Nightside - Hex In The City

      "Of course you don't. No-one ever does, until they have to. It's something that changes you forever. It's like killing something in yourself, too. I'd spare you that knowledge, for as long as possible. Until then, it's just too dangerous for you to join me on a case. A real case. Because you can never tell when they're going to turn dirty."
      At which point we were interrupted by a whole bunch of lemmings escaping from the unseen kitchens. They'd launched a mass breakout, and came swarming across the floor of the clearing like a furry tide, while diners squealed and shouted and pulled up their feet. The lemmings climbed up onto chairs and tables and even lower tree branches, and threw themselves through the air, in fine old lemming fashion. Cathy and I cheered them on.
      "Look; that one's got a parachute! That one's hang-gliding! Go, little fellow, go!"
      It was all over in a few moments. The lemmings scattered into the surrounding jungle, singing high-pitched victory songs (something about Rick only having one ball), and everyone settled down again. No-one emerged from the unseen kitchens in pursuit. Lemmings were always on the menu (very nice, stuffed with locusts' legs, in a tart lemon sauce) and there were always more on the way. Lemmings breed like there's no tomorrow, and indeed for a whole lot of them, there isn't.
      Cathy and I went back to contemplating our menus, watched over by the foot-tapping giant penguin, who'd developed a bit of a twitch in one eye.
      "Don't touch the dodo steaks," I advised Cathy. "They're strictly for the tourists. They taste awful, no matter what kind of sauce they're trying to disguise them with this week. How about... the roc egg omelette? Feeds four. No? Well, there's always the jabberwocky giblets. They come with borogroves, but they're always a bit mimsy .... Chimera of the day? Roast mammoth; always big helpings. Or how about Hydra?"
      "No," said Cathy. "Greek food doesn't agree with me."
      After a certain amount of toing and froing, we finally settled on dragonburgers (flame-grilled, of course), with a nice healthy salad on the side. For dessert, Cheshire Cat ice cream. (Because it vanishes, it's not fattening.) We'd no sooner given the waiter our order than the food arrived, hot and steaming on a hostess trolley pushed by another giant penguin, wearing a name badge that said hi! my name is ... piss off tourist. I'm convinced Rick has a precog in his kitchen. The penguins left us to our meals with a simultaneous dismissive sniff. I palmed my sliver of unicorn's horn, and surreptitiously tested both my food and Cathy's.
       No trace of poison,said a snotty voice in my head. But the calories are off the scale, and it's far too salty. I thought we'd agreed you were going on a diet?
      I put the sliver away. I hate chatty simulacra. Give them a steady job, and they think they're your mother.
      Cathy and I ate in silence for a while. The dragon meat was delicious. Very smoky taste. Quiet conversation went on around us. It was all very civilised. When the drag-onburgers and some of the salad were just a pleasant memory, we sat back and waited contentedly for dessert. It arrived immediately, of course, and the penguin waiter quickly cleared away the dirty plates and slapped the bill on the table. (Service not included. They wouldn't dare.) When the waiter was gone, I leaned forward to talk confidentially with Cathy.
      "One thing you have always been better at than me, Cathy, and that's knowing everything about the latest trends. See the gentleman in the navy blue suit and old-school tie, two tables down? What the hell is thatall about?"
      The man in question had a hole drilled neatly through his forehead, on through his brain, and out the back of his skull, leaving a narrow tunnel all the way through his head. You could see right down it, though I tried very hard not to.
      Cathy looked, and sniffed loudly. "Ultimate trepanation. The idea was, drilling a hole through your forehead would allow the bony plates of the skull to break apart and expand, allowing the brain room to expand as well, and thus make you more intelligent. This new fad just takes the idea to its logical conclusion. Personally, I would have stuck with the smart drinks. They didn't work either, but they had to be a lot less painful."
      "I would have thought deciding not to drill a hole in your head was a pretty good indication of intelligence," I said, trying not to stare, or wince. "I wonder if the hole plays music when the wind blows through it? Or maybe ... you could pull a cord through the hole—mental floss! Helps remove those hard-to-digest ideas!"
      Cathy got the giggles, and almost choked on her dessert. She washed the ice cream down with a large glass of the complimentary house blue. The bottle Rick had provided was already almost empty, without any help from me. Cathy regarded alcohol as just another food group. I'd ordered a Coke. And insisted on the real thing, not one of those diet monstrosities. The waiter got back at me by putting a curly-wurly straw in it, the bastard.
      And then all the conversation in the clearing stopped abruptly, and all the animal noises from the jungle died away. It was like the world was holding its breath. There was a soft gentle sound, like wind chimes caressed by a breeze, and Lady Luck came striding out of the jungle and into the clearing. She was slender and elegant, her every movement almost painfully graceful, wearing a long, shimmering, silver evening gown that matched her eyes. She had delicate Oriental features, with long, flat black hair, and a small mouth with very red lips. She looked right at me, and her mouth stretched suddenly into a smile to die for. She came out of the jungle darkness like a dream walking and headed right for my table. As she left the trees behind, the branches burst spontaneously into flower, or withered and cracked apart. Sometimes both. As she walked between the tables all the cutlery turned to solid gold. A blind man could suddenly see, and another man slumped forward, dead of a heart attack. And suddenly everyone in Rick's Cafe had an apple in their hand.
      Everyone smiled at Lady Luck and reached out to touch her, but she avoided them. Some looked away. Some brandished magical charms at her. She ignored it all with aristocratic calm. People craned their heads, trying to work out whom she'd come to see. Lady Luck only ever appeared in person to the very fortunate, or the soon to be damned. Often called on, but rarely made welcome when she deigned to show up. And then she stopped at my table, and everyone else started breathing easily again.
      Lady Luck sat down opposite me without waiting to be asked, on a chair that appeared out of nowhere just in time. She smiled once at Cathy, who grinned back foolishly, dazzled, then Lady Luck gave me her full attention. By now I was almost supernaturally alert, checking for any sudden changes in myself or Cathy, or our immediate surroundings, but it seemed Lady Luck had grown tired of showing off. I didn't relax. The most beautiful ones are always the most dangerous. I knew my fair share of magics and tricks, including a few I wasn't supposed to know even existed, but I had nothing that could hope to stand off a Being as powerful as Lady Luck. So, when in doubt, bluff. I gave her my best confident smile, met her silver gaze calmly, and hoped like hell I could talk my way out of this. It didn't help when Cathy suddenly threw off the glamour that had dazzled her and looked like she was about to dive under the table or try and hide in my pockets. She knew a real threat when she saw one. Attracting the attention of the gods is rarely a good idea.
      I gave Cathy a reassuring look and concentrated on Lady Luck.
      "I didn't call you," I said carefully, just to get the ball rolling.
      "No," she said, in a soft, thrilling voice. It felt like being scratched where you itched. By a very sharp claw. "I came to you, John Taylor. I wish to hire your services, to represent me in a delicate matter. I want you to investigate for me the true nature and origins of the Nightside. I want you to discover how and where it all began, and, most especially, why and for what purpose."
      I swear I just sat there for a few moments with my mouth open, utterly taken aback. I had always hoped that someday somebody would back me on what could be the greatest case of my career, but I hadn't expected it just to come out of nowhere like this. There had to be a catch. There was always a catch. Like, for example, why did a Power and Domination like Lady Luck need help from a mere mortal like me? I said as much, only much more politely, and Lady Luck hit me with her dazzling smile again. Her canines gleamed gold. It was like drowning in sunshine.
      "I wish to know why probabilities are always so out of my control, in the Nightside. Why so many long shots, good and bad, come true here. Is there perhaps a hex on the Nightside, and if so, who put it there, and for what reason? I want to know these things. If I knew and understood the origins of the Nightside, I might be better able to manipulate chance here, as my role requires."
      I looked at her thoughtfully, taking my time. Lady Luck was one of the Transient Beings, a physical incarnation of an abstract concept, or ideal. Appallingly powerful, but limited to the role she embodied. She normally appeared in person only once in a Blue Moon, but this was the Nightside, after all. And like every other Power and Domination, she always had her own agenda, as well as being notoriously fickle.
      "I'm not the first one you've approached about this, am I?" I said finally.
      "Of course not. Many others have had the honour to serve me in this matter, down the centuries. All of them failed. Or at least, none of them ever came back, to tell me how close they'd got. But it's not in my nature to give up. I am always on the lookout for a likely ..."
      "Sucker?" I suggested.
      She favoured me with her glorious smile again. "But you are different, John Taylor. I have high hopes for your success. After all, you can find anything, can't you?"
      I considered the matter, letting her wait while I examined all the angles. When something seems too good to be true, it nearly always is too good to be true. Especially in the Nightside. Lady Luck sat patiently, as relaxed as a cat in the sun. Cathy had pushed her chair back as far as it would go without her actually joining another table, and it was clear from her unhappy face that she didn't want me having anything to do with this case, or this client. But if I were afraid of taking chances, I'd never have come back to the Nightside. I nodded slowly to Lady Luck, and did my best to sound as though I knew more than I actually did.
      "The few who profess to know the Nightside's true beginnings have a vested interest in keeping them secret. Knowledge is power. And these people ... we're talking major players, Powers and Dominations ... Beings like yourself—and greater. They won't take kindly to my barging in and treading on their toes."
      "That's never stopped you before," Lady Luck said sweetly.
      'True," I said. "But still, I have to ask: why haven't you gone looking for the answer yourself if you want to know so badly?"
      Lady Luck nodded briefly, acknowledging the point. "I don't interfere directly in the world nearly as much as people think I do. Statistics just have a way of working themselves out. My role requires that I remain ... mysterious. Enigmatic. I prefer to work at a distance, through... deniable agents."
      "Expendable agents."
      "That, too!"
      I scowled. "I get enough of this doing jobs for Walker. Why did you choose me, particularly?"
      "Because you let the chaos butterfly go free, instead of destroying it. Or trying to control it yourself."
      "No good deed goes unpunished," I said.
      "What will it take to hire you?" said Lady Luck. "To take this case? How much do you want?"
      "How much have you got?"
      Her smile was suddenly that of a cat spotting a cornered mouse. "I will give you something far more valuable than gold or silver, John Taylor. I know who and what your mother was. I will tell you, in return for you finding out what I wish to know."
      I leaned forward across the table, and I could feel my face and voice going cold and ugly. "Tell me. Tell me now."
      "Sorry," said Lady Luck, entirely unmoved. "You must earn your reward."
      "I could make you tell me," I said.
      People began getting up out of the chairs and backing away. Cathy looked as though she wanted to, but loyalty held her in place. And Lady Luck laughed softly in my face.
      "No you won't, John Taylor. Because you're as trapped in your role as I am in mine."
      I sat back in my chair, suddenly very tired. Cathy scowled at me.
      "You're going to do it, aren't you?"
      "I have to. I want to know the origins of the Nightside as much as she does."
      Cathy glared at Lady Luck. "Are you at least going to make John lucky, while he's working for you? You owe him that much."
      "If I were to ally myself openly with John Taylor," said Lady Luck, "others of my kind might come out against him. You wouldn't want that, would you, John?"
      "No, I bloody well wouldn't," I said. "Your kind are too powerful and too weird, even for the Nightside. But... could I perhaps say that I am working on your behalf? That would give me some authority, and might even get me into some of the more difficult places."
      "If you like," said Lady Luck, "but I cannot, and will not, intervene directly in your investigation."
      I grinned. "The people I'll be questioning won't know that."
      "Then the mission is yours," said Lady Luck. She rose gracefully to her feet and bowed briefly. "Try not to get killed."
      She vanished abruptly, in a crackle of possibilities. A spring of clear water bubbled up from the ground where she'd been standing. I didn't think Rick would be too bothered. Knowing him, he'd probably make a feature out of it. Everyone watching began to relax, and sat down again. A number of serious hushed conversations started up, combined with lots of glancing in my direction. A few began pocketing the transmuted gold cutlery, until the penguin waiters made them put it back. Rick didn't miss a trick.
      "I've decided ... to sit this case out," said Cathy. "I'm almost sure I have some urgent filing that needs doing, back at the office. Behind a securely locked and bolted door."
      "Understandable," I said.
      "You're not thinking of doing this on your own, though, are you? You are definitely going to need backup on this one. Serious backup, with hard-core firepower. What about Suzie Shooter? Dead Boy? Razor Eddie?"
      I shook my head. "All good choices. Unfortunately, Shotgun Suzie is still on the trail of Big Butcher Hog, and likely to be for some time. Dead Boy is very involved with his new girl-friend, a Valkyrie. And the Punk God of the Straight Razor is currently occupied doing something very unpleasant on the Street of the Gods. It must be something especially upsetting, because some of the gods have come running out crying. No, I've got someone else in mind, for a case like this. I thought I'd approach Madman, and just maybe, the man called Sinner."
      "Why don't you just shoot yourself in the head now and get it over with?" said Cathy.

Three - Dealing with Reasonable Men

      And so I walked out into the Nightside, looking for an honest oracle. There's never any shortage of people who don't want to be found, especially in the Nightside, and I don't like to use my special gift unless I absolutely have to. My enemies still want me dead, and I shine so very brightly in the dark when I open my third eye, my private eye. Fortunately, there's also no shortage of people (and things that never were and never will be people) who specialise in Knowing Things that other people don't want known. There are those who claim to know the secrets of the past, the present, and the future; but most are only in it for the money, most of the rest can't be trusted, and they all have their own agendas. Sucker bait will never go out of fashion in the Nightside. But luckily I was once offered, as payment for a successfully completed case, the location of one of the few honest oracles left in this spiritual cesspool. The long centuries had left the creature eccentric, garrulous, prone to gossip, and not too tightly wrapped, but I suppose that goes with the territory.
      I left Uptown behind me and headed back into the old main drag, where business puts on its best bib and tucker, and tarts itself up for the travelling trade. All the gaudiest establishments and tourist traps, where sin is mass-produced, and temptation comes in six-packs. In short, I was heading for the Nightside's one and only shopping mall. Mass brands and franchises from the outside world tended to roll over and die here, where people's appetites run more to the unusual and outre, but there's always the exception. The Mammon Emporium offers brand-name concessions and fast-food chains from alternative universes and divergent timetracks. There may be nothing new under the sun, but the sun never shines in the Nightside.
      I strolled between the huge M and E that marked the entrance to the mall, and for once nobody crossed themselves, or headed for the nearest exit. The Mammon Emporium was one of the few places where I could hope to be just another face in the crowd. Shoppers from all kinds of Londons came here in search of the fancy and the forbidden, and, of course, that chance for a once-in-a-lifetime bargain. People dressed in a hundred different outrageous styles called out to each other in as many different languages and argots, crowding the thoroughfares and window-shopping sights they'd never find anywhere else. Brightly coloured come-ons blazed from every store, their windows full of wonders, and countless businesses crammed in side by side in a mall that somehow managed to be bigger on the inside than it was on the outside. Apparently space expands to encompass the trade involved.
      To every side of me blazed signs and logos from far and distant places, MCCAMPBELL'S DOLPHIN BURGERS, STAR-DOCK'S SNUFF. WILL DIZZY'S MORTIMER MOUSE. BAPTISMS R US. PERV PARLOUR, SOUL MARKET; NEW, USED AND REFURBISHED. And of course THE NOSFERATU BLOOD BANK. (Come in and make a deposit. Give generously. Don't make us come looking for you.) A dark-haired Goth girl in a crimson basque gave me the eye from the shadowy doorway. I smiled politely and continued on my way.
      Right in the middle of the mall stood an old-fashioned wishing well, largely ignored by the crowds that bustled unseeingly past it. The well didn't look like much. Just a traditional stone-walled well with a circle of stunted grass around it, a red slate roof above, and a bucket on a rusty steel chain. A sign in really twee writing invited you to toss a coin in the well and make a wish. Just a little bit of harmless fun for the kiddies. Except this was the Nightside, which has never gone in for harmless fun. Most oracles are a joke. The concept of alternate timetracks (as seen every day in the Nightside's spontaneously generating Time-slips) makes prophecy largely unprofitable and knocks the idea of Fate very firmly on the head. But this particular oracle had a really good track record in predicting the present; in knowing what was going on everywhere, right now. I suppose specialisation is everything, these days. I leaned against the well's stone wall and looked casually about me. No-one seemed to be paying me or the well any special attention.
      "Hello, oracle," I said. "What's happening?" "More than you can possibly imagine," said a deep, bubbling voice from a long way below. "Bless me with coin of silver, oh passing traveller, and I shall bless thee with three answers to any question. The first answer shall be explicit but unhelpful, the second allusive but accurate, and the third a wild stab in the dark. The more you spend, the more you learn."
      "Don't give me that crap," I said. "I'm not a tourist. This is John Taylor."
      "Oh bloody hell; you're back again, are you?" The oracle sounded distinctly sulky. "You know very well your whole existence makes my head ache."
      "You haven't got a head."
      "Exactly! It's people like you that give oracles a bad reputation. What do you want? I'm busy."
      "What with?" I asked, honestly curious.
      "Trust me, you really don't want to know. You think it's easy being the fount of all wisdom, when your walls are covered with algae? And I hate Timselips! They're like haemorrhoids for an oracle. And speaking of pains in the arse; what do you want, Taylor?"
      "I'm looking for the man called Madman."
      "Oh God; he's even worse than you. He'd turn my stomach, if I had one. What do you want with him?"
      "Don't you know?"
      The oracle sniffed haughtily. "That's right, make fun of a cripple. At least I can see where he is, unlike you. But this answer will cost you. No information for free; that's the rule. Don't blame me, I just work here. Until the curse finally wears off; then I will be out of here so fast it'll make your head spin."
      "All right," I said. "How many drops of blood for a straight answer?"
      "Just the one, for you, sweet prince," the oracle said, its voice suddenly ingratiating. "And remember me, when you come into your kingdom."
      I looked down into the shadows of the well. "You've heard something."
      "Maybe I have, maybe I haven't," the oracle said smugly. "Take advantage of my sweet nature, before the price goes up."
      I jabbed my thumb with a pin and let a single fat drop of blood fall into the well, which made a soft, ugly, satisfied noise.
      "You'll find Madman at the Hotel Clappe," it said briskly. "In the short-time district. Watch your back there, and don't talk to any of the strange women, unless you're collecting infections. Now get the hell out of here; my head is splitting. And carpethat old diem,John Taylor. It's later than anyone thinks."
      The Hotel Clappe, spelled that way to give it that extra bit of class, looked just like it sounded; the kind of duty, disgusting dump where you rented rooms by the hour, and a fresh pair of sheets was a luxury. Good-time girls and others stalked their prey in the underlit streets, and the crabs were so big they leapt out of dark alleyways to mug passersby. Appearance was everything, and buyer beware. But there will always be those for whom sex is no fun unless it's seedy, dirty, and just a bit dangerous, so... I walked down the street of red lamps looking determinedly straight ahead and keeping my hands very firmly to myself. In areas like this, the twilight daughters could be scarier and more dangerous than most of the more obvious monsters in the Nightside. Depressingly enough, an awful lot of them seemed to know my name.
      The Hotel Clappe was just another flaky-painted establishment in the middle of a long, terraced row, and no-one had bothered to repaint the sign over the door in years. I pushed the door open with one hand, wishing I'd thought to bring some gloves with me, and strode into the lobby, trying to look like a building inspector or someone else with a legitimate reason to be there. The lobby was just as foul and unclean as I expected, and the carpet crunched under my feet. A few individuals of debatable sexuality looked up from their gossip magazines as I entered, but looked quickly away again as they recognised me.
      I wasn't entirely sure what Madman was doing in a place like this. I didn't think he cared any more about sane and everyday things like sex or pleasure. But then, I suppose to him one place was as good as any other. And it was a good area to hide out. It wasn't the kind of place you came to unless you had definite business here.
      A couple of elfin hookers made way for me as I approached the hotel clerk, protected from his world by a heavy steel grille. The elves looked me over with bold mascaraed eyes, and gave me their best professional smiles. Their wings looked a bit crumpled, but they still had a certain gaudy glamour. I smiled and shook my head, and they actually looked a bit relieved. God alone knew what my reputation had transmuted into, down here. Certainly the clerk behind his grille didn't look at all pleased to see me. He was a short sturdy type, in grubby trousers and a string vest, a sour face, and eyes that had seen everything. Behind him a sign said simply you touch it, you pay for it. The clerk spat juicily into a cuspidor, and regarded me with a flat, indifferent face.
      "I don't do questions," he said, in a grey toneless voice. "Not even for the infamous John Taylor. See nothing, know nothing; all part of the job. You don't scare me. We get worse than you coming in here every day. And the grille's charmed, cursed, and electrified, so don't get any ideas."
      "And here I am, come to do you a favour," I said cheerfully, carefully unimpressed by his manner. "I've come to take Madman away with me."
      "Oh thank God," said the clerk, his manner changing in a moment. He leaned forward, his face suddenly pleading, almost pathetic. "Please get him out of here. You don't know what it's like, having him around. The screams and the howls and the rains of blood. The rooms that change position and the doors that suddenly don't go anywhere. He scares the Johns. He even scares the girls, and I didn't think there was anything left that could do that. My nerves will never be the same again. He's giving the hotel a really bad reputation."
      "I would have thought that was an advantage, in an area like this," I said.
      "Just get Madman out of here. Please."
      "We'd be ever so grateful," said one of the elfin hookers, pushing her bosoms out at me.
      I declined her offer with all the politeness at my command, and the clerk gave me a room number on the second floor. The elevator wasn't working, of course, so I trudged up the stairs. Bare stone steps and no railing, the walls painted industrial grey. I could feel Madman's room long before I got anywhere near it. Like a wild beast, lying in wait around a corner. The feeling grew stronger as I moved warily out onto the second floor. Madman's room lay ahead of me, like a visit to the dentist, like a doctor bearing bad news. The air was bitter cold, my breath steaming thickly before me. I could feel my heart pounding fast in my chest. I walked slowly down the empty corridor, leaning forward slightly, as though forcing my way against an unseen pressure. All my instincts were screaming at me to get out while I still could.
      I stopped outside the door. The number matched the one the clerk had given me, but I would have recognised it anyway. The room felt like the pain that wakes you in the middle of the night and makes you think awful words like tumourand poison.It felt like the death of a loved one, or the tone in your lover's voice as she tells you she's leaving you for someone else. The room felt like horror and tragedy, and the slow unravelling of everything you ever held true. Except it wasn't the room. It was Madman.
      I didn't know his name. His true, original name. I don't suppose even he did, any more. Names imply an identity and a history, and Madman had torn those up long ago. Now he was a sad, perilous, confused gentleman who had only a nodding relationship with reality. Anyone's reality. What drove him mad in the first place, insane beyond any help or hope of rescue, is a well-known story in the Nightside, and one of the most disturbing. Back in the sixties, Madman was an acid sorcerer, a guru to Timothy Leary, and one of NASA's leading scientists. A genius, with many patents to his name, and an insatiable appetite for knowledge. By the end of the sixties, he'd moved from outer space to inner space, to mysticism and mathematical description theory. He studied and researched for many years, exploring the more esoteric areas of arcane information, trying to discover a way to view Reality as it actually is, rather than the way we all perceive it, through our limited human minds and senses.
      Somehow, he found a way to See past the comfortable collective illusion we all live in, and look directly at what lies beneath or beyond the world we know. Whatever it was he Saw in that endless moment, it destroyed his sanity, then and forever. Either because baseline Reality was so much worse, or so much better, than what we believe reality to be. Unbelievable horror or beauty, I suppose both are equally upsetting ideas. These days Madman lives in illusions, and doesn't care. The difference between him and us is that he can sometimes choose his illusions. Though sometimes, they choose him.
      Madman can be extremely dangerous to be around. He doesn't believe what he sees is real, so for him it isn't. Around him, the world follows his whims and wishes, his fears and his doubts, reality reordering itself to follow his drifting thoughts. Which can be helpful, or confusing, or scary, because he doesn't necessarily believe in you, either. He can change your personality or your history without your even noticing. And people who annoy or threaten him sufficiently tend to get turned into things. Very unpleasant things. So mostly people just let him wander wherever he wants to go and do whatever he feels like doing. It's safer that way. It helps that Madman doesn't want to do much. People who try to use him tend to come to bad ends.
      And here I was standing outside his door, breathing hard, sweating, clenching my hands into fists as I tried to summon up the courage to knock. I was taking a hell of a risk in talking to him, and I knew it. I hadn't been this scared since I faced up to Jessica Sorrow the Unbeliever; and I'd had a sort of weapon to use against her. All I had to set against Madman were my wits and my quick thinking. And even I wouldn't have bet on me. Still, at least Madman came with his own warning signals. For reasons probably not even known to himself, Madman came complete with his own personal sound track; music from nowhere that echoed his moods and intentions. If you paid attention to the changes in style, you could learn things.