DEMON LORD
Harold Anton Kruger July 2003
The lists were connected to an incident in the past when Milton Brown crashed his spaceship in the deserts of the planet Pangolin. His ship carried a cargo of metric bananas..
When Milton crashed the spaceship he was thinking in jargon. The ship’s computer had crashed just after landing. He swore and climbed down to the sand. Hot air hit him like a blast from a furnace. The bluish sun was small but very intense. Milton found that the cargo bay doors were open and the porter robot still worked. It opened one of the crates and separated one magenta banana from the bunch. “Here, the pilot is entitled to one free banana.”
“Wow, thanks, the company is so generous,” replied Milton, unpeeling the oddly coloured fruit. “Hey, can you go to the nearest spaceport and get help for the computer?”
“No, my duty is to stay here and sell the cargo to traders. There is an established trade route passing that oasis.”
Milton turned and squinted. In the distance was a patch of green.
“When will the trader get here?”
“That is hard to predict. A few hours or a few days.”
“A few days!”
Milton thought for a while. He hated the porter robot, and there was absolutely nothing to do. He decided to walk to the oasis and meet the trader there. It would be hot, and he had no means of carrying water, but that beat hanging around here with a crashed ship and a humourless machine.
Milton began walking, but before he had gone far the strangest sensation overcame him. He felt dizzy and disoriented. He stumbled in the sand. He seemed to black out and eventually regain his senses as if emerging from a deep sleep. He slowly came to recognise the desert and the taste of banana in his mouth. He looked back at the ship. It seemed too close and parked at a different angle. Everything seemed somehow different.
Milton took a while to reorientate himself, and then with a shrug headed out across the desert towards the oasis. He walked for several hours in his grey pilot’s jumpsuit, and the sweat was soaking through in dark patches. He was terribly thirsty.
Abruptly a crow cawed loudly, right behind his head. He spun around, heard a flapping, saw nothing and turned back.
Milton saw a yellow and blue beach umbrella. He saw the flash of white teeth. There was a table in the desert, on a patch of polished floor, under the umbrella. There was a smartly dressed brown man standing beside the table, smiling at Milton. He was holding a glass jug of orange liquid.
Milton approached the table, only just trusting his eyes. He stepped onto the polished floor and the man offered him a seat at the table, in the dark pool of shade. As he sat down there was the flash of something gold in the distant sand-dunes.
“Orange juice, sir? The first glass is free.”
“Well, alright, that’s very kind..”
A single glass stood on the table top. The brown man filled it with orange juice.
The desert was baking hot. Milton soon finished the glass. A powerful craving for more of the orange juice filled Milton. “I’ll have another glass please.”
“Certainly, Sir, but I’ll need your card. One glass will cost you half of your money.”
“You have to be joking.”
“No. It’s quite simple, Sir, the orange juice is rather special, and out in this hot desert it gains in value, that’s why one glass is now worth to you half of your money.”
Milton sat in silence for a while, trying to sort out his thoughts and feelings.
“Well, hey, I do feel strange, and this desert is just so hot. Alright, one more glass.” Milton handed over his plastic card.
“Just the one, Sir?”
“well, make it two then.” The brown man scanned the card and returned it.
Milton drank the second glass quite slowly, but the third went surprisingly quickly.
“Very good sir. Now if you would please stand and step off the floor…”
“What?’ Milton stood up.
“Please step off the floor.”
Milton stepped off the floor. As he did so the brown man pressed a small grey device in his hand. The floor and everything on it gradually faded and then vanished. The last thing to go was a flashing white smile. Then Milton was alone in the desert once again. He checked his plastic card. The balance registered as Zero.
Milton swore. There was a flash of light. Something shiny in the yonder dunes. Like gold. Milton began to trudge towards it.
Suddenly there was a loud cawing above his head. A silvery crow swooped across the desert, heading towards the gold flash of light, as if directing Milton there.
“You think I’m a complete idiot, crow, not knowing to head for the gold?”
The heat of the sun was relentless. It frazeled down in context.
The silvery crow was perched on a brass handle. This was what had been flashing in the sun. The handle was on a box of dark, polished wood. A large, long box.
As Milton approached, the crow flew away.
The long box was half buried in the side of a dune. Milton tugged at the wooden box to no avail. Then he managed to lift the top. It yielded slowly. Inside he saw the spines of many books, in many different colours. He selected one at random. It was called GYROSCOPE by Anton Kruger. He selected another ----THE INSTRUCTION BOOK by Glerphus Mu Dao.
Milton opened THE INSTRUCTION BOOK and read a confusing series of paragraphs and lists. Then the book described a character opening a copy of GYROSCOPE, and this is what he read;
Abstract ALEPH
An intermittent maelstrom of didactic caveats, counterpointed, syncopated, severely scunged by the utter putrescence of incipient insensitivity, go swirling into the para-tactile vortex………
Milton stopped reading. The sun burned down on the top of his head. The crow cawed somewhere nearby.. He could not concentrate. Also there was no point in taking both books if one contained a copy of the other. He put THE INSTRUCTION BOOK back in the box. “The para-tactile vortex” he muttered, and closed the lid.
In the distance Milton could see something green and white that fluttered. At first he thought it was the crow in flight, but the colour difference was obvious. He began to walk across the desert again. His legs soon grew tired. His eyes ached. He was growing thirsty.
“Orange juice! Orange juice,” he called, but his voice was a feeble croak..
The green flutter turned out to be palm leaves. The white flutter was many strips of white fabric on a large wooden rack.. Milton dragged himself around one large dune and saw that the wooden rack formed a canopy for a row of five antique washing machines. Two cats wrestled on a decorative carpet in the shade of a multi coloured canvass awning that was also shading a round wooden door going into the side of a dune that was clumped with grass, and a bench set about with wooden chairs. The door opened and a little man walked out holding a silver tray on which were bottles and glasses.
For a while the two just stared at one another. Then the little man said, “Welcome home, Demon Lord. I have the water and wine you requested, and have thrown out all the Orange juice, at your command. I see you are wearing a human again. Have a drink.”
“what?
“ I am a Hobbit in your service.”
“You’re a Hobbit?”
“Exactly. I am known by the name Cornelius, but you have forgotten me.” Cornelius placed the silver tray on the bench and bowed extravagantly. He was dressed in yellow and blue striped pantaloons and a green silk shirt. Around his waist was a wide leather belt, fastened by a complex brass buckle. His feet were bare and hairy, and around his head was a white cotton bandana.
“You threw out the orange juice?”
“At your command, Demon Lord.”
Milton was too tired and thirsty to discuss the matter any longer. He came to the bench and rapidly polished off a glass of water. Meanwhile the Hobbit seated himself opposite Milton, and, taking a strange cast iron gadget, began to uncork one of the bottles. He turned an iron crank first one direction, to send the screw into the cork, then in the reverse direction, which drew the cork out. There were three large wine glasses on the bench and Cornelius filled two of them with red wine. .
“I think you have mistaken me for someone else.”
“How is that, Demon Lord?”
“I’m not Demon Lord.”
“Well, if you do not accept a reality in which you are the Demon Lord and I am the Hobbit, then perhaps you are Milton Brown and I am psychic business Hobbit. In that case I have plenty of orange juice in the cellar, but everything here is expensive and you Sir, are completely broke,”
“How do you know so much about me?”
“Because I’m a psychic Hobbit. Now, which reality do you accept?”
“I’m not sure, but maybe you are a psychic Hobbit ………the rest of it sounds more real to me.”
“Yes, I run this little shop and a laundry business. I also run several orange juice salesmen who are androids and beam into remote desert areas just when they are needed.”
“That was an android?”
“The brown man? Yes. He is called Harris. I know you met him recently.”
“What am I thinking right now?”
“Ooh …….all I get is static.”
“No, I’ve got an image in my mind, and if you were psychic you would know.”
“Orange juice?”
“Good guess, but I don’t think you are really psychic. How did you know those things?”
“You tell me, Demon Lord.”
Milton thought for a moment. If he insisted on his reality then he was broke and he couldn’t touch the wine. To be a Demon Lord for Cornelius would mean getting things for free …but then in that reality the orange juice had been thrown out, and that was what he craved ..
“Well,” replied Milton slowly, “You knew those things because I am the Demon Lord and I projected them into your mind.”
“Very good, lord, now you may try the wine”
“Thank-you.” Milton sipped the wine. “Now, is there any chance of getting orange juice?”
“You ordered it to be thrown out.”
“Now why do you suppose I did that?”
“Oh, who knows but yourself, Lord?.”
They both sipped wine. A wind ruffled the canopy above and fluttered the strips of white fabric on the rack over the washing machines. A crow cawed, harsh and loud, and the next moment landed on a perch up under the canopy, jutting from a support pole. Milton had not noticed the perch. He gazed at the silver bird and supposed it to be a native of the planet Pangolin.
“Remember your friend and guide, Guru?” There was a teasing tone to Cornelius’s voice.”
“Oh yes, I remember Guru.”
“he leads you to good things and warns you of the bad.”
“So he does, but why do you tell me?”
“Because you are humouring me. You forget being a Demon Lord..”
“Well, sort of,” said Milton.
“Look can’t we compromise or mix these two realities?”
“Perhaps, but someone around here must be the Demon Lord.”
“And what is that, exactly?” Milton sipped his wine.
“Well, there are several versions, but according to the old, classic story every planet with sentient beings will also be infested with Demons. These will be hard to detect, but they rule the other beings. Human people think they rule Pangolin, for example, but the people are controlled by Demons. Then, somewhere on the planet, wearing some guise or other, will be the Demon Lord. He or she rules over all the Demons in turn, thus is the ruler of the planet. The more powerful Demon Lords can rule many planets ----whole galaxies of planets in fact. Now we have tracked down the Demon Lord of Pangolin to this spot in the desert. The Demon Lord can take a shape and then forget who he really is. So it could be you or me, or even Guru or one of the cats.”
Milton turned to see the two cats tussling on the carpet. The larger, ginger cat had pinned down the fluffy white cat.
“Now if I am the Demon Lord of Pangolin, you will obey and serve me,” said the Hobbit.
Guru cawed loudly, dreaming of bread.. Cornelius jumped up from his chair and ran to the carpet. The cats darted away behind the washing machines. “And if I stand on my magic carpet, I will rise into the air.” He stood in the middle of the carpet. Nothing happened.
“Oh dear, I’m not the Demon Lord. Perhaps it’s Gimel.”
“And who is Gimel?”
“He’s a man, a trader who comes this way every month. He’s due today.” Cornelius returned to his chair and sipped his wine , “You know Gimel means camel in the ancient Hebrew language. He comes here on a string of camels.”
“A string of camels?”
“Well, linked by rope. You know.”
“Mmm ….now If Gimel is the Demon Lord----“
“He might have orange juice, yes.”
Milton stood up and looked around. He wished that this Gimel was the Demon Lord.
His grey jumpsuit felt horribly sticky and uncomfortable.
“Er, Cornelius, do you think I could give my suit a wash? Is there something else I could wear?”
“Yes, by all means. I have some man-sized clothes you can wear. Wait here.” The Hobbit jumped up and opened the round door in the sand dune. Then he disappeared inside.
After a while the round door opened and Cornelius emerged with clothes in his arms. The Hobbit obligingly turned his back while Milton changed. The costume consisted of baggy green trousers with a drawstring, and a red silk shirt. Once it was on he took his soggy jump suit across to the washing machines, but before he reached the washing machines he found several large baskets, and one was full of fabric, presumably the laundry to be washed. The fabric was white cotton in strips, with black lettering printed on them. Milton picked up one of the strips.
List
Pangolin
Zen
carrots
Spuds
Brainwashing powder
Font correction fluid
Ideal Gas
Milk solids
Dictating machine
Reading machine
Writing machine
Lamington bear
Sports mouse
Water rabbit
“The washing machine is a metaphor for the mind,” said Cornelius, taking the jumpsuit from Milton’s hands and deftly putting a washing machine into operation. “All the scraps of information churn around and around. I use a soap powder, since there is no brainwashing powder and the detergent powder kills the grass holding my sand dune in place. You see I pump the grey-water up to the top of the dune where the solar panel is and the water trickles down through a pile of rocks. Now, put all of that information in your washing machine and start the cycle.”
“Um, sure. But why are you washing all these crazy lists? What are they for?”
“Ah, the real reasons we might never know. They come from an organisation in the big city, and I believe it to be a religious organisation. Now if you look at the lists drying on the rack, you will notice gaps in the lists.”
“Gaps?”
“Quite so. Some of the list is printed in permanent ink, but some items are in watercolour. After I do the laundry these items wash out, of course, leaving the gaps.. All the clean lists with gaps are sent back to the city.”
“But why do they do it?”
“That’s where mystery comes into the equation. I have not much of a clue. From what I have read in the lists, however, the religion is related to Hinduism and Zen. The word Zen and the names of Hindu Gods often appear on the lists. Perhaps the lists are used as something like the Zen koans. But I have no idea why some of the list is in watercolour.”
Milton shook his head in perplexity. Since he had landed on this planet nothing had made any sense. He felt there was no firm ground for him to stand on. The Hobbit (and he was still struggling to get his head around the reality of the Hobbit) led the way back to the bench where he poured them more wine.
A man leading a camel appeared from around the other side of the dune, dressed all in white., with a wide straw hat. He waved and made the camel kneel down. Then he hauled two large pannier baskets from its back. The camel got up at his command and walked back around the dune. The man put the pannier strap across his shoulders and with some effort carried the baskets up close to the bench, where he dumped them. He swept off his hat and bowed to Milton. “Welcome back, Demon Lord.”
“Oh no.”
“Forgotten again? Do you know who I am?”
“You must be Gimel.”
“Yes, though I expect Cornelius told you. How are you, Cornelius?”
“Oh much the same. Quite well. And yourself?”
“I’m very good. Surprisingly good.” He began to rummage in one of the baskets. The other basket was full of laundry.
“Ah, Gimel, “ said Milton, “Do you have any orange juice?”
“You never tire of asking, but yes I do.” He produced a flask and filled Milton’s water glass, “But this juice is only safe for the Demon Lord, as you instructed, and will kill a human imposter.”
“Oh no!’ Milton gazed at the orange juice longingly.
Gimel took a large leather pouch from the basket and tossed it to Cornelius. The Hobbit took a pipe from his pocket and filled it with pipe weed from the pouch, then he filled the third wine glass and placed it in front of Gimel. Gimel sat down on a chair and filled his own pipe.
“Would you like a pipe, Milton,” asked Gimel.
Milton paused, thinking. Then he said “No, that’s alright, I don’t smoke.”
“Ah-ha!” cried Cornelius, “So you must be the Demon Lord.”
Quiet fell for a few moments.
Milton felt a mounting confusion and anxiety.
Then Cornelius and Gimel both burst into laughter.
“Sorry, Milton, but it was your own idea. The term Demon Lord has a double meaning,” said Cornelius, lighting his pipe. He exhaled a thin trickle of smoke. “You see to give up an addiction, such as smoking, is, in poetic terms, to master a demon. Someone who can beat an addiction is in the position of Demon Lord. I know you don’t remember it, but you used to smoke.”
“So this means that I’m no Demon Lord,” said Gimel, brandishing his own smoking pipe. “ Now, I think you have suffered enough. We will tell you the true story, and it’s OK to drink the orange juice. Look,” he sipped it, “Perfectly safe for humans or Hobbits.”
Milton guzzled the juice, but for some reason it did little for his craving.
“The problem is that Harris put a drug into that first orange juice,” Gimel explained, “so you can’t get a fix from ordinary juice. Now the reason we know so much about you is because this has happened before. Many times, in fact. The problem started with your addiction to metric bananas. Let me tell you the story.”
“It all began a few years ago when your spaceship broke down in the desert. You ate a banana. The first time you ate them not much happened, but the drug was in your system. You wandered the desert and the orange juice salesman Harris found you, and that was no great surprise since his business is based on detecting people in your plight. You then found this oasis where Cornelius lives, and I was here with my camels, on my way to meet you and pick up a load of metric bananas. You were supposed to land in the desert close to this oasis.”
“Where is the oasis?”
“Just behind the dune. So then I gave you a lift back to the city. Harris had taken all your money so you went right back to work as a pilot. A month later the company gave you the same assignment, to bring a cargo of bananas from a space station to this desert on Pangolin. You landed the ship and took some bananas from the cargo, since at that time, about a month from the first occasion, the cravings start. But soon you were walking in the desert and the real effect of the drug kicked in. Amnesia. You forgot that whole last month. It wipes out memory in between when you first ate bananas and when you last eat them. Then you ran into Harris and of course you didn’t remember him. You thought that it was your first arrival on Pangolin. You only remembered the first landing when you broke down. Then you pretty much repeated the cycle every month after that. You think this is your first visit and you’ve just met your first Hobbit. Actually we have been meeting like this every month for the last two years. The difference is that you don’t have to go into the city to get a repairman”
“You know when I was a kid we used to play cops and robbers using a banana as a gun. We used to call them flavour guns.”
“That’s a new one, Milton,” said Cornelius, you usually repeat the same old stories.”
“We often try to break the cycle and get you off the drugs. The most recent attempt has been to treat addiction as a Demon and help you to become a Demon Lord. I told you the legend of the Demon Lords several months ago. It was your Idea that we try to convince you that Milton is a Demon Lord. You thought it might help you master the cravings. So far you have not become the Demon Lord, but these are strong drugs.” Gimel had a wistful expression on his face as he exhaled a cloud of smoke. “But you have stopped smoking, which is a good start. I might give up one day myself, but I’m a trader of the smoking herbs, among other things. I can’t avoid it. You didn’t smoke before you met Carmelia, who runs a cigarette stall. You fall in love with Carmelia every month. You don’t have to travel that way now, back towards the city, but so far you’ve always wanted to see her after hearing about her, so I take you there and one of the other traders who come this way bring you here again and on to your spaceship. Personally I think love is the worst kind of drug. Do you want to see her?”
“Well of course. I want to fall in love. What is she like?”
“Oh, you will find out soon enough. What is that book?”
Milton glanced down at the book on the bench. He had forgotten about it. “This is called Gyroscope. Do you do much reading?”
“No, I don’t read myself ……..but Cornelius reads a lot.”
“That’s true,” said the Hobbit,” I’m an avid reader.”
“I try to be,” said Milton with a sigh, “But I always start books without finishing. I usually just get through the first few pages. Why don’t you have this one, Cornelius. I want to repay your hospitality a bit.”
“Why thank you, that’s very thoughtful of you. Did you bring the book from planet Trafel?”
“No. I was forgetting. It was the strangest thing. I found a whole box full of books out in the desert. I can’t imagine how they got there.” Milton passed the book across to Cornelius.
“I like the cover. What’s it supposed to be, I wonder. A cyborg face perhaps.”
“Who knows?”
The trio continued chatting and drinking wine for another hour. Gimel then announced that they had to go. They said goodbye to the Hobbit.
Gimel took the camels to Milton’s spaceship and collected a shipment of metric bananas. Then they trekked across the desert for several hours.
Carmelia waved as they came into view. She was wearing a pale blue dress and her long black hair was fastened with a copper pin. She stood behind a strange little glass-fronted stall. In the stall were single cigarettes. There was a red tent behind the stall.
Gimel unloaded a barrel of water for her. He tied the camels to a rock and rolled the barrel to the tent.
Carmelia was the most beautiful woman Milton had ever seen.
“Remember me yet?”
Milton shook his head bashfully. She ushered them both into the red tent. There was a patterned carpet on the floor, a few items of furniture, and an air cooling machine. A cut-glass ashtray sat in the middle of the carpet. They sat down on the carpet and Carmelia offered them cigarettes. Milton was going to mention that he didn’t smoke, but he was scared of offending the beautiful woman. He accepted the cigarette and a lighter. He lit what he thought was his first cigarette, but he didn’t cough.
Carmelia had large, dark, slanted eyes, a small, flaring nose and rosebud lips from which she blew smoke. “Any money, yet, Milton.?”
“Ah, not yet.”
“How can I marry you without the money?”
“Er…I don’t know,” Milton mumbled.
“Have to avoid that orange juice, Milton,” said Gimel laconically, frowning at his cigarette.
“It’s vendors like Harris who give the rest of us a bad name,” said Carmelia. Milton found the tone of her voice enchanting. He felt giddy. He was in love.
Presently Gimel had to leave, to meet an old steam train, he said. Milton would wait with Carmelia for a trader going back to the spaceship
“Of course it’s not just the money. I can’t marry a drug addict.”
“Isn’t tobacco an addiction?”
“You often ask me that, and I’ve had different answers. Now I’d say the difference is that smoking is acceptable, and it’s only a minor addiction.”
“Why do you run a stall in the middle of a desert?”
“You always ask me that. Out here there’s no competition. I can charge more, and it’s on a regular trade route. Most of the traders know me and buy my cigarettes.
“And you know something, Milton, the worst thing about your addiction is the amnesia. It wipes out your memory. I know you well by now, but you can’t remember a single thing I’ve told you. You have to start from scratch every month. I used to take it personally. You proposed the first time we met, but I have to remind you of that. For some reason you kept taking the drug in the metric bananas and forgetting all about me. But now I’ve just come to accept it. You have a monthly cycle, like a woman, and it’s going to continue until we are both old.
“Gimel tells me that the cravings come every month, and the illegal trading on Pangolin is established on that basis. Every month ships from Trafel land in remote areas of our planet. I think it helps them if the pilot is hooked, since you only remember the first trip.”
“You know part of my mind is convinced that this is the first trip and I’m caught up in some elaborate hoax.”
“Of course I’ve heard that one before. Once you said I was an android. But it’s not a hoax. It’s a drug addiction You first met me about two years ago. You had that same goofy expression on your face, which means you’ve fallen in love again. All you need to do is avoid the drug once in the month and the cycle is broken. You will remember and I will Marry you.”
Carmelia lit another cigarette
“Why don’t you tell me more about different planets,” she said, exhaling smoke with her words, “At least you tell me interesting things.”
“What have I already told you?”
“Ah, well what we always do is that you list planets, and I stop you on the first new one to me, and you tell me about it.”
“Planets? OK, well there’s Tarif, Twilight 7, Nihon, Sarifia, Serath, Capanecta, Dalerth----“
“Stop! That last one.”
“Dalerth?”
“Yes, I don’t know anything about that one.”
“Dalerth,” Milton scratched his chin thoughtfully, ”home of the Millipods.”
“The what?”
“Millipods. I’ll tell you about my first trip to Dalerth. The spaceport was in the middle of a great forest. The building was shaped like a huge glittering cone or spire, with the landing platform around the base. The spaceport coffee shop had a view of the tree-tops. There I met a traveller called Macra, and he said I had to have a look at the Millipods before I left Dalerth. He offered to show me, when I had finished my coffee.
“We went up in a glass lift, passing a very mundane series of rooms and offices. Then at the thirtieth floor Macra stopped the lift. We looked out on a vast room full of machinery, swarming with little robots. These were the Millipods; small silvery spheres with metal arms and legs. Macra told me that most of the plant was for reproduction of Millipods, but they made other machines for trading, too. The Millipods had not been built by humans, merely discovered. They were specially designed for or adapted to working with other machinery. Many people wanted to throw a few grenades into the plant, but the government had made a deal with the Millipods. Several continents on Dalerth belonged to them, while others were reserved for humans.”
There was a shout from outside the tent. Carmelia jumped up.
“Oh, it’s Meran. He’s a trader, and though he doesn’t smoke he always buys a lot of cigarettes. He can take you back to your ship.” She walked from the tent into the heat of the desert. Milton followed her. A man with curly black hair, a slightly hooked nose and an infectious smile was dismounting from his camel. There were four other camels behind him.
Before Milton knew it he was on one of those camels, waving to Carmelia as he moved away.
“Please try to remember me this time, but don’t make any more promises.”
“I’ll try.”
The camels plodded off. The powerful sun beat down on his straw hat. Meran began to sing in a foreign language. The sound was emotional and evocative, but Milton could not put a name to the emotions expressed.
The camel lurched and swayed. Milton squinted at the rocks and dunes all around. He thought of all sorts of things. Details of his experiences on Pangolin. A banana, a silver crow, a glass of orange juice, a brown man, a long box of books, a Hobbit, the Demon Lord and a washing machine.
The washing machine is a metaphor of the mind, Cornelius had said. He began to understand it, with all the same load of recent images and scraps of information churning around. They pulled him first one way then another. The face of Carmelia. The crazy beating of his heart. Smoking a cigarette. Meeting Meran. “Long time no see, old friend!” squeezing him in a bear hug. Then the goodbye. “Please try to remember me this time…” but no promises. He must have promised in the past. Two years? What was really going on? Why would he keep eating the metric bananas?
Some hours later the oasis came in to view. Meran made their camels kneel down and they dismounted.
“Oh, I have to change my clothes. My jumpsuit must be dry by now.”
“It always is. But listen. You are caught in a cycle. A snake with its tail in its mouth. It is driven by craving and desire. You must gain control of these, and the snake will let go. Now get your clothes and meet me back here. When the camels have drunk I can take you to your ship.”
*
Milton gazed at the screens in the cockpit. He half expected the computer to be crashed, but it was working.
“Cargo bay doors closed,” said the computer.
“Initiate take off.”
“Key in access sequence, please.”
Milton pressed a series of button pads. There was a humming as the anti-gravity generators turned on, then the ship lifted smoothly into the sky. Milton lifted the ship’s nose and they rocketed upwards, continuously accelerating.
Milton watched the rear-view screen as the desert dwindled to a small yellow patch. He saw other patches surround it and then the outline of a continent surrounded by sea. The continent shrank until he could see other continents. Then he could see the entire globe of Pangolin, but the desert had vanished.
“Confirm destination, please.”
“Constellation Karina, star Montaku, planet four, Trafel.”
“Locking on. Please enter hyper-drive sequence.”
Milton’s fingers flickered over the pad. There came a strange noise as the hyper-drive activated. The stars blurred and vanished. The blurs returned and turned back into stars. The constellations had all changed.
Milton’s viewscreen drastically filtered the light from the star Montaku, which was now close enough to be called a sun. The ship was already speeding towards the planet Trafel. Then Milton saw the reverse of his view of Pangolin; the planet expanding, continents growing until they hit the atmosphere, descending in a tight orbit.
“Confirm city and spaceport, please.”
“Aquarium city, fishy spaceport.”
“Reconfirm, please.”
“Iona city, Lesagos spaceport.”
“Confirmed. Landing in approximately 17 minutes.”
Lesagos spaceport was pear-shaped, with over 50 landing pads, both large and small. The massive pear-shaped platform was on top of a huge tower that rose like a titan from the teeming depths of Iona city. There was a sprawling sea of other towers and skyscrapers all around.
Milton fed his plastic card into the computer and it paid him for the return trip. Then he was outside, strolling towards the terminal building. An enormous bird glided overhead. Milton ignored it. He reached the terminal building in ten minutes.
In the terminal coffee lounge Milton ordered a large glass of orange juice. It didn’t satisfy the cravings after he gulped it down, and felt unsatisfied.
Then Milton had another idea. He walked to the lifts and went down to the Cadwell Space Transport offices. There was a sleek womandroid at the information counter.
“Excuse me, I want to apply for more working hours.”
“Oh, does this mean your current working hours are at fault?” she purred
“Well, yes, I suppose so.”
“You need to see the complaints officer. Talk to Mr Karl, floor 857, room 15.”
In room 15 he was met by a very good-looking android. He was the only Human in the room.
“Name, pleas.”
“Pilot Milton Brown. I’m here to see Mr Karl.”
“Just over there Mr Brown, at the third desk.”
Milton passed two desks. One had a machine looking exactly like a goose, with a namecard announcing her as Mrs Havernash. The next desk had an ape-man, or, to be exact, a Homo Habilus. He was called Mr Frank. Mr Karl was a huge Grizzly bear.
“State you complaint.” Growled the bear.
“Well I er don’t get enough working hours. Just one flight a month.”
“And you want more?”
“Well, yes.”
“So why did the company decide to give you just one flight a month?”
“Um, it was due to my depression, originally.”
“That’s on the grounds of mental illness. Do you really think the company is ignorant and at fault?” The bear leaned forward threateningly.
“Ah, no, I didn’t mean that.”
“Then there is no longer any grounds for complaint. Goodbye.”
Milton had flash-backs of the bear as he waited for the lift. They caused him to tremble and, at the same time, curse himself for being cowardly. He recalled images of Carmelia. The images were a bit blurred now. What would she think of him?
The lift arrived and he stepped into the plush, round interior. Several others shared the lift, politely ignoring each other. Floor 500 had already been selected. An image of the grizzly bear leaning across the surrogate wood desk. He pictured it swiping viciously at his head. But it was only a machine. He did have grounds for complaint. The depression improved if he worked more. But then sometimes……
His mind drifted. The lift hurtled down. He felt suddenly heavy. They stopped at floor 561. Someone got off. The doors closed. Images of Pangolin. Being greeted by a Hobbit. Lurching on the back of a camel. Gimel’s pale blue eyes. The grizzly bear. He did have grounds for complaint. But then it wasn’t really a complaint at all. He was requesting more working hours. He should go back and see someone. The lift stopped at floor 500. But he would just be directed back to Mr Karl. He shuffled out with the other people heading for the transport tower. He knew already that he was not going to go back to face the bear.
Warm muggy air hit him as he walked outside. The sky was overcast as usual. Milton walked across a wide, curving bridge of pseudo-marble. Tall palm trees flanked him on either side. Dark shapes drifted through the air. He kept recalling the image of the bear. It was just a machine, he tried to convince himself. And his mind was just an ancient washing machine going through an automatic cycle.
The bridge connected the spaceport building to the top of transport tower. There were gardens on the roof of the tower. All buildings had to have gardens on the roof, with at least one tree. Milton breathed the sultry air and walked past the gardens, trying not to remember the bear.
All around the roof there were piers. Milton made his way to one where a huge fish was docked. He walked through the doorway in it’s side and was greeted by a womandroid stewardess.
“Welcome aboard rainbow Trout Transport . Please swipe your card here if you select economy, and choose any seat on this deck.”
“Thank-you.”
Milton chose a window seat and gazed down at the various creatures drifting through the sky. Occasionally he saw the modular form of the more old fashioned air busses, but the more recent design was to copy fish and other animals on a large scale. It was anti-gravity which made this possible. The air was stratified into different speed zones. Slow fish drifted down below. Giant Tuna and birds streaked through the skies above.
The rainbow trout gradually filled with people. Milton remembered the image of Pangolin and the planet shrunk in his rear view screen. He thought about Carmelia. There was an ache of yearning in his chest. Other images came and went.
A handsome, immaculately dressed man stepped into the fish. The stewardess welcomed him, but he replied with a rapidly modulated sound punctuated by clicks and whistles. It sounded like dolphin language. The stewardess answered in the same language. Milton realised that the man was an android. They spoke for a while, then the android moved down to business class.
While androids had first been designed as slaves, to occupy the lower levels of human society, they had been developed and refined so that they naturally rose to the top. Now they had developed their own language that was much more rapid and efficient than English. It made Milton wonder what they were planning.
The stewardess closed the door and soon the trout moved off with a swaying motion. Once out of the slow zone around transport tower’s rooftop, they accelerated. Milton was worrying about the bear again, wondering what he should have done.
The stewardess came down the aisle with a trolley, offering drinks.
“I’ll have an orange---er, no, make that a blue wine.”
“A blue wine, sir. This is a Misurac Trombelli.”
“That will be fine.” Milton sipped his drink, which was almost too sweet for him.
The trout was already docking at another rooftop. Milton watched the variety of fish through the window. He didn’t know much about fish, but he recognised a catfish below them, and some kind of ray far below the catfish.
After a few more stops Milton got off at Gabro Tower. This was where he lived. The images of Pangolin were still going round in his head, but the planet seemed very far away now. It joined his other crazy memories. Milton walked by the gardens that he knew so well. Gabro Tower was old, and named after the dark stone it was supposed to be made of. He had been here about five years, not long after the diagnosis of depression.
Before going to the lifts Milton walked to the black stone railing, and dug a present from Pangolin out of his pocket. It was a pack of cigarettes and a lighter. He lit up and inhaled the smoke. It tasted rather nasty, but he felt the need to smoke. He didn’t remember being a smoker but his body was addicted to nicotine.
A killer whale sped by, surely no larger than normal. He thought back over his trip on the Rainbow Trout. The android. The blue wine. The stewardess. He inhaled more smoke. The blue wine not the orange juice. A snake with its tail in its mouth. To fight the craving (He really shouldn’t smoke). And now he thought that, like the original machines, the washing machine analogy was bound to break down at some point. One point was this; you didn’t unload the contents of the mind all in one go when the cycle was ended, and then start afresh with dirty laundry. Perceptions caused the mind to keep adding to the images and scraps of information, while forgetfulness kept erasing others.
Milton finished the cigarette and flicked it over the rail. His heart ached and he thought of Carmelia. The western sky was a dull red. The sun was sinking behind the clouds. It was time he returned to his room on floor 502.
He was standing in front of a pseudo-wood door. It had the carving of a plant on it, and a label that read; 50214 Mr Milton Brown. He pressed the label with his thumb and the door slid open. The lights and the holovision both turned on automatically as he stepped inside, avoiding the clothes strewn across the floor. The holo projected the image of a middle aged woman in a simple purple outfit. She was holding a half-empty glass in one hand and her words were slurred;
“Private Loline reporting for duty. Hi Milton. I forget when you were going to work. If I reach you in time come up to the bar. See ya.” The image faded. It was replaced by a tall blond man with craggy features. “This is Moon sending a time capsule. You just have to go to the dome, Milton, it’s really awesome inside.”
Milton walked to the sofa and flopped down. His hand found a book he didn’t recognise. A young girl appeared in the centre of the floor. On one side was an old coin-operated vending machine, and other old machines were crowded on the other side.
“We know you like old machines, Milton. So do we. That’s the reason we’ve set up a trust fund for obsolete machinery. Please consider donating to the trust fund, or it might mean the end for me and my friends.”
Milton immediately thought of the old washing machines.
“Now here’s something to really interest art lovers,” said a sincere, neatly cropped man, ”These modern artists have gone back to their roots and cover their bodies with spray-on plastic…”
Milton hit a button on his old-fashioned remote.
A beautiful woman with coppery red skin appeared. She was wearing a skimpy black thing that revealed more than it covered. She held a steaming container. "“Hello, Milton. You should try Leanardo’s take away food. I dare you to take me away,” she laughed, wrinkled her nose and then turned away, walking with an undulating gait to the automatic door of a shop. Milton’s view of the shop zoomed out, so that he could see the location in relation to gabro tower.
Milton turned off the holo and turned on the screen wall. It showed a Jurassic forest scene. Odd cries filled the air and little dinosaurs ran between the trees. Milton found it much more relaxing than the holo. He remembered the unfamiliar book on the sofa. He picked up the book, opened it and began to read;
Journal 05/06/3427
If this is all news to you, Milton, it means the bad thing happened again and this book could be useful. In case you can’t guess this means that you am I, and you have forgotten. You ate a banana again, you idiot. You forgot about Carmelia and all the other people you know.
I am writing with a mixture of hope and dread, because I am hoping that this Journal will help get me out of the amnesia cycle, but I dread that nothing can help now. I have been trapped for nine months now, and I never thought of writing a journal for myself. The thing is, I don’t really feel I need to. I think it is just a matter of deciding to avoid metric bananas, and it should be easy. Judging by all the time that’s gone past I must have felt this way before, only to fail when I reach Pangolin. Now nine months of my life is lost, and I think the only way to salvage lost time is to make a record for myself to read later.
Meran told me the cycle is like a serpent biting it’s tail, and each revolution strengthens the cycle, but then if you go around a lot you learn about the trap and how it works, and this can be used to escape the cycle.
19/10/3427
Several months have passed without writing because I hid this book under my mattress. I don’t know why I did it. Perhaps I got paranoid. I thought the bed felt a bit more uncomfortable but I didn’t think of checking till yesterday.
Anyway, I’ve had a terrible month. I’m only writing for something to do, having lost all faith in the journal project. It fails to break the cycle or anything. Now I’m feeling average depressed, so I can still write. When I’m badly depressed the best I could do is scribble a few words. Then I can’t even concentrate on holovision for more than five minutes. When I’m intensely depressed I can’t do anything at all, and life is absolute hell.
I’ve been having bad dreams. In the first one I was talking to Carmelia in her red tent. I asked her a question, and she answered in this rapid speech like dolphin language. In the dream I didn’t recognise it, but then I woke up. It was really bad, that one.
Then I watched a holo that was supposed to be funny, and a horror too. It was about this ginormous anteater that came to a city and started tearing the buildings open with its claws and licking up the people like ants. The holo wasn’t that scary, but then I had a dream filled with suspense. I was running around in a building that was still in the stages of construction. I knew that something like the big anteater was lurking outside, and any moment the sides would be ripped open and I would be eaten. The more I ran, the more scared I got. I almost had a panic attack in the dream. I woke up covered in sweat, panting like mad.
22/2/3428
I don’t remember the new year. I don’t remember writing this stupid Journal. I glanced at it once before earlier in the month and threw it in a corner. I know it can’t work or help me, but I’m just going to use it to express my foul mood. In my silly classification system I have been hovering between badly depressed and intensely depressed for most of this month. Although I feel a bit better than that now, it seems stupid to say I feel better because I feel bad.
When I was at my worst I couldn’t do anything, so when I was just badly depressed I went up to the roof and stepped over the stone railing to the ledge, and gazed down towards my death.
I stood there on the brink for about ten minutes, I had planned to jump and expected to any second, but for some reason I kept gazing at the scene below. Then I heard a voice speaking to me; “Long way down, Milton.” I recognised Moon by the voice. His full name was Moon Dust Redemption. “Thing is, you’re already down and you don’t want to go any lower. That way’s just too final. You know we live in interesting times. Come down here and we can talk about it.”
“I don’t think it’s worth it, Moon.”
“Come on, that drop won’t go anywhere for a while. You can always jump later if you have to.”
For some reason I climbed back over the rail and went to talk with Moon in the garden. “Yeah, these are interesting times. You know the androids will soon have the majority in parliament. We will have fully rational government for the first time in history.”
“You think that’s good? To be controlled by androids?”
“Well, they’ll only control government. And while I’m all for alternate states of mind, there’s a place for everything, and I think that in government we are in need of the rational. Androids happen to be more rational than anything else.
“Say, do you know how I got this name?”
“No.”
“It was from a dream. You see at the time I was feeling low and stuck in a rut. In the dream I was on one of the Moons. I don’t know which one. The machines there were mining the dust and selling it to people. When we ate the dust we could travel to anywhere in the universe. But in the dream I had discovered the dust before the machines, and I was going round to the back of the mining site to give the dust away for free. When I woke up I changed my name to Moon Dust Redemption, and I made other changes. Not long after I got more into computers, then I landed this job I have now. Then things improved for me.”
Moon said more that I don’t remember clearly. Things about being unique people and about Carmelia. After that I didn’t want to jump so much. I’ll hang in there for another month at least.
In fact I’m going to just postpone my plan, and make a pact with myself here to jump next month, because all living is hopeless and futile.
15/3/3428
I came back here pretty confused and although this book was lying around, I didn’t bother looking inside. Now I’ve read it and I’m not sure what to think.. I feel very tired and sad in just a basic kind of way. I can’t be bothered with suicide or any silly pact I made. I don’t remember those times and I don’t want to. I still have a craving for orange juice.
I’m going to use this journal for my own purpose, and one good thing is that it can hide the amount of memory loss. Although I’m doomed to repeat the cycle, if I keep jotting down events here, I can convince people that my memory is coming back, since I realised that the company will have more against me and add to my mental illness file if they find out about amnesia.
I should hide it so that people who break into the place can’t find it when I’m away, but under the mattress means I don’t find it for months. At least under the pillow, but that’s not much good and it could be too late.
When I got back there were clothes and junk all over the floor. Of course I didn’t remember it being this untidy. I must be getting worse. Anyway, I managed to take one load of washing to the laundry chute. Tomorrow the laundry robots will bring it back clean. I have to admit it’s pretty easy to do the laundry, but I almost never get around to it.
Here’s a new person to remember. He is called Gary, and he ate at our table in the canteen. Petra was going on about how she was a racially pure black and could trace her family tree all the way back to Earth, so I asked the new guy a question about what he does. He said writing poetry about farts. Then he elaborated on his topic and raved on much worse than Petra. Moon wanted me to remember about a crystal, but I didn’t. At least I’ve known most of my friends before going to Pangolin. But then Pangolin was interesting and different, and more than half good. Here it gets boring pretty quickly. I can watch holo, but most things look the same.
Milton looked up and focussed, without really seeing, on a little flock of dinosaurs dwarfed by giant trees. This was really strange. A journal written by himself that he didn’t recognise at all. In theory it was no stranger than the other effects of forgetting, but in practice this moved him more. It was his own voice talking to him like a stranger. He read the journal until he was tired, then he went to bed.
*
Milton ran though the orange-brown canyon. Sections of the ground moved at random, so he often stumbled. He could see the end of the canyon in the misty distance. Beyond that were hills and sharp mountain peaks. Nestled in the hills was a creamy white pearl. It would be very large but looked small from here. He ran on through the narrow canyon.
Suddenly a trapdoor opened in the jagged canyon wall to his left and a huge centipede shot out, its pincers just missing his neck. He shrieked, jumping to the right and almost fell. He ran on, the ground heaving under his feet at intervals.
He reached the end of the canyon and stopped. It was a sheer cliff face down to a mass of jagged rocks far below. Suddenly another giant centipede shot towards him from the right. With a scream he tried to dodge and stumbled off the cliff.
He was dead.
With a sigh Milton peeled the sticky electrodes from his temples. Moon had lent him the game, but he hadn’t got very far with it. His place was a mess, with clothes strewn all over the floor. Later he would have a clean up and do a few loads of laundry, despite what he felt about the laundry robots, but not now. It was dinner time.
Milton left his unit and walked to the lifts. They worked by ani-gravity and were very swift. He went from floor 502 to floor 530, and walked down the corridor towards the canteen. Inside he was met by the noisy buzz of many voices. He joined a cue and waited. He kept thinking of giant centipedes. The game was really scary. Why had Moon recommended it?
He reached the vending machine and swiped his card, ordered his food. An Indian curry - chicken tikka masala on shira – a fluffy blue carbohydrate food, and orange juice.
Milton walked automatically to table 16. The people he knew best in Gabro Tower always ate here. He said hi to those he recognised. Moon was there, and he sat next to petra, opposite Zena, who was very thin with lank blond hair. There was a man next to Zena who he didn’t know, a gangling man with bushy orange hair He decided to be polite, “Hi, have we met?”
“Sure, I’m Gary Gregory.”
“Milton often forgets,” put in Zena.
“I remember Gary. You write interesting poetry, don’t you?”
“The poetry phase was a long time ago. Now I’m into the classification of farts. I use three basic categories of sound, smell and duration. Under sound we have the silent and whooshing farts, reverberating farts of various pitches and qualities, and compound farts with changing pitches and qualities---“
“Please, Gary,” said Zena, “We’re trying to eat.”
Milton noticed that Gary was eating beans and onions. Gary ignored Zena and continued; “In fact I had to borrow from the Chinese languages to classify the different tones or pitch changes of farts…”
“Come on, Milton. I can’t eat next to this,” said Zena, getting up from the table with her tray.
Milton hesitated.
“Under smell we have a basic division of methane and sulphur---,”
Milton picked up his tray and followed Zena. She walked across the large room and chose a table under the window. Milton studied her as she walked. So thin, she was probably anorexic he decided. He sat down opposite her at the new table and gazed out of the window. It was like an aquarium from the perspective of ants. Huge fish moved around in confusing patterns. He saw a rainbow trout and was pleased for some reason. His chosen company was represented in the aquarium. The various transport companies tended to specialise in one creature. For the slower transport within the city it was usually a fish. Other cities on Trafel used other animals or objects. That was why Iona city was sometimes called aquarium city.
“I had to get away from that awful man.”
“Yes, he was a bit much”
“So you forgot again, or you’d never have encouraged him to start.”
“Yes. I’m sorry.” Milton thought of the centipede and shuddered
“Oh there’s no need to take it so hard,” Zena picked at a small serve of noodles without oil.
“And what have you been doing all this time, while I made the stupid mistake of forgetting?”
“I can tell you a little, but you know it’s not so stupid to forget. I think I prefer it.”
“But why?” Milton was slightly distracted by a large marine turtle.
“Well, you know we didn’t talk that much before your amnesia, but afterwards you were a bit lost and confused, so I talked to you more. But with all people there are mistakes and confusions. I’d say things I regretted later. Then you would go off to Pangolin and when you came back the slate was clean. I could forget about the mistakes of the last month and start again with just the better stuff. The next month was similar, but it’s like I can improve on each new month.”
Milton finished a mouthful of chicken tikka masala. “Well, I’ve never considered the benefits before, but then it sounds like only a benefit for you. I don’t get much out of it.”
“Well, you don’t know, Milton. There could be plenty of bad stuff you wanted to forget, so now you don’t remember wanting to. But it’s probably better you forgot it.”
“Actually,” said Milton sipping his orange juice, “I think there are things I wanted to forget.” He was thinking of the near suicide he had written about. But thanks to the journal, now he knew about it again. They both ate in silence for a while.
“You asked what I’d been doing,” said Zena presently, “But I don’t do very much. I have been getting more into Natal Analogue. I started a few months ago. Well, probably more than a few. I took it just after parties or a special occasion, to start with, but now I take it every night, sometimes in the day as well.”
“But what is it?”
“Well it comes as a little rod, and it’s like a virtual reality game except it only lasts ten times, and they cost almost two hundred credits each. You go through the holo, and it shows dark swirling red and maroon, with the sound of a heartbeat and other strange music. You press the rod to your head, then your navel. You feel the umbilical chord growing from your stomach and you go back to the womb, before any kind of problems started. It feels just amazing, but they say only certain kinds of people like it. I’m definitely one of those people. I’d recommend it to you, but then it can be really expensive if you get into it, and you say you loose your money on an orange juice drug when you visit Pangolin.”
“Yes. I don’t think I’ll try Natal Analogue.”
They continued eating.
“I saw a big turtle,” commented Milton, “Must be a new transport company. Things change over two years.”
“Yes, the turtle company started a while ago. Now there’s also otters, jellyfish and a few others I don’t know. What else is new for you?”
“The animal machines in company offices. I’m only used to androids. The complaints officer at Space Corp was a grizzly bear. It really scared me.”
“Oh yes, there’s more animals in android jobs everywhere. I went to a department store and the assistant was a talking humming bird.”
They chatted for some time. The food was finished. Milton went up to the roof for a smoke, and later he went back to his room. He intended to put something soothing on the holo, but he was drawn to the journal with a morbid curiosity and began to read;
6/4/3428
I haven’t read much of this journal and I don’t want to. I’m sick of everything. All I know is that I have a cyclic addiction that makes me forget, and then I live another month in the hell of depression. Then I repeat the pattern. What's the point? I never get any closer to Carmelia because I never remember her at the time.
Only one different thing happened this month. I went downtown on the walkway lanes. I slowed down to get some takeaway, when I saw this interesting temple. I’d never noticed it there before. It had really nice architecture with intricate carvings. Around the door were statues of Gods, on one side was a very serene Buddha on a big flower. On the other side was a dancing God with six arms that I didn’t recognise. Above the door was a God with a man’s body and an elephant’s head. I have always avoided religion in the past, but for some reason I was drawn to this temple. I like the outside, at least, even if the beliefs are irrational.
Although I am angry this month, actually I’m not as bad as I was in the past.
Later. I’ve read more of the journal now, and for some reason I feel more optimistic. I’m sure there is a way to break the cycle, and this journal can help
20/5/3428
Eventually I got round to reading this journal. Things have been in bad depression mode most of the month. It’s a good thing when I have the energy to read and write, it means I must be less depressed now. But the things I read and write are still flat, with very little meaning. I only write now as something to do when I get sick of holo. Actually there’s other things to do but I’m too lazy. There’s clothes all over the floor, as usual. On one hand I really hate living in a mess, and on the other hand I can’t motivate myself to pick them up and do the laundry. One thing that holds me back is I know that the laundry robots will come the next day with my clothes, and for some reason I find these machines particularly spooky. Also I’m over my craving for orange juice.
I don’t have the energy to record all the things that would supplement my memory next month.
For one thing it feels like the plan of another person. It has nothing to do with me and it sounds paranoid. Why pretend that I have the memories when I don’t? I’d rather be honest about it, even if it leads to something bad. I’m only writing for something to do, there’s no great project behind it. Why make plans? I have no control over my fate. Bigger things happen and I get caught up in it, not remembering what happened, destined to repeat the cycle for the rest of my life. Oh well, I tried when there was a chance, but it’s too late for that. It’s like being a depressive; despite all the medication Dr Skim gives me I continue to fall into depression. The only funny thing there is that I always get well enough to pilot when it’s time to see the Hobbit, Gimel and especially Carmelia. It must be just my bit of good luck. It was a real shock meeting Cornelius, since I’ve visited many planets, and always thought Hobbits were mythical. Then I thought Cornelius was a kind of dwarf human, but he scoffed at the idea of being a dwarf, and insisted that his parents were Hobbits, and his whole species are Hobbits. Apparently he came through a hyperspace rift in the desert. It connects one desert to another in a different dimension. He was travelling in some remote desert and was transported to Pangolin. I’m not sure I can believe it.
Milton put the journal down. Now it was time to try again.
He was running through a tropical rain forest. He navigated by the moss growing on the north side of the tree trunks. He knew he was heading for the dome, although he couldn’t see it. Then a small green thing flew at him and stuck. Milton flinched and tried to remove it. It was a green tree frog. He ran on but he couldn’t get the frog off. Then another one jumped at him. He swiped at it wildly and veered to the left. The trees were suddenly full of tree frogs all jumping at him. He staggered, shouted, clawed at the frogs.
He blundered into a clearing. Too late he recognised the huge leaves on the forest floor. The plant gathered him up in its leaves and squeezed him to death.
Game over. He swore in his own personal lexicon and removed the sticky electrodes from his temples. It was high time for a smoke. He knew that he should give up, but at the same time knew he wanted to smoke, and he would. Milton gathered his cigarettes and lighter. He made his way to the roof.
. *
In the twilight Milton saw a few other people on the roof. The air was humid. It was overcast and muggy. There was a woman by the rail he habitually smoked at. She was smoking. She wore a strange long black garment. Her face was creased with age and worry.
“Hello Loline.”
“Oh, it’s Milton. You’re back from your forget me trip or whatever you call it.”
“Yes. How have you been?”
“Well I was down in the bar drinking with the usual crew when Gary turns up. Pretty soon he corners me and tries to explain the definition of two tone farts. I had to escape. Luckily he doesn’t smoke so I grabbed the excuse to come up here and smoke. You know what his problem is? Having a brain and nothing to do with it. I know he’s got a brain. He studied science, but like most of us in Gabro Tower he has some disability and he doesn’t work. So he does nothing all day and ends up noticing and studying his farts. My God what a week. Tuesday I went to see my Mother. Took the Garfish all the way to Montre. She gives me a long sermon the minute I arrive. Says that I have to go to church with her. I can’t stand it. She’s forced that religion down my throat since the moment I was born. Well, since I was a little girl. I don’t believe in it. Well sometimes I do. Sorry God. Oh I’m so confused. But isn’t everybody? Don’t get mixed up in religion, Milton. Stick to your bananas. I wish I could forget.”
“No, it’s worse. I’m trying to remember. I want to remember Carmelia.”
“Oh that’s right, you’re still in love. Wish I could fall in love. Never meet the right guys, do I? Why don’t we swap places, you can remember and I can forget.”
“Sounds good to me.”
“Oooh, what’s that?” A dark shape swooped low over the building, to land on a nearby tower.
“Looks like a dragon”
“Yes it is, and so realistic. That’s a good idea. I bet they push a few fish out of the pond. Bound to be a success. Flying by dragon will be all the rage. What’s going to be next?”
“Frogs. They’ll have big frogs that can hop from one rooftop to the next.”
“Yes, and seahorses, too. Ones that blow bubbles or smoke.”
“Does the dragon breathe fire?”
“Well I couldn’t see any. Hey we may as well have big crocodiles and snakes.”
“That would be too scary. A walrus would be OK.”
“I’d prefer a duck. I don’t know why that hasn’t been thought of. It could swim slowly in the lower air and fly with it’s wings for high speed. We