The Quanderhorn Xperimentations

by Andrew Marshall

  ‘ I’m saying “Don’t proceed with the bombing”. ’

  ‘But, sir – that’s not the phrase.’

  ‘ I know it’s not the bloody phrase. The phrase is: Proceed with the bloody bombing .’

  ‘No, that’s not the phrase, either, sir.’

  ‘ All right, all right: Proceed with the bombing. Clear? ’

  ‘I’m . . . sorry, sir. I’m still rather confused.’

  ‘ I don’t know how to make it clearer to you: Proceed with the bombing! Don’t proceed with the bombing! ’

  My head was spinning now. ‘Sir, we’re approaching the point of no recall. Bomber Command will automatically switch us to radio silence.’

  ‘ For the love of mercy, man, listen to what I’m saying: Proceed with the bombing! Proceed with the bombing! Proceed with the bombing! ’

  I gulped back the lump in my throat. The radio silence light above the cockpit blinked on. ‘Acknowledged. Over and out, sir.’

  I wasn’t sure but I thought I caught the final faint words as the radio faded out. ‘ The idiots are proceeding with the bombing . . . ’ But it was drowned out by the pipes striking up ‘Old Man River’.

  There was no turning back now.

  I had my orders and, whatever my personal reservations, I intended to carry them out.

  Chapter Thirteen

  Outprint from Gargantua, the pocket Quanderdictoscribe. Dateline: Sunday the 6th of January, 1952 02.12 hours

  NEW BRIAN: We seem to have lost signal for a few moments there. To bring you up to date: we negotiated the Riddling Sphinx of the Living Flames with consummate ease, and now find ourselves in an immense, echoing, airy chamber. Clearly, this is the heart of the ziggurat. The walls are glowing with a gentle amber phosphorescence of some kind – it’s magnificent! There are fluted columns of gold and other lustrous metals I’ve never seen nor heard of, and glimmering crystals embedded in the vaulted ceiling—

  NEW GEMMA: Look, Bri-Bri! Tell them about the—

  NEW BRIAN: Yes, yes, I’m getting to it, darling. Please don’t interrupt.

  NEW GEMMA: Sorry, darling. Do forgive me.

  NEW BRIAN: (CLEARS THROAT) As I was about to say: ahead of us is a wide flight of steps. We’re mounting it now. It leads to an altar-like platform . . . Half a tick! The chamber’s entrance is opening again behind us . . .

  Chapter Fourteen

  From the journal of Brian Nylon, 6th January, 1952 – [cont’d]

  Bruised, singed, half-choked and exhausted, we staggered into the welcome coolness of a rather grand corridor with an enormous carved and gilded door at the far end.

  Guuuurk was still moaning. ‘Oh, the untrammelled ecstasy of answering riddles where flames shoot out of the floor every time you’re wrong!’

  ‘We weren’t wrong many times,’ Troy protested.

  ‘We were wrong all the times! We didn’t get one right !’ Guuuurk exploded. ‘Not even that one where it was obviously a penguin in a lift! Whatever possessed you to say “a skunk on a trampoline” ? My co-respondent shoes are still smouldering!’

  ‘Shall I stamp them out again?’

  ‘ No! ’ Guuuurk snapped. He was right at the end of his tether. We all were.

  On the bright side, at least my trouser legs were no longer glued together. On the dark side, my trouser legs had been entirely burnt off. Along with my leg hair. Not to mention, the elastic in my pants had slightly melted. Gemma had offered me a safety pin, but it wasn’t very effective in keeping them up. I had to walk with my legs ludicrously far apart in order to maintain my dignity.

  As we approached them, the palatial double doors swung open grandly, bathing us in a brilliant golden glow from the chamber beyond.

  A thought suddenly struck me: could it be we were actually approaching the culmination of the quest? Did we dare to hope?

  We stepped through the arch into an immense, echoing cathedral-like vault, and stood blinking in the unaccustomed light.

  ‘Oh my goodness! We’ve made it! We’ve won!’

  ‘Brian . . .’ Gemma warned.

  As my sight adjusted, I could see an immense staircase at the far end of the vault, and a group of figures just about to reach its top.

  The duplicates had got here first!

  ‘We’ve lost!’ My face collapsed. ‘They’ve beaten us fair and square.’

  ‘There is no “fair and square”.’ Guuuurk shoved me aside roughly. ‘Haven’t I taught you shower anything ? If we’ve lost fair and square, then we cheat !’ And he and Troy raced off towards the prize.

  I looked over to Gemma. She was following them. ‘Well, what are you waiting for?’ she barked over her shoulder. ‘Pull up your knickers and run!’

  Chapter Fifteen

  Outprint from Gargantua, the pocket Quanderdictoscribe. Dateline: Sunday the 6th of January, 1952 02.16 hours

  NEW GEMMA: Brian! It’s those dreadful coarse people from outside!

  NEW BRIAN: They’ll never reach us in time Just two more steps, poppet . . .

  [UNKNOWN SOUND]

  NEW GEMMA: What’s that peculiar ethereal music? Where’s it coming from?

  NEW BRIAN: Good heavens! An astonishingly bright light has just fired up right above us, illuminating an intricately carved plinth, which is rising from the floor . . . and displayed on top of it is—

  NEW TROY: A dirty old bucket?

  Chapter Sixteen

  From the journal of Brian Nylon, 6th January, 1952 – [cont’d]

  Guuuurk and Troy had reached the steps, but my splay-footed jogging had left me seriously behind Gemma, who stopped and turned to urge me onwards. ‘I think they’ve found it, whatever it is!’

  ‘Why are we doing this?’ I panted, ‘We’re honour-bound to enter the Obliteration Chamber.’

  ‘No,’ Gemma insisted. ‘Pure rationality: who doesn’t get the relic gets obliterated, and it isn’t in their hands yet.’

  We started up the vertiginous steps.

  Guuuurk, already halfway up, yelled: ‘No! Wait! Stop! Don’t touch it!’

  ‘Too late!’ My doppelgänger (excuse the German!) did that annoying Robin Hood laugh again and nudged his Gemma. ‘Look at them: the Losers’ 800 yard relay! Truly pathetic. And why is the other me waddling like a platypus ?’

  ‘He isn’t wearing any trousers!’ she squealed, staring incredulously.

  ‘The man’s a downright pervert! Don’t look at him, darling.’

  ‘I can’t help it! His legs are smoother than mine ! He looks like Betty Grable—’

  Guuuurk, almost at the top now, shrieked breathlessly: ‘Keep your filthy hands off that bucket!’

  ‘And what if I don’t?’ My duplicate reached out, hand teasingly hovering over the relic, but not quite touching it.

  Guuuurk cried, rather desperately I thought, ‘You realise it could be dangerous!’

  Guuuurk’s other shook his head. ‘That’s a scurrilous lie. As usual.’

  The smile died on my other self’s face and he drew back his hand. ‘Actually, he could be right.’

  Troy stepped up to the platform. ‘But it’s only a bucket!’

  I still had at least twenty steps to go, and my calf muscles were cramping up like billy-o.

  The other me smiled patronisingly at Troy. ‘Only a bucket? Look at the symbols running round the dais: they can only mean one thing . . .’

  ‘What’s that, Brian?’ his Gemma simpered.

  Meanwhile, my Gemma had reached the others at the top and was peering intently at the inscriptions. ‘It can’t be! I’ve heard tales of it, but I never dreamt it was real .’ She straightened, her eyes wide. ‘It’s the Gaulus Tempus .’

  New Gemma looked at her with faux innocence. ‘Which, translated for all us Latin duffers, means . . .?’

  ‘Oh, for pity’s sake,’ Gemma snorted, ‘you’re me ! You have a double first from Oxford!

  The other Gemma smiled with a superior air. ‘There’s nothing worse than a self-important clever clogs, is there
, though?’

  ‘Well, let me see . . . There’s a self-denigrating, simpering man-worshipper?’

  ‘I’m sure I don’t know what you mean.’

  ‘And I’m absolutely certain you do.’

  I reached the platform, wheezing and holding up my pants. My namesake ended the incipient catfight. ‘It’s the legendary Gaulus Tempus . Literally translated: the Bucket of . . . Chicken.’

  We all stared at him.

  ‘Chicken?’ I echoed.

  ‘Bucket of Time !’ He was suddenly sweating a little. ‘ What did I say? I seem to be feeling rather peculiar—’

  ‘We came through all that for a bucket ?’ girly Gemma pouted. ‘Why?’

  The other me seemed to have recovered somewhat. ‘You scatterbrained lovely! It’s no ordinary bucket: It holds time, and it’s bottomless.’

  Troy’s duplicate frowned. ‘But if there’s no bottom, won’t the time all fall out though it?

  ‘Ha!’ our Troy laughed. ‘You’re so stupid!’

  ‘No, you are!’

  ‘No, you are!’

  ‘No, you are!’

  ‘No, you are!’

  ‘No, you are!’

  ‘No, you are!’

  ‘No, you are!’

  Sensing victory, our Troy announced triumphantly: ‘No, you really really really are!’

  ‘I’m not.’

  Troy was crestfallen. ‘He’s done it again!’ he yelped. His brow creased. ‘But he is right: if there’s no bottom, the time would fall out through it.’

  My duplicate explained: ‘Not literally bottomless, Troy, figuratively barnacles.’ He blinked and shook his head to clear it. ‘ Bottomless . I’m getting a little confused.’

  Both he and the ersatz Gemma were indeed looking distinctly peaky. ‘I’m feeling a bit queer myself, darling,’ she trilled, wiping her brow, ‘but at least the Gaulus Tempus is ours.’

  True enough. In a moment, the Bucket would be in their hands, and it would all be over for us.

  Amazingly, inspiration struck.

  I turned to our Guuuurk and raised my eyebrow meaningfully. ‘Guuuurk, old chap,’ I crooned, casually, ‘this may be the time for you to show us all that delightful childhood game from your homeland . . .’

  He looked baffled. ‘What? Pin the Tendrils on the Blubber Beast?’

  ‘No!’ I smiled. ‘The other game.’ I squinted with one eye and pointed to it inconspicuously. Everyone stared at me strangely for some reason.

  ‘What?’ Guuuurk frowned. ‘Hop Round the Snakes? 1-2-3 Stab?’

  ‘No!’

  ‘Children Skittles?’

  ‘No, I mean . . .’ and I hummed through my teeth, ‘Mnnhun clurzee urszey.’

  ‘ Martian Closey-eyesy ? Oh, no. Martian Closey-eyesy would be totally inappropriate at this moment.’ A thought appeared to strike him. ‘Just a minute, though – how foolish of us!’ He peered at the relic. ‘It’s the final trap! Obviously this rusty old bucket isn’t the true Gaulus Tempus at all. Clearly, it’s that splendid golden thing right over there in the other direction!’ He pointed to the far end of the chamber, and naturally we all turned to look, before we realised we’d been had!

  We heard an odd clicking sound and all turned back to see Guuuurk with his hands in the air, frozen in the act of reaching for the relic.

  Slowly, he stepped back, revealing his counterpart brandishing a rather fearsome-looking Ray Gun.

  ‘Hands up, everybody, and keep absolutely still,’ Copy-Brian warned, arms akimbo.

  There was a blinding green flash and a deafening zap !

  My duplicate’s recording device was blasted off his shoulder, leaving only smouldering wires and a metallic stench.

  ‘As your pathetic Earth “hero” says,’ the alternate Guuuurk snarled, ‘put your hands up.’ He carefully edged his way over to the bucket, keeping his weapon trained on us. ‘With this relic, the Glorious Martian Attack Force can turn the clock back to the last invasion – only this time, victory will be ours!’

  ‘Great plan, Martian brother!’ Guuuurk stepped forward again with seemingly genuine enthusiasm. ‘I say, is that the Blast-O-Matic E-Z Kill DeLuxe? That’s my favourite Ray Gun!’

  ‘Get back in line, you nauseating spuuung-deng-bankkerrtt !’

  I’ve no idea what it meant, but Guuuurk visibly stiffened and stepped back immediately. *

  ‘Brian – do something!’ replacement Gemma pleaded.

  ‘Do what, darling?’ other me replied. ‘The Martian devil’s beaten us fair and squirrel. Square! ’

  Out of the corner of my eye, I spotted Gemma surreptitiously sliding her hand towards the clasp of her duplicate’s handbag, in which there would certainly be a compact mirror . . .

  As I made to step forward to distract the mad Martian, there was another blast and the handbag blew to bits with a shriek from substitute Gemma, and a resigned sigh from the proper one. I noticed, with some horror, that the blast had scorched her hand. I began to feel real hatred for this ignoble alien fascist.

  ‘It would be a serious mistake to think me a foolish posing popinjay, like that ridiculous purple quisling.’ The rogue Guuuurk nodded towards his counterpart. ‘Now – all of you get back down the steps,’ he rasped, ‘except, of course, for Imperial Spy X-One-Zero.’

  * It means literally ‘mushroom in the sandwich’, a reference to a particularly virulent fungus which disguises itself as one of its more delicious and rather less deadly cousins. Once consumed, it immediately spores voluminously, causing its unfortunate host to expand rapidly and explode, usually before pudding is served. Besides spoiling many dinner parties, the fungus was also reputedly the method by which the legendary Empress Bazzzogg the Fairly Unpleasant secured so many successful ‘divorce’ settlements.

  Chapter Seventeen

  Private Diary of Winston Leonard Spencer Churchill: Sunday the 6th of January, 1952

  Having explored every possible recourse with the Air Chief Marshal himself, I was compelled to conclude there was no earthly way to recall those deadly bombers.

  I hastened back to the platform to find Quanderhorn cursing his stenographic machine, which seemed to have seized up like a motor car engine on a frosty morning.

  ‘Dammit – they’re not transmitting!’ the reprobate spat. ‘Something’s gone terribly wrong in there. And now there’s no way of finding out what.’

  ‘I care little to what desperate reckless shenanigans you refer, Quanderhorn. The darkest hour is now irrevocably upon us.’

  ‘What? You can’t even reverse your own bombers, you septuagenarian incompetent?’

  ‘Rant and rave as you wish, it will avail you nothing. I now have the solemn and unenviable duty to inform Her Majesty the Queen that, regrettably, the entire fabric of existence is about to come to an end in a little under seven minutes. And, for all it matters, Her Royal Highness the Princess Margaret might just as well go and marry Group Captain Townsend. Or, for that matter, Admiral Nelson, General Custer or Colonel bloody Mustard in the library with a candlestick, should she so desire!’

  ‘It still may not come to that.’

  ‘If by some fantastic contrivance it does not, and we somehow survive, be warned.’ I fixed him with my fiercest stare. ‘I intend to put an end to your infernal “Xperimentations” once and for all!’ I slammed my Homburg onto my head and turned. ‘I bid you farewell, Qu wwaaaaaa nderhorn!’

  I left the scoundrel to his own devilish machinations, much good would they do him.

  Much good would they do anyone, now.

  Chapter Eighteen

  The Rational Scientific Journal of Dr. Gemini Janussen, Sunday 6th January 1952 (Again)

  The evil Martian was looking directly at Brian, who seemed utterly poleaxed by the suggestion.

  ‘I-I’m a spy for Mars ?’

  ‘Yes,’ Guuuurk nodded with considerable enthusiasm. ‘You’re an honorary Martian, Brian.’

  Brian’s shoulders sank. ‘I am? I . . . That can’t be . .
.’

  ‘I recruited you, remember. I gave you the discounted membership rate of three shillings and sevenpence ha’penny . . .’

  The other Guuuurk looked at him askance.

  ‘Purely to cover administrative expenses . . . It’s non-returnable, unfortunately.’

  ‘That’s simply not possible,’ Brian protested. It couldn’t be true, could it?

  ‘Surely you remember the initiation ceremony?’ Guuuurk insisted.

  The other Martian took it up: ‘You swore allegiance to the Sacred Bag of Dust, and we hung you up by hooks through your cheeks for forty-eight hours.’

  ‘But I don’t have any scars on my cheeks.’

  Our Guuuurk raised all his eyebrows. ‘Not those cheeks, I’m afraid.’

  ‘I’m fairly sure I’d have remembered dangling from hooks skewering my buttocks for two whole days,’ Brian protested with genuine indignation.

  ‘Well, I remember it,’ his duplicate raged. ‘I still make a whistling sound when I sit down! What is wrong with you? You’ll agree to do almost anything just to avoid making others feel uncomfortable, won’t you?’

  Well, that was Brian, all right! But would he really take it to such an extreme he’d betray his own planet ?

  ‘Right.’ The bad Guuuurk waved the gun. ‘Stay next to me, Agent X-One-Zero—’

  Brian bunched his fists unconsciously by his side. ‘ Please don’t call me that,’ he cautioned, coldly. I’d never seen him in such an icy fury.

  The Martian was oblivious. ‘The rest of you line up over there. I’m taking the bucket now. Agent X-One-Zero . . .’

  Brian’s knuckles turned white.

  ‘. . . pick it up!’

  Poor old Brian was clearly suffering. There was a battle raging inside him. A civil war between the man he was now, and the man he’d once been.

  I suddenly felt such a pang of sympathy for him, I could scarcely breathe. I ached to tell him he didn’t have to be that man any more. The past meant nothing. The things he’d done – they’re not what Brian was any more. He was his own man now. A good man. Kind. And faithful. And a jolly decent sort. ‘Don’t be the man you were !’ I wanted to shout. ‘Be the man you’re becoming !’