‘What, here, in the chicken poo?’
‘Quite so – they are rather messy, aren’t they? But they do call the shots, as it were, so who are we to complain?’
‘I’ll just stand then,’ said Eddie.
‘You do that, good fellow.’
And so Eddie stood. ‘And while I’m standing,’ he said, ‘perhaps,’ and now he shouted. Loudly. ‘Perhaps you can tell me what in the name of any of the Gods is going on here?’
‘Quietly, please.’ The other Eddie put his paws to his ears. ‘It’s a quite simple matter. And I am certain that an intelligent bear such as yourself, one skilled in the art of detection, has, as these Americans would say, figured it all out by now.’
‘Are you in charge here?’ Eddie asked. ‘Are you the one in control?’
The other Eddie inclined his head. ‘I’m in charge,’ he said.
‘And there’s only the one of you? Not more than one, no other copies?’
‘Just me,’ said the other Eddie. ‘Just me, just you.’
‘And so you are the murderer,’ said Eddie. ‘The one who murdered the clockwork monkeys, and then the band at Old King Cole’s, and then the orchestra at the Opera House. I saw you there.’
‘And I saw you, and I applauded your enterprise, risking all to enter this world. Very brave. Very foolish, but very brave all the same.’
Eddie Bear made a puzzled face. ‘Why did you do it?’ he asked. ‘Murder your own kind? To reproduce them as free giveaways to sell chicken? It doesn’t make any sense.’
The other Eddie laughed. ‘You call it murder,’ he said, ‘but here we call it franchising. Your kind are not my kind, Eddie. I am not of your world. Your world is very special. To those in this world it is a land of dreams, of make-believe, where toys live and have adventures. A world of fantasy.’
‘It’s real enough for me,’ said Eddie Bear.
‘But it’s a mess. Every world is a mess, every world needs organisation.’
‘This one certainly does.’
‘Which is why we are organising it. Let’s face it, you tried to organise yours, didn’t you? When you were mayor of Toy City?’
‘Ah,’ said Eddie, ‘that. Well, that didn’t go quite as well as it might have.’
‘But you tried your best and we observed your progress. You tried your best but it just didn’t work. And so we decided that the best thing to do would be to wipe the slate clean, as it were. Out with the old and in with the new, as it were. Take the best bits out of the old, employ them in this world. Then do away with the worst.’
‘I don’t know what you’re talking about,’ said Eddie, ‘but I know I don’t like it, whatever it is.’
‘I’ll explain everything,’ said the other Eddie. ‘And then you can make your comments. Ah, here comes Jack with the beer.’
Jack entered bearing beers. He gave one to Eddie and Eddie took it between his paws and gave it a big swig.
‘I spat in it,’ said the other Jack.
And Eddie spat out his swig.
‘That wasn’t very nice,’ said the other Eddie, accepting his beer.
‘I know,’ said the other Jack, ‘but it made me laugh. Cheers!’ and he raised his bottle.
‘Cheers,’ said the other Eddie. ‘Oh and by the way, I saw a little light twinkling on my desk a while ago. It would seem that someone has penetrated the outer perimeter.’
‘That’s right,’ said the other Jack. ‘His friend,’ and he cast a thumb in Eddie’s direction.
‘My Jack?’ said Eddie.
‘Your Jack,’ said the other Jack, ‘smashed through the gates in a stolen police car, in the company of some young woman, and entered the bunker using the guard’s security pass key card.’
‘Most enterprising,’ said the other Eddie. ‘And where are he and the young woman now?’
‘In the elevator, on their way down.’
‘Really?’ said the other Eddie. ‘Well, we can’t have that, can we?’
And he reached out a paw and pressed it down on a button on his desk.
And in the elevator all the lights went out.
‘Oh dear,’ said Jack. ‘I don’t like this.’
And then the elevator juddered.
And then it began to fall.
And Jack in the darkness went, ‘Oh dear me.’
And the elevator plunged.
22
Down went the elevator, down and down. Down and down in the dark. And up rushed the ground, it seemed, in the dark. Up and up and up.
And then there was a sickening sound that echoed all around and about.
Eddie heard something and felt something, too.
‘What did you do?’ he asked.
‘Nothing to concern yourself with,’ replied his other self, taking up his beer between his paws and draining much of it away. ‘These paws are a real pain at times, aren’t they? No opposable thumbs—’
‘I had hands with those once,’ said Eddie sadly. ‘But tell me, what did you do?’
‘Just switched off the elevator. Don’t go getting yourself upset.’
Eddie rocked gently upon his paw pads. He felt upset, he felt unsettled, he felt altogether wrong.
‘You look a little shaky,’ said his other self. ‘But never mind, it will pass. Everything will pass. But it is a great shame about the hands. They were very nice hands you had. I can’t understand why everyone thought them so creepy.’
‘What?’ went Eddie, raising a now droopy head. ‘How did you know about me having hands? I don’t understand.’
‘I know all about you,’ said his other self. ‘It is my job to know all about you. Learn every subtle nuance, as it were. Be you, in fact. I told you, we kept a careful eye on you when you were mayor.’
‘I’ll tell you what,’ said Eddie Bear, ‘I really hate sighing, you know. Sighing gets me down. I have a normally cheerful disposition, but once in a while I really feel the need for a sigh. And this is one of those times.’ And so Eddie sighed. And a deep and heartfelt sigh it was, and it set the other Jack laughing.
‘And so why sigh you, Eddie Bear?’ asked his other self.
‘Because,’ said Eddie, ‘I don’t understand. I consider myself to be more than competent when it comes to the matter of private detective work. I pride myself upon my competence. But for the life that is in me, I do not understand what is going on around here. I don’t understand why you’ve done what you’ve done, what you intend to do next, nor why you look just like me, and why this gormster –’ Eddie gestured towards the other Jack ‘– looks like my best friend Jack.’
‘And so you would like a full and thorough explanation, couched in terms readily understandable to even the simplest soul?’
Eddie sighed once more. ‘Please feel free to be condescending,’ he said. ‘I’ve never been very good with subtle.’
‘Nice touch of irony.’ Eddie’s other self finished his beer and set his bottle aside. ‘All right, it is only fair. I will tell you all. Jack, you may leave us now.’
‘Oh, I don’t think so.’
‘I think so, Jack. Take your leave at once.’
‘But he’ll go for you, sir – he’s a vicious little bastard.’
‘Language,’ said Eddie’s other self. ‘Eddie needs to know and it is right that he should know. Bears have a code of honour, don’t they, Eddie?’
‘Noted for it,’ said Eddie. ‘Along with their sexual prowess. And their bravery, of course. Bears are as noble as. Everyone knows that.’
‘And so if I ask you to swear upon all that means anything to you that you will make no attempt to harm me during the time that I am explaining everything to you, I can rely on you to honour this oath?’
‘Absolutely,’ said Eddie Bear.
‘Because you see, Jack,’ said the other Eddie, ‘bears can’t cross their fingers behind their backs, so when they swear they have to stick to what they’ve sworn.’
The other Jack made non-committal sounds.
‘S
o clear off,’ the other Eddie told him.
And, grumbling somewhat, that is what he did.
‘Care to take a little trip?’ asked Eddie’s other self.
Eddie Bear did shruggings. ‘Is my Jack all right?’ he asked.
‘Don’t worry about your Jack. Would you care to take a little trip?’
‘It depends where to.’
‘I could just kill you,’ said Eddie’s other self.
‘I’d love to take a little trip,’ said Eddie. ‘Teddy bears’ picnic, is it?’
‘In a manner of speaking. Step a little closer to the desk, that’s it. Now, let me join you.’ And Eddie and his other self now stood next to each other. ‘And if I just press this.’
And then.
The horrible chicken-poo-carpeted floor fell away.
Eddie and his other self hovered in the air, borne by a silver disc that, it seemed, shunned the force of gravity.
And this disc, with these two standing upon it, slowly drifted downwards.
Eddie peered fearfully over the rim of the disc. ‘What is happening here?’ he asked in a rather shaky voice.
‘Fear not, my friend, fear not. I am going to take you on a tour of this establishment. You will see how everything works and why it does. We shall chat along the way.’
‘Hm,’ went Eddie. And that was all.
And the slim disc drifted down.
‘The technology that drives this,’ explained the other Eddie, ‘is years ahead, centuries ahead, of the technology that exists upon this particular world. And the denizens of this particular world will never catch up with such technology. That will not be allowed to happen.’
‘The chickens from space,’ said Eddie Bear.
‘Well, hardly from space, but in a way you’re right. There are many, many worlds, Eddie Bear, many, many inhabited worlds. But they are not out in space somewhere. They are all here, all next to each other, as the world of Toy City is next to the world of Hollywood, separated by a curtain, as it were, that only those in the know are capable of penetrating.’
The flying disc dropped low now, over a vast industrial complex, great machines attended to by many, many workers.
‘And what is this?’ asked Eddie.
‘Chicken production,’ his other self explained. ‘Human-kind has this thing about eating chickens. But as logic would dictate to anyone who sat down and thought about it for five minutes, it is simply impossible to produce the vast quantity of chickens required for human consumption every day. It would require chicken-breeding farms covering approximately a quarter of this world’s surface. So all the chickens that are eaten in the USA are produced here. They are artificial, Eddie, cloned from a single chicken. The pilot of a chicken scout ship that crashed here ten years ago. Soulless clones – they are not real chickens.’
‘From space?’
‘No, not from space. Do try to pay attention. Recall if you will the various religions that predominate in Toy City. You have The Church of Mechanology, followed by clockwork toys who believe that the universe is powered by a clockwork motor. The cult of Big Box Fella, He Come, a Jack-in-the-Box cult that believes that the universe is a big box containing numerous other boxes. There is more than a hint of truth to their beliefs. But what I am saying is this: all these religions have a tiny piece of the cosmic jigsaw puzzle. The chickens just happen to have a far larger piece.’
‘Yes, well,’ said Eddie, ‘everyone is entitled to believe whatever they want to believe, in my opinion, as long as it causes no hurt to others. I happen to be an elder in an exclusive teddy bear sect, The Midnight Growlers.’
‘You are its one and only member,’ said the other Eddie as the flying disc flew on over the seemingly endless faux-chicken production plant. ‘My point is this. All religions are correct in one or other respect. All religions possess a little part of the whole. The followers of Big Box Fella are about the closest. All life in the entire Universe exists right here, upon this planet. But this planet is not, as such, a planet. It is the centre of everything. The centre of production, as it were. There are countless worlds, all next to each other, each unaware of the existence of the world next door. Sometimes beings from one world become capable of penetrating to the world next door. And do you know what happens when they do?’
‘Bad things,’ said Eddie. ‘That would be my guess.’
‘Well, there have been some bad things, I grant you. But I will tell you what the beings from the world next door discover when they enter a new world. They discover that, but for a few subtle differences of belief and appearance, things are exactly the same. There are the many who toil and the privileged few who control their toiling and profit from their toil. This is a universal truth.’
‘And so you and whoever or whatever you represent are going to do something about this injustice?’ asked Eddie.
‘You are seeking to be ironic, I suppose?’
‘Very much so,’ said Eddie.
‘And not without good cause. It is not possible to change the status quo with anything less than force of arms. You tried, Eddie, when you were mayor. You tried to put your world to rights. And what came of your good intentions?’
‘Bad things,’ said Eddie, sadly. ‘Hence the loss of my hands.’
‘Exactly. You tried, but you failed. But it was the fact that you were trying that drew our attention to you. One of our craft penetrated the world Beyond The Second Big O. To your side of it. And we observed your efforts. And we thought to ourselves, things could work out in this world. Things could be better. And so I was created, to replace you, so that smoothly and without incident I could be substituted for you and run your world for our own ends.’
‘You thorough-going swine,’ said Eddie. ‘And I mean that offensively, as some of my best friends are pigs.’
‘But after all the effort of creating the perfect facsimile of you, what happened? As I was on the point of eliminating you in order to take your place, you made such a foul-up of being mayor, because in your naivety you thought that things could be changed in a nice way, that you were kicked out of office. Leaving me redundant.’
‘Poor old you,’ said Eddie.
‘It was touch and go,’ said his other self. ‘They were all for melting me down, me and the Jack they’d created to substitute for your Jack. But I had a plan.’
‘I often have a plan,’ said Eddie, sadly.
‘Of course you do, which is one of the things I like about you – we have so much in common.’ And the other Eddie patted Eddie on the shoulder.
And Eddie considered just how easy it would be to push him right off the flying disc.
But then there just might be a problem getting off that disc himself.
And there was the matter of the bears’ code of honour.
‘So I came up with this plan,’ said Eddie’s other self. ‘Why not clear out Toy City? It could become a decent environment, with a lick of paint and a bit of rebuilding. And what with the ever-expanding population of Chicken World—’
‘Chicken World?’ said Eddie. ‘There really is a Chicken World?’
‘Of course. And one with no natural predators. And you would be surprised at just how many chickens a single rooster can, how shall I put this, “get through” in a single day. The chickens are looking to expand – to your world, to this one. Once all the indigenous inhabitants have been, how shall I put this?’
‘Murdered?’ Eddie suggested.
‘That’s probably the word. Or at least subdued. So I took an overview of the denizens of Toy City. In this world, the young, and indeed the old, just love toys. Especially special toys. Collectables. They just love them. And so, I thought, why not have the toys of Toy City work for us, to aid us in our plans for expansion.’
‘You sick, and how shall I put this? Bastards!’ said Eddie.
‘Tut, tut, tut. It’s business – and survival, of course. Imagine, if you will, travelling to another world and discovering that its inhabitants feasted upon your kind. B
red them, slaughtered them and ate them. That is what the pilots of the first chicken craft, the one that crashed here in the desert near Roswell in nineteen forty-seven, discovered. One lone survivor was brought here to this establishment. Happily he was able to communicate, to make deals in order to ensure his survival. And when he offered an alternative to all the eating of his own kind that went on here, by demonstrating that it was possible, using advanced chicken technology, to mass-produce ersatz chickens and eggs at a fraction of the cost of real ones, the humans went for it. Fools that they are. And there you have it.’
‘No,’ said Eddie. ‘That’s not fair. I assume that you intend to have me killed. Am I correct in this assumption?’
The other Eddie shook his head.
‘No?’ said Eddie Bear.
‘No,’ said his other self. ‘You will die – and shortly, too – but not at my hands. Your kind cannot survive in this world. There is a certain, how shall I put this, magic to your kind. We remain unable to discover just how the kindly, lovable white-haired old Toymaker imbues toys with life. But toys cannot live here. Surely you noticed when you arrived here – your companion’s watch ceased to work, then his weaponry.’
‘You saw that?’
‘We see all. Remember, you and Jack were abducted and implanted with homing beacons up your bums. We’ve known where you were from the start. Jack’s watch soon failed, then his weaponry and then that calculating pocket of his—’
‘Wallah,’ said Eddie. ‘He nicked it from Tinto. I should have known. That’s how he figured out about the Opera House.’
‘Wallah is dead and you will soon die,’ said the other Eddie. ‘Sad but true. So I suppose it will do no harm to explain the rest. By channelling the very essence, the very soul-stuff of those toys, the monkeys, the band, the orchestra, and soon all of your kind, by drawing out their essence and funnelling it into free giveaways to promote the sale of our special chicken, we eliminate all competition. No real chickens will be eaten on this world again. And within one year, after the release of the movie, when the Golden Chicken chain goes global and every chicken that is eaten is one of our special chickens, this world will be ours.’