Vurt

"Home," he answered.

Home? Where's that then?

And the river was a vein of blood under the sun.

AN IDEAL FOR LIVING

Eyes opening to a flicker.

Colours, shapes of faces, people laughing.

The television was on.

I'm sitting in a deep velvet armchair, in the corner of a small living room, watching through half-open eyes. The television was a matt black model, with chrome trim. A real

collector's item.

The kids down on the rug were screaming with joy. The dog's tail wagging.

Noel Edmonds was on the television. With his whirlpool of hair, and that cheeky grin, he was asking questions of a happy family. Every time they got a question wrong, a rude noise sounded, and this bright red pointer moved closer to the symbol of a pile of sick. Above the family rested a giant bucket. It was steaming. Below the bucket, in large blue and red letters, were the words Noel's Spew Tank. Even when the television family got a question wrong, still they laughed and giggled. Down on the rug the three kids and the dog were laughing along. The dog laughed by wagging her tail. I was laughing as well. My god! I hadn't seen this since my childhood. What was happening?

I opened my eyes fully then, trying to take it all in. This room, this house, this wallpaper of flowers, and the people who were gathered there. It was all so familiar, like a memory. Like I'd been here before.

The oldest kid was a teenager. Her name was Mandy. The dog was called Karli, and the second girl was called Twinkle. I didn't know the name of the youngest kid. And I suddenly got this picture; they've never seen this before! Never seen the hair of Noel, the cigar of Saville, the magic of Daniels.

The living room door opened and Barnie came into the room. He was followed by a woman. She was carrying a tray of food, and Barnie had a bottle of wine and some glasses. The woman's hair was green, emerald green, and it reached down to her fifth vertebrae; it stirred up some feelings in me. Like I'd known her before, and very closely. Couldn't place it. She put the tray down for me, on a small glass coffee table. The food went with the room. Plates of meat and fish, spiced vegetables, crispy salads, ginger and garlic pastes, fruit and nuts, crumbling cheeses, apple pie with a ci

"You awake now, Crewcut?" Barnie asked.

"Yes. I..."

"You were out cold. All of you were. When's the last time you slept?"

"Slept..." I couldn't remember. "What time is it?"

The woman answered. "Half two."

I jerked upright then, out of the chair's soft embraces. "Half two! Is that afternoon or morning?"

The woman laughed.

"It's the afternoon, Scribb. You dumbo!" This from the older kid on the floor, whose name was Mandy.

"You want to dig into that food, Crew?" asked Barnie.

I did. It was ages since I'd eaten.

"Where's Beetle?" I asked.

"Beetle's in the bedroom," Barnie told me. "This is our home, and this is my wife... Lucinda." The woman smiled. Her mouth was wide and opulent. "And this is our child, Crystal." At these words from Barnie, the young girl pulled her face from the screen for a second, to give me a smile.

I started on the good food, feeling it ease my need. I could feel food dribbling down my chin, and I suppose I must have looked a little bit of a mess. "I can't stay here," I mumbled through a big mouthful. "I'm in a hurry." Some oil was dripping off my chin. I had to get back to Brid and the Thing. That was all that counted. But I didn't even know where I was.

"You fell asleep in the chair, Crew," Barnie said. "We didn't like to distrub you." "This is our home," Lucinda added. "You are most welcome."

"Have I seen you before?" I asked her.

"Oh, most probably." She smiled again. She had a perfect face. So did Barnie. The child also. They were all smiles. The room where they lived was a hive of comfort. The paintings on the wall told the same story; half naked women coyly glancing, horses leaping the waves, swans gliding down rivers of gold, big-eyed puppy dogs chewing on stolen slippers. The room was drenched in age-old colours.

Just then the television family got one too many questions wrong, and Noel's Spew Tank started to fall. It covered them in gunge, and they loved it. The audience roared their approval. The kids on the rug following suit.

And it suddenly came to me that not even I had done this before; never seen Noel, Saville, or Daniels. All this is way before my time. I'd just seen the reruns. So what was going down? And why was I going down with it?

Deja Vurt.

That's the name of the feeling you get sometimes, in Vurt, when you've done this one already, but you're in the Vurt anyway, remember? And you're thinking it's real. So a loop is made in the head, and it becomes a kind of Haunting. Memories of your previous trips start to play on the feather dreams, shifting them out of phase, like a feedback wave. Maybe this was the answer. I'm in a Vurt, getting a real cool Haunting.

"It's not a real television," Barnie said. "It's just pre-recorded tapes."

"This isn't real," I shouted. "It's just not real!"

"That's right," he answered, as though proud of it, before lifting up his arm to me, and with the other hand he peeled off a section of the flesh, showing me the workings underneath.

"This is what I am," he said.

I was looking into this hole in his skin, gazing into a pool of wet plastic; the nanogerms popping along the veins of his blood, the synthetic bones flexing as he lowered and raised his arm for me. "This is what I am," he said again, slow this time, with a hint of sadness, like he'd left something behind, something human.

Robo! Barnie was a robo. A robochef!

"Inside of here," he said, tapping his tight skull, "are all the best recipes of all the best chefs on this world. I am their depository."

As though in response to this, the young child, Crystal, ripped some flesh off the back of her neck. It was almost like she was playing, it meant that much to her.

"This is Roboville, Crew," Barnie said. "I think the pure call it Toytown, isn't that right?"

"Don't let Barnie scare you," Lucinda was saying, but it was too late for all that. I was almost retching.

The roboman took a step towards me. "Isn't it fu

"Tell me the way out of here," I asked. "Got something to do."

"Don't think that's possible," said Barnie. "Beetle's in a bad way."

"He isn't that pure," Lucinda said. Was she referring to me, or to the Beetle?

And I saw myself in a boat on the water, watching the shore, useless gun in hand, watching Tristan getting dragged down by the cops, heading for the station. Where they turn the screws on your feelings, until you can't feel any more. It wasn't a Vurt. It wasn't a dream. The world was real, and my eyes were wet from it. Oh for a little less Vaz in my life, and a touch of glue. Maybe then I could stick hold tight of somebody.

The kids were laughing out loud at the television family's misfortune and I didn't know what was real any more.

There were chains and handcuffs arranged along the walls of the bedroom. A collection of whips lay spread out on a bedside cabinet.

Beetle was strapped to the bed, with six strong tethers. He was flat on his back, and the colours were pouring out of his skin in blades of light. Seemed like half his body was taken over by now, alive with fractals.

"Scribble! My babe!" he said. "Good to see you up and about. You go