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Gavin G. Smith
In memory of “Fast” Eddie Clark (1950–2018)
Phil “Philthy Animal” Taylor (1954–2015)
Ian “Lemmy” Fraser Kilmister (1945–2015)
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I
LEMMY MADE A grunting noise as he looked around at the train station he’d found himself in. The air was filled with steam and soot coated the ceiling. The air had the sepia quality of an old photograph. He was no expert but he was reasonably sure that the architecture was nineteenth century European Orientalism. It was only when he saw the gleaming steam locomotive at the head of the luxurious blue carriages that bore the twin golden lions of the Compagnie Internationale des Wagons-Lits that he realised where he was: Sirkeci Railway Station, Istanbul. More to the point, the train he was looking at was the Orient Express. This was clearly a dream but a surprisingly detailed one: the noise of the bustle, the smell of burning coal mixing with that of Turkish food from the station’s restaurant, he could even tell he was close to a large body of water. It was still a dream, however. Rockstar notwithstanding he’d never been able to afford to travel on the Orient Express, though he’d always wanted to.
He smiled, enjoying the moment, real or otherwise, and slid his hand into the pocket of his denim jacket. That was when he felt the ticket.
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II
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To the uniformed conductor he’d been Mssr Kilminster. It wasn’t his favourite thing but the guy was just doing his job. The conductor had taken his long case, shown him on board and escorted him through the cramped corridors, polished wood on one side, glass on the other.
“Fucking Lemmy!” The voice fractured the serene atmosphere of the train.
Lemmy tried not to groan. He was grateful for every single last one of his fans. He’d talk to them whenever but there was a time and a place for the shouting. Still, he plastered a smile on his face and turned around.
The long hair, tattoos and worn 1916 Tour T-shirt told Lemmy that the kid was an actual fan and not just somebody who’d heard of the Ace of Spades a few times.
“You’re like a fucking god, man!” the fan cried as he pushed past the conductor. Up close, Lemmy noticed the man was older than he’d initially thought. No teenager, possibly even in his mid-thirties.
“Nice to meet you,” Lemmy growled and offered his hand but the fan grabbed him in a hug. Lemmy didn’t like this kind of personal space invasion but, conscious of his surroundings, he slapped the fan on the back, breaking the clinch as quickly as was politic.
“Oh man, I can’t believe you’re here! Lemmy in the flesh. I’ve seen you guys so many times! I’ve got so much to talk to you about. What’s it like being a rock-god!?” He pointed at him. “You sung, the song man, the song, Fuck Smells Like Teen Spirit! Ace of Spades is the anthem!”
There were other people struggling with luggage towards them. They all looked oddly familiar to Lemmy but he couldn’t quite place them.
“You on the train?” Lemmy asked. The fan nodded. “Well look, let’s talk later. We can have a drink.”
The fan rocked back as though stung.
“Why you gotta’ be like that?” he demanded.
The conductor was staring at his polished shoes, clearly uncomfortable.
“What do you mean?” Lemmy asked.
“You’re trying to fob me off!”
“No, look, I’m just trying to get settled in, and so are all these other people,” Lemmy told him. He’d had this kind of thing happen before, but rarely had it turned so quickly.
Suddenly the fan was in his face.
“Fucking sell out!” he spat and then pushed past.
Lemmy had to force his anger down. He didn’t need respect from anyone but if you couldn’t manage common-fucking-courtesy you were just an entitled little prick.
“Mssr,” The conductor said gesturing towards his cabin.
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III
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The incident with the fan had a left a bit of a sour taste in Lemmy’s mouth. He’d remained in his beautifully appointed cabin as the train had skirted the Sea of Marmara before heading inland. He’d tried reading but couldn’t settle to Psmith Sorts it Out, despite Wodehouse being one of his favourites. He was restless and he needed a smoke and wanted a drink. Grabbing his hat he headed for the restaurant car and the bar.
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Making his way down the sleeper car’s narrow corridor he found a thin, bespectacled, gawky looking guy, wearing a suit that wouldn’t have been out of place in a 1950’s dance hall. He was standing in the corridor looking out the window over the plains at the snow capped mountains in the distance.
“’Scuse me buddy,” Lemmy said.
“Oh sure,” the kid drawled, he couldn’t have been more than twenty-five, as he pushed himself against the glass so Lemmy could squeeze by. Lemmy guessed Texas by the accent and again something felt familiar about him but he pushed on, wanting to visit with Captain Jack.
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Lemmy wandered past the linen, leather and polished brass art-deco splendour of the dining room and into the bar area, which wouldn’t have been out of place in the most luxurious hotel. He tried to ignore the muzak version of Good Golly Miss Molly that the pianist was playing on the baby grand.
There were a few people sat around the lounge. He noticed the fan there but he just crossed his arms and looked away. Fuck him, Lemmy decided.
Once again the other people in the bar looked vaguely familiar and the fact that Lemmy couldn’t place them was starting to irritate him. It seemed consistent with dream logic, however. He’d remember who they were when he woke up and probably kick himself if they were somebody he wanted to talk to. It’d be less important if they were all arseholes, however.
“Jack and Coke,” Lemmy told the barman. He was immediately suspicious of the man’s contrite expression.
“I am sorry, mssr, we do not carry Jack Daniels, we have a number of fine malts?”
It was something he should have expected. He wasn’t at the Rainbow after all. This place was clearly too posh for Captain Jack. His sigh was a rasping growl. The barman raised an eyebrow. Lemmy reached into his jacket and pulled out a packet of Marlborough Reds.
“I regret, mssr–” the barman started.
“No smoking, right?” Lemmy muttered.
The barman just nodded apologetically.
Lemmy rolled his eyes and not for the first time considered that people were so scared of dying they were destroying all the pleasures of living.
“Psst!”
Lemmy looked around. The furtive-looking guy trying to get his attention was thin to the point of emaciated, stubble covered his chin and neck and he had lank, shoulder-length hair. He wore a corduroy suit and floral pattern shirt and looked almost as out of place in the Orient Express’s bar as Lemmy himself did. He wouldn’t have looked out of place in Piccadilly in the 70s, however. He was the very caricature of a drug dealer.
“Yeah?” Lemmy asked.
The dealer gestured for him to move closer. Lemmy strode over and sat at his table.
“What you got for me?” Lemmy asked, trying to mask his distaste. It would have been hypocritical for him to condemn the dealer given his on-going use of amphetamines but this man just screamed habitual opiate abuser and Lemmy remembered finding a body in a bathtub.
A bright red can of cola appeared on the glass-topped polished mahogany table. Lemmy looked down at the can and then back up at the dealer.
“Well it’s a start.”
A litre bottle of Jack Daniels followed.
“Nice.”
“I’ve got what you want,” the dealer told him. His accent was all London. “Speed, bennies, dexies, you name it I’ve got it.”
“Good to know,” Lemmy told him. He gave it some thought. “Just the Jack and the Coke.” For the first time in a long time he actually wanted to sleep.
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IV
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Lemmy sat bolt upright in the bed. Her name on his lips. She’d been waiting behind his eyelids, his beautiful dancer who’d come back from Beirut with an H habit. He rubbed his eyes and then ran his fingers through his hair. It’d been so long. He still remembered pushing the door to the bathroom open and seeing her arm lying limp over the edge of the bath.
“Fuck,” he muttered. It was a dream, a flashback he hadn’t had for so long. Perhaps getting sleep, in what was clearly a dream, had been a bad idea. Speed, on the other hand, was starting to look like an excellent one.
He’d settle for a cigarette for the time being. Even by Lemmy’s standards the dealer seemed a little too seedy, or maybe just too much of a cliché, his presence here on the train, along with that of the fan, confused Lemmy a little, on the other hand it was a dream.
The conductor hadn’t been at his post when Lemmy peeked out of his cabin, so he’d risked heading out into the corridor in only his Y-fronts, after all it had gone two-in-the-morning. They were up in the mountains now, somewhere in Bulgaria. Despite the darkness he could make out the snow-covered rock flashing past the window. He cranked down one of the windows only to be blasted by a gust of sub-arctic wind. He was freezing but committed. He sparked up a cigarette.
“Hey stud.” Female, LA accent.
Lemmy turned to look. She was gorgeous. Mixed race, tall, slim, but full-breasted and showing it off in a corseted top, long braided hair running down her back. Tight jeans and boots finished off her rock queen ensemble. She looked like the matron goddess of every female rock fan the world over. She was perfect and she had an unlit cigarette in one hand.
“Got a light?” she asked.
Lemmy handed her his Zippo, using the time she spent lighting her cigarette to appreciate her more fully. She handed the lighter back and then exhaled, a half-smile on her face, fully aware that she had just been inspected. She returned the favour by looking down at Lemmy’s Y-fronts.
“It’s cold,” Lemmy told her. She just laughed. He liked this chick. “What’s your name?” he asked.
“What do you want it to be?” she asked.
He almost said, Susan, but she’d been dead for more than forty years now. There must have seen something in his expression, however. Her smile became more sympathetic.
“Thanks for the light,” she said and turned away, heading back down the corridor in a cloud of cigarette smoke. Lemmy smiled as he watched her arse. She glanced back at him.
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V
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Shouting woke him up the second time. He wasn’t sure if he’d been dreaming, or just remembering playing poker with a demon. He was coming to the conclusion that he should have gone with the speed and stayed awake. Sleep was a bad idea and he suspected that he’d always known this. He could hear cries of alarm from out in the corridor. He heard a number of different voices speaking in rapid, urgent French and Italian. He could feel the steady movement of the train over the tracks underneath him, so at least they hadn’t crashed.
He climbed out of bed, opened the door a crack and peered down the corridor. He saw a number of the train’s personnel grouped around a cabin further down the sleeper carriage, towards the restaurant car. They were staring into the cabin, horror written all over their faces. The conductor glanced his way and then all but ran towards him.
“Mssr Kilminster, Missr Kilminster! It is murder!”
That woke him up.
“Sorry to hear that,” he told the conductor as the little man reached Lemmy’s cabin.
“You must find the murderer!” the conductor insisted.
“What?”
“You’re the famous detective, yes?”
“No, I’m the bass player in a rock’n’roll band,” he growled but whatever he was saying and what the conductor was hearing appeared to be two very different things. The little man had grabbed Lemmy’s arm and was trying to pull him out into the corridor.
“Hold on, hold on!” Lemmy protested. “At least let me get my clothes on.”
Reluctantly the conductor relinquished his hold on him. Lemmy retreated into his cabin. He had no real idea why he was getting dressed or humouring the conductor, beyond the feeling that he should go along with this bizarre dream. When he’d had enough he’d force himself to wake up.
“Yeah, he’s definitely fucked,” Lemmy opined. Somebody had painted the sleeper cabin red. It brought back unpleasant memories of the murder of an old housemate. Most of the wounds were on the victim’s torso, there were a few on his legs and his arms as well. The latter, Lemmy suspected, were defensive wounds but he only knew this because he’d seen a few cop shows in his time. The victim looked as though he’d been torn at by wild animals. His face had largely been left alone. Something about his grey face made Lemmy think the man had been old before his time, worn down by life. Short-haired, clean-shaven, Lemmy guessed the victim was in his seventies. There was a worn bloodstained suit hanging in the cabin’s wardrobe.
“Who is he?” Lemmy asked.
“Ian Fraser,” the conductor told him.
Lemmy was more than a little taken aback when he heard the name.
“He was a commercial traveller,” the conductor continued.
More alarm bells were ringing but it was only when he saw the boots, so out of place with the rest of the victim’s clothes that he started to realise what was going on. Mr Fraser’s cowboy boots were Hollywood Riff-Raff, handmade by Pascal, just like Lemmy’s own.
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VI
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The train’s staff had worked out which of the passengers had an alibi and presented Lemmy with the four who didn’t. That left him with the fan, the dealer, the woman and the gawky-looking Texan with the specs. It was all nonsense of course but Lemmy had decided to go along with it because who doesn’t love a detective story? Besides, now he knew who the victim was he wanted to know who’d killed him.
He had decided to conduct the interviews in the observation car at the back of the train. He suspected they were somewhere in dreaming-Croatia high up in the mountains again, bright winter sun making the snow gleam. Through the windows of the observation car, Lemmy could see the train curving out in front of him, smoke rising from the locomotive’s funnel into a clear blue sky as he took another drag on his cigarette. It was a beautiful day.
The door to the otherwise empty observation car opened and the conductor escorted the fan in. He dropped down into the chair opposite Lemmy like a grumpy teenager.
“Someone gets killed and you wanna blame the guy with the long hair and the heavy metal T-shirt,” he snapped.
Lemmy gave this some thought.
“You know who I am, right?”
“Anyway, fuck that guy,” the fan snapped, “he was a suit, the man, the enemy.”
“He was a person. We can’t all live the life. You don’t know what he was like, what his responsibilities were.” The words had all but come as a surprise to Lemmy.
“Fucking sell out,” the fan snapped, contempt written all over his face.
“You said that already.”
Lemmy studied him for a few moments. The fan squirmed under his gaze, crossing his arms in another teenaged throwback move.
“I’m grateful,” Lemmy finally said. The fan’s eyes widened, Lemmy didn’t think it was what he’d expected to hear. “Not just to you, to all of you. Your support enabled us to do what we loved.”
“Could’ve fooled me,” the fan muttered.
“I’m not going to die for you.”
The fan looked him straight in the eyes. The teenager was gone. There was something older, darker there now.
“You sure about that?” he asked.
Lemmy took another drag on his cigarette.
“Yeah, I’m sure,” he said and exhaled. “It wasn’t you, was it?” The fan just looked down, it was enough. “Look kid,” Lemmy continued, “What you’re feeling, that resentment. It’s not me that you’re angry with. You need to find out what’s making you unhappy and deal with it.”
“It’s too late for that, too late for all of us.”
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VII
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The conductor showed the dealer in next. By now the observation car contained a thick fog of cigarette smoke, tinged blue in the cold sunshine. Lemmy had a Jack and Coke in highball glass on the table next to him.
The dealer sat down, radiating the nervous scumbag entitlement of a criminal used to being questioned.
“Why would I kill a customer?” he demanded before Lemmy could ask him anything.
Lemmy stubbed a cigarette out and lit another one.
“I figured it’d be the speed that gets me in the end. Make my heart explode, something like that,” Lemmy growled. “Or my liver would pack in,” he said nodding towards the nearly empty bottle of Jack. “I’ll need more of that by the way.” The Dealer just nodded. “Maybe the coffin nails.” Lemmy held up the smoking cigarette clutched between nicotine stained fingers. Even as he said this last he knew there was some thought he couldn’t quite grasp, something he couldn’t remember.
“Nobody made you do any of it,” the Dealer said.
“I know that.” Lemmy closed his eyes for a moment, remembering pushing the bathroom door further open and seeing her in the water. The needle lying on the rotting linoleum next to the bathtub. “I’ve got diabetes, you know?” The dealer just watched him, uncertain, not sure where this was going. Lemmy tapped the red can next to the bottle of Jack with one of his rings. “Maybe it’ll be the sugar, huh?”
It was clear the dealer didn’t know how to respond.
“You’re not the killer,” Lemmy pronounced. The Dealer actually looked relieved. “But there’s something of the parasite about you.”
“Fucking hypocrite,” the dealer spat.
“Maybe, but you ever sell to someone when you knew you shouldn’t? When you knew they couldn’t handle it? When they were going off the deep end? Ever cut your product with something bad?”
“They made their choices. I don’t have to listen to this.” The Dealer was on his feet, heading for the door.
“Hey!” Lemmy snapped.
The dealer stopped and turned to look at him.
“Leave the speed.”
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VIII
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The door to the observation carriage was pushed open a crack. Lemmy looked up, expecting the conductor to escort the woman in for her interview. It was the interview he was most looking forward to. Nobody came in, however.
“Who’s there?” he demanded. He could make out movement in the corridor beyond. Then something was spinning through the air. He cried out as he felt a sharp pain in his arm. He looked down to see a razorblade glued between two coins embedded there, blood starting to stain his denim jacket.
“Motherfucker!”
He was on his feet racing for the door, wrenching it open. He saw someone disappear into the adjoining sleeper carriage. He didn’t get a good look at them but there was something wrong with their shape and once again he had that strange feeling of familiarity. He raced after them but the sleeping carriage’s corridor was empty by the time he got there. He stalked up the corridor. The door to the third sleeper cabin opened as he passed. He started to turn but someone grabbed him and dragged him in. Lemmy shrugged them off and swung round to face them. The woman.
“‘The fuck?” he demanded.
She looked down at the razor blade imbedded in his arm.
“They’re trying to scare you off,” she told him.
“Who’s they, darlin’?” he demanded.
She just stared up at him.
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Lemmy, covered in sweat, cried out as he came deep inside her and collapsed back into the bed breathing hard. She rolled off him and landed next to him laughing.
“So did I do it?” she asked. “Am I the murderer?”
Lemmy laughed and lit up a cigarette. She took it from him, inhaling deeply and then held it to his lips. He took a drag studying her as he did so.
“Maybe you’re a femme fatale,” he said.
“You notice you never get a homme fatale,” she mused.
Lemmy chuckled.
“You’re the reason why, y’know?” he told her.
“Me?” she asked.
He was looking out the window; the vibrations of the train shaking the snow from the tops of the fir trees as it passed. For a moment, as she’d straddled him, she could have been Susan.
“All of you,” he told her, “I loved every last one of you.” He considered his statement. “Well maybe not every one of you.”
“Loved?” she asked. “Past tense?”
He turned back to her.
“I need to use the loo, darlin’.”
She pointed at the polished wooden door of the sleeper cabin’s tiny bathroom.
“Mi casa, su casa,” she said.
“I need a shit love, I can’t do that to you. I’ll be back,” he told her as wriggled into his Y-fronts.
“For round two?”
“You might just be the death of me.” He stood up. “Thanks for this,” he said holding up his wounded arm. She’d bound it with a hand towel from the bathroom.
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They were on him as soon as he opened the door. Grey-skinned, clawed hands grabbing at him, pulling him down the corridor. Lemmy tried to break free, thrashing around he caught a glimpse of them. Warpigs, in their pickelhaube helmets. Their leader a snarling, tusked, wolf’s skull, old Snaggletooth himself. Album art come to life. He fought like he hadn’t fought in years. Lashing out at them as he tried to break free. The rear of the train fell away to be replaced by roaring flames in unnatural colours.
Someone grabbed his legs. He looked back, expecting to see another one of the warpigs. Instead he saw the woman. She threw herself backwards holding onto his ankles. Somehow she managed to break their grip and the two of them landed hard on the carpet. His heart beating faster than Mikkey’s double kick drums. The train had returned to normal. The warpigs, Snaggletooth and the flames had all gone.
“Enough of this shit,” Lemmy muttered.
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IX
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It was night again when Lemmy walked into the dining car carrying his long case. He’d asked the conductor to gather everyone, not just the suspects. He still couldn’t remember quite who the other passengers were but he was starting to work out their identities now that he knew what was happening. He nodded to the woman as he passed and she smiled back. The dealer wouldn’t meet his eyes. The fan stood up in Lemmy’s path. Lemmy put the long case down on the table that the bespectacled young, gawky-looking Texan was sitting at and squared up to the fan.
“I’m sorry, man,” the fan said.
“Both of us lived up to our side of the compact,” Lemmy said and hugged him.
Then he sat down at the table opposite the gawky Texan.
“By a process of elimination,” Lemmy said and poured himself a tall Jack and Coke.
“So I’m the murderer?” he asked. Except he wasn’t from Texas any more, he was from Memphis. Sunglasses had replaced spectacles on a now fleshy face. He wore a gold lamé jumpsuit.
“Well it all started with you,” Lemmy said. He was chopping up lines of powder with the razorblade the woman had dug out of his arm.
“Bit of cliché, isn’t it?” A Scouse accent now, Christ as a Liverpudlian.
Lemmy snorted a line of speed, then another in quick succession. The amphetamines were not what they had become, a requirement of functioning, the need to stay awake as long as possible to crack the bone and suck the marrow. Instead it felt like the first time: neon lightning playing across the tired grey matter of his cerebellum.
“Rock’n’Roll didn’t kill me,” he told the Man in Black sat opposite. “I’m responsible for my actions. I don’t need to hide behind nothing.” He lit up a cigarette and flipped the case open. Standing up, he removed the Rickenbacker bass from its case. “Difficult to mourn a life lived,” he said and downed the rest of his Jack and Coke.
He turned from the table and walked towards the front of the dining carriage, except now it was starting to resemble the Rainbow Bar and Grill on the Strip.
He walked past Jimi, whom he still missed, and Janis and Jim. He walked past Bon, and Phil and John, who hadn’t been ready for the 80s. He walked past other members of the 27 Club, Brian, Kurt, Amy and Robert, poor kids all of them. Past Sid and Nancy, the famous ones, the not-so famous ones and the so-called nobodies that he still remembered. He knew them all now.
Susan sat in a booth close to the stage.
Filthy and Eddie were waiting for him as he plugged in. Eddie started in on the intro to Motörhead.
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Metal warped as the Locomotive pulling the train through the blizzard became a snarling tusked wolf’s skull, flames in its mouth, burning coals behind its eyes.
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Lemmy stood under his microphone, head up, and told them who he was.