance over the shoulder told me that the shadowcop was out of the park and heading towards the flats. I slammed the door on the sight. Silence. Pause. A catch of breath. The look of despair in Mandy's eyes, naked eyes under the hall lights, her arms straining to hold the weight of alien meat. "Shit!" I said. "We forgot the rug." The Thing was naked in our hands.

"How did we get here?" Mandy asked.

"What?"

"Why is it always like this?"

"Never mind that. Keep going."

Above us, on the next landing, Brid was drifting with the shadows, trailing smoke. "Follow her," I said.

It was like carrying a bad dream up a flight of greasy collapsing stairs.

Sometimes it feels like the whole world is smeared with Vaz.

"Are you after the Beetle?" I asked, halfway up the first flight

"Beetle? Don't be daft."

"Oh good. Because Bridget would kill you."

"Seb told me something."

"Oh yeah?" I managed, between panting breaths.

"There's a new delivery, tomorrow."

"Of what?"

"New stuff. Good stuff, he said. Bootlegs. Well black."

"Voodoo's not black. I told you that."

"Yes, English Voodoo. Seb -"

"He's got it!? Mandy!"

"Not yet. Coming in tomorrow -"

"Mandy! This is -"

"Watch out! The Thing! He's…"

I was dropping the alien. My hands were too sweaty. I was losing the world. A feather was floating in my mind. A beautiful multicoloured specimen. I almost had it! Just reach out!

"Scribble!" Mandy's voice calling me back down. "What's wrong with you?"

"I need it, Mandy! No messing. We've got to find Seb again."

"Not him. He gave me the contact name. Said that Icarus was getting a new delivery."

"Icarus?"

"Icarus Wing. That's his source. Seb's supplier. You know him?"

I'd never heard of him. "Mandy, why didn't you say this before?"

"Would have done. Just the cops… and all that… the shadow-cop… the dog. Scribble, I got confused. I… I'm sorry…"

I looked at her then, her greasy scarlet hair a mess from the rain, a last smudge of paint on her bottom lip. Oh sure, no great beauty under the harsh light of a stairwell, face creased from the carrying of that lump of alien flesh, but my heart was calling out a song, a kind of love song, I guess. Christ knows, it had been a long time without singing.

"Do you think Seb will be alright?" she asked.

"Find him, Mandy. Ask him about English Voodoo -"

"I don't think he'll be working that Vurt-U-Want counter any more."

"Don't you know where he lives?"

"No. He's very secretive… Scribb!" Mandy's eyes in shock mode.

"What? What is it?"

"Over there! The corner -"

We'd reached the first landing by now. There was a store cupboard set into the wall. It was marked NO GO. In the dark space between it and the wall lay a coil of rope, a violet and green rope. It moved. Sudden like.