Xenoform by Mr Mike Berry Read Free Book Online Page A

people swarmed like insects beneath the towering blocks of brick and plastic. Tec pointed. Pharmacopia was just ahead and to the left, two huge bouncers like dolmens outside it. They looked more like the type to cause trouble than prevent it. A trickle of revellers were seeping in and out of the club in various states of inebriation.
    Whistler drove the van around back to the car park and stopped smoothly in a space. The other vehicles were mostly brightly coloured gravpods, some of them heavily modified into boy-racer machines. A vulgar purple ground-trike squatted in their midst like a monster. The van was like a negative image amongst these bright toys. A holo-construct in the form of a huge silver-green fish swam through the sky above the club.
    ‘Pharmacopia?’ mused Roberts, scratching his stubbled chin. ‘Why a fish?’
    ‘Beats me,’ boomed Spider, unplugging from the vehicle. ‘I’ve told the van not to kill anyone,’ he informed the others.
    ‘Good,’ replied Whistler, leaving her seat.
    ‘Fun time,’ said Sofi with all the enthusiasm of one about to undergo dental surgery.
    ‘Try to cheer the fuck up, eh?’ suggested Spider, punching her on the shoulder as she bent to open the door of the van. She kicked back at him, quite effectively for someone in her unbalanced position, not bothering to check the results, and exited the vehicle. The others disembarked after her, Spider rubbing his leg and grinning.
    The harvesters milled about for a moment, checking and stowing items of equipment. They looked like any other group of clubbers preparing to go in. A party of four – two men and two women – passed them, returning to their own vehicle. One of the men, wearing a ridiculous outfit of buckled rubber straps, sported a large, ruby red crab’s claw for a hand. His face was ugly with designer pockmarks but his scrawniness looked natural. The team watched him as inconspicuously as they could, Tec starting to roll a joint as he stood.
    ‘Nah,’ said Whistler. ‘Claw’s okay, but the rest of him doesn’t look worth much.’ There was general consensus. The four club-leavers got into their gravpod and it moved slowly away.
    ‘Come on, then,’ said Whistler and the others followed her around the side of the building towards the front.
    They approached the bouncers, Whistler at the head of the group. The two men were bent together, sharing dabs of bright blue powder out of a paper wrap. They looked up as the harvesters neared them, one of them stowing the wrap about his person again. This man, a giant with rows of chrome spikes along the backs of his arms, hands and neck, put out one hand to stop the group.
    ‘Any illegal weapons?’ he asked.
    ‘No, I’m good, thanks,’ answered Whistler brightly, sauntering right past him.
    A look of astonishment flashed across his square face and was replaced almost at once by a grim expression. One huge hand shot out to grab Whistler by her retreating shoulder. Anticipating it, she spun around, deflecting the hand in one motion, and stood staring the huge man directly in the eye – passive again, hands lowered. The bouncer’s hand returned slowly to his body and his lip curled slightly. His eyes were like storm clouds – a dark and thundery grey. His friend had one hand on a baton at his belt and was regarding Whistler with simple interest. Her posture was non-confrontational but she could see the subtle tensions in the bodies of her group as they watched. Tec’s head was glowing with a murderous deep purple.
    ‘Relax,’ she said charmingly. ‘Just stunners an’ shit.’ She was agonizingly aware of the smartgun hanging heavily in one jacket pocket, its evil little mind even now monitoring possible targets, listening for stress in voices, harbingers of violence.
    There was a moment when the possibilities seemed to hang in equilibrium. Then the bouncer nodded, Whistler smiled disarmingly, and the five harvesters passed between the doormen and into the club.