100% M-Hype

The checkpoint guard didn't give the girl a second glance. Dressed in a polyester tracksuit and thongs, topped with a recycled PET beanie - the standard dress code of the modern disenfranchised - Soraya looked every bit a complete nobody. She'd even smeared dirt on her cheek for added realism. All checkpoint guy did was scan her for weapons and narcs and then she was inside. No one cared who went into Oldtown - only coming out again was restricted to citizens. She gave her Tangler a reassuring pat. It was a feminine defense product, and didn't count as a weapon.
Soraya strolled with conscious casualness down the main drag of Oldtown, keeping her wits about her. According to her GPS implant, Mary Street was approximately fifteen minutes away.

It was pretty much like she'd seen on TV: boarded up shopfronts, gutters choked with McFilth. People bundled up in layers of crappy clothes pulled ancient shopping carts containing their lives behind them. Kids threw rocks at each other. Lots of dogs. Soraya was a bit nervous about the dogs. Rabies wasn't supposed to be a problem any more but you couldn't be sure of that in a scudgy place like Oldtown. You couldn't be sure of anything. Yet here she was, seeking clues. There was one in Oldtown somewhere, Soraya was sure of it. The roadie was the biggest lead she'd ever had. Fame and fortune were within her grasp.

The fabled Triple Stack bootleg recording at the Royal Homebush Stadium was what it was all about. The ultimate performance of M-Hype™, the greatest band in the world. M-Hype™ had done three sets that night, performing all their songs in chronological order. Did a recording really exist? Nobody knew for sure. Everyone you ever met reckoned they knew someone who used to have it, or their girlfriend knew someone who used to have it, but no one had ever actually held it in their hands.

Soraya was a collector. An Uberfan. She had every saleable item the band had ever produced. All the M-Hype™ clothing, the boots, the hair accessories, the make up, the lingerie. Art, interactives, games, toys. The official M-Hype™ tattoos that you couldn't just buy. You had to earn points for those. She had the set of live action dolls that performed every track on the band's third album. Every zine, every pic. But she didn't have the Triple Stack. Not yet anyway.

Officially, there was no recording made of M-Hype™'s ultimate live concert. Chatrooms had been debating the issue for years. Dampening technology had been at its most rudimentary back in 2013, but it had been effective enough, the fields generated so powerful they used to fuck up air traffic control. There was no way a private operator could have sneaked a pirate recording, but the legend had persisted for almost 20 years. Some sites had it listed in their discographies as "Royal Homebush live 2013 (?)," but had anyone actually touched a copy? Soraya didn't think so. Still, it was important to find out the truth before she made a claim for accreditation in the Gallery of International Fandom. If the Triple Stack didn't exist then she was going to have to prove it. And prove it first. The world was full of M-Hype™ fans all hot for immortality.

According to the Central Registry records that she'd hacked, there was a resident of Oldtown called Ronnie Hogan-Smyth. Oldtown was an inner city suburb filled with Genetrash and Oldfolk. Ronnie didn't even have an e-dress or a v-phone, just a pension unit in one of those enormous suicide blocks that you could see from the train. It wasn't going to be easy to find him. Heaps of Oldfolk sublet their units out to Genetrash in exchange for narcs. Still, it was the only lead she had so it was worth a try. Ronnie Hogan-Smyth was the lynchpin in Soraya's operation. Soraya's research into early dampening technology had revealed that the only place from which it would have been possible to make the Triple Stack recording was the onstage Multiphase Feedbox . So if a recording had been made on that reportedly balmy night back in October 2013, then the band and crew would have known about it.

Soraya smiled. Old Ronnie the roadie would know the truth. As she walked she started to think a bit more about her closest rival, Skunk Murdoch. Soraya met M-Hype™ fans all the time but hardly ever any serious Gallery contenders. Skunk was different. He had the tattoos, for a start. And for seconds he claimed he'd actually seen the Triple Stack.

Not that Soraya believed him.

Mary Street. She was nearly there. A dog howled somewhere in the distance as she turned a corner. Soraya stopped and glanced upwards at the suicide blocks.
"Betcha the lifts don't work," she said out loud to herself.
"Betcha you're right," replied a quiet voice.

Soraya spun round quickly to find an old woman standing a few metres away in the shadows. Her head was covered with a ratty, fringed shawl so Soraya couldn't see her face.

"Scuse me," said Soraya. "D'you know a guy lives in there called Ronnie Hogan-Smyth?"

The old woman stood motionless.

"I know everyone lives round here," she said. "You don't live round here."

Soraya reached inside her trackie dacks pocket. "You want some chowstamps?" Still the old woman didn't move. After a long pause a withered arm extended itself from beneath the shawl. Soraya dropped a wad of coupons onto the bony palm. Fingers closed like talons and the hand withdrew.

"Block B, sixtieth floor," she croaked, "but I'd be trying Howard Park if I was you. Old Ronnie don't go up there much no more since the lifts gone bung."
Soraya attempted a polite smile as the old crone shuffled away. She checked her GPS. Howard Park was seven blocks south. Somewhere in the distance she thought she heard a siren.

She headed off quickly in the direction of the park, her eyes scanning the crumbling buildings for signs of movement. So far so good. Hopefully her luck would hold. Soraya felt the pressure of unseen observers hiding in the doorways. She saw a couple of kids playing in an alleyway but they bolted as she approached. Her palm curled around the Tangler. Nasty place this Oldtown. Still, it would all be worth it if she could find the roadie.

She could smell the park before she could see it properly, a mix of urine and paint stripper wafting on the afternoon breeze. Dark hulking trees stood sentinel above an amorphous shanty of cardboard boxes and awnings crudely fashioned from sheets of dirty plastic and anything else that had come to hand. The park was full of old men dressed in rags, swaying slightly on unsteady legs, all eyes fixed on Soraya as she approached the gate. She stopped and stared back at them. She knew she couldn't possibly go in there and hope to come out the other side in one piece, Triple Stack or no Triple Stack.

"Ya lookin for ya Dad?"

Soraya turned her head, startled. Nobody. Just the empty street with its scattering of plastic bags being tousled by the wind. She felt a sudden tug on her clothing and looked down to find an emaciated Aboriginal girl of about six years old yanking on her trackie dacks.

Soraya lowered herself to one knee to meet the little girl eye to eye. "What's your name?"

The girl didn't answer. She let go of Soraya's leg and scampered for an open doorway about thirty metres back down the street. Soraya glanced toward Howard Park. Forty-odd pairs of red-rimmed eyes stared back at her hungrily. She looked to the doorway where the little girl had vanished, then approached it cautiously.

"Hey… you there… I'm not going to hurt you."

The door was open but she knocked anyway. Peering inside, she discovered an empty room illuminated by a naked globe that dangled from the ceiling. She knocked again and entered, one hand on her Tangler, calling out a nervous greeting.
At the back of the room was another doorway, this one hung with a grimy beaded curtain. Cautiously she pushed the plastic strands aside and stepped through. She faced a group of girls ranging in age from the six year old to teens. All of them were dark skinned and all of them carried weapons, a mix of firearms and knives - even the littlest one.

Soraya raised her hands.

"Sorry girls. Didn't mean to interrupt."

One of the older girls motioned for her to drop her hands.

"You lookin for someone, Sista?"

Soraya nodded. The girl nodded back.

"Looking for your Papa maybe?"

Soraya shook her head. "Na," she said. "Just this old roadie guy."

"Whatcha got in them pockets?"

Soraya shrugged. "Chowstamps?" she said hopefully.

The girls smirked, the littlest one giggling before burying her face in the lap of an older kid.

"Here's the deal. We find your old man and get you back to the citizen gate, then you give us all your stuff. Yo?"

Soraya shifted her weight from left foot to right. "Why should I trust you? Why wouldn't you just jump me and take it all anyway?"

The older girl rolled her eyes. "Because Sista, we want ALL your stuff. Pheromone pin codes as well as the hardware. Everything you got 'cept for the trackie dacks and thongs. Got it?"

Soraya thought it over for a moment and then agreed. The older girl clapped her hands. Within minutes a pot was bubbling on a crusty old stove. Spears were produced, their blades dipped into the thick, mysterious liquid.

"Don't touch anything," said the older girl. "This stuff'll kill ya."

While they waited for the poison to thicken, Soraya told the girls what she knew about Ronnie the roadie, and how important it was to record his testimonial about the Triple Stack. The older girl, Ruby, listened passively but her eyes widened when Soraya brought out the microdisc recorder to show them.

"I get to keep one disc and I gotta pay the roadie," Soraya warned. "Everything else's yours."

Ruby nodded distractedly, her eyes shining.

The old men in the park seemed scared of Ruby and her girls, or perhaps the poison-tipped spears they were carrying. The girls and Soraya entered the shanty park together in a phalanx, spears pointing outwards. Some of the men growled obscenities and a couple of them spat, but no one actually accosted the group. None of the girls seemed in the least bit frightened. This was a business transaction to them, that was all.

Ruby seemed to know a lot of the men in the park. Soraya heard the roadie's name muttered several times: Ronnie Hogan-Smyth, Old Ronnie, Ronnie the King. Finally, after what seemed like hours, the gang came to a halt outside a tent made of real canvas.

"Bigfella this Ronnie bloke o' yours," said Ruby, handing her a spear. "Careful where you point this thing. We wait here."

Soraya took a deep breath and activated the recorder. Grasping the spear in her right hand, she ducked to enter the tent.

Inside, the air hung thick with sweet, pungent smoke, that made Soraya cough. At the far end sat King Ronnie on his throne. The walls were lined with wizened, bearded men, all sitting cross-legged, listening as the big man spun tales from the good old days. A bong passed from hand to hand. Candlelight flickered, illuminating craggy faces and casting drastic shadows across the tent's taut canvas walls.

Soraya approached the throne, spear point hovering. King Ronnie hadn't noticed her yet. He paused mid-anecdote to pull on the bong. Soraya arrived at the foot of his throne just as he exhaled a thick plume of scented smoke. She glanced around the room in awe. It was like stepping into a history vid. So many of the faces were half familiar. Vintage musos, roadies, publicists and journos, all old men now but still proudly bearing their mullets and tour jackets as if they'd stepped down from the stage just yesterday. King Ronnie's mullet was the proudest she'd ever seen, feathered on top and flowing way down past his shoulders to melt into the shadows at his feet. Conversation drained away as King Ronnie acknowledged her approach.

"Come here, my child," he said in a rich basso voice as he beckoned her to his side. She stepped up to the throne, spear point lowered to the dirt.

"Tell me about the Triple Stack," she said.

The tent's interior was silent now. King Ronnie raised an eyebrow.

"Homebush, October, back in 13. You know what I'm talking about, old man…"
Soraya felt the little hairs on the back of her neck begin to prickle. At the farthest reaches of the tent a murmur had begun. It grew louder and louder, and just when Soraya felt that her life might actually be in danger, King Ronnie raised his hand and the tent fell silent again. The King's eyes glistened wickedly in the candlelight.

"Speak, my child," he said.

Soraya took a deep breath.

"I need to know if the Triple Stack really exists," she whispered.

King Ronnie began a low chuckle. "Of course it exists," he said. "I recorded it myself!"

The tent was filled with astonished gasps. "Do you still have it?" Soraya asked, her eyes gleaming. The tent was silent again. King Ronnie shuffled in his throne, running his fingers through his magnificent salt and pepper ape drape before responding.

"After the concert there were three platinum Triple Stack discs etched, one for each band member. It was Hype's idea. The boys were getting tired of touring. He could tell the writing was on the wall."

Soraya nodded, licking her lips. "Three, you say." Her heart raced. Three Triple Stacks meant three chances at winning a place in the Gallery. King Ronnie beheld her shining eyes and read her mind.

"Don't waste your precious youth on such a futile quest," he said softly. "The Stacks exist, yeah, but the boys took them all away when they retired to their private islands. Not for the likes of mere mortals such as you and I, little girl, not those Stacks."

But Soraya stood tall, stabbing the hilt of her spear into the earth.

"We'll see about that," she said.

She didn't need Ruby's girls to escort her out of Howard Park. The sea of ragged old men parted as she exited King Ronnie's tent. But a deal was a deal, so they took her all the way to the citizen gate. Soraya turned to thank them all and emptied out her pockets. When she'd given them everything she had and reprogrammed all the pheromone PINS, she extended her hand to Ruby.

"It's been real," she said.

But Ruby shook her head. "We said everything," she said, drawing a knife from her belt. Soraya raised her hands, exasperated.

"You've got it all, girlfriend!"

Ruby's knife blade glinted in the afternoon sunlight.

"I don't got your GPS…"

Soraya slapped her hand over the GPS implant protectively. "You can't be serious! It's an implant for fuck's sake…"

Ruby cocked her head to one side. "Sorry, Sista, but everything's everything."
Instinctively Soraya reached for the Tangler, forgetting that she'd handed it over to the gang already. One of the girls was pointing it directly at her. Soraya raised her hands and started backing away slowly in the direction of the gate.

"Won't hurt that bad," said Ruby. "Gatekeeper'll call you an ambo…"

Soraya opened her mouth to protest when a sound like a whipcrack split the air. She panicked and looked down at her torso but there was no blood. One of the girls collapsed to the ground, her forehead pierced with a tiny red dot.

"Gimme that disc or I'll blow yer head off…"

Skunk Murdoch emerged swiftly from a derelict building, brandishing a laser, its red targeting beam now trained on Soraya's forehead. The girls bolted, scattering in all directions, abandoning the body of their sister where it fell.

"And what disc would that be?" shouted Soraya, hands raised above her head.
"Don't fuck with me," sneered Skunk. "Gimme the Stack or you're fried."

Soraya widened her eyes theatrically.

"You got it all wrong, my friend…"

Skunk came in closer, circling her, weapon hand held steady. Soraya glanced at the Gatekeeper but he was minding his own business. Ruby and the girls had long gone.
Skunk smirked. "There's no one gives a rat's tit, girl, so you'd better just hand it over and then we can blow this sewer."

"But I don't have it," she protested.

Skunk laughed nastily and recalibrated his aim. "I'm counting backwards… five… four… three…"

There was a sudden swooshing sound and Skunk stopped counting. Instead he screamed, thrashing violently as silvery mesh fired from Soraya's Tangler entangled his body. Neither he nor Soraya had noticed one of Ruby's girls creep in close enough to use the device.

"Fuck off, Sista," echoed Ruby's voice. Soraya didn't wait around to find out what was going to happen to Skunk Murdoch. She ran for the gate, spat on the DNA screen in front of the guard's booth, and moments later was out of Oldtown and back in the more familiar world again.

DISC 1

Guitarist Lucky Lopez surfaced roughly a year after Soraya's meeting with King Ronnie. He wasn't calling himself Lucky any more, just Lopez, but it was definitely the same guy. He didn't look so lucky any more either: wan and pallid, never seen without his v-shades. Permanent body tremors. Some celebrity memezine said he'd suffered two failed pancreas transplants and that his eyes had rotted away from the side affects of anti-rejection therapy - thus the v-shades - but those zines said any old thing they liked, seeing as no one could ever trace the source.

First he was spotted in Bermuda judging a Miss Pre-teen Sex Kitten pageant. Next time it was at a Kiribati health resort. The time after that the Orbital Moulin Rouge. Soraya kept careful tabs on Lopez via scores of pirate satellite nodes, feeding all his movements into probability generators to locate his island. By the time she finally found it she was way too late. Someone else had beat her to it, killing Lucky Lopez in cold blood. Did they ace him for his Stack? That was the real question. Soraya held her breath for days waiting for an announcement, but the place in the Gallery of International Fandom remained vacant. Further investigation revealed that Lucky Lopez hadn't taken his Stack with him to the grave, so after a while she gave up on it and turned her attention to the other two.

DISC 2

Chug Denver Steele had never left the public eye. When M-Hype™ folded he played with a succession of other bands, as drummers do, and then he entered politics. He talked quite openly about the Triple Stack after Lopez died. Soraya heard him speaking at a public rally in Copenhagen, extolling the evils of iconography, saying that the modern world placed too much value on material possessions. Soraya stalked Chug for months on end. He had an island, of course, but he never went there. She learnt that his Triple Stack most likely resided in a bank vault somewhere. That was tough news, but until she had proof she decided that she might as well keep right on stalking. She joined his Party and became a tireless campaign volunteer.

Chug's ambition was to ban the depiction of objet d'art from public billboards. Chug said billboards encouraged avarice, envy and theft among the lower end consumers. Soraya was kind of getting into the vibe of it all when Chug's life ended abruptly, a sniper's beam between the eyes at a showroom demolition. Poor Chug. No mention of the Triple Stack in the media afterwards when his body was laid to rest. No Gallery contender appearing out of nowhere, triumphantly clutching a disc. Soraya was back to square one.

There was only Hype's Stack left.

DISC 3

Sunlight dazzled as her first footprint sank into the diamond-coloured sands of Harmony Beach. All roads led to this perfect place - somehow she'd known that in her heart when she first set out upon her quest so many years ago. Hype's private island was still and quiet. Soraya closed her eyes and heard nothing but the swishing of palm fronds and the gentle lull of ocean kissing sand.

Unearthing the whereabouts of Lucky Lopez and Chug Denver Steele had been child's play compared to the years it had taken her to find Armando Hype's hideaway. Hype owned lots of islands. A couple of franchise States, lots of mansions, ex-wives and children all over the place. No one had seen him in the flesh for a long time. Some even said he was dead. But he wasn't dead - he was right here on Harmony Beach. Soraya was sure of that.

The island had satellite security protection and it didn't appear on modern navigational charts, but Soraya had got lucky last August in a bar at Port Moresby. Pirate treasure the old fart had slurred when he'd sold her a map so ancient it was printed on paper. Hype's great grandaddy had been a village chief, and Harmony Beach was a tourist resort till cyclone Kylie sucked all the buros out to sea back in 2010. And after that? Well, there was no such place as Harmony Beach any more. That's why Hype's most private island had never shown up on FOI databases.
How many blood sacrifices had fallen at the feet of her destiny? She'd given up counting after the failed raid on the sarcophagus of lead guitarist Lucky Lopez back in 2040. Six fans had been entombed trying to get to Lucky's Triple Stack. Soraya had been lucky that time. All she'd lost was a finger.

She'd understood then that Hype's Triple Stack was the one with her name on it. She'd felt the Stack calling to her through space and time, drawing her here to this place.
She loosened the fit on her stealthsuit and walked along the beach. She was armed, of course, but there really was no need. Why bother protecting an island that didn't exist?

Hype's home was a museum, a monument to his greatness. Two automaids ignored her, busy with the polishing of marble statues as she walked right in through Hype's front door. She wandered languidly from room to room eyeballing every item closely, finding shelf loads of golden discs, but not one of them the Stack.

Hype was obviously the kind of guy who liked to commemorate every significant moment. There was no real furniture in this place, just rows and rows of climate-controlled souvenir cabinets stretching from floor to ceiling. Soraya paused to consider. The Stack had to be here somewhere. Everything else of his was here, from his bronzed baby booties to a jar of his used condoms. Shirts he used to wear had been encased in glass, with holograms of him wearing them. Everything perfectly preserved. She turned a corner and discovered a trophy cabinet so immense that at first she mistook it for a support wall.

Soraya placed her hand on the glass then withdrew it again quickly. This cabinet was freezing. The glass was thick and opaque. What sort of a display cabinet has glass you couldn't see through? She looked around the edges for controls, finding only a big blue button. She pressed it and the glass became see-through.

Soraya gasped and held in her breath. The media had lied. Lucky Lopez wasn't in that sarcophagus at all - he was right here in Armando Hype's trophy cabinet, propped up like a doll in a box. Chug Denver Steele was frozen by his side. A glint of frosty gold caught her eye, and she remembered to breathe normally again. Both dead men wore ropes of gold around their necks. Dangling from the ropes were two of the three Triple Stacks.

Soraya forgot all about the cold as she pressed her nose up against the glass. So beautiful. A silvery tear slithered down her cheek. The two dead guys were draped in leopard skin robes. No need to wonder what the extra space up the far end of the cabinet was for.

Suddenly the lights went out. Soraya turned to see a dark mass filling the doorway, blocking out all the sunlight. She couldn't make out any details except for a shimmy of golden light reflecting from the shadow's chest. The third Stack. Armando Hype. It had to be.

Daylight returned as Hype strode into the room - three hundred kilos of quivering flesh enveloped in a paisley sarong. Rubbery lips parted, emitting a kind of lowing sound. Soraya couldn't make out what he was saying.

She stared at him for a moment, stunned. What a monster! She stared at him some more, turned her head to stare at the dead guys in the cabinet, then stared at Hype again and crossed her arms.

"What the hell happened to the greatest band in the world?" she snarled.
God, he was revolting. And to think that she used to play out interactive fantasies, fucking him on stage in front of a roaring crowd. He'd been the world's primo singer once, now he couldn't even speak properly.

"Gimme the fucking Stack or I'll blow your head off." She slipped her hand into her stealthsuit and brought out a laser, aiming it squarely at his gargantuan heaving chest.

Hype growled, spraying spittle. He lunged at her suddenly, catching her off guard. She managed to jump clear of his grabbing hands.
"For fuck's sake - I'm your number one fan," Soraya chided him sarcastically. "How 'bout some respect!"

Hype, unbalanced but not toppled by his exertions, steadied himself and lumbered around to face her. His eyes widened, pinprick pupils darting here and there as he tried to determine what was going on.

"Gimme the Stack, Armando, you big fat dog turd," Soraya growled.

A squirt of spittle escaped his lips, running a rivulet down his chin.
"Nuh," he said. "Gonna m- m- make me?"

Suddenly Armando Hype lunged forward, knocking her to the ground. Soraya fired her weapon, missing his body but shattering a glass cabinet near the door. She squealed in horror as Hype lost his balance, and his gargantuan bulk toppled forward, landing on top of her, pinning her to the floor.

"Get offa me, you freak!," she screamed. Rubbery fingers pawed her stealthsuit. He was searching for something. Her gun. He shifted his weight momentarily, scrabbling for her wrist. She grabbed a handful of corpulent flesh and dug her nails in hard. He didn't seem to feel it, but Soraya felt his bulk shift again, and used the moment to squeeze free. All of her, except for the gun, which Hype was now gripping tightly. She let go, jumping clear just as he took aim, blasting a smoking hole in another of his precious display cabinets. Soraya crawled behind a bronze statue as the smoke dissipated. She was never going to make it through the door. There had to be another way out.

There was. A staircase. As Hype lumbered to his feet, Soraya made a break for it. She squealed as a laser blast demolished a banister, missing her arm by a fraction. She ascended the stairs on all fours, not daring to pause and look back over her shoulder. Fortunately Hype didn't seem to be a very good shot. Shards of crystal rained down as he missed again, obliterating a series of chandeliers.

Soraya made for the first open doorway. Inside, the room was filled with hundreds of guitars, displayed neatly in rows on stands. There was no time to think. Soraya grabbed the nearest one. Gripping its neck tightly with both hands, she raised it above her head and stood to one side of the entranceway. She could hear Hype approaching, crystal crunching beneath his feet on the stairs. He was shouting too. Something loud and angry and incomprehensible. Soraya decided not to wait until he entered the room. She leapt out into the corridor, swinging the guitar like an axe.

"Arghh!" she cried, bashing Hype on the head with all her strength. Hype fell backwards, rolling down the stairs like a bloodied, blubbery snowball. He landed in a crumpled heap, but he still had the gun, and was managing to hold it steady and aim it in her direction. Soraya let out another battle whoop, raising the guitar above her head again as she leapt down the staircase. She brought it crashing down upon his head again and again and again until finally he was still, the gun clattering uselessly to the floor.

Grinning girlishly, she picked it up and tucked it back in her suit. She stepped over to the quivering corpse, yanking the golden rope from around its neck and held it up before her eyes. Sunlight sparkle off the Stack's smooth surface. So pretty. So fucking pretty. Now she was going to be famous. All her dreams had come true.

She was about to hang the disc around her own neck when suddenly she had a better idea. Somewhere in this museum/mausoleum there would have to be a player. Before she went on, she had to relive the passion.

Sure enough Hype kept a cabinet full of musical equipment. Amongst all the other junk was a disc player and some bubble phones. Soraya took the equipment out onto the porch, sat down on a wooden step, set the b-phones for a five metre aura, and spun the disc.

It was crap.

'100% M-Hype' was published in Passing Strange, MirrorDanse 2002

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