Chapter One
Hostile Visions In The Hinterland
… our quest begins … bat-creatures …
an unsuspecting hitch-hiker …
We
were 3 hours out of Bradford in the great white droptop Chevy and my companions
(Rhubarbtriangulist & a 300-pound Samoan prop) had just opened up another
six-pack which we had collected (along with the acid blotters, the bennies, a
quart of ether, uppers, downers, crystal meth., peyote and the raisin bagels)
before leaving the Tiki Lounge at the White Swan in Wetwang in a frenzied gimp
scavenger hunt... the only thing that worried me, though, was the Fear. There
is nothing more helpless and irresponsible than a Rugby League Forum member in
the depths of a binge.
As
we drove through the desert I began to see huge bats flying at me as the dawn
sunlight filtered through the clouds. I looked over at my passengers. My Samoan
fellow flyer was pouring Theakston’s Old Peculier onto his bare chest in an
attempt to facilitate the tanning process. I didn’t tell him about the bats...
after a six-pack of OP and the reds he’d been popping, he would see them soon
enough.
Even
though the sun had come up and we were already helplessly strung out by that
time, we knew we had to keep going. Ticket sales for the WCC had already
started and we had a moral responsibility to get there before the RFL’s single
‘phone line inevitably crashed and burned. It’s tough to achieve the sort of
believability that a forum like TRL demands unless you make at least a passing
attempt cover the story. Besides, my journalistic professionalism was on the
line.
The
fools at TotalRugbyLeague.com had already advanced me £500 which had funded our
chemical shopping spree and ensured that we would have enough cash on hand to
buy off any indignant jobsworth that might object to our swilling beer and
general swinishness in a football stadium. The area around the dashboard
already looked like the dumpster behind an all-you-can eat pizza parlour, but
we were well stoked for our journey.
“Man,
this is the way to commute”, said my 300-pound Samoan buddy as he adjusted the
volume on the volume so that the psychedelic whipsong of Acid Mothers Temple’s
‘Interstellar Overdope’ drowned out the screaming of the bat-creatures.
My
passenger noticed the hitcher before I did. “Maybe we should take that kid on a
spin with us”, and before I could say anything, he had already waved the poor
chump over. The kid’s eyes lit up like Christmas,
“Dang,
I never got to ride in a convertible before!” he said pulling open the door
“Hi, my name’s Julian”.
“Welcome
aboard”, I said feigning enthusiasm. My buddy eyed him like a leopard selecting
a weak young dikdik for supper. “We’re not like the rest of them”, he said
waving a Gerber Mini-Magnum hunting knife at him in a friendly manner, “We’re
your friends”. He began to giggle, spilling beer on the kid’s backpack.
He’s
about to lose it, I thought. “Behave or I’ll have too put the dogs on you”, I
said quietly. My buddy seemed to understand. The evil glare in his eyes seemed
less harsh and he relaxed a bit. I hoped that the music had drowned out
everything and that the kid was too naïve to expect any deep weirdness.
Suddenly,
savagely, our rêverie was cut brutally short by the return to wakefulness of
Rhubarbtriangulist. “What’s that greedhead scum O’Neill doin’ in the car? Run
him down! Feed him to the f*cking lizards!” More pills were applied and I broke
out the ether, inducing a kind of wary equilibrium.
As
we hit cruising speed again I thought I could hear a muffled thumping from the
boot of the car. Cazart! Jones had regained consciousness, and I didn’t have
time to stop again to bludgeon his bleeding carcass into silence unless I
wanted to lose those goddamn tickets.
With
this quandary in my mind, we topped a rise and saw the outskirts of
Huddersfield laid out before our bloodshot eyes. We were paid-up members of the
Too Much Fun Club, looking for some vicious amusement before kick-off and that
twisted pigf*ker Jones was going to provide it.
… the rugby league dream …
MOODSWING! …
rhubarbtriangulist goes
hunting …
Paranoia
began to take hold. I glanced at the screen and noticed that Oscar the Samoan
was paging through something twisted from a something called
www.senseless.violence on his laptop. He began to leer at O’Neill. I wondered
what would happen to us if he caught on to what we were doing. He might call
down the cops - some vicious thugs to straighten us out if things got out of
hand. We might have to turn him over to some of our friends in the South Stand
Experimental Psychology Department for some medical tests. They would drop him
into some sort of sensory deprivation chamber, load him up on adrenal
stimulants, and make him listen to Ian Robertson for hours and hours.
Did
I say that out loud? I glanced at O’Neill. He was starting to get
nervous, but he wasn’t looking at me. I needed to connect to him on some level.
Let him know that what we were doing was valuable. ‘The Rugby League Dream,
kid, that’s what we’re after.’ His pupils moved from side to side, but he didn’t
say anything.
“We
are on a quest,” I began again, “to determine whether there is any hope left,
whether there is any room left for the Rugby League Dream.” He still wasn’t
willing to make eye contact. “Hey!” I said slapping the back of Oscar’s chair,
“Doesn’t the Rugby League Dream mean anything to you?” Oscar cursed as
gibberish scrolled across his screen. I had caught him off guard, mid
keystroke, but I had O’Neill’s attention, I could see
that.
“We
aren’t the first ones to do this, you know. This path was blazed before. Did
you know that?” His eyes said that he didn’t. I tried to focus my thoughts.
I
remembered how, like a red tide washing up on the shore of a fashionable beach,
the seminal search for the Rugby League Dream had ended in utter failure almost
a quarter of a century ago. The glow was gone, but the smell remained. But
Oscar and I had witnessed the dawning of a new age with the growth of the
internet.
In
the real world, the Rugby League Dream was supposed to be as dead as the Zurich
Premiership, but the TRL Forum held a new promise that had yet to be tarnished
by the kind of feed-bag, prevent-defence apologism that had seized the hearts
of every visionary once crazy and lucky enough to manage to build something on
the frontiers of radicalism. How could I explain that to this myopic dork.
“The
internet is our best hope. It is full of possibilities. It’s potential is
limitless. I’m not talking about data transfer or information availability, I’m
talking about dreams. On the internet, you can say what you like, EMail anyone
who matters. Look at Oscar here.” He looked. “He’s a 350-pound Samoan in real
life, but when he enters a Forum he becomes a sleek word-warrior. He is
transformed.” He looked at Oscar again. “You’re not a racist, are you?” I asked.
“Heck
no,” Julian said, “I got nuthin’ against injuns no matter what they look like.”
“Good,”
replied Oscar, “I’m glad to know that you’re not some kind of bigot.” His voice
sounded odd. Had he detected condescension in O’Neill’s
voice? “Maybe I should do something for you as a gesture of friendship. How
would you like to crack wise on this finest of fine forums?”
“I’d
like it a lot.”
“Just
give us a login name and we’ll set you up.” What did Oscar have in mind? I sat
there helpless as O’Neill provided the information.
Oscar’s
fingers were a blur as he started typing. The password appeared via EMail even
as we watched. Even before I realized what was going on, O’Neill let out a gasp as he realized that the new
identity would let him vent his spleen across the world. Oscar stopped typing
and held his pinkie over the keyboard.
Moodswing!
I stood on the brakes and we snaked to a halt diagonally across the road.
Oscar
had the look of a carnivore as he scanned the nomadic Australian up and down.
His prey sat there quietly, dazed, doomed. He knew that as soon as this Samoan
monster turned on him his life was over. His body’s bleached bones left in the
sand of the parched desert which abuts this stretch of the road from Bradford
to Huddersfield.
Oscar’s
grin widened, his eyes narrowed, and he switched off the Laptop. I looked up to
see O’Neill slinking away from us looking feral and
whipped. “And don’t waste your time hiding you EMail address to keep me away,”
Oscar bellowed after him, laughing maniacally. Rhubarbtriangulist followed him
off into the hills, scenting blood. I got the feeling we would only see one of
them alive again. The bat-creatures would feed on the loser’s carcass.
“What
a drongo,” Oscar added, “I only wanted to make him think I was going to grease
him.” I nodded, less than sure. I eased the car back onto the correct lane as
Oscar reached for some Jimson Weed. His blood sugar must be getting low, I
thought. Not a good sign.
Chapter Three
Confrontation At The George
Hotel
… just say “yes please” …
the FEAR …
was that who I thought it
was? …
“...
Doctor Futtocks... “ It began as a tingling sensation at the base of my spine.
“Doctor Futtocks?” Then it began to crawl up through my body cavity, stopping
momentarily in the vicinity of my swollen spleen. “DOCTOR FUTTOCKS!” My eyes
snapped open, I was slumped in front of the registration desk staring up at a
nine-assed Peyote Demon with teeth dripping poison. “What can I do for you
Doctor Futtocks?”
I
wrenched my fried cerebellum into gear “Er... highest character... family
values... total coverage... total professionalism...” I stammered as it began
to tunnel through my brain stem, wrapping itself around my hypothalamus.
“When
will you be contributing to the Forum, Doctor Futtocks?” The irritation in her
voice was palpable. It was too much. There was an eruption, like Athena (or the
Alien) birthing itself from the top of my skull, there it was, THE FEAR.
She
recoiled in horror as she saw and smelled The Fear and knew I was overcome.
Wham. A hard blow between the shoulder blades causing me to gasp suddenly.
“Doctor Futtocks will be logging on later this afternoon, of course. After he
has bought his WCC tickets.” Oscar said, “I am in complete control and will be
supervising everything. It is my duty. I am his Attorney.” He glanced at the
receptionist’s badge “Doreen West, huh? We all have our crosses to bear.”
“Yes,
of course,” she said with obvious relief. “But I think that Doctor Futtocks...”
“His
condition is none of your concern, young lady. He is under careful medical
supervision. The side effects are regrettable, but necessary considering the
dosage required and his condition.” Oscar spun me around away from the front
desk. “Ta ta, bon voyage, a bientôt, auf wiedersehen and thank you for your
invaluable assistance. As an attorney, I strongly suggest you change your name
by deed poll. Not a good handle to wear in this town.” he said grinning and
waving at her as we walked down the hallway.
“You
arrived just in time,” I whispered to him. “Did you notice the poison dripping
from her teeth? A RFL spy for sure!”
“No
more peyote for you, my friend, you have to be careful around these pigs. You
start muttering gibberish like that and they’ll lock you up in second. First
they’ll tie you down and beat on your kidneys until you sign a confession. Then
they’ll send you to prison for re-education. Remember what happened to that kid
who played a trial game of League under an assumed name? He got fitted up for
14 months in prison. Hard time. You’d never survive that.” I nodded, knowing
that he was right. But I needed more chemicals and I needed them now. It was
time to cover the match build-up and I wanted to be prepared.
A Quest For Truth
… setting the scene … oscar
talks me down …
As
we staggered down the corridor, Oscar laughed, then affixed me with a bemused
expression. “If you are going to go into one or your hallucinatory frenzies,
you should at least show the good judgement to yell at something other than a
functionary.”
“A
what?”
“A functionary,”
he groaned. “Just save your energy for the suits and greedheads who are REALLY
hurting the Dream.” I could hear his capitalisation of the word.
“She
was onto us.”
“That’s
not the point, She is a drone. A NUMBER. A cog. There is no use arguing with a
drone. Besides, it is annoying to everyone else and embarrassing to me.”
“What
was annoying was she was peering inside my skull. Besides, I have my
journalistic integrity to think about. Something you, as a prop forward, have
little use for. Jeez, it’s getting difficult to walk through here with all
these snakes. What kind of a hotel is this?”
“It’s
you, not the hotel staff at all. Your brain has been pickled by drugs and sleep
deprivation. And don’t describe anything else to me, I think I’m starting to
get sick. Now we need to get you involved in the WCC properly. If you write up
something twisted about snakes and mescaline monsters with fangs dripping
poison, the editors at TotalRugbyLeague.com are bound to get suspicious.”
He
was right. For good or ill, I needed to track the story down into its lair.
Corner it. Kill it. And eat it.
No...
No... that’s not it at all. I needed to track it down and distil it to its
essence. Find the Truth. Or at least some facsimile thereof. Someone needed to
make sense of the weirdness going on in this part of the world. And for
whatever reason, I had decided that I was the one to do it. Maybe
TotalRugbyLeague.com had not realized when they set up the Forum, that it would
propel me into another savage quest for Truth in pursuit of the Rugby League
Dream, but whatever the intent, the shining path was there and we were just
twisted enough to take it.
Chapter Five
The Ticket Office
… preaching to the
unconverted … pies & tequila …
justifiable violence …
Buying
the tickets was uneventful enough as such things go, but I couldn’t seem to
work myself into enough of a frenzy to extract anything profound from the
experience. The concept centred around a fight for supremacy between the best
Rugby teams in the World, held deep in bandit country. Replica strip-clad fans
kept hurrying past to the ticket office, disappearing in a cloud of dust and
tanning solvents, only to reappear some time later having completed their
‘mission’.
Oscar
and I tried to relax, but after the anticlimax of our own transaction, I
decided to opt out and find some alcohol. Oscar amused himself by threatening
passers-by while I sat in the bar, made some notes, and tried to make sense out
of what was going on.
Sense?
What could be more senseless than a bunch of hyper-fit Rugby League players
crashing into each other for 90 minutes? Did it need to make sense? Hmmm. There
is a place on the east side of town, a seedy spot with a particularly nasty
clientele. How would they react to the World Club Challenge? Could they be
enticed to come along? Of course, the RFL would not be real copacetic about a
bunch of boozefighters in filthy leathers staggering around the hospitality
boxes - might not help the ambience. But, if it looks like Mohammed isn’t
interested in going to the mountain…
“Oscar,
stop doing whatever it is you’re doing to that woman and give me a hand.” Did I
detect a sheepish look from the felonious one? “I need you to come with me for
a little road trip. It’s time for some social experimentation.”
“Indeed.”
Oscar snarled a few terse expletives and pulled his bulk away from the lobby.
“What do you have in mind?”
“Remember
PeeWee Herman’s first movie.” I nodded. “That part where he goes into the biker
bar.” I gave an affirmative grunt. “And he tries to use the phone and he knocks
over their Harleys and they decide to kill him.” I smiled remembering the
scene. “And he only escapes with his life, because he does this great dance
thing to the tune of that song ‘Tequila’.” I chuckled.
“Hell,
NEITHER ONE OF US CAN DANCE!” Oscar bellowed exultantly as we pulled into the parking lot.
Perhaps
he was right. Perhaps mixing drunks and Rugby people was not the greatest of
ideas. These things had a way of getting out of hand. Years ago at Jerry’s
place there had been an attempt at cultural cross-fertilization involving Rugby
League and Rugby union types. From what I have been told, it started out
harmlessly enough, due in no small part to the availability of copious
quantities of dope, I suspect. The press were parked ominously across the
bridge from Jerry’s place with their phones going and telexes crackling. On the
other side were the Leaguies, the rah-rahs and Jerry.
The
vibes were right. Nobody got hurt. But, a few weeks later a mob of Sunday Times
hacks gatecrashed the gig, brainwashed an initially sympathetic passer-by, and
bulsh*tted up some ‘League is dying’ story so bad that it put the BBC to shame.
Another well-intentioned social experiment gone bad. But that was years ago and
I was not afraid of risks.
“Social
engineering is not for the weak at heart,” I said to Oscar as we got out of the
car, careful not brush up against any of the filthy walls. “I have a
responsibility as a journalist to find the Rugby League Dream no matter how
dangerous the path.” We unloaded some of the drugs and headed for the bar.
We
passed a familiar figure loping down the middle of the road, pausing to howl at
the clouds. Rhubarbtriangulist’s fangs dripped blood. I didn’t need to ask
where that high energy diet had come from.
The
place was a dive, with the sign ‘CABLE HOGUE’S BAR’ picked out in pus-coloured
paint above the door. A grey, single story structure which had retained the
original dirt floor, it seemed too derelict to have survived so long without
being burned down or bulldozed in the interest of the public good. Located at
the corner of two streets three miles from the old Fartown ground, it festered
for years until the town grew up around it. Now surrounded by light commercial
suburban development, it looked as out of place as a David Campese in a contact
sport. We entered the place and inhaled the aroma of stale cigarettes and cheap
lager.
On
the way in, we bumped into a spiky-eyed character who bore a striking
resemblance to Fred Gassit. “Must be Adam MacDougall” muttered my monged
Polynesian pal “Jeez, this place smells worse than my flat,” he added with a
certain amount of respect.
“Who
are you kidding, bubba? I’ve been to your apartment,” I whispered back. We
dumped the pills on a table near the bar and Oscar started to schmooze. I went
to the car to get the Laptop and Oscar’s hunting knife. By the time I got back
to the table, Oscar had been surrounded by a group of wary, but
interested-looking fellows. The biggest one of them was a guy with a tattoo
that said ‘Arm The Unemployed’. He looked at Oscar’s Hawaiian shirt, looked at
me, and laughed in a not entirely unfriendly manner. It was going to be an
interesting evening.
“Whaddaya
havin’?” the mammoth biker asked me and nodded in the direction of the bar,
behind which a skinny, fortyish woman in a leather miniskirt was standing there
like a fart in a trance.
“A
Meat Pie,” Oscar and I responded in awkward simultaneity, drawing sceptical
looks from the swaying mass gathered around the table. “With... uh... Tequila
chasers, of course,” I added quickly. The barmaid started on the order,
throwing us a disgusted look.
“Doctor
Futtocks is my name and I’m a journalist by trade,” I said addressing the head
gonk, “and this is Oscar, my personal enforcement, dealer and attorney. Please
pardon the inconvenience, but we are on a quest for Truth and we need these
pills for our work.”
“Well,
Futtocks, you can call me Sonny.” I shook his hand without, I hoped, grimacing
noticeably at the knucklecracking grip. “What kind a circus are you boys
plannin’ on runnin’ here?”
“We’re
on a mission from God. Or a journey to the centre of our brains. Take your
pick. As far as the match goes, it’s war. A transglobal, appallingly violent
Rugby League match for World Dominance. I’m here to spread the word to the
masses and as soon as my colleague gets the laptop running and someone gives me
a phone line for the modem, we’ll be ready to book you good people some
tickets.” Oscar explained with staccato gracelessness. “It’s a hurtin’ game” I
added.
“Finestkind.
You want us to come?” Sonny asked. “Sounds okay to me. I’ll come as long as yer
buyin’ the beer.” Sonny pulled up a chair. I attached the extension cords and
somebody snaked over the phone line.
The
waitress arrived with our drinks. The Tequila wasn’t cold, but we didn’t
complain. Oscar had already fired up the computer. His fingers played across
the keyboard. Windows opened and the system was rolling. All of us, Sonny, the
drunken onlookers, even the waitress watched mesmerized as the debauched 350lb
Samoan did his Rachmaninov bit with the keyboard.
After
an unusually short period of time, he looked up and announced, “The ticket
office has crashed. Usual RFL snafu. Let’s see who’s posting on the Forum”.
Sonny moved around to Oscar’s side of the table. Oscar left to get the
mescaline from the car, so that the guys could join in our mindset. The
waitress arrived with more drinks. I continued taking notes. Oscar returned
with two wraps, a Gordian knot of trouble on his forehead.
I
caught snippets of the conversation as the guys seemed to be trying to organize
a group to break into the video rental store next door to sting some animal
porn tapes. The place began to fill up. I was struck by the odd resemblance
that the action around our table had to a casino craps table with a high roller
on a tear.
“I’d
say things are going rather well,” Oscar whispered to me, momentarily
unoccupied pending the completion of ticket transaction. I nodded to him,
noticing a band in torn denim and black t-shirts, setting up a drum kit on the
stage at the opposite end of the room.
“What
would you say is the biggest problem facing the world today?” I asked Oscar.
“The
ubiquity of the Old School Tie operating system in sport,” Oscar replied chuckling.
“It’s
like that guy we gave the lift to this morning.” I answered, ignoring his
response. “‘I never got to ride in one of these machines before’. The poor
dweeb had no access. No access to the Big Fun.” His statement echoed in my
abused brain. “That is the crux of the issue.” For instance Sonny had never
gone to a Rugby League match before tonight. Looking at his fevered expression,
I could tell that he was hooked by the mere thought of it.
The
band had finished setting up the drums and were wheeling into place their
speakers, monitors, and mixer. A banner went up behind them, proclaiming them
as ‘The DGFFH Experience’ Oscar watched them prepare. In spite of the tequila,
the drugs, the sleep deprivation, and the low-protein scraps they were bringing
me in lieu of the Meat Pie I had ordered, I could see it coming. Impending
disaster. The guy watching the Hindenberg go up in flames must have felt the
same way. I could see it coming and there was nothing I could do about it.
The
roadie began stringing cable from the speakers to the mixer. Having used up all
of the mains sockets near the stage, he unwound an extension cable from the
stage in the direction of a socket near our table. The socket that Oscar’s
computer was running off. “OK, guys, I’ll just disconnect this toy and I’ll
have enough juice to rock this joint,” he called back to the band.
“Doctor
Futtocks,” I turned, distracted for a fatal moment. “I had Bubba get this for
you.” The waitress said handing me a Meat Pie. “For a couple of southerners,
you and Oscar sure know your pastries.”
SMACK. Thud. It had started. I
turned back just in time to see Oscar kick one of the kids in the gut. Someone
had yanked the power cable connected to Oscar’s laptop from the wall. Another
kid hit Sonny in the back of the head with a mike stand. I ducked as someone
threw a pool cue in my direction.
“I
think I’d better bug out for the dugout,” I said to the waitress as I moved
away from the brawlers. Things got out of control. At first the kids tried to
keep the Oscar away from the instruments on stage. They were unsuccessful. I
found myself behind the bar with the barmaid. He cursed me and ran out the back
door to call the cops. The waitress handed me the bill and then sprinted off
with a baseball bat to help Sonny.
The
bar tab (with damages) totalled £635. Ordinarily this might have presented a
problem. A test for my expense account. But, tonight my ethics rather than my
journalistic skills would be tested. Actually, not much of a test. I wrote out
a short note:
Thank you for a lovely evening. As our resources are a
bit depleted, I hope that you will not find it too much of an inconvenience for
me to ask you to request the balance of the payment from our associates at
TotalRugbyLeague.com.
Please send a bill for the outstanding balance to Mr
(name and address deleted --Ed.) We will have someone from the office stop by
to retrieve any of the company’s equipment that survives. Have a nice day.
Doctor Futtocks
I paper-clipped the note
to the back of the till receipt and left it on the cash register. Improbably,
Oscar joined me behind the bar. His shirt was soaked with blood and beer and he
had a bruise on his neck, but he looked surprisingly good. That is, as good as
is possible for Oscar. I motioned for him to follow me out the back door. We
made it to the car unscathed, but in my haste to get the door open I did the
domino thing with the motorbikes of Sonny & Co.
“An
unqualified success,” Oscar said opening up a Meat Pie and dropping most of it
all over the inside of my car. It was my Pie; I had no idea how he had ended up
with it. “Wait ‘til TotalRugbyLeague.com hears about this. And to
think I doubted you. Squeal those tyres!.”
“What?”
I asked putting the car in gear and looking to see if anyone had noticed my
fiasco with the bikes. “There’s no one after us now.”
“Squeal’em
anyway. When you leave a scene like that you gotta cheese it.” We burned
out.
Chapter Six
A New Mission
… strange rumblings in
leeds … a visitor from the valleys …
the treachery manifesto …
The
London media is not friendly to Rugby League folk. We, like The Greatest Game
Of All that we follow, perform best when treated like human beings. Hence my
surprise at Oscar’s enthusiasm for our newest assignment. Some reactionary group
called the ‘Return To The RFU Movement’ was having its annual general meeting
in Leeds during the WCC weekend. TotalRugbyLeague.com had got wind of it from
Centralparker and faxed the information to us.
We
had been forced to set up camp at a cheap B & B after our social experiment
at the bar. While we expected TotalRugbyLeague.com to make good on the tab,
for the time being we were persona non grata.
“They
should thank me,” said Oscar, “for relieving them of the indignity of writing
reviews of a match the London hacks wouldn’t touch with a ten foot toad.” In
any event, it would be a while before things got sorted out and we could feel
comfortable showing our faces on the Forum. We had planned on keeping out of
sight for a while until the fax arrived. Oddly enough, they wanted us to go
there in person to cover the event. They had made all the arrangements, special
press passes, hotel reservations, an expense account...
“Oscar,
I don’t know about you, but to me this seems too good to be true. Maybe we should
decline to go in person. Maybe we should make the whole thing up. What about we
go to some backwoods local, a place so far off the main road no-one will bother
us and use our imaginations?”
“You
mean the main Grandstand at Sale RUFC?”
“Yeah.
Or maybe we should hole up in the George Hotel with a bunch of drugs and booze
and cover the convention from there. Maybe writing up this ‘Return To The RFU
Movement’ thing is just what we need to put the Dream into perspective.”
“Perhaps
I should stomp you right now, cut out your spleen, and tattoo the word “weasel”
across your forehead for even suggesting that we pass up this opportunity.”
Oscar was already packing.
He
was right of course. This assignment was a chance to pursue the greedheads even
further. We needed to find out what this group had in store for the fans, those
without money privileges.
Security
has become a big issue now that the collaborators had moved into top gear. The
Caisley/Hetherington/Lindsay cabal were going to try to cover things up. Make
things comfortable for the fans, while still selling out to the pinstripers of
Twickenham. These folks had their own vision of the Rugby League Dream and it
didn’t involve Rugby League. If they needed to round up and incarcerate a few
who suspected their motives, there were plenty of Forum freaks, petition
collectors and magazine columnists to pick from. Maybe this was too big a story
to cover from some rinky-dink B & B room in the middle of Woop Woop.
“Move
over and let me take a look at that fax,” I said to Oscar. “I need to make sure
they rented us a convertible.”
The
drive to Leeds went as well as could be expected, considering
TotalRugbyLeague.com’s initial reluctance and conditional acquiescence to our
demand for a convertible. As a token cost-cutting gesture, someone was being
sent along with us to keep an eye on our behaviour. Ho ho. Oscar had requested
the back seat, I had jumped into the driving seat, and we ended up sitting with
this guy as we tried to break the speed limit in a ragtop that should’ve had a
mercy killing ten years ago.
We
weren’t too unhappy about being banished into the heart of darkness (well,
Headingley anyway). The Forum regular who had been assigned the job of riding
shotgun on our investigation introduced himself as Stanislaw Dziama. He sported
the England replica strip of a seasoned man-on-the-move. No luggage.
“I’m
Oscar and this is Doctor Futtocks,” Oscar said, smiling at Stanislaw. I nodded
at him, too out of breath to say anything. “Sorry about the confusion, but we
are on a very tight schedule.”
He
had been sipping on a martini when Oscar and I turned up. I had missed the
motorway exit and had decided to take a chance on another access road. When I
realized that the access road did not connect to much more than a dead end
suburb, I executed an handbrake turn, hopped back over the curb, crossed the
central reservation, cut in front of a School Bus, powered up the ramp, and
came to a squealing halt in front of the TotalRugbyLeague.com building.
Time
for a drink. We drank. It felt good. Damn good. We were armed. We were stoned.
We were strong. I had written this paragraph like bad Hemingway. A few more
drinks and I rewrote it like Dr Seuss.
I raised my glass and took
a slug,
It felt good mixing drink
with drugs.
I was feeling good that
day,
Now that Jones was locked
away.
Did I drink it with some
Spam?
No! I ate green eggs and
ham!
Enough!
my thin veneer of professionalism was being dissolved by the junk in my veins.
Oscar slapped me, fast and brutal, across the face. “Pull yourself together” he
hissed “You’re supposed to be ripping off Hunter Thompson!”
We
were hopelessly late by this time. After transferring Stephen Jones from the
boot of our old wheels to the new one, I gave the receptionist the keys and two
twenties. “Just have someone park it out front and leave the keys in the
ignition,” I yelled at him as I jogged after Oscar. “We may need to leave in a
big hurry after they calculate our expenses”.
We
arrived at Headingley hot on the tail of the mysterious cabal. Sweating like
pigs from our white-knuckle ride and loaded with more bennies than we could
realistically handle, we were greeted with a look of intense loathing by the
security guard. Oscar chopped him across the throat and I scarcely had time to
set up our listening gear and take up our hidden position with the headphones.
By this time, I was wheezing like an aqualung. I took two long pulls from the
jar of ether and settled back into a crouch.
“Toss
that thing over here,” Stanislaw pleaded, “my heart is thumping like a
devilbunny.” I handed the ether over and he took an experimental pull. “Jeez.
That stuff tastes awful.”
“Hmmm,”
I said, having regained my breath, “I think I have just the thing for you.” I
retrieved my medical bag from underneath the seat in front of me. I pulled out
some samples in bright foil containers. “I picked these up in Guayaqil. They
are being test-marketed for truck drivers. Over-the-counter stuff, no
prescription required. A little caffeine, a little ephedrine hydrochloride,
some theophylline, and a touch of phenylmercuric acetate to keep it fresh.” I
handed him and Oscar the packages.
“As
an experienced lush, I recommend that you take it with Greek brandy to ensure
greatest potency,” Oscar advised sagely. I retrieved the bottle from the bag
and handed one each to Oscar and Stan.
Our
new companion gobbled two packages and polished off half the bottle in a few
minutes. I pulled out my notebook to work on the TotalRugbyLeague.com piece. Oscar fiddled with the listening gear.
“Wow,
you’re listing to Acid Mothers Temple?” Dziama exclaimed. His pupils where
dilated and his eyes had a glazed look. “Are they weird? I don’t think I’d mind
weird. MAN! That stuff really got a hold of me. I can really concentrate now.
What do you say, you let me borrow that tape for a while, huh?”
“Sure,”
I said, handing him the tape player. “Roll with it.” His hands were shaking
noticeably, but he had a big grin on his face. I went back to my notes.
“I’ve
listened to this side three times now.” babbled Stan, “It’s better every time.
No wonder you listen to this stuff. I really understand it now. It’s all
in the rhythms. The pulses. Wow, I have got to GO! To the restroom. Sorry.
Excuse me. I’ll be right back. Don’t mind me.” His movements were quick, but
unsteady. He disappeared into one of the Portaloos. I went back to my notes.
Oscar dozed.
I
jammed the headphones to my ear again. The meeting of the cabal was winding
down. Jonty had hacked their lines of communication and I listened to the final
orders unfolding onto the finest reel-to-reel tape.
CAISLEY: …okay, we hand
over the biggest names in English Rugby League and in return we get more
positive press coverage than we’ve had since 1895.
HETHERINGTON: Remember, if
anyone gets wind of the sellout before the event, we’re all dead.
LINDSAY: Okay, so Inverdale covers TV, Campbell takes Radio and when Jones finally gets here, he’ll coordinate all print media.
We
snickered, knowing that Mistah Jones was still locked in the boot of our car.
“When did we last feed that knucklef*cker anyway?” I wondered. As the cabal
went their separate ways, we raced out to the car park. Unexpectedly, Mad Dai
was waiting for us. An amiable streak of piss from the wrong side of the tracks
but the right side of Offa’s Dyke, he was leaning on the bonnet of our car.
“I knew something was up”, he drawled, “I had
a Sunday Times hack turn up at my house, researching a ‘League is dying’ story.
We killed him with a speargun and the dogs cleaned his bones. Is that who I
think it is locked in the boot?”
“Yep.
Large as life and twice as bouffant. Want to engage in some constructive
dialogue with a nationally respected journalist?” Dai took the proffered
revolver and opened the bootlid on the now skeletal gibbering mess curled in a
foetal position around the spare tyre. If we iced the guy, we’d have more space
for beer and drugs. And guns. We’d need to be carrying some serious heat if we
were going to stop these scumfeeders. We were give the Dream spiritual CPR and
all bets were now off.
Unused
to the high-grade stuff we’d fed him, Stanislaw staggered out of the Portaloo,
a turd in each hand. “Look, man,” he stuttered “I found Frodo an’ Gandalf!” We
left him in a giggling heap, his eyeballs vibrating. We weren’t pig enough to
cut into his happiness. Besides, he would keep. If Lindsay, Hetherington and
Caisley had their way, he wouldn’t have anything to live for anyway.
“Bugwa! We shall gnaw on
their skulls!” screeched Oscar as we smoked rubber away from the site of that
sick sad conspiracy. Little did those Fatbacks know we had come to whip the
shit out of everything they had been brought up to hold dear.
Chapter Seven
Bad Craz i ness On The Street
… signing off time for the
BBC massive … speaking in tongues …
a bad choice of t-shirt …
Back
on the road I addressed Oscar, “Not so fast there. We’re not busting in on that
gig until we know exactly what’s going on. I can’t afford to be compromised
while on assignment.”
“Don’t
pull any of that noble journalistic integrity crap with me, white-eyes. I know
you far better than that.” He grabbed my arm. “Let’s dump the equipment at the
Hotel and take a spin downtown. These rah-rahs are starting to close in on us
like leeches.”
The
hotel staff was efficient. We were back on the street in ten minutes. Oscar had
obtained an ice-bucket from an accommodating dwarf in a military outfit that
had been hanging around the front desk. Oscar gave him a big tip and he bounded
off like a bunny. Teddy Roosevelt had said “walk softly and carry a big stick”,
but he had never been to Yorkshire on a 9-day bender. The masterplan was
“Stagger around like a mutant on ether, just tip big.” Good advice. But I
expected nothing less.
The two of us paused, arrested
by the sight of a vigilante mob. They were beating Matthew Robbins like a
red-headed stepchild. Oscar went into a fighting crouch, flipping his knife
out.
“Cut that sh*t out” I yelled.
“I fully intend to” he chuckled
as he waded into the melée. I groaned as I looked at my watch. this was not Big
Fun Time - we were way behind schedule
Near the Stadium, a bunch of
Newcastle Knights players were looking up at the bright cloudless skies. “Looks
like snow” whinged one. “Fog, too” he added “At least that’s what we’ll tell
them back home if we lose.”
We
purchased a couple of six-packs at the stop-n-rob on the strip and opened the
first of four small plastic-wrapped pouches filled with something hellacious.
Maybe Huddersfield wasn’t ready for us. Intensity and Focus do not appear to be
appreciated by the movers and shakers. Manic crazies with the jitters might
make the locals nervous. Can’t have that, can we. Hell no.
We
had the ice-bucket between us. After couple of hours of joyriding and a few
passes up and down the strip, the back seat of the car was covered with
empties, lightning bolts were bouncing around our brains like a mini
thunderstorm. We had each hoovered up a goodly toke of our choice and we were
beginning to feel a little bit... giddy.
We
were stopping for chips again. I had the car in neutral and I was revving the
engine randomly because Oscar had told me not to. The engine noise was tickling
his spine. He was giggling like a maniac. So I just sat there tapping on the
accelerator. It seemed like the appropriate thing to do.
Back from the chip shop, Oscar’s eyes narrowed.
He tapped my shoulder and pointed up the road. A large car was pulling away
from the kerb. We could see Nicky Cambell and Fergus Sweeney in the car. John
Inverdale was driving. Where they’d stopped, a cheap-looking hooker was
laughing with her friends and waving a crooked little finger at the departing
car. We ghosted up beside them as they sat at a red traffic light.
“Hey
Rah-Rahs, I want to make you an offer!” Oscar bellowed back at them. “A
business proposition, don’t you want to get WIRED?” He leaned over the car door
at them. His eyes were bloodshot and his pupils were mere pinpricks.
They
pulled away, staring straight forward, pretending we didn’t exist. It wouldn’t
work this time. I kept pace as Oscar slammed his open hand on the roof of their
car to get their attention. “Don’t you BBC weasels want to get HIGH?” he yelled
at them. “Hey, you Old School Tie reptiles!” Oscar was barking at them over the
scream of the engine. “What are you AFRAID of? A little EXCITEMENT might do you
GOOD!”
There
was fear and intense loathing in their eyes. This was England, after all, and
they hadn’t expected to be menaced by some foreign-looking, 350-pound lump in a
land they thought they owned. “Dammit! Dammit! You’ll REGRET you ever SAW US!
WE TAKE CARE OF OUR OWN!” Campbell screamed spitting and crying. Fergus Sweeney
in the back seat had pulled out a Colt Python, a snub-nosed .357 and was waving
it at Oscar. The traffic light ahead of us was red, but both cars were hurtling
toward it at top speed.
Oscar took a deep breath, rolled down the window
and surpassed himself. “LE MANU SAMOA LENEI UA OU SAU,
LEAI SE ISI MANU O LE ATULAULAU! UA OU SAU NEI MA LE MEA ATOA, MA LO’U MALOSI
UA ATOATOA!” The poor devils’ brains simply couldn’t process
the signals coming hot and foul from their eyes and ears. A maggotbrained,
piss-soaked, vomit-stained behemoth screaming and raving in tongues about the
Toecutter, The Book Of Revelations and biting his enemies eyeballs in half.
Inverdale’s self-control disappeared like a moth in a blast furnace. He burnt
rubber as he ran the red light, his companions’ faces boggled at us as they
raced for safety. I buried the accelerator, hurling Oscar into the
back seat. I matched speeds with them as we headed down the boulevard.
“Did you get a good look at them? Missing links.
We’d better call that anthropology professor friend of yours. This could be
BIG!” Passing our prey, I yanked the handbrake. We skidded across their path.
Oscar took off his jacket which had been soaked with the beer he had been
drinking.
The
endgame was a messy sordid gundown with little to commend it, save the massacre
of three enemies of the Rugby League Dream. Maybe four. A passer-by with a ‘RU Joking’ T-Shirt caught a stray
round. Blew his face clean off. He was still squealing as we reversed over his
chest on the way out, turning him into Wiener Schnitzel.
MEMO
FROM THE TRL FORUM
DATE: JUNE 12, 2005
FROM: DR FUTTOCKS
SUBJECT:
THE DEATH OF STEPHEN JONES
NOTES
ON THE PASSING OF A GENUINE MONSTER... HE WAS A LIAR AND A QUITTER, AND HE
SHOULD HAVE BEEN BURIED ALIVE... BUT HE WAS, AFTER ALL, THE SUNDAY TIMES’
‘RUGBY’ CORRESPONDENTS.
“And he cried mightily
with a strong voice, saying, Twickenham the great is fallen, is fallen, and is
become the habitation of devils, and the hold of every foul spirit and a cage
of every unclean and hateful bird.” (Revelation 18:2)
Stephen Jones is gone now, and
I am poorer for it. He was the real thing - a monster straight out of Grendel
and a very dangerous enemy. He could shake your hand and stab you in the back
at the same time. He lied to his readers and betrayed the trust of his
employers. The unhappy editor of the Sunday Times, who kept him off the dole,
was not immune to the evil fallout. The editor, who believes strongly in Heaven
and Hell, has told more than one of his friends that “I know I will go to hell,
because I employed Stephen Jones.”
I have had my own bloody
relationship with Jones for many years, but I am not worried about it landing
me in hell with him. I have already been there with that bastard, and I am a
better person for it. Jones had the unique ability to make his enemies seem
honourable, and we developed a keen sense of fraternity. Mad Dai hates Jones,
Chairman M hates Jones, Sadfish hates Jones, I hate Jones, and this hatred has
brought us together.
No doubt Jones would have
laughed if I told him this. “Don’t worry,” he would say, “I also work for the
BBC, and we feel the same way about you.”
It was Stephen Jones who got me
into sporting politics, and now that he’s gone, I feel lonely. He was a giant
in his way. As long as Jones was active - and he was, all the way to the end -
we could always be sure of finding the enemy on the Low Road. There was no need
to look anywhere else for the evil bastard. That was Jones’ style - and if you
forgot, he would kill you as a lesson to the others. Rats don’t fight fair,
bubba. That’s why God made terriers.
If the right people had been in
charge of Jones’ funeral, his casket would have been launched into one of those
open-sewage canals that empty into the ocean just outside Southend. He was a
swine of a man and a jabbering dupe of a writer. Jones was so crooked that he
needed servants to help him screw his pants on every morning. His body should
have been burned in a trash bin.
These are harsh words for a man
only recently canonised by the BBC and the News Corporation - but I have
written worse things about Jones, many times, and the record will show that I
kicked him repeatedly long before he went down. I beat him like a mad dog with
mange every time I got a chance, and I am proud of it. He was scum.
Let there be no mistake in the
history books about that. Stephen Jones was an sick man - sick in a way that
only those who believe in the physical reality of evil can understand it. He
was utterly without ethics or morals or any bedrock sense of decency. Nobody
trusted him - except maybe the BBC, and honest historians will remember him
mainly as a rat who kept scrambling to get back on the ship.
The funeral was a dreary
affair, finely staged for TV and shrewdly dominated by ambitious presenters and
revisionist hacks. Steven Barnes, still eloquent at the age of 136, was billed
as the main speaker, but he was quickly upstaged by two other candidates for
Jones’ job: Steve Ryder and Fergus Sweeney of Radio 5, who formally hosted the
event and saw his chances crippled when he got blown off the stage by Ryder,
who somehow seized the No.3 slot on the roster and uttered such a shameless,
self-serving eulogy that even he burst into tears at the end of it.
Ryder’s stock went up like a
rocket and cast him as the early front-runner for the Sunday Times position.
Sweeney, speaking next, sounded like an Irish Engelbert Humperdinck
impersonator and probably won’t even reading the sports come the summer.
The historians were strongly
(but falsely) represented by the No.2 speaker, Jeremy Guscott, Jones’ Minister
of Information and himself a zealous propagandist with many axes to grind. He
set the tone for the day with a maudlin and spectacularly self-serving portrait
of Jones as even more saintly than his mother and as a man of many godlike
accomplishments - most of them put together in secret with Guscott, who came to
the funeral as part of a huge publicity tour for his new book on Rugby, genius,
and the great minds of our time, including himself and Stephen Jones.
Guscott was only one of the
media clique who suddenly came to see Jones as more than the sum of his many
squalid parts. He seemed to be saying that History will not have to absolve
Jones, because he has already done it himself in a massive act of will and
crazed arrogance that already ranks him supreme, along with other Nietzschean
supermen like Hitler, Campese, Bismarck and the Nigel Starmer-Smith. These revisionists
have catapulted Jones to the status of an journalistic Caesar, claiming that
when the definitive history of the 20th century is written, no other writer
will come close to Jones in stature. “He will dwarf Madame Jockstrap and
Maurice Bamford,” according to one scholar.
It was all gibberish, of
course. Jones was no more a great writer than he was a good person. He was more
like Stuart Evans than Billy Boston. He was a cheap crook and a merciless liar
who bored more people to death in Cardiff and Swansea than the U.S. Army lost
in all of World War II, and he denied the truth to the day of his death.
Some people will say that words
like scum and rotten are wrong for Objective Journalism - which
is true, but they miss the point. It was the built-in blind spots of the
Objective rules and dogma that allowed Jones to slither into a position of such
power in the first place. You had to get Subjective to see Jones clearly, and
the shock of recognition was often painful.
Jones’ meteoric rise from the
unemployment line to the Sunday Times would never have happened if TV had come
along 10 years earlier. He got away with it because most readers had never
heard the other side of the story. When Jones finally had to face his accusers
for real in the 2002 PCC hearings, he got whipped like a mule. Even die-hard
rah-rahs were shocked by his cruel and incompetent persona.
When he arrived at the Sunday
Times, he was a smart young man on the rise - a hubris-crazed monster from the
bowels of the valleys with a heart full of hate and an overweening lust
destruction. He had stomped like a Nazi on all of his enemies and even some of
his friends.
Jones had no friends except
John Inverdale and Nicky Campbell (and they both deserted him). It was
Campbell’s sordid death in 2002 that led directly to Jones’ downfall. He felt
helpless and alone with Campbell gone. He no longer had access to Radio 5’s
ghastly bank of Personal Files on almost everybody in Broadcasting House.
For Jones, the loss of Campbell
led inevitably to the disaster of Twickersgate. It meant hiring a spin-doctor -
who turned out to be an unfortunate toady named John Inverdale, who squealed
like a pig in hot oil the first time Jones leaned on him. Inverdale panicked
and fingered NewsCorp head Rupert Murdoch, who refused to take the rap and
rolled over, instead, on Jones, who was trapped like a rat by Inverdale’s
relentless, vengeful testimony and went all to pieces right in front of our
eyes on TV.
That is Twickersgate, in a nut,
for people with seriously diminished attention spans. The real story is a lot
longer and reads like a textbook on human treachery. They were all scum, but
only Jones walked free and lived to clear his name. Or at least that’s what the
RFU say - and they are, after all, pillars of the establishment.
Jones liked to remind people of
that. He believed it, and that was why he went down. He was not only a crook
but a fool. Two years after he quit, he told a journalist that “if the RFU does
it, it can’t be illegal.”
Shit. Not even Sweeney was that
dumb. He was a flat-out, knee-crawling thug with the morals of a weasel on
speed. But he was Jones’ mouthpiece for five years, and he only resigned when
he was caught red-handed taking cash bribes across his desk in Broadcasting
House.
Unlike Jones, Sweeney didn’t
argue. He quit his job and fled in the night to Bath, where he appeared the
next morning in Court, which allowed him to stay out of prison for bribery and
perjury in exchange for a guilty (no contest) plea on income-tax evasion. After
that he became a minor celebrity and played golf and tried to get a Ford
Dealership. He never spoke to Jones again and was an unwelcome guest at the
funeral. They called him rude, but he went anyway. It was one of those
Biological Imperatives, like salmon swimming up waterfalls to spawn before they
die. He knew he was scum, but it didn’t bother him.
Sweeney
was the Lord Haw-Haw of the Jones regime, and Campbell was its Caligula. They
were brutal, brain-damaged degenerates worse than any hit man out of The
Godfather, yet they were the men Stephen Jones trusted most. Together they
defined the sports agenda of the British establishment.
It would be easy to forget and forgive Steve Ryder
of his crimes, just as he forgave Jones. Yes, we could do that - but it would
be wrong. Ryder is a slippery little devil, a world-class hustler with a
totally grey face and a very keen eye for weak spots at the top of the power
structure. Jones was one of those, and Ryder exploited him mercilessly, all the
way to the end.
Ryder made the Gang of Four
complete: Sweeney, Campbell, Ryder and Jones. A group photo of these perverts
would say all we need to know about the Jones era.
Jones’ spirit will be with us
for the rest of our lives - whether you’re me or Ady Spencer or Sadfish or
Bishop Tutu or Keith Richards or Boris Yeltsin’s daughter or your fiancée’s
16-year-old beer-drunk brother with his braided goatee and his whole life like
a thundercloud out in front of him. This is not a generational thing. You don’t
even have to know who Stephen Jones was to be a victim of his ugly, Nazi
spirit.
He has poisoned our water
forever. Jones will be remembered as a classic case of a smart man shitting in
his own nest. But he also shit in our nests, and that was the crime that
history will burn on his memory like a brand. By disgracing and degrading the
reputation on The Sunday Times, by fleeing the truth like a diseased cur,
Stephen Jones broke the heart of the world of journalism.
Chapter Eight
Buzzkill: DOOM On
Doctor F.
… a failed experiment in
narcotic osmosis …
death and rebirth … Old
Faithful …
We
stopped at a safe-house on the north side of town to try and get two cans of
Mace, some fresh ammunition, and a laminated wall-map of Huddersfield and the
surrounding badlands. Mace? No joy. Pepper gas, that’s what we had purchased;
we had no luck finding real Mace. But the nice, honest sales clerk told us it
would work just great all the same. At least I hope the sales clerk was honest.
She declined to let me test the stuff on her, so I had to take her word for it.
Oscar
was in an expansive mood “Smell that,
son? Recovered meat and potato! I love the smell of Meat Pies in the morning!”
We
entrusted the convertible to the hotel again and headed up to our room. Room?
To be accurate, our suite. We had upgraded. We were after all, consummate
professionals, and with the stolen TotalRugbyLeague.com’s credit cards in my
pocket, a head full of crystal meth. and hopelessly jangled nerves from our
gunplay, I had fallen prey to Oscar’s debauched admonishments.
“As your attorney, I
advise you to get us moved into the soundproofed Bunnyboiler Suite,” he had
said. “It’s the only appropriate thing to do considering the circumstances.” I
caved in without argument. It took three uniformed dwarves about 15 minutes to
move all of our luggage to our new accommodation. We were not the most
efficient of packers. Oscar gave the head dwarf a couple of twenties and
advised them to invest it in hookers and gin. They loved us at that joint.
After
unpacking, I entered the main room… living room… communal space. Whatever you
call the big, bedless part of a multi-room suite. Admittedly, I am not exactly
accustomed to first class accommodations. Including an overnight stop at the
Hotel Dajti in Tirana and our current arrangement at the George, I will have
spent a grand total of four days in what I would consider high-roller lodgings.
I’m
not complaining, mind you. Any port in a storm and all. But the typical
crashpad did not provide a big-screen television, leather chairs and couches,
and an elaborate Victorian roll-top desk to work on.
Oscar scanned the copy of the
cabal’s press release, reading out particularly fnord-ridden passages. It was
called ‘Imagineering An Enhanced Potential For Tomorrow’, and that sick
manifesto was rammed to bursting with obscenity, treachery and horrors of every
description…
“You should post a freshly
severed ear to everyone on the RFL board and tell ‘em you’ve hired an army of
speedfreaks to go out and reclaim them.” I suggested.
“They’ll track us down and chop
us like hamburger” he moaned, clawing at his forehead. “This is bigger than we
thought. This is Armageddon, the O.K.Corral, the final kissoff.” He was
sweating like a Rugby union prop after a hundred metres’ brisk walk.
I
tried to calm him. “You need to change down a gear or two”
“Jacuzzi!”
responded Oscar.
“What!”
“Jacuzzi,
Jacuzzi, this suite has a Jacuzzi. Do whatever you want, Futtocks, I’m too
wired for sleep. I’ll just order up some bigtime highroller room service and
have a nice long soak.”
“Whatever.
Just let me work on my bulletin, OK?” I interpreted a snort from Oscar as a yes
and proceeded to get ready for a night of transcribing my notes.
As I
alternately wrote and dozed, stoner music oozed under the door of the bathroom,
rising to a tsunami of sound. Oscar had
spent the ‘70s in Israel with Mandy Rice-Davies, Zoogz Rift and a houseful of
dope-crazed Mossad agents. During his brief sojourn in New York, he’d been
responsible for the several acts of arson at Studio 54. From then on, the disco
set shunned him like the rabid dog he was. His response was to ‘retro’ his
tastes.
I awoke gasping and
screaming from a horrible dream about a giant white rabbit ripping my lungs
out. I took a pull on my bong and a sip of vodka and realized that the twisted
Surrealistic Pillow music hadn’t been part of my dream at all. From the
bathroom, I could hear Grace Slick belting out the chorus with manic abandon...
Faine Jade’s ‘People Games
Play’ shuddered at the door and I hunkered down against the opposite wall,
poised and ready. I knew what was coming. I was a veteran of the wars fought
inside that shaven Samoan skull. Buzzkill! Or… DOOM on Dr Futtocks. Once again,
as if it was fated, Jefferson Airplane’s ‘White Rabbit’ came howling through my
skull, distorted as hell and making my pineal gland do the Macarena.
Remember what the dormouse said:“Feed your head. Feed your head. Feed your head”
FEED YOUR
HEH-EH-EH-EH-EAD!
Oscar
was snarling, “Dammit, Dammit, DAMMIT!”. He was kneeling buck naked in the
Jacuzzi. He had filled the tub with a sickly mixture of water and parts of our
stash, as if to get higher by osmosis. Even though he couldn’t reach the hi-fi
from the bathtub, I moved everything farther away from him on the counter. I
noticed a colourful bottle lying empty on the counter next to the Jacuzzi.
“Ohh. You swine. You filthy swine. You’ve been into the Night Nurse, haven’t
you? I was saving that for an emergency, you greedy punk. For later on, anyway.
Oh, I never should have trusted you.”.
“Give me that back, you honky pig!” he screamed at me and reached into
the bathtub pulling up a flame-shaped Malaysian dagger. The thing was about a
foot and a half of wicked steel. I didn’t dare speculate on the reason why he
had the thing in the bathtub with him or even how he had got hold of it (room
service has a lot to answer for).
He may have
been crazy as a loon, but it seemed only fair to let him testify. Ask not what
your country can do for you. Ask, rather, what you can do with drugs, water and
240 volts.
I could see that he had been crying; his eyes were bloodshot and mean.
“Just tell everyone that I wanted to keep going. To get really WIRED. I set the
controls for the heart of the sun, but I just couldn’t get high enough.” He was
waving the sword at me playfully.
“I’m your best friend in the world, you know,” I continued, “can’t I
talk you out of this?”
“Never. I’ve reached my peak. I just realized that as I was playing this
song. My skills are honed razor sharp. I am as good as there is. Why stick
around here and wait for the inevitable decline.” He had a crazy/brave/scared
look about him. The chemicals and the weird vibes of this place had seized him
and breaking him loose would not be easy. But, maybe he was right. Maybe he
needed something to get him over the top. “I can’t go on with the Dream, buddy.
When you get to the top man, when you destroy the devilbunny brainiac behind
this evil plan, , I’ll be with you in spirit…”
“Ok. Ok. But, I’m only willing to help you because I care about you like
a brother. You understand that don’t you?” He nodded. “Ok, you just relax there
and I’ll restart this tape for you. When ‘White Rabbit’ finishes and ‘Old
Faithful’ starts, I’m going to toss this...” I pointed to the hi-fi, “into the
tub with you. Is that what you want?”
“Yes, dammit. I want to go out with an explosion. And turn up the music.
I need a wall of sound.” He relaxed back into the tub. His formerly maniacal,
but now cherubic face glowing with contentment.
“Sure,” I said hitting REWIND. I restarted the tape and cranked the
volume. The psychedelic keening of the electric guitar and the pounding rhythms
started anew; I could see Oscar’s body twitching with every note. Grace Slick
hollered out the words of the song, a song which I could state authoritatively
(and without hyperbole) had launched a million hallucinations. One more
hallucination tonight, Gracie dear. Just stick with me on this one.
I retreated to the common room where I found the ball that we had
discovered in the car after our joy ride earlier in the evening. In a few
minutes the song was nearing the climax. I could hear Oscar thrashing away
furiously. I knew instinctively that he had progressed to the highest level at
record pace. He was nearing the final confrontation. I opened the door again.
Oscar didn’t look up, but I knew that he knew that I was standing there. We
both knew what was coming next. The final battle, the death embrace...
FEED
YOUR HEH-ED!
FEED YOUR
HEH-EH-EH-EH-ED!
I dashed in and dunked the 8-panelled Gilbert into the bathtub/Jacuzzi with
all my might. The screams were
incredible. I beat a hasty retreat and rummaged through the supplies we had
brought up from the car. I found what I needed just as Oscar leapt through the
doorway, still naked and brandishing the dagger.
“Do you see what I have in my HAND!” I screamed at him. “It’s Pepper
Spray, buddy, the Real Deal. You want some of this?”
“What?” he growled at me.
“That’s right, bubba. A little squirt of this and I’ll show you truth.
I’ll show you how to meet your maker on MY terms if you come anywhere near me,
Oscar!”
“You honky pig. You wouldn’t dare.”
“Oh wouldn’t I? Ten minutes ago you wanted to end it all and now you
want to croak me. I can’t believe this crap. All I wanted was a couple of hours
of peace so I would write up today’s journal and get ready for the match
tomorrow. That’s all I asked for. Jeez.”
He relaxed and dropped the sword on the carpet. He grinned at me.
“Futtocks, I wasn’t really going to cut you, just carve a little smiley face on
your forehead. For good luck.” He sat back on the couch. “Look, your clothes
are soaked. Sorry, man. I know that you need your sleep. Hell, you’ve got work
to do tomorrow. Go back to sleep, dude. Sorry about the noise and all.”
“Two more hours, Oscar. That’s all I’m asking for.”
“Sure. No problem.” He helped me reset my alarm clocks and then he
staggered off to his bedroom, quietly closing the door behind him. With all of
the stuff he had absorbed, there would be no sleep for Oscar tonight. Nope.
Chapter Nine
An Ending Of Sorts
…
foiled at the kissoff? … help arrives … guns, guns, guns…
the
brainiac unmasked …
Outside the
Stadium late next morning, our plan had mutated. Watching the match was no
longer good enough. We had decided to suck, f*ck or cajole our way into the
press box and create some mayhem amongst the assembled throng.
“Jesus on a
wubber cwutch” groaned Oscar in his best Elmer Fudd voice “Maybe we’ll have to
bribe someone to get into the press box. Or even Mace somebody.” I attached an
official-looking laminated tag to my medical bag as we marched towards a door
marked ‘PRIVATE: KEEP OUT’.
I asked a
surly security guard where the action was. He looked at me like it was all he
could do to restrain himself from ripping out my floating rib and eating it. I
was tempted to Mace the bastard, just to be on the safe side.
Instead, we
found ourselves in the bar. “Yo barman! Funky Cold Medina. On the rocks”
snapped my companion, as I popped a cap of Amyl and knocked back an Absinthe
while I waited for the Shakes to subside. I was flying high and hairy on eleven
secret herbs and spices and I sat down and dug Oscar’s bellowed performance.
“A lazy young pig
got tired of his gig
and asked for a transfer to
union.
The boys ran him down
on the outskirts of town
and ripped of his nuts with
a coathanger.
Everything after that was
like
coming home in a cage on
the back of a train
with no money and cancer
and a dead girlfriend.
in the end it was no use.
He died on his knees in a
barnyard,
with all the others
watching.
Res ipsa loquitur.”
He finished to
an appalled silence. It was time for action. Charge! We burst into the Stadium
Head Office, howling like dogs. The room was grey. I mean everything was
grey. Out of the corner of my eye I caught a flash of movement. An almost
invisible figure lunged at me. Oscar straight-armed him and he bit dirt. Hard.
“Ha! The one
man who could disappear in a totally grey room!” jeered Oscar “Okay, Ryder,
you’re getting yours right now.” I lit up a cigar as Oscar expertly filleted
Grandstand’s answer to Lord Haw-Haw. This time there would be no mistakes. This
time there would be no witnesses, no survivors but the deserving. We were
cleaning house for keeps in this year of Our Lord two thousand and two.
Our triumph
was cut brutally short by Caisley and Hetherington bursting in through a
concealed entrance, both carrying shotguns. “Creeping Jesus!” yelled
Hetherington, “How did these two get in here?” his eyes narrowed. “Did you two
pigs ice the BBC team? I don’t care about Sweeney, but you’ll pay if you killed
Inverdale and Campbell.”
“Campbell and
Inverdale were the Caligula and Goebbels of your sick little plot. They were
brutal emotionally-retarded pigs worse than Lord Haw-Haw.” I riposted,
“Together they defined the BBC’s sporting agenda. They had to go. As for
Sweeney, he was a flat-out knee-crawling thug with the morals of a weasel on
speed. Nous ne regrettons rien.” I was playing for time. The time came.
“Drop the
iron! Don’t make no bull moves!” Saved by the bell, namely Scooternik’s Mac10
pressing into Caisley’s neck. Our backup had arrived. “The hired muscle is on
the way” he added “We’ve been feeding the Halifax pack on nothing but raw meat
for three weeks now”
The rest of
the Fatbacks could be mopped up later. We had divided; we would conquer at
leisure. Nigel Wood was to be shot out of season, stuffed and mounted. By John
Hopoate. The word was to be put about that the surviving members of the RFL
board were going to be killed as the clock struck midnight - by a gang of
motorcycle Huns from Flimby & Fothergill; a drug-crazed swarm that gloried
in the title of ‘Justified Ancients Of Mu-Mu’.
We had whipped
them and they were lost and blind, stumbling and screaming in the wilderness.
On the way out, we yanked the plugs from Bill MacLaren’s Asinine Simile Generator
reprogrammed the sucker with a fire axe.
Leaving the private area, Oscar fobbed off the waiting
SAS troops by promising them all publishing deals. “Orange and Black covers,
everything.” he assured them “And an ITV Movie option. Trust me, I’m a friend
of Sean Bean”. Impressed, they even helped carry our stash from the car. The
two of us marched off into the golden sunlight, just sick enough to be totally
confident.
Before taking
our seats in the press box, I had to piss like a racehorse and we headed for a
public toilet outside. Coming out, we heard the opening bars of ‘Funky Town’ by
Lipps Inc. choogling through the door of the bar next door to the MacAlpine.
Oscar gave a convulsive shudder and drew his lips back over his carious fangs.
“Disco Pigs! Do we have time to get those pimp scum? ‘Pig today, bacon
tomorrow’ is my watchword since those snotty bastards eighty-sixed me from
their lousy scene.”
“Of course we
have time” I said, killing another shot of Loch Dhu, “We shall make time. That
is the mark of the pro.”
The drugs kicked in again. At last! I watched the
sky turning a reassuring blood colour. I arched my back, stretching the kinks
out of my spine as the spiral light of Venus drilled an expressway to my skull.
The Peyote Coyote descended from the clouds and shat pure wisdom into my
pan-fried cerebellum. As Quetzalcoatl passed by, I bought some popcorn off him
and leaned into the trip. I was still alive and it felt good for now. The
chemicals and sleep deprivation had raped my synapses, but I would be ready
when the Day came to unfurl the red and black flags of Anarchy and Revolution.
I informed
TotalRugbyLeague.com by EMail that I would have their femurs snapped if they
hesitated even for a moment in the matter of expense-payment. They knew that I
was in contact with people who would twist their heads off for a negligible
fee. The sharks were coming home to roost.
Next stop -
possibly - the annual pigshit and Pimms pageant of the 6 Nations. We would do
things that would make people puke and howl for their lawyers.
For now? The
Dream was still alive, and we had a game of Rugby League to watch…
In a secret
underwater Headquarters at Murrayfield, Maurice Lindsay watched the action on a
giant monitor screen. He stroked the white persian cat on his lap and frowned.
His troubled rêverie was suddenly pierced by a harsh Australian voice. “Jeez,
Lindsay, get outta my chair!” Rupert Murdoch hobbled into the Operational HQ
“Don’t tell me you’ve failed again?”
“I’m… I’m…
sorry, master. I know I’ve been promising the death of Rugby League for
decades, but it just won’t die!” Lindsay’s voice rose to a furious, yet still
somehow camp, bellow. “We’ll never get those free 6 Nations tickets now. Those
creeps have ruined me!”