The Zombie Adventures of Sarah Bellum (51 page)

"
Nothing,
erm, Mother!" says Justin, hurriedly. "My mother is here.
She is not well. I am looking after her, you see…"

"
Justin…"
moans another woman's voice. "I'm bored. Come back inside…"

"
Your
mothers both sound in good health to me!" announces Corporal
Punishment. "Perhaps Mr. Slaughter could stay and entertain them
for you?"

Carvery shrugs amenably,
and cracks his knuckles.

"
You
might want to check that they have their
Wills
written and in order first," I
suggest. "Just in case, Justin Time."

The rickshaw pilot
procrastinates in the doorway, apparently loathe to either leave, or
to leave Carvery in charge of his harem of potential mothers/possible
radio show fans.

"
Okay,
okay – I come to stupid General's office!" he snaps at
last. "We will see if I am ripe for the reaping yet! Er –
Mother – you stay in bed. Both of you. No catching colds while
I am out. Or touching anything, without me."

He hustles Luke and
Carvery outside, and emerges into the blistering sunshine. But before
he can close the door, Carvery's foot is somehow caught in it.

"
Forgot
something," he says – kicks the door back open again,
disappears inside – and locks it.

"
Damn!"
I yell out loud, before Justin even has the chance. His mouth sags,
in formation of whatever expletive had sprung to mind.

"
Yes,"
he agrees, subdued. "What she said."

But of course, I'm not
thinking of the wellbeing of Justin Time's female company. I'm
thinking of that little diary in Carvery's trouser pocket, and how
I'm supposed to get Corporal Punishment to decipher it so that I can
understand the supposedly important power of this stupid golden
clockwork hand…

"
From
what I understand, he won't be long," Luke reassures us,
unexpectedly. "Let's go. I want to meet your famous wife,
Justin! See if she's really as bad as you make out. I swear, no-one
has beaten mine yet. I wish they would. Even Carvery said he would
have to charge me for it."

Between them, Luke and
Punishment manhandle the sobbing rickshaw pilot/rogue disc jockey
away from the
Winnebago
, as the music in the mobile home is
cranked back up to full volume. It starts to rock erratically, on its
hard-standing of paving slabs laid on the scrubby jungle floor.

Damn, damn,
damn!

I hurry after the three
anyway, and as I catch up with their longer stride, something thumps
me in the spine.

"
Hey,
where are we going?" Ace Bumgang greets me.

My heart and bladder
fight to switch back to their rightful places again.

What part of his body did
he just touch me with? I'll be re-living that one in my mind at night
for months…

"
We
are going to meet Justin Time's wife!" says Luke, cheerfully.

I guess he's happy to
meet anyone's wife other than his own.

"
Cool,"
Ace remarks. "Hey, I found out what was wrong with the
ambulance. They were trying to make their own moonshine gasoline, and
got the mix wrong."

"
How
wrong?" Carvery asks, suddenly catching up.

Luke was right. That was
suspiciously fast… Maybe he keeps a stopwatch on him, and is
trying to beat his own personal best.

Perhaps hanging out with
The
Stig
too much has made him competitive…

"
Well,
I reckon they've accidentally cracked the secret recipe for
Guinness." Ace pulls a pint glass from his trouser-pocket,
two-thirds full of a black liquid topped with creamy white foam, and
holds it out. "Siphoned from the reserve tank just now."

Carvery accepts the
glass, and sniffs it before taking a sip.

"
Yup,"
he remarks. "That's definitely not napalm. I smell a future
peace treaty brewing."

"
Peace
treaty?" Justin Time splutters. "Noooo! No money in making
peace treaty! They just not succeed in making cheap gasoline yet! You
know the story – the man, who say: 'I not fail seven thousand
times. I discover seven thousand ways not to succeed.'"

"
Well,
in the Six a.m. Lounge they're failing to make Guinness, while here
in the Nine a.m. Lounge they're failing to make rocket fuel,"
Ace remarks.

"
Yeah,"
Carvery agrees. "How much money do you think that sort of
information is worth? Properly worded, of course?"

"
How
much money do you think the information that a certain
rickshaw-flying trans-Lounge operator is hiding that information is
worth?" Ace grins.

"
An
arm and a leg?" Carvery suggests.

"
And
a head and a foot and two testicles and a man's proportional
representation!" Justin shouts. "It is not Guinness, I tell
you! It is just bad combustion engineering chemistry, by amateur
scientists and part-time amputee surgeons!"

"
Well,
I've heard it called worse," Ace shrugs.

"
In
my experience, Mr. Time, if it looks like an elephant, smells like an
elephant, and has a poacher's head stamped underfoot like an
elephant, it is an elephant!" announces Corporal Punishment,
wisely. "Come to the Okavango Delta in flood season, and I
challenge you to deny the existence of elephant, when it is staring
you in the back of your screaming head!"

"
Anyway,
anyway," Justin Time recovers himself. "They give up on
chemistry already. So no more failed jet fuel and they throw all
evidence away, hah! Tomorrow, they convert all ambulances to gas
power!"

"
Good,
they can run on your hot air, Mr. Time!" Punishment approves.

"
Seems
to be a popular opinion of you, Justin," I remark, recalling
damply the moment that Higham Dry Senior decided to test our ability
to fly unaided, from the top of the mountain fortress.

"
Shame
they don't have a way of running on Sarah's nervous bladder as well,"
says Carvery. "They'd be unstoppable."

"
And
what was stopping
you
just now?" I bristle.

"
Just
checking to see if Justin Time's mothers had any organs on them that
they didn't need," he replies. "Still looking for
replacements for Fuck-Tits back on the giant barge, now that Crispin
has used the ones you skewered earlier to save Homer."

"
Oh."
I look at his hands, to check for bloodstains. Well – up to the
elbows, could be normal for him on any given day. "Any luck?"

He shakes his head.

"
Nah.
They'd had that thing done already, where it's all been snipped and
turned inside-out, and stuffed with silicone."

I boggle.

"
Mummified?"
I gasp.

"
A
lot of effort to pass as anyone's mother, definitely," he nods,
agreeing with me for once. "That's why as a guy, in some cases
you can only be certain once you've cut them open."

"
They
do like it up them, Miss Bellum!" Corporal Punishment confirms,
tapping his bayonet. "Right up the fuzzy-wuzzy…"

"
First
zombies, now mummies…" I groan. "I dread to think
now what's happening to… um… to your girlfr…
Miss… er… Thingummyjig…"

"
To
be fair, Sarah, I don't think they like being called
'Mummies'
,"
Ace informs me. "I think they prefer
'Ladies'
."

"
No
worries." Carvery looks unconcerned. "The state we last saw
Bruiser in, I doubt anyone could tell either way what she started out
as."

"
A
Frankenminky," I agree gloomily, echoing Crispin's own mother's
opinion, and both the boys nod. "Oh – the General's
office. Is this it?"

A long silver
Airstream
is stationed in the shade, on the outskirts of the camp. As we
approach, Justin Time visibly shrinks in direct proportion to its
proximity, accompanied by the increasing volume of his knocking
kneecaps.

"
Gooood
of you to join us," says that
devastatingly deep voice, and Crispin steps ominously out of the
shadow of an overhanging Strangler Fig. "Would you be so kind as
to step this way?"

My own knees sympathise
with Justin's. Gosh – I keep forgetting how manly he is…
I mean,
was
…

"
Permission
to squeak, Sir!" says Justin, jabbering now through his
chattering teeth. Crispin glowers at him darkly, before deigning to
nod. "Thank you, Sir! Er… eeee-EEEEEE-HHHK!"

CHAPTER
SIXTY-SIX
:

FULL METACARPAL
JACKET

The door of the
Airstream
opens with a creak, hinting at inefficient home-made
WD-40
oiling the hinges. There is an accompanying whiff, akin to stale ale.

"Enter,"
summons a low voice.

Justin Time, now a skin
bag of mostly knocking knees and chattering teeth, is hauled in front
of the great oak desk within, between Luke and Corporal Punishment.

Four strangers sit at the
desk. An imposing Oriental General with a monocle and clipboard. A
rotund, ginger-whiskered Captain tucking into a pot of tea and a
large cream bun. A young and skinny Lance-Corporal in a knitted scarf
and mittens, arms folded sulkily, as if he wishes he was elsewhere…

…
And
an exquisitely beautiful Afro-Oriental female officer in khaki
fatigues, who rises to her feet slowly. While at the same time Justin
drops completely to the floor and prostrates himself, as if he is
hoping it will part and swallow him whole…

She speaks only one word,
and with it, the fate of all in the room is apparently clear.

"Tea?" she
says, politely.

"Not a drop of it,
you loathsome spawn of Hell!" Justin shouts, slightly muffled by
the rather nice Persian carpet.

"Three sugars,
please," Luke beams.

"Black," says
Carvery.

"White, no sugar,"
says Ace. "You're sweet enough to keep me going."

She smiles and nods, and
turns to the large, gleaming chrome vending machine. Another one of
Crispin's high-end refreshment models, no doubt…

"Corporal
Punishment?" she asks, over her shoulder.

"I'm a giver, not a
receiver." Carvery shakes his head.

"Hot water only if
you please, General Domina, Ma'am," Corporal Punishment
acknowledges gratefully.

"Not much fun you
can have with that," Carvery tells him. "Maybe inflict a
few minor scalds and blisters… You need to get out more."

"Miss Bellum?"

I jump as she addresses
me. I'm still wondering how to get that little diary out of Carvery's
pocket without him noticing.

"Um," I reply,
wondering if my bladder can handle any more liquids today, or whether
I should just wait for the next Sloe Gin Sling to cross my path,
which would be preferable. "I could perhaps just nibble a
sugar-lump…"

She nods, and proffers
the bowl.

An immaculate set of tiny
vintage engraved silver sugar-tongs perch on top of the sparkling
white and brown cubes.

"Thank you," I
murmur, helping myself to a lump. The tongs spring back and forth
between my fingertips, suggestively. "Do you mind? I just want
to admire these for a moment…"

"Justin Time,"
the monocled General Sunny-Jim interrupts, fortunately distracting
everyone from my budding plan. "You have been brought before us
to face the outstanding charges of flying carpet theft, distribution
of counterfeit
One Thousand Yard Stare Masters Degree
certificates, and absconding without leave. And also charges of
defamatory statements about our patron broadcast by you on
Panic
Stations FM
, abusing your position on the field hospital radio.
Do you have anything to say in your defence?"