"Hey fuckers!" I shouted, or tried to. My voice was weak from the struggle. "You better leave my friends alone!"

Oh wow! I guess you can say anything, if the blood is stirred enough. The shadowgoth laughed. Her robo partners were back in action by now. They gathered in a circle around us. Shadowgoth turned her face towards me, blinked, just the once, and then I felt her finger in there, inside my mind, pulling me apart. Shadow-fuck!

All I wanted was a shadowcop to flicker into life, except that this was the Bottle, a no-go cop zone.

The game's over, little man," the shadowgoth said.

Oh fuck. Game's over.

Just then a door opened. Some two flats down. And a man stepped through. His hair was a long, thick net of grease, leading straight back into the doorway.

Guy was beautiful.

He had a dog on a long lead. The dog reached out with a vicious set of jaws, took a loud snap, came up with that errant dream-snake in its jaws. The dog swallowed it in a quick gulp.

The goths looked back at the white guy with the jungle hair, and the dog from hell.

"Tristan! My man!" The Beetle calling from where he lay.

"The fun's over," said the jungle hair.

He had a shotgun, cocked and ready. And a dog.

Cocked and ready.

No contest.

HERBAL HAZE

The room was thick with Haze. And a jungle of hair.

We were all safe and sound inside of number 407, the home of Tristan. His girlfriend, Suze, was bathing our wounds with some herbal concoction. It smelt like the ripest fruit, but tasted like wine, and it touched our cuts with a sweet hand. Tyrannosaurus Rex were singing on Tristan's system, all about the light of the magical moon, and I could hear dogs howling through the walls.

A line of dreamsnake skins were pinned over the fireplace.

Tristan had lodged his shotgun against the doorjamb, just in case. Now he was mixing up a lethal brew in a stoneware pot. Suze dropped some seeds in there as well. It gave off a dense pall of smoke and the smell was wondrous to the senses.

"Who the fuck was that goth woman?" asked the Beetle.

"Take a good sniff of that, my beauties," announced Tristan. So we breathed deeply of it, as the gunmetal blue mist filled the room. And straight away I was into paradise land, touched by angels, caressed by spirits.

"Who was she?" the Beetle asked once more.

"Can't you handle it, Beetle?" Tristan said. "The Beetle getting beaten by a woman?" And maybe that was it; the hardcore man was smarting. Suze had lifted his shirt up, free of his jeans. She was applying the sweet lotion to his cut.

"Tell me! Who was she? I need to know."

"They call her the Nimbus," Suze said.

"Nimbus is one top-level shadowgirl," added Tristan.

"She's just a mist, Trist," Suze replied.

"Nowhere near as lovely as you, my lover," Tristan said, running his fingers through the smoke that was rising in thick waves from the herb jars. And that was true. It wasn't anything obvious, Suze's beauty, but it was getting to me. Her look was cool, serene, like she'd lived through some bad things, but was now on the other side. It was the eyes that got you; they had a soft golden glow to them. What with the eyes, and all that hair, this woman was affecting me. Maybe this smoke was getting to me. Through the Haze I saw that Mandy was flat out on the floor, wrapped up in the dog. His paws were all over her.

"That's one big robodog, Tristan," the Beetle said.

"Karli? She's just a puppy," he replied.

A puppy. That was the biggest dog I'd ever seen!

Suze was speaking. I kind of caught it through the mist. "That's a nice trophy, Beetle." She was admiring the snakehead attached to Bee's lapel. "We don't have no trouble with snakes around here. Not with the dogs."

"Yeah! That dog did good," the Beetle said.

"What brings you around, Beetle?" asked Tristan.

"What else, Tristie. Drugs."

"What kind? Got some nice Mexican Haze in. You're breathing it right now."

"I'm looking for some good Vurt, my man."

"Now you know, that's not really my trip. Not these days. I'm into natural things now. Vurt isn't natural."

"We're looking for English Voodoo."

Tristan went quiet then. He tugged for a few seconds at his hair. Suze felt the tug and responded in the same way, tugging back on the plaits that joined them. They were twinned crusties, sharing the same haircut. Six feet of thick entwined hair stretched between them, and you couldn't see where one ended, and the other began. Over the years their hair had knotted, and knotted hard, until separation was an unthinkable torture. They would walk the world together, never less than six feet apart. Now there's love for you.

"You want English Voodoo?" asked Tristan.

"You know where to find some?" Beetle said.

"No. Not at all."

"You telling the truth?"

"I got rid. Pretty quick. I don't like that stuff. It's not natural."

"But you had some?" I asked, shaking from the knowledge.

"I told you, the once. I don't do Vurt any more. Period. And may I suggest, young kid..." Tristan stared directly at me. "That you keep off that stuff yourself. It's a killer."

"You heard of Icarus Wing?" I asked.

"What's that? Some new killer feather? Man, they just can't leave it alone."

"No. It's a man. A man's name. He's a feather seller."

"Like I said, I don't work those areas any more."

Suze had gone silent. She was adding some new herbs to the pot. A fresh brew of Haze floated into the room.

"For old time's sake, Tristie," asked the Beetle.

"It means that much, yeah?" Tristan replied.

"We lost someone. To the Vurt."

Tristan went quiet again. And when he did speak, this was all he could come up with; "That's a bummer, Bee."

"You really not got any Voodoo, Tristan?" asked the Beetle.

Tristan's reply was the softest whisper; "Years ago. Years ago." "Just wondered."

"Wonder not, Bee. English Voodoo fucks. It leads to bad things."

This was too much for me. "Someone good," I said. "Desdemona."

"Who's Desdemona?" asked Suze.

"Scribble's sister," replied Beetle. "We lost her. To the Voodoo."

"Uh uh, I get it," said Tristan. "Swapback time. It doesn't work, Beetle. I've never known it work."

"Scribble's on a mission trip," the Beetle told them. "And we're all getting dragged along. He's set on finding her. He'd give his all. Wouldn't you, Scribb?"

Tristan and Suze looked towards each other. I saw their hair as a river, flowing from each to each.

"Only a fool goes into English Voodoo," said Suze. She was looking straight at me. The robopuppy had come up close to me, licking my face. I was doing my best to discourage her, but that dog just kept on licking. "Karli likes you," Suze added. I was covered in dog spit by now, so I couldn't argue. "Tell us," she repeated, and something in her voice got to me, some kind of recognition. Like I'd known her for ages, without ever meeting. What was that feeling?

"You'd better tell the story, Scribb," the Beetle said to me. "You're better at it than I am."

So I told them.

It went like this...

ON THE WASHING OF DROIDLOCKS

Brother and sister walking it home from a club; vanless, way past the last bus time, no money for an Xcab. We were halfway down the Wilmslow Road when we heard a screaming. A woman screaming, and we took that walk, right into a fist fight

A guy was clutching a woman, shaking her. She was screaming, over and over, face twisted towards the indifferent traffic.

"Get off me! Stop hitting me! He's hitting me! Get him off me!"

"I think we should stop," said Desdemona.

"What?"

"I think we should do something."

Oh wow, like thanks, sister.