GSX Fiction - Possession is 9 / 10ths...

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POSSESSION IS NINE TENTHS OF THE LAW

I never wanted the bike in the first place. Oh yes, I know a lot of people would be chuffed to bits to open their garage door and have a mint condition Suzuki Katana sitting there, not a mark on it, the casings as flawless as the day the bike left Japan. There it sits, the big rectangular headlight and angular fairing making it look like a beast crouching to spring, silver paintwork gleaming even in the half-light of the dim garage. Each morning for three days I went through this ritual; I unlocked my garage door, flicked the up and over door with a swift movement of my arm, and looked at the Katana parked proudly in the middle of the floor.

But I have never owned a Katana.

It's my garage, and I am the only person who has keys, and no-one has broken in, but until last week, I had never seen this bike before. I walked round it for possibly the thousandth time, and marvelled how a twenty year old motorcycle can be in such incredible condition. It is a GSX1100S, 1980 or 1981 judging by the numberplate. The tyres are brand new, without even the patina of dust that a single turn will bring. No-one has even sat on this bike - the seat is still plump and sleek with a thin yellowing veneer of plastic across it.

And it's not mine.

A week, yes, it's a week since I opened the garage and found that I seemed to have acquired a companion for the GS550 which I've used day in and day out for the last four years. There is no way that you could call the GS pristine or spotless, I think it was born grimy and matt black.

The first morning I opened the garage I staggered backwards reeling into the sunshine. I always park the GS in the centre of the room, laziness I guess, it's easy to ride in and wheel out, and nothing else needs to go in there. But this time the GS was parked close to the far wall, the bars grazing the concrete blockwork, while the Kat stood in its traditional place.

For one brief, mad moment I thought that perhaps someone had sneaked in and painted the GS silver in the night, although the Katana and old Suzuki are worlds apart in looks, styling, and well, I hate to say it, class.

If they were girls, then the GS would be a lapdancer in a seedy club and the Kat would be doing pirouettes at the Royal Ballet. I stood out in the sunshine, staring into the gloom of the garage. None of my friends owned - or ever had owned - a Katana, and certainly not one like this.

Besides, as I said, I had the only keys to the garage door, and having carefully checking for any signs of tampering, I had to conclude that either I was completely mad and imagining it, or someone, somehow, had got hold of the keys to my lock-up.

I walked slowly back into the house, leaving the door up. Just inside the front door was a small china bowl with a mess of keys in it. I tipped the bowl over, and sorted through them. Picking up two keys held together in a metal slip ring, I looked at them wonderingly. These were the spare keys to the garage. They were here, not lost, not left in the street for someone to find and strike lucky.

Here, and no one else had been in this house except for me for almost a month. I even dismissed the idea of someone having hit upon a duplicate key; I fitted the locks to the garage when I first moved here, two different kinds of locks from different manufacturers.

Besides, people broke into places and stole things…

That was one of the reasons my friends had laughed at me for fitting good quality, heavy duty locks, as if anyone would want to steal the GS. Yes, if you went to the trouble and risk of breaking into a place you made sure you took enough away to make it worth your while. A bead of cold sweat ran down my spine.

Perhaps that's what happened. Perhaps someone had stolen this bike, realised they had nowhere to hide it, and had stashed it here. I ran at full tilt out of the house and down the path, slamming the garage door shut almost before my hands touched it. I leant with my back against the door, as if I had to hold it shut, and closed my eyes.

If someone had stolen it, then what would they do when they came back and found that I had discovered it? My face has never been my fortune, but I quite like it as it is, and I didn't want it rearranged. Worse even, what if the police found it before they did? How the hell would I prove I had nothing to do with it, especially with another bike in the garage?

Well, my fingerprints wouldn't be on it… But it was so gleamingly clean that no-one's fingerprints were on it, and I could imagine a smug police officer leaning over me and telling me just that. I opened the garage again, hoping that it had been a strange, crazy, waking dream, that I would be looking only at a ratty old Suzuki and a few cardboard boxes.

The Katana smirked at me.

I edged round it, not wanting to get close to it, and manoeuvred the GS out into the light. Once the door was shut, and the GS fired up, I felt like I could breathe again, and by halfway through the day at work I was beginning to think it had all been a strange hallucination. I even started to laugh at myself by it, and I had almost forgotten about it on the ride home.

It was still there, looking even cleaner and shinier that it had that morning. I groaned aloud, and then silence, the only noise the slowing tick of the GS engine cooling. In the distance I heard a bike, but I was too dazed and too slow to slam the door down in time.

Simon brought his bike to a halt beside the GS and peered into the garage.

'Bloody hell, where'd you get that?' he said, as he struggled to get his helmet off. I had a few seconds, while he was fighting straps and lining and scarves to think what I could say. A few seconds wasn't enough, I doubt a few hours would have been enough.

'Um,' I coughed, ' It's not mine… I'm just looking after it.'

'Who for?' I wasn't thinking far enough ahead for that question.

'Oh, who for? A friend.' I stuttered. Simon gave me a sideways look, after all we all know each other and each other's friends and bikes. He started to examine the bike more closely, and I knew he would start asking questions for which I had no answers. I heard the snitch as Simon sprang the seat catch, and then heard him laugh.

'You sly old bugger!' he said, whistling through his teeth. I looked at him. He was holding a piece of paper and grinning at me.

'A friend's, eh? Like hell! So where have you been hiding this little beauty all these years?'

'Hiding?' I said, stunned. I had no idea what he was talking about.

'This.' He waved a hand at the Katana. 'This bike you've owned for, what…' he looked down at the paper, 'Twenty years. How the hell did you afford something like this when you were eighteen? And where has it been for…'

I was saved more questions by his sudden squeal. He had stepped back against the bike and then, equally swiftly, leapt away from it clutching his hand. Blood started to drip onto the dusty floor. We both looked at the bike; the seat still up, an open mouth it seemed.

Wrapping his injured hand in one of his many scarves, Simon leaned forward to examine what he had cut his hand on, but neither of us could see anything sharp enough to inflict that sort of damage. He slowly unwound the rapidly bloodying rag, and we both looked at his hand in silence.

Simon wiped the welling blood away, but what lay beneath wasn't a cut.

It was a bite.

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After Simon had gone, finally taking my advice to get the wound looked at by his doctor at the very least, I remembered the paper he had found in the seat compartment. I closed the seat, stretching a single finger over to push it down, not wanting to get near it.

The paper lay near the back wheel, a dusty footprint on it where either Simon or I - me I think - had stood on it in all the confusion. I picked it up, and wiped the dust off on my jeans.

It was a logbook. It was a logbook for a Suzuki Katana GSX1100S, with the same registration mark, and (I bent my head to look) the same engine and frame numbers. It had had one owner since new.

And that owner was me.

I have no idea how long I stood in the half-light, looking blankly at the official form which had my name and address printed on the top left hand side. Perhaps it was an elaborate practical joke by my mates I thought, perhaps Simon was in on it too.

They were probably all down the pub while Simon told them how I'd tried to explain it away, and laughing their heads off. The logbook looked genuine enough, but then so do half my qualifications. Yes, it must be a hoax. A very complicated hoax, and God knows where they'd got the Kat from, but a hoax nonetheless.

Well, two or however many could play at that game. It was in my garage, the logbook said it was mine, then it was mine, wasn't it? And if it was mine, then… The keys were in the ignition. More evidence that it wasn't stolen. I smiled to myself at having rumbled the joke.

I wiped a tiny spot of blood off the fairing where Simon had swung his hand round in shock, and the engine fired first time, echoing round the half-empty space. Gingerly I edged it out of the garage, nicked it into first and let the clutch out. I have never heard a bike purr, and laughed at those who said fanciful things, but this bike, well, it purred.

I rode for miles that night, and from the first few yards the bike felt like an extension of me, as if I had indeed been riding it for all the years I was supposed to have owned it. The sky darkened, and I eventually - and reluctantly - turned for home.

I edged round the far side of my town, deciding to give it a final thrash down the dual carriageway before winding through the backstreets to my house. After all, no doubt everyone would turn up to take it away tomorrow, so I might as well have some fun before they did. I knew that the old Suzuki superbikes were quick, but I was surprised by just how fast it would go.

So was the patrol car I passed in a layby. When I heard the siren wail behind me, I panicked. I no longer thought the bike was stolen, but I didn't know who it belonged to, and how did I explain that? I felt the slight rustle of the logbook tucked in my inside pocket, but I guessed that showing the police a forged document was going to land me in more trouble.

Resigned to the fact that I was deep enough in, I pulled the bike over to the side of the road. The policeman took his time getting out of the car, putting his hat on, picking up his notebook, all the usual psychological tricks to make you even more nervous.

'In a hurry, sir?' he said with mock geniality. I shook my head. 'Well, you seemed to be in a hurry to me. Any idea just how fast you were going?' he paused, 'Sir.'

Again I could only shake my head. He changed tack.

'Nice bike. You don't see many of these, especially in this condition.' He walked round it, and he was right. Despite the miles I had put on the bike tonight there wasn't a speck of road grime or dust anywhere to be seen.

'Had it long?' The copper had to say it twice before I could nod. He was beginning to get fed up with my mute act, but I found I couldn't say anything.

'Okay, lets have some identification.'

His tone was sharper, and I automatically felt in my pocket where I kept my wallet. My hand closed round the logbook and, in spite of my head telling me not to, I brought it out. It was too late, I couldn't stuff it back into my jacket with arousing suspicion, so with a sudden overwhelming wave of misery sweeping over me, I handed him the document.

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'That's fine, sir.' I blinked as he handed me back the logbook. 'Sorry, we have to do a PNC check in these cases, just in case it's stolen. You've owned it a long time, then…' He nodded at the Suzuki.

'Nice to see them kept up like this. Try and keep your speed down in the future, though.'

And he walked away. I watched the taillights of the police car disappear before I started the engine, and realised that I hadn't said a word through the whole interview. It was almost as if the bike had done the talking for me.

When I got home, the GS had been moved. I had left it against the far wall, where I had found it this morning, but now it was in the back corner, in the darkest part of the garage, almost as though it was cowering.

I parked the Katana in the centre, and stood looking at it for a second. If this was a joke, then it was getting more elaborate. It was one thing to park this bike on me, but to change the logbook into my name was another thing. Indeed, it was another thing, for if they'd just changed the ownership details it would say I'd only owned the bike for a week or a month or whatever.

Not twenty years. And there would be the details of the last keeper. But no, I was, apparently, the first registered keeper. And that's what the PNC check would have said, too.

Suddenly the Katana nestled against me and purred.

I took a step back in alarm, but realised it was only the headstock moving a little, and the purring merely the cooling of metal parts. When I took the GS to work the next day it coughed and spluttered all the way. It had never been anything other than reliable, and despite spending my lunch-hour tinkering, there seemed to be no reason for it. Going home was the same, and two streets away it stalled and refused to start again.

I pushed it, and stopped a couple of times to check it over, for it was becomingly increasingly difficult to move. As we got near the garage I was having to use all my strength to push it, and it seemed like it was seizing into a solid block, as if it was reluctant to go home.

By the time I got it into the garage I was exhausted, the sweat pouring off me. I looked at the Katana, sitting smugly in prime place, and decided to take it down the pub and return it to whichever of my friends had borrowed it. Enough was enough, and I wanted to know how they'd pulled it off.

But the Katana wouldn't start when I went back out to it. It was completely dead when I turned the key. An idea began to form in my head; if I went down to the pub and they knew I knew about the Kat, then someone might slide away and come and collect it while I was still drinking. That would give them an even bigger laugh. No doubt they'd even follow me home to see my face when I saw it was gone.

My face set in a grim smile. Fine, I'd find out who'd been in. I rooted around among the cardboard boxes until I found a sack of cement that was left over from some house stuff. I sprinkled it liberally over the floor until it formed a grey carpet. No one would be able to set foot in the garage without disturbing it.

Quite how this was going to identify the culprit I wasn't sure, but I felt a lot more satisfied having done something. I closed the door, and as it slammed shut I thought I heard a growl. A short, low growl. Probably a dog round the back of the garages, I thought, unconvinced.

Unable to face another minute working on a sick bike, I walked to the pub. It was three hours later when I left, more confused than ever. Everyone had denied any knowledge of the Katana despite my laughter, cajoling, anger and eventual bafflement. Simon had told them about it, and they were keen to know more about it, but in the end I had to accept that they didn't know anything.

When I turned into my road I heard the scream.

It wasn't human, and it wasn't animal. It was a highpitched, metal against metal screech that cut through me like a knife. I didn't even try to rationalise what it might be, I had never heard anything like that before, and I never want to again. It was the next morning when I unlocked the garage.

The Katana was in the middle of the garage, exactly where I had parked it, as if it was in the middle of the showroom.

But everywhere else was carnage. The GS was smashed into a thousand pieces.

Oil was sprayed up the walls, sharp pieces of metal were embedded into the floor and the ceiling, and there was nothing left that was recognisable as a bike. And the Katana was untouched.

Except… except for one speck of dark oil, in the same place from where I had wiped Simon's blood. And the cement was completely undisturbed.

No-one - no-one human - had been into the garage.

I closed the door and ran into the house. Only when I was inside the safety of the house, did I realise that I was shaking uncontrollably.

An hour and half a bottle of whiskey later I had calmed down a little. Taking a torch with me, I went out to the yard. I was walking as softly as possible, although I didn't know why. I could hear a curious crunching, like the noise of an impactor in a scrapyard, but I thought it must be the blood rushing in my head. I shone the torch around the garage. The Katana was in middle of the floor, and the floor was still covered by its untouched cement carpet.

But there was a lot less of the GS than there had been…

**** ****

That was four days ago, and I haven't left the house since. Two days ago I heard the GSX's engine fire up. And now I can hear her engine - I've started thinking of her as a female - running again, and I know she is waiting for me.

She could get into the garage, and she can get out. I look down at my hand and slowly unclench my fist to look at the garage keys.

And a Katana ignition key.

WORDS: WIZZKITT - ILLUSTRATION: LOUISE LIMB

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