Otto
staggered to the toilets, as much for shelter as to answer a call of
nature. Those recently reformed, sing-along baldies were coming to
the end of their over-familiar set, and he was quite keen to get some
respite from the persistent drizzle that had been soaking the crowd
on the common pretty much since they got there.
He
had left his friends and made his way to the furthest toilets he
could find, feeling a little the worse for wear after a long
afternoon and evening in the cold and wet listening to a lot of live
music by bands that either were not really his thing, or else too
blown about by the wind to really hear properly. He had got to a
point where he had had enough. The Beatles could have come on with
AC/DC to play a set of ABBA covers, with Tina Turner and Freddie
Mercury on backing vocals, and he would still have wanted to go home.
Pulling
the door on the plastic cubicle shut behind him, he got on with the
half-hearted business of relieving himself. As he splashed the loo
and seat in equal measure, slumped against the wall, he fixed his
eyes on the logo at eye level.
“Portal
Double Zero?” The words rolled around in his head, fighting for
space at the front of his brain with the cider for which he had
somehow justified spending half this month's salary.
Otto
sighed, grateful for the quiet and absence of rain. He realised that
he could not actually notice the pitter-patter on the toilet roof. He
could not even hear the music any more. Had there not been an
irresistible clamour for an encore? He adjusted his dress, and opened
the door.
It
took him a while to fully appreciate what was in front of him. He
could see the field. He had a lovely view of the castle. The
entertainment complex with swimming, gym and venue facilities was
unmistakeable to his left. What he struggled to come to terms with
was the fact that there was absolutely no trace of the Abcestival,
sponsored by the school of dentistry. There was no stage, no beer
tent, no girls handing out fluoride information leaflets and no
throng of weather bashed party goers eagerly absorbing the latest
opportunity for overpriced food and drink outlets that the council
had secured for the seafront.
Otto's
mind reeled, and when he stepped away from the toilet, his legs did
the same. His tipsy feet were unexpectedly falling on hard, dry
earth, not the sucking mud that still clung to his DMs.
It
was getting dark now, and his disorientation was giving way to a mild
panic. There were people walking by on the pavement and he lurched
over to them, waving an arm.
“Hey!”
he accosted them, “where is Abcestival?”
The
kindly looking couple stopped, bemused.
“Hello,”
the middle-aged woman greeted him, “are you one of our eastern
European friends?”
“What?
No, I came out of the toilet”. Otto turned and gestured to the
small plastic box he had just vacated, only to find that it, too, had
vanished.
“Can
we help you?” the other middle-aged woman asked him with pity in
her eyes, looking his damp form up and down.
Otto
did not know what to say. He backed away. Something was clearly not
right, but he did not know what. Had he passed out? Had he drunk
something he really should not have? He had no idea what was going
on, but he had just one over-riding instinct, and that was to go
home. He made his way out onto the road. Here too, things were not as
they should be. In the gathering gloom he could see that the tanks
were missing from outside the war museum. He stumbled on across the
common, desperately hoping that once he was safely indoors that
things would somehow sort themselves out.
It
took him more than half an hour to reach his flat. His key did not
work in the outer door that led in from the street, and even though
on some level this did not surprise him, Otto tried quite a few times
before giving up. The doorbell that was supposed to connect to his
first floor flat had not worked since he moved in, yet with an
inexplicable tingle he found himself pushing the button anyway. With
a scrape and a squeak, a young woman stuck her head out of a window
above.
“Hello?
Can I help you?” she called down.
“Er,
yes, maybe. You see I live here”.
“Did
you just move into the basement flat? You need to go round the
side”.
“No,” Otto called back, “no, I live there, in number 3”.
“No,” Otto called back, “no, I live there, in number 3”.
She
did not answer straight away. He could see her straining to make him
out properly in the monochrome half-light. He felt self-conscious and
conspicuous as he was examined by this strange silhouette that was
examining him from what should have been his own lounge window.
“Do
you need the Assistants?” called down the voice.
“Eh,
assistance from whom?” he replied. His mind was foggy, and he felt
he should get away. He had already started to turn and walk down the
street.
“Wait,
please!” the voice called after him. “You don't need to leave.
Let us help you!”
Otto
was already around the corner.
He
meandered through pseudo-familiar streets, lost in a world of
thought, rather than connecting properly with the world of sense
experience. Without any conscious plan, he ended up in the Guildhall
Square. The large TV screen was still on at this late hour, and was
showing just one, still picture. A face. The female visage that was
gazing down at him was very familiar, but the name written large
underneath was not.
A
tap on the shoulder made Otto jump.
“You've
come to give thanks to Muriel?” The old man was short, hairy and
wearing a yellow hi-vis jerkin with the word 'ASSISTANT' written in
big capitals on the front and back.
The
uncanny feeling that had been bombarding Otto's brain since he had
emerged from that mysterious toilet seemed to be building to a
crescendo. He recognised the woman in the picture; she was not
someone he knew personally, and he had no warm feelings for her
whatsoever. The very idea that he might be wanting to give thanks to
her was ludicrous. This was someone that was responsible, as far as
he knew, for appalling decisions affecting the lives of countless
people both home and abroad. He had so much going on in his head, yet
could only manage a short echo in reply.
“Muriel?”
he said.
“Muriel
F.C. Diamond!” The old man was beaming. Otto looked between him and
the screen. He pointed up at it, and the man nodded vigorously.
“I
think I might know what the 'F.C.' stands for,” Otto mused.
“Fayn
Calixte,” came the reply.
“That's
not what I was thinking of. All right, I give up,” said Otto,
shaking his head, “where's the camera? Who's the joker, is it
Gibson? I'll chin him”.
“Come,
friend, let me show you how we do things here. You could do with dry
clothes, and I dare say some hot food. Let's get you some shelter for
the night”.
Otto
was led to a small Rickshaw, and bundled into the back. Before he
could adjust, his well wisher had grabbed the handles and set off at
a brisk pace.
“No,
wait, you don't have to carry me,” Otto tried to protest.
“
I am here to Assist you,” came the
shout back, “please try and relax, this won't take long”.
Otto
could not believe it when his ride brought him back to the seafront,
and right to the door of the D-Day museum. Except all trace of the
memorial purpose of the building had disappeared. They stopped, and
Otto dismounted.
“Where
are the tanks?” he asked.
“This
is the Shelter”.
Without
any further discussion, Otto was led through a reception area where
he was met with a succession of smiles from everyone that he passed.
The building had been adapted and added to since he had seen it last.
But that was just last week, surely? He was taken to a storeroom, and
his companion arranged for him to be fitted out with a whole new set
of clothes. He was told that some were donated, and that others came
through a scheme that Muriel had instigated whereby clothing stores
and supermarkets would pass on unwanted end of line stock. Feeling
much more comfortable as he left the changing cubicle, he found it
hard to conceal his delight when he was taken to the dining hall. It
was a very busy place, much like a canteen, with people queueing for
food as others sat at numerous tables. The Assistant left him alone
to enjoy his meal. As he sat, he was able to hear the sound of people
conversing in native tongues from all over the continent. Otto was no
linguist, but he was able to tell that the menus were available in a
selection of different languages. This multi-cultural support service
took him by surprise. He had friends that had worked in support
services, but he had never known of anything of this type, or on this
scale. Someone plopped into the seat beside him.
“Great,
isn’t it?” Otto looked up into the smiling face of a swarthy,
stubbly man in a long robe. Ever since he had emerged from the
strange toilet he had met only nice, friendly people. He started give
full credence to the idea that had been growing in his subconscious,
the notion that he was somehow in some parallel version of his own
reality.
“Yes,
I suppose it is,” he replied. His new dinner partner had spoken in
a thick accent that Otto did not recognise, and was naturally curious
about. He was not quite sure how best to bring the subject up.
“You’re not local, I take it?”
This
comment caused great hilarity. When the laughter subsided, and tears
had been wiped away, his new friend spoke again.
“Ha!
Stan is a local! Stan travelled all the way from my home country, and
I have settled here, so now I am a local. I would live nowhere else.
Here is beautiful. Muriel makes it so”.
That
woman’s name again. She was clearly not the woman he thought he
recognised, but he felt he had to try and check.
“This
Muriel, she is the local M.P.?”
“Yes,
or course!”
“And
she didn’t vote to bomb Syria, I suppose?”
Stan
looked shocked. “Let me tell you, my friend. Let me tell you! This
woman was part of the human shields, she spoke out when no one else
would, she gave speech after speech in the cause of justice and fair
treatment for all. Every man, woman and child here owes their
existence to the efforts of this champion, this saint! The clothes on
your back, give thanks to Muriel. The food on your plate, give thanks
to Muriel”. Stan gave Otto’s plate a little shove with his hand.
“I only wish my wife and children were here for this”.
Otto
felt a tightness in his heart. “They didn’t make it?” he asked
quietly.
“Ha!
Of course they made it, but they are staying at The Mansion tonight,
all ten of them, and it’s falafel night here! They love falafel”.
Their
discussion carried on well into the night. Otto heard how Muriel
Diamond had brought back from America many ideas and philosophies
that had radically changed her outlook and political standpoint. She
had gradually wrought swathes of humanitarian changes that had
impacted all over the world, but nowhere more so than in her own
constituency. The thing that Stan found most emotional to describe
was how she had challenged her own government over the child refugee
issue, and had fought for and won them the right to be brought in
their thousands to a place where there were people willing to provide
shelter and resources to ensure that they were looked after. Muriel
had even vacated her own luxury property, affectionately known as The
Mansion, so that refugee children could be housed there and cared
for.
“Can
I ask, is Stan your given name?”
“No,
it’s just what they call me”.
“Isn’t
it a bit, well, you know, racist?”
“There
are no racists here,” was his answer.
Otto
was allocated a bunk in a dormitory, and he only realised how much
his aching body needed to rest once he was lying down. As he
stretched out, he thought deeply about what he was finding out.
Everything seemed great. Compared to what he was used to, problems
were being solved, positive action and kindness to others were
winning out over xenophobia and selfishness. Ignorance was on the
run, and it all seemed down to the efforts of one woman. In spite of
this, Otto was worried. He was steeped in enough sci-fi folklore to
know that there was probably a catch. Some ulterior motive that would
be to the great disadvantage of most people involved. Was it his duty
to try and find out? Was that why he was here?
Over
the next couple of days, he did not venture far. He mingled with the
other residents and absorbed all he could about how this world
differed from his own, and he speculated where he could on exactly
what had caused things to be different. Muriel herself was a mystery.
She looked just like someone that he thought that he knew well from
the media, yet of course had never met. Here, somehow, she had been
given a totally different birth name, and turned out to be a complete
contrast to the individual that he had made up his mind about after
reading internet articles and twitter comments. Had he been wrong
about that version of her? Or could two versions of the same person
really be that different? Everything that he found out about Muriel
Diamond informed him of her innovations and her commitment; key
moments such as the way that she had sweet-talked Mr Putin into
implementing his own extensive aid programme, and intercepted
overladen boats en route to Lesvos using her own yacht, to help save
refugees from a watery fate. He had to admire the way that she had
adapted the old museum after getting the contents moved into the
dockyard. Muriel had her own proud military family history, yet she
managed to use that to emphasise the need for intervention and change
from a modern viewpoint. There was acceptance and gratitude for old
ways whilst embracing the new. Otto read articles that were eloquent
and persuasive that left him in no doubt that togetherness was the
only future and that dropping bombs on people would not solve any of
the long term problems facing humankind.
On
Thursday morning he took a stroll across the common. It was overcast
and blustery, but plenty of people were out enjoying the day. A group
of children were playing an expansive wide game, and as he got closer
he noted there were a few adults joining in. He was almost past them
when he stopped. Right in the middle, laughing and running as hard as
any of them, was the woman with that face. She kept playing, but
gradually became aware of the person looking at her. She turned her
head a number of times as she moved around. Otto was not sure if she
had looked at him directly, those deep set eyes very close to that
proud nose gave the appearance of a slight squint. Eventually she
detached herself from the game and got into one of the Assistants’
Rickshaws, and was taken off in the direction of the Diamond Shelter.
She passed close enough to Otto for him to be sure that their eyes
met. For a second, he even thought that there was a flicker of
recognition. He dismissed this as fanciful, and carried on his walk.
The sky was darkening ominously.
He
returned in time for the evening meal, and he was intending to spend
the rest of the day quietly reading. Before he had the chance to
clear his plates he was tapped on the shoulder. A man in an official
looking suit was behind him.
“Muriel
would like to speak with you.” The matter did not seem up for
debate, and the man in the suit stayed behind him until they reached
an office in a part of the refurbished complex that Otto had not been
to before. The door was opened for him, and he went in alone. Muriel
Diamond was sat behind a desk.
“Please,
sit down,” she beckoned. Otto did as he was asked. Muriel got
straight to the point. “We don’t know who you are. Your
identification doesn’t check out. I don’t believe for one minute
that you arrived on any of the refugee transports, I think you came
from much closer to home. So the question is, who are you, and where
do you come from?”
Otto
felt very uncomfortable. He had heard nothing but good things about
this woman, but clearly she was no fool. He really did not like the
way that she was looking at him. She got up and moved around to the
front of the desk, and sat on it.
“Look,
you’re not in any real trouble, we’ve been watching you, and
you’ve done no real harm. But you have been asking a lot of
questions. Things that even the dumbest person really ought to know.
I want to know why?”
Otto’s
discomfort grew. He got up out of his chair, and tried to back
towards the door, but his sense of direction was off and he backed
right up into the wall. Muriel moved towards him. She ended up almost
toe to toe, and even though he knew he had no real reason to panic,
he was afraid.
“OK,
mystery man, let’s have it!”
And
then she kissed him. He was so taken aback that he could not move or
fight, until he realised that he did not have to. As suddenly as she
had grabbed him, she let go, and went back behind her desk, where she
grabbed a photo standing in a frame and turned it towards him. It was
a picture of his own face, wearing a tan and a TV toothpaste smile.
“That’s
me!” was all that he could say.
“No,
it’s definitely not you. This is my Dicky, he was my rock after my
husband was butchered in Turkey. Yet he was also taken from me as we
carried out our last rescue mission in the Med. When I first saw you,
I thought, I hoped he might have come back to me. Once I’d kissed
you I was sure. You're not him”. Otto rubbed his lips and adjusted
his trousers. Muriel continued, “so the question still remains: who
are you?”
Otto
told her everything that he could. He saw no reason to lie, or miss
things out. He had no real idea what was going on either. She
listened intently and asked only pertinent questions. When it came to
the reason for his being there, they both speculated.
“I
thought it might be something to do with the referendum?” Otto
offered.
“What
referendum?” Muriel genuinely had no idea what he was talking
about. It turned out on this world, the referendum had been a
campaign pledge that had never been followed up on. The ongoing good
work to promote accord in as much of the world as possible was
getting wholesale and unprecedented support from nearly everyone,
which meant that it was just not an issue here.
Suddenly
there was commotion outside, and an aide knocked and entered
hurriedly.
“The
storm’s coming ma’am. Too many people have gone down to the
seafront. Could you have a word?”
“Honestly,
the trouble with being brilliant is that they expect you to do
everything”. She flashed Otto a self-deprecating smile, and left
the room. He followed close behind.
Out
on the promenade, the waves were crashing down. Black, terrible
clouds had gathered, and the edges of the forecast Hurricane Madonna
had arrived as promised from the Atlantic to abuse the south coast.
“Dirty
foreign storm, coming over her and smashing our beaches,” Otto
found himself muttering.
Muriel
started talking to people individually, asking them to get back
indoors, but they were not interested. It seemed that they already
had agreed on the best course of action. Everyone kept pushing Muriel
forward and pointing out to sea. They were shouting things at her,
but the wind made it impossible for Otto to hear. After a short while
it became clear what they wanted. They thought she should command the
storm to retreat. These people whose lives had been saved and
transformed by this woman had elevated her to the point of
deification.
Muriel
ended up on her own, apart from the throng, a little way down the
prom from everyone else. Each crashing wave sent spray high in the
air and over those gathered. The crowd had separated them, yet Muriel
turned and held Otto’s gaze completely. He could tell from her
countenance that she knew that any gesture would be futile, yet the
weight of expectation from all these people that believed in her was
too much. She raised her arms. This was her Cnut moment.
“The
sea defences!” The aide at Otto’s elbow screamed. Waves were
crashing with increasing ferocity, and with a terrible and audible
crack the concrete under Muriel’s feet split and fractured, and in
another explosion of spray, she was gone.
Chaos
ensued. Staff and security arrived on the scene, residents were
ushered inside, though many were not keen to go. Grieving wailers and
adverse conditions made rescue efforts nigh on impossible.
Otto
removed himself from the masses, but could not face going back
inside. What did it all mean? Could this world endure without one of
its guiding lights? An idea formed in his mind. Perhaps Dicky was not
dead, just missing. Maybe he could reappear and carry on the good
work that his lost partner had started. This world was much better
than his, so why not stay and get in at the top?
Concentrating
on his plan, he absent-mindedly reached out for the door of the
portable toilet he happened upon in the car park and went inside. As
soon as he saw the logo in front of him, he snapped back to the
moment and dashed outside again.
He
was too late. The D-Day Museum car park was back as he remembered it.
He was removed from that world and its tragedy. Otto headed for home
once more, readjusting with every footfall and keen to see just how
his world had behaved while he was away. He glanced over his shoulder
and noted the tanks were reassuringly in position.
He
failed to notice the unfamiliar look-out towers on the seafront,
searchlights scanning the water. Nor did he see the lights come on in
front of the nearest tank, and the turret swivel. A non-registered
alien had been detected and the UKIP migrant pacifier had come
online.
