Zoo City - By Lauren Beukes Page 0,30

swell.

"Is that the only contraband?" Amira says.

"Des is holding," S'bu indicates his friend. Des cringes, pulls out a bankie of weed and gingerly hands it over to Amira.

"What's wrong, sweetie?" Mark asks.

"Nah, it's just, we thought you were–" Des says. "The cops."

"Zombies," Arno says at the same time.

"Why would you be worried about the cops?"

"I dunno. Just. 'Cos." He waves a hand vaguely in the direction of the ashtray. There's a couple of video game boxes lying next to it, starring flesh-eating undead and aliens. One, Grand Theft Auto VI: Zootopia, features a badass in a hoodie, packing a shotgun with a snarling Panther by his side.

"You know this means we're going to have to search the house. Again."

"Whatever," S'bu says, and slumps back into the couch, picking up the controller and going right back to his game, a first-person slayer. He's playing a mini-skirted girl with spiky green hair and a machine-gun for an arm facing down shambling hordes of particularly monstrous aliens.

"Do you want to go back to rehab, S'bu?"

"Doesn't bother me." But I notice he flinches, enough to throw off his shot. On screen, an alien manages to gore his arm, knocking his health down to 89 per cent.

"This is Zinzi December. She wants to talk to you. Help her out," Mark says.

"It's for a story for a magazine. Credo?" I bluff.

"Oh yeah?" S'bu isn't even vaguely interested, but Des perks up dramatically.

"Credo cooks, bro," he says, nudging S'bu's arm. "You're in Credo, you're in. Hells yes, lady. My boy is down."

"Great," I say.

"Whatever, you clear it with these guys," S'bu says, still intent on his game.

"Oh, we're 'down'," Mark says. He whistles for the Mutt. The Dog jumps off the red pouf and immediately starts sniffing around the room with great seriousness, tail wagging. S'bu lifts his feet for the Dog as it snuffles around the bottom of the couch.

"Just seeds, man," says Des.

The Dog follows its nose out of the room, Mark and Amira behind it. We can hear them climbing the stairs. A minute later, there is the sound of objects being thrown around.

"Shid, dude, whad if she breags by shid?" Arno says.

"Then I'll buy you more shit. Will you shut up? You're wrecking my concentration."

Everyone is quiet for a moment. Des and Arno watch me watching S'bu kill aliens. Upstairs, there is more thudding. Impulsively, I shrug Sloth off onto the recently vacated pouf, squeeze in next to S'bu, and pick up Des's discarded controller.

"This is two player, right?"

"Yeah, but–"

"Killing aliens with S'bu Radebe. That's profile gold. Credo will love it."

"They're Cthul'mites, actually."

"Whatever. They all bleed the same." From the player screen, I select the huge black guy character with Mike Tyson tattoos on his face and whipblades mounted in his forearms. Nice to see game designers keeping up the stereotypes.

"You any good?" S'bu gives me a sideways glance.

"Fucking terrible. It's all you."

"Oh great." But he cracks the slightest of smiles.

"Anybone wand a beer?" Arno says, heading for the kitchen.

"Get them now before they're all confiscated," S'bu calls out after him.

"I'll have one," I shout, gutting a particularly loathsome specimen with slobbery jaws and elongated fingers with my whipblades. I'm already down to 46 per cent health. It's only when Arno comes back, cracking the bottles of Windhoek open with his teeth, and sets mine, foaming, on the table in front of me, that I realise what I've done.

"Oh thanks, but actually, I'm gonna skip." I barely manage to duck as an arachnidy thing with a wobbly glutinous mass on top, like the bastard love-child of a jellyfish and a spider, spews a cloud of mechanical insects at me. Luckily S'bu is there to liquidise it, and most of the insect cloud terminates in shrieking sparks.

"Our beer too good for ya?"

"No, it's just that I don't particularly want to go back to rehab either."

"No shit, man," Des says. "That place is ill. All full of whining junkies with the shivers."

"Abnd zombies," Arno adds, hopefully.

"Don't you guys have some place to be?" S'bu snaps.

"No, man. We're here for the duration."

"Seriously, I think I heard your moms calling."

"Dude. Uncool."

"Madoda. Take a hint and hamba."

"Fine. Come on, Arno, let's go aim for hadedas on the fourteenth hole."

"Bud I like hadedas."

"Gijima, fatty boomsticks. Can't you see I'm in the middle of an interview?"

Des grabs the set of clubs leaning against the wall by the fridge, and heads out, not bothering to pull on a shirt. He gives S'bu the finger as he goes. Arno follows, dragging his