The 2084 Precept

by Anthony D. Thompson

  "I consider it to be my obligation, Peter. You and I had agreements, we both complied with them, and there was nothing in any of them which implied you would be subject to ongoing surveillance or any other form of harassment which might have a continuing negative effect on your private life."

  "Nevertheless, thank you again, Jeremy. And what would the second matter be?"

  "The second matter would be with regard to my disappearance, to my return home. Poor Jeremy Parker will be left behind and will regrettably be left with his own brain which, as you know, is in very poor repair. In other words, he will have a relapse. Without my presence, he will revert to being the dangerous psychopath he always was. However, my departure will not occur immediately as there are certain things that need to be settled, tidied up as you might say. One of these items is the Obrix group of companies."

  So he was staying, was he? Suspicious, indeed. Possibly the proof of the pudding in fact. Fantasy worlds are all fine and dandy and they can function in the mind at an extraordinary level of detail, but when it eventually comes to the point of having to fly off to your own delusion, well now…that is when it becomes a trifle difficult, oh yes. So let me push him on that.

  "Why would you want to stay, Jeremy? Why would you want to tidy things up? As I understand it, from your point of view you are basically just leaving an ant colony."

  "Your ant colony, Peter, is certainly of no importance to us at all. However, my continued presence for a while might feasibly provide a psychological aura conducive to the success of the deliberations currently occupying the valuable time of your species' leaders. Or it might not. But as members of a benevolent society, my professor and I have decided that the mere possibility of such an effect makes a brief prolongation of my presence a desirable affair. And to be honest, Peter, studying the immediate sequel will add a final and refined touch to my research data and consequently to my dissertation’s closing conclusions. And so I thought I might just as well tidy things up at the same time."

  Man, oh man, does he have answers for everything. You have to take your hat off to him. He is in possession of a highly creative brain, amazingly impressive neurons beyond any doubt, and to that we have to add the telepathic powers and the astronomy.

  "And the Obrix companies Peter," he continued, "they mean nothing to me, as you can imagine. I have decided to sell the group to you. If you want it, of course."

  How many times in the past few weeks has this guy been able to knock me off balance? These companies have nothing to do with his fantasy world, they are real, and so is their money, I've received some of it myself. But I can't of course buy anything like this, not at any legal price anyway.

  "That is another extremely generous gesture of yours, Jeremy," I said, "but I regrettably cannot accept it. I don't have that kind of money."

  "That has been taken into account," he replied. "I have set up a new company whose share capital is the legally required minimum and you, using your own personal means, will purchase those shares. It also so happens that this company has received some extremely high value loans from selected private and institutional investors, these loans being for the purpose of acquiring other companies with a view to improving their performance and subsequently selling them off at a substantial profit, or turning them into public companies via a stock offer, or else simply keeping them and benefitting from above-average annual dividends. And the first company to be bought by your new company will be the Obrix Group, as already agreed with the main institutional investor."

  Well, not for the first time was he proving his genius for making things happen, our friend Jeremy, and I was absolutely not going to enquire as to whether anything telepathic had been involved in his dealings with the investors. But probably that had been the case, I thought to myself. Investors would not normally make loans of any size to a new and under-capitalized company—and rarely to others as well. If they did want to become involved, they would buy shares, they would acquire part-ownership and have representatives on the board.

  "The funds available,” continued Jeremy, “are not sufficient to meet the full purchase price which, as you may appreciate Peter, is of an amount sizeable enough not to attract any undue attention. And so the remainder will be on credit, and this can be paid off over time by your new company's share of the profits generated by the newly acquired Obrix group of companies."

  "Interesting, Jeremy. And may I ask what you, as the sole shareholder on the receiving end of all of this money, are going to do with it?"

  "Ah hah," said Jeremy. "I wouldn't have expected you to miss out on that, Peter. First of all, and needless to say, I shall be providing for the expert and luxurious care of Jeremy Parker following his coming relapse. And as for the rest, I don't know. Perhaps part of it could go to somebody I know who might want to lend it to his new company to enable it to accelerate its loan repayments?"

  Ploutus had done his fair share and, in the absence of a Christian or Islam equivalent, my neurons latched on to Lakmish Devi to thank this time. Lakmish Devi, as you may know, is the Hindu goddess of wealth and consequently and unsurprisingly the household goddess of most Hindu families. A discerning choice in my view and preferable to a goddess of poverty if there is one, which I would doubt, she wouldn't get her fair share of the prayer cake. Lakmish Devi, on the other hand, is worshipped daily and enjoys a huge following, especially among Hindu women, for whom she is a favorite. And yes, we know that Lakmish Devi has 108 names and is responsible for many other things in addition to wealth. She has her hands full even if she works overtime, no doubt about it, but what the names are and what her additional duties are, I couldn't say. My non-Hindu neurons do not consider these nuggets of information to be of sufficient importance to be allowed a place in any of their archives. Only the wealth bit was stored.

  "Jeremy, please tell me what I have done to deserve all of this."

  "No problem, Peter. It's simple. You have proved yourself to be a benevolent and non-violent human. You have also assisted me greatly and in a cooperative and non-belligerent manner. And I find your tendency toward cynicism to be a harmless, natural and defensive reflex which allows you to serenely and inoffensively cope with the ghastly environment in which you happen to find yourself, and of which you are forcibly a part. Your ant colony," he laughed.

  "My ant colony."

  Funny thing, but these occasional references to ants have finally jogged my neurons into recalling the second poem I had published all those years ago. That poem was another weird poem and it was all about ants; Céline's class would have enjoyed supplying interpretations for that one as well.

  "Exactly, Peter. And now we have to agree on a day and a time at the end of next week for you to fly over and meet with the small army of lawyers and accountants and advisory bankers who will have a number of documents for you to sign in connection with your purchase of the Obrix companies. The prime minister is sending a legal representative to ensure there are no problems or, if there are, to ensure that they are resolved. I won’t be present, I have a lot to do and I am also involved in a takeover in Spain. But my presence in London would be superfluous anyway. Just you and the experts."

  "Obrix Consultancy Partners," I said. "I've been meaning to ask you about that. I see from your edict that Obrix is your name for our planet. Does the word actually mean anything or is it just a name? Like Saturn for example?"

  There was a pause.

  And the reply, when it came, was a subdued one. “It is simply the name of your planet translated into your language’s consonants and vowels to replicate our wave sounds, Peter.”

  “Uh-huh. But forgetting about languages and wave sounds, does it mean anything? And how was the name decided anyway? And by whom?”

  There was another pause.

  “I owe you some honesty on this one Peter. I chose the name for my dissertation. Your planet is otherwise catalogued as a reference number, sub-referenced to your star which in turn is sub-referenced to your galaxy. A name is
a good idea for dissertation themes.

  “But what does it mean?”

  “The word means anomaly, Peter. I called your planet Anomaly. Talk to you again soon," he said.

  And a takeover in Spain, eh? A nice coincidence, oh yes. And so we agreed on a time and a date and I couldn't do more than say goodbye, my cerebral functions had fallen into disrepair; not, as we know, for the first time in the past few weeks. Their training had left them unprepared for the Jeremy Parkers of this world. Sensory overload is the medical term, I believe.

  I spent the afternoon at the side of the pool pondering my unfamiliar financial situation in between occasional spells in the water. I had a contract with United Fasteners allowing me to earn as much or as little as I wanted over the next year or two. I was CEO and ship owners' representative of Naviera Pujol and its consultant to boot and I was earning a very fat sum and a very fat bonus, fat being an apt enough term for anyone such as myself who was not a billionaire. I had way over one million Euros in the bank from my previous consultancy and stock market activities, plus another million from Jeremy, less whatever tax the birdbrains needed to spend on themselves, flap, flap, or give to Greece, flap, flap, or throw away on something else, flap, flap.

  And I was about to own a company which would propel me into the multimillionaire bracket as soon as my pen touched paper, at which moment in time I would cease describing the sums from Industria y Transportes Pujol S.A. as fat. And I would put myself on the board of my new company for a decent fee, and I would appoint myself Chairman and CEO of it as soon as I was finished sorting out the Naviera, with a salary to fit and a contract providing me with bonuses, or boni if you prefer, and plenty of stock options. And—nearly forgot—I would also be receiving some succulent dividends every year on my shareholdings. And—almost forgot again—my dividends and the value of my companies would be increasing year on year at a hefty pace as soon as I began to occupy myself as my own internal consultant.

  Had I forgotten anything? I didn't think so, but in any event I was not going to spend any more of my sunny Sunday thinking about it or excavating the mine of providential incidents in an attempt to rationalize how it had all happened. It had just come about, that's all. Full stop. Or period, if you are American and have the need to utilize a word already gainfully employed for several other unconnected purposes, the details of which it would serve no purpose to enter into here.

  The only problem I might have is if the Christian god turns out to be the real one. His son is quoted in the Christian Bible as saying "It is easier for a camel to go through the eye of a needle, than for a rich man to enter the kingdom of God." He is quoted on this three times in fact, twice in Mark and once in Luke, just to make sure we don't misinterpret anything.

  Well…bloody hell. Not very nice. I mean…bloody hell. So perhaps I should develop a strategy for dealing with that as soon as I can find the time. Perhaps I can make use of the massive loophole left open by his choice of words, buy a camel and then manufacture a giant-sized needle with an eye so large the animal would be able to amble through it without even stooping. Whatever. My type of consultant knows that problems have solutions. I shall consider all reasonable alternatives.

  The book I was reading, Platform, took my mind away from it all. It is one of those books which make you think, and it requires your involvement to the exclusion of most everything else. I was approaching the end, which was unfortunate. It was one of those books you would like to continue reading for a few more weeks. The main character was holed up somewhere and appeared to be waiting to die. In fact he not only appeared to be waiting to die, he appeared to be wanting to die—because of a woman problem. Fair enough. His decision, nobody else's, and judging by his exotic and minutely described sexual experiences, he would at least have the consolation of being able to say 'I lived'. A consolation not available to all and sundry on this planet; but there you go, what else is television for?

  I will be interested to see how everything turns out for this character in the end.

  I am thinking of buying another of this author's books. There is one called Atomized. The author is an interesting and intellectual guy, clearly one of the top intelligent 10% of the species. Although, actually, and now that I come to think of it, 10% is a gross exaggeration. I am going to chuck that quota, the same as I chucked the croissants. 1% would be more like it. But if consider the subject in depth , it is clear to me that 1% is also an outsized and far-fetched exaggeration. The ratio should be 0.1%. That still gives us over 7 million intelligent people on the planet (truly intelligent is what I mean of course, rather than the retarded human definition of it). And that number has a nicely pleasant and reasonable kind of ring to it. To my ear, that is. Its consonance is of the logical kind. A dialectic estimate, 0.1%. Around 7 million. I am happy to settle on that.

  * * * * *

  I was lying on my stomach and had to turn my head in order to identify to whom the hand lightly scratching my shoulder was attached.

  It was Céline.

  My body reacted by rolling over onto its back in panic. It then just lay there staring at her while my panic-stricken neurons desperately searched for information as to the correct manner in which to greet another guy's fiancée. The pathetic result was some kind of a gurgle, a desperately weird kind of gurgle.

  "Shhh…Peter," she said. "He was a good man…is a good man…but I don't love him. I thought I did and I tried, I tried very hard, but it didn't work anymore. It wasn't possible. It's because of you. I am…I think I am in love with you, Peter. Probably. Even though we don't know each other. Do you think that's stupid?" she finished.

  And she stood there, not smiling, her eyes full of query and doubt about what I might have to say. And she pushed her glasses up higher on her nose, and that made me smile, and that made her lean over me and kiss me gently and tenderly and softly and it was as if we had never been apart, as if we had been together for a long time, and as if we might never be apart again.

  DAY 46

  If incredible sex is one of the ingredients required to justify the use of that nebulous and frequently misapplied word love, then I was in love—maybe. And whether that nebulous and oft misapplied word exists as a long-term concept, or whether it must be restricted to the characterization of a short-term emotional state whose duration is limited to a period of a few days or a few months or even a few years, I don't know. And since I don't know, I reserve my judgment.

  But incredible sex can sometimes be the cause of aching bones and also of aching non-bones, and of a pleasurable and languid weariness, and that was the state I was in when I woke up. Céline was still fast asleep, she was mightily tired from her extensive travels of the day before, and from ending her day at 4 a.m. on the morning after.

  She had feigned illness to absent herself from school for a few days—only a mammoth emergency would cause her to do something as dishonest as that, she explained—and she had travelled from Rouen to Okriftel to find me. And the kindly, gracious, wonderful Monika, and it may have broken her heart a little to do it, had given her some coffee and some Sahnertorte, and she had also given her my address here in Mallorca. And Mr. Brown had swamped her with his goodbye dog-kisses and she had taken two buses to Frankfurt airport and she had bought herself an inexpensive Air Berlin ticket to Palma and then she had taken a bus to the Palma city center and then another one to get to Illetas and then she had walked down the road to my hotel.

  The night had been a long one. We had done this and we had done that and we had done other things as well. And in between the bouts of doing this and that and other things, we had also talked a lot. And that is how I came to learn about Amélie. Amélie was a friend of Céline’s. And she could come to visit us soon n’est-ce pas? Mais naturellement, of course she could. Amélie had been in London for some time, living in Barons Court and studying at the LSE. And Amélie had had an amazing experience. She had had to go to the police because she was frightened of a man who had credited her bank account wit
h the sterling equivalent of €100,000 for no good reason. The police had asked her not to return the money while they were investigating. And she had police protection in the meantime. It would do her good to get away for a while.

  Well…now how about that? Oh yes indeed, Mr. Jeremy Parker, you are going to have to create some more of your astounding delusions the next time we meet in order to explain away the bewildering connections between Céline, Amélie, United Fasteners, Naviera Pujol, and myself and yourself. There is more to this than meets the eye. I am truly and truthfully agog—or en gogues as the Middle French, whence we stole the word, would have it. It will, no doubt about it, be another fascinating experience for me to hear what he comes up with this time.

  * * * * *

  I watched Céline for a while, her adorable face lying on the pillow, her ponytail flopped out behind her, snoring ever so quietly and with that overpoweringly defenseless look which spectacle-wearers can exhibit when not wearing spectacles. The blinking red lights were gone, there would be no more timely Xmas cards or birthday cards to keep them blinking until they break up with their boyfriends, no more adding to the list, just let me be able to keep Céline for as long the ocean’s waves will allow.

  I went into the bathroom and called Pedro in the office. I told him I wouldn't be in this morning, I had an important meeting (not a lie). But I would pop in for the afternoon’s staff meeting. No problem, he said, everything had gone well with the Gerona Sol and it will be departing for Morocco at around midday. The Mahon Star would be leaving for Palma as usual this evening and would be loaded to full capacity or very close to it.

  I went down to the terrace to have breakfast. I took my laptop with me and I typed out that poem to give later to Céline. She could include this one also in her class's offbeat poetry critique program. It was entitled 'Faith' and it went like this:

  I trod on an anthill yesterday,