textfiles/magazines/TWILIGHTWORLD/twilight.world-2.1

From lets2780@stud.let.ruu.nl Fri Apr  8 11:42:15 1994
Date: Jan 01, 1970 at 12:00
From: Twilight World <lets2780@stud.let.ruu.nl>
To: Subscriber <pauls@fir.cic.net>
Subject: Twilight World Volume 2 Issue 1


                         T W I L I G H T   W O R L D

                          (previously TWILIGHT ZONE)



                               Volume 2 Issue 1

                              January 15th 1994



               "Now you're stepping into the Twilight Zone..."










 This magazine may be archived, reproduced and/or distributed provided that no 
additions or changes are made to it. All stories in this magazine are fiction. 
No  actual  persons are designated by name or  character.  Any  similarity  is 
purely coincidental.
 If you bought this magazine through an expensive PD library,  be sure to  get 
it cheaper somewhere else next time,  as it's FOR FREE and I didn't intend  it 
to be for free just so that someone else could make lots of dosh with it!
 Please  refer  to  the  end  of this  text  file  for  information  regarding 
submissions, subscriptions, copyright and all that.


= LIST OF CONTENTS ===========================================================


 EDITORIAL

 THE FAIRY FELLOWS MASTER STROKE

 The third Tale from the Tavern at the Edge of Nowhere
 by Bryan H. Joyce

 THE LAST NINJA

 Whele Hang Foy Soozooki and his Loyal Selvant ale Intloduced
 by Lichald Kalsmakels

 POPULOUS

 Where Cronos Warchild joins Odd Folk
 by Richard Karsmakers

 RICK DANGEROUS II

 Where Fate plays once more with Sir Richard 'Rick' Dangerous
 by Richard Karsmakers


= EDITORIAL ==================================================================
 by Richard Karsmakers


 Some  time  ago,  Jason  Snell (editor of the  excellent  "InterText"  online 
magazine)  told me that the previous name of the magazine you're reading  now, 
"Twilight Zone",  might have some serious implications where trademark use was 
concerned. As it happens, the creators of the TV series and films of this name 
have  also done (or are perhaps still doing) a *magazine*,  making  it  sortof 
naughty for me to actually use it,  too. They haven't taken legal steps yet (I 
am even quite sure they have never heard of my "Twilight Zone",  and  probably 
never  will),  but I don't want to take any chances.  That's why mid  November 
last year saw a small reader survey with regard to a possible name change. For 
a while I dabbled with names such as "Dusk" and "In Communicado" and the like, 
but  in  the  end  it  was Dereck Safarian (cheers!)  who  came  up  with  the 
brilliantly straightforward "Twilight World".
 So  "Twilight  World" is the new name with which this magazine enters  a  new 
year,  a year that I hope will be its definitive breakthrough in terms of  its 
readers circle.  Between this and the previous issue the number of subscribers 
has  more  than doubled,  so I'm satisfied to say the  least.  The  number  of 
readers  should  increase even more dramatically in the future as I'm  at  the 
moment setting up an automatic server and all that stuff - to make  everything 
even easier.

 Last  but  not least (although I know it's a bit late  and  proper  etiquette 
wouldn't  have  it),  I would like to wish all of you a profoundly  happy  and 
successful  new  year.  May it keep your computer virus-free and may  it  find 
necessary  the  invention  of new ways of giga-mathematics to  allow  for  the 
calculation of your annual income.
 And, of course, I hope you'll like reading this issue.


 Richard Karsmakers
 (Editor)


= THE FAIRY FELLOWS MASTER STROKE ============================================
 by Bryan H. Joyce


                 A Tale From The Tavern At The Edge Of Nowhere

 
 An older version of this tale was previously published in "STUNN" and appears 
here by permission of its author, our good friend Bryan "James" Joyce.
 
 Hi!  I'm Tony Wheelbough.  At the moment,  I'm a barman at a very unusual bar 
called the Tavern.  It is part of a complex known as The Edge Of Nowhere. This 
name  is misleading.  It's actually situated on a planet near the core of  the 
galaxy we Earthlings call the Milky Way.  The planet doesn't have an  official 
name,  but  most visitors call it the Edge.  This is probably because  of  the 
hundred  foot  high  hologram  of a flashing neon sign  saying  "The  Edge  Of 
Nowhere"  that is usually the second thing that the startled  traveller  sees. 
What's the first thing? I'll tell you later. The Earth time, at the moment, is 
about 1955.  Due to the turbulence in the space/time continuum created by  the 
core stars,  space/time travellers are washed up here all the time. I've heard 
that there is a similar effect at the centre of most galaxies.  The Milky  Way 
is  the  only known place where this effect disgorges the flotsam  and  jetsam 
onto a specific place on the surface of a planet. It seemed a worthwhile place 
to  build  a  hotel  and  leisure complex.  I  had  nothing  to  do  with  the 
construction; I just work here.
 Sounds all very interesting doesn't it? Bet I know what you're thinking right 
now.  How  did  I  come  by  such an  ordinary  job  in  such  extra  ordinary 
surroundings?  Admit it.  That's what you're thinking.  Right?  You're not the 
first  to have asked such a question.  Customers often ask me how I  ended  up 
here.  This is my story. Like many aspects of my life, it starts in an unusual 
manner.
 In  any  life,  there are an infinite amount of points where  it  can  change 
drastically and suddenly by pure circumstance. Millions of seemingly unrelated 
events led to my current state.  If they had worked out differently,  I  would 
not have ended up at the Tavern at The Edge Of Nowhere.  The most  significant 
event was the "seemingly" coincidental intervention of the fairy fellow.  This 
is also his story.

                                    *****

 To start with,  the fairy fellow was unconscious.  If he had not  been,  this 
story would probably never have happened. It seems incredible now when I think 
about it, but even I don't know where I found him. I was lost.
 I'm digressing already.  Perhaps it would be better if I threw in a bit of my 
own history first.
 I was living in England when I was made redundant from my job at the Berwick-
upon-Tweed Matrix shop.  I decided to take a long holiday.  Other matters  had 
been preying on my mind for some time.  I was very depressed,  but I would not 
have  admitted to being suicidal.  What was needed was a sabbatical of  sorts. 
I've always been fond of backpacking.  Without pausing for minor details, such 
as planning the route, I was off to Scotland.
 The flying bus took me to Glasgow.  From there,  I got a mono-rail to a small 
village called Dalwhinnie. After a food binge at the Ben Alder tea rooms I set 
off into the grey drizzle that lined the edges of Loch Ericht (not a very good 
route). The path ran out after about 10 miles, from there I was walking on wet 
peat and boulders on what was,  in places,  almost a cliff edge. Indeed, every 
now and then,  I had to negotiate large places where the mountainside had slid 
into the loch.  At one such place sat a small frog.  Strange?  The loch was  a 
sheer  drop of about 80 feet and there was no other water for miles.  I  knelt 
down and talked to the frog for a while.
 "Gribbit.  Gribbit!" I said.  The frog just turned its back on me and huddled 
down  as if it wanted to go to sleep.  "Charming," I said and continued on  my 
way.
 I wonder how all these boulders got here? Answer - they had fallen off of the 
tops of the mountains. You don't believe me? Then push aside a boulder and see 
beneath the bodies of passing idiots like me.
 For  the first few days,  I used the map to walk between places of  potential 
interest.  The  first  night I spent in the haunted bothy at the foot  of  Ben 
Alder. Luckily, I never saw anything ghostly hanging from the back of the door 
in the middle of the night.  The story is that a shepherd hung himself  there. 
Many people have seen his ghost. I hate the supernatural. When I was about 13, 
I  saw  something  that made my hair go white,  but that - as they  say  -  is 
another story...
 The next night was spent in the tent in the middle of Rannoch moor. Next day, 
I wandered off at random not really caring where I went. Rather stupid really! 
I don't know where I pitched the tent that night.  I didn't bother to work  it 
out on the map.  My mind was numb with depression,  but lacked specific focus. 
Like the previous nights,  I slept like a dead man. The following day I didn't 
go  anywhere at all.  I spent the day in the tent reading "All Fall Down,"  by 
Enid Jackson.  A fictionalization of the real life story of a woman who was  a 
plague carrier.  I had been meaning to read it for years.  It turned out to be 
totally bland plot wise, but really great for its historical accuracy. I threw 
it away.
 That night in the tent disturbed me greatly. All the bad things that had been 
hiding  in  my  mind  during  the day came bubbling  to  the  surface  in  3-D 
technicolour.  My mind was a cinema projecting the same movie again and again. 
Each time the interpretation was minutely different, but the plot remained the 
same.  In the soft silent blackness,  I brooded about the death of my  beloved 
Sarah Brown so many months ago.
 We  were staying in Stockport Maine in the good old US of A.  I was drunk  on 
the night of the accident. We all were. I was driving, my brother Joey and his 
wife Mary were in the back seat. They had come up from New York especially for 
my 21st birthday.  The party we had just left had been out in the countryside. 
I  can't  remember the name of the village,  but it should  have  been  called 
"Hicksville".  Everybody  was related to everybody.  The four of us stuck  out 
like  a sore thumb.  Nevertheless,  it had ended up a very  pleasant  evening. 
Sarah was at my left hand side in the passenger seat.  We had been dancing all 
night.  Not  only was it my birthday,  but when we were at the party  I  asked 
Sarah to marry me. She said that she would think about it. Swine!
 It  was 2 a.m and I was tired,  but happy.  Sarah was asleep.  Joey and  Mary 
chatted quietly.  It was raining,  very windy and I was driving too fast.  The 
moon was bright and full.
 At  the  side  of  the road was one of the strangest  figures  I  could  have 
expected to see at this time of the morning,  or indeed,  any time of  day.  A 
tall stocky man dressed in green tights, short green jacket and a woolly green 
hat  pulled well down.  At first he reminded me of a stereotyped  Robin  Hood. 
When the automobile got closer, I spotted his short silvery beard. All in all, 
he was dressed like an actor I had once seen playing the part of Oberon,  King 
of the Fairies,  in a Shakespeare play.  He waved furiously and jumped about a 
lot.  I did not know why, but there was something familiar about him that made 
me feel uneasy. He might have been shouting. It looked like it, but I couldn't 
hear anything above the noise of the engine and the wild weather.
 "Bloody loony hitchhiker! No way baby!"
 Almost  knocking  him  down,  we roared by spraying him  with  water  from  a 
unfortunately  placed  puddle.  Seconds later,  at the crest of a  blind  hill 
darkened by overhanging trees, the automobile struck a large dark shape in the 
middle of the road.
 Something screamed.  Human screams followed as the windscreen shattered  when 
Sarah was thrown through it. The world spun as the automobile turned over onto 
its  top,  righted  its self again,  rammed a tree and skidded down  a  grassy 
embankment. Sometime during all this, something hit me on the face. Why hadn't 
the crash balloons gone off? The seat belt was breaking my ribs...blackness!
 I don't know how long I was out.  Don't think it could have been long. When I 
came  to,  someone had pulled me out of the automobile.  Near  by,  the  fairy 
fellow  was  bending over Sarah.  A glowing band was about her  head.  It  was 
connected  by  a  thin cable to what looked like a  large  portable  computer. 
Distantly,  I was aware of the twisted body of a steer lying near by.  It must 
have  been standing in the middle of the road when the automobile had hit  it. 
Jesus wept! Had the citizens of Hicksville county never heard of fencing?
 Trying to protect her from the loony,  I tried to stand.  A million volts  of 
pain  surged  through my left side.  The whiteness of bone  glistened  in  the 
moonlight and the blackness of marrow protruded from the skin of my left  fore 
arm. I blacked out again.
 Much later,  I found out that I also had two broken ribs on the left side and 
whiplash.  Joey's  head  was  badly cut and he had three  broken  fingers  and 
whiplash. Mary had a broken leg and a fractured collar bone.
 I  was  lucky.  If I had not been wearing my seat belt,  the  steering  wheel 
column  would have impaled my chest.  It was an old  automobile;  made  before 
crushable steering wheel columns became standard.
 Sarah was not so lucky.  On her way through the windscreen, hit the dashboard 
hard enough to break her collar bone and all but one of her ribs.  Jagged bone 
tore her heart apart. She was dead in seconds - I hope. Never again would I be 
irritated  by the way in which she treated all strangers as if they were  long 
lost friends.  Never again would I run my fingers through her long black  hair 
or  gaze into those sad grey eyes.  Never again would I have to stoop to  kiss 
her. The loveliness was gone. The greatness that was Sarah Brown did not exist 
outside of memory. She was wonderful. She was the best. She was dead.
 The  memory  of her broken body lying on the grass beside the road  with  the 
stranger bending over it will haunt me till my dying day. Who the hell was he? 
What  on Earth was he doing?  These questions remained unanswered.  You  would 
have  thought someone so distinctively dressed would have been found  quickly, 
wouldn't you? He was never traced.
 Although the accident was over a year ago,  I never drank again. She had died 
because of alcohol. Not so deep down, I knew that if I ever took a drink again 
then someone else would die. It would be me.
 As  I lay in my tent that night unable to sleep,  death the  purifier  seemed 
like  an increasingly good fellow to meet.  No job.  No  kids.  No  Sarah.  No 
future? Yes, it WAS a bloody good idea! How to do it?
 At nearly quarter to four that morning, I left my tent and started to climb a 
nearby hill. It was cold, wet and dark. I left my coat and waterproofs behind. 
I would not need them again.
 Twenty minutes later, I reached the summit of the steep hill. Coincidence had 
provided me with just what I was looking for. The other side of the hill was a 
sheer cliff.  Carefully,  I approached the edge and looked down into the  dark 
beckoning woods below. It would be so easy - so inviting - to take a last step 
forwards  into  oblivion.  A  few seconds of  freezing  flight  then  silence. 
Forever.
 Obviously,  I didn't take that step - so,  I'm a coward, big deal! Instead, I 
sat down.  Drunk with fatigue, I was in a dreamlike state. I cried for a while 
and then sat in a trance for a long time. Why me?
 Suddenly I jerked to awareness. The sun was up and the view was quite lovely. 
I was cold. I shivered in the cutting wind. My clothes were damp with the rain 
and  nervous  sweat,  but I did not care.  For some  unknown  reason,  I  felt 
euphoric.  I was aware of a warmth - a hope - inside. Everything happens for a 
reason.  Sure, life had hit a few too many curve balls recently, but all times 
-  even  bad ones - change.  I think it was George Orwell who  said  something 
along the lines of,  when you're lying on the bottom of the world the only way 
is up. Think I know what he meant.
 I had decided to stand up when I sneezed.  Suicide by Pneumonia.  I waited  a 
few moments for the next sneeze.  It is my experience that sneezes are  plural 
never singular. The second sneeze never came. Wrong again Tony. I stood up and 
began the weary climb back down the hillside.
 I was thirsty so I stopped and drank deeply from a spring.
 "Oh,  God!  I need a drink!" I whispered out loud.  All at once,  with a vice 
like grip, the hand of depression re-clutched my brain.
 By the time I got back to the tent, it was far too bright to try and sleep. I 
got out my stove and heated up a tin of Irish Stew.  After only two spoonfuls, 
I felt suddenly sick. I swallowed two caffeine tablets with cold sweet tea and 
reluctantly decided to force the rest of the stew down.
 After some more cold tea - God really knew what he was doing when he invented 
tea and sugar - I folded the tent away and went down to the stream to wash the 
remains  of the stew from the pot.  I changed my mind and violently threw  the 
pot into the white water. The world stinks!
 "And then,  one day,  all the shit died! So ad bloody infinitum!" I shouted - 
no, I don't understand it either - and went back to the campsite.
 When  everything  was  packed I set off.  I didn't plan  to  go  anywhere  in 
particular.  I  didn't  even look at the map.  It didn't matter.  It  was  the 
walking that mattered.  When you walk for a long time,  even the best  scenery 
eventually  gets  dull.  Your  mind  seems to switch  off.  Your  body  is  on 
autopilot. The rhythmic swing of your legs hypnotises you. The hours can go by 
very quickly - if you let them.
 Many hours later,  I came to a largish village.  Where it was,  I don't know. 
There was a licensed grocers and it was open.  I bought a bottle of whisky and 
a half bottle of cheap wine.
 I  walked for a quarter of an hour until I was sure I would not be  seen.  My 
water  flask hung on the crystalline graphite frame of my rucksack -  so  it's 
old fashioned,  but it still does the job.  I opened it,  drank half a pint of 
water and poured the rest onto the road. We wouldn't like to end up dehydrated 
- would we?
 I  opened  the bottle of whisky and poured most of it into the  water  flask. 
About a quarter was left in the bottle.  I held it up to my face and stared at 
the beautiful golden liquid.  Oh,  such delights it would bring!  It  sparkled 
magically as it caught the sunlight. I sniffed at the mouth of the bottle. The 
smell made my stomach heave whilst my mouth watered with desire...

      Nostalgia  had been triggered.  A memory popped up out of  the  twilight 
     zone.  Me,  aged  four,  tasting whisky for the first time.  It  was  the 
     morning  after some sort of party.  I had discovered what looked  like  a 
     half  full  bottle of soft drink.  I couldn't read,  but  recognised  the 
     bottle  as being cream soda.  Why was the liquid a sort of brown  colour? 
     Who  cares!  I tilted back the bottle allowing the unknown into my  young 
     mouth  and went into an extreme panic at what I tasted.  It was  fire!  I 
     spat  it out and got a towel to dry my tongue with.  The stuff  made  the 
     towel  go a funny colour.  Who would put such horrible stuff in  a  cream 
     soda bottle? Was that what they called alcohol? If that's what the grown-
     ups call "drinking",  they must be mad! Why on Earth would anyone want to 
     drink stuff like that?  It hurts! I'm never ever going to drink that sort 
     of stuff when I grow up!

 ...I took a sip.  It made me cough.  I drained the remainder in one prolonged 
gulp.  It burned like hell;  yet contained a welcomed comfort reminiscent of a 
long lost friend. "Hello. I'm back! Long time no see," it said happily. I held 
my  breath  for a while so that I wouldn't cough and threw  the  empty  bottle 
away.
 After  my abstinence,  the fatigue and my depression,  one mouthful  of  that 
hellish  brew would have been enough to make me high.  The amount I  had  just 
gulped down was just plain stupid!  Ten minutes later it hit me. My last clear 
thoughts were pathetic.
 "If I wait till I'm starting to sober up,  I can sip the rest and stay  drunk 
all day."
 It must have worked; for the rest of that day I walked in a trance. The night 
passed like a long shadow.  The next day was a hazy dream.  The effects of the 
drink could not have lasted that long.  I must have bought more,  but I  don't 
remember.
 When I sort of came to my senses - I don't know how much time had passed - it 
was four in the afternoon.  Which afternoon,  I did not know.  I was  overcome 
with exhaustion.  I had to get some sleep.  It was raining again and I  didn't 
have a clue as to my whereabouts.  I was walking along a country road.  To  my 
left  was a lake or loch.  To my right was a pine forest.  I set off into  the 
forest looking for a campsite.
 Soon,  I  came to a large clearing and stopped suddenly.  Very  suddenly.  In 
fact, I fell over.
 Not wanting to get up again, I wriggled out of my rucksack straps and managed 
to open it.  I had enough awareness left to find my survival kit.  I took  out 
the survival bag and,  with much difficulty,  pulled the toggle which  allowed 
the memory metal struts to unfold it. I put my sleeping bag inside, crawled in 
and blacked out.
 Odd people have odd dreams.
 There was a room with no windows.  Perhaps a cellar?  A stairway seemed to be 
the only way out.  I went up the stairs.  Dead end. A deep growling laugh that 
sounded strangely familiar. I turned to look.
 At the bottom of the stairs was a terrible apparition. It was a naked sexless 
person.  Instead of a head, it had a slimy white skull. Bleeding eyes in sharp 
edged sockets swivelled my way. The thing waited for me. "Come here. I want to 
talk  to you," the skull said with a flapping tongue that looked  suspiciously 
like a slice of raw liver.  Again,  laughter.  The stairs folded and became  a 
smooth slope. I started to slide towards the monster. No! More laughter.
 Terrified,  I clawed at the slope until my fingers bled. First time I've ever 
felt pain in a dream!  It was so real that I felt my fingernails peel back and 
break.  Splinters  of wood from the stairs embedded themselves into  the  open 
weeping flesh.  It's only a dream! It's only a dream! Then why does it hurt so 
much?  The  thing reached out with a massive hand and engulfed my  face.  Wet. 
Cold.  Dark.  I can't breath!  Laughing! It hurts! When you die in a dream, do 
you die for real?
 And  then I woke up.  I still couldn't breath.  Something was on my  face.  I 
pulled it away and gulped in air. What had been on my face? It was the plastic 
of the survival bag. The damp morning dew had made it stick to my face.
 Reluctantly,  I  opened my eyes.  My head throbbed and I felt sick.  I  moved 
slightly and became aware of an urgent need to empty my bladder. It was either 
getting dark or getting light. I pressed the button of my watch.
 "Five p.m." It informed me.
 For Scotland,  it was surprising that it was not already dark at this time of 
year. I must have been asleep for over 12 hours. I crawled out of the survival 
bag and gently vomited bile onto the grass. The steam from the mess was vivid, 
white,  thick and unreal.  I stood up, unzipped my fly and washed the ugliness 
away with a snaking flow of the darkest urine I had ever seen.
 "Thank God, no one can see the state I'm in!"
 I turned around and got the biggest shock of my life.  A few feet away, lying 
on the ground, was a bearded man dressed in green tights and jacket. The fairy 
fellow!  He  was  lying  face down  with  one  arm  outstretched,  presumably, 
unconscious.  A  woolly hat was lying on the ground beside him.  His hair  was 
white - just like mine.
 My hangover forgotten, I checked him for broken bones and bruises. Nothing! I 
ran  my fingers quickly through his hair.  If there was a lump there I  missed 
it. He was breathing okay and his pulse was strong, so I didn't bother putting 
him into the recovery position. Where could he have come from? Who was he? Why 
was he still so familiar? Could this really be the same person that I had seen 
by the roadside so long ago on that terrible night?
 I  stood up and began to look for an automobile or something.  Why I  assumed 
there  would  be  a vehicle,  I don't know - I just  did.  I  didn't  find  an 
automobile.  I found a something.  It was roughly the same shape as a two  man 
hovercraft, but the controls on the open dashboard were of an unfamiliar sort. 
There  was three large digital clock displays.  There was no  steering  wheel, 
foot pedals or wheels.  A five foot flywheel was mounted behind the sofa  type 
seat.  A  sort of safety rail ran right around its perimeter.  There  were  no 
doors, but the rail would have to be climbed over to get in.
 Obviously,  it  was not a hovercraft.  It must be capable of moving  in  some 
other  manner.  After  all,  this was the middle of a forest in  the  Scottish 
highlands.  How else could it have got here?  Was it some weird ground  effect 
machine?
 I climbed in.  There was a button labelled EMERGENCY RETURN.  I was about  to 
press  it  when a thought struck me.  If this ridiculous  machine  was  indeed 
capable of motion;  pressing the button might set it off on a journey. Maybe I 
would have trouble switching it off again?
 I climbed out again and carried the Fairy fellow into the vehicle.  I settled 
down into the seat beside him and pressed the button marked EMERGENCY  RETURN. 
With a hum the fly wheel started spinning.  The world began to shake slightly. 
The hum increased in pitch and everything outside of the craft went grey. Look 
again!  There was no outside of the craft any more.  Just the greyness. I felt 
like  a character in one of those cartoons where the hero is running  so  fast 
that he leaves the cartoon altogether and stands on an empty canvas.
 I felt panic surge over me and I insanely decided to jump over board into the 
nothingness, when the Fairy fellow woke up.
 "Don't," he called.
 I had one leg over the side already.  I would have jumped out, but I couldn't 
feel  the  ground.  When the fairy fellow had spoke I felt a  giddy  sense  of 
disorientation. So strong was this feeling that for a moment I thought that it 
was myself who had spoken.
 "Don't do it.  I don't know what will happen,  but it might be rather nasty," 
he said.
 For a second or so I thought about diving off over the side and then  changed 
my mind. Instead, I withdrew my leg and dropped back onto the seat beside him.
 "What's  going  on?  Who  are you?" I was too frightened to be  able  to  say 
anything else.
 "Er,  I  can't  remember,  but my head hurts.  Who are you?" he ran  a  heavy 
scarred hand through his white hair and gave a groan.  I don't know why, but I 
got  the  impression that he was lying and that he knew perfectly well  who  I 
was.
 "Tony Wheelbough," I said.
 "I know!" he said laughing.
 "Know what?" I said.
 "I remember what's happening now.  Well,  sort of! You shouldn't be here with 
me.  As to what the hell is happening,  things are still a bit hazy.  Are  you 
flying this thing?"
 "No. I hit the emergency return button."
 "I  don't  think that I remembered to set it,  so we'll end up in  the  right 
place probably at the wrong time."
 "What?" I said again.
 "Oh wise up Tony! Haven't you worked it out yet? This is a time machine."
 "Like the TARDIS?" Given my current position,  you would think that it  would 
have been difficult to mock the fairy fellow. Still I tried.
 "Not quite. More like the one in that antique film."
 "Back To The Future?"
 "No!"  he said in annoyance.  "That's not old enough to be  an  antique.  I'm 
talking  about  that film about a time machine that was called  er,  The  Time 
Machine. It's your favourite film."
 "How would you know?"
 The greyness changed.  In its place was a reddish sky and grass so dark  that 
it  was  almost black.  In front of the time machine  were  two  extraordinary 
things.  The first was the skeleton of a whale.  It was instantly recognisable 
as a whale simply because it could not have been anything else.  It looked  as 
if the bones had been polished and was quite beautiful in an odd sort of  way. 
The second extraordinary thing was a gigantic flashing neon sign which floated 
unsupported in the air above what looked like an old Edwardian manor house. It 
said;

                     T H E   E D G E   O F   N O W H E R E

 "We've arrived," said the fairy fellow.
 "Please tell me what is going on?" I whimpered.
 "Sorry  no  time.  Must be off.  Go to the help booths over there."  My  eyes 
followed as he gestured towards a row of what looked like cash dispensers  set 
into the side of a wall standing in front of the manor house.
 "But...but?"
 "Hurry  up.  I shouldn't be here at all.  Causality violations and  all  that 
stuff.  Savvy?" He vaulted over the safety rail,  ran round to my side of  the 
machine and roughly pulled me out onto the dark grass.  Next he lifted up  the 
seat  of  the  craft to expose a storage area which was  filled  with  several 
bits'n'pieces.  He removed what might have been a large portable  computer.  A 
familiar glowing band was attached to it by a single thick cable.  He  carried 
them over to a second,  identical, looking time machine parked near by. Opened 
the seat locker,  dumped his cargo in, slammed the seat shut again and climbed 
inside.
 "Be seeing you," he grinned.
 "Wait!" I shouted.
 "The help booths. Go to the help booths!" he pointed again.
 Then he and the time machine were gone.  It was as simple as that. One second 
he  was there sitting in the machine smiling and the next he was  gone.  There 
was  no fading involved.  No bang of air rushing in to fill a vacuum.  Just  a 
sharp crack like a large piece of elastic snapping and I was alone on the dark 
grass beside the skeleton of an extinct sea mammal.
 Not for long though!
 There was another sharp crack to my left.  I looked and saw,  perhaps 50 feet 
away,  a  large object where nothing had been seconds ago.  It looked  like  a 
miniature  version  of the part of an oil rig that shows above  the  waves.  I 
guess its height must have been around the 30 foot mark.  As I watched, a door 
opened,  a ramp extruded and three people got out.  I say people only  because 
the creatures were humanoid and walked on hind legs.  Instead of clothes  they 
were  covered  in  tidy  green  feathers and  had  several  belts  hung  about 
themselves. One of them looked in my direction and gave a wave and a whistle.
 "Hi!" it said when I didn't answer its whistle.
 Its  face  was  much like I imagined a human being's would  look  if  it  was 
covered  in  feathers.  To my surprise there was no beak on the face  nor  was 
there any sign of wings on the body. It turned back to its companions and they 
walked off towards the building. "Some people!" one of them muttered quietly.
 What  I needed at that moment was a book entitled,  How To Stay Calm.  As  no 
such publication was available, I decided to follow the bird-men at a discreet 
distance.   Nearer  the building,  I could see the words,  "Edge  Of  Nowhere" 
carved in the stone above the main doors.  To the right and left were  smaller 
sets of double doors.  Over one set of doors a small black and gold sign said, 
"The Last Restaurant". Under the sign was a painting of a cobbler's anvil with 
a ballet slipper in the background.  Very funny I don't think! LAST, huh! Over 
the other set of doors a sign said "The Tavern".  There was no painting beside 
this  sign.  It  was through the latter that the bird-men  went.  I  tried  to 
follow,  but could not.  It felt as if something was pushing me back. At first 
it was as if I was walking into a strong wind that slowly increased the nearer 
I got to the building.  When I was about 15 feet from the front door the force 
was so strong that my progress was halted. What now?
 I  turned,  intending going over to the so-called help booths and was  pushed 
over  by  the invisible force and dragged a few feet back the way that  I  had 
came. Oh, why can't I have piece and quiet to enjoy my hangover?
 The  nearby help booths looked a bit like cash dispensers except for  a  dark 
hole  where  the  money  would come out and a  much  larger  landscape  screen 
containing many lines of text.  The first line of text was English. The second 
looked like Russian.  The next might have been Mandarin.  The next 30 or  more 
lines  were  a mystery to me.  I later found out that some  were  other  Earth 
languages an others Alien dialects. Here is what the English text said,
 IF YOU CAN READ THIS, TOUCH IT.
 I did as I was told.
 ARE YOU FROM EARTH?
 A full sized drawing of a keyboard appeared in the screen. Slowly, I typed in 
my answer.
 "Yes."
 WHAT TIME?
 "2040."
 IS THAT A.D?
 "Yes."
 WHAT UNIVERSE?
 "Don't understand."
 WHAT IS YOUR NAME?
 "Tony Wheelbough."
 PLEASE WAIT THERE IS CONFUSION!
 More than a minute goes by.
 DO YOU UNDERSTAND ANYTHING THAT HAS HAPPENED TO YOU TONY?
 "Not much."
 DO YOU WANT TO?
 What a dumb question! It was tempting to give a negative answer, but it was a 
machine  and  wouldn't  catch the irony.  It would  probably  would  just  say 
goodbye. Instead, I answered in the positive.
 The  help booth went on to tell me lots of things about the Edge Of  Nowhere. 
Like  the nature of the invisible barrier that prevented my progress  earlier. 
It  was  nothing more than a fancy type of force field  nicknamed  a  friction 
field - true friction fields don't exist.  The nearer you got to it the harder 
it became. Fine, I had already guessed as much. What's it for? This was pretty 
obvious when you thought about it. To keep out undesirables.
 Time  travellers don't always arrive by time machine and are not  necessarily 
friendly or even sentient.  It's not unusual for a tiger or something  equally 
vicious to get caught up in a naturally occurring time warp and be thrown  out 
near the Edge Of Nowhere.  When the planet was discovered there were all sorts 
of skeletons - even a few human - and other junk lying about in and around the 
arrival  zone.  There  is no surface water on this planet and nearly  all  the 
vegetation is poisonous (to Earth creatures anyway),  thus the skeletons. This 
zone is roughly triangular with sides slightly less than 10 miles long.  Right 
in  the middle is a safe zone where nothing is ever washed up by the  currents 
of time.  This is where the complex was built.  For extra security,  the force 
field  was  added.  All the junk was cleared away to make  room  for  arriving 
space/time craft - actually,  nearly all of the visitors are space,  not time, 
travellers. Travelling any distance through space involves a certain amount of 
mucking about with time. The only piece of junk that was allowed to remain was 
the skeleton of a blue whale.  It was moved nearer to the force field, covered 
with preservative and polished.
 This was all very interesting stuff, but how do I get in?
 YOUR KIRLIAN FIELD MAY BE ADJUSTED.
 May be adjusted?  I knew what a Kirlian field is.  It's a sort of  electrical 
force that surrounds everything. Some people call it an Aura. Even as early as 
the twentieth century it had been photographed by a special process. According 
to  the  help booth,  by the twenty-third century it  was  almost  universally 
accepted that the Kirlian field is actually the soul.  Inanimate objects  have 
'pretend' souls. Animals have partial souls that will grow into the full thing 
if self-awareness occurs. The friction field that protects the Edge Of Nowhere 
is  triggered by the lack of a key patch in the person's  Kirlian  field.  The 
patch is attached to the individuals Aura by the help booth if it is satisfied 
that  the person is not dangerous.  Unfortunately,  Kirlian technology  is  an 
inexact  science.  One in every ten thousand people has a naturally  occurring 
patch similar enough to a key so that the force field ignores them.  According 
to the help booth, the chances that one of these people would turn out to be a 
threat to the Edge Of Nowhere is so low as to be negligible.  I'm not so sure. 
Life is full of impossibilities. Well, mine is!
 My Kirlian field was,  indeed,  adjusted. After it had answered my questions, 
the help booth asked me all sorts of questions.  Some of them were quite  odd. 
For example,
 ARE YOUR MOTHER AND FATHER ALIVE?
 "No."
 WILL ANYONE MISS YOU?
 "Doubt it."
 DO YOU LIKE COMMUNICATING WITH STRANGERS?
 "If you mean gossiping, then yes."
 And so on, and on and on...
 At the end of it all,  I was thanked for being so helpful and was told to put 
one of my arms into the dark hole to the left of the screen.
 BE  CAREFUL  NOT  TO TOUCH THE SIDES OF THE HOLE OR YOU WILL  GET  A  PAINFUL 
ELECTRICAL SHOCK.
 I was careful and did not receive a shock.  My soul was marked and I was free 
to enter the Edge of Nowhere. There was one last question for me.
 THE ANSWERS YOU HAVE GIVEN AND THE SIGNS IN YOUR KIRLIAN FIELD SHOW THAT  YOU 
WOULD MAKE A GOOD BARMAN. SUCH A POSITION EXISTS HERE. ARE YOU INTERESTED?
 "No."
 YOU ARE LYING.
 "No, I'm not."
 THEN YOU HAVE NOT PROPERLY CONSIDERED THE MATTER.
 "I do not want a job as a barman." 
 YES YOU DO.
 "I do not!"
 THIS  UNIT  IS INCAPABLE OF LYING.  IT HAS BEEN IN CONTACT WITH  A  PARTY  OR 
PARTIES FROM ITS OWN FUTURE. APART FROM SHEILA STEVENS, TONY WHEELBOUGH IS THE 
NAME OF THE MOST WELL KNOWN BARMAN THAT WILL EVER WORK IN THE 'TAVERN'.
 "I don't care."
 I  AM  PERMITTED  TO  TELL YOU THAT AS A DIRECT  RESULT  OF  TONY  WHEELBOUGH 
BECOMING A BARMAN IN THE TAVERN,  THE INDIVIDUAL KNOWN AS SARAH BROWN WILL  BE 
BROUGHT BACK FROM THE DEAD IN A FEW MONTHS TIME. THIS INFORMATION IS ACCURATE, 
BUT CANNOT BE PROVED AT THIS TIME.
 Oh,  my  God!  How could this machine know about  Sarah  Brown?  Fumbling,  I 
hurriedly typed in a question.
 "Explain?"
 THIS  INFORMATION  HAS  BEEN SECURITY-PROTECTED.  IT WILL  NOT  BE  REPEATED. 
FURTHER  INFORMATION IS NOT AVAILABLE.  THIS UNIT WILL DENY ALL  KNOWLEDGE  OF 
EVENTS ALREADY GIVEN.
 The information was indeed security protected.  I questioned it for a  while, 
but  it  acted dumb and denied saying anything about Sarah  Brown.  There  was 
nothing else I could do.  This was blackmail! Reluctantly, although intrigued, 
I turned away, walked a few tens of feet - unmolested by the force field - and 
entered the Tavern for the first time. My life was changed for ever. 
 Approximately 100 days later.
 It would be fair to say that I settled in quickly. As is often the way with a 
new job,  at first,  I was slow and made a lot of mistakes.  No one seemed  to 
mind too much.  I was rather scared of aliens for a while. The bird-men turned 
out to be okay - although rather vain.  They were the only aliens who actually 
came  from  somewhere  I'd heard of.  They came from  a  planet  that  circled 
Arctaurus. Luckily, the customers were mostly human.
 I don't think that there is much point in going into lengthy about my  duties 
or  the bar itself.  Bar work is the same the Universe over;  serving  drinks, 
dealing with drunks,  working odd hours and cleaning up vomit. And that's just 
the good things!
 This  bar room is not particularly different from any other bar room.  It  is 
about  eighty  feet wide and perhaps three hundred long - rather  larger  than 
most.  The three hundred feet of mirror which lines the back of the actual bar 
is interrupted every twenty or so feet by doors that lead into the back stores 
and kitchens etc,.  The back eighty or so feet - looking from the main door  - 
is  partitioned into booths that can hold eight people at a squeeze;  more  if 
the  tables  are folded.  Lighting is very subdued here.  Just the  place  for 
lovers  to hide and stare into each other's eyes.  Pity we rarely get them  in 
here.   Finally,  at  the  very  back  are  the  sleeping  booths.  These  are 
affectionately  known as "Coffins" by the regulars.  They are over seven  feet 
long and about three wide and high.  Although the bar room has a high ceiling, 
the sleeping booths are stacked three high.  From a distance,  the wall behind 
the partitioned tables looks like a mausoleum wall.  Instead of brass plaques, 
the doors had windows with blinds.
 Tonight  is  fancy dress night in the Tavern.  The bar is more  crowded  than 
usual. I'm dressed as Robin Hood. I've got on green tights, a green jacket and 
I'm excited.  Very excited.  I've just realized how I can save the life of  my 
beloved Sarah.  I can do it without braking the laws of time - not that  there 
are very many.
 Earlier this evening I was in conversation with a rather drunk woman from the 
twenty-fifth century.  I cannot remember her name.  She was plain-looking with 
the most astounding legs I've ever seen.  The subject of the conversation  was 
Kirlian  fields and the way in which the soul stays with the  body  throughout 
all eventualities.
 "To start with," the woman with the incredible legs sai (she was dressed as a 
black and white cat),  "The Kirlian field isn't the soul.  It's just an effect 
caused  by  the presence of a soul.  No one can detect a  soul  yet.  Give  me 
another Traffic Lights."
 I  mixed her drink badly and the colours blended together into a yucky  mess. 
She didn't mind. Just shrugged, sipped at it and continued her tale.
 "We  all  have  a  longer life than we  think.  The  soul  can  jump  between 
realities. Let's say that your anti-grav failed..."
 "Your  anti-grav  failed,"  I irritated - I'm  good  at  that.   "...but  you 
survived the drop only to be rushed into intensive care. Somewhere about then, 
reality  branches  into  two or more paths.  In one path  you  die  from  your 
injuries.  In another you manage to survive.  Your soul will follow  whichever 
reality is the more probable. In this case, your death is the most probable so 
your soul follows that path until you die.  If conditions are right,  the soul 
goes on to some other place."
 "You mean Heaven or Hell?" I said.
 "Who  knows?  If  the conditions aren't right the soul jumps  into  the  next 
probable  reality line and attaches itself to your body in the  reality  where 
you didn't die," she smiled and lit up a synthi-joint. "Good huh?"
 Her  smile did something to me.  It was every bit as appealing as  her  legs. 
Suddenly,  I felt very sad and in need of a cuddle.  Even although the  Tavern 
was pretty busy, I felt very alone and insignificant.
 "What  if there is no other reality for the soul to go to and the  conditions 
aren't right for it to go on?" I said.
 "It becomes a ghost, of course," she sneered as if I was very stupid.
 "If  we only have one soul,  what about all the other time  lines.  There  is 
bound  to  be other alternate time lines about with copies of both  of  us  in 
them. Do they have souls or do we have them?"
 "You're being daft now. You told me that you already know about pretend souls 
and partials. When the time lines split, the soul travels on the most probable 
time line whilst a pretend soul goes on any others. If the alternate time line 
is  a  strong one,  the pretend soul will eventually become  a  partial  which 
probably will develop into the full blown thing at a later date. See?"
 "Right," I said.
 "When  you  arrived here at the Edge,  you probably only had a  pretend  soul 
cause something pretty dramatic must have happened otherwise you'd never  ever 
have ended up here. You with me?"
 "Still," I said.
 "By  now  it's grown into a full one again or been replaced by  the  original 
from your dead copy in the alternate time line.  Maybe am wrong!  Maybe it was 
inevitable  that you'd end up here no matter what happened!  Am I  making  any 
sense or am I just drunk again? Does anyone care anyway? More importantly, are 
there any pretzels?"
 I fumbled about under the bar and got a bag of Unicorn Horn shaped  pretzels, 
poured them into a dish and gave them to Miss lovely legs.
 "Thanks,"  she  said and licked at the tip of a pretzel in  an  uncomfortably 
suggestive manner.  Actually,  it was not really all that suggestive.  It  was 
just wishful thinking on my part.  At the back of my mind all I could see  was 
her legs.  Legs which I had only glimpsed for a few seconds as she entered the 
room and crossed to the bar.  Oh, hurry up and go to the powder room so that I 
can look at them again!
 "It  all sounds very convenient.  Don't get me wrong,  I'm not calling you  a 
liar,  but  it  all  sounds  a bit fishy to me.  How  did  you  come  by  this 
information?"
 "It's a matter of history.  You can check it out. This scientist guy built an 
artificial soul..."
 "If no one has detected a soul yet," I interrupted,  "let alone seen one, how 
could he build one?"
 "I'm  not  the  bloody scientist!  You want to hear this or  not?"  she  said 
indignantly, blowing smoke into my face.
 "Okay!  Okay!  Sorry. Please continue. I didn't mean to offend."  "You better 
not have.  Right then,  er...what was I saying?" She was beginning to slur her 
words.
 "A matter of history," I said.
 "Oh, right! This artificial soul was made for an artificial intelligence that 
existed inside a computer matrix.  It was a copy of the scientist's own  brain 
pattern  with  artificial thoughts added.  It was set up so that  the  thought 
patterns were not conscious. Like it was living, but in a coma. Follow?"
 "Why?" I said.
 "Patience my dear.  We're getting there.  It was a question of morals. If the 
copy of his own brain stored in the computer was given an artificial soul that 
later developed into a real one,  then it would be alive.  It was not moral to 
kill a perfectly good mind just for the experiment. See what I mean?"
 "Yup," I agreed.
 "When  the  artificial  soul  developed to a real one -  and  it  did  -  the 
intelligence  was copied to a second computer matrix.  The soul stayed in  the 
first matrix until it was shut down.  Effectively, the artificial intelligence 
was  dead.  The soul left the first matrix and locked on to the second  matrix 
which was a copy of the mind that had been killed."
 "Hold on there!  Have I got this right? You're saying that in your century, a 
human mind can be copied into a computer matrix and it continues to live? That 
the soul moves to the matrix on the person's death?"
 "Well,  er  yeah?  That  sounds about right.  Provided that the copy  in  the 
computer matrix hadn't had enough time to develop its own soul."
 "How'd cloning technology work out?  Could a body with an empty mind be grown 
and the computer copy of the mind moved into it?" I was suddenly very excited. 
Something was beginning to form at the back of my mind.  The traditional light 
bulb was waiting to pop.
 "I see what you're getting at.  Yes.  It's been done plenty of  times.  You'd 
have to record the person's brain patterns before or at the moment of death."
 Pop!
 The master stroke!
 "Thank  you!" I leant across the bar and planted a big wet one right  on  her 
kisser and hurriedly left the bar.
 "Wait!  Any  chance of a large bloody Mary?" she called after me,  but I  was 
gone. Solid gone.
 Working fast,  I called in a few favours. Within the hour, I was climbing out 
of the Tavern's time hopper carrying a large portable computer.  I still  wore 
my Robin hood outfit,  but had also put on a white artificial beard so that  a 
certain person would not recognise me. I left the computer in the field beside 
the hopper. Both were water-proofed so there was no danger of the rain causing 
short circuits.
 I hurried to the roadside to check the lie of the land.  Oh no! I had arrived 
later  than I thought!  Not too far away was a  speeding  automobile.  Without 
thinking, I panicked and jumped up and down shouting "Stop!"
 The  car sped through a large puddle drenching me.  Without pausing to  watch 
for  the inevitable,  I ran back to the time hopper,  collected  the  portable 
computer and ran for the top of the hill. I did not see the crash, but I heard 
it. It was not very nice. I shuddered at the deja vu.
 I ignored the dead steer lying half on the road half on the grassy field  and 
went straight for the still figure nearby.  It took me a great deal of courage 
not  to look at the dying body of Sarah Brown.  I put the sensor band  on  her 
head and started the memory dumping process.
 There was a strong smell of gasoline in the air.  I knew that the  automobile 
would not explode,  but the fumes from the gas could be harmful. Just to be on 
the safe side, I pulled the other three from the wreck.
 I  did not feel at all strange when I pulled Tony from the wreck.  I was  too 
worried about Sarah to be unnerved by the oddness of the situation.  I dragged 
them all away from the wreck and went back to check on Sarah.
 The  computer had finished recording her memories.  I cut a lock of her  hair 
off  with  a  pair  of  small folding  scissors  which  I'd  brought  with  me 
specifically for that purpose. There were no romantic reasons for this action. 
I needed a sample of her DNA.  A sound made me look away.  It was Tony. He was 
trying to sit up.  For a few seconds he looked at the bone sticking out of his 
flesh and fainted again.
 Sarah Brown's body was definitely dead by now. I carried her mind back to the 
time  hopper.  If the conversation I had heard earlier had been  correct,  the 
real Sarah Brown was now in the computer. It was not just a copy. When she had 
died, her soul had either went on to the eternal place - unlikely - or was now 
in the computer with her memories.  I lifted the time hoppers seat and  placed 
the computer into the space beneath.  Elated,  I lowered the seat, got back in 
and turned the machine on and...but wait!  What had I forgotten?  This had all 
happened months ago by my way of thinking. I felt confused. I think that I was 
supposed to jump forwards, just over a year, to Scotland, but why?
 I  couldn't remember why.  Nevertheless,  I guessed at the co- ordinates  and 
pulled  out  into  the time lanes.  Oh,  yuk!  I hate this  grey  cocoon  that 
surrounds the time hopper. It makes me travel sick. Wasn't there a way to make 
the field transparent so that I could see where I was going?  Yes there was. I 
had read the handbook a few weeks ago. Ah, yes! I know what to press.
 Obviously,  I  pressed the wrong buttons.  The time engines cut out  and  the 
craft hung powerless several feet above a clearing in a forest. Perhaps it was 
a side effect of the decaying time field,  the time hopper bucked like a  wild 
thing and threw me right over the safety rail.  I was lucky because the ground 
broke my fall. That's not as stupid as it sounds. If I hadn't been interphased 
with  reality  properly,  I would have fallen through the ground and  kept  on 
going.  Not  that  I'd be alive for long -the air out there  would  have  been 
intangible too.  I think my hat came off when I hit the ground. Then I blacked 
out.
 When  I came to,  I was back in the time hopper.  I could tell that  we  were 
moving  because of the greyness.  A familiar figure beside me looked as if  he 
was going to jump overboard.
 "Don't," I called,  "Don't do it. I don't know what will happen, but it might 
be rather nasty,"
 After a few uncertain seconds,  he withdrew his leg and dropped onto the seat 
beside me.
 "What's going on?  Who are you?" he mumbled, obviously very frightened. I was 
a bit worried myself,  but at least I knew what was going on.  Well,  sort of! 
Perhaps  I should lie to him?  I don't remember much about this bit the  first 
time round?
 "Er, I can't remember, but my head hurts. Who are you?" I groaned.
 "Tony Wheelbough," he said.
 "I  know!"  For some reason the whole situation struck me  as  suddenly  very 
funny.   The  rest of what happened you already know.  It was exactly  as  the 
first  time only the vantage point was different.  We arrived at the  Edge  Of 
Nowhere.  I transferred to the other time hopper taking the computer with  me. 
Tony was looking rather confused so I told him to go to the help booths.
 Moments later and I was back at the Edge of Nowhere. This time in my own time 
line.  I  gave  the  memories  of Sarah Brown and her  lock  of  hair  to  the 
appropriate person - Doctor Mary Cope - who returned to her own time to  where 
the new body had been cloned three years ago.  She sent the lock of hair  back 
in  time  to  her  self so that the cloning could take  place  and  began  the 
transfer of the memories into the three year old result of that  cloning.  The 
computer memories were erased and the soul jumped to the new body.
 Sarah settled into her new body okay,  came back from the future to the  Edge 
Of Nowhere,  fell in love with me all over again, married me and lived happily 
ever after - except that that was not quite the way in which it  happened.  It 
might have worked out that way in the movies, but this was real life.
 To  start  with,  her new body looked only about 15 years old -  pretty  good 
since it only took three years to grow it.  Call me old fashioned,  but I felt 
extremely uncomfortable touching it. The Sarah that I'd know was a woman. This 
was  the body of a child.  She too was also uncomfortable with her  new  body, 
though  not  in the same way as me.  It was the way in which  she  moved  that 
bothered her.  Everything, even a human body, needs to be run in. Her new body 
just didn't "feel" right.  Her legs felt wrong and the balance was off. On top 
of that,  she had a bad case of "future shock". Months passed before she could 
except what had happened and learn to enjoy life again. Trouble was, there was 
far too much to enjoy for my liking.  How could our relationship grow if there 
was  that  many new things and people in her life that I  never  occupied  her 
thoughts any more?
 Eventually,  I couldn't handle things any more and had to talk about it.  The 
talk  lasted quite a long time.  There was no argument.  It was  quite  tender 
really.  Quite sad.  In the end we decided to split - she decided to split.  I 
couldn't decide anything. Perhaps it really was for the best? She got a job in 
the Last Restaurant and works there still. Sometimes we meet and talk.
 "We can still be good friends," she said.
 "Yeah, course we can," I lied.
 She may be able to be friends,  but I could never be.  Not now. She had taken 
my heart and broken it into tiny pieces.  Fragments of love scattered  through 
time. Very bloody appropriate! What was I to do now?
 What indeed?
 When the current of love batters you, sometimes you just got to lean into it, 
other times you got to go with the flow and see what else turns up.

                                    *****

 So that's my story. Another story of love and death. I suppose it's pointless 
in the end to anyone but me,  but you had to ask and the telling has helped me 
to understand my life a bit more.
  "But,  what was the master stroke?" Do I hear you ask?  Back when I  started 
this  memoir,  I would have been tempted to say something dull like,  "It  all 
was!" but now I know what it was.
 I never leant into it. I went with the flow. That was the real master stroke.

                                                 (C) Bryan H.Joyce - 27/Feb/92
                                                       Final version 27/Aug/92 


= THE LAST NINJA =============================================================
 by Richard Karsmakers


 Hang Foy Soozooki held his hands above his eyes,  peering at a cloud of  dust 
gathering at the horizon.  It warned him that something was coming,  something 
potentially dangerous.  He had been trained for many years,  perhaps too  many 
actually.  His  instincts  he trusted unreservedly.  He  signalled  his  loyal 
servant, Sjau Long, to take cover.
 "But don't folget," Hang Foy added,  sounding important,  "to tly and look at 
what I might do. You will lealn flom it!"
 Hang Foy Soozooki, last of the true Ninjas of the Ancient Pagoda of Tjang Kai 
Tjec,  put  his  gear down beside him.  He carefully laid on  the  ground  his 
sheathed  Samurai sword,  took from his pockets his razor-sharp  Shurigen  and 
removed from his shoulder his Sanyo PLT-1001 Turbo Injection Ghettoblaster. He 
knelt down to the ground, putting his ear to the soft dry soil.
 "Hmmm..."  he  murmured.   In  his  mind  he  raced  through  the   countless 
possibilities  he  had been taught at  the  pagoda.  Sure-footed  deer?  Post-
Korean  Half-track vehicle?  Anyone seeing Master Soozooki on the ground  like 
that would have been baffled at the concentrated execution of what is known by 
the Samurai of old as The Play Of Elephant And Mouse Stamping Together.
 "Hmmm..."  he  murmured again.  It was more difficult than he  had  dared  to 
anticipate. Through the arid soil the resonance sounded like a herd of Eastern 
Mongolian Groundhogs one moment and like a Transylvanian Butterfly landing  on 
a common Forget-Me-Not the other.  Master Soozooki,  however,  wasn't just any 
other  Learned  Samurai.  Carefully weighing the  possibilities,  taking  into 
consideration  multiple geographical and ecological factors,  his eyes lit  up 
with knowledge.
 "No  doubt,"  he  proudly exclaimed to himself,  "this  must  be  an  Alabian 
tholoughbled,  callying  a  pelson weighing apploximately  seventy-six  kilos, 
wielding an 18th Centuly rifle at his left hip, and..."
 His  servant  interrupted  from the  bushes.  "May  youl  evel-so-humble  and 
plobably nonwolthy selvant,  speck of illitating dust in youl eyes,  know  how 
much  that is in pounds?" Obviously,  Sjau Long had had an English  education. 
Which says it all, really.
 "El..." Hang Foy said,  distracted.  From a pocket he took a small device and 
pressed a few buttons.  "Onehundledandsixtyseven point fiftyfive," he replied, 
"Now whele was I?"
 He  was about to kneel down for another session of The Play when he  heard  a 
polite  cough.  Stifling his rapidest of killing reflexes,  he  slowly  turned 
around  to  behold a man on a horse,  accompanied by a man of  rather  smaller 
stature who sat on a mule. The man on horseback, one of slender build and long 
moustache,  carried a flag with a white windmill with wooden wings embroidered 
on it. They appeared to have been standing there for a while already, watching 
the Ninja during most of his Play. There was wonder in their eyes.
 "Please, sir," the man of small stature said, "my master and myself appear to 
have gotten lost.  Might you be able to tell us the way to Portugal, or inform 
us as to our current whereabouts? We have windmills to fight, you see."
 Hang Foy Soozooki was speechless. There was no other way to be, for the small 
man  had  spoken some obscure Iberic language that appeared not to  have  been 
taught at the Pagoda.  Ancient Sumerian, post-modern Serbo-Croatic, any of the 
hundreds  of  Indian dialects,  Master Soozooki mastered them  like  the  most 
fluent  of natives.  Somehow he seemed to have missed the lectures needed  for 
the proper understanding of what was being said now.  He would have to  resort 
to The Art Of The Prime Directive: "If All Else Faileth, Look Nonplussed."
 He did. The strangers were not impressed.
 From the safety of the bushes,  Sjau Long cast a careful glance at the scene. 
Was  that the man carrying an 18th Century rifle at his left hip,  astride  an 
Arabian thoroughbred? He was, somehow, beginning to have second thoughts about 
Master Soozooki's supposedly infinite Ninja capabilities. He ducked quickly as 
he noticed the man on horseback scanning the surroundings.
 Master Soozooki had to regain control over the situation.  There was only one 
way.  He  had perhaps never actually been top notch at some of The  Plays  and 
The  Arts,  but  he  had never come across an equal when  it  came  to  deftly 
handling  a Samurai sword.  He took from the floor the  sheathed  sword,  then 
bowed slowly to the strangers.
 Suddenly  he assumed a defiant position,  spreading his  legs  somewhat,  and 
within  a  fragment  of  a moment a gleaming  Samurai  sword  was  frantically 
attempting to cut air molecules in two.
 "Hakkitakki Wegballezakki!" he yelled,  his voice resonating with  excitement 
and Ancient Pride, "Banzai! Carpe Diem!"
 Dust rose around the quickly moving form of the Last of the Ninjas.  Flashing 
metal could be discerned at various instances,  and miscellaneous other  cries 
erupted from his being.  A horse whinnied. A flag, still erect from within the 
cloud of dust and debris,  shook.  When Master Hang Foy Soozooki had  finished 
looking like,  let's be frank,  an utter fool,  he bowed once more to where he 
assumed the various parts of the strangers would be lying now.  Sjau Long  had 
tried to follow what had been going on, but the dust had been impenetrable for 
his untrained sight.
 When  the dust had settled,  Sjau Long saw a Ninja with two hoof imprints  on 
his posterior, bowing to an empty patch of road where lay a Ghettoblaster hewn 
meticulously in two. Sjau Long, deeming the moment opportune, revealed himself 
from  the bushes.  He examined the Ghettoblaster - *his* Ghettoblaster  -  and 
peeled  from it a Metallica tape.  He was disappointed to note it was hewn  in 
two, too.
 "Kakki!" he said.

 A  long man of rather slender build stopped his horse before passing  out  of 
sight beyond the crest of a hill.  His servant,  somewhat less slender and not 
as long either, sighed deeply.
 "Come on Sancho," the man said.
 "I think I see a windmill," the servant remarked, matter-of-fact.
 "Where?" the man peered.
 "There, just beyond the far horizon."
 "Let's go then."
 Several moments later, their flag also disappeared from sight.

 That evening,  around sunset,  Sjau Long had recovered from the loss.  Master 
Hang  Foy Soozooki was still bragging about his ability to totally  obliterate 
two men as well as the animals they had presented themselves on.  He  admitted 
to  regret the fact that he seemed to have destroyed the flag too -  he  would 
have  liked  to retain a souvenir.  They hadn't run into any trouble  for  the 
remainder  of  the  afternoon,  though the sudden  apparition  of  a  Japanese 
Emperor's  Ghost had unsettled them for a few moments.  It had disappeared  as 
quickly as it had come,  though. Master Soozooki had used the occasion to show 
off  some more of his flashing sword technique - known at the Pagoda as  Lotus 
Decapitation.   Although  he  had  nearly  made  himself  the  Lotus,  it  had 
effectively scared off the apparition.
 It was already getting pretty dark.  Master Soozooki decided they would  have 
to find a place to stay and make a fire for the night.
 "Sjau Long," he ordered, "please use youl humble talents to conceive a file."
 The  Master's servant took a lump of wood and a bottle of  Stroh  Rum,  after 
which  he  went away for about a minute.  It was one of the  few  tricks  that 
Master  Soozooki had taught him.  The Act Of The Dragon,  he believed  it  was 
called.  Several  instants  later a loud "AAALLGGGAALGL!" rolled  and  bounced 
through  the evening silence,  after which a viciously besweated servant  came 
back from the bushes carring a half-empty bottle of particularly strong liquor 
in one hand and a burning lump of wood in the other.
 They  had barely warmed their hands at the fire and Master Soozooki  had  not 
yet started the usual recitation of the past heroic events of himself and  his 
forefathers when a high buzzing became audible.
 If  there was one thing Ninja Master Hang Foy Soozooki hated most  fervently, 
it  was gnats whizzing around his head.  His narrowed eyes followed the  small 
arthropod without moving his head as much as a fraction of an inch. Not losing 
sight  of the nasty buzzing insect,  he fumbled for his Samurai  sword.  After 
stifling  a  cry and retreating a burned hand from the fire,  he  located  his 
sword and slowly unsheathed it.  He had never moved that slowly.  After  about 
fifteen  minutes,  the  gnat had still not decided to  fly  away,  the  sword, 
gleaming eerily in the flickering flames, was positioned vertically before the 
Ninja. Again his mind raced. Would he employ Dragon Defenestration? Or perhaps 
the obscure and barely legal Panda Battering?  No.  He had a better idea.  His 
eyes had the familiar pre-eruption gleam of knowledge.
 "Banzai!  Coito  Ergo  Sum!" he cried with a voice loud enough  to  wake  the 
ghosts of dynasties worth of ancestors.
 The gnat was temporarily distracted. It forgot to fly. It kindof floated, not 
quite aware that it should be falling,  right before the crossed eyes of a now 
sore-throated Samurai.
 Before  gravity had regained its power over the gnat,  however,  a shiny  and 
utterly  sharp blade slashed through the darkness  viciously and  mercilessly. 
Within the same movement,  smooth and highly trained such as only True Samurai 
are able to execute, it disappeared soundlessly within its sheath. For once.
 The  gnat,  which at that instant seemed to realise that it had forgotten  to 
beat its wings rather too long, decided it was time to go. If it had walked it 
would have looked much like trundling.  Only it was flying.  But if there's an 
airborne version of trundling this was it. 
 The  last  of  the true Ninjas seemed ultimately  pleased  with  himself.  It 
manifested itself through a broad smile and a mesmerizing look in his eyes.
 "Might I be so immodest as to point out to you the fact that you have  missed 
the  gnat,  mastel?" his servant remarked,  carefully so as not to induce  the 
Ninja's wrath.
 Master Soozooki didn't find it necessary to move anything but his lips as  he 
exclaimed  with repressed triumph,  cleaning a tiniest of red blots  from  his 
sword:  "I may seem to have missed that althlopod,   but that gnat will  NEVEL 
have sex again!"

 Original version written March 1989. Rewritten January 1994.


= POPULOUS ===================================================================
 by Richard Karsmakers


 Once upon a time there was a world. A world where everybody lived happily and 
where  there was no war;  indeed,  a world where people  just  lived,  hunted, 
harvested, ate, slept, and multiplied.
 In this world it was that a man called Zantar lived.  He was ruler of a tribe 
some hundred people in size,  and a very thriving tribe it was  indeed.  Among 
them were some excellent huntsmen,  and they even had some primitive means  of 
using  the power of running water to help them with various tasks  they  would 
otherwise have had to perform by manual labour.

 Zantar lived on an island.  Sometimes,  he used to go out at sunset to wonder 
what might be beyond the sea. Where did the sun set? Was there perhaps another 
island and,  if there was one,  would there also be people there?  Zantar  was 
very  eager  to learn about other people's technology - if  their  were  other 
people  that is - and teach them his own knowledge in return.  Yet he  had  no 
means of finding out whether there actually *was* something there. If his folk 
were  to build ships to explore,  only The Divine Ynnor would know what  would 
happen: They might even fall off the flat earths.
 It  might be noteworthy to mention that these people had a  scientist  called 
Sendatsuh,  who believed the earth was a rather intricate complex of six  flat 
discs, each a copy of the other, after he had once seen himself gazing back at 
his own image in the water of the sea - looking rather dumbfounded!

 On this sunny mid-spring day,  he had had to call together the Council of the 
Elders as something inexplicable had happened:  When taking his usual  morning 
stroll  through the hills,  he had discovered a large Ankh,  partly hidden  by 
some burned bushes.  Next to the Ankh lay an enormous Skull hewn out of stone. 
Its  eyes  gleamed  with a red light that intensified as  the  sun  shone  its 
morning rays on them.
 He  found  it  rather unsettling to say the  least,  especially  because  the 
surroundings  of the objects had been totally blackened for about  900  square 
teefs (1 teef = 1/3rd yard = approx. 1/3 metre).
 The  elders  sat silent in Zantar's wooden hut.  They looked at  each  other, 
trying to read from the various expressions the various thoughts.  There  were 
six in total:  Sendatsuh the Scientific One, Nroejbrot the Ancient One, Nafets 
the Earnest One,  Sacul the Extensive One,  Seec the Fortuitous One and, last, 
Zantar the Wise One.
 "Blackened is the end," quoted Nafets, "thus soundeth the Prophecy."
 "Winter it will send," Zantar added,  "yes, Earnest One, hard times are bound 
to be nigh."
 "Throwing  all you see," said Sacul,  as if adding yet another quote  to  the 
words just spoken,  "into Obscurity!" With the last words, he heaved his hands 
to the sky.
 "Woe! Woe!" Nroejbrot and Sendatsuh chanted, "the end is nigh!"
 "Quiet,  fools!" Zantar cried,  "as of yet, Ynnor the Divine One has shown us 
nothing that would point to it, and..."

 At  that very instant,  a crack split open the sky,  and a deafening  thunder 
followed within a second after it.
 "Woe! Woe!" everybody now cried in unison, "Reficul the Evil One is upon us!"
 Only Zantar was still silent, seeming to be deep in thought.
 The  others  now  began to lament a song of Old,  not ever  sung  before  and 
seemingly reserved for the Most Evil of occasions:

              "Fire
               To begin whipping dance of the dead
               Blackened is the end
               To begin whipping dance of the dead
               Colour our world blackened
                                Blackened!"

 As if to emphasize the moment,  a desperate knocking could suddenly be  heard 
on the heavy wooden door of Zantar's abode.
 "Come in!" the leader yelled hoarsely.  A boy came in,  dressed in a tattered 
O'Neil jacket.
 "The horizon has changed,  Mr.  Wise One!  There is now land! And it's coming 
towards our shores even as I speak!"
 Zantar looked as if he had a sudden vision: A vision, strange and unconnected 
though  it  may  seem,  of an enormous ship filled with a  thick  black  fluid 
crashing  into the shores of a distant land covered with hard  water.  He  saw 
dying Sea Otters,  dying Sea Birds,  dying Seals,  all covered with the  thick 
black  fluid.  He saw mankind not doing anything at all about it;  just a  few 
volunteers  helped the animals,  tears in their eyes.  He saw the whole  world 
perish eventually.
 He discarded the vision as a ridiculous one;  surely,  mankind would never be 
able to build such enormous ships?  And,  if they could,  mankind would surely 
not sit and watch nature decay in case of such a disaster?
 "Ridiculous," he said,  reacting to both his vision and the boy's  statement, 
but he hurried outside to follow the lad that dashed back to the coast.

 Along the coastline,  about thirty men stood gazing at what was happening  on 
the horizon.  Indeed, it seemed that another coastline had been created there, 
and it seemed to draw near at quite an astounding speed.
 The  Scientific  One,  still panting from running after  Zantar,  gazed  with 
profound wonder.
 "This can't be," he exclaimed,  "I have been working on a General  Relativity 
Theory with regard to quarks and interplanetary bonds,  but I was sure of  the 
fact  that  our (flat) worlds are expanding rather than diminishing  in  size. 
Must make a mental note to work that one out some day."
 After  having said that,  he continued gazing at what his  Relativity  Theory 
considered to be quite impossible.
 "Nothing is impossible," said the boy wearing the tattered O'Neil jacket.  He 
had  a striking resemblance to someone that would later be known  as  Einstein 
(in  his younger years),  but of course these people didn't know that nor  did 
they  know of the things this Einstein fellow would turn out to do  some  day, 
and therefore they didn't heed this remark, nor some others the boy brought up 
(some quite interesting ones pertaining anti-quarks,  the space-time continuum 
in conjunction with the fourth dimension,  light speed,  the relative  Doppler 
effect, H-Bombs, etc.).
 "Hack off!" was all that Zantar the Wise One found necessary to interject.
 Would  he have had a tail,  the boy would have had it between his legs as  he 
slunk off.

 "Just imagine," Zantar philosophized to Sendatsuh,  "just imagine that  there 
is an entire new civilisation there, a civilization that we can learn from and 
that we can teach our knowledge..."
 He sighed as he said it. The Scientific One just nodded approvingly.
 "For one," he said, "they either know how to reverse my Relativity Theory, or 
they know how to harvest land from the sea."
 In  spite of the fact that Sendatsuh clearly acted as if he had thought  long 
on how to put that which he just said in the appropriate words,  the Wise  One 
didn't  react.  Obviously,  Zantar didn't realise what severe consequences  it 
could  have  to the world if either of these two statements turned out  to  be 
true.
 When  a reaction turned out not be coming within the next couple of  seconds, 
the Scientific One added: "Somehow, I think the latter is highly unlikely."
 Zantar  nodded.  Sendatsuh  began thinking aloud about adding  a  conditional 
minus sign to his Theory.

 By  noon,  there were only a hundred yards between their shores and those  of 
the land that was coming towards them.  They now saw that pieces of land  were 
just pulled from the sea,  instantaneously transforming from a wet sea  bottom 
to  dry earth soil.  At times,  a seemingly random process of lowering a  part 
back into the vast ocean could be witnessed.
 "Impossible!"  Zantar could hear the Scientific One mumble at times  next  to 
him.
 "Hack off!" the Wise One would each time whisper. Obviously, he was preparing 
some  kind  of speech in case a representative of the other  civilisation  (if 
there was one) might enter his domain.
 After another quarter of an hour or so,  it happened. The shores touched, and 
the process stopped at the very moment.

 From behind the hills,  someone emerged. The someone was wearing a red jacket 
with leopard design.  Other people emerged from behind the hills as well. They 
all wore the same clothes, yet the one that had appeared first wore a cap with 
a badge knitted on it.
 The badge portrayed a small skull;  a skull with small red eyes,  that glowed 
in the noon sun.
 Zantar  beamed with pride as he realised how many representatives there  were 
to  hear  his speech.  Finally,  his thoughts turned out to  be  true:  Indeed 
there  was  a civilisation beyond the sea,  and they had sought to  visit  his 
tribe! They had even brought their hunting tools with them!
 Hunting tools?
 Every single one of the people emerging from behind the hills was wielding  a 
blunt object in his hand,  some of formidable dimensions and no doubt  equally 
formidable weights.  Come to think of it,  the impact of one of those  objects 
upon any animal's head would probably be quite formidable, too.
 There were now at least fifty of them,  standing on the highest  hills.  They 
left  a  certain menacing impression by their posture and the  look  in  their 
eyes.

 The  leader held his hands to his mouth and cried something to his  followers 
in  a tongue not even Sacul the Intensive One could interpret.  He could  only 
shake  his  head  when  Zantar  looked  at  him,  raising  his  Wise  Eyebrows 
inquiringly.
 Next,  the leader turned to Zantar's folk.  By now,  all members of the tribe 
were gathered;  women, children and men. Even Nroejbrot the Ancient One by now 
had  succeeded in catching up with the rest,  and was leaning heavily  on  his 
staff, panting. A tawse was hanging on his belt.
 "What's up?" he puffed.
 "Just hack off!" Zantar replied. He felt he was repeating himself, but anyone 
who mentioned it would just have to hack...right.
 The Ancient One looked irritated to the rabble on the new piece of land.  His 
free hand gently caressed his tawse.
 The leader now began to speak.
 "My name is Noruas!" he cried, "Woe me! Woe me!"
 He  waited  a couple of moments to see what his spectator's  reactions  were. 
Which were none;  that is, if you don't count the look in their eyes that they 
usually  gave to naughty little children.  Nroejbrot caressed his  tawse  with 
some more enthusiasm now. A specific look settled in his eyes; a look that had 
not been there since he had last chastised Zantar when he'd been naughty  once 
more. That had been quite a while ago.
 Noruas,  who  was  slightly set back by this utter lack of  proper  response, 
considered  the time ripe to pull open all registers.  He breathed in  deeply, 
then started to chant loudly in a low voice:

              "Blackened is the End
               Winter it will send
               Throwing all you see
               Into obscurity!"

 The reaction to this chanting was reversely proportional to the one after  he 
had  called  out  his  name.  The  sudden panic was  epic  (at  least  in  its 
proportions):  Just  about  all of the hundred tribe members gathered  on  the 
beach  dashed  in  about a hundred different  directions,  yelling  a  hundred 
assorted yells of panic (though mostly "Woe!  Woe!", "The Prophecy has come to 
pass!" or "Ynnor help us!").
 Noruas' tribe now marched forward as well,  with even more menacing looks  in 
their  eyes.  They wielded their truncheons as if desperately wanting to  find 
out what would happen if one'd smash it on a living skull.
 A  satisfied look settled itself upon the face of Noruas,  the Evil  One.  He 
laughed a laugh that would later inspire a bit of Michael Jackson's "Thriller" 
- though of course he didn't realise that then, nor did Michael.

 Since Zantar's people had only lived in the most serene peace thinkable, they 
didn't know what to do against such a threat other than just running for their 
lives.  It  was  the only defensive technique they knew,  and even  that  they 
didn't know well.
 From  their hiding places they looked and saw the Noruasians take over  their 
land.  They saw how their women were hunted down and raped,  how their  houses 
were  burnt  and how their children and people of old  age  were  slaughtered. 
Nroejbrot was one of the first to fall. He tried to slap the naughty boys with 
his  tawse but to little avail.  His blood stained the beach red,  as did  the 
life  fluid  of many others;  Zantar was agile enough to run faster  and  hide 
better to avoid getting murdered.  Though it killed him inside when he saw his 
people raped and butchered.
 The Noruasians ceased their violence when they reached the giant stone  Skull 
with  the  large red,  glowing eyes.  It was as if they had  known  its  exact 
location all the time. They knelt and started praying and chanting towards the 
object,  no  longer heeding the Zantarians in their suffering.  It  seemed  as 
though they had reached an aim.

 Another  flash of lightning split open the sky,  followed by a truly  roaring 
sound  of thunder.  The Noruasians looked at the sky,  and for the first  time 
fear could be seen in their eyes.
 And yet another flash.
 And yet another (not quite so delicate) sound of thunder.
 Now Noruas' people seemed to be panicing. In epic proportions, even.
 Right under their startled feet,  a swamp seemed to emerge from the soil.  It 
was as if someone,  maybe a Divine being,  had but pressed a simple button, or 
clicked  a  mousepointer  on some icon or another.  The  swamp  just  emerged. 
Every Noruasian drowned.
 Never had a chance.

 "You  have  defeated the powers of Darkness," I read aloud from  the  screen, 
"the  power of Light has prevailed.  You have won the first level of the  game 
'Populous'.  You  may  now proceed to the next if you feel like  you  want  to 
continue being a God."
 I take the mousepointer off the 'Swamp' Divine Interaction icon,  and prepare 
myself  for conquering the next map.  I take a large swig of Coke,  and put  a 
handful of potato crisps in my mouth.
 "This time," I think, "I prefer being the baddie!"

 Original  version  early 1989 (just after the Exxon Valdez  had  swamped  the 
Alaska coast with oil). Rehashed January 1994.


= RICK DANGEROUS II ==========================================================
 by Richard Karsmakers


 The  story so far:  After a great many adventures,  our  mutant  ninj...er... 
heroic  explorer  ventures deep into an old cave that's  apparantly  of  Aztec 
origin. It  turns out to be more lethal than he reckoned,  but  eventually  he 
makes it to another door, really deep down in the cave complex where the light 
of day hasn't been seen for quite a lot of centuries.
 So there we pick up the storyline.  It is quite dark except for a small flame 
in  the  distance.  The camera pans in,  and we see a small figure  holding  a 
torch, standing before a door that looks immensely solid and impenetrable.

 Sir Richard 'Rick' Jones had felt uncomfortable in a very awkward way when he 
had gone deeper and deeper into this dangerous,  uncharted Aztec cave.  On top 
of that, his torch was also on the verge of dying.
 That had made him feel *really* uncomfortable.
 What was he to do once the fire decided to abandon him?  He had to open  this 
enormous door, no matter what or how. If he didn't succeed, the light would go 
out,  he  would  never  find the exit again and he would  die  of  starvation, 
endlessly listening to the fading echoes of his own cries for help.
 If he would succeed in opening the door,  however,  something or other  would 
probably  get him killed,  too.  But this way at least he had some kind  of  a 
chance.
 "Like Confucius said," Rick thought aloud, "If you're in a large pile of warm 
damp shit, try to get out of it even if you may end up in another one."
 It might not have been Confucius, on second thought.

 Rick  carefully  probed the door much in a way that would have caused  it  to 
slap his face vigorously if it had been a female.
 Frantically,  he  tried to decypher the ancient writings on the ancient  door 
and the archway that supported its iron hinges.  It was of no avail,  however. 
Apart from the odd post-Aztec insult, he could read none.
 "Oh no.  Shit," he said,  kicking the door much in a way that would cripple a 
couple of toes if the kicker wasn't wearing army boots (unfortunately for  Sir 
Richard 'Rick' Jones, it did for he wasn't).
 He was too much occupied with his own toes for a couple of seconds to see the 
door opening slowly, which did not even make the slightest hint at the tiniest 
of sounds in spite of its rusty-looking hinges.
 Neither  did he notice that,  in the split second before the door started  to 
open,  a maggot muttered "Hey pal, that's my text!", after which its momentary 
distraction caused it to fly soundlessly into the solid stone of the old door, 
ceasing to exist.

 As Rick looked up from his sore toes,  he suddenly gazed to where there  used 
to be a door.  Instead of that door,  there was now a lot of air which had the 
tendency  to be totally transparent and thus totally failing to  conceil  from 
sight a bright red British Telecom telephone booth.
 It stood in the middle of nothing,  or at least it seemed to.  There were  no 
cave walls nor anything else.  There was just a bit of floor.  A bit of  floor 
with the aforementioned telephone booth on it.
 Limping slightly,  Rick ventured nearer.  An eerie kind of light was  emitted 
from  the  telephone  booth,  and  it seemed to draw him  nearer  to  it  most 
incessantly.
 When he stood before it,  gazing up and down,  Sir Jones felt a strong desire 
to open it.
 He did.
 When  he looked into the phone booth he didn't see anything  except  darkness 
most profound. This caused a strong desire to enter it.
 He did.

 At once the telephone booth door closed in a way it usually does once  you've 
entered it.  Also,  just like British Telecom telephone booth doors usually do 
when you're trying to get out, it got stuck.
 When beating and kicking the door didn't seem to help, Rick got to terms with 
the  thought of not being able to get out (you'll know the feeling  if  you've 
ever used a phone booth in Britain).
 The inside,  however,  was now no longer revealed in sheer darkness. Instead, 
Rick saw what he guessed was radio equipment of the fairly advanced kind.
 He fumbled around with a couple of switches and sliders.

 Suddenly,  much  in a way a British Telecom telephone booth door would  after 
approximately half an hour (but about two seconds before the  firemen,  police 
and national guard finally arrive), it opened in a rather mysterious way.
 Rick  gazed  out into a world he could quite definitely recall  never  having 
laid eyes on before.
 He was standing knee-deep in a swamp. At the far horizon, there was a volcano 
that  smoked in an attempt to tell the world it wasn't exactly  asleep.  There 
were palm trees and several huge ferns all around him and the little red phone 
booth.
 Rick remembered scenes like this from books about Natural History.  He seemed 
to  have  discovered  some kind of timetravel-booth and  his  fumbling  around 
seemed to have resulted in getting set back in time millions of years.
 "Oh no.  Shit." he mumbled as the true impact of this thought caught up  with 
him.

 A giant Tyrannosaurus rex,  that happened to have been hidden from sight by a 
couple  of  huge palm trees before,  considered this the opportune  moment  to 
reveal itself.
 It *did* seem very strange to a Tyrannosaurus,  but it felt as if it had been 
robbed of something it had wanted to say, and it could have sworn to know that 
little human from somewhere (be it from his past, present or future).
 In  had but one proper reaction for this peculiar feeling that it  had  never 
felt before (and probably never would again). It growled in a menacing way and 
started  to prowl towards the ridiculous red box and the  accompanying  little 
human that had the nerve to invade his swamp.

 Rick  did  just about the most stupid thing one could possibly do in  such  a 
situation:  He tried to get back into the telephone booth.  Its door, as could 
have been expected,  had found ways of slamming shut and consequently  getting 
jammed,  though - much in a way ordinary British Telecom telephone booth doors 
would  when  sensing that someone wants to make an urgent phone  call  or,  in 
general, whenever it's raining outside.
 Rick froze.  He closed his eyes, opening them quickly again after finding out 
that  it  merely (and unwantedly) resulted in appearances of the  Grim  Reaper 
beckoning towards him from the inside of his eyelids.
 The time that had elapsed during Rick having his eyes  closed,  however,  had 
sufficed for someone else to be introduced into the scene.
 Yelling  "Matcha!  Matcha!  Matcha!"  and wielding some kind of  barge  pole, 
something  that  could  not be described to be anything  else  rather  than  a 
caveman distracted the attention of the huge dinosaur.
 It  turned around its huge head and growled even more menacingly than it  had 
growled before. It went for the caveman.
 A  cavewoman  now also appeared on the scene,  much to the  surprise  of  Sir 
Jones.  She  had long black hair and wielded a small  burning  torch,  yelling 
"Hureka! Hureka! Hureka!" and pointing at it.
 The caveman beckoned the cavewoman to throw the torch, yelling "Tonga hureka! 
Tonga hureka!"
 The cavewoman threw the torch towards the caveman, who caught it clumsily.
 The  giant  Tyrannosaurus was now getting pretty close to  the  caveman,  yet 
slowed  down as it seemed to be frightened by the fire.  Its  utterly  limited 
brain capabilities lead it to getting exceedingly confused.  It lost  interest 
in what was going on in quite a complete fashion. It trudged off in search for 
prey that would tax his brain less vigorously, preferably without red boxes of 
flickering torches.
 The cavewoman ran towards the caveman, jumping in his arms.
 They both growled and did something that looked very much like kissing. Then, 
the caveman whispered: "Tonga aluna Lana."
 The cavewoman whispered: "Lana aluna Tonga."
 The caveman now looked up and asked: "Zak-zak?"
 The cavewoman, turning red, nodded.
 They both trudged off to where they had come from.

 A sound as if a jar of beans had just been unscrewed brought the  spontaneous 
opening of the red telephone booth's door to Rick's attention.
 He went inside again.
 After the door locked itself,  he probed it much in the fashion someone would 
when  getting locked in a British Telecom telephone booth for  the  fourteenth 
time.
 It was jammed again.
 Outside,  some  heavy thumping sounds indicated that the  Tyrannosaurus  had, 
some  way or another,  regained knowledge of what it had set out to  have  for 
lunch in the first place.
 Rick quickly fumbled a bit more with the manifold buttons and sliders, trying 
to  get  them  back into the same positions in which he had  found  them  when 
discovering it.
 The heavy thumping sound ceased quite suddenly.
 Carefully,  much  in  the  way someone would after having been  locked  in  a 
British Telecom telephone booth for the fourteenth time, he opened the door.

 "Hey! What the f@*k are you doing in *my* time machine?!"
 Rick  looked straight into the agitated face of a middle-aged man  with  grey 
curly hair and a long travel-worn scarf around his neck.
 "Who are you?" Sir Jones ventured.
 "Who?" the man cried, "Who!"
 He kicked Rick out of the booth.
 Totally  confused,  Sir  Jones  walked  off,  directly  in  front  of  a  car 
approaching him at a slightly unhealthy speed. In it, someone sat with a broad 
grin on his face, muttering something about 'industrious retaliation'.
 The car collided with the jungle explorer annex time traveller,  causing  him 
to get flung against a wall and getting lethally injured in the process.
 Just before dying, Rick muttered: "Oh no. Shit."
 He  then sighed his last sigh without uttering as much as a...well...a  sigh, 
really.

 The  car  drove  for  its  driver  to get shot  by  a  passing  cop  who  had 
accidentally  witnessed the hit'n'run.  This was the start of a  new  vendetta 
that  was  to continue for aeons throughout the continuum of time  and  space, 
breaking miscellaneous laws of life and death.
 But that, as you'll be happy to know, is another story altogether.

 Original written November 1990. Rehashed January 1994.


= SOON COMING ================================================================


 The next issue of "Twilight World",  Volume 2 Issue 2,  is to be released mid 
March  this  year.  Please refer to the  'subscription'  section,  below,  for 
details about automatically getting it in case you're interested.
 Please  refer  to the section on 'submitting',  below,  for  more  detail  on 
submitting your own material.
 The next issue will probably contain the following items.

 PARTICULARLY NASTY ARTHROPODS
 by Richard Karsmakers
 The ultimate of itch-invoking nausea

 MASTERS OF WAR
 by Bryan H. Joyce
 Another mesmerizing tale told in the Tavern at the Edge of Nowhere.

 RAMBO III
 by Richard Karsmakers
 Where Cronos Warchild enters the nightmares of a Police Officer.

 A REALLY BAD DAY
 by Bryan Kennerley
 Some  days nothing happens the way you want it.  But it's never quite like  a 
  REALLY bad day.

 AIRBORNE RANGER
 by Richard Karsmakers
 Mokheiny beware! Death is heading your way...

 THE SCHOOL OF LIFE!
 by Kai Holst
 A story of the two L's: Love and Life.

 DOGS OF WAR
 by Richard Karsmakers
 No  brain.  Or at least not much of it.  Give it a flamethrower and see  what 
  happens.

 AND MORE


= SOME GENERAL REMARKS =======================================================


 DESCRIPTION

 "Twilight World" is an all-format on-line magazine aimed at everybody who  is 
interested  in any sort of fiction - although it usually tends to  concentrate 
on fantasy-and science-fiction.
 One of its sources is an Atari ST/TT/Falcon disk magazine by the name of  "ST 
NEWS" which publishes computer-related articles as well as fiction.  "Twilight 
World" principally consists of the best fiction featured in "ST NEWS" so  far, 
with additions submitted by dedicated "Twilight World" readers.

 AIM

 It  has  no particular aim,  but "Twilight World" would like to  be  a  fresh 
breath  to all you people out there that don't mind a magazine that tries  not 
to  conform  to too many preset rules,  which might indeed cause some  of  our 
stuff to be considered 'rude' or perhaps totally disgusting (or  worse,  plain 
boring).

 SUBMITTING ARTICLES

 If you've written some good fiction and you wouldn't mind it being  published 
world-wide,  you can mail it to me either electronically or by standard  mail. 
At  all  times I reserve the right not to publish submissions.  Do  note  that 
submissions on disk will have to use the MS-DOS/Atari ST/TT/Falcon disk format 
on  3.5"  Double-or High-Density floppy disk.  Provided  sufficient  IRCs  are 
supplied (see below),  you will get your disk back with the issue of "Twilight 
World"  on it that features your fiction.  Electronic submittees will  get  an 
electronic electronic subscription automatically.
 At all times,  please submit straight ASCII texts without any special control 
codes whatsoever,  nor right justify or ASCII characters above 128. Please use 
*asterisks* to emphasise text if needed.

 COPYRIGHT

 Unless  specified along with the individual stories,  all bits  in  "Twilight 
World"  are copyrighted by the individual authors but may be spread wholly  or 
separately to any place - and indeed into any other magazine - provided credit 
is given both to the original author and "Twilight World" and/or "ST NEWS".

 CORRESPONDENCE ADDRESS

 All  correspondence and submissions should be sent to the address  below.  If 
you  need a reply,  supply one International Reply Coupon (available  at  your 
post  office),  or two if you live outside Europe.  If you want  your  disk(s) 
returned,  add  2 International Reply Coupons per disk (and one extra  if  you 
live  outside Europe).  Correspondence failing these guidelines will  be  read 
(and perused) but not replied to.
 The address (valid at least up to summer 1995):

 Richard Karsmakers
 Looplantsoen 50
 NL-3523 GV   Utrecht
 The Netherlands
 Email R.C.Karsmakers@stud.let.ruu.nl

 SUBSCRIPTIONS

 Subscriptions (only electronic subscriptions available!) can be requested  by 
sending  me some email (at the address mentioned above).  "Twilight World"  is 
only available in an ASCII version.  Subscription terminations should also  be 
directed to the mentioned email address.
 About  one to two weeks prior to each current issue being sent out  you  will 
get  a message to check if your email address is still  valid.  If  not,  your 
subscription is automatically terminated.
 Back issues of "Twilight World" may be FTP'd from atari.archive.umich.edu and 
etext.archive.umich.edu.  It will also be posted to alt.zines,  alt.prose  and 
rec.arts.prose. Thanks to Gard for this!

 PHILANTROPY

 If you like "Twilight World", a spontaneous burst of philantropy aimed at the 
postal  address mentioned above would be very much  appreciated!  Please  send 
cash only;  any regular currency will do. Apart from keeping "Twilight  World" 
happily afloat,  it will also help me to keep my head above water as a student 
of  English at Utrecht University.  If donations reach sufficient height  they 
will  secure  the  existence of "Twilight World" after my  studies  have  been 
concluded.
 Thanks!

 DISCLAIMER

 All  authors  are  responsible for the views  they  express.  The  individual 
authors  are  also the ones you should sue when copyright  infringements  have 
occurred!

 ST NEWS

 In case you have an Atari ST/TT/Falcon,  you might check out "ST  NEWS",  the 
"Twilight  World" mother magazine.  The most recent issue can be  obtained  by 
sending  one  disk  plus two International Reply Coupons (three  if  you  live 
outside Europe) to the snailmail correspondence address mentioned  above.  "ST 
NEWS" will *not* be officially available electronically.
 "ST NEWS" should run on any TOS version,  needs a double-sided disk drive and 
prefers at least 1 Mb of memory (though half a meg should be supported too).

 OTHER ON-LINE MAGAZINES

 INTERTEXT  is  an electronically-distributed fiction magazine  which  reaches 
over  a  thousand readers on five continents.  It publishes fiction  from  all 
genres, from "mainstream" to Science Fiction, and everywhere in between.
 It  is  published in both ASCII and PostScript (laser  printer)  formats.  To 
subscribe, send mail to jsnell@ocf.berkeley.edu. Back issues are available via 
anonymous FTP at network.ucsd.edu.

 CYBERSPACE VANGUARD:   News and Views of the SciFi and Fantasy Universe is an 
approximately bimonthly magazine of news, articles and interviews from science 
fiction,  fantasy, comics, animation (you get the idea) genres.  Subscriptions 
are available from cn577@cleveland.freenet.edu.
 Writers contact xx133@cleveland.freenet.edu.  Back issues are availabe by FTP 
from etext.archive.umich.edu.

 YOU WANT YOUR MAGAZINE MENTIONED HERE: Mail me a short description, no longer 
than six lines with a maximum length of 78 characters. No logos please.

 EOF