the aberration

chapter nine

'What kind of name is Master Beef anyway?' blurted Sam, after several moments of silence between them. 'Are you trying to sell yourself or what?'

The room they were in was small and completely bare, with rough concrete walls like the rest of the place. Beef turned and looked at the marine. Beef's stare was, as usual, blank and utterly indecipherable, yet there was something that felt unsafe about it, hazardous and unstable; like he might strike out at any moment. But he said nothing, turned back to the open slat and angled the snout of the rifle to the right, watching the marines as they hovered uncertainly at the edges of his view.

'And why the fuck,' insisted the marine, 'are you wearing that...that!' He pointed from his position backed against the far wall, determined to reduce Beef to something sensible.

Beef jiggled the rifle snout a bit more to ward off some of the less cautious men on the other side of the door. Then, eventually, he asked, 'Why does anyone wear anything?'

The marine looked nonplussed. 'What?'

'Why, for example,' said Beef, 'are you wearing what you wear?'

Sam stared at him, then looked down at his olive drab clothes. 'What are you talking about?' he asked. 'We all wear this. It's our uniform.'

'So you're wearing it to be a marine,' said Beef.

'Well...yeah. Is that supposed to answer my question?'

'My point is,' Beef said, 'all practical purposes included, you are essentially wearing what you wear to be something. Something else. Something that extends beyond yourself as a naked human being.'

Sam continued to stare. Despite himself, the marine found his mind working to follow Beef's unexpectedly expansive response. 'You mean...you mean like an image?'

Beef nodded, still peering through the slat. 'In part. Like I said, there are practical considerations too, but it's all...extension of self.'

'Right,' said Sam, nodding in acknowledgement only of his own complete lack of sanity. 'Extension of self. Gotcha. And what exactly is it that you're trying to be, Master Beef? A bloody great freak?'

Beef thought about this. 'Yes,' he replied.

* * *

When Amelia had picked up the last notebook, she rose to see Sim walking away. 'Going, are you?' she asked, doing her best to feign cool nonchalance.

'Yes,' Sim called back.

Amelia hesitated. 'Where?' she said.

Sim stopped and turned. 'What does it matter?' he asked. 'I thought we weren't sharing.'

Amelia glared at him. 'Fine,' she said. 'You've shown me I can't trust you anyway, sneaking up on me like that.'

'The trust was supposed to be mutual,' replied Sim. 'Why be so cagey with the notebooks?'

'I don't even know you, Mr Hyde,' said the detective. 'I'm not about to open myself up to somebody I just met, especially given the circumstances! And you've just gone and proved that I was completely right in being so protective.'

Sim held up his hands. 'Nobody's asking to know your life story, detective. All I was after was anything you had that could help us out.'

'I told you everything I felt ready to share.'

'You're being very dramatic, I think,' he said. He looked at her curiously. 'Is it that you had my name written in a love heart?'

Amelia had thrown the notebook before she had realised what she was doing. He ducked to the side and it flew over his shoulder.

'You are ridiculous,' she declared, going to retrieve it. 'Weren't you leaving?'

'I was,' agreed Sim, visibly amused. 'Then you kept me with your questions.'

'Well, off you go then,' the detective replied curtly. 'Good luck and have fun. Sneak up on me again and you will suffer for it.'

'Not unless your aim improves, I'm afraid,' Sim retorted cheerily, turning and continuing on his journey as Amelia Muse pointedly ignored him and walked away in the opposite direction.

She made her way towards the rock that jutted up at the east end of the lake, glancing back to watch Sim Hyde's long, leather coat disappear into the trees. She tried to collect a sense of purpose about her and climbed onto the rock to survey the area. It was still too dark to see much by.

Her stomach grumbled again and she grumbled with it. Returning to her previous spot on the ground, she curled up and used her wet deerstalker as a pillow, not daring to close her eyes lest the leather-clad thief return.

* * *

Mike held tightly to the closely spaced rungs as he descended further into the darkness of the hole. The droning microwave above provided some small illumination, but in the narrow passageway Mike's own body blocked the light to his feet, which he dug into the earth to make sure of their purchase.

'How deep does it go?' he asked.

'Deep enough,' replied the microwave.

Then, suddenly, Mike's feet came into contact with the floor. Where the wall ended the ladder continued, running perpendicularly along the ground like a small rail track. Mike stepped aside and the microwave moved into the dark space, filling it with a dim, ghostly green light. They were in a vaguely rectangular excavation that looked like a mining tunnel, two-metre long beams of some copper metal supporting the flat roof at slightly tilted angles across it and either side, spaced at regular intervals.

'Where does it go?' asked Mike, his purple hair sucked of all its vividness in the sickly gleam. Despite everything, he had to stifle a yawn as he looked down it.

'You will see,' said the microwave.

'Are you always this unhelpful?'

The microwave turned to Mike almost as if it were affronted. 'We must continue,' it said. 'There is something we must do.'

'And what might that be?' Mike urged, as the machine floated away. 'Do you have to be so mysterious? Why can't you just tell me?'

The microwave slowed again and rotated. 'We cannot progress if you delay,' it replied.

'Well, I'm sorry,' said Mike, 'but for all I know you could be leading me to my death or something. I'm not going with you until you tell me what's down there!'

'I do not intend your death,' the microwave replied. 'It would serve little purpose. Now please desist your quibbles. You must come with me! You can return to your tree, but it would be rather pointless.'

'You said I'd be able to sleep,' Mike complained. 'And you said there'd be food.'

'There may be yet,' said the microwave. 'But we must not falter!' He paused. 'You would not want to give up now, would you? With answers so close?'

Mike looked at him suspiciously. 'You're promising me answers,' he reiterated, as if stating the conditions of his continued cooperation.

The microwave inclined. 'Of course,' it said.

Mike sighed. 'Alright then. Lead the way.'

* * *

'What exactly is it you were planning on doing from in here?' asked Sam.

'I wasn't planning on doing anything from in here,' replied Beef. 'But these things happen.'

'What do you want?' the marine demanded. 'Why are you here?'

'To learn the answer to that very question,' said Beef. 'You wouldn't tell me when I first asked, so I figured I'd be persistent. Which makes all this your own fault, really.'

'So you're telling me,' said Sam, 'that you really don't know...like, why you're here? At all?'

Beef looked at him. 'Are you going to tell me now?'

Sam appeared to be suffering from some internal conflict. 'But you could be trying to trick us,' he said. 'How do I know you're not one of...them?'

'One of who?' When the marine did not reply, Beef said, 'Look, if I was whoever you think I am, what harm would it do you to answer the question?'

Sam thought about this. Still leaning cautiously against the wall, he attempted in vain to scrutinise Beef's face.

'The porcelain woman,' Beef continued. 'The fat bastards in tweed.'

A look of horror and alarm passed over the marine's face.

'They weren't human, were they?' Beef pressed. 'What were they?'

'Don't talk about them!' shrieked Sam. 'Don't...they're not...' His expression became tormented.

Beef studied him, then turned back to the rifle, which was still jammed in the slat, and checked on the other marines. There was hushed discussion. 'Five of us there were, in the end,' he recalled. 'An old lady, a detective, a tramp, a comedian and myself. It might have been the set up for some kind of joke,' he mused, 'only the comedian wasn't very funny.'

He turned back to Sam. 'Still not going to answer my question, then? We could be in here for a very long time.'

Sam opened his mouth, but was interrupted by a shout from someone on the other side of the door. 'We're coming closer!' came the voice. 'Don't shoot, we just want to talk!'

* * *

The microwave swung with simultaneous ease and purpose through the cool, stale air in the subterranean tunnel. Mike followed with aching feet. His combined fatigue and confusion had worn down his strength but he lurched on nevertheless.

'Here we are,' announced the microwave, as the tunnel opened out ever so slightly and then came to a complete dead end.

'A wall,' Mike observed. 'Great.'

The wall consisted mostly of flattened earth, but for a single copper rectangle, about a metre high and half as wide, positioned roughly in the centre above the track; and a small, metal valve wheel to the right.

'I require you to turn it,' explained the microwave. 'Sadly, I was not able, despite my best efforts.'

The thought of the microwave ineffectually trying to use its corners to nudge the spokes entered Mike's mind. He absent-mindedly flexed the fingers at his sides, feeling for the first time that he had some kind of advantage over the sentient kitchen appliance; that it needed him, rather than the other way around, and that this gave him some control over it.

'What does it do?' he asked.

The microwave made a noise of impatience. 'Really,' it said, irritably. 'Must you question every action we make?'

'I'm not turning it until you tell me,' insisted Mike.

The microwave seemed to stare at him, as it always did. Eventually it said, 'I do not know.'

'You don't know what it does?' Mike repeated, sceptically.

'That is why we must turn it,' said the microwave. 'Otherwise we will never find out!'

Mike looked petulant.

'Turn it,' threatened the microwave, 'or I will leave you here without your required sustenance, and you shall perish.'

Mike tried to stand tall with resolve, but soon caved in. 'Fine,' he said.

The microwave watched with curiosity as he made his way to the wheel and placed his hands on it. He gripped it and heaved clockwise, but it would not budge. Mike paused for rest, panting, and then attempted it the other way. After some resistance it gave and turned about a quarter of the way round before jarring to a stop again.

Something in the wall gurgled.

Mike cried out and stumbled back as hot steam suddenly erupted from the edges of the copper rectangle. The microwave looked on with interest. Then the metal plate fell forward and was revealed to be some kind of giant, wedge-shaped receptacle, like the coin retrieval tray of a big vending machine. From it rolled a small contraption, about the size of a human head, which dropped to the ground and landed neatly on the track.

'Aha!' cried the microwave. 'Magnificent! There is our answer!'

It was metallic and bulbous, with a recognisable clock face of the same material protruding at an angle from the top like a large tumour. The clock had no visible hands, but a rapid, scratchy ticking filled the tunnel.

'What is it?' asked Mike.

The two of them watched as the thing made its way loudly and busily along the track using a complicated system of wheels and retractable claws. They hurried after it, following its progress as it reached the far wall and used the claws and wheels to climb up the rungs of the ladder. Mike did not want to climb up after it in case it lost its grip and fell on his face, so he left the microwave to rise up out of the hole instead.

'Where's it going?' he called up to it.

'It is travelling in the direction from which we came,' answered the microwave.

'Are we going to follow it?'

The microwave seemed to pause in thought. 'Sadly not,' he decided. His voice echoed down the hole from his elevated position. 'It is not safe that way. Soon it will be rife with the destruction and death that I spoke of earlier.' He sounded regretful, but Mike got the distinct impression that this had more to do with the fact that they would not be able to determine the final outcome of their experiment.

'There is a place not too far from here where you may restore your energy,' the microwave continued. 'There may also be food.' He was already flying off.

'Wait,' Mike shouted after him, scrambling up the ladder. 'Wait! Hold on a minute! Infuriating, talking microwave...'

* * *

'Drop your weapons,' Beef ordered, as a handful of men cautiously edged into view.

They hesitated. The man leading the group nodded to the others.

'But Sarge--'

'That's an order, marine!'

The marine mumbled, 'Technically it wasn't...'

'Sarge, why don't we just lob a grenade in there?'

'Don't be a dick, Jameson. Sam's still in there!'

'Quiet!' barked the sergeant. 'Or I'll shoot all your balls off! Do it now!'

The file of marines reluctantly dropped their weapons.

'Hands above your heads,' said Beef, as they shuffled further into view. He guessed that others still lurked out of sight with their guns at the ready. 'Those stairs on the outside,' he said conversationally. 'Bit of a design flaw.'

'I told you we should have blown them up!'

'Shut it!' said Sarge. He was a man in his thirties with bright green eyes and rusty bristles for hair. He glared through the door slat. 'We have you trapped,' he said to Beef.

'You're a bit low on personnel, I noticed,' Beef responded. 'Maybe a dozen of you at best. Why is that?'

'There's enough of us to bring you down if we have to,' replied the sergeant, calmly.

'Maybe,' said Beef. 'But I do have a hostage'--he glanced at Sam--'and I just got some of you to set down your arms. I guess it depends who's faster. I was quicker than your sentries.'

'What is it you want?' Sarge demanded.

'I'm having a hard time getting you people to answer some of my questions,' Beef told him. 'They're not especially difficult questions.'

'He says he doesn't know where he is!' Sam called from behind him.

Beef glanced at him again. He was, at least, staying put. 'That's about the size of it,' he agreed.

The marines exchanged significant looks.

'Is this some kind of sick joke?' spat the sergeant.

Then somebody cried, 'What was that?', and all the marines turned in horror as gunfire broke out somewhere to the right.

'Man down!'

'Kill the bastards!'

Beef stepped back from the door.

Sam moaned in his tormented way. 'Is this one of those friends of yours?' he said.

Beef did not reply. The sound of gunfire was rapidly retreating from their position. Beef checked to make sure the corridor was clear, then lifted the latch and pulled open the door. He left with his rifle at the ready.

His heart pounding, Sam picked up the discarded pistol, empty of bullets though it was, and went after him.