excerpt
“Why—”
“Of course, Mr. K’s boyos could give you a hand, if you’d like that, for boys
will be boys, I haven’t forgotten. You won’t forget it in a hurry, either, my laddie
. . . Just step out of those nasty old clothes, you don’t be needing ’em for
this . . .” Buttivant is cooing and burring like a disgusting old pigeon.
“That’s right, Luke!” shouts pop-up Kraskolkyn, beaming. He’s brandishing
Lucas’s wallet. “We know your top secrets, got all your right stuff,
Luke—cards, money, everything. But no bloody good now, see? We give you
new ID, good ID, you ride through the Junction. All fucking way, you know?
So make it nice and easy, do like the man says. Or else we help you.” He strides
over to the Chair and playfully tugs an electrode.
“Suppose I don’t want to ride . . .”
“Look here, you damn lucky, lucky to live this far, yeah?” In close-up, Mr.
K’s lips protrude, as he grips Lucas by the jawbone, to discover crucial nerves
in his neck. “You wanna be a Security problem? OK, I get ’em for you.”
Is there a choice? As Lucas is pulled out of his jeans, he senses Buttivant’s fat
fingers on the small of his back. Any second now he’ll feel paws on his thigh, a
fist nudging his rectum. Then, unbearably, there will come the thickening
penis, virally enriched, ready to direct-inject the syndrome, to magically
transfer its contagion . . . For the signs and symbols on the wall spell it out:
this must be the ritual abuse he’s read about.
“Sit, doggy, sit!” Mr. K snaps his fingers and points at the Chair. As Lucas
slumps into it, Buttivant bumbles gleefully with the harness. His red-rimmed eyes
are bleary with appetite, and he starts breathing heavily as he tapes a couple of
electrodes to Lucas’s forehead. But Kraskolkyn is growing impatient. “Come on,
get out the new gismo, I don’t know why I make it so easy for you . . .”
Buttivant mutters, goes behind the screen and wheels out a bulky black
camera on a tripod. While the Controller fiddles with cables and sockets,
Kraskolkyn slurps a mouthful from his flask, wipes his mouth, and leans over
to take Lucas into his confidence. “We take your ID, see, for the trip to Seaside.
All new gear, you the first to try it. Old Buttivant have no chance, and he
hang around praying it up for ever. Even Uncle Joe can’t make it, how about
that for a crying time? But thanks to lucky Luke, maybe everybody have window
of opportunity, wide-open . . .”
The pathetic diminutive Luke. Luke the Puke. But nothing matters any
more unless he can worm his way back from the ledge of Kraskolkyn’s dread
window and in the meantime he’s wordless.
Libros Libertad 