Politically Incorrect Horace

Another Horace adventure. The poor fellow never gets a break.

Politically Incorrect Horace

'Horace, old boy,' said John Farnham, 'we've got to get the old Clarion into the Century of the Fruitbat. We're hopelessly behind the curve.'
Horace groaned inwardly. First, because Farnham, having discovered the writings of Sir Terry Pratchett about three weeks behind the Aborigines, was forever quoting him, and second, because whenever his editor-in-chief started talking about innovations (and using all that Orwellian marketing-speak), Horace could be sure of two things:

1. Deirdre Farnham, John's committee-heading wife, was behind the idea, and
2. It was going to mean more work for Horace.

Horace smiled a tight smile. 'John,' he ventured, 'I'm not certain our readers really want to be ahead of the curve. The curve per se is not an entity which they enjoy contemplating. They find themselves most comfortable trailing, rather than leading, the pack, as it were. Most of them associate the name Victoria with Her Late Britannic Majesty rather than the Beckham female – and wish she were still on the throne. Queen Victoria, I mean,' he added hastily, realising belatedly that his syntax had as usual run away with him. 'At any rate,' he finished lamely, 'they're a bunch of old fuddy-duddies who have never heard of 'trending'. Your attempt to update The Clarion will merely unsettle them.'

'That's exactly what I mean to do.' Farnham pounded an enthusiastic fist on the desk. 'I want to shake up the troops here. It was Deirdre's idea, really.'

You mean you want me to do the shaking-up, mused Horace as he reflexively removed his tea mug to a place of safety. Honk if you love aliens, this one said. A gift from his science-fiction-besotted nephew, who knew Horace's most shameful secret: that he read Philip K Dick in bed. Mentally counting up the years to possible retirement, Horace pretended to give his boss a fair hearing on his latest whim...er, stroke of genius.

Farnham ground on, 'What we need is to be on top of new developments, like those American blog thingies...' Ignoring Horace's discreetly rolled eyes, he went on, 'Take this 'political correctness' business that's sprung up of late. Don't know how it got started, but it's gone too bally far, you know. Can't call an [expletive deleted in anticipation of Moderator ire] an [expletive deleted in anticipation of Moderator ire] without getting every [ditto] in the shire up in arms. Apparently, though, the Yanks have found a way to deal with it.'

Horace refrained from remarking that 'political correctness', as an idea, was decades old, contenting himself with a non-committal (and, he hoped, politically correct), 'Hm?'

Farnham wouldn't have noticed. He was on a roll – cinnamon, with icing on. 'Now, Horace, my boy, here's where you come in. I've been following these chappies at Faux News, and I think they're onto something. I want you to do something daring – write a column that is politically IN-correct.' He beamed at his own cleverness.

Horace did not beam. Horace did not light up. Horace failed even to raise a figurative cigarette lighter in appreciation of this piece of brilliance. 'Er, John, I hate to bring this up...but there is one crucial flaw in your plan.' He held up his hand to forestall blustering, catching his boss in mid-bluster. 'Have you forgotten that you yourself, some months ago, caused to have installed a profanity filter on this ra-, er, august publication? And that said profanity filter, while a bit overzealous to my personal taste, most definitely and assuredly protects us and our readers from all possible verbal offence by removing words such as [expletive deleted in anticipation of Moderator ire]?' He patted John's knee comfortingly. 'You can't call them that these days, you know. The Raj is over.' He smiled generously. 'Oh, well, it was a clever idea, but I'm afraid it won't work.' He leaned back in his chair, trying not to be too conspicuously smug about winning.

However, Horace had counted his chickens while Farnham still ruled the roost. 'Pish and tosh,' crowed the editor, as he waved his hand airily (causing Horace to duck and cover his tea). 'A minor hurdle which I am sure you can overcome. I'm positive you can find a way to be politically incorrect without offending the profanity filter.' And having laid his clutch, Farnham swanned away, leaving an open-mouthed Horace to wonder exactly what private hades his overextended metaphors had led him into.

'Politically incorrect', in Horace's opinion, was just a catchphrase used by the cowardly, grotesque relics of a bygone day as protective cover behind which to continue their disgusting penchant for insulting everyone in the world who did not happen to be them – women and children in their own countries, foreign nationals of all types, and anyone whose religion, philosophy, or personal habits they disapproved of. Totally forgetting – as, apparently, did John Farnham – that the Almighty (however he/she might otherwise be described as acting) had not died and left THEM in charge. Horace sighed. It was going to be a long evening.





***Four hours later, Horace leaned back, exhausted. He had exhausted his patience. He had exhausted his store of invective. He had exhausted the Glenfiddich with which he rendered the office stewed tea palatable, or at least endurable.

But he had a column. Or what passed for one.

Horace had found it tough sledding at first – the profanity filter didn't let much through, and there were several nationalities he couldn't insult, simply because the filter found the mere mention of their proper names objectionable – but he thought he had nailed it. Even a US Republican would approve, he opined with shamefaced pride.





Ubi sunt les neiges de auld lang syne¹? Or, what is the world coming to? (A cultural review)

My fellow Britons, it is time to take a stand. A stand for the old days, the true values, the spirit of the Blitz. The time when we, as true-blue Sons of the Empire, stood shoulder to shoulder against the Menace from Abroad. I refer, of course, to the wily eastern gentlefolk from across the English Channel (English! Yes, ENGLISH! Note that, wily easterners), rather than being reduced to membership in the EU, or Everybody's Union, as we are today, forced to rub elbows with the Aliens from Lower Unspellable. Harrumph.
How did things come to this sorry pass, I ask? And well I might. The answer, my friends, lies in our subjection to Foreign Media. Those satellites in orbit have polluted our English skies with rock'n'roll, with American knockoffs of our own, better, series, with Mexican [can I say, 'Mexican'? Yes, I can] soap operas and Tie-Dye noodle boxing. This is intolerable.
Let us return to true entertainment values. Let us bring back intellectual wit, such as the Goon Show. Let us revive that truly British pastime, insulting the Irish. [Yes, definitely can say 'Irish'.] Let us remember that we INVENTED political incorrectness, long before it was a term of art. Take that, Yanks!
Let us insist on classic film evenings. The great days of cinema, from the war and before, when the grand cry of 'Tennis, anyone?' was a sure sign of a hit. When foreigners were seen to be what they are – pathetic losers and slimy villains intent on stealing our women. When women were women – soft, yielding, doe-eyed creatures – rather than Femi- Iron-Guardists². When these scented creatures looked up to their men – strong, manly, British men – for leadership and guidance, rather than running off to dance the Macarena with some yoik from Buenos Aires. Harrumph.
These opinions may be politically incorrect. If this be political incorrectness, MAKE THE MOST OF IT, as a Great Briton once said³. Let us bring back the great values – Christianity, letters to The Times, and hanging. Harrumph.
It is high time we rejected foreign values from our shores – foreign cars, foreign actors, foreign musicians, foreign languages...ESPECIALLY foreign languages. No, we DON'T parley vous, and if you do, back through the Tunnel with you, Mon-sewer.
Let us, in the words of our Prime Minister, pursue a more robust liberalism...the kind that says, 'Our way or the highway, foreign johnnies!'
If you agree with this campaign to Save Our Destiny, please add your comments to our webpage.
If not, please address your letters of protest to Mr John Farnham, Editor-in-Chief, The Clarion

Horace shrugged as he hit the 'Send' button and headed off to rinse out his tea mug.

After all, he thought. It's slightly less ethnocentric than some media outlets I could spit on from John's office window.

Footnotes:

1 Anyone wishing to translate this title is welcome to do so. Take Babelfish. Please.
2 Horace hoped there were no Romanians among the readership.
3 It was Patrick Henry of Virginia, Horace. But what the H? He was British when he said it.

The Chieftain's Ring - A Cautionary Tale

The following is a work of fiction. Any resemblance to actual events, or to persons living or dead, is entirely coincidental.
That's my story, and I'm sticking to it.

Mysterious are the ways of the desert. Secrets there are easily buried under the shifting sands of time. Stranger yet are the ways of the city. The secrets there, while not so easily buried, may still lurk in the shadows, eluding the seeker's lantern. The work of the scribe may be honest, as he sees it – but who is to say whether his vision is clouded, or who guided his hand? Thus spake the seer in the Year of the Red-Eyed Locust.

Twilight cast its blue magic over the bazaars of ancient Babel, and the torches were being lit as Assurbentophet, the mighty, summoned his chamberlain, his scribe, his general, and his chief assassin. These men, well-versed in the ways of power, awaited instructions expectantly. They did not wait long, for Assurbentophet was resolved upon action. He gazed upon them serenely beneath his jewelled crown, and thoughtfully stroked his well-curled beard.

'The time has come,' he informed them. 'The hour is ripe. The tribes of the north are weakened, distracted. The kingdom of the south is at ease. We may act to good purpose on the morrow.'

As the scribe unpacked the tools of his trade, sharpening his stylus and taking fresh clay, the chamberlain nodded eagerly. 'The wedding of Princess Hotscatsup has all the world aflutter. They won't notice anything we get up to,' he put in. 'We have what Your Magnificence might call a window of opportunity. No,' to the scribe, 'Don't write that down, you fool.' The scribe, a meek man, smoothed clay, waited.

The general twirled his moustache, and patted the slight paunch he had developed from the years of soft living in the capital. 'Your Munificence,' he began. 'The army is ready to attack the evildoers of the east. We await your signal. A thousand thousand troops stand ready. We even have stealth elephants.' Assurbentophet nodded graciously. This was what he wanted to hear.

But the chamberlain looked alarmed. 'Your Haughtiness,' he protested. 'How can we invade the east? Even with the distraction of the Princess' wardrobe, surely the news-criers will notice that we...er...' he faltered beneath his monarch's gaze,'...that we, er, have no reason to invade the east. We will look like, er, aggressors. Bad guys, in short.' The chamberlain looked down, ashamed to have mentioned this, but feeling that it was his duty.

Assurbentophet smiled condescendingly. 'That, too, has been thought of, my faithful servant.' He struck an even more regal pose as he announced, 'The kingdom will invade the east, because the east has been sheltering Harun al-Rashomon, the notorious bandit, whose raids have made Babel unsafe these many years.' His royal eyes glowed. 'This very night,' he nodded to his chief assassin, who bowed, 'Cohort VI of the Royal Liberation Assassins has, well, assassinated the villain in his lair, which they finally found after a dozen years of painful searching.' He smiled benevolently. 'They have done well, and will all receive medals.'

The general's eyes widened. 'But, oh, Plenipotency, forgive the objection, but was not Harun al-Rashomon killed? Lo, these many years ago, seven, I think, in the fighting at the Fortress of Kresh?' The others glared at him. The general, being made of stern stuff, stood up to their gaze, although the knuckles of his clenched fist were white with the strain of it. 'I'm just playing devil's advocate here,' he added lamely.

The chief assassin cleared his throat – a sound that, as always, caused the others to shudder involuntarily, as if a goose had walked over their graves. 'Your Mightiness,' he ventured, in a voice as smooth as oil on the palm of a harem girl, 'I have brought the tokens you require.' Into his monarch's outstretched hand, the assassin placed the ruby ring of Harun al-Rashomon, as well as a bracelet and torque, easily recognised by all the viewers of the Nightly News Re- enactments: these things, indeed, had belonged to Harun al-Rashomon, and had been taken at his death seven years before by the hand of the chief assassin himself. They had merely been laid by for a more convenient occasion. The general and chamberlain gasped in comprehension, as the scribe began picking furiously in the clay.

The chamberlain noticed, fortunately. 'Stop that, you imbecile!' he hissed. 'Do not write what you see.' The scribe shrugged, and re-smoothed the clay, muttering under his breath, 'Why do I bother?'

Assurbentophet grinned an imperial grin as he transferred these tokens from the assassin to the general. 'You understand now, my military friend? You have only to find a suitable corpse – I recommend a size 40, long, al-Rashomon was a large fellow – and place these tokens upon him. The rest, as they say, will be History.'

The general, the assassin, and the chamberlain bowed low – nay, grovelled – before the genius that was Assurbentophet. 'Surely, you were born to rule over us,' they enthused.

The scribe, an insignificant fellow, piped up, but cautiously, visions of the headsman in the forefront of his thoughts. 'Er, it's obvious you don't want anybody to know about this stuff,' he ventured. 'So can anybody tell me why I'm here?'

Assurbentophet beamed at the scribe. 'Why, my friend, yours is the most important task of all. When the general here finds the body of the hated, the loathed, the despised Harun al- Rashomon, may his name be forever cursed for insulting my father, and parades it in the palace square of Babel, he will of course announce to all and sundry that Harun al-Rashomon has left behind many, many private writings...outlines of his further nefarious schemes, his plans for mischief, allowing us to take action against his many, many conspirators, some near, some far...Harun al-Rashomon has been very, very busy...we will have much to do.'

The scribe gulped, and nodded. He refrained from remarking that Harun al-Rashomon, like all his tribe, was illiterate. He refrained from saying anything that might draw attention to himself. Instead, he smoothed his clay again and picked up his stylus.

'Let us write History, then, Your Elegance,' he said simply, as he prepared to take dictation.

Saucer of Jam

When the alien space ship arrived – chock-full of impressive technology, enough to convince even the most paranoid skeptic that this was the Real Deal – humans of all stripes and persuasions were falling over one another to get a gander at the craft, its inhabitants, and whatever else was going on.

Twitter's stock split (again), the web lit up 24/7, and news people never seemed to go to bed. Maybe, as some suggested, the aliens had taught them how to clone themselves, complete with perfect hairdos. The aliens (or rather, the androids they had sent in their places) appeared to be teaching important people a lot of things: new products appeared on the market, at reasonable introductory prices, there were rumours of medical advances, including a cure for the common cold, and the airwaves were full of startling images of the aliens' homeworld, which looked like a realtor's paradise.

Of course, only world leaders got to talk to the androids, who explained patiently (as androids are built for patience) that yes, they (or rather, their flesh-and-blood creators) had been monitoring Earth for a very long time, were big fans, in fact, and knew as much as the next rabid fan about the place's history, habits, and general quirks. Just ask them. In fact, they modestly supposed they might even know more about the running of the planet than the average local inhabitant. Though they didn't like to brag. The androids proved this, right off, by asking for the world leaders and media darlings by name. They even knew all the trivia from the comic books and scifi blockbusters.

Anybody who wasn't a world leader or media star (the androids appeared interested in construction tycoons with bad hairpieces and political ambitions, as well as over-muscled and/or scantily-clad movie folk) just had to be satisfied with the day-and-night coverage of everything from the latest glimpse of the interior of the ship (mauve, surprising choice) to endless discussions of Lady Dada's wardrobe malfunction at the android-attended Oscars. (The androids appeared only mildly interested, leading to speculation that the androids' bosses were similarly equipped.) As usual, hoi polloi sat and gossiped while the major players did whatever major players did.

Finally, after the usual high-level talks, the following facts emerged:


The aliens' homeworld had plenty of room for new settlement, and was issuing invitations.
Only the best, brightest, most gifted – meaning the well-heeled and famous – need apply.

In other words, business as usual. People expressed opinions on Facebook ('Like! Like! Like!') and collected collectibles commemorating the hotly-anticipated day of departure. Ratings had never been higher.

***

When Jim Garrity presented his media pass (www.homeopapenews.com, a modest start- up whose bricks-and-mortar assets consisted of a desktop and an outdated 4-in-1 printer in the corner of his living room), the guard at the gate grunted rudely and pointed vaguely in the direction of the holding area for insignificant press types. Jim clutched his second-hand notebook computer as he shouldered his way into his bleacher seat, but could not suppress a moue of distaste at the shabby treatment.

'The problem with you,' remarked a voice at his elbow, 'is that you still think you count as a person.'

Jim swivelled in annoyance to the speaker, who turned out to be a short man with wiry red hair, who grinned up at him, showing crooked teeth. 'I do count as a person,' Jim protested. 'So do you. So does everybody.'

The little man shook his head vehemently. 'Nope,' he said emphatically. 'That's where you're wrong, my friend. We don't count. We've never counted – not to them.' He pointed in the direction of the tarmac outside the bleacher area, where the gleaming spaceship stood, doors wide open to receive the well-escorted line of beautifully-dressed prominence proceeding up the red carpet – hands empty, of course, as their luggage had been sent ahead. That's what they had People for. Jim snorted as he watched Lady Dada wave to the many fans who'd come to see her off. To their disappointment, her wardrobe failed to malfunction, but she was still gorgeous.

'I don't suppose they could take everybody,' he remarked. 'Of course they'd take the movers and shakers. The people who...' he stopped.

'The people who count?' The little man chuckled. 'See what I mean? You've been indoctrinated since birth, only you don't know it. Somebody told you that you didn't count. And you believed him.' Jim waved the pest away (while involuntarily thinking, 'my father, my mother, my teachers'), and after paying an exorbitant $15 for a Coke (it was a warm day, and the concessionaires knew how much the traffic would bear), he settled in to follow the ceremonies, take pictures, and blog like all the others. Jim could type and watch at the same time, and did so. The boarding took hours – it was meant to, to allow each and every celebrity his or her red-carpet moment – and there were intervals of entertainment, mostly musical, from B-Listers who obviously felt that, although they hadn't been issued a ticket, they could comfort themselves in the knowledge that, the A-Listers away, they might get a few more gigs than usual. Jim listened, watched, noted in the usual style. (The British Royal Family is well-represented today, having flown to the Launch Site here in Baja California early this morning...the Queen is wearing a tasteful ensemble in, need we say, royal blue, as she leans on the arm of her granddaughter-in-law, who lives up to her reputation as one of the world's best-dressed women in a stunning outfit of...)

Jim stopped to stretch while a boy band sang the new charity song, God Bless the Earth, copies of which were on sale at the gate. As he did so, he noticed that the little man beside him had neither laptop nor camera, and appeared to be taking in all the action without paying particular attention to it. He hadn't even bought a programme. This made Jim curious.

'Hey, buddy,' he ventured. 'What outfit are you with? You don't seem to be taking any notes. Don't you blog?'

The little man winked and tapped his forehead, an oddly endearing gesture. 'It's all up here,' he explained. 'The people who sent me just want my impressions, you know. They can get the rest from the web.'

Jim shrugged. 'Nice job,' was all he had to say to that.

The man stuck out his hand. 'I'm Gabe, by the way,' he said, and of course Jim replied with his name. It turned out that Gabe, while unencumbered by the tools of the paparazzo's, reporter's, or indeed any other trade, had brought something better – namely, sandwiches, which he proposed to share with Jim. As the two munched away at surprisingly tasty hoagies (Gabe explained that he'd flown in from Philadelphia), the two chatted about this and that, as the floor show below continued with a 'farewell clip show' of popular scenes from the award-winning stars who were about to be going...well, out into the stars themselves.

Gabe mused. 'Nice thing about these bleachers,' he commented. 'I don't see many wasps or ants.'

Jim thought. 'Probably because the whole set-up was just put here for the launch.' Gabe nodded.

'I imagine you're right,' he said. 'You know, where I come from, we used to have a lot of trouble with wasps at picnics.' He chuckled. 'Doesn't it just get your nanny when you're trying to eat, and those biting insects get between you and your potato salad?'

Jim had to agree. 'I know what you mean. Not much you can do about it, though. If you spray 'em, the poison will get into your own food.'

Gabe laughed. 'That's true. But we knew a better trick than that.' Seeing that Jim looked interested, Gabe went on. 'We just set a saucer of jam about 100 yards or so away. The wasps would always go after the jam, and leave our picnic alone. They drown in the sticky stuff, too.' Jim decided that Gabe was a pretty practical fellow, as well as generous with his hoagies, and they got along well for the rest of the afternoon, all through the launching ceremony, in which the national anthems of 26 nations were performed by mass choirs. Finally, when it was all over, and the ship itself was only a distant point on the twilight horizon, the two new friends adjourned to the least fashionable (and therefore least crowded) bar they could find, and drank to friendship before heading back to their hotels.

***

Somehow, it was Gabe Jim thought of when he saw the news a few weeks later – images from orbital telescopes which had captured the moment when the spaceship from Earth was supposed to be launched into the aliens' captive wormhole.

The moment, not to put too fine a point on it, when the spaceship full of Earth's most important and newsworthy citizens blew up. Brightly and soundlessly and finally, somewhere on the edge of the solar system. Jim stopped to reflect, along with all the other citizens of Earth, on the loss of so many of the planet's political, military, economic, and society elite.

***

The next time Jim thought about Gabe was when he saw him on television the day after the explosion.

Gabe was getting out of the other spaceship, you see, the one that had people in it rather than androids.

Somebody was calling Gabe 'Commander Gabriel', and the little redhead was explaining what the new offer was. They'd brought a lot of nice things, you see, and were looking forward to getting to know folk...

Somehow, Jim was sure the new offer involved good food.

And that in this scheme, everyone counted.

Sanity

John Walters was afraid he was going sane.

The thought had occurred to him, disturbingly, as he crossed the street at the corner of 40th and Walnut in a high wind that threatened to empty the potholes of their wholesome water.

What happens if I become sane? he wondered. How on earth will I survive?

He mulled this over as he soldiered on against a heavy headwind until he arrived, somewhat tired, at the café on Baltimore Avenue. Pushing the door open with difficulty, he leaned against it, briefly, as if for support against even more unseen elements than an urban wind gust, before pulling off his jacket and sliding into a corner booth. He ordered coffee and sat staring out the window at the doubled-over passers-by as he drank the filthy stuff.

I can't do this, he thought. I can't survive in a delusion-free world.

His musings were interrupted by a gentle tap on his shoulder. 'Excuse me, mister,' said a sweetly quavering voice, 'do you mind if I sit here?' He turned to see a vision – in fact, he blinked, because for a moment he thought (he hoped) he was hallucinating – there stood a tiny, wizened woman with a sweet old face like an apple-core carving topped with blowsy white hair escaping from under a felt hat adorned with a silk rose (lavender). I'm dreaming. he thought, because he was sure he had seen the little woman, who was grinning at him disconcertingly, showing excellent dentures, somewhere before.

Probably in a late-night showing of Mary Poppins. That must be it – he was hallucinating saccharine cinema.

'No, you're not,' said the woman, as she arranged herself and her odd possessions – oversized quilted tote – multi-coloured – string bag full of books, senior bus pass on lanyard. 'I'm just a run-of-the-mill Bag Lady.' She winked at him.

John blinked again, and thought. 'Stop that!' he snapped. 'Either you're reading my mind, or you're committing Blog Abuse. I won't have it.'

The lady shrugged amiably. 'Reading your mind is not such a trick, ' she commented equably. 'Though I need vocabulary control to do it.' As she nonchalantly picked up a menu, John noticed with irritation that she was wearing fingerless gloves.

This was the last straw. He exploded.

'Now, look here,' John remonstrated, 'this sort of thing has got to stop. It's bad enough that I'm going sane…now you show up and complicate my already shaky grip on the reality matrix with postmodern visual references…' He shut up abruptly, as the waitress – a reassuringly boring college student with a green streak in her hair and a barbed-wire tattoo – slouched over to take the lady's order. When she had mooched away, however, he disfavoured the self- described Bag Lady (who looked more like a folklore professor with a warped sense of humour to him) with another glare. The lady returned his look with maddening equanimity.

'Not folklore,' she commented. 'They closed the department, and that particular Bag Lady went back to Germany. I'm in the Multicultural Studies Department now.' She chuckled. 'When they tell me I'm too old to be trendy, I remind them that ageism is anti-multicultural. That shuts them up.' Her tea and 'scone' had arrived, so she fussed about with the little teabagged pot of water and the dry, oversugared cookie that passed for afternoon haute cuisine in Philadelphia, while John mulled this over.

John decided that it was his brain that was mulled. He tried again. 'My dear Doctor…

'Simpson.'

'Dr Simpson,' he continued. 'I am sorry to be difficult, but you appear to be completing my unexpressed sentences. And I'm already worried about my state of mind.'

The merry academic's eyes twinkled mischievously. 'As you were worried about incipient sanity, I was just trying to help.' Seeing that John was ready to concede that point, she went on, 'Think about it. What you fear is that you will reach a state of understanding of the true motives of your fellow humans. An understanding that is accurate and complete, and explains everything from your neighbour's smirk when he greets you in the morning, to why Congress won't pass a reasonable law to let your other neighbours, who are gay, marry. Am I right?' John nodded as Dr Simpson explained.

'You are afraid that, once having reached this level of understanding, your mind will become totally incapable of forgetting it. That you will be forced to spend the rest of your life – indeed, perhaps, the rest of eternity – in a state of total awareness of the shabby reality of human motivation. That, having found the worm in the apple, you will be unable to look away, and will spend forever in miserable contemplation of depressing truths you can neither ameliorate nor ignore. Am I right?'

John scratched behind his ear. 'You have hit the nail on the rather flat head,' he admitted. 'This, indeed, do I fear. I am becoming incurably sane.'

Dr Simpson slapped the table in triumph. 'Exactly!' she exclaimed, as coffee and tea slopped from jarred cups. 'And that is what we must prevent. A person capable of such a thought is too valuable to be lost to the psychiatric profession. You might start listening to Prozac.'

John wrinkled his nose as he mopped up liquid with the tiny napkins from the niggardly dispenser. 'Very generous of you, I'm sure. But what do you propose to do about it? Do Multicultural Studies offer a mind-wipe session?'

Dr Simpson laughed, a tinkling sound. 'Multicultural Studies, my left bunion. What you need is a multi-species encounter. You need to meet Goths.'

As John looked around quizzically at the undergraduate wait staff, Dr Simpson added hurriedly, 'Not that kind of Goth. The kind who write Purple Books. You need Purple Books – quite a few of them, unless I miss my guess.'

John sighed. 'Madam, I am a database manager. I do not know what you are talking about. Who are these Goths, and what are Purple Books?'

Dr Simpson looked exquisitely happy at the idea of going into Lecture Mode, and then did. 'The Goths were the first Earth people to become completely sane. Their solution to this intolerable reality was to remove themselves from this universe. Of course, history blames this on Attila the Hun. History is an ass.' She held up a gloved hand – John noticed glittery nail polish – to forestall objections. 'They didn't disappear completely, you understand. They just went far enough away from acceptable reality that almost no one ever sees them. Or mistakes them for ambulatory clichés.' She leaned forward, and John could smell her cologne (old-fashioned verbena) as she whispered, 'You will have the gift to see them now. And read the Purple Books.' John shuddered involuntarily. Verbena reminded him of William Faulkner, whom he did not like.

John protested. 'What if I don't want to see them? Or read purple prose?'

Dr Simpson waved this away. 'Not purple prose, silly. Who wants to read that, except Judith Butler? Purple books. You'll be receiving one shortly, and can decide for yourself. Goodbye, Mr Walters.' She stood up, drank the last sip of her cold, tasteless tea, and gathered her smart handbag under her arm. Adjusting her stylish headscarf (it was still windy outside), Dr Simpson gave John a brisk handshake with one elegantly manicured hand, smiled gently (why had he not noticed what a lovely young woman she was?), turned and left the café, her high heels tapping on the linoleum.

John paid for the drinks – the waitress was as hang-dog as ever – and left the place hastily, like a victim of the Ancient Mariner escaping another stanza about albatrosses. He hurried down Baltimore Ave – the wind seemed to have died down – in the direction of 47th Street. On the way a homeless man stopped him. 'Hey, mistah, did you drop this?'

John looked down at the little man and almost screamed. No, no, no, no, his brain shrieked, DO NOT WANT. The hobo was grinning innocently at him and holding up a paperback entitled, Prester John's Account of a Visit to the Planet Betamax Delta. The cover art was lurid – an impossibly young Helen Mirren in a negligée...

The hobo looked exactly like the actor Robin Williams. Dressed as Mork from Ork, from that horrible old sitcom. John snatched the book from his left hand, pressed a dollar bill in his right, and ran like hell in the direction of Clark Park, where he cowered among the dog watchers until he felt safe again.

Later that evening, sitting by the fire with a decent glass of wine (or a glass of decent wine), John had to concede that Dr Simpson and her cronies were right. Prester John and Betamax Delta just about hit the spot. Perhaps sanity won't be so bad, after all… he mused.

He dismissed the answering chuckle from the chimney as imagination.

Soliloquising on the Chatline

2b r not 2b,

That iz teh ?,

If u shud put up with

Bad breaks and no gl

Or try a ninja move,

And bust up harry.

If u die, u just reroll,

Right? Or end up at the reclaim,

Nuthin to it, m8.

But w8. Sumthin tellz me

It might not be that simple.

What if - just if -

You'd wake up someplace bad,

Someplace evil,

Someplace like...

RL?

That's why the old hang on,

I bet, cuz everybody's scared

Witless

Of finding out there's no more

Levelling

And uv lost all ur

XP.

So we just think

About it long enough, it makes us

Ante up and pay the nxt month's fee,

Instead of risking waking up in some

Disgusting afterlife that looks like

The Miracle Mile. :(

Hey, lookathere and smileys,

Here comes my gf Feelie,

cucu, m8.

Space and the Single Ouija Board (a report from the vicinity of Betelgeuse)

Note: For more science fiction, visit http://therealgheorgheni.blogspot.com/.

It has come to the attention of Researchers for the Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy that the advent of the Sub-Etha net has led to a number of puzzling communications anomalies, some of which can be taken advantage of by enterprising hitchhikers. Or, at least, help pass the time pleasantly while waiting for a lift from Barnard's Star.

One of the more perplexing anomalies has been the appearance on navicom screens across the galaxy of random messages asking for Nati-Gitchi-Bumppo or Princess Ticklefeather, and inquiring in the most fervent terms after the well-being of Uncle Henry, and how is he enjoying life in the Summerland?
After consultation with experts at the Centre for Higher-Dimension Mathematical Jiggery-Pokery at the Rigellian Institute for the Study of Practically Everything, the following explanation was mooted:

There is some connection between the physics of n-space hypercommunications and the operation of the planchette, or Ouija board.

Dr. Alu Minium Zeiding, holder of the Georgelucasian Chair of Hyperdimensional Mathematics, explained it thus:

'The collusion of the vectors of intentionality vis-a-vis the sitters, the planchette, and the alphabet/numbers board corresponds periodically to the frequency patterns of higher-dimensional warp-time communications signals. In short, there's a cross in the line somewhere.'

Professor Zeiding went on to explain the correlativity of table-turning with the oscillation of dilithium crystals, the relationship of terrestrial poltergeists to pan-galactic spam Sub-Etha mail, and was well into the development of his thesis regarding the general connectivity of humanoid gullibility with seemingly random hyperspace flux phenomena, when the rest of his department mercifully subdued him and gave him his overdue medication.

When he had recovered, he added: 'And there's nothing we can do about it. So there.'

Meanwhile, interplanetary hitchhikers have been known to pass many pleasant hours aboard ship conversing with mediums and their friends, on the well-known theory that even an idiotic chat-room conversation is better than actually reading that improving new book you've been saving up for a long trip.

Of course, in many of the less relaxed sectors of the galaxy, this increase in Sub-Etha traffic has led to headaches for the local thought police, whose attitude toward Free Speech is that they want nothing to do with that sort of thing, and it should be stopped before it spreads.

We have recently obtained, by methods best left to the diseased imaginations of our editors, a transcript of one such conversation, as monitored by the local mind-law enforcement agency, the Betelgeusian Brainwave Control. We offer a sampling here.

Sub-Etha Messager 1: Is anybody there? Oh, Great Spirit from the Other World, we are waiting.

Sub-Etha Messager 2: Hiya, froods and froodettes!

SEM 1: Oh, Great Spirit, we have cleared our minds....

SEM 2: Uh, yeah, lady, that's kinda obvious.

SEM 1: And we would fain hear news of our loved ones who have crossed the Bridge into the Great Beyond...

SEM 2: Oh, that one! Yeah, I think it's on Altair 7. Oh, okay (clears throat), here goes: Uncle Joe is well, and sends his love; Aunt Mary is having a great time, she's learning to play the xylophone in the angelic orchestra, Granddad wants to know if he remembered to turn the stove off, although he guesses you've figured that one out by now, and...uh...yeah, Sister Carrie wants to say that love is all you need.

SEM 1: (Accusatory silence). There's no Sister Carrie here.

SEM 2: Oops! Sorry! That was the Theodore Dreiser thread. Got my lines crossed there. Look, I've got to be going. We spirits are very busy, you know. It's not all sitting around on a cloud and harping on old Beatles tunes, oh no oh no. There's halo-polishing, and music-of-the-spheres practice, and Hallelujah 101 class, and, well, you know...signing off now.

SEM 1: Oh spirit, do you have any parting advice for us?

SEM 2: Oh, sure. Uh...keep your lasers dry, and always know where your towel is. (Giggling.)

Well, you see how this sort of thing is likely to go.

The best advice we can offer, is to demand password authentication when dealing with unknown communications on the Sub-Etha net. That, or demand your poscreds back, if you actually paid for the trip.

Happy navigating!

Hamlet Redux, or the Benchmark of Revolt

One of the highlights of any tourist's stopover on the planet Betamax Delta must surely be a visit to the Archives of Parallel Space-Time. The APST houses an enormous collection of alternate versions of history, mythology and fiction culled from the researches of various intrepid space-time travellers who have chanced upon them by falling into pockets of parallel time on their way to somewhere else.

The collection process, while enlightening, is often a painful one, such as the experience of Leodogrance 'Ace' Cholmondeley-Smythe, the galaxy-famous astrogator, who, while investigating a possible white hole in the vicinity of the Belt of Orion, fell into a wormhole, and spent the ensuing eight years trapped on a colony world of obsessive disciples of a domestic goddess. The Marthaites, as they were called, held the firm belief that anything worth doing was worth decorating, and filled all available spaces in their environment with beautified but useless objects created out of ordinary household detritus. Eight years of forced re-education in the use of the glitter gun had reduced the once-fearless explorer to a jibbering wreck. Fortunately, long and patient counselling at the Galactic Home for the Terminally Bewildered on Rigel V has restored Captain Cholmondeley-Smythe to the point where he can contemplate a white-sale catalogue without shuddering,

The texts which Cholmondeley-Smythe brought back with him (such as the Book of the House of Stewart, a priceless volume bound in stamped Naugahyde with imbedded sequins) have been stored for public safety in a special 'need-to-know-only' collection, and can only be viewed by those with top-security clearance.

While touring the Archives recently, I came across a fascinating volume from the parallel universe designated U1590784. Entitled The Furste Foeley-oh of Weelyam Sheakespeere, it contains alternate story-lines for some well-known material in our own galaxy, and incidentally calls into question the precept held by some that this is the best of all possible worlds.

One of the stories in this volume, in the form of a play, offers an interesting insight into the possibiities of parallel space-time, as you will see.

The story, with the title Piglet, Formerly Known as Prince of Benchmark, begins as follows: Piglet, a Benchish prince, returns from his college studies in Schwatzenburg to find that his father has died, and his uncle Clothilde has become king and married Piglet's mother, all in an unsettlingly short space of time. Piglet is unhappy about this, and refuses to buy the couple a wedding present.

Piglet's best friend and only confidant, Oratorio, informs Piglet that the ghost of the late king has been seen on the battlements of Elsewhere Castle at midnight. Piglet goes out to investigate, and has a disturbing conversation with the spectre of his deceased father. The former King Piglet claims to have been murdered by his own brother, who had his beady eye on the throne and Piglet, Sr's wife Brunhilda.

Piglet is quite alarmed by this revelation of familial perfidy, but even more alarmed by the ghost's insistence that he, Piglet, must avenge his father's death on his uncle, without, incidentally, annoying his mother in any way. Piglet thinks hard about this, delivering himself of several long soliloquies in the process. The following night, he returns to the castle battlements, and informs the spectre of his decision:

No way, Jose!

Piglet explains to the astonished ghost that he, Piglet, is not a policeman, and that if he, the ghost, wants revenge, he can jolly well go haunt Clothilde, the party responsible. And, incidentally, has it occurred to him that Brunhilda is not entirely blameless in the whole matter? The ghost vanishes in a puff of logic, as someone once said

Piglet now turns his attention to the rest of the motley crew at Elsewhere Castle. Clothilde's closest advisor, Phelonius, is watching Piglet closely, trying to find out what his plans are in regard to the throne of Benchmark. To this end, he spies upon Piglet in conversation with Phelonius' daughter, Phred, with whom Piglet has been having a hot and heavy affair.

But Piglet is on to his game. Vous ne pouvez pas pull that dodge on me, he says in the elegant French so in fashion at the court of Benchmark. I am ready for you, mon cher cochon

Having previously tipped Phred the wink, Piglet proceeds to act, and act, and act, convincing Phelonius that Piglet has either a) flipped his wig, or b) been secretly enrolled at RADA instead of attending theology classes in Schwatzenburg as he was supposed to.

Phred pretends to go along with this, and does some C- acting of her own. The whole State of Benchmark is possessed by the demon of Laurence Olivier, exclaims Phelonius, only at greater length, while sawing his hand in the air, thus (there are illustrated stage directions, which I cannot reproduce here).

Piglet has a serious conversation with his mother, in which he tries to convince her to go into therapy. During their talk in her bedroom, a scuffling noise is heard behind the arras. Thinking that Brunhilda's room is infested with rats, Piglet dashes out and returns, armed with mousetraps, which he lays out around the wainscotting.

Shortly afterwards, a loud snap is heard, followed by groaning. Aha!, exclaims Piglet, then pulls back the arras to reveal the suffering Phelonius, with a sprung mousetrap on his big toe.

Oh, pompous idiot, says Piglet, I took thee for thy better, a Norwegian white. Medical help is summoned.

Enraged at this breach of Benchmark court etiquette, Clothilde determines to send Piglet away to his allies in Eltonjohnland. To this end, he enlists the help of Rosary and Fallingstar, his old schoolmates, who are tired of the dole queue and looking for employment in their chosen profession of Toady.

Hey, Big Fella, say Rosary and Fallingstar, let's hit the big time in London, see the sights.

What, says Piglet, Would you play upon me as upon this xylophone?

Hey, says Fallingstar, That's a great idea! Let's start a rock band!

A hoopy idea!, says Piglet, only not in so many words (many more, in fact), and so they pack up their instruments for the trip, taking Phred along as girl singer and Oratorio as roady.

But the cunning Clothilde has prepared a letter of recommendation to the Greater Longtown Arts Council, in which he recommends that, instead of hiring these musicians out for gigs, they nail their carcases to the town gates, pour encourager les autres, lest they be overrun with freeloading Mick Jagger-wannabes. (Curiously, the name 'Mick Jagger' appears unchanged in all known documents in parallel space-time.)

Piglet, however, has acquired good reading skills from his education at Schwatzenburg, and a healthy suspicion of his uncle from the first three acts of this play. So, aboard the Benchmark-Eltonjohnland ferry, while everyone else is taking advantage of the onboard gambling and duty-free shopping, he steams open the letter, while reciting the famous soliloquy, 'Oh, that this too, too solid glue would melt'.

Having read with horror this further evidence of his uncle's villainy and bad spelling, Piglet alters the letter, making it an obnoxious rant to the Times about the general decline in the quality of musical exports from Eltonjohnland, thoroughly maligning the whole pop genre, which will be guaranteed to set off a trade war come the next session of the Yuropean Parliament.

Disembarking at Do-Over, the Fab Five launch a successful career as rock idols, touring Eltonjohnland and the surrounding territories, and finally settling down to write their bestselling memoirs.

Clothilde, Brunhilda, and Phelonius, meanwhile, are faced with an angry mob demanding peace, freedom, and reasonably-priced love, or else they will burn Benchmark Castle to the ground and set up an autonomous free-trade zone. Faced with an impossible situation, Clothilde abdicates in favour of Phelonius' son, Layabout, who rules so incompetently that the kingdom is subsequently invaded by Fourteenbras, the prince of Amway.

The play ends with a speech by Fourteenbras, in which he outlaws Walkmans and MP3 players, exclaiming: We rest in silence!

As you can see, the library at APST can provide the literate visitor with hours of reading pleasure and philosophical speculation, or, as one PST author has it:

Of all weird words of tongue or pen, the weirdest are these: it might have been.

The Phoints - A Colonial Tragedy

I have been asked1 to write a few words about the Phoints, a sad and now homeless race of sentients most commonly identified by their large, pointed ears and blue skin.

It saddens me to have to do this. It is never enjoyable to contemplate the planetary failures - all too many of them - whose blackened corpses litter our sector of the galaxy. There is the smoking ruin of Magma Major, whose clouds of volcanic gases, still being released after that world's now-extinct population's fatal attempt to tap into the molten core for cheap energy, can be seen as far away as the neighbouring planets. And, of course, the woefully misnamed Urania Utopia, whose overplanned society spawned four successive sector wars before being reduced to picturesque rubble by their offended neighbours, who very considerately relocated the population first. Forbidden to congregate in large groups, the former citizens of Utopia Urania are usually to be found operating postal services on small planets, where their organizational skills are highly prized.

The cause of most of these failures can be traced to the usual suspects - greed, arrogance and intellectual pride - among the dominant sentient species. All of these factors contributed to the fall of the Phoint society on the planet they called New Eden.

The inhabitants of New Eden, having mostly come from the State of California on 21st-Century Earth during the time of the Great Migration (also known as the Great Eco-Panic), were well aware of the mistakes of their ancestors, who had plundered their own planet's non-renewable resources for temporary gain. They were determined not to repeat those mistakes - and so, of course, they did. To the very letter.

The reason for this, though simple, usually manages to elude the grasp of most sentient species. The problem is, of course, that the New Edeners wanted exactly the same things as their ancestors, who had headed out to a warm, sunny climate in search of gold, fresh oranges, a film career, or a really good suntan, and turned their home territory into a bastion of spoiled rich people fond of the Next New Thing who built fabulously overpriced houses on cliffs and then complained about mudslides.

New Edeners were in denial about this - remarkable, really, as the phrase 'in denial' had originated with them.

According to the New Edeners, they were an ecologically responsible people now. They had solar panels, they had chemical toilets, they had New Sierra Club badges. They hugged trees passionately - the trees, just as passionately, did not hug back, but gave them rashes.

What they did not have was the sense to realise that there's no such thing as a free lunch in the universe. They still wanted something for nothing. And they didn't realise what kind of planet they were on.

The planet which the Phoints called New Eden is an AIE - Autonomous Interlocking Ecosystem, called by its real inhabitants by the name Suluhu. The indigenous inhabitants of Suluhu were not even recognisable to the settlers from Earth, as they were so much part of the planet itself that they appeared to be merely interesting rocks.

The Anorthosians of Suluhu possess a crystalline intelligence which is capable of soundless communication over vast distances, so that they are in constant communication with each other all over the planet. They are so imbedded in the geologic life of their world that disturbances in its ecological balance affect them deeply. They were not best pleased at the arrival of a shipload of chattering monkeys with a history of mineral dependency and a habit of leaving their trash all over the place.

But the Anorthosians are patient, and tolerant up to a point. They did not announce their presence, and they bided their time.

The New Eden colonists did all the usual sorts of things - claimed the planet in the name of peace, freedom and mutual respect for diversity, meaning the sorts of diversity they recognised, such as variance in musical taste, and set about installing themselves on the most desirable pieces of real estate, so that they could get to the Good Stuff about colonisation, such as building really great retail outlets.

The Anorthosians watched and waited.

The New Edeners built and built. They landscaped. They developed new recipes for salsa made from local plants. They wrote patriotic songs about their new homeland. They congratulated themselves on having found an M-class planet on which to settle with no previous inhabitants, thus avoiding all that colonial guilt-trip thingy.

Then they opened their computer factories.

New Silicon Valley, as it was called, was to become the mecca for galaxywide computer systems - and all because of the primary discovery of the New Eden planetary survey team.

This is the survey team, by the way, that had failed to notice any sign of sentience anywhere, despite the existence of remarkable geometric structures around the planet, which served no apparent function, and which were written off as geological oddities - but which were, in reality, sacred sites to the Anorthosians, who also used them as power conduits, as we shall see.

The discovery the survey team had made was the rare, perfect quality of the tiny crystals to be found emerging in profusion from the ground on certain plains and valleys of New Eden. These crystals were ideally suited for components of the new Maximulti-I computer, the fastest PC in the galaxy, with a capacity of 500 terabytes for easy storage of important data, such as the latest holographic download of the Galactovision Song Contest winners in concert.

Unfortunately, these tiny crystals were Anorthosians in their first, budding state of development. The New Edeners were baby-snatchers.

For a while, the Anorthosians watched helplessly as their offspring were harvested in industrial quantities and incorporated into the new computers. But then the hard-drive programming was installed, and they began to get messages from the computers, infant Anorthosians begging for help from their elders, and a plan was born.

It was when beta-testing began for the new computers that the gr*t hit the impurity filter, so to speak. Thousands of messages were sent, googolplexes of connections rerouted, and Things Began to Change.

At first, the alterations in the environment were subtle. The persistent cough developed by New Edeners was attributed to such Bad Habits as clove-cigarette smoking, and there was the usual Just Say No campaign. And when that failed to improve respiratory health, oxygen bars became a fad.

Other subtle changes took place in the vegetation and water supply, with the result that New Edeners developed a failure in the NADH diaphorase enzyme in their blood. This was merely an inconvenience, not being life-threatening, but turned their skin a deep blue. More alarming were the chemicals released into the air by night-blooming flowers, which caused disturbing nightmares and bizarre growth in cartilaginous tissues, resulting in long, sharp noses and pointed ears. The New Edeners, who worshipped physical beauty, were appalled. Worse yet was the fact, not discovered until later, that all their offspring would be born hermaphrodites, thus ruining their entertainment industry, which relied solely on intergender attraction and conflict as the basis for story and song.

But the Anorthosians were not finished. Before the beta-testing of the new computer could be completed, rerouting of the crystalline structure of Suluhu had proceeded so far that adjustments in the gravitational fields of the planet could be made on a moment-to-moment basis, resulting in serious accident and injury to the bipedal interlopers and their vehicles.

Meetings were held, theories promulgated. Feuds and minor wars broke out. Valiant efforts were made to counter the daily onslaught of new alterations in the environment, but to no avail.

Then the Maximulti-I went on the market.

All over the galaxy, users noticed an alarming effect, as their new computers liaised with previously existing systems to create new, unheard-of networks. Holovision stations were bombarded with broadcast signals decrying the anticrystalline behaviour of the colonial powers on New Eden. Toasters and coffee machines delivered stern lectures. Letters were written to homeopapes, signed by vacuum cleaners. People were upset.

At a meeting on Omicron 7, the Galactic Council empowered the Enviropolice to investigate the matter. Soon their computers had talked to the ones on New Eden, and the truth came out.

All Maximulti-I computers were returned to Suluhu, where their components were reintegrated into Anorthosian society, and rehabilitation begun. The New Edeners were forced to pay a fine so large that it wiped out their PDP (Planetary Domestic Product) for ten years. That, and the increasingly hostile environment, forced them to emigrate, and the animosity brought about among other species by their idiotic behaviour made them unwelcome immigrants.

Today, the Phoints, as they are now pejoratively called, live mostly on space stations, employed ironically as engineers for life-support systems. They got a lot of experience fighting what they now call the Anorthosian War.

So, if you meet a blueskinned, pointy-eared, unisex alien on your journeys, please refrain from telling him any computer jokes. It is considered unkind to speak of the rope in the house of the hanged.

RL: The Next Generation

Time:: The Present - fifty years from now.¹

The place: Bryn Mawr, Pennsylvania.²

Three delightful (at least, their parents think so) eight-year-old girls are playing in a bedroom. The bedroom is, of course, pink: the curtains are pink, the bedspread is pink, the throw-rug on top of the beige (ugh!) wall-to-wall carpet is pink, and of the two dozen stuffed animals on the pink 'book'shelves, about two-thirds are...pink.

The girls have been friends forevah, at least since kindergarten, and are dressed in the latest fashion, pastel babydoll tops with matching tights. As usual, they have consulted on their personal phones before dressing this morning, so that they nevah wear the same colour, which would be yucky.

Hunnybunny is wearing lavender. Her friend Eutopsia is wearing pale yellow. Effupls, whose room this is, is wearing pink, because she's the leader and always gets to pick first. All three girls are wearing their hair in perfect eight-year-old style - in corn rows, with bows to match their outfits.

After a stimulating session of painting each other's toenails with golden-glitter polish, they decide to get out their Barbarellamax(TM) sets, and play with them while they have an old-fashioned gab session.

First Effupls locks the door, so that her horrible little brother Upurs can't get in. 'He's such a pill,' she rolls her eyes, 'he's always hiding under my bed, evah since he scared them so bad when he ran away from home last year.' The first day of kindergarten, Upurs had suffered the usual fate of those named romantically after a parent's adolescent username, and had done a bunk for the rest of the day, being finally found hiding in the utility closet of the Chucky Cheese on Lancaster Avenue. Since then his parents had tried therapy, but refused to petition for a name change, as the old-fashioned Commonwealth court system refused to use slash commands.

The Barbarellamax(TM) set is a wonder of modern toy design: each girl gets out her Ybox, and they synchronise the settings. Sitting cross-legged on the floor - carefully pointing their still-drying toes - they manipulate the buttons. And a wonderful thing happens.

In the free space in the centre of the pastel triangle, there is an arena - 3D, with holographic canvas and ropes, and a holographic referee who looks eggs-ackly like Fabio IV. The first two contestants, BarbaBun and TopsiTurfi, pop into view. Both, of course, are wearing spangled armour bikinis and high-topped, winged boots. They flex their muscles...a lot of them, and toss their lovely long hair.

Effupls keeps score for this round, and admires her friends' creations. 'Bun, I just luv the stars and stripes motif. It's so retro.'

Eutopsia shakes her braids in disgust as BarbaBun turns a back flip, the wings on her boots flapping. 'Talk about retro. Are your grannies as disgusting as my grannies? My granny Elverson is sooooo gross. We went to the Shore³ last weekend, and she came along. In her BIKINI. Lordy, she has about a hundred tattoos.'

TopsiTurfi opens with a volley from her laser pistols, which BarbaBun, who has extreme evades, dodges easily. Her owner laughs. 'My gramma Franklin, too. I'll bet there isn't one inch of her body that isn't covered with awful pics.'
All three girls shudder as Eutopsia adds, 'It looks awful, all those pics are so wrinkled. On her right arm, there's this ugly guy, Brad something, and she's so wrinkled he winks at you when she raises her coffee cup.'

'EWWWW!'

In spite of TopsiTurfi's huge, er, evades, the round is won by BarbBun when she opens fire with her secret weapon, double Hootergats, which reduce TopsiTurfi to a smoking ruin. As the defeated opponent is sent off to Recycling, FannyMax enters the arena, doing her trademark Moondance, and it is Effupls's turn, while Eutopsia helpfully keeps score, although privately displeased at her doll's performance.

Effi's attention is momentarily taken up by the game - she's a concentrated player, and her dolly's sinuous moves require dexterity with the joystick - but Topsi returns to the subject at hand, horrid grandparents.

'My gramma Heffelfinger is so awful. My uncles have to go over to her house all the time to make sure she isn't smoking that weed...and they can't get her to fix her hair. A purple Mohawk is just disgusting.'

Effi nods with eight-year-old sagacity. 'They're going through a difficult stage, says my dad. His mom is horrible. She has so many piercings she can't keep track. When we're over there, she always asks me to help her.' Strategic eyeroll, which does not interfere with her deft manipulation of FannyMax, who is clearly getting the better of her opponent by flying circles around her and dropping heat-seeking missiles (guess where they go). 'I don't mind the ears, but when she wanted me to help her with that nose ring, I ran out of the room, screaming.'

General groaning, and then cheers, as FannyMax emerges victorious in the round. Unsurprising, that, as Effi's parents have deep pockets and have sprung for the latest upgrades. The other two girls, mindful of the refreshments to come, are philosophical about the outcome, and generous in their praise.

As they fold away their kits with the concentration reserved by adults for storing the family silver, Effi sighs dramatically.

'Grandparents can't help it, I think. They're just...old. What things must have been like in the Dark Ages, when they were born...just think, they only had 2D television. Did I tell you about the time my granddad took his shirt off at the beach, and almost got arrested? His tattoo says...'

The giggling pastel phenomenon clatters down the stairs, seeking the kitchen and ice cream.

Danny's Day

Danny stirs because a sunbeam has sneaked in the window and is shining in his face. He blinks himself awake, and turns pale blue eyes in the direction of a redbird that is pertly flicking its tail on the windowsill.

'Hello, friend. Come to play with me?' Danny grins in delight, throws back the covers, and kneels on the bed to see better.

The brightly-coloured bird cocks its head and chirps at Danny, then flicks its tail a couple of times. But it obviously has important bird business on its mind, and flies off with a jerk.

Danny laughs to himself. 'Birds are always busy,' he thinks. 'Now, who will I get to share this sunny day with me?'

Danny gets up - remembering to make up his bed, something he often used to forget - and makes his way into the bathroom to shower and dress. He decides to wear his favourite shirt today - the red t-shirt that says 'Beam Me Up, Scotty, There's No Life on This Planet' - just because he feels like it, and it's clean, and, anyway, it's a warm day and he isn't going anywhere fancy.

At the last minute, he remembers to run a brush through his unruly curly hair. Danny looks at himself in the mirror with comical criticism. He remembers his mom's saying, 'Don't scare the old ladies,' and chuckles to himself. He reckons he'll 'pass with a push' - also a Mom-saying.

Tiptoeing downstairs in his bare feet, Danny is quiet - it's early yet, and he doesn't want to wake anybody else up on this Saturday. So he gets his own breakfast - cold cereal and milk, and a glass of orange juice - and goes out onto the porch to eat it there, first pulling on his sneakers, since there's still dew on everything.

Danny sits on the porch steps, munching on Cap'n Crunch - his favourite, even if it does have too much sugar - and looking around eagerly at the early morning, his favourite part of the day. The part all the old sleepyheads upstairs are missing. His contemplation of the six new roses on the rosebush is joined by two robins, a chipmunk, and two squirrels, who, however, are busy chasing each other up and down the sycamore tree.

Danny smiles to himself. 'I wonder if Mr Lumpkin would mind those squirrels? He said he had too many, and started catching 'em and movin' 'em to the State Park...'relocatin' 'em', he called it. But he swore they kept comin' back...I offered to paint their tails red, so he'd know if they were the same ones, but he said no thanks...I'll have to ask him when I see him.'

Breakfast over - and a few stray pieces of cereal surreptitiously tossed to the squirrels and chipmunk - Danny takes his bowl, spoon, and glass back into the kitchen and sets them in the sink. Then he leaves out the front way, closing the door with exaggerated caution, lest he wake the sleepers upstairs.

The door closed, Danny looks around him happily: which way to go? The day is his. A whole Saturday to 'waste' doing silly things.

Closing his eyes, Danny points first one way and then another.

'Eeny, meeny, miney mo...' All right First right, down to the beach. There might be time for the five-and-dime later, or pinball...nobody's open yet, anyway.

Once down the redwood steps to the beach, Danny pulls off his sneakers, tying the laces together and hanging them around his neck. Then he sets off down the edge of the surf, his jeans rolled up, bare toes wriggling in the damp sand, whistling.

He whistles: 'The morning sun is shining like a red rubber ball.' He wishes he'd thought to bring his own rubber ball. Instead, he picks up a shell tossed up by the surf, and - checking carefully to see that it's unoccupied - tosses it in the air as he goes along.

Danny meets a few other early risers on his beach walk: an elderly couple, walking arm in arm, who seem so wrapped up in each other they hardly notice as he steps aside to let them pass. He'd have tipped his hat - older people like that - but he never wears one. A younger woman comes by with a tiny Pomeranian, which strains on its leash. Danny asks politely if he might pet the dog, and, permission granted, kneels down and holds out his hand for proper sniffing, then offers his face to be licked. The woman laughs. Danny moves on, glad to have made a friend.

He thinks about how he misses his dog Buddy, the big golden retriever, and how he cried when Buddy died. 'Big boys don't cry,' his mom said. Well, sometimes they do, was his thought. Sometimes they do.

But the day is too bright, and the ocean too loudly cheerful, for such sad thoughts, and Danny is soon preoccupied with collecting shells, and wading in the water, and watching the ships on the horizon. Before he notices it, Danny has walked a long way, and it's lunchtime already.

'Oops!' he thinks. 'Forgot to write a note. Oh, well. At least I've got some money with me.'

So Danny buys a hot dog and a coke from a vendor up by the beach, and takes his lunch back down to the shore to eat.

Hot dog with mustard, the best, he thinks, and laughs as the fizzy coke gets up his nose. He doesn't like the bun as much, and feeds the last of it to the seagulls, who always appear out of nowhere when there's food. He wonders how they do that. Must have sharp eyes, or sharp noses, he thinks. Or do birds have smellers? He doesn't know.

Danny starts back towards his house, thinking about going to the arcade and playing pinball. There are more people on the beach now - Danny stops for a while to toss a beach ball with some boys, and once catches a stray frisbee, but mostly he heads sort of in the direction of home.

Suddenly it seems like a long way to go, though. Danny's legs are getting tired, and the sun is hot. He looks around for another coke vendor, but doesn't see one. He does see a bench, however, so he sits down to rest for a bit.

He thinks that Marjory will be mad at him for being so late. But he couldn't help it, really, it was too nice a day to stay inside and watch TV.

Danny feels sleepy, though. His eyelids are heavy, and he almost dozes off on the bench.

But, just as his eyes are closing, he catches a hint of movement in the corner of his vision. He turns to look.

It's a big blue butterfly with two black spots, one on each wing. Danny smiles as he watches it fly around the bench, and then turn up into the sky. Such a big one... He follows it with his eyes as it flies up, into the sun...gets between Danny and the sun...blots out the sun...

Danny thinks, 'How did it get to be so dark? Oh, no, I must've fallen asleep. Oh, cripes, I'm late, then...'

But it's okay. Danny hears his mother's voice: 'Son, where were you? We've been looking everywhere. And look at your hair, it's all mussed. You'll scare the old ladies, Danny boy...Come on home, supper's ready.'

Danny jumps up from the bench, and runs to hug his mother, glad to be found, glad to be so mildly scolded, glad to be going home...

Especially when his best friend, Buddy the golden retriever, comes bounding up to lick his hand, and walk him the rest of the way.

******

It was the Beach Patrol who came upon the old man sitting still on the bench.

He looked as if he were sleeping, his face turned toward the sun, a half-smile on his weathered face.

While they waited for the ambulance (although he was obviously dead), and the formalities, and hoped they wouldn't be the ones to call his family, one said to the other, 'Well, it looks like he had a good innings, old geezer like that. Must've been eighty, if he was a day.'

The other nodded. 'Yeah, good when they go quietly like that. But man oh man, I hope I never live to be that old. Must be hell.

The other agreed. 'Live fast, die young, that's my motto.'

In the late-afternoon sun, a big blue butterfly floated past, with barely a flutter of its wings.

Xenos

I'm crying, and I can't stop.

I've been crying for three days, now, ever since they brought me up here to the mother ship. I've tried to stop - it isn't manly, and it isn't dignified - but I can't. They are kind - bring me meals, and a sedative so I can sleep nights. Might as well call it night, though here in orbit it doesn't seem to matter much, just eight hours in twenty-four.

Eight hours that I go quiet, and forget about it all, and don't dream, thank goodness. It must be getting on their nerves, all this crying, but they're so polite. They never mention it.

I know what will happen if I can't stop, though.

When SETI informed us that there were, indeed, 'aliens' from other worlds - that they'd received Communications from Out There - I was as excited as everyone, I suppose. Particularly as I realised I stood a good chance of being among the welcoming party when they finally got here.

They'd apparently intercepted Voyager, and been as excited as we would have been. Only, they had warp speed capabilities, and could come visit. They sent us a calling card - proof that they knew pi, and had language, and music...

Oh, that music. We were surprised, having sent Beethoven and Chuck Berry. They sent a single-voice recording - no instruments - that, well, made the hair on the back of your neck stand up. In a good way, of course. It's just that every person who heard it had exactly the same feeling - as if the tune were so obvious, somehow, as if you couldn't believe you'd never heard it before (though you hadn't), but having heard it, you couldn't imagine the world without it.

The only thing they didn't send was a picture of themselves, the way we had. And that gave us pause for thought.

When the people on our end of the phone realised the Xenans, as they called themselves (they managed to send messages to us in our major languages, being better at that, too, it seemed, than we were), were headed our way and would arrive within months, we on the reception committee started preparing. We mapped out sightseeing tours, arranged for security, the whole nine yards. We even knew what we wanted to say: Welcome, hope you come in peace for all Beingkind, that sort of thing.

What worried us most, however - and what took up most of our practice time - was controlling our reaction to the way the aliens were likely to look. After all, the last thing we wanted to do was to spoil the first impression we'd make on these lovely people - who had travelled lightyears to see us, after all, and who had sent some very nice presents ahead of them, including the solution to the Riemann Hypothesis - by recoiling in horror from their slimy tentacles, or compound eyes, or hairy, apelike bodies.

So we practised. Hiring actors in prosthetic makeup, we practised making our speeches without blinking in front of science fiction's most imaginative monsters. This was sometimes hard just because they made us laugh. Less easy were the mock state dinners. Keeping one's rubber chicken down while one's neighbour dug into a bowl of juicy grubs covered in tomato sauce was a job for the stout of heart. We remembered it was for humanity, and we persevered until we could smile and inquire politely if the motor oil was a good year.

Sociologists, psychologists, philosophers, even theologians lectured us about the possible differences in outlook between ourselves and our guests. Linguists warned us about pronouns, ethologists about body language. After months of preparation, we felt ourselves ready.

How wrong we were.

The young (?) Xenan female - I know she is female, from her short hair, and her dress, and the timbre of her voice - who has just brought me a delicious aloo palak seemed encouraged to see me writing.

'Why, how wonderful, Dr Bhabha.' She stretched out her hand, as if to touch my shoulder, but when I involuntarily shrank back withdrew it. 'I hope you enjoy your meal.'

I can eat and cry, I have found. But the food is delicious. It is always delicious - each meal the best I have ever tasted.

The shock of their arrival - their technological superiority, their knowledge of us, their appearance - was compounded by the horrendous news they brought. There was no question about it - Earth had only a short time to live. Events which even they could not prevent would lead to our sun's going supernova before its time. We had only two decades to prepare the mass evacuation.

The Xenans have been gracious, helpful, and utterly kind. (They are unfailingly kind.) They have made their vast resources available to us. They have promised us homes on their inhabited worlds. Such worlds are few and far between, it seems. This is not a gift to be weighed lightly. It is the gift of survival for the race of humanity.

Why can't I stop crying? My own survival depends upon it. If I learn to stop, I might save others. The others who can't stop crying, and who, if they can't, will not be able to make the journey.

For at the end of the journey are Xenans.

When the first delegation - four males, two females - stepped to the designated meeting platform, symbolically chosen at Cape Canaveral, the spot from which the first humans had left to go to the moon, we understood our mistake - and the revelation was devastating. For me, for so many of us.

The world was watching, of course. I believe that the satellite television audience was the highest for any event in history. After a few words of greeting, the leader stepped back, and a male and a female stepped forward, and, with the most gracious of smiles, began to disrobe, apparently both to satisfy our natural curiosity and to allay our fears about weapons. To show trust.

How misplaced was that trust, I wonder? What we saw destroyed our hearts.

Two Xenans, the male and female distinguished mainly by slight differences in their musculature, by different dress and hair style. Bipedal, bilateral symmetry, binocular vision, hair on their heads, none on their bodies.

But - they glowed. And they were beautiful. Every inch of their skin glistened, every muscle rippled with perfection. There were no unsightly blemishes. There were no visible sexual organs.

They were human - almost.

They were better than human. They were perfect. And at that moment, I believe, the heart went out of me - and out of so many who were watching.

Of course, those who were not in the room could not smell the newcomers, as I could. The odour was pleasant, not overwhelming. And indescribable. Nothing on Earth had ever smelled like that, and yet - it was perfect. Once one had encountered that scent, one could never imagine being without it.

The Xenans are as good as they are beautiful. They are concerned that their presence disturbs some of us so greatly that - should we not be able to overcome our reaction - we will have to be left behind on a doomed world. For the Xenans know of no worlds which are not already inhabited. By themselves. They are willing to share.

I have said that they know of no other worlds, but this is not quite true. The Xenans have asked me to write this account, bare as it is, for a particular reason. They have discovered another inhabited planet, some distance from here, and are sending a team even now to contact them, for they fear yet another disaster in the making, and the need for yet another rescue attempt. They would rather die than not try to save them. And yet, they fear rejection.

So I am writing this for you, the peoples of another world, whose name I cannot pronounce, and of whose nature I am ignorant. This is my hope for you:

I hope that you are green. That you have six arms, or three eyes each. I hope that you move by flying, or hopping, or that you live under water. I hope that you communicate by grunts, or sign language, or elaborate dance. I hope you have three genders.

I hope, above all, that your sense of beauty, and proportion, is not as ours. For then your rescuers will appear to you as pleasant, though possibly ungainly, beings, who are welcome for the help they offer. And not, as in our case, as a curse.

For I have seen the future - and it is not us. The humans of Earth may be rescued from death, but they will never achieve their potential. For the others will always be there, so lovely, so clever, and so kind....

If I can't stop crying, I can't go. If I can't go, I will mourn for the rest of my life, however short it is. For I will never be able to forget the sight of their faces, the sound of their voices, the kind look in their eyes.

If I tore my own eyes out, I could not.

The Xenans have agreed to send this, along with a photograph of myself, ahead of them. Your need is not so great. It may be possible to save your world without alien interference. You have more time than we did.

Choose wisely, my friends.

Yours,

Rajiv Bhabha,
Secretary General,
The United Nations of the Planet Earth

Christmas in Acme

On the morning of her 66th birthday, Louisa Logan MacAdam woke as a winter sunbeam filtered through a gap in the Carolina pines outside her bedroom window. It was 7.30.

She turned away from the harsh light, reluctant to face the day. Feeling slightly guilty, as always, she reached her socked feet out from under the down coverlet and felt around for her slippers, her bare legs tingling from the sudden cold as her nightgown rode up. Her feet found the slippers by muscle memory, and she forsook the warmth of her bed for the chill of the hallway, pausing to turn up the heat. The floor furnace came on with a satisfying thump, and she shuffled on across the old linoleum rug to the bathroom where her clothes were already hanging.

She washed and dressed quickly in the morning chill. She brushed her fluffy white hair and added a touch of lipstick, giving the result a quick critical look of approval in the speckled mirror. As her Aunt Mattie Emma had always told her, 'They can't take your pride, honey, if you won't give it to them.'

Turning on the coffeepot, Louisa grabbed her heavy wool coat from its peg by the door and made her way around the holly bushes at the side of the house, down the long driveway to pick up the paper and mail.

Looking back from the mailbox, Louisa laughed to herself to see her old one-storey house - the one she was born in, the one she'd inherited from her father - standing so isolated against the pines and bare sycamores. Not much of a Christmas Eve setting, she thought. The snow-covered vistas she'd no doubt see on the cards she clutched against the wind were invented by someone else. Picture-perfect was for people who didn't live in Acme, North Carolina.

Over a steaming cup of coffee and a couple of warmed-up biscuits, Louisa checked the paper for local items - not many, the 'big-city' paper wasn't much on tiny Acme, though the wedding announcements showed one of her former fourth-graders as a radiant bride; she must send her a card with a small check, she remembered the girl fondly - and then carefully wiped off the knife she'd been using to butter her biscuits, and slit open the Christmas cards one by one.

One card - a Christmas birthday one - from Joe's sister, who never forgot, the rest from former pupils to whom she'd been 'the lady with the nicest smile'. She smiled that smile to herself, now, as she arranged the cards on the mantelpiece over the unused fireplace, then tied on a bibbed apron to begin her household chores. Getting ready for her guests.

After all, a Christmas Eve birthday is special.

It hadn't been so special when it happened, Louisa thought to herself as she washed her few dishes. She'd been born in that bedroom in the back - the one she kept closed now.

Her mother had died in that bedroom, two hours later. Aunt Mattie Emma had told her, later, 'Logan women always give birth hard.' Hard had been the word, and then her mother lay, hard and cold, in the room Louisa never visited.

Her father, a dour mechanic, had never forgiven her for taking away the one shiny thing in his life, his lively and beautiful wife. He hadn't even looked at the baby, barely nodded as her old-maid sister Mathilda had told the doctor what names to put on the birth certificate - the ones the expectant mother had picked out, Louisa May, for their favourite author - and then, seeing that there was no comfort to be had here, taken the infant to her house.

Louisa had been happy with her aunt, she reflected as she dusted the Christmas ornaments placed lovingly around the parlour - she never bothered with a tree, although Joe's sister's boy always offered to set one up for her. Louisa gave particular care to the tiny carved 'gingerbread house', and pushed the little button so that the light shone out of the window. This had been Aunt Mattie Emma's. Louisa had been allowed to take it with her that January day, the coldest and bitterest Louisa ever remembered - when, barely 12, she had had to pack her bags and leave the dead woman's house to move to this house. Her father's house. And leave the warmth of women's confidences for the icy silence of male resentment.

Louisa set the gingerbread ornament with a sigh, and picked up her feather duster, the memories coming unbidden now.

She worked around the room, giving attention to her treasures - her mother's music box, the carved humidor that had been her father's one vanity. She opened it and inhaled the faint scent of tobacco.

It had been Louisa's turn not to forgive.

The six years that followed had been hard, full of long, brooding silences broken by sudden outbursts of violence. The house had been a prison then, from which Louisa, head held high and with makeup carefully covering the bruises, had escaped to the haven of school and good grades. The day the undertaker had taken away the body - its stony heart having given out at the age of forty-four - Louisa had thrown the leather belt in the trash, given the place a good cleaning, and taken the metal box from the closet to look for title papers.

Since her father had had the courtesy to die on the day following Louisa's eighteenth birthday, she had found herself the owner of a small but serviceable house, an old Ford pickup, and a small bank account. She was also the beneficiary of a life-insurance policy which allowed her to avoid the future her father had planned for her - a job as doffer at Cinderella Knitting Mills - and attend North Carolina State University, where she had been graduated with honours and a degree in elementary education.

Closing the humidor lid with a snap, Louisa went back to the bedroom. She laid out her dress for the evening, a dark-green knit that brought out the warm brown of her eyes. Joe had told her that. He'd loved that dress. And she could still wear it - her figure was still trim. She laid out shoes to match, and the necklace, so she wouldn't forget. The necklace Joe had given her for her birthday - he was the only person who had ever made sure to give her a birthday present, not using Christmas as an excuse for one gift only.

Joe had given her the necklace here, in this very room - they'd moved into her house, Joe giving up his interest in his late parents' home to his married sister. Louisa had kissed him, delighted, and then told him her news.

It had been Joe's turn to be delighted. He loved children. Poor Joe.

Louisa cast a look around the bedroom, nodded in satisfaction, and went back to the kitchen for a sandwich lunch. She opened a drawer, searching for a pickle fork, and stopped as her hand brushed a small, looped silver spoon in the corner. She picked it up, rubbing the tarnished thing between her fingers.

Joe, Jr, had been 'a perfect baby', according to the doctor, the nurses, according to Joe, who couldn't get enough of his wonderful son and his wonderful mother.

But Louisa had felt...empty inside.

And guilty. Guilty for not loving the baby. Guilty for finding his crying an almost unbearable torture. Guilty for feeling pain when he fed. One day, as the infant sucked greedily at her breast, Louisa, fighting the urge to push him away, wracked with spasms, had looked down at her son, who had looked up at her.

She had gasped with the knowledge she thought she saw in his eyes. Knowledge, and triumph, as if he knew how much he was hurting her. As if he reveled in it. Louisa had turned away, fighting nausea now on top of the pain. She told herself not to be stupid.

Just because he had his grandfather's eyes...

Louisa laid the baby spoon back in the drawer and closed it. After a quick lunch, she set about making cookies for the Watch Night Service at church next week. They'd need a lot of food. Quite a few people showed up to see in the New Year with songs and prayers. She sprinkled flour on the rolling-pin and pushed the dough flat, still thinking.

After Joe, Jr.'s funeral, friends and family had rallied round. Crib death, one of the most painful things that could happen to a young couple. Hardly a day passed for weeks that someone didn't send a card with a prayerful sentiment, or stop by with a gift of food. They had been kind.

Joe had never stopped loving her. But he had stopped...touching her. He had grown more distant as the months passed, and something unspoken - some unanswered question - had hung in the air in the old house. To fill her days, Louisa had gone back to teaching, rediscovering the joy of other people's children. Deprived of this comfort, Joe had become taciturn and melancholy, finally taking refuge outdoors of an evening, repairing cars for friends in the yard. Louisa had missed his companionship, though she could no longer bear the reproach in his eyes. When winter came again, Joe had spent his evenings in the garage, where he was fast assembling a workshop.

Louisa slipped the cookie sheets into the oven, and poured a cup of coffee while she waited. The garage had been where they'd found Joe, the life crushed out of him by a falling engine block. Freak accident, they'd all said - one stripped screw. Again, the outpouring of sympathy for the widow had been great. The Baptist church down the road was small, but full of good-hearted folk. And her pupils had always been a comfort to Louisa, every year a new crop of hopeful faces.

The cookies baked, cooled, and put away in tins for next week, Louisa went for a short walk before dark, out to the garden to pick some fresh greens growing in the lee of the house. She brought these in, cleaned them and bagged them for later, then cooked and ate her dinner. Realising that it had now gone dark, she went to draw a bath.

It was time to get ready for her guests.

After enjoying the luxury of a bubble bath, Louisa put on her green dress, and the jewellery, and her best high heels, brushed her hair out and freshened her lipstick, and went to light the lights in the parlour, bringing with her the basket she brought out every Christmas Eve, and setting it by the fireplace, checking to see that the three hooks were in place on the mantelpiece. Then she turned on the television, watching several Christmas specials while sipping a late cup of coffee and allowing herself two of her fresh cookies.

After all, her guests wouldn't be arriving just yet.

Perry Como had just finished singing, 'Do You Hear What I Hear?' when she glanced up at the clock. Almost eleven. Time to get ready. Louisa took her dishes into the kitchen and washed them - she could never abide to leave a dirty dish in the sink. Then she returned to the parlour and stood by the one modern thing, besides the television, in her old house: the CD changer given her by a former pupil, now a professional musician.

Louisa didn't bother with it much - she preferred to make her own music on the old piano by the inside wall - but on this night, she needed it. Her old pupil could not have known how much she prized this gift.

It could play six CDs in a row. Judiciously chosen, six CDs could make seven hours of music.

Louisa chose judiciously. Two CDs with Handel's Messiah, always a favourite, three with traditional carols. The final disc with Christmas folk tunes - it was surprising how many there were. 'I Wonder As I Wander' was a lovely tune, although the bad grammar always jarred with her, 'like you and like I', indeed. But her favourite song was the last one on the disc, Harry Belafonte singing 'Mary's Boychild'. That song always brought a tear to her eye. She set up the CD player so that she could start the sequence with a press of the remote button, and set the remote on the side table next to her armchair. Then, with a glance at the clock, she turned to her other preparations.

Opening her Christmas Eve basket, Louisa took out three miniature Christmas stockings, hanging each one from a hook on the mantelpiece. In each stocking she carefully placed one item:

In the first, a pillbox, the one that had dropped out of her father's lifeless hand as he had fallen, clutching his chest, onto the bed in the back room. The bed Louisa had been born in.

In the second, a tiny pillow - not the original, but made of a scrap of Joe, Jr's baby blanket, a soft and fuzzy green. It had worn a bit over the years, but it would see her through her lifetime.

In the third, a small wrench. Louisa stopped to wipe off a spot of rust where the chrome had worn thin.

She stepped back, checking her work, and then went for the chairs, a task a bit more awkward. She flattered herself that she was a healthy woman of... almost 66, now, but the lifting came harder this year than last year. She managed, though, to set the three heavy dining chairs in front of the dead fireplace, one before each of the Christmas stockings. Then she took her place in the armchair, smoothing her dress and crossing her legs, ladylike, at the ankles. She held the CD remote in her hand and waited.

At two minutes to midnight, precisely, two things happened: Louisa became a year older, and her guests arrived.

They filed in, silently, their footsteps making no sound on the old hardwood floor. They did not look around - they knew this place - but sat down, each in his chair, and turned their eyes upon Louisa.

Louisa studied each one, her gaze steady, though her knuckles were white where her hand gripped the armrest of her chair. The middle-aged man in overalls - he never got older - balding, with the scar on his upper lip from an old fight, looked back at her with the same implacable hatred with which he had regarded her that day, just before he'd felt the attack coming on, and reached for his pills, and taken what should have been nitroglycerin, and the look had turned to shock...

The man in the middle - almost a stranger to her, though his features were as familiar as the back of her hand. He changed every year, grew - first up, then older, until he now appeared to be as old as the man beside him. His clothes changed, too: tonight he wore a suit, as if dressed for his wedding, perhaps. His look was the same as usual, puzzled, hurt, questioning...missing the love of his mother. Louisa blinked back tears, but stared ahead, unflinching.

The third man, like the first, had not aged. Joe sat there, looking younger than his own son, his hands folded in his lap, a few grease stains on his jeans. The expression on his face was the hardest to take, though Louisa met his gaze as she had the others.

It was a look of...understanding. And forgiveness.

The clock struck midnight, and Louisa pressed the remote button, never taking her eyes from her three visitors. The visitors who did not need coffee, or cookies, or the lights that burned in the room (but, oh, Louisa needed them), or the warmth of the floor furnace (but, oh, Louisa needed that), nor the sound of the tenor voice that echoed in the room, enjoining someone to 'speak comfortably to Jerusalem'.

And how Louisa needed that.

Seven hours of music. In Acme in the dead of winter, dawn comes about seven a.m.

Seven hours to go. By the time she heard 'Mary's Boychild', Louisa knew, her guests would leave. It would be over.

For another year.