Something Rotten

  'And point two?' asked another board member. 'The public's positive and non-eatworthy perception of penguins in general?'

  'Not insurmountable, sir. If you recall, we had a similar problem marketing baby seal burgers, and they are now one of our most popular lines. I suggest we depict penguins as callous and unfeeling creatures who insist on bringing up their children in what is little more than a large chest freezer. Furthermore, the "endangered" marketing problem can be used to our advantage by an advertising strategy along the lines of "Eat them quick before they're all gone!'"

  'Or,' said another board member, '"Place a penguin in your kitchen – have a snack before extinction.'"

  'Doesn't rhyme very well, does it?' said a third. 'What about: "For a taste that's more distinct, eat a bird before it's extinct?'"

  'I preferred mine.'

  Jarvis sat down and awaited the CEO's thoughts.

  'It shall be so. Why not "Antarctica – the new Arctic" as a byline? Have our people in advertising put a campaign together. The meeting is over.'

  The board members closed their folders in one single synchronised movement and then filed in orderly fashion to the far end of the room, where a curved staircase led down. Within a few minutes only the CEO and Brik Schitt-Hawse remained. He placed his red-leather briefcase on the desk in front of me and looked at me dispassionately, saying nothing. For someone like Schitt-Hawse who loved the sound of his own voice, it was clear the CEO called every shot.

  'What did you think?' asked Goliath.

  'Think?' I replied. 'How about "morally reprehensible"?'

  'I believe you will find there is no moral good or bad, Miss Next. Morality can only be asserted from the safe retrospection of twenty years or more. Parliaments have far too short a life to do any long-term good. It is up to corporations to do what is best for everyone. The tenure of an administration may be five years – for us it can be several centuries, and none of that tiresome accountability to get in the way. The leap to Goliath as a religion is the next logical step.'

  'I'm not convinced, Mr Goliath,' I told him. 'I thought you were becoming a religion to evade the seventh Revealment of St Zvlkx.'

  He gazed at me with his piercing green eyes.

  'It's avoid, not evade, Miss Next. A trifling textual change but legally with great implications. We can legally attempt to avoid the future but not evade it. As long as we can demonstrate a forty-nine per cent chance that our future-altering attempts might fail, we are legally safe. The ChronoGuard are very strict on the rules and we'd be fools to try and break them.'

  'You didn't ask me up here to argue legal definitions, Mr Goliath.'

  'No, Miss Next. I wanted to have this opportunity to explain ourselves to you, one of our most vociferous opponents. I have doubts too, and if I can make you understand then I will have convinced myself that what we are doing is right, and good. Have a seat.'

  I sat, rather too obediently. Mr Goliath had a strong personality.

  'Humans are moulded by evolution to be short-termists, Miss Next,' he continued. His voice rumbled deeply and seemed to echo inside my head. 'We need only to see our children to reproductive age to be successful in a biological sense. We have to move beyond that. If we see ourselves as residents on this planet for the long term we need to plan for the long term. Goliath has a thousand-year plan for itself. The responsibility for this planet is far too important to leave to a fragmented group of governments, constantly bickering over borders and only looking towards their own self-interest. We at Goliath see ourselves not as a corporation or a government but as a force for good. A force for good in waiting. We have thirty-eight million employees at present; it isn't difficult to see the benefit of having three billion. Imagine everyone on the planet working towards a single goal – the banishment of all governments and the creation of one business whose sole function it is to run the planet, by people on the planet, for the people on the planet, equally and sustainable for all – not Goliath but Earth, Inc. A company with every member of the world holding a single, equal share.'

  'Is that why you're becoming a religion?'

  'Let's just say that your friend Mr Zvlkx has goaded us into a course of action that is long overdue. You used the word religion but we see it more as a single, unifying faith to bring all mankind together. One world, one nation, one people, one aim. Surely you can see the sense in that?'

  The strange thing was, I almost could. Without nations there would be no border disputes. The Crimean War alone had lasted for nearly 132 years, and there were at least a hundred smaller conflicts going on around the planet. Suddenly, Goliath seemed not so bad after all, and was indeed our friend. I was a fool not to realise it before.

  I rubbed my temples.

  'So,' continued the CEO in a soft rumble, 'I'd like to offer an olive branch to you right now and uneradicate your husband.'

  'In return,' added Schitt-Hawse, speaking for the first time, 'we would like for you to accept our full, frank and unreserved apology and sign our Standard Forgiveness Release Form.'

  I looked at them both in turn, then at the contract they had placed in front of me, then at Friday, who had put his fingers in his mouth and was looking up at me with an inquisitive air. I had to get my husband back, and Friday his father. There didn't seem any good reason not to sign.

  'I want your word you'll get him back.'

  'You have it,' replied the CEO.

  I took the offered pen and signed the form at the bottom.

  'Excellent!' muttered the CEO. 'We'll reactualise your husband as soon as possible. Good day, Miss Next, it was a very great pleasure to meet you.'

  'And you,' I replied, smiling and shaking both their hands. 'I must say I'm very pleased with what I've heard here today. You can count on my support when you become a religion.'

  They gave me some leaflets on how to join New Goliath, which I eagerly accepted. I was shown out a few minutes later, the shuttle to Tarbuck Graviport having been held on my account. By the time I had reached Tarbuck the mane grin had subsided from my face; by the time I had arrived at Saknussum I was confused; on the drive back to Swindon I was suspicious that something wasn't quite right; by the time I had reached Mum's home I was furious. I had been duped by Goliath – again.

  16

  That Evening

  TOAST MAY BE INJURIOUS TO HEALTH

  That was the shock statement put out by a joint Kaine/Goliath research project undertaken last Tuesday morning. 'In our research we have found that in certain circumstances eating toast may make the consumer writhe around in unspeakable agony, foaming at the mouth before death mercifully overcomes them.' The scientists went on to report that although these findings were by no means complete, more work needed to be done before toast had a clean bill of health. The Toast Marketing Board reacted angrily and pointed out that the 'at risk' slice of toast in the experiment had been spread with the deadly poison strychnine and these 'scientific' trials were just another attempt to besmirch the board's good name and that of their sponsee, opposition leader Redmond van de Poste.

  Article in The Mole, 16 July 1988

  'How was your day?' asked Mum, handing me a large cup of tea. Friday had been tuckered out by the long day and had fallen asleep into his cheesy bean dips. I had bathed him and put him to bed before having something to eat myself. Hamlet and Emma were out at the movies or something, Bismarck was listening to Wagner on his Walkman, so Mum and I had a moment to ourselves.

  'Not good,' I replied slowly. 'I can't dissuade an assassin from trying to kill me, Hamlet isn't safe here but I can't send him back and if I don't get Swindon to win the Superhoop then the world will end. Goliath somehow duped me into forgiving them, I have my own stalker and also have to figure out how to get the banned books I should be hunting for out of the country. And Landen's still not back.'

  'Really?' she said, not having listened to me at all. 'I think I've got a plan for dealing with that annoying offspring of Pickwick's.'

  'Lethal injectio
n?'

  'Not funny. No, my friend Mrs Beatty knows a dodo whisperer who can work wonders with unruly dodos.'

  'You're kidding me, right?'

  'Not at all.'

  'I'll try anything, I suppose. I can't understand why he's so difficult – Pickers is a real sweetheart.'

  We fell silent for a moment.

  'Mum?' I said at last.

  'Yes?'

  'What do you think of Herr Bismarck?'

  'Otto? Well, most people remember him for his "blood and iron" rhetoric, unification arguments and the wars – but few give him credit for devising the first social security system in Europe.'

  'No, I mean . . . that is to say . . . you wouldn't—'

  But at that moment we heard some oaths and a slammed door. After a few thumps and bumps Hamlet burst into the living room with Emma in tow. He stopped, composed himself, rubbed his forehead, looked heavenward, sighed deeply and then said:

  'O! that this too too solid flesh would melt, Thaw, and resolve itself into a dew!'1

  'Is everything all right?' I asked.

  'Or that the Everlasting had not fixed His canon 'gainst self-slaughter!'2

  'I'll make a cup of tea,' said my mother, who had an instinct for these sorts of things. 'Would you like a slice of Battenberg, Mr Hamlet?'

  'O God! O God! How weary, stale, flat, and unprofitable – yes, please – Seem to me all the uses of this world!'3

  She nodded and moved off.

  'What's up?' I asked Emma as Hamlet strutted around the living room, beating his head in frustration and grief.

  'Well, we went to see Hamlet at the Alhambra.'

  'Crumbs!' I muttered. 'It – er – didn't go down too well, I take it?'

  'Well,' reflected Emma, as Hamlet continued his histrionics around the living room, 'the play was okay apart from Hamlet shouting out a couple of times that Polonius wasn't meant to be funny and Laertes wasn't remotely handsome. The management weren't particularly put out – there were at least twelve "Hamlets" in the audience and they all had something to say about it.'

  'Fie on't! O fie!' continued Hamlet, ''tis an unweeded garden, That grows to seed; things rank and gross in nature possess it merely—!'4

  'No,' continued Emma, 'it was when we and the twelve other Hamlets went to have a quiet drink with the play's company afterwards that things turned sour. Piarno Keyes – who was playing Hamlet – took umbrage at Hamlet's criticisms of his performance; Hamlet said his portrayal was far too indecisive. Mr Keyes said Hamlet was mistaken, that Hamlet was a man racked by uncertainty. Then Hamlet said he was Hamlet so should know a thing or two about it; one of the other "Hamlets" disagreed and said he was Hamlet and thought Mr Keyes was excellent. Several of the "Hamlets" agreed and it might have ended there but Hamlet said that if Mr Keyes insisted on playing Hamlet he should look at how Mel Gibson did it and improve his performance in the light of that.'

  'Oh dear.'

  'Yes,' said Emma, 'oh dear. Mr Keyes flew right off the handle. "Mel Gibson?" he roared. "Mel ****ing Gibson? That's all I ever ****ing hear these days!" and he then tried to punch Hamlet on the nose. Hamlet was too quick, of course, and had his bodkin at Keyes' throat before you could blink, so one of the other "Hamlets" suggested a Hamlet contest. The rules were simple: they all had to perform the "To be or not to be" soliloquy and the drinkers in the tavern gave them points out often.'

  'And—?'

  'Hamlet came last.'

  'Last? How could he come last?'

  'Well, he insisted on playing the soliloquy less like an existential question about life and death and the possibility of an afterlife, and more as if it were about a post-apocalyptic dystopia where crossbow-wielding punks on motorbikes try to kill people for their gasoline.'

  I looked across at Hamlet, who had quietened down a bit and was looking through my mother's video collection for Olivier's Hamlet to see whether it was better than Gibson's.

  'No wonder he's hacked off.'

  'Here we go!' said my mother, returning with a large tray of tea things. 'There's nothing like a nice cup of tea when things look bad!'

  'Humph,' grunted Hamlet, staring at his feet. 'I don't suppose you've got any of that cake, have you?'

  'Especially for you!' My mother smiled, producing the Battenberg with a flourish. She was right, too. After a few cups and a slice of cake, Hamlet was almost human again.

  I left Emma and Hamlet arguing with my mother over whether they should watch Olivier's Hamlet or Great Croquet Sporting Moments on the television and went to sort some washing in the kitchen. I stood there trying to figure out just what sort of brain-scrubbing technique Goliath had used on me to get me to sign their forgiveness release. Oddly, I was still getting pro-Goliath flashbacks. In absent moments I felt they weren't so bad, then had to consciously remind myself that they were. On the plus side there was a possibility that Landen might be reactuallsed, but I didn't know when it would happen, or how.

  I was just getting round to wondering whether a cold soak might remove ketchup stains better than a hot wash when there was a light crackling sound in the air like crumpled cellophane. It grew louder and green tendrils of electricity started to envelop the Kenwood mixer, then grew stronger until a greenish glow like St Elmo's fire was dancing around the microwave. There was a bright light and a rumble of thunder as three figures started to materialise into the kitchen. Two of them were dressed in body armour and holding ridiculously large blaster-type weapons; the other figure was tall and dressed in jet-black high-collared robes which hung to the floor on one side and buttoned tightly up to his throat on the other. He had a pale complexion, high cheekbones and a small and very precise goatee. He stood with his arms crossed and was staring at me with one eyebrow raised imperiously. This was truly a tyrant among tyrants, a cruel galactic leader who had murdered billions in his never-ending and inadequately explained quest for total galactic domination. This . . . was Emperor Zhark.

  17

  Emperor Zhark

  'The eight "Emperor Zhark" novels were written in the seventies by Handley Paige, an author whose previous works included Spacestation Z—5 and Revenge of the Thraals. With Zhark he hit upon a pastiche of everything a bad SF novel should ever be: weird worlds, tentacled aliens, space travel and square-jawed fighter aces doing battle with a pantomime emperor who lived for no other reason than to cause evil and disharmony in the galaxy. His usual nemesis in the books was Colonel Brandt of the Space Corps, assisted by his alien partner Ashley. There have been two Zhark films starring Buck Stallion, Zhark the Destroyer and Bad Day at Big Rock, neither of which was any good.'

  MILLON DE FLOSS – The Books of H. Paige

  'Do you have to do that?' I asked.

  'Do what?' replied the emperor.

  'Make such a pointlessly dramatic entrance. And what are those two goons doing here?'

  'Who said that?' said a muffled voice from inside the opaque helmet of one of his minders. 'I can't see a sodding thing in here.'

  'Who's a goon?' said the other.

  Zhark laughed, ignoring them both. 'It's a contractual thing. I've got a new agent who knows how to properly handle a character of my quality. I have to be given a minimum of eighty words' description at least once in any featured book, and at least twice in a book a chapter has to end with my appearance.'

  'Do you get book title billing?'

  'We gave that one away in exchange for chapter heading status. If this were a novel you'd have to start a new chapter as soon as I appeared.'

  'Well, it's a good thing it's not,' I replied. 'If my mother was here she'd probably have had a heart attack.'

  'Oh!' replied the emperor, looking around. 'Do you live with your mother too?'

  'What's up? Problems at Jurisdiction?'

  'Take five, lads,' said Zhark to the two guards, who felt around the kitchen until they found chairs and sat down. 'Mrs Tiggy-Winkle sent me,' he breathed. 'She's busy at the Beatrix Potter Characters AGM but wanted to give you an update on what'
s happening at Jurisfiction.'

  'Who's that, darling?' called my mother from the living room.

  'It's a homicidal maniac intent on galactic domination,' I called back.

  'That's nice, dear.'

  I turned back to Zhark.

  'So, what's the news?'

  'Max de Winter from Rebecca,' said Zhark thoughtfully. 'The Book World Justice Department has rearrested him.'

  'I thought Snell got him off the murder charge?'

  'He did. The department are still gunning for him, though. They've arrested him for – get this – insurance fraud. Remember the boat he sank with his wife in it?'

  I nodded.

  'Well, apparently he claimed the insurance on the boat, so they think they might be able to get him on that.'

  It was not an untypical turn of events in the BookWorld. Our mandate from the Council of Genres was to keep fictional narrative as stable as possible. As long as it was how the author intended, murderers walked free and tyrants stayed in power – that was what we did. Minor infringements that weren't obvious to the reading public we tended to overlook. However, in a master stroke of inspired bureaucracy, the Council of Genres also empowered a Justice Department to look into individual transgressions. The conviction of David Copperfield for murdering his first wife was their biggest cause célèbre – before my time, I hasten to add – and

  Jurisfiction, unable to save him, could do little except tram another character to take Copperfield's place. They had tried to get Max de Winter before but we had always managed to outmanoeuvre them. Insurance fraud. I could scarcely believe it.

  'Have you alerted the Gryphon?'

  'He's working on Fagin's umpteenth appeal.'

  'Get him on it. We can't leave this to amateurs. What about Hamlet? Can I send him back?'

  'Not . . . as such,' replied Zhark hesitantly.

  'He's becoming something of a nuisance,' I admitted, 'and Danes are liable to be arrested. I can't keep him amused watching Mel Gibson's films for ever.'