Colony Read online

  One million, three hundred and sixty thousand.

  There are lots of people round the table, now. Eddie is finding it hard to breathe. Almost as an afterthought, the croupier reaches to push out Eddie's comparatively small pile, and cocks her head, quizzically. As if it's a foregone conclusion that Eddie will let his sixty-four thousand, eight hundred winnings ride on.

  Eddie's lost, here. This is way out of his sphere. We left the land of Sensible long ago, and we're deeply into the uncharted waters of the Cape of Loonyness, now. There be sharks, here, Eddie. There be dragons.

  Oh boy.

  Could this happen? Could a thing this good happen in a life as unlucky as Eddie's? He looks around the crowd of eager faces. They all want him to bet. To win. They want a happy ending. They want to see someone beat the system.

  And if he wins, if he does win, he wins so much. He gets his life back. His insides stay inside him. His brains don't become sloppy, random graffiti on a stairwell wall.

  And if he loses...

  But that's not even worth contemplating. This is what we call 'a streak' here. For the first time ever, Eddie's on a winning streak. It may not, technically speaking, be his own winning streak, but he's hitching a ride anyway.

  He's going to do it.

  He's raising his hand and turning his head towards the Eddie lookalike, to exchange a smile of mutuality, of defiance, of confidence, when he stops. The Eddie lookalike isn't looking at him. He isn't looking at the croupier, or the table, or the wheel. He's looking at his watch, then over towards the exit. What is this? Millions, literally tens of millions at stake on this spin, and the man is bored?

  And it suddenly dawns on Eddie what's going on, here. This man doesn't care about winning or losing the odd million or two. And not because he's rich -- he's beyond rich. He's with the Project. He's a bona-fide pilgrim, and tomorrow morning, and for the rest of his life, he'll be living in a world where money doesn't matter. He'll be leaving the planet Earth, with all its concerns, all its pleasures and its pains and all its currencies behind.

  Eddie can't risk his life on that basis: gambling an insane gamble in tandem with a man who doesn't give a flying hootenanny about winning or losing. And Eddie changes the motion of his hand, beckoning for his winnings. The croupier shrugs -- what does she care? -- and sweeps Eddie's chips over to him.

  The crowd all look away from Eddie. He's embarrassed them with his cowardice. But that's all right with Eddie. That's fine with him. He scoops up his chips clumsily, cradling them between his arms and his chin. He knows the croupier's shooting him a contemptuous sneer for not slinging over a few chips to tip her. But Eddie doesn't care about that, either. Like she deliberately let him win, or something? More important to Eddie, he has to get away from the table. Quickly. Before the clattering silver ball settles.

  He must never find out where that ball winds up on this spin. Because, either way, he doesn't think his heart could take the strain.

  He turns from the table. Some chips tumble out of his clumsy grasp. He wants to leave them there, at least until this spin is spun, but he can't. He can't afford to lose any of it. He has to let every chip multiply if he's going to save his life.

  And as he's scooping up the stragglers, he hears the ball stop clattering. And there's a silence. Is this a real silence, or is it one of Eddie's perceived silences?

  It's real, all right. It's broken by the croupier's voice. Though Eddie has never noticed before -- it's been drowned out by cheering or by the tha-dump, tha-dump thudding of Eddie's blood circulating past his ears -- she always calls out the winning number and the colour of its square.

  'Thirteen, black.'

  And under the tumult that follows, Eddie tries not to do two sums, but, naturally, he fails.

  He has turned his back on over two and a quarter million, and the man who wanted to lose has just netted an eight-figure fortune in the region of forty-six million, six hundred and fifty-six thousand. Tax free.

  Eddie needs a drink. A big drink. But first, the anal accountant in him wants to tidy up his chips. He staggers over to the cash window and tips his winnings into the dip on the counter. The cashier asks him if he wants cash, but Eddie shakes his head and orders the largest chips they have.

  When he reflects on this, Eddie will come to believe he made the two biggest mistakes of his life in as many minutes.

  He collects six ten-thousand chips, four one-thousands and some change, and turns to head for the bar. In the short space of time it's taken Eddie to change his chips, a very long and unruly queue has formed behind him. Foolishly, Eddie doesn't think about why this might be, and heads for the bar.

  The bar is strangely deserted and it takes quite a while for Eddie to order his cola successfully.

  So what's the plan now? He needs one more number. One more successful bet. That's all. He sips at his soft drink, trying not to think of the bet he just didn't make. There is a furore behind him, but Eddie's wrapped up in his own little furore. He has to make that one last bet. He needs a number. He looks for a sign, but sees nothing. The bartender presents the bill. Absently, Eddie says to put it on his room. The bartender asks for his room number. Eddie says eight, eight, eight and slides over his key. And still Eddie's looking for a sign. The barkeep repeats the number. Eight, eight, eight. And Eddie wishes this guy wouldn't keep interrupting his thought train while he's looking for a sign, for some indication where he might put his money. On top of which, the over-loud tannoid is making some earsplitting announcement so a man can hardly think straight. 'That's right.' Eddie raises his voice, as close to bad-tempered as Eddie's ever been. 'Eight, eight, eight. That's what I said. That's what it says on the key fob. That would be eight, followed by another eight, followed by a third and final...'

  And Eddie's off his barstool and standing at the nearest roulette table, which is surprisingly devoid of custom. Eddie puts his chips down on the number eight.

  The croupier ignores him. He's talking to a waitress.

  Eddie coughs. 'Excuse me? Is this table closed?'

  The croupier turns and looks at Eddie's bet. 'Are you serious?'

  'Deadly serious. Sixty-four thousand, eight hundred serious.' Eddie sips his cola. He's secretly delighted to have impressed a hardnose like this croupier, who looks like he's seen a lot of serious gambling action. Eddie's definitely a hardcore gambler, now. For this one final spin, Eddie's triple X-rated.

  The croupier offers a facial shrug to the waitress, who giggles flirtatiously, and with an exaggerated flourish, he lifts the silver ball out of its housing in the middle of the wheel.

  'Any more bets?' He calls with comic theatricality, which is to say unfunnily in the grossest way.

  The waitress, astonishingly, leaps on to the table and sits with a thump that knocks Eddie's neat tower of chips over. 'Yeah,' she grins, 'I bet my ass on red.'

  Eddie tries not to be thrown by this inexplicable levity. He stacks his chips neatly again, and tries to ignore it.

  The croupier says: 'Sorry, lady, but your giant ass appears to be placed on the red and the black.'

  She giggles again. 'Whoopsy.' She shifts her buttocks, so only one cheek is on the table. 'Better?'

  'I'm afraid not, lady. It's still on the red and the black. It's also on the odd, the even and about half a dozen other numbers...'

  The croupier ducks to avoid the waitress's flung stiletto-heeled shoe. He calls: 'No more bets.'

  He spins the wheel.

  Eddie sips the cola. He'll complain about the staff later. When he's a millionaire.

  The croupier flings in the ball, with another pantomime flourish.

  This time, Eddie has no nerves. There is no feeling of suspense. No doubts. No fears. Just a certainty, a cool, unshakeable conviction that the ball will bobble into compartment number eight. Just that.

  And it does.

  Sweet as a teat.

  'Eight, black.'

  Eddie smiles a smile that qualifies as 007 wry. Superiority. Satisfaction
. Aplomb. Two million, three hundred and thirty-three thousand, give or take. He's a double and a third millionaire. He's safe. He's free. He's going to live.

  But the croupier doesn't acknowledge the win. He doesn't seem even to notice Eddie. No, instead the croupier flings his croup in the air and yells: 'The lady loses her ass to the house!' and starts advancing on the waitress with mock menace. She yelps, clambers on to her hands and knees and starts backing across the roulette table, growling. Eddie can clearly see her fine skimpy satin underpants which admirably just barely accommodate her far from giant ass. Under any other circumstances, the view would be enough to silence Eddie, to distract him completely, at least for a few moments. He certainly could use a few good images for his erotic memory library, to counterbalance some of the erection nobblers he's acquired tonight. But Eddie has won a considerable amount of money here, and this behaviour is a very long way from appropriate to the situation. This is wrong.

  Eddie says 'Excuse me' through his smile, but the croupier keeps advancing, crowing, 'That ass belongs to me, young lady. I must collect that ass.' And the waitress keeps backing off on all fours, growling and snarling, her beautiful satin-thonged derriere wiggling in Eddie's face.

  Eddie thumps the table, hard. This does get the staff's attention. 'I don't want to break anything up here, but there is the small matter of my bet.'

  The croupier looks round at the table. 'Your bet?'

  'Number eight.'

  'You won?'

  'Sixty-four thousand, eight hundred globals. All on numero eight, my friend.'

  The croupier registers the tower of chips, raises his eyebrows and nods. 'That's right. You won your bet.' There is a long and unseemly pause. A smile struggles not to cross the croupier's lips. He sniggers, then barely manages to cough out a falsetto: 'Congratulations!' before collapsing into a bizarre giggling fit. The waitress joins in.

  Eddie looks around for some kind of help. What is going on here? Did he inadvertently wander into some part of the casino reserved for the mentally derelict? His fortune, his lifeline, his very future currently lies in the hands of a maniacally giggling lunatic. This is bad. This is very, very bad. What if they cart the guy off in a straitjacket? Who's going to believe Eddie actually placed his winning bet? This is too much, too cruel.

  Eddie grabs the guy by the lapels. Not violently, that's certainly not in Eddie's nature, even under this level of provocation. He just wants the man's attention.

  'Look, you can fool around all you want to, friend, you can cash in the waitress's backside at your leisure, but first, you have to pay me my winnings.' And in case that sounded too confrontational, Eddie adds: 'Is that OK with you?'

  'Sure.' The croupier snickers and calms down. 'I'm sorry. Take it.'

  'Take it?'

  The croupier waves his hand expansively at the neat banks of chips by the wheel. 'Take it.'

  'Take my winnings? Myself? Help myself to two million, three hundred and thirty-two thousand, eight hundred globals?'

  'Whatever you want! Take it all! Think big, my friend. Take all of it.'

  Eddie's face doesn't know what to do with itself. His mouth doesn't know what word to form. It attempts a couple of vowels, but the larynx isn't co-operating. He looks from the chips to the croupier and back again. There is clearly something wrong here. Something very, very, very wrong. He looks back at the croupier and manages to verbalize a 'b' sound, which exhausts his current conversation bank.

  The croupier gently removes Eddie's hands from his waistcoat lapels. 'Didn't you hear, pilgrim? The casino's closed down. Some lucky son of a bitch won almost fifty million. Broke the bank. All bets are off.'

  Eddie's mouth attempts a few more vowels and a hard consonant or two, but his voicebox just won't join in.

  'Hey, I'm sorry. I thought you knew. Everybody else seems to know.'

  Eddie looks around. The casino certainly does have an after-the-party look about it. The staff have all loosened their ties and they're chatting in groups. The few punters still remaining are operating some tables for each other, making ludicrously large, meaningless bets.

  'OK.' Eddie gathers his wits. 'OK. So I didn't win the bet?'

  'Hey. Sorry. I thought... I mean, it was just fun. You were just having fun, right?'

  'But my stake...' Eddie struggles to keep a whimper out of his voice. 'My stake, that's still good.' And even though the croupier's shaking his head sadly, Eddie carries on. 'I can still cash in my original stake, of course. That's real money, still, is it not?'

  'There was an announcement.' The waitress is joining in now. 'Everyone must have heard the announcement.'

  Eddie sucks in his lower lip.

  'It was a very loud announcement,' the waitress adds, infected suddenly by Eddie's patent misery.

  'Sooooo.' Eddie's lips have trouble moving on from the 'o' shape. 'Thooose chips are, what? Worthless?' Eddie tries to pitch the penultimate syllable high, to induce a note of faux levity, but his mouth is too dry and his voice cracks, and his lower lip begins to quiver before he can suck it in again.

  The croupier and the waitress look away. This level of barely contained anguish is close to unwatchable.

  'But they have to pay. Don't they? I mean, there is a legal contract, here. There is a binding agreement. A tacit bargain. In law. Is there not?'

  The croupier shrugs.

  'I mean, surely... surely they should pay off the rest of us, before they pay out the full fifty million. So what if Mr Break The Bank only gets forty million and change? So what if his sky yacht has one less propeller? What about us? What about the little people?'

  The croupier sighs. 'You have to be realistic, pilgrim. Say you're a casino. What would worry you most? A lawsuit from a bunch of little people who've probably lost most of their money anyway, or a lawsuit from a multi-millionaire?'

  Eddie nods. That does make sense. That makes good business sense. That's exactly the advice Eddie would probably have given if he'd been the accountant here.

  Eddie simply stands for a while, waiting for his skin to stop buzzing, but that isn't going to happen any time soon. The croupier coughs quietly and tries to fasten up a button on his waistcoat that isn't really undone. Of all the things Eddie has to feel bad about, he begins to feel bad that he's ruining a moment of sexual excitement for these two young people. He nods, forces a truly dismal smile, and catches the word 'thanks' before it leaks inappropriately out of his mouth, managing instead to turn it into what he hopes might pass as a macho grunt of farewell, but sounds, in fact, closer to a piggy death squeal, and turns towards the exit.

  He has no idea where he can go from here. No idea what he can even try to do. He's the walking dead. He's a zombie.

  The next time he's aware of his surroundings, Eddie is at the casino door. The speakers are stuttering a very old recording, certainly pre-digital. Pre-stereo, even. The song is 'The Man Who Broke the Bank at Monte Carlo'. His eyes are smarting. He doesn't know why.

  7

  Now Eddie's on the street. He doesn't know how far from the casino. Some sound has snapped him out of his shocked state. He hears it again. That flat, unreverberating, non-movie sound of real human-on-human violence. He glances to his left. A man is on the floor, being kicked mercilessly by two other men. Eddie doesn't look up at their hair, but he does register the pink fluorescent socks swinging with businesslike regularity.

  Eddie wonders how far down the alphabet the boys are now. Still on the 'D's, possibly. If Eddie is on their list, he's probably got an hour or even two before they work their way down to the 'O's. Though, of course, some systems classify Eddie's name under 'H', in which case he's probably got considerably less time.

  He looks up at the sky, shimmering above the thermal dome. In Afortunado, it rains for seven minutes every seven hours, which the designers hoped would give a semblance of randomness. For the long-term inhabitants, the street vendors especially, it's become a sort of Chinese water torture. This doesn't look like a rain hour...
>
  Eddie snaps to towards the end of a shower. He wonders how long he's been walking. He tries to get his bearings, and spots the Hotel Felicity on the next block. He's spent an hour, maybe two, going nowhere. This is crazy, Eddie. You can't just give up. You still have time. You need a plan. You need to make something happen.

  But that's not how Eddie's life operates. Eddie doesn't make things happen. Things happen to Eddie. And now, just when he needs it most, something mercifully does happen to him.

  There's a bar, a low-rent tavern over the road. There's a neon sign over the entrance. Bizarrely, the bar appears to be called the This is Where You're Meant to Be, Eddie Inn.

  He blinks.

  That is definitely what the sign says. He looks around. Nobody else is looking at the sign. Why would they?

  Eddie crosses the road. He looks up at the neon sign again. Now it says The Loser's Blues Bar. But Eddie's past caring. He pushes open the door and steps in, anyway.

  He's in a bar. A dark bar. This is the darkest bar Eddie's ever been in. The major light source is a handful of neon alcohol brand signs over by the serving area. The dismal illumination these provide is dissipated by thick plumes of disturbingly untobaccolike smoke.

  Eddie has never walked into a drinking establishment where he felt comfortable or welcome. In Eddie's mind, the piano always stops when he enters a bar. All eyes flit in his direction, and the brains behind the eyes immediately start calculating precisely when to jump him, and just how badly damaged to leave his poor, pilfered body.

  And for once, this really is such a place. This is a dive at the bottom of all dives. A dark, impenetrable place, where dark figures plan dark deeds and perform dark acts.

  Eddie waits for his eyes to adjust to the gloom enough for him to find the damned door out of the place. He tries not to contemplate the strange noises around him: the whispers, the gruntings, the barking of mad laughter, the smashing of glass, and the inexplicable wet sounds.