The Puppet Shop

Darren kicked the General Magic under his desk. It was on the blink again, making gurgling noises and becoming uncomfortably hot. Now would be a bad time for it to crap out on him, when he had so much to do. The commands from Asteron were coming thick and fast, an army preparing for battle. He tapped on the computer keyboard, scrolling through the messages they had sent him. Ever since the first broadcast intrusion, where they had interrupted his viewing of Doctor Who to let him know of his recruitment, the messages had been consistently brief, pragmatic and obtuse.

But this was how Asteron worked, and he knew better than to question them. He was fortunate, blessed even, to have been conscripted into the resistance. He didn’t know how many of them there were, but given the activity on the private message boards he was far from alone.

The latest instruction, in broken grammar as always, stated ‘BECOME IT WHEN FAST REGARD 76′. He drummed his fingers on his chipped teeth. The number 76 came up often, and was significant to Asteron, and the movement. He would occasionally see people with ’76’ on their hats or clothing, or the number on a higher than expected proportion of car license plates. This is how he knew he was protected.

The General Magic sighed and its LEDs flickered wanly. He kicked it and the computer monitor dimmed and was rejuvenated. BECOME IT WHEN FAST REGARD 76. The spider icon next to the message blinked, spun and disappeared. Darren took the needles out of his hands and switched off the machine.

Sheila’s bag was large, of thick tan leather, with floral embroidery. It went everywhere with her, including Dr Kirline’s office. The bag was large and sturdy enough to provide protection from the unknown, a role it was currently performing, sat on her lap as the doctor spoke.

Dr Kirline was – and Sheila wasn’t sure of exactly the right words here – a brown man. He was explaining in soft tones how the protocols worked, and the risks inherent in them. Sheila wondered if his god was her God. Or if his god had an elephant’s head, or lots of arms. Her thought process uncomfortably changed course, like a rat hitting a maze cul-de-sac.

There was a backpack apparently, that she had to wear. It was black and ugly. Couldn’t she put the contraption in her tan leather bag with floral embroidery, she asked? Dr Kirline smiled and said she could, as long as the wires reached the electrodes. Her dishwashing hands whiteknuckled the thick tan leather. She was going to be late for brunch with David.

Dr Kirline was talking about the stories in the news. The ones about the institute and that poor girl, the bald one who jumped. Sheila made empathetic cooing noises until Dr Kirline looked serious and told her that there were other forces at work, that wanted to besmirch the Institute’s reputation, and he wouldn’t let that happen.

But Sheila wasn’t worried. Like the tan leather bag with floral embroidery, she was resilient.

Like the tan leather bag with floral embroidery, she was practical.

Like the tan leather bag with floral embroidery, she was empty.

It was around the size of a shoebox, with curved corners, and painted matte black. Four unlabelled LEDs pulsed lazily at the bottom right corner. It was a source of free energy, and it was called General Magic. The Institute had placed an order for fifteen of these units, from a small concern based in Sweden. Their representative was hazy on the technology and how it worked, and was at pains to point out no patents had been filed or sought. It worked, he said, because it was General Magic.

Dr Terence and his team were keen to have a portable power supply for the collection of data in the field, and General Magic was easily transportable in a backpack, even for the more slight of the participants, such as Marina. Because it never ran out of power, and never needed recharging, it was also used in certain applications for backup electricity such as patient monitoring and life support.

The Institute’s technical department secretly took a General Magic unit apart during the assessment stage, but were dismayed to see all its circuitry encased in thick black epoxy. They remained skeptical, quoting the laws of thermodynamics to anyone who would listen, but the facts spoke for themselves. The fifteen units had been running for six months now, without charging or external forces being required.

One of the more vocal detractors of General Magic was the ever pragmatic Rokus. He refused to be alone in the room with a unit, and complained of high-pitched noises emanating from them that nobody else could hear. The hospital staff gradually tuned out his complaints once he started claiming General Magic boxes would move of their own accord, and would whisper in a foreign language when placed in the dark.

One frosty November morning, Institute staff arrived at work to find the words “GM POWERED BY RESCUE DOG SOULS” daubed on the front steps.

Dr Terence looked across his desk at his colleagues. It was 1976. The Shar Pei skull sat between them all, warm white and sharp.

“Well?” asked Dr Terence. “How did this Shar Pei Skull get in my desk drawer?” His dark eyebrows lifted.

Rokus coughed and shifted uncomfortably in his chair, his tight curls glistening with sweat. The hospital administrator wasn’t the kind of man prone to pranks, but was the only one who had been seen entering Terence’s office since yesterday. “I have no idea, Doctor, where the Shar Pei skull has come from.” It was 1976.

“Madeleine?” asked Terence, swinging his gulag spotlight gaze on the ruddy-faced assistant. “This – object. Have you seen it before?”

“No, Doctor,” stammered the girl. She pushed her glasses up her nose. “I’ve never seen that Shar Pei skull before in my life.”

It was 1976. Dr Terence sighed. “You know what this means, of course,” he said to the room at large. Rokus, Madeleine, and Mr Victor looked at each other in turn. “We have to be more careful in future.” His colleagues exhaled relief, inhaled future career security. Much bustling and exiting.

Alone now, Dr Terence picked up the Shar Pei skull and turned it over in his hands. Tomorrow, he would need to find another desk drawer to put it in.

“It is 1976,” he said.

Ever since her stay at the hospital, Marina had been having strange dreams. They had warned her of certain side effects of the procedure – hair loss, increased libido, yellowing of the skin – but this was unexpected. She was sitting in the airport, waiting for a flight, sipping a cardboard-flavoured coffee, and trying not to worry.

Voices clamoured over the tannoy, but she couldn’t make out any words for some reason. The departure and arrival boards clattered, despite being digital. A man in a cowboy hat led a llama on a leash past her, she could smell its wool.

Marina woke up. She was in a doctor’s waiting room. A magazine she had been reading lay on the floor at her feet. For some reason, the other people in the waiting room all had pet carriers on their laps. She couldn’t see inside the pet carriers, but each was emitting strange snuffling and chewing noises. The door opened, and a man in a cowboy hat aimed a gun at her and pulled the trigger.

Marina woke up. She sat bolt upright in bed, sweat soaking her tank top. She rubbed her face with her hands and blinked hard. The clock said 3:00am. It was always 3:00am. There was a good reason for this, but she couldn’t remember what it was. She walked to the bathroom for a glass of water, blinking at her stretched features in the cold light of the bathroom mirror. She thought she saw something over her shoulder in the darkness, and started – but it was just a hoodie hanging on a door. She turned back to the mirror, her face was made of raw steak.

Marina woke up. She was in a hospital bed. She instinctively pinched her arm – it hurt. This was reassuring. She ran her hands through her hair, then looked at them. Thick strands were interwoven between her yellow fingers.

Marina woke up.

The spine terminates in two closely related and largely interchangeable objects. The pelvis and the skull physically resemble each other closely, especially in the early stages of formation, nerve bundles connecting the brain and the reproductive organs, the input and the output of the organism, the sky and the earth. As above, so below.

She stirred her coffee. He was late. He was always late. Being a surgeon was important, she supposed, more important than meeting your wife for brunch. She felt selfish, then indignant. Brunch wasn’t a matter of life or death, it was more important than that. She had news to impart – life changing news, about the dog they had planned to adopt. It had been kidnapped.

The rescue shelter had called her the previous evening, in distress, apologetic. This kind of thing just never happened, they said – security was as tight as you might expect for a building full of free dogs. They implored Sheila to come and visit again, select another animal, they even had another Sharpei just like Bruce, but he had a squint.

The teaspoon slipped out of her well-moisturised grasp and clattered onto the cafe table, giving her a start. At the exact same moment, the lights in the cafe flickered off and back on again. Nobody else seemed to notice. Then he was here. David, flustered and raw-handed, handsome apologies and hair flicking. He sat down, eyes searching for a waiter.

Sheila told David about Bruce. David didn’t look concerned, or really even interested. He would be, if he knew this was the fifth time this exact scenario had happened to her. Prince, Tigger, Petal, Shadow, Bruce. All taken, from different shelters, over the last ten years, the evening before she was due to collect.

David was talking now, about his new shoes. They were full-grain leather, he said. A woman needed a bypass – presumably heart not road, but he didn’t specify – his pager beeped, the waiter arrived as David was putting his jacket back on. More apologies, hair flicking, the cafe door swung shut.

Sheila checked her email. Another town, another rescue centre, another dog. Another David.

Dennis stared through the chasing raindrops to the scrap yard below. He could never seem to get the damp rust smell out of his clothes and hair, no matter how many times he bathed or did laundry. It had been a long time since he’d had a customer, and even then it was for an alternator, a piece of dash plastic, an indicator glass. The heaps of car-casses piled on top of one another almost up to the window of his shack, which tottered on stilts above the wastes.

Every now and then – perhaps once or twice a month – one of the cars would awake from its slumber, and provided it wasn’t at the bottom of a pile, slowly drag itself on flaccid tyres towards freedom. Headlights dangling from ruined faces, wing mirrors twisting on their sinews in the metal breeze. They would creak and roll as quietly as they could until Eric pinned them to the scrap yard mud floor with the crane, like a shiny boot on a fox’s neck.

Dennis wiped his nose on the sleeve of his branded sweatshirt. The scrap yard sighed beneath him. Once, he’d found a naked woman tied up in the boot of a Pontiac. He’d stared at her waxy naked flesh, closed the boot, and made a cup of tea. He came back later that day to check on her. She was still there. He’d thought about calling the police, or a priest, or a mechanic. Then the Pontiac went to the crusher in Eric’s jaws. That was years ago.

Sometimes, when Dennis blinked in a very dark room, he would see the woman’s terrified eyes blink back at him.

He heard rolling, deflated rubber.

He lay in his hospital bed as the bombs rained down. They had shaken the walls of the ward for what seemed like days, but had likely only been hours. Plaster dust fell from the ceiling. In the bed next to his, Charlie was being presented with a birthday cake by his grandchildren.

He noticed the cake had three pink candles, all lit. The flames flickered as the air pressure fluctuated. Charlie grinned his toothless smile and waved his dessicated hands in time with the Happy Birthday song.

Terence had been bedridden for five months. What should have been a routine operation turned into something more existential. These things happen. He shouldn’t have mentioned the Kraken. He should have kept his mouth shut about the Big Black Cat in the car park. He’d have been out of here by now if he’d just been a little bit smarter.

The bombs continued to fall. It was exasperating.

Before long the nurse arrived, she had the head of a bat. Terence sighed. They made smalltalk, she took his temperature and his blood pressure, both of which were either too high or too low. She shook her head at Terence, like it was his fault. He looked apologetic, and she walked away, shaking the thermometer.