‘Oh you should, sir. You really should.’
‘All right.’ Augustus sighed once more. ‘I’ve a minute or two to kill before I—’
‘Before you what, sir?’
‘Never mind. So you want me to guess, do you? Is it anything to do with Egyptians, or chickens?’
‘No, sir. And I must say that the chaps from the other realities we deal with are keeping a bit of a low profile.’
‘Hardly surprising that, is it? So, not Egyptians or chickens?’
‘No, sir.’
‘Give me a clue then.’
‘Right. It’s something that flies through the air.’
‘Ah,’ said Augustus. ‘Is it one of those big black secret unmarked government helicopters that we deny all knowledge of having?’
‘No, sir. Although one of them has gone missing.’
‘An aeroplane then.’
‘No.’
‘A rocket?’
‘Close.’
‘Oh, I’m bored with this. Tell me what it is.’
‘The Americans have launched a nuclear warhead from one of their secret satellites that they don’t know that we know about.’
‘I was pretty close, then, when I said rocket, wasn’t I?’
‘Very close. Would you care to guess at the target?’
‘That’s easy,’ said Augustus. ‘I’ll just bet they’ve targeted London, to wipe out the monster.’
‘Well done, sir. And, for three in a row, would you like to guess how long it will be before the warhead arrives?’
‘Easy too, I can work that out in my head. About thirty minutes I’d say.’
‘Close enough, well done.’
‘Now it’s my turn,’ said Augustus. ‘I spy with my little eye, something beginning with . . . Hold on . . . Would you care to run all that by me again?’
‘Hold on. Hold on,’ said Porrig in the helicopter. Whatever are we worrying about?’
‘The nuke, I think,’ said Rippington.
‘No, I mean, think about it. If the Ministry of Serendipity controls just about everything, then they’re perfectly capable of knocking an approaching missile out of the sky.’
‘Of course they are,’ said Sir John.
‘Of course they are,’ said Rippington.
‘Of course they are,’ said Porrig.
‘Are you quite certain?’ Danbury asked, ‘Because I have a “certain—”’
‘Are you quite certain of this?’ asked Augustus Naseby, growing quite white in the face.
‘Quite certain, sir. The warhead will reach ground zero in a little less than fifteen minutes.’
‘Then only one course of action lies open.’
‘Engage the nuclear defence network that the Americans don’t know we have?’
‘The very same.’ Augustus delved into his shirt and brought out one of those special keys on a chain that very very top brass always carry with them for unlocking and arming the nuclear capability.
He flipped up a section of desk top to reveal one of those special units with the flashing lights and the big red button with keyhole arrangement that goes the special key in question.
Augustus Naseby inserted the special key and gave it a twist. The word ARMED sprung up on a little screen.
‘It’s a jolly good job the Americans don’t know we have this,’ said the man in the white coat, which, although nameless, was growing a little sweaty at the armpits.
‘Why?’ asked Augustus.
‘Well, sir, if the Americans knew, then they would have encoded a scrambler into their warhead that would cut all our power.’
‘You’re not wrong there, I suppose.’
‘Better push the button, sir.’
‘Right then, I will.’ Augustus reached to push the button.
But all the lights went out.
23
‘Bother,’ said Augustus in the dark.
‘Was that an order, sir?’
‘Who said that?’
‘I did, sir. Man in a white coat called Julian.’
‘Have you got a big torch?’
‘No, sir. Ouch!’
‘Well at least I’ve found the stick.’
‘I’ve got a torch, sir,’ said another voice.
‘Who’s that?’
‘Man in the white coat called Albert, sir. If you’d care to follow me, I think we should be heading for the top secret steam-turbine-driven Victorian escape pod that is cunningly disguised as a well-known London landmark. Sir.’
‘What escape pod?’
‘Who said that?’
‘Who said “who said that”?’
‘I did.’
‘Who are you?’
‘Who’s asking?’
‘Sir, I really think you should follow me now.’
‘Well switch your torch on then, you twerp.’
‘I haven’t got a torch.’
‘But I thought you said—’
‘I’m the one with the torch, sir.’ The man in the white coat called Albert switched on his torch.
Its name was Trevelyan.
‘Nice torch,’ said Augustus.
‘Thanks,’ said Trevelyan.
‘Who said that?’
‘Just follow me, sir.’
‘Who said that?’
‘That was me,’ said the pig. ‘It’s fun this, isn’t it? Does anybody have a plan?’
‘So that’s my plan,’ said Porrig, who bad been outlining his plan in the cockpit area of the long black secret unmarked Ministry of Serendipity helicopter. ‘What do you think of it then?’
Above the rotor blades CHB CHB CHBed.
In the cockpit area there was silence.
Porrig glanced at his watch. It was twenty past four.
‘Have you ever noticed that?’ said Porrig. ‘The way if there’s ever a lull in the conversation and it all goes quiet, it’s always either twenty to, or twenty past the hour. I wonder why that is.’
‘It’s a tradition, or an old charter, or something,’ said Sir John. ‘Although on this occasion I feel it is something else entirely.’
‘Oh?’ said Porrig. ‘What?’
‘Sheer horror!’ screamed Sir John. ‘You cannot be serious, you just cannot.’
‘Why?’ asked Porrig.
‘Because. because . . .’
‘I think,’ said the old bloke, adjusting the throttle and fiddling with the gears, ‘that Sir John is just a little concerned about the scale of your plan.’
‘It will take a big plan to stop a big monster.’
‘Yes, I’ve no doubt of that. But what you’re suggesting is a tad ambitious.’
‘No,’ said Porrig. ‘Piece of cake. It’s all here in Apocalypso’s book. I can do it all by myself. Easy peasy.’
‘No no no.’ Sir John waved his long hands about. ‘You don’t grasp the complexity. A trick like that—’
‘Illusion,’ said Porrig. ‘Call it an illusion. It sounds much better than trick.’
‘Illusion, then. An illusion like that would take days to set up. It would require a team of skilled technicians. Cost thousands of pounds. Need to be—’
‘No,’ said Porrig once more. ‘There’s no need for all that fuss and bother. I can probably find all the bits and bobs I need right here in the helicopter. And Rippington will help me.’
The imp bobbed up and down on Porrig’s knee. ‘I certainly will,’ he said.
‘Tell him,’ Sir John implored the old bloke. ‘Tell him it can never work.’
The old bloke double-declutched and changed down. ‘I don’t think he’d listen,’ he said. ‘And Rippington’s keen, aren’t you, Rippington?’
Rippington nodded his little grey head. ‘I think Porrig’s plan is the ploughman’s lunch,’ said he.
‘And that’s good?’ Porrig asked.
‘The very best. It outshines the barman’s breakfast and the dishwasher’s dinner and ranks the beggar’s banquet, not to mention the furtler’s feast.’
‘The furtler’s fea
st?’ said Porrig.
‘I told you not to mention that,’ said Rippington. ‘But it’s all somewhat academic really, isn’t it?’
‘Why?’ Porrig asked.
‘Well,’ said Rippington. ‘Do you see that little telescreen jobbie on the instrument panel there?’
‘I do,’ said Porrig.
‘And you notice it has the nuclear symbol above it?’
‘I do,’ said Porrig.
‘And the words INCOMING MISSILE in capital letters flashing on and off?’
‘Yes,’ said Porrig, ‘I do.’
‘And the little digital clock counting down? Do you see the little clock?’
‘I do see the little clock,’ said Porrig.
‘Well, that’s why it’s somewhat academic.’
‘Academies of learning,’ said Dilbert Norris, who hadn’t finished speaking; who, in fact, was only warming up. ‘Great seats of higher education. And when I talk about great seats’ — he waggled his bottom — ‘I know just what I’m talking about.’
Dilbert paused. ‘I didn’t hear laughter,’ he said. ‘I made a joke about bottoms there and I didn’t hear laughter.’ He folded his brow and thought very bad thoughts and the whole world that was watching laughed out loud.
‘That’s better,’ said Dilbert. ‘Try to keep up, it’s less painful. You’ll soon get the knack. Yes, indeed, academies of learning. We will do away with those. Mankind has become over-sophisticated, which, considering how stupid you all remain, is perhaps somewhat oxymoronic. But you’ve lost your roots. And when I talk about roots, I know what I’m talking about.’
Gales of laughter blew in Dilbert’s direction.
Dilbert sighed. ‘That wasn’t a joke, you dimmos. That was a statement of fact. You have entered the computer age. You could be moving outward to the stars. But what have you done with your computers? Turned them into mindless games and weaponry and mobile phones. I despair, I truly do. But we’ll have no more of it. Back to the land with you, I say. But for a few. A chosen few, who will work on a little project of my own.’
Dilbert grinned greenly into the nearest camera.
‘I am going to have myself cloned,’ said Dilbert. ‘Produce a crop of little Dilberts and Dilbertas. Seed the planet with my kind. You lot will be farmed the way that you farm chickens. He who is top of the food chain is top of the tree of life.’
‘We’re all gonna die!’ Danbury flapped his hands about, and Sir John Rimmer flapped his hands about .The old bloke did not flap his hands about, because he was holding the joystick. Rippington didn’t flap his hands about, because he was afraid he’d fall off Porrig’s knee. And Porrig didn’t flap his hands about because he thought it was really uncool.
And Dr Harney didn’t flap his hands about because he was unconscious.
‘Stop flapping!’ ordered Porrig.
‘I wasn’t,’ said Rippington.
‘Nor me,’ said the old bloke.
‘Danbury, wake up Dr Harney,’ ordered Porrig. ‘Make him fish out his radio from its . . . er . . . special holster and call up his American base. Have him tell them that the situation is under control and they must disarm the missile.’
‘Okey-doke,’ said Danbury.
‘Bravo, Porrig,’ said the old bloke. ‘So are you still going ahead with your inspired plan?’
‘Absolutely. If we can stop the nuke, we’ll still have to deal with the monster. And if we can’t stop the nuke, and it’s all academic, we’ll still have had a jolly good try.’
‘Bravo once more. I am proud to call you my great-great-grandson. So what would you like me to do?’
‘Land the helicopter, so that I can make all the necessary adjustments. Then on to . . .’ Porrig paused. ‘Where exactly is the monster now, Rippington?’
‘Somewhere called Trafalgar Square,’ said the imp. ‘I can hear his thoughts and they’re very very noisy.’
It was very very quiet in London. Very quiet. Deathly so. No traffic moved and no hooters honked. No hawkers hawked and no pedlars peddled. No trendy gits with mobile phones stood in shop doorways showing off And no rich gits minced out of their chauffeur-driven motor cars parked on double yellow lines and swanned about in Harrods
Streets and pavements were deserted.
Shops and businesses abandoned.
The rich and the poor, the great and the good and the godless, moved and weaved and meshed together no more.
Those who could flee, had long since fled.
Those who could not, now knelt.
The sun shone down upon Trafalgar Square. A light breeze ruffled some pigeon feathers. And the great fat green and sprouty sod lounged upon his human hillock, chuckling mightily.
‘Laugh it up, people,’ said he. And the silence broke to huge cries of mirth, though none with a trace of amusement.
‘Right then,’ said Dilbert. ‘I really would like to sit about chatting with you people for the rest of the day, but I regret that I must leave you for a while. You see, being the kind of God that I am, the all-seeing and all-listening kind of a God, I am ever alert to potential danger. And you will never guess what is heading this way. Nuclear missile, that’s what.’
A terrible moan rose up from the kneelers. The terrible moan of the damned.
Dilbert nodded his big bulbous head. ‘It’s true. Launched by the Americans from one of their secret satellites. Can’t trust anyone, can you? Except for me, of course. Yes, the Americans. I heard it from the Ministry of Serendipity, you know. That’s the secret organization that really runs your planet. I can hear their tiny minds at work. They’re scurrying about beneath the ground like little rats, trying to escape, even as I speak.
‘I wonder if they’ll make it. I know that I will.’ Dilbert reached down into his human hillock and tore off an arm with a wristwatch on it. ‘Let’s see,’ he continued. Yes, I have a ten-minute margin of safety. Kindly convey me to my spacecraft and I’ll prepare for the off.’
He cast out his terrible mental pain and the kneelers rose and gushed towards him, sweeping up over the human hillock, bearing his enormous weight upon their straining shoulders, lowering him gently down to his waiting spacecraft. And Dilbert gazed up into the clear blue sky and smiled and then said, ‘Hang about.’
The strainers and lifters and carriers and shifters halted and hung about. And gazed up also.
Dilbert pointed and all the people stared.
Because something was coming.Something quite wonderful.
It was coming in low from out of the sun and it glittered and twinkled and twirled as it came. It didn’t look like a nuke and it didn’t look like a fighter aircraft or a long black secret Ministry of Serendipity helicopter. It looked like a silver seven pointed spacecraft.
Just like Dilbert’s in fact.
Dilbert rubbed his eyes and Dilbert squinted. And Dilbert sent out thoughts and thoughts came back to him. Then Dilbert shouted, ‘Clear the decks, make room, make room,’ and he fluttered his fingers and sent people running and he gazed on as the craft gently settled.
And Dilbert said, ‘Mum, is that you?’
24
Dilbert’s mum was smaller than her son. Much smaller. But then mums so often are. Because with mums it really is the case that size doesn’t matter. The smallest mother can have the largest son. In fact the smallest mother often seems to. And no matter how large that son may be, he grows really small in the presence of his mum.
And as the dome of her spacecraft opened and Dilbert’s little mum climbed carefully down, you could almost feel Dilbert shrinking.
You could almost see it as well.
Dilbert’s mum was a sproutish little body. She wore a little pinny, as mums used to do. She had mean little arms and mean little shoulders, a mean little mouth and mean little eyes too. She walked with a shuffle, on mean little feet. And she fretted as she shuffled; in the way that some mums still do.
Dilbert gazed down upon his mum, and his face took on that anguished expression that big sons’ fac
es always take on when confronted by their mums at quite the wrong moment.
‘Well,’ said Dilbert’s mum. ‘Aren’t you going to give your old mother a kiss?’
Dilbert’s big mouth opened to emit a strangled croak. His big fat fingers fluttered and he waved away his people.
‘Go on,’ he muttered, between clenched teeth. ‘Go on, shove off.’ He flung his pain this way, that way and the other and people took to hurrying away. At considerable speed.
‘Come on then,’ said Dilbert’s mum. ‘What are you doing there?’
‘Just . . . er . . . just . . . er.’
‘And what is all this about?’ Dilbert’s mum pointed a mean little finger and Dilbert knew just where it was pointing.
‘Dead things,’ said Dilbert’s mum. ‘A big pile of dead things. You’ve done this, haven’t you?’
Mumble mumble mumble, went Dilbert.
‘Speak up, speak up. I let you out of my sight for a couple of hundred thousand years and this is what happens. You just wait till your father gets here.’
‘My father . . .’
‘You’re in big trouble, my lad.’
‘Big trouble?’ Dilbert’s mouth fell horribly open. ‘Big trouble,’ he said once more, then he held up the arm with the wristwatch on it. ‘Mum, you have to go. You have to go now.’
‘Go now?’ Dilbert’s mum folded her mean little arms. ‘Go now? I’ve only just arrived and I haven’t even had time to stretch my old legs.’
‘Mum, this is very important. You are in great danger.’
‘Stop it at once, you silly boy, and give your mother a kiss.’
‘No, Mum, really. You really shouldn’t be here.’
And it was quite true, wasn’t it? Dilbert’s mum really shouldn’t have been there. She really wasn’t part of the equation. Dilbert did have a lot on his plate. Things to do, people to conquer. And there was that nuke approaching.
‘Mum, you have to go. You really do.’
‘I’ll go when I’m good and ready and not till I’ve had a kiss.’
‘But, Mum . . . I . . .’
‘Kiss,’ said Dilbert’s mum, indicating her mean little cheek with her mean little finger.
‘Then you’ll go? You promise you’ll go?’