THE 2084 PRECEPT
Anthony D. Thompson
Copyright © 2015 Anthony D. Thompson
All rights reserved.
Anthony D. Thompson has asserted his right under the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988 to be identified as the author of this work.
This book is a work of fiction. It has been invented by me. Names, characters, places and occurrences are either fictitious or are used fictitiously and any resemblance to real persons, living or dead, business or any other establishments or events, is strictly coincidental.
ISBN: 1514261170
ISBN 13: 9781514261170
Ebook formatting by www.ebooklaunch.com
'Only two things are infinite, the universe and human stupidity, and I'm not quite sure about the former.'
Albert Einstein (1879—1955)
~
'Forgive them, for they know not what they do.'
Jesus Christ (The Christian Bible, Luke 23-34)
For my daughter Caroline, with huge amounts of love
ACKNOWLEDGEMENT
I would like to express my grateful appreciation for the assistance I received from Dr. Jeremy Resnick, Consultant Forensic Psychiatrist, Nottinghamshire Forensic Service, U.K. I made use of certain facts, annotations and explanations provided by Dr. Resnick, but adapted them to suit the needs of the novel. As the saying goes, I used the information ‘freely’. Any errors are exclusively my own.
Anthony D. Thompson
CONTENTS
Prologue
Day 1
Day 2
Day 3
Day 4
Day 5
Day 6
Day 7
Day 8
Day 9
Day 10
Day 11
Day 12
Day 13
Day 14
Day 15
Day 16
Day 17
Day 18
Day 19
Day 20
Day 21
Day 22
Day 23
Day 24
Day 25
Day 26
Day 27
Day 28
Day 29
Day 30
Day 31
Day 32
Day 33
Day 34
Day 35
Day 36
Day 37
Day 38
Day 39
Day 40
Day 41
Day 42
Day 43
Day 44
Day 45
Day 46
Epilogue
About the Author
PROLOGUE
The tall, blond man was standing in the middle of the room. He was dressed casually. Sports jacket, chinos and a polo shirt. He was looking out of the window. The trees were leaning in submission to a strong wind and the snow was falling in gusty swirls and had made everything white already.
Nice day, thought the man to himself. But nothing which his overcoat and scarf wouldn't solve, and certainly it was no danger to his relaxed good mood. On the contrary, he liked wind and snow. Always had.
The room could have been a meeting room in a modern budget hotel. Simple furniture, white walls, the décor and the lighting easy on the eye. Looking good and smelling clean.
But the room was not a meeting room in a modern budget hotel. It was a meeting room on a ward in a U.K. low security unit for the mentally ill, a reduced security unit to which the man had eventually been transferred as his apparent return to sanity had become increasingly impossible to ignore.
The door to the room opened and he counted the number of people as they came in. Fourteen. More than usual for a meeting of this nature, he knew. But then, as he also knew, he was something of a celebrity. His was a rare case and had attracted a lot of attention. He had been the subject of many professional conferences, both internal and external, over a prolonged period of time.
Only to be expected of course. Years ago he had been classified as potentially dangerous, both to himself and to others. He had not actually harmed anybody but he nearly had. He had been insane. He had been classified as a DSPD patient—one of those who suffer from dangerous and severe personality disorders of various kinds. In other words, a potentially violent psychopath.
All of this he knew and agreed with. And then a remarkable improvement in his condition and his increasing ability to intelligently discuss and analyze his past and present situations had led to his transfer, thanks also to the modernized principles enshrined in the 1994 Reed Report, from his initial high security environment to a medium security one, and thence to this low security unit.
The man's repeated requests to be released and returned to the community had resulted in a gradual withdrawal of all medication. The psychological and psychiatric testing programs were intensified. Periods of escorted 'leave' outside of the institution were approved. After his transfer to the low security unit, a certain amount of unescorted leave was also added to the program. And eventually a recommendation was presented by the responsible consultant psychiatrist for an absolute discharge. And this had been approved by a First Tier Tribunal.
The man had been aware of the applicable procedures. He was aware of the fact that neither the Ministry of Justice nor any other jurisdictions were involved, as his detention had not been subject to any criminal or civil restriction orders. He was not surprised that the discharge had been an absolute one. Such discharges were rare for inmates with his given medical history, but they were not unknown. The psychiatrists must have been totally convinced of his return to sanity. Alternatively, they had possibly considered his detention all those years ago to have been a mistake of some kind, faulty judgment resulting in an overstatement of his medical condition at that time. Or even that his mental illness had, back then, and for whatever reason, been intentionally faked.
As the others sat down, the man also took a chair out of courtesy, placed his small suitcase beside him on the floor and laid his overcoat and scarf on top of it. He was calm and collected, and he continued to glance out of the window. At the snow, at the wind, at the freedom.
As is usually the case, he had been informed of his release several days ago. This was merely the formal goodbye. They told him again of his aftercare rights under section 117 of the MHA. They informed him that mental health and social care needs would be provided under the CPA umbrella whenever he wished and for as long as he wished. And they hoped he would be taking advantage of such facilities, in spite of his statement to the contrary.
The man had no friends. A social worker would, for one week, take over control from the Court of Protection of the £50,000 he had inherited when his mother had died two years ago. After that, control of the full amount, less accommodation and related costs incurred during that week, would revert solely to him.
They confirmed that the taxi had been ordered and would arrive in thirty minutes. They confirmed that it would take him to the hotel he had requested, where adjoining rooms had been booked for himself and a CPN. The community psychiatric nurse would assist and further evaluate him until a community support worker had helped him obtain permanent accommodation.
They repeated their wish that he maintain regular contact with the aftercare team. They reiterated the fact that, as mandated by the law, he was free from restrictions of any kind. They handed him his private documentation and his copies of the non-confidential medical documentation pertaining to his case history. And they wished him well.
The man had given them his full attention during these proceedings. He had done so out of courtesy and also because he had no reason to want to cause them any inconvenience, let alone trouble. These were pleasant people and they were genuine professionals. They had tre
ated him well, and they were proud of their involvement in his progress toward a discharge.
He smiled and looked around the group for the last time. The Consultant Forensic Psychiatrist, who was also the Clinical Director, was there. One of his assistants was there. The unit's general manager was there. A psychologist was there. Two registered nurses were there. A physiotherapist and an occupational therapist were there. The designated CPN, two social-cum-support workers, two health care nurses and a researcher were also there.
He stood up and said thank you. He wished them continued good health and success in both their professional and their private lives. He put on his overcoat and scarf. There was some shaking of hands and then he and his suitcase were accompanied out of the room by two male nurses. In addition to low security patients, there was a small medium security section on this site, and they had to pass through two locked doors to exit the ward and enter the main corridor. They then walked about one hundred meters to the next set of locked doors and hurried out into the swirling snow and crossed over an internal road to the reception building. Two electrically operated doors controlled their passage through the airlock area and then, nodding to the area's security man, they moved on and out into the institution's open portal.
Into the outside world. The sane outside world. So it is said.
The three persons who would accompany him to the hotel arrived. They waited and watched the snow swirling and falling until the taxi appeared. They climbed into the taxi and it drove off into the whiteness, its lazy blue exhaust spirals being snatched up by the wind and blown back without delay into their previous state of non-existence.
DAY 1
It was just one of those ordinary days.
A day pushing us closer to the middle of the second decade of the twenty-first century.
Assuming of course that you happen to patronize the Gregorian calendar, a solar calendar introduced in the year 1582 to replace the Julian calendar mandated by Julius Caesar’s minions in the year 46 BC. This reformed calendar changed the length of the year by 0.002%. It also retroactively confirmed its starting point as the year of birth of the key deity in one of our religions. Or, if you prefer, of that deity's self-proclaimed representative. But in either case in human form. Universal acceptance of the calendar in the western world took its time, but its adoption by Greece in the year 1923 completed the process.
On the other hand, if you are one of the large number of people who use a Chinese calendar, things are more complicated. The Chinese have a number of calendars, including lunar ones with 354 days to the year. They are all more or less complex and you could now be in the year 4,711 or in the year 102 or in some other year, depending on which one you use. You might also need to use a converter-calendar to check with the Western one in order to know how old you are and so on.
Alternatively, you may be the user of an Arab calendar, of which there are also several. But you would normally be the follower of one of the Islamic ones which tell you that you are in the year 1435 AH. The starting point here is the date of a journey, more or less forced, of that religion's self-proclaimed key prophet from Mecca to Yathrib (or Medina, as the latter is nowadays called).
And of course if you operate on the basis of a Hebrew calendar, the method used to measure your time is a notably singular one. This calendar is a lunisolar one. It gauges time by comingling three unrelated astronomical phenomena: the Earth’s rotation on its own axis, its own revolution around the sun, and the moon’s revolution around the Earth. Those utilizing this calendar are aware of the fact that the resulting inaccuracies require the corrective interpolation of a thirteen-month year from time to time. And you are now in the year 5775 which, as you know, is the year both the universe and the human species were created.
Not that it matters in the slightest, does it, what year we humans are in.