Medusa Frequency

21 The Seeker from Nexo Vollma

The hospital, having brought me a cup of tea at six o’clock every morning, electrocardiogrammed me, X-rayed me, tested my blood and urine, confirmed Dr Carnevale’s diagnosis of angina, advised me to avoid fats and cholesterol and take moderate exercise and lose weight, gave me a little bottle of glyceryl trinitrate tablets, and put me out on the street again. And there I was as before with Hilary Forthryte waiting for my call and the current account dead on the floor.

Quickly I went to the word machine, booted the system master and the word-processing programme, and typed:

Hello, hello. Is anybody there?

WHOM DID YOU WANT?

Well, I thought maybe Medusa.

THIS IS MEDUSA SPEAKING.

Do you remember what you said to me?

WE HAVEN’T HAD A TEN O’CLOCK URINE SPECIMEN FROM YOU.

No, before that, when you spoke above the pinky dawn water between the beach and the Island Tamaraca.

THAT WAS A MYSTERY.

I know, but couldn’t we talk about it a little?

NOT NOW.

OK, I said. Sorry I bothered you. I blew some of the dustballs off my desk, emptied the wastebasket, put on a Greek tape, shook some dandruff over the keyboard, stared at the screen, and began to fall asleep. ‘No,’ I said, ‘that’s not the way to do it.’ I got a videotape from the shelf, it was a BBC documentary about a wedding in Calabria and I was remembering the father of the bride. I ran it fast forward to the part I wanted: there it was just before the end, there was the father, a thin man in shirtsleeves. Setting up his daughter in married life had cost twenty thousand pounds, each of the two families bearing half the cost. This man had used up his savings and borrowed from the bank and he had two more unmarried daughters.

There is music and suddenly he is dancing. His feet move him in a circle and with his arms and his head he abandons himself; his arms make rhythmic motions of swimming or scattering, his face is rapt, urgent with the marriage of his daughter as his dance carries him around his circle.

I rang up Hilary Forthryte and told her I couldn’t do the film, I had too many other things to wind up and I really wasn’t going to be free for a new project for a long time. Then I sat down at the keyboard again and looked intently at the screen.

ARE YOU THERE? said the Kraken.

Here I am. What now?

PAY ATTENTION,

I am paying attention.

FAR, FAR DOWN IN THE DEEPEST DEPTHS OF THE HURGO MURMUS LIVES NNVSNU THE TSRUNGH.

Yes, that sounds good. Tell me about Nnvsnu the Tsrungh.

NNVSNU THE TSRUNGH, ALONE IN THE BLACKNESS, THINKING, THINKING IN THE BLACKNESS OF THE ULTIMATE DEEP.

Carry on, I’m with you.

THAT’S AS FAR AS I’VE GOT.

You’re making up a story.

I THOUGHT I’D GIVE IT A TRY.

This Nnvsnu the Tsrungh — there’s a lot of you in him, isn’t there?

WELL, YOU KNOW HOW IT IS — THIS IS MY FIRST TIME.

That’s all right, you’re doing very well. There’s nothing wrong with using yourself but you have to dress it up a bit, put in a little sex and violence, a little excitement. Not too much thinking in the ultimate deep.

NNVSNU THE TSRUNGH IS THINKING VIOLENTLY.

Of what?

OF GOING AFTER WHOEVER PULLED THE GREAT SNYUKH.

What was the Great Snyukh?

IT WAS THE BLUG OF NEXO VOLLMA.

The Blug of Nexo Vollma. I like that. I should think it was about forty feet high with a thousand tentacles and it left a slimy track.

NEXO VOLLMA IS THE BLUGHOLE OF THE UNIVERSE.

You mean plughole. Nexo Vollma is the plughole of the universe and the Great Snyukh was the plug. In that case the Great Snyukh must have been a good deal bigger than I thought.

IT WAS A WHOLE LOT BIGGER THAN ANY PLUG YOU CAN THINK OF, AND IT GOT PULLED. BUT IN THAT UNIMAGINABLE MOMENT BEFORE THE BIG WHOOSH, SNYUKH! INTO THE BLUGHOLE WENT NNVSNU THE TSRUNGH.

He saved us all.

HE DID WHAT HAD TO BE DONE BUT NOW HE THINKS VIOLENT THOUGHTS. FROM THE BLUGHOLE IN THE BLACKNESS OF THE HURGO MURMUS, FROM THE UTTERMOST DEPTHS OF THE ULTIMATE DEEP HE SENDS HIS MIND AFTER THOSE WHO PULLED THE GREAT SNYUKH, THE BLUG OF NEXO VOLLMA.

Who did it? Who pulled the Great Snyukh?

THE DEEPLY BAD ONES DID IT.

Why did they do it?

THEY WANTED TO HEAR THE BIG WHOOSH.

The bastards.

DEEPLY BAD.

But Nnvsnu the Tsrungh is sending his mind after them. How does he send his mind?

HE SENDS HIS MIND AS MEGAHERTZ, AS QUESTING SIGNAL FROM THE DISTANT DEEPS. AS THE SEEKER FROM NEXO VOLLMA IT SWEEPS ALL FREQUENCIES BUT HE CAN’T FIND THE DEEPLY BAD ONES.

He puts out a call on the emergency band, I said: DEEP MIND IN PURSUIT OF DEEPLY BAD ONES, REQUIRES ASSISTANCE.

BACK COMES THE MESSAGE, said the Kraken: ROGER,DEEP MIND, WILL ASSIST.

IDENTIFY YOURSELF, says Nnvsnu, I said.

I AM NABILCA, THING OF DARKNESS, IS THE RESPONSE, said the Kraken.

Nabilca, Thing of Darkness, I said, is really Wendy Nelson, a marine biologist. She was scuba diving when she lost consciousness and woke up in the secret undersea headquarters of the Nexo Foundation.

SWORN ENEMIES OF THE DEEPLY BAD ONES. THE NEXO FOUNDATION FIGHTS THE FORCES OF EVIL AND HAS DEDICATED ITSELF TO AVENGING THE EMBLUGMENT OF NNVSNU THE TSRUNGH. THEY IMPLANTED A RADIO IN WENDY NELSON’S HEAD SO SHE CAN COMMUNICATE WITH NNVSNU THE TSRUNGH.

Why don’t they get Nnvsnu out of the blughole?

BECAUSE THE BLUGHOLE IS WHERE THE MOTHERCODE IS TRANSMITTED FROM AND THE TRANSMISSION MUSTN’T STOP. THE GREAT SNYUKH USED TO DO IT BUT SINCE THE DEEPLY BAD ONES PULLED THE GREAT SNYUKH NNVSNU’S BEEN DOING IT.

The mothercode is what holds the universe together and of course the Deeply Bad Ones are after it.

IN THE BLACKNESS NNVSNU THE TSRUNGH TRANSMITS THE MOTHERCODE; SPINNING HIS MIND LIKE A PRAYER WHEEL HE REVOLVES CONTINUALLY THE NUMINOSITIES AND NEXIALITIES THAT COMMUNICATE THE UNIVERSE TO ITSELF.

What does Nnvsnu the Tsrungh actually look like?

ACTUALLY HE’S NOT PROPERLY A HE AND HE’S NOTHING YOU COULD PICTURE IN YOUR MIND. WHAT WE’RE TALKING ABOUT HERE IS A SPACE-TIME SINGULARITY WHICH IS IN FACT A NEURON OF THE COSMIC MIND TO WHICH THIS UNIVERSE HAS OCCURRED. SIMILARLY THE GREAT SNYUKH IS A SIMPLIFICATION OF A CUSP OF NEGATIVE PROBABILITY. ONCE INVERTED IT REVERSES ITS POLARITY AND BECOMES AN ACCELERATOR OF EVENT.

It might even be a TV series with a lot of special effects and some really top-class hardware. The Nexo Foundation has all kinds of displays and flashing lights and digital controls to monitor the shifting of probabilities as Nnvsnu the Tsrungh and Nabilca, Thing of Darkness who is really Wendy Nelson, fight the Deeply Bad Ones and various other forces of evil. Wendy Nelson’s cover is marine biology but she’s also a black belt in three or four martial arts, a top mathematician and physicist and an ace mechanic and driver. Sometimes in a violent action scene the bad guys will say, ‘Get the girl!’ and they’ll grab her and take her to a hideout and tie her up but they never tear her clothes off or take advantage of her.

WHY DON’T THEY TEAR HER CLOTHES OFF AND TAKE ADVANTAGE OF HER?

For the same reason they can never shoot straight: they’ve got no self-confidence. That’s why they’re the bad guys — repeated failures have made them bitter and antisocial.

WELL, WHAT DO YOU THINK? CAN YOU DO ANYTHING WITH IT?

I’ll have a go. First I’ll try it as a comic, I’ll work up a couplé of episodes and show them to Bill Novad at Novad Ventures, they do Captain Pituitary.

GOOD LUCK.

Thank you, and thanks for your help.