Animals were on the very lowest level of a deteriorating “assembly line” that produced souls like cartons of solar plugs or bosonicabus engines, according to Applewhite. Household pets such as Osman were crude, aspiring demi-souls trapped at a lower level of existence, and waiting in anguish to join the higher level. Beasts of burden and wildlife were less worthy yet. When a human died, professed Applewhite, sometimes a conniving animal soul would take over the human “container” and win its slim chance to grow. Animals were, at best, disposable objects, at worst, organic “vessels” loaded with damaging demi-souls.
The cult members, Applewhite claimed, were on much more august metaphysical footing than either humans or animals, naturally. They were neutered—many cultists chemically sterilized themselves—members of a faraway alien race called the Luciferians. They occupied the top of Earth’s production cycle, evolving far beyond all other beings. They were not killing themselves but merely shedding their “containers.” Ideas of ecosystem or an interconnected biosphere were hopelessly terrestrial illusions—“scams,” as Applewhite put it—and once the cult’s “Level Above Human” had finally left Earth with the “comet’s” arrival, the planet would merely be a dangerous spawning mechanism.
“We’re going to be getting out of here?” Applewhite said, ending nearly every sentence with a rising-question tone. “We’re going home and it’s wonderful?”
Applewhite’s words rattled Cuthbert and prompted a flurry of febrile questions in him. What if the cultists went after the zoo animals before he had the chance to free them? And what if this Applewhite scoundrel hurt the otters? Then he might not see Drystan again.
If Urga-Rampos, reaching perihelion for the first time in four thousand years, had been the cult’s signal to move to the “higher level” and to join their alien brethren from outer space, if the comet was still, days after the mass suicide, supposed to be visible even to the naked eye in bright London, if all these things were true, and England was ending and Earth a broken soul-machine—well, then, his time for action was short.
Perhaps the great comet had already landed, in London? Where would anyone find it? Near the embassies?
“Oh, who focking knows?” he said aloud, almost huffing for air.
But the otters, he knew where to find them. The average British citizen didn’t know it, but otters were the sacred mascots of Albion, as precious as cattle to certain Hindus. If nothing else, he must release them; and, yes, along the way, he would also release as many other creatures as possible, of course, opportunistically or methodically—it didn’t matter. The more free animals to face the coming attack of the death cult, the better, he reckoned.
It was all, of course, a florid delusion. But there it was, for better or worse: Cuthbert Handley, a working-class Flōt sot from Birmingham, had to save the animals.
the scent of a wounded elephant
HE FELT FAMISHED; HE WAS TREMBLING. VOMITING had made him hungry. He got out a Fray Bentos steak and kidney pie he had been saving, as well as a leftover block of Golden Syrup cake from the cupboard. For the past few days, he had been eating nothing but vacuum-sealed mackerels and instant treacle cake—and drinking cheap supermarket swills such as Longbow cider. He liked to eat at least a pie a week, but he still considered meat pies a luxury, since each cost seven and a half pounds at Tesco.
To preserve their traditional image, the Fray Bentos pies still came in old-fashioned, flat tins. Cuthbert opened the tin with a can opener whose nuplastic handle was melted badly on one side. He put the oily lid in the sink. He touched the rubbery surface of the uncooked pastry with his fingertips. There was a red-orange film of grease on the pastry. He licked this off his fingers, and got the lid from the sink and licked that, too. It was salty and metallic, and this reminded him of the blood he tasted if he brushed his teeth too harshly.
He pinched off a corner of the manufactured treacle cake, and chawed on that. It was beautiful, he thought, really beautiful stuff. Count on McVitie’s! The thousands of dead frugal members of Heaven’s Gate apparently frowned upon the enjoyment of food. For their last meal they had “splurged,” he read, and ordered thousands of turkey pot pies at a particular chain restaurant in America. They stacked their plates for the busboys. Cuthbert loathed turkey. A beef kidney—that was a feast. He carefully placed the pie in the oven. He could hardly wait for it to puff up.
When the pie was cooked and he’d finished it, he rooted through all his drawers and closets looking for dark clothes and something dark to rub on his face. He located the electric torch he kept underneath his bed; its solar-cells had run down, and it offered only a meager glow, but he still thought he should take it.