yamboard

[yamboard]

4.

Baller rolled into the spotlight. Gaunt and hunched, he looked down with a hat concealing his eyes. The unbearable din in the room softened to murmurs. He paused. Then he began to prodigiously twist his board around his feet so he seemed to float above a blur. The crowd shouted and whooped until he paused again and continued in a more respectful atmosphere. Porto groaned.

- What’s the appeal? Porto said.

- He’s good, Jamma said.

- I don’t get it, Porto said.

- It’s a good story. The guy goes clink-side. A shoulder-width cell, no board. Total darkness. I heard he started out imagining the board, hopping up and down on the spot. Then used anything he could; crushed up organics, his cellmate’s back. He struggled for his style. Think you could handle that? Jamma said.

- Sure, that’s impressive in prison. But he’s in the big wide outside now. He could use the space. A whole lot of space. This is just contrived… Porto said.

Baller paused and glanced towards them. Porto quieted down and waved apologetically.

- What’s so different about your Cookham friend? Jamma said, chuckling.

Porto stayed silent. After the demo, they both joined a small group outside the deeper tunnels. Frou Frou turned up gently smiling, Baller after him. Porto guessed he probably had night vision, the prick. Jamma led them into the system with a light and terrain scanner. After ten minutes of hushed rolling she signalled that they were in the big man’s territory. They continued on, Porto disappointed in the hostile area’s lack of atmospheric novelty. After some time they stopped and lined up below a ladder. Jamma shushed them and started climbing. Porto waited his turn and grimaced knowing Baller followed right below him as he ascended. He reached the top and someone hauled him up. They milled about in a damp, concrete utility room. A small cage boxed them in around the hatch.  Jamma nodded at a frazzled kid who emptied his bag of mining equipment. He punctured the bars and they quickly stepped through the gap. The door led to dim corridors and rooms with flashing screens. They confirmed no-one lurked about and gathered in the main room.

- So this is where you saw Cookham? Porto said.

Jamma stared at the screens and directed frazzle-kid’s typing.

- Hey! I’m talking to you, Porto said.

Jamma finally turned her eyes to him and frowned. Baller glared over her head.

- We’ll get to your video soon. But this might tell us where the big man’s transmitting from, Jamma said.

- You’ve been playing us, Porto said.

- You’re not getting that video until the big man’s gone. You idiot, Jamma said.

- Cruel and rankly dishonest to boot. The boy can be ass but he earnestly wants this, Frou Frou said.

- Shut up! Porto said.

They both found themselves physically restrained in the corner while Jamma scanned coordinates.

- You two got the city riled up. We want you aboard, Jamma said, not turning to look at them.

- This is scandalous! Frou Frou said.

Jamma kept looking over the kid’s shoulder.

- Got it? Got it. Nice work, now we need to get it to Hoot, Jamma said.

They heard squeaky laughing and whirring. A miniature ship crashed through a corner vent, the big man projected atop it. Everyone ran as it exploded, mid-taunt. Back in the tunnel Porto rolled blind in a migraine haze. They bumped into eachother and yelped in the dark. Eventually Jamma said,

- Stop! We can’t lead them to the shelter. I need to go to Hoot. Baller, Porto, Chunk, you come with me. Everyone else to the Grim Street Hovel. Hang out, put fireworks in bins, do whatever until tomorrow and then head back.

- Me and Frou Frou aren’t separating. In fact, we’re leaving, Porto said.

- And how are you going to see your video? Jamma said.

Porto decided to not turn them into the big man and followed along. They weaved through a different path, longer than the one before, and colder. They emerged into a grey day outside the city, near where Porto and Frou Frou jumped the checkpoint. Jamma led them into the forest.

- Weird place, this. Stay away from the trees. There’s electric currents and ghosts. I reckon we should stick to the path, Porto said.

Chunk, the kid, laughed and said,

- We need a data hag, dingus! And Hoot’s the best one around. She just likes to keep the forest creepy to scare away your types.

- I hate you, Porto said.

They passed by the buzzing trees until they reached a house far away. Jamma knocked on the door, and Hoot opened it to welcome them inside. Porto stared at the old woman, who was covered in machine detritus and wild hair. She muttered quietly and sat down in front of a large, black screen. The room hummed with lights and calculations.

- Had no trouble finding you, Jamma said.

- I allowed myself to be found. I have had a boring day. And I hope you bring objects that could disturb that heckling pig man. He has sent spies into this forest for weeks now. Ree-hee-hee, Hoot said.

Jamma respectfully handed a small metal cube to Hoot. Hoot plugged it into a panel below the screen, which shot into a black-and-white vision of revolving geometries. The group stood and trembled as she placed her hand on the panel and the pictures whirred and veered. Porto felt the room dim. Hoot turned to lock eyes with him. His vision smudged beyond her face.

- And you? Why are you here? Hoot said.

- I’ve been forced to. I need to know where I can find a man in a video. I really like his boarding and I want to learn how to do it like him. But Jamma’s holding me up. I feel tired. I’d go home but my cousin would beat me up. And I’d run but I’d feel like your ghosts if I didn’t meet the video man, Porto said.

- I’m not the only power in these woods, love, Hoot said.

[yamboard]

3.

Porto realised he’d been too long in the abyss. He looked up at the mountain range he lay under, at the salmon clouds lingering above it. His forehead struggled to return to a seated position and glanced to the right. Outside the wall-sized window, a raggedy wall-sized bird glitched and squawked at him. He dropped to his knees and his ankles floated back and up so that he revolved about. He looked back, upside down, at where he’d been sitting. The Cookham Skater sat there. He stood up, rolled into view, grinned sadistically at Porto, and then rolled off.

Last week Porto and Frou Frou entered Moonshine. Hearing about the org head’s distaste for yamboarding, they buried theirs sometime outside of town. They passed the bridge checkpoint leading in, all innocent, and walked to Jamma’s address. The whole journey, no sounds of boarding.

- I need ice block, Frou Frou said, but like ees bleak.

The pair now sat alone in Jamma’s mouldy flat, not her official location since she began her underground band of freedom fighters. The org head, the “big man”, banned yamboarding a few weeks earlier (they were also killing civilians). So a movement began. But Porto and Frou Frou had to prove themselves by debauching on substances that went beyond the capacity of the snitch. Jamma’s location being sensitive information.

- Why can’t we just ask her about the video? That’s why we’re here. Not some stupid freedoms, Porto said.

- It’s our responsibility as boarders to contribute, Frou Frou said, licking an ees bleak.

- You’ve been hiding by the beach… We should’ve kept the shock prod, Porto said.

- They would’ve taken it, Frou Frou said.

The buffoonish guy Jamma had guarding the door came in to leer at them. He looked like he was trying to critically assess how sauced they actually were, stupid grin on his face. Frou Frou rolled his head about and gurgled.

- When are you gonna let us see Jamma? Porto said.

- When you two prove yourselves, the guard said.

- Oh screw this, Porto said.

He stood up and started thwacking the guard. Frou Frou stopped miming and joined in. The guard complained and ran off. The pair ran dizzy through the same streets, through the bridge checkpoint, and back to the burial site. They dug with their hands, feeling the dirt in their pre-post-drug haze.

- Come on! Come on! Porto said.

They got near the bridge and jogged, leaping onto their boards to seek fear in the officers’ eyes. Porto waved the shock prod around his head and screamed as he blurred past families and traders. The officers nervously checked each other, unsure how to deal with these nutcases bringing good and honest passion to the confrontation. The pair cracked their boards so that they propelled over the checkpoint, Porto stabbing a shock prod into the ear of an officer as he went.

Porto and Frou Frou injected themselves into Moonshine. They could feel the distorted yelling and nervous beeps ranging all over the city, warning its inhabitants that something was coming. The pair blasted down the main street in need of trouble before the uppers wore off. Wet heat arced through their clothes. Land ships veered around them. Dejected citizens sat on pavements or stopped browsing storefronts to watch the scene. Porto gnashed his teeth and eyeballed the people, the birdlife, the solid buildings above them. As he watched, the building faces switched to large black video feeds. A collage of porky, cruel looking men appeared. They all glared out of the screen.

- Sons of the Five Hells begone, one said.

- Ripping and roaring and burning and boiling, one said.

- Yamboarding is for dweebs! One said.

- Oh I’ll get ya, oh I’ll get ya, one said.

And so on. The pair cackled and taunted the screens, barely thinking of the traffic at this point. They kept pushing until the street emptied and they heard a rumbling sound. Compact zoom-tanks turned a corner a few blocks in front and formed a barricade. The porky men laughed and bayed. Then a humongous mobile structure appeared. A towering screen lined with speakers and weapons sat on tank tracks that lumbered up behind the barricade. It projected the same depressing image as the buildings.

A bit much even for their state, the pair halted before the barricade.

- What do we do? Porto said.

- Take courage, and know that the Merry Anglers… Frou Frou said.

They both felt reassuring scrapes behind them. They looked back, where a ragtag group of boarders had formed. More poured in from the wreckages and shadows and sewers of the city. At the front stood a tall woman dressed in clothes so baggy that Porto forgot his imminent death. The big man…

- Big men? Porto thought.

The big man variously sneered, jeered, and spat at the gathering force. One of his faces inhaled deeply, and the structure exhaled its missiles. The zoom-tanks shot energy charges into the crowd. Everyone panicked and dashed around craters and epileptic lights. Frou Frou grabbed Porto by the collar and dragged him into an alleyway. Porto felt himself barge into a tall silhouette that waved them into a room. They followed a group down stairs and into a tunnel system, away from the shaking above.

Porto took a long glug of hard drink that left him retching. He sat among a pile of pillows with zany designs, in a party full of boarders. Frou Frou stood in another corner shouting doctrine at a tired teenager. Jamma, still baggy, but with a new hat, knelt down before Porto’s pillow castle.

- How are you feeling? Jamma said.

- Grand. I’m the master of my domain, Porto said.

- You’re probably coming down right now, Jamma said.

- From your shitty drugs, Porto said.

She laughed and shrugged.

- We’re gonna do more and then play Coward, Jamma said.

[yamboard]

2.

Rain drummed on the hats of the Merry Anglers. They bundled their knees up to their chests and huddled close for shelter. Frou Frou, their leader, whispered encouragement. Porto shivered along, dressed in deep black rags. He’d dipped into the hole and emerged spluttering on the beach twice that evening, soaked through.

The next morning felt muggy. Porto squelched about the beach tending shrines. He tried to avoid the hourly bowl run, but Frou Frou soon caught him hiding in the wreckage of his cousin’s Hopper.

- Come, a Brother of the Angle cannot skimp on his carving. What troubles you? Frou Frou said.

- What troubles me? You idiot! You’re the one that did this to me. You cretin, Porto said.

- Most initiates at least try to improve after the second flush. But you continue to batter yourself. Do you completely lack self-respect? Frou Frou said.

- I’ve seen yamboarding. What you lot do, it makes me sick, Porto said.

He explained what he saw.

- …a novelty restaurant?  Frou Frou said.

That night, while the others huddled, Porto boarded straight into the hole. He walked back and repeated. At each trip a few peeled off and watched him attack it. Eventually all of them stood around the rim. Finally, Frou Frou stopped Porto and turned to say,

- Friends, this is a troubling case. I sense this lifestyle, that we have found so invigorating, is burning him down invisibly. How can we be merry with this inferno beside us?

Porto woke up to a headache. Frou Frou, decked out in bags, hauled him up and slapped him between the shoulder blades. The Anglers saw them off and they began trekking to Moonshine. Porto had no idea what was going on. They walked.

- Quite a tale you told us before you tried to knock your own block off last night. Do you know how to find this Pissbucket? Frou Frou said.

 - Is not Pissbucket… is cousin, Porto said.

 - I see, Frou Frou said.

 - Cookham. Cookham, Porto said.

 And they walked.

 - …the angler needs a philosophy, much like the yamboarder. But the Anglers, we fuse our deepest convictions in both our favourite pastimes. Truly we are floating in providence. You may think me flippant, calling them pastimes. On the contrary! We believe in leisure, and assiduously pursuing it… Frou Frou said.

- Then why hovel about in filth by the sea? Porto said.

- It allows us to focus all the more. It drives us. What drives you, youngster? Frou Frou said.

 - I’m 21! You probably are too. You just have bad skin. And your philosophy? It’s junk. Yamboarding isn’t twee-hardy-har-har flipping around. It’s rhythm. It’s repetition. I don’t need your fancy carving. I believe in hitting pavement until you’re numb, and then trying another trick. All these people with their avant twirls… Porto said

And they walked until they met a strange figure in the woods. They were formed of staticky silver lines, like tiny scratches on painted metal.

- Hello, Frou Frou said.

The figure stayed put, flexing a pale hole where their mouth should’ve been.

- Can you speak, friend? Frou Frou said.

Porto and Frou Frou looked around and saw more staticky characters drifting about the forest floor. Porto tugged at Frou Frou’s robe and they humbly continued along the path. They looked back and saw the figure still standing where they left them. Frou Frou stopped at a turn and ambled to a near tree. He leaned close to it and beckoned Porto over. The tree hummed electric.

The path wound on. Behind a bush, they found a knee-height mechanical cube chugging along. Beside it stood a tiny carving of a woman yawning, her eyes open wide. Frou Frou lay down and listened to the ground.

- Extraordinary! I think its connected to the trees, he said.

They stuck far from nature for the rest of the way. After a day of strong walking the forest thinned and they arrived at a roadside hostel. They gladly took off their packs and pushed through the door to find a grotty reception desk. A gruff old woman leered at them from behind it. Off to the left, some crusty patrons played a vicious game of Split the Pig in the bar.

- I don’t have any money, Porto said.

- Of course not, and neither is it my intention to stay here. Roofs are for less hardy fellows. My objective is information, Frou Frou said, tapping his nose.

He approached the desk.

- Where are my clothes, Gladys? Frou Frou said.

- Right where you left them, punk. And I guess he’s in need as well, Gladys said, sticking her thumb at Porto.

The pair followed Gladys into a backroom where they exchanged their hats and rags. Porto wore a mismatch of workpants, t-shirt, and coat. Frou Frou an ostentatious, Harlequin-like purple outfit. Porto thought he looked oddly clean.

- Wanna ride the wave? Gladys said.

- It’d be our pleasure, Frou Frou said.

Gladys pulled a rack of clothes aside to reveal a smaller room. The pair stepped in and Gladys closed the opening.

 - What’s this? What’s going on? Porto said.

- A bit of fun. Get on your board and brace yourself, Frou Frou said.

The floor opened and Porto screamed as they dropped into a wooden pipe. He barely managed to catch the downward slope and turn before he launched upwards. He slowed in the middle and looked. Frou Frou flew up to scrape the walls. The impact howled about the bunker. Porto laughed and scurried up. He dropped back in, gained speed, and weaved down to some small bowls at the end of the pipe. He readied to hit them full evil until he met a lump, swerved, and clattered to the ground. The lump, a human person, shook herself out of her sleeping bag and yawned.

- My legs! Porto said.

- Right on, right on, she said.

She stood up, beer cans falling of her and rattling. Porto recovered and marched towards her.

- This is unethical. What are you doing lying in the middle of the bowl? He said.

- Hmm? Oh, I was just snoozing. Get to roll out of bed and straight into it. No commute. Ideal, she said.

- How now Porto, this sound perfectly ethical, Frou Frou said.

They bickered for a few minutes. Frou Frou introduced them as Merry Anglers, which Porto objected to. Clara, the sleepy boarder, kept making relaxed shrugs and noises. She’d been on a weeklong yam binge, taking quick breaks to get supplies and limber up in the fresh air. The rest she spent snoozing, chugging, and charging.

- A yam binge is a holy undertaking. But prolonged focus can lead to imbalance. Take angling, for example… Frou Frou said.

- True, true. But I dunno, not too into water sports. And I think it’s nice to just let the fish flow on. Why bother them, eh? Here I am, doing what I do. Enjoying a few refreshments, a good session. My muscles hurt but I’m happy. I’m swimming up my own stream. Can’t stay here forever, I know that. Gladys is an upstanding lady. Especially since I dipped pretty quick from Moonshine, couldn’t unify my assets. From Moonshine? Yeah! Long time, long time. Oh for sure I know Jamma! You know her cousin? That’s cool, that’s cool. She’s making moves, last I heard starting a revolution against the big man. Sounded intense… Clara said.

[yamboard]

1.

The cobblestones of Echidna Docks rattled. Porto cruised down steep and sleepy residential hills towards the industrial zones. Under his feet, a Yam Board, the vessel of the yamboarder. This early in the morning he encountered few people except for local oldies, burnt out from twitchy nights. He weaved around seabirds until he saw an old man with deeply hollow eyes. Porto smirked and stopped before the man.

- Morning! Porto said.

The man grumbled.

- That toy’ll get ya killed, he said.

Porto’s smile grew and he prepared to retort until a white presence shot into his peripherals. He slipped back and his board skittered away. Looking up, he saw a squat woman in a sheet dancing about. She hooted and the hollow-eyed man croaked, gripping his stomach and shaking.

- This is really too much, Porto said.

He stood up and glared down at the tiny oldies. Convinced he could salvage this look, he cocked his chin and retrieved his board. Then he turned back.

- Kill yourselves, he said.

And he continued down the hill without checking their reactions. The cobblestones turned into smooth concrete and Porto rolled quietly by empty factories. He followed a map inside his head until he reached a crumbled wall that muffled clangs and shrieks within. Inside he saw kids yamboarding, but he searched about for Pissbucket. Seeing her turning about he said,

- Yo!

Pissbucket nodded at Porto and they started chatting.

- Yo, she said, giggling.

Porto felt old. He looked about at the kids, most of them not even teenagers. He missed being at his own haunts with his own friends when they’d board all day. Taking breaks to eat, swallow meds, and talk loud in public. Then back at it until he felt the sweat chill him through. All gone. Even now he could feel his body failing.

- Having a senior moment? Pissbucket said.

- You had something to show me? Porto said.

- Yeah, she said, smiling.

Porto followed Pissbucket, all neon pink and layered hats askew, to a small pod at the back of the factory.

- War is completely fried, heh. Wait till you see it, when it hits your cortex! Pissbucket said.

She heaved open the pod and Porto saw War, a stumpy 10-year-old, trembling in a seat surrounded by a button-littered console and a small monitor that seasoned his face with lights. War cringed and squinted at them. Pissbucket shooed him out and beckoned at Porto. Lanky, he awkwardly manoeuvred himself around the console and into the seat.

- This’s an old farming comm shell we hauled over here. Transmitter goes to the roof! My cousin the island over bounces us pirate yam things. Yesterday we get this video, and War’s been sitting here since. Knowing your tastes, my friend, I thought of you, Pissbucket said.

Pissbucket pressed a button and the monitor hummed. A grainy black-and-white title card said Five Months Sober and Crying. Porto could sense War excitedly peering behind him. The screen crackled and transitioned to what looked like a novelty restaurant. Big cartoonish animals from far-off planets popping out of dense faux flora. Porto saw a man approach the centre of the cleared-out floor. A massive, old-looking guy, about the size of the creatures. His board glinted. And then he began.

Porto felt his chest warm. He’d seen other boarders go in, but the giant on the screen straight parodied them. He took dusty tricks, banished them into the ooze, and constructed something else. It was honest and humorous. It was magnificent. The man finished and rolled past the camera, smiling. The screen cut to black and said, in bold white letters, Cookham.

- I asked my cousin and we don’t even know if it’s a name or a place, Pissbucket said.

That night Porto woke up to his right foot cramping. He held it out and yelped pathetically, eventually thinking to jump up and walk around. Forsaking his sleep, he packed up his board and a few changes of clothes. He thought of War sitting in the pod day-after-day. Then he quietly left the house and walked across dark fields nestled in the hills behind the Docks.

Approaching dawn revealed Porto’s objective. He found the Hopper sitting by his cousin’s shed. It was a battered vehicle with two long legs that supported a spherical chamber. He pushed a key into its ankle and its legs bent, the hatch opening up. Porto tossed his bag and jumped in after it.

Porto buckled in and the Hopper hatch closed. He sat in darkness for a few seconds, a video feed of the outside world soon lighting up the interior. A console in front of him flickered and projected a set of arcane topographies. Propping up the directions Pissbucket provided, to her cousin’s place in Moonshine, he rummaged about for a user’s manual and found a modified shock rod. Remembering his own cousin’s habits, Porto hastily jammed in coordinates until the Hopper went quiet. He felt himself slowly lowered. Then the Hopper jolted up and landed harshly a few fields across. Alive, Porto spent some time pitifully nodding to himself until he forced a laugh and kept going.

Farmland led to seaside cliffs so that Porto finally saw his destination, a wide strait between his island and the next. He scanned the sky and sea for local org forces. Grinning, he set his coordinates to the other side. Just the one hop over the altitude limit and he’d be right.

The Hopper launched and plopped into the strait. Porto watched the video short as he fainted and let the currents move him.

A banging noise woke him. Something wedged the hatch open and arms hauled him out of the wreckage. He lay on a pebble beach surrounded by light and stink. Pushing himself up, he looked back and saw his Hopper tangled in fishing nets. Forward, the beach became grass and there squatted a group of odd people in hats so wide they concealed their shoulders. They looked like dirty pigeons huddled together, squashing their heads into their chests. Porto decided to walk in another direction.

- You cannot run, a voice said.

- You have trespassed on sacred ground, another said.

- Troy Town! Troy Town! Another.

Porto looked back at them.

- Watch me, he said.

He marched up the beach.

- Wait! We have your board, one said.

Porto walked back and stood before the group. They sat around a labyrinth constructed from stones and pebbles on the grass. One of them, presumably the leader, stood up and flourished about. They had piercing green eyes.

- Foolish of you to tangle in our nets. On the observation of the Feast of the Salty Angler of LaForge, no less. All witnesses to these proceedings must be initiated or die. Navigate this path and we shall allow you entry, the leader said, gesturing at the maze.

- No, Porto said.

- No indeed! Our lives are strictly bound. No family. No society. No ships. No eating out and admiring the hotties around you. No twirling your bejewelled fingers as you enjoy snacks at a friend’s dandy dress-up. No interplanetary terminals and their soothingly cosmopolitan advertisements. No, indeed. Yes to duty. Yes to cold rain. Yes to a life of true knowledge. Say yes. Say no. Regardless, you shall be one of us, the leader said.

- No, Porto said.

- We have your board, the leader said.

- Don’t need it, Porto said.

- You’re a terrible yamboarder, the leader said.

- Huh? Porto said.

- Oh! The boy thinks he’s special, a crony said.

- Hah! Well then, you villain. If you’re too good for the labyrinth, why not face me in the bowl? The leader said.

He emphatically turned about and sauntered over a low hill. Porto looked for an exit, but he heard a shock prod buzzing behind him. He followed the group and saw that the hill overlooked a large bowl made of a dark, smooth material. It steeply dipped towards a hole in its centre.

- Where does the hole go? Porto said.

The leader produced a board from inside his cloak. Someone tossed Porto’s board at his feet.

- We compete simultaneously. The best wins and exits the bowl at the top. If that’s you, you can roll away from here. The loser can only go down. If you lose, you will be reborn and join us, the leader said.

Porto tried to smile. He knew he could board, but this was all-in-all stressful. The leader kept twirling about and squatting. The group lined up around the bowl and drew out their own boards that they slapped the edges with. The prod still at his back, Porto said,

- Hang on, hang on! I’m happy to show off, but I think you should understand the context. I like to deconstruct your typical…

He felt a shove and entered the bowl. The leader zoomed past him and arced about to impeccably grind the top rim. Porto looked back, face-planted, and went gurgling down the hole.