The Demi-Monde: Winter (27 page)

That shook Norma up. It was easy to dismiss the inhabitants of the Demi-Monde as just figments of ABBA’s fevered quantum imagination but not so easy when the bastards started to talk about having memories of their previous existence in the Real World. That the Dupe of Reinhard Heydrich should somehow be all-aware seemed to be a dangerous occurrence. The son of a bitch was bad enough when his malignant, Luciferian personality was confined to the Demi-Monde, but when it seemed suddenly to have become Real World-perceptive …

‘How do you know all this?’

Heydrich gave a nonchalant wave of his hand. ‘Who knows? It might be that my personality – my will – is simply too powerful for ABBA to contain.’

ABBA? The bastard knew about ABBA.

‘ABBA?’ she asked, hoping against hope that Heydrich was talking about the Demi-Mondian deity rather than the supercomputer running the simulation she was trapped in.

Heydrich carelessly flicked the ash from his cigarette onto the carpet. ‘Please, do not play the naïf with me, Miss Williams. ABBA is the immensely powerful difference engine that designed and created the Demi-Monde as a playground for the American military to train their soldiers and to test their pathetic little theories about urban warfare.’

Jesus.

‘Okay, so if you know about ABBA then you must know that you’re just a computer glitch, a ghost in the machine. How does it feel, Heydrich, to be nothing more than a computer programmer’s wet dream? How does it feel to know you can be edited out with one click of a mouse?’

Heydrich shrugged. ‘There is no difference between how I felt when I was active in the Real World and how I feel here, in the Demi-Monde. Cogito ergo sum: I think, therefore I am. In both realities my existence hangs on the whim of Fate. What difference does it make if I am killed by the bullet of a Czech terrorist or the whim of a computer programmer? In both existences I would still be very much dead. But’ – he gave a chuckle – ‘here in the Demi-Monde, I am very much alive.’

‘That still brings me back to my original question: so what?’ Norma gave Heydrich a careless smile, as though what he was saying had little import. The last thing she wanted was this lunatic to appreciate how unsettled he was making her feel.

‘Your problem, Miss Williams, is that you are unable to understand or appreciate what it is like to taste power and have it snatched from you. I sit here agonised by the thought of “what if?”. What if those Czech terrorists hadn’t succeeded in assassinating me? What if I had been on hand to wrest the levers of power from Hitler when he faltered and his will crumbled? What if I had become Führer?’

‘You would have been hanged with all the other Nazi war criminals at Nuremberg, that’s what.’

‘Perhaps. But then, perhaps not.’

‘Unfortunately for you, Heydrich …’

‘You will address me by my title.’

‘And you can kiss my ass.’

There was a sour silence for a moment as the pair of them glared at one another. Finally Heydrich broke the silence. ‘No matter. Call me what you will. We are alone.’

‘Then I’ll tell you what you are: you’re a computer-drawn chimera. You’re a nothing, just a piece of digital doodling. And that being the case all of your psychotic “what if” scenarios will have to be played out here in the Demi-Monde. And you better enjoy it while you can because one day someone in the Real World is going to pull the plug on this shitty little world of yours.’

Heydrich laughed scornfully. ‘How pathetic you are. Do you really believe a person of my will, my genius, of my ambition, would be content to be imprisoned in this … nothing of a place? Do you really imagine I will be content to be condemned to live my life – my second life – in a world that is little better than a digital sandbox built for the education of military incompetents and the amusement of armchair generals?’ He shook his head. ‘Impossible: when man has feasted on steak he is no longer satisfied with mince.’

‘You don’t get it, do you, Heydrich? So let me spell it out: you ain’t real.’

‘If I had more time and more patience, Miss Williams, it might be interesting to debate how a sentient entity, as I undoubtedly am, can ever be considered not to be real. But unfortunately time is pressing and the interesting must yield to the important. We were talking about Adolf Hitler. Hitler believed that the principal aim of Germany’s foreign policy was to ensure that Germany’s living space was that necessitated by the size and needs of its population. This is the notion of Lebensraum that persuaded him to invade Czechoslovakia and Poland. During my exile here in the DemiMonde, I have had a chance to ponder upon this and I now believe that in this matter the Führer was wrong. In my view the foreign policy adopted by a nation has nothing to do with the needs of the people; rather it must be designed to enable a nation to achieve a size that is consistent with the will, the genius and the energy of its leader. Nations wax and wane, grow and contract, not because of the needs of their people, nor because of that nation’s political, economic or military success but because of the scale of the ambitions of the one who leads it.’

‘Look, Heydrich, fascinating as all this is and much as I would just love to sit around here all day shooting the breeze …’

Heydrich ignored her. ‘I will be frank with you, Miss Williams, I wish to conquer the Real World.’

Norma laughed uproariously. ‘Your ambition runs ahead of itself, Heydrich, you haven’t yet gained mastery of the DemiMonde.’

‘That is just a question of time. My crushing of the DemiMonde is an historic inevitability. I have already initiated Operation Barbarossa …’

‘Unfortunate pick: Operation Barbarossa was the invasion of Russia that led to the downfall of Hitler in the Real World.’

Heydrich scowled. ‘There will be no such “downfall” in this world. Soon I will have conquered the Demi-Monde and then I will change it.’

‘Change it?’ ‘I will remake it in my own image. By the imposition of my Final Solution I will eliminate all the sub-races from this world. In the microcosm that is the Demi-Monde I will construct my world of the Übermensch – of the Superman – who will, in turn, claim the Real World. That is my task here in the DemiMonde: the purification of the human race.’

‘You Nazis tried that once. Tried and failed.’

‘No, we did not fail, rather the Führer failed us. Ultimately he was proven to be weak. He was a false Messiah. But I, Miss Williams, am not weak. And I have learnt from the failure of the Führer. I will mould the Demi-Monde into a perfect Aryan world. All sub-races – the nuJus, the Poles, the Shades, the Orientals and the Arabs – will be scoured …’

‘Scoured?’

‘Eliminated. Shortly, in a matter of days, Operation Barbarossa will begin here in the ForthRight. The nuJus and the Poles – the scum of the ForthRight – have been packed together in the Warsaw Ghetto and soon I will unleash that madman Archie Clement and his SS-Ordo Templi Aryanis, their mission to destroy all of the Untermenschen gathered there. Clement will be my Eichmann.’

‘You will kill your own people?’

‘No, I will kill those of my own people who are inadequate or racially degenerate. Only the strong will be permitted to live in order that those who come after are stronger still.’

‘Why do you hate the Poles so much?’

‘It is an instinctive thing, a manifestation of the hereditary hatred of the Teuton for the Pole. Of all the people of the world – of this and the Real World – the Pole is one of the basest. After the Jew and the Black, the Pole is the lowest form of the species Homo sapiens. To eliminate such a vile creature is merely an expression of the Darwinian doctrine of the survival of the fittest. The Poles, the nuJus and the Shades are not fit to co-habit this – or any other – world with the Aryan people, and hence it is only logical and fitting that they be expunged.’

‘You are totally mad, you know, Heydrich.’

‘Not mad, Miss Williams, I am merely gifted with the ability to perceive the reality of Nature and with the force of will to act on that perception. Great men like Genghis Khan, Tamerlane and Alexander are not remembered for the millions they slaughtered but for the grandeur of their ambition. The eradication of the three million stupid and worthless Poles and nuJus cowering in the Ghetto will, in fifty years, barely warrant a footnote in the books recording the history of the Demi-Monde. And once the Poles have been dealt with it will be the turn of those degenerate and perverted LessBiens who inhabit the Coven.’

‘But to what end? All this suffering, but you and your Übermenschen will still be marooned here in the Demi-Monde. You’re still just a Dupe like everyone else living in the DemiMonde!’

Heydrich gave a scornful laugh. ‘It is now time for you to meet, or should I better say, to remeet, a friend of yours, Miss Williams.’

Heydrich rang a handbell on Dashwood’s desk and immediately Beria entered the room accompanied by a girl whose identity was shrouded beneath a heavy veil that cascaded from the top of her bonnet, over her face, to pool at her shoulders.

After Beria had bowed out of the room, Heydrich made the introductions. ‘Miss Williams, I have the great pleasure in presenting my daughter, Aaliz.’ The girl drew back the veil and Norma found herself gazing at … herself.

She had to do a double take. To her amazement this Aaliz Heydrich was her perfect twin, her exact duplicate. But there was more to the girl’s mimicry than simple physical resemblance: with the exception of the colour of her hair, of the absence of body piercings and the lack of tattoos this girl was Norma. Every mannerism, every reaction, every nuance of expression was a precise match for those Norma saw every morning in her bathroom mirror.

But the most troubling thing was that she had met Aaliz Heydrich before in the Real World. Aaliz Heydrich had been the girl in the store, the girl who had coaxed and cajoled Norma into playing The Demi-Monde computer game.

And the tragedy was that Norma hadn’t recognised her … hadn’t recognised herself. Oh, she had known, instinctively, that there was something wrong about the girl but she had been so skilfully disguised that Norma hadn’t realised that she was looking at and talking with herself. What a fool she had been.

‘You’re the girl in the shop.’

When Aaliz Heydrich replied, she spoke in a voice that was identical to Norma’s, the thick New York accent she’d used in the Real World had vanished. ‘Yes. It’s amazing what a haircut, hair dye, glasses and rather outré make-up can do for one’s appearance, Norma.’

Heydrich chuckled at Norma’s confusion. ‘It would seem, Miss Williams, that the creators of the Demi-Monde had a peculiarly puckish sense of humour. They used as the digital jig for the creation of my daughter the image of the eldest daughter
of the President of the United States. It was a piece of serendipity that has opened great possibilities for one as ambitious as I am.

He gestured his daughter into a seat and lit yet another cigarette. Maybe, Norma hoped, there was a chance that the bastard would smoke himself to death before much longer. But then, of course, as Demi-Mondians didn’t have lungs the chance of the maniac developing lung cancer was minimal.

‘Aleister Crowley has long been of the belief that the DemiMonde is surrounded and manipulated by a Spirit World, or, as you call it, the Real World. Although Crowley propounded his beliefs in magical terms, in essence he has been proven correct. You, the denizens of the Real World, Miss Williams, are Crowley’s Spirits and we know how mischievously you delight in testing and tormenting us poor Demi-Mondians. But there was one thing that seems to have been beyond the wit of the creators of the Demi-Monde and that was an appreciation of the psychic bond that would exist between the Dupes of the Demi-Monde and their Real World twins. Crowley, though, sensed this, and using his occult powers, he has striven to achieve a melding of the Demi-Mondian self and the Real World self.’

‘Look, Crowley’s out to lunch.’

‘The unfortunate thing from your point of view, Miss Williams, is that Crowley has succeeded in bridging the divide between the Demi-Monde and the Real World. Your presence here is proof of that. Admittedly, my daughter’s excursion into your world was Crowley’s first and, thus far, only successful attempt to manifest a Demi-Mondian in the Real World. And although the experiment highlighted certain limitations, it did enable us to lure you here to the Demi-Monde.’

‘But why?’

‘Initially to prevent your masters from destroying the DemiMonde. When I took power in the ForthRight my first task was to preserve the Demi-Monde from the threat you so eloquently describe as “pulling the plug”, and to do this I had to have a hostage, one of such importance that the Real Worlders would be deterred from closing the Demi-Monde. You are that hostage, Miss Williams. But having accomplished this, I then identified other opportunities arising from your presence amongst us.’

‘Other opportunities?’

‘Indeed. It came to me in a moment of inspiration,’ said Heydrich with a triumphant little smile. ‘All Demi-Mondians are exact replicas of persons in the Real World and that means that not only do people in the Real World have doppelgängers here in the Demi-Monde but Demi-Mondians have doppelgängers in the Real World. It’s a sort of digital quid pro quo. And as you Real Worlders, in your arrogance, imposed your personalities on the people of the Demi-Monde, I wondered whether it would be possible to reverse this process and have Demi-Mondians impose their personalities on their Real World doppelgängers.’

Norma gawped and then an awful, chilling realisation dawned. ‘You want to swap your daughter for me!’

‘That is the intention,’ said Heydrich blithely. ‘Aaliz here is to be my Trojan Horse. Of course, this Rite of Transference, as Crowley rather melodramatically calls it, is as yet unproven, but he is very confident that it can be made to work. We DemiMondians might not have the faculty of the Real Worlders in the manipulating of the digital universe but we are very adept at manipulating the psychic one. And once Aaliz is in the Real World – posing as the daughter of the most powerful man in the world – she will be able to lobby very effectively for the preservation of the Demi-Monde … amongst other things.’