The Bride Wore Black Leather

blocking out the stars in the sky, with not even a murmur of flapping wings.
    So if you want to cross from one side of the road to the other, you either have to do something quite appalling to a chicken . . . or do what everyone else does, and use the underpass. Walk down a flight of steps, travel through the simple concrete tunnel that passes beneath all the havoc and horrors of the traffic above. You’re a hell of a lot safer in the underpass than you ever are up on the street because all the underpass tunnels are monitored and protected by the Authorities, in the general interest. Can’t have the tourists coming to any harm before our many and voracious businesses have squeezed every last penny out of them.
    I strolled through the brightly lit corridor, and unlike on the street above, everyone was calm and polite and not in any way violent, and gave everyone else lots of room. Because each and every underpass is patrolled by unseen trained poltergeists. Courtesy of the Authorities. You’ll never see them coming, but if you make any kind of trouble, they’ll turn you inside out in a moment. And leave you that way. It’s surprising how long you can live in such a condition though that’s not necessarily a good thing. And that’s the standard punishment. Really piss off a poltergeist, and it will demonstrate that not only has it got a really nasty sense of humour, but also absolutely no restraints when it comes to experimenting with the human form in appalling ways.
    But they can’t be bothered to do anything about the graffiti artists. Apparently they consider them beneath their dignity. So the walls are covered with overlapping scrawls of names and boasts and urgent messages from the subconscious of the Nightside.
Meet the new Walker, same as the old Walker. Razor Eddie does it with surgical precision. Supersexuals of the world unite, you have nothing to lose but your inhibitions. Where have all the elves gone and who do we go to to say thanks?
And, a bit intriguingly,
Let the sunshine in.
    And, of course, the inevitable buskers. I think the poltergeists let them hang around to brighten up their endless job. But only as long as the musicians maintain a professional standard. The untalented and overambitious can often be seen hobbling out of the underpass with their instruments stuffed where the moon doesn’t shine. I dropped the odd coin in every other cap or outstretched hand I passed, on the grounds that the wheel turns for all of us, and karma can be a real bitch. The only difference between any of us and the homeless is one really bad day.
    The usual buskers lined the way, giving it their all, such as it was. A trio of Greek Muses were singing a ska version of the “Ballad of Eskimo Nell,” in close-part harmonies. Complete with gestures. A ventriloquist with a vampire dummy had the dummy singing “Love You till the Sun Comes Up Again,” while drinking a pint of blood. An old-fashioned ghost with its head stuck underneath its arm was singing “I Got You, Babe,” in a duet with itself. And a punk barber-shop quartet were making a real mess of that old punk favourite, “She Fucked Me with a Chain-saw and It felt Like a Kiss.” A little style can be a dangerous thing.
    I came up out of the Underground on the other side of the street and headed out of the naked jungle and into the expensively suited jungle of the business section. People started giving me even more room than before, often actually stepping aside to let me pass. Of course, they weren’t stepping aside for John Taylor, PI, but for the new Walker, representative of the Authorities. Those powerful but shadowy grey eminences who ran the Nightside, inasmuch as anyone did, or could. Some people faded back into dark doorways, or disappeared down even darker alleyways, and a few actually turned around abruptly and headed back the way they’d come. Part of me thought I could get used to this.
    I stopped for a moment, to consider my reflection in a shop-window to see if my new authority had changed me in any way. But the same shabby face looked back at me, a little more battered and hard-used as I headed towards the end of my thirties. The same long white trench coat, traditional armour for a tarnished knight-errant. Tall, dark, and handsome enough from a distance, that’s me, with cold eyes and a colder smile. And perhaps only I could see the beaten-in tiredness, from carrying so many burdens. I made a face, to keep me from getting