PROLEGOMENON TO APOCALYPSE

  

Judge Jury, one of the three judges on the big mahogany bench, popped the lid on a tin, laid a pinch of snuff on the back of his left hand, hunched over, and sniffed. Up one nostril, then the other. And after blinking the sting from his eyes, resealed the tin and pocketed it under his puffy robes. ‘Go on,’ he said with a dismissive flick of the wrist.

The accused scanned over the tattered pages of the spiralbound notebook in his hand, sighed and read aloud, ‘There are podzols, lochs and lochrans, peat bogs and plateaus, streams of crystal-clear water and snowcapped mountains of jagged volcanic rock, bumping up through the boggy grass, tilting the pines, rowan and birch trees at all weird and wonderful angles. There are also skittering otters and minks flittering through the wilderness with gay abandon alongside the pine martens.’

He stopped and took a breath.

‘Need I go on?’ he protested, raising his manacled hands, until the rattling chains between them, looped under the brass waist high bars around him, prevented them going any higher.

No answer.

‘Right,’ he went on, ‘aaaaanduh there are wood ants and aphids galore, marlins, peregrines, ospreys, and loads of annoying hooty tooty owls, hen harriers, mergansers, and the odd solitary golden eyed duck dotted around here and there.’

‘Continue,’ Judge Jury said.

‘The Dalradian limestone lies on the Northern Felwort, where one can find...’ he looked up at the three judges, ‘to anyone who can be bothered to go out there and look for himselfuh, astragalus, thyme and bottle sedge, rock rose, wild strawberry and globe flowers to name but a few. There are also limestone pavements on Schiehallione Mountain, where one can find, let me see...  Oh, yes, furrows, or grykes as they are commonly known by the common people, lined with dog’s mercury, herb bennet and ivy: the non-itchy scratchy stuff, wood sorrel and wood anemone. There are kestrels, sparrow hawks, tawny owls and barn owls, with nary a barn in sight, and yet even more owls you can hope to shake a stick at. And believe me I tried,’ he said wearily, dropping his hand clutching his notebook to his side. ‘Subjected as I was to relentless dive bombing from all quarters.’

He looked up at Judges Judge, Jury and Executioner for some semblance of sympathy, empathy, for anything of humanity showing through their stony faces. Saw none and continued.

‘But I digress,’ he said. ‘There are ravens and bullfinches, buzzards and carrion crows that took a disconcerting interest in my unwanted presence. There are also chiffchaffs and longnecked cormorant thingies, twites and waxwings with not a Lazarus among them. I also found some barytes at Farrogon Hill if that’s of any interest. I mean, I wouldn’t know since no one told me what I was supposed to be looking for.’

‘What’s that?’ Judge Executioner asked.

‘Farrogon Hill?’ the accused said.

‘The other thing.’

‘Baryte?’

‘Yes. What is it?’

‘It’s a mineral. Barium sulphate. There was also celsian. A barium feldspar that I chis...  I mean, fowwowwound at a place called Cluny Moor.’

The swivel headed judges glanced at each other, backhanded their mouths, and mumbled, faced front once again and down at the accused.

‘Tempted, were you?’ Judge Jury sighed accusingly.

‘Beg pardon?’

‘Never mind,’ Judge Judge said. ‘Go on.’

‘Look, I had a canvas rucksack that ended up sodden to hell when it drizzled, which it did eternally in that Godforsaken place, took some photographs with a blocky Kodak box brownie camera, with a real glass lens, I might add—’

‘Where are they?’ Judge Executioner interrupted.

‘Hmm?’ the accused mumbled tight-lipped, raising his eyebrows.

‘The picchurs,’ Judge Executioner elucidated, leaning forward, peering through his wiry windswept eyebrows.

‘Ah, the pictures the pictures...’

‘Yes, the picture the pictures. Where are they?’

‘I lost them.’

‘You don’t say,’ Judge Jury said, slumping back, wig askew, reaching up with his spider thin fingers, tugging it back into focus.

‘Look,’ the accused continued. ‘I had a canvas rucksack. Decidedly not waterproof as I have said. I took photographs and notes. I’m surprised anything survived. I’m surprised I survived—’

‘Pity,’ Judge Executioner said wearily, head propped up on one hand, doodling boredom on the blotter in front of him with his other.

‘I was turned into a backpacker,’ the accused complained. ‘Something of which I have absolutely no experience and forced to disappear in some godforsaken waterlogged dump called Rannoch Moor. I did as I was asked, although I can’t be sure of what that was. Then I hear rumours that borders were closing. That Europe’s old borders within borders are being reinstated. That America and Europe are becoming increasingly isolated. That Great Britain, a misnomer if ever there was one, has gone into Good Old Blighty mass production mode of its evil incarnate Brimstone missiles and now, now, Trident warheads are just itching to be blasted into orbit and annihilate anything that breathes. I’m surprised this whole island hasn’t sunk under the waves with the weight of all that ironmongery. And now nuclear warheads are pointing out from the inside of Europe to the rest of the world, which, funnily enough, has evoked a mass hysteria of joyful dancing in the streets. The long-awaited imposition of a New Age Utopia, apparently. The young are exuberant, and the creaky old pagans, of the Louis Pauwels and Jacques Bergier variety, The Morning of the Magicians and all that, are slithering out of their wormwood closets, swinging fluorescent ribboned tambourines all over the place...  Look, it’s not as if I’ve killed anyone.’

‘So you say,’ Judge Jury said.

‘But you are a cheat,’ Judge Judge said.

‘And a thief,’ Judge Executioner said.

‘As well as a liar,’ said all.

‘You weren’t there on holiday, you know,’ Judge Jury said.

‘Accused,’ Judge Executioner said up on high from the shiny mahogany bench, ‘you were sentenced—’

‘And I appreciate that.’

‘Silence!’ Judge Jury yelled, slamming down his Grenadil gavel.

Judges Judge and Executioner jumped at the clatter, recomposed themselves and smoothed down their billowing robes.

‘I can say nothing in my defence?’ the accused squealed.

‘No!’ all judges spoke as one.

‘We’ve had enough of you.’

‘More than enough.’

‘You cause havoc everywhere you go.’

‘This is your last warning.’

‘You said that the last time,’ the accused sulked, lips pouting.

‘Your final last chance,’ Judge Judge said.

‘And the time before that,’ the accused whined, hands up, chained bracelets rattling, in supplication. ‘But if I can only explain.’

‘Enough! No more excuses.’

‘So, we have decided—’ Judge Executioner said in a calmer tone, tugging at the ermine lapels of his robe.

‘I don’t even have the opportunity of stating my case to a jury?’ enquired the accused.

‘What? What?’ Judge Judge asked, cupping a hand to his ear, pretending he hadn’t heard clearly.

‘It seems that I have no right to a defence. There isn’t even a prosecutor, bar the three of you...  you...  your excellences on the bench.’

‘So you can lie your way out of it again, you mean,’ Judge Executioner said.

And after an indignant sharp intake of breath, the accused said, ‘No good men and women of a jury to hear my case?’

‘We couldn’t find any good ones,’ Judge Judge smirked.

‘Or bad ones for that matter,’ Judge Jury said.

‘Anyway, we don’t need them,’ Judge Executioner added. ‘This is a closed court.’

‘A setup as usual, then,’ the accused said.

‘Besides, we need you for something else,’ Judge Jury said.

‘For something much more important,’ Judge Judge said.

‘We are quite aware of the dangerous situation brewing in the world,’ Judge Executioner said. ‘So your new mission is to fix it before it gets out of hand.’

‘Before it gets out of hand? It already is out of hand,’ the accused said, admiring his newly buffed fingernails.

‘Exactly, so now we need you to sort it out. Nip it in the bud, as it were,’ Judge Jury said.

‘So what is this new mission, then?’ the accused asked, holding the brass rail in front of him in a white knuckled grip.

‘It’s a surprise,’ Judge Executioner grinned.

‘Look, I’ve already done what you asked. I traipsed around the moors. I took notes. I found nothing. I didn’t even know what I was looking for.’

‘That was just part of your rehabilitation,’ Judge Judge said, ‘you stupid man.’

‘Besides, your sentence hasn’t been discharged yet,’ Judge Jury said, grinning with thin rubber band lips.
Manacles and chains notwithstanding, the accused drummed his fingers impatiently on the brass railing around him.

‘I know what this is,’ he said. ‘It’s a set up. You won’t do it for yourselves because you’re too damned scared to put the soles of your own feet onto terra firma, aren’t you?’

‘Enough!’ Judge Executioner snapped.

‘However,’ Judge Jury said in a more conciliatory tone, ‘we may let you go after this new mission we have lined up for you.’

‘What do you mean, may?’

‘You do realise we could keep you incarcerated forever, don’t you?’ Judge Executioner said. ‘Eternally.’

‘How could I forget? And for what? Nothing.’

‘You blew up a planet, man!’ Judge Judge exploded.

‘It was uninhabitteduh! How many times must I say it?’ the accused said. ‘Besides, it wasn’t a real planet. It was a paper mâché exhibition thing in the children’s section of the National Museum of Scotland. How was I to know they were going to plaster it in layer after layer of shellac, or yacht varnish, or whatever the hell it was, some kind of secret goo, no doubt, dreamt up by closeted beardy boffins in the dusty cobweb bound higher echelons of the museum. I mean what else have they got to do with their time but dream up dangerous concoctions that turn into concrete? Behind. My. Back. I mean. What if some innocent child had fallen into a bucket of that slop? What then? What then?’

‘Shut up!’ Judge Executioner jumped up from his seat, appealing to the two other judges. ‘Listen to him. He’s nuts.’

‘Oh my God,’ Judge Jury spluttered, ‘that makes it even worse, you...  you... vandal! A children’s exhibition made by chilldaren, made for chilldaren.’

‘You can’t go around destroying things you don’t like,’ Judge Jury rebuked.

‘It was an accident,’ the accused said. ‘I didn’t mean to blow the thing up. I pushed the wrong plunger thingy, obviously.’

‘And you’re a kleptomaniac,’ Judge Executioner said, finger wagging. ‘The worst. You can’t take things that don’t belong to you. And you better not have taken anything from that last mission at...  what the hell’s the name of that place again?’

Judge Jury peered in closely over his halfmoon spectacles at a slip of paper in front of him. ‘Rannoch Moor, or some such,’ he said.

‘Thank you, Cyril,’ Judge Executioner said. ‘That mission,’

‘Failed mission, you mean,’ Judge Judge said.

‘Look,’ the accused said. ‘I always give the things back. Well, nearly always. I only keep what won’t be missed.’

‘Like the cyclotron?’ Judge Jury said, eyebrow raised, elbow on bench, chin cupped in hand.

‘Oh, that.’

‘Yes, oh that. It took a lot of shenanigans getting that thing, whatever the hell it is, back where it belongs,’ Judge Judge said.

‘It didn’t work, anyway,’ the accused said, gripping the brass rail and swinging back on his heels.

‘Madam Curie’s notebooks?’ Judge Executioner said. ‘Still missing, we gather?’

‘They’re radioactive, for God’s sake,’ the accused said, yanking himself up straight. ‘Lethal, I say. I did humanity a favour. Besides, I replaced them with extremely good forgeries.’

‘There weren’t yours to take in the first place!’ Judge Executioner yelled.

‘And then there are all the other things we still can’t find,’ Judge Jury said.

‘Like the Etruscan jewellery from The House of Castellani, for a start,’ Judge Executioner said.

‘Strictly speaking, that is Etruscan revival jewellery,’ the accused corrected.

‘Where have you hidden it?’ Judge Jury asked.

‘Somewhere safe.’

‘Where?’

‘Well, I was trying to excavate a little hole in a planetoid—’

‘Which you accidentally conveniently blew up because your finger slipped. Right.’

‘What’s wrong with my own name?’ the accused complained.

‘It’s unpronounceable.’

‘No consonants.’

‘All x’s and q’s without the u’s and whatnot.’

‘Unacceptable.’

‘Insufferable gobbledygook.’

‘Therefore, you are to have a new name,’ Judge Judge said.

‘And as an extra precaution, someone will be assisting you this time,’ Judge Executioner said.

‘I don’t need an assistant,’ the accused sniped. ‘I always work alone.’

‘Work. Work?’ Judge Jury laughed. ‘You couldn’t make this stuff up.’

‘And looking at your past academic record,’ Judge Judge said, ‘in the widest possible sense of the word as to be meaningless, it amounts to a grand total of absolutely nothing. We do nevertheless recognise some of your skills. Therefore, you are to be deemed with the accolade of a doctorate. But rest assured, no one will question its veracity since doctorates are not worth the paper they are written on, anyway. In that sense, you will be good company. An unquestioned oaf who is arrogant and stupid at the same time—’

‘I am not stupid,’ the accused protested.

‘—just like all the other balloons with a doctorate. Plus, you’ll have the bonus of having a D and an R in front of your new name. If anyone asks, you can always say it stands for Dead Wrong.’

Guffaws of laughter and tears of merriment from the bench, as the three judges, wigs askew and eyes asquint, jabbed each other in the ribs with elbows and self-congratulatory patting on each other’s humps.

‘If I may?’ the accused said, raising his hand in his best scholarly manner. ‘But the word wrong does not start with the letter R.’

‘Shut up.’

‘Now.’

‘Your advantages—’

‘You think out of your box.’

‘The box,’ the accused corrected.

‘You have blue sky thinking, whatever the hell that is.’

‘Not that blue when you get right up there,’ the accused said, pistoning his middle finger ever upwards.

‘And now for the big reveal,’ Judge Executioner said.

‘The reason we sent you to Rannoch Moor,’ Judge Jury said.

‘Apart from being nothing of worth to steal from there—’ Judge Judge said.

‘—was to see how observant you are,’ Judge Executioner said.

‘Which you are,’ Judge Judge said.

Judge Jury opened a folder and traced his fingers downwards on the papers within. ‘Yes,’ he said. ‘Brock, it’s called. Strange but true. A troublesome vortex, by all accounts.

‘Something is preventing its closure.’

‘Or someone.’

‘And since you seem to be immune to everything…’

‘Including common sense…’

‘And justice…’

‘You are the perfect candidate for the job.’

‘And as an added security measure, you are to have your age reclocked.’

‘What?’ the accused yelped.

‘In reverse.’

‘First of all, you will be aged dramatically. Some kind of newfangled serum that shall shorten your telomeres or some such, it says here. You will recover, rapidly, I am assured when your telomeres shall lengthen themselves naturally. Unfortunately, without the antidote, your de-aging won’t stop at all.’

The plaintiff’s jaw dropped. ‘Has this been evaluated before?’

‘Says here that it works well on nematodes. So, the choice is yours. The big needle or eternal incarceration.’

‘So you better get on with sorting out this impending apocalypse fast by closing down that vortex, or whatever the hell it is, fast.’

‘And find out whomever or whatever is preventing its closure. And the Brimstone missiles and nuclear Tridents can be put away for a rainy day.’

‘Apart from everything else, it's causing major problems the longer it exists. Ripples and distortions in the temporal locality.’

‘And beyond.’

‘And once you fix the problem—’

‘As a reward.’

‘—you will be given the serum, so your de-aging is halted automatically.’

‘And if I fail in this suicide mission, you’re sending me on?’ a bug-eyed accused enquired.

‘You’re dead.’