[The continuation of the Survivor Short Story “project” in the War On Boris the Bytrode series. This time, back in time, 1967, following the adventures of middle-aged mum, Letitia… In this episode (9.2) On a Melbourne beach, Letitia has a nap, longer than planned, and wakes up to a nasty surprise …]
Her wee rest and recovery took longer than expected. She reasoned, as she surfaced into consciousness, that she deserved just five more minutes, and then five more minutes after that…
When she resolved to become conscious again, the palm trees cast long shadows and the sun slipped on the downward slide in the West. People and seagulls crowded the beach. Many amongst the human masses appeared weary and unhappy.
Letitia gazed at the discontented crowds and thought, I guess I would have been depressed if I had to put up with the sad excuse for sand that these Melbournians have to tolerate.
Seagulls, also grumpy, squabbled over the occasional chip or tossed burger crust. In every gull group, there was the inevitable one-legged bird, upon whom the picnickers took pity and hurled their unwanted food in their direction. At least the leg-challenged birds were happy.
Letitia dug in her pocket for the comfort of cash. Her heart stopped a beat. She groped harder and deeper into the dusty corners of the pocket. With a sinking feeling, she realised that her money was gone. She swept the pebbles around her in vain hope and desperation.
‘Gone! All my money’s gone!’ she cried, ‘Merd!’
No one else on the beach seemed to care. She felt that she was being punished for the lies she told Frieda concerning Coles Bay. She had visions of trekking by foot, eight hundred kilometres to Adelaide. She imagined giving into hitch-hiking and being murdered by some axe murderer and buried in some shallow grave west of Bordertown.
‘Great!’ she muttered sarcastically as she stiffly rose to her feet and trudged through the gritty sand to the steps leading to the road. She stood gazing hopelessly at the sideshow contemplating her options. Luna Park yawned at her, laughing. Sensing that she was odd, out of place standing there, she ambled up Acland Street to its end. The restaurants were filling fast with mirthful multitudes making the most of the balmy summer evening and work satisfyingly concluded for another day. She glared at the revellers wondering who of them had helped themselves to her pocket in her sleep. Perhaps the spare cash would be used for drugs. She ground her teeth anger rising at the thought.
Letitia walked beyond the business precinct bound for the city. She came to a grinding halt at St Kilda Road and a wall of peak hour traffic. ‘Nah, this is ridiculous!’ she heard her voice rambling as the cars relentlessly whizzed past. She turned and dragged her feet back to the beach. She planned to find her way to the city by following the shoreline. Unfamiliar with Melbourne, she did not know where the roads went. No idea that in that stage in history, all roads lead to Melbourne CBD.
[The continuation of the Survivor Short Story “project” in the War On Boris the Bytrode series. This time, back in time, 1967, following the adventures of middle-aged mum, Letitia… In this episode (9.1) In Melbourne, Letitia looks up her sister, Doris …]
Letitia had intended to stay only one day in Melbourne, but somehow, that one day stretched into eleven days. The time warp of good intentions began with her well-intentioned plans to look up her sister Doris in the white pages. Two thick wads of telephone directory, now that was a novelty. She hadn’t used one of those since Boris exiled her to Mirror World in 1962. Her eyes found the teeny-weeny letters most challenging. Finally, she located Fahrer which was the family name. But out of all the Fahrers there were none beginning with the letter “D”; or perhaps it was that her weary eyes had trouble deciphering any letters “D” or otherwise. She realized that there were disadvantages to having short-sightedness corrected after the unfortunate encounter with the blast that propelled her into Mirror World. Now that she was in her late forties, she had become long-sighted. The thought of wearing spectacles, did not enthuse her. Here she was, in the dimly lit St Kilda Post Office, and she could not even take the bulky book out into the strong sunlight, even for a second. The staff kept glancing and narrowing their eyes at her.
She decided to abandon the pursuit of her sister and stroll casually up Acland Street. She was hungry. One piece of vegemite toast and a small orange juice simply did not cut it to stave off the hunger pains much past lunchtime. She knew that she should save the money for the bus fare, but she was ravenous. She had never seen so many cake shops in one street in all her life. Even in Mirror. Every second shop front threw before her sweets, pastries, and lashings of cream on display. They all looked so inviting, so delicious, so wanting her to eat them.
She stopped by the narrow shop with the towers of mille-feuillewhich were labelled in this world’s café as “vanilla slices”. She hadn’t eaten an Australian “vanilla slice” in decades. For all she knew, vanilla slices with their crunchy biscuit base, smooth sweet lemon custard cream and rich hard coconut icing, had not existed for decades; not in Mirror, they hadn’t. In Mirror, the mille-feuille were slightly different, more pastry and whipped cream. She wasn’t keen on cream. Cream tended to make her nose all stuffy and cause her to sneeze.
The Australian variation, she recalled used a biscuit base and custard as the filling. Ah, memories of high school lunches of meat pies with slathers of sauce, milk chocolate and the final satisfying touch of vanilla slices came flooding back to her. She sighed and followed the glass-case parade of sweet slices of vanilla into the tiny cake shop. There was barely room for the two sets of tables and chairs that were squeezed against the baby-blue wall. Black and white checked tiles cowered under a streaky film of dirt caught under a careless attempt at mopping. Or perhaps it was her sunglasses that made the floor, as well as the general atmosphere of the shop darker and dingier than it would have been otherwise.
Letitia ordered the vanilla slice and a hot chocolate to accompany it. The shop did not serve pies, only cakes. A complimentary newspaper served as entertainment for one. She sipped her coffee, ate delicate savouring portions of cake, and picked at the paper’s headlines to read. All the while she remained under the watchful eye of the bored shop assistant and the blaring of talk radio from the back room. The vanilla slice was a disappointment, but she thanked the dark-haired lady, saying that she enjoyed her meal (Ha! What meal?), and politely left the establishment. The overload of sugary sweetness made her dizzy and propelled her back to the seashore.
Letitia dabbled her feet in the cool kelp laden salt water and lay on the damp gravely sand to recover. She intended having a little sunbake, a little closing of the eyes, a brief nap, before making her way to the city to book the bus to Adelaide. She had plenty of time. The bus wouldn’t leave before nine or ten o’clock that evening. That’s what someone had said. She was sure. Plenty of time. Plenty of time. Plenty…Plenty…
[The continuation of the Survivor Short Story “project” in the War On Boris the Bytrode series. This time, back in time, 1967, following the adventures of middle-aged mum, Letitia…In this episode (8.2) Wilhelm gives Mrs Berry Bogan something to chew on…]
Without waring the Blue Berry Bogan rose. She pointed at Letitia and words exploded from her lipstick laden mouth. ‘Illegal aliens! They are taking over our jobs, our country. They are the ones having millions of children! They will take over our country if we are not careful.’
Wilhelm stood up, turned, and faced her. ‘Yes, but you must understand that they are escaping from terrible persecution. They are often desperate. They need somewhere to go.’
‘But our country is being filled to the brim with aliens! I mean, look at Sydney. It’s like, like spot the white person,’ Berry Bogan argued.
Her children shrank into their cream buns as if the light of morning had made them embarrassed at their mother’s outburst.
Mrs. Bogan stabbed the Age with her false bright purple fingernail. ‘It’s these foreigners, mark my words, man. They are causing the crime to rise.’ Her girl with cream smattered over her rose painted lips was cussing audibly at her plate. The freckled son began hyperactively bobbing up and down as if he was an organ-grinder’s monkey.
Letitia giggled.
‘What are you laughing about, Mum?’ Wilhelm interrupted Letitia’s entertainment. ‘I hope it’s because you are finding Mrs. Berry’s bigoted views as amusing as I do.’
Mrs. Bogan Berry, stared at Wilhelm and then at Letitia. She paled. ‘Who are you people? She pointed at Letitia. Is she? Is she your mother?’
Wilhelm shrugged. ‘What is it, if she is, to you?’ He laughed. ‘Or, if in fact, I am hers? What is it to you?’
At that twist of a comment, the two little vipers stopped their cavorting and fixed their narrow eyes on Letitia.
‘No way!’ the boy exclaimed.
‘Told j’ya she’s too old,’ the girl said and turned to wolf down her bun.
‘Actually, aliens…’ Letitia began, then paused, ‘Aliens,’ she continued, ‘are just human beings – poor, persecuted human beings. They did not ask to be different. They just are. But after-all, in the end, the bottom line is…’ The Bogan family had now simultaneously paled to a seedy shade of green.
Letitia gathered her thoughts and resumed, ‘aliens are just human. Actually, they are nicer, more decent, more moral, more polite than the average Australian – is anything to go by.’ She smiled serenely beyond Wilhelm at the pale mum, daughter and son as they shuffled from the bistro leaving a pile of uneaten buns, coco pops, bacon and eggs, and instant coffee.
‘What a waste!’ Wilhelm glanced at the mountain of discarded food left in the Bogan’s wake.
‘Yep. I bet’chya aliens wouldn’t leave so much food to waste.’
Wilhelm twisted himself around and reached out a groping hand towards the deserted table. ‘Did they leave the paper? I forgot to pick one…’
‘Nup. They took that.’ Letitia was secretly hoping that they had read about her, that somewhere in that paper existed an article on the plane crash in Antarctica. She would be vindicated then. Leave them safe with the false knowledge that she was someone else. Although, she did not fancy being a science teacher, especially that girl’s science teacher.
As if reading her thoughts, Wilhelm remarked, ‘You know there will be no news about the crash, don’t you?’
‘How do you know?’ But before Wilhelm had time to answer, Letitia sighed, ‘Of course, Boris.’ Then as if the utterance of his name triggered enlightenment, she smacked her forehead, ‘Of course! Doris! Doris was their science teacher. Oh, she’d be one mean teacher!’
‘Shucks! I was hoping to read the news and do the crossword.’ Wilhelm lamented, totally unaware of Letitia’s a-ha moment.
Letitia smiled. ‘Hey, is that Melbourne?’
‘Na! It’s Geelong,’ Wilhelm pan-faced replied. ‘Don’t you know that it takes forever to reach Melbourne?’ He then rose abruptly from the table. ‘Darn! I’ll just have to go and get one for myself. I hope they haven’t run out. I hate it how they never have enough papers.’ With that he stomped off in the direction of the buffet.
Port Phillip Bay was murky green and choppy. The early morning sun glanced off the salt dusted window that spanned the bistro restaurant.
Sooner than expected, the Spirit of Tasmania was docking at the pier of Port Melbourne and Wilhelm and Letitia were packed and alighting. Letitia thanked Wilhelm for all he had done and all the help he had given her. When they had parted ways, Letitia sat on the beach by the shore. The sand had bags of shade as if it had just woken up from a long summer night of revelry. The waters of the bay were chopped and churned up, a muddy green blue, as if hung-over from the hard night before. She gathered her scattered plans for the day and resolved to seek out a telephone directory to look up Doris. Perhaps Doris lived in Melbourne. After all the Bogan family must come from Melbourne, surely, she reasoned. And if not, one more day’s delay in reaching Adelaide surely could do no harm.
[The continuation of the Survivor Short Story “project” in the War On Boris the Bytrode series. This time, back in time, 1967, following the adventures of middle-aged mum, Letitia…In this episode (8.1) Letitia and Wilhelm face their demons, and one Berry Bogan mother, on the Princess of Tasmania bound for Melbourne.]
Letitia faced breakfast behind sunglasses, her head covered with a silken scarf. ‘Protection against my identity has come at an inflated cost of $10 for the eyewear and a further $5 for the head gear; money well spent as far as I’m concerned,’ she said.
‘It was meant, however, for the taxi fare to Tullamarine Airport, and now I fear you won’t have enough to cover the flight to Adelaide,’ Wilhelm rambled as they entered the dining room. The lemon-yellow rays of the rising sun filtered through the salt-encrusted windows. ‘Now, what’s left of the loan may only cover the overnight bus fare to Adelaide.’
‘That’s a bit fiscally pessimistic, don’t you think, Will?’
‘You’ll see.’
Wilhelm pale, with dark rings under his eyes, began quibbling over the breakfast offering of ham and cheese sandwiches and orange juice. He then turned his criticisms onto the hairy family over the other side of the dining room.
‘Keep away from them,’ Wilhelm pointed at the homage to the Beetles party, ‘bad news, they are. Bad news.’
Letitia, shade-clad and sea-seedy, glanced in their direction and turned away.
‘You can’t make a judgement about them based on hair, Wilhelm. They might be perfectly good parents.’
Wilhelm wiped crumbs from his section of the table. ‘We have a bad feeling about them.’
‘We?’
Wilhelm leaned close to Letitia and whispered, ‘The IGSF. If you get my drift.’
Letitia prepared to take a second look, but Wilhelm held up his hand. ‘Don’t. It’s all under control. I’ll keep you safe. From them.’
‘Thanks, Will, but I wish you had been around when I had the Bogans from Boganville torment me last yesterday.’ Letitia adjusted her scarf. ‘By the way, where did you get to?’
Wilhelm patted their air between them. ‘Never you mind. Nothing to get alarmed about. Stay calm.’
‘Now, you are worrying me.’ Letitia sighed. ‘Just my luck, Boris will be on the boat and sink it.’
‘Stay calm. We won’t let that happen.’ Wilhelm stroked the table and then tapped it. ‘Bogan? What exactly is a “Bogan”? Isn’t it a type of moth?’
As he spoke, the said mother and her offspring walked into the dining room.
‘Speak of the devil. And her charges. They’ve just walked in,’ Letitia answered barely moving her mouth. ‘That, my friend, is what I mean by “bogan”.’
Wilhelm leaned back in his seat and observed. ‘Interesting! They’re joining the Hippie’s. Interesting.’ He locked eyes with Letitia. ‘Keep away from them too. They’re trouble.’
‘Shh! They might hear you,’ Letitia said.
Wilhelm casually sipped his juice and shook his head. ‘What parent lets her daughter walk around half-naked? I’ll never know! Tsk! Tsk!’
Letitia batted the space between them. ‘Wait till you have a daughter, Mr. Thumm.’
Wilhelm’s eyes widened. ‘Daughter? Am I to have a daughter?’
Letitia covered her mouth. ‘Maybe, who knows? In another universe, dimension, you do.’
Following that comment, Letitia could not resist taking a peek. She glanced quickly around just as the purple mo-haired clad mother armed with the day’s Melbourne Age, her minx of a daughter baring more thigh than skirt, and the short sniggering son, paraded past their table. Letitia turned away hoping that her scarf and sunglasses were enough to fool them into thinking that she was no one in particular.
The “Bogan” family ostentatiously chose the table directly behind Wilhelm. Mum who had all the round features of a blue-berry, and who wore ugg-boots to match her furry lavender cardigan, spread the paper over the narrow table while her off-spring raced off to fill their trays with cakes for breakfast. As she lifted the monumental sized newspaper to turn the page, Letitia noticed the headline, “Ryan to Hang.”
‘Nothing about any plane crash in Antarctica, then,’ Letitia muttered with a shudder.
‘Did you say something?’ Wilhelm said softly.
‘No, not really.’ Letitia kept her head down and eyes fixed on the one piece of vegemite toast and small glass of orange juice. ‘I see hanging is still a thing in this day and age.’
‘Yes, it is, although, there are calls to have it abolished.’
‘Just thinking about it, has made my seasickness return.’
‘Just as well we didn’t go on my yacht,’ Wilhelm said. ‘The sea was particularly rugged overnight.’
At that precise point in time, the ferry passed through the Heads of Port Phillip Bay. The boat rocked in every direction possible. The Bogan mother directly behind Wilhelm caught Letitia’s gaze. Her chubby cheeks flushed. Her eyes narrowed.
Letitia bent her head and prayed that she would not be mother-Bogan’s victim for breakfast this morning. She had no desire to be bawled out by a blue berry. Especially after Wilhelm’s warning to keep away.
[The continuation of the Survivor Short Story “project” in the War On Boris the Bytrode series. This time, back in time, 1967, following the adventures of middle-aged mum, Letitia…In this episode (7.2) Letitia and Wilhelm separately face their demons on the Princess of Tasmania bound for Melbourne.]
The cabin shuddered and roared. A flame-haired woman towered over and menaced her. Tails, lean and slimy, leered at her, laughing. His teeth turned black and jagged, and the face became that of the minx’s mum. Smoke filled the cabin. And bang!
***
Letitia bolted upright. Wide awake. Blinking in the darkness. Her world bucking and rolling. Side to side. Back and forth. Up and down. She clung to the sides of the bunk as it rolled one way then the other. She remained sitting, expecting to be assaulted with relentless seasickness. However, apart from a head that felt as though it was wadded thick with cotton wool and a nose stuffed with glue, she did not feel ill. She swung her feet over the bedside and landing them on the floor, she pushed herself to standing. She waded through the blackness to the door. Aiming for that thin sliver of light marking its direction. Letitia was hungry.
The mean mother and her menacing charges reared up in her memory. Perhaps, I’m not that hungry, she reasoned. Although her stomach growled protesting otherwise, she returned to her bunk and hibernated under the thin cotton covers.
***
Upon viewing the Hippie family in their Kombi, Will grew cold. Sweat, with a life of its own, dripped from his temples and underarms. The gentle sea breeze mingled with the dampness sending a chill through to his core.
Will studied the woman driving the van. ‘It’s him,’ the little lady’s voice echoed behind his ear.
‘Is it?’ he muttered. ‘Are you sure? Okay, I’ll just take a closer look.’
‘What?’ Letitia glanced at Will. ‘What are you saying?’
‘I, er, um am just taking a visit to the men’s room.’ He patted her arm. ‘You’ll be alright?’
‘Yeah, fine.’
Will made his way down to the car docking bay. There, he watched the Kombi and its inhabitants. And waited.
Close up, they were obvious. Not the kids though, like he expected. They were just kids. Proper little Munchkins. But the man and woman. The “man” in the kaftan with his long curly brown hair and John Lennon specs, currently carrying the dog, walked like a woman.
Will nodded. ‘Interesting.’
All those years merged with a woman gives a man a certain insight about such matters like how they walk and talk. The Boris attack and being thrown some 400-years into the past, that’s how that situation happened. And now that woman, her spirit or whatever it was, had been stuck in his head, even after the separation. Courtesy of Boris. With his slimy strings attached, of course.
As the van moved closer, Will focussed on the driver. ‘It’s him,’ the little voice at the back of his ear repeated.
‘Just the sort of thing Boris would do,’ Will said.
At a distance, Will followed the odd family to their cabin.
Once inside, he slid up to the door and listened.
‘Ah, that’s better,’ a woman said, ‘I swear this wig is giving me hives.’
‘Calm down, Maggie, dear,’ a man said, ‘it’ll all be worth it. Not long to go now, my precious.’
‘Did you see her?’
‘Yes, my precious. I have my agents onto her. She should be grateful I saved her life.’
‘Don’t know why you bothered. She’s just an old frump, now really. No use to breed with.’
‘Ah, but, my precious, that is where you are wrong. Her mind. Her skills. And the Admiral, just think what I can get the Admiral to do if I have his daughter in my grasp? Look at what lengths he’s going for his son?’
‘I don’t agree,’ the lady snapped. ‘You’re wasting your time. I’m going out for some fresh air.’
The cabin door swung open.
Will slipped around the nearest corner while a lady, red curls bouncing down the curves of her back, marched past him.
As she disappeared down the corridor, Will peeked around the corner to glimpse a round man in a brown tweed suit, close the door to the cabin.
[The continuation of the Survivor Short Story “project” in the War On Boris the Bytrode series. This time, back in time, 1967, following the adventures of middle-aged mum, Letitia…In this episode (7.1) Letitia and Wilhelm board the Princess of Tasmania bound for Melbourne.]
Boarding
The Princess of Tasmania towered over the tedious queue of cars. Cars and some trucks, flanked one side of the Mersey River, waiting patiently to be uploaded. Not one vehicle seemed to be moving, and the long line just seemed to be getting longer, stretching into the distant blur on the horizon. The faces of the unfortunate occupants were gridlocked into grim expressions of determination or abject resignation that the next few hours of their lives would be spent sitting in the car and waiting for the ferry to swallow them up. There were, some enterprising fellows who reclined against their Holden or Ford Utes and puffed on their cigarettes.
From the vantage point of the deck, Letitia and Wilhelm cast pitying glances down upon their fellow car-jammed passengers. Boarding was a simple affair in the company of Wilhelm. After disposing of his Aston Martin in the care of a steward who looked after cars belonging to the rich and privileged, Wilhelm and Letitia presented their tickets to the ticket officer, and then simply walked onto the boat via a firmly fixed wooden slatted plank. While the masses languished in the linear car park below, the few car-free passengers scattered themselves sparsely around the sunny edges of the ferry or sought their cabins for comfort.
Letitia leaned on the thick metal white rail and basked in the soft southerly breeze that took the sting out of the late afternoon summer sun. The cavernous mouth of the ferry had not opened yet and the queue of vehicles kept piling along the side of the river far, far into the distance.
Directly below her, sat a Kombi Volkswagon housing a hippie couple and a pair of feral children. Well, they certainly were acting feral. Letitia reckoned to Wilhelm that waiting in a traffic line for hours on end would do that to anyone, especially kids. One of the dirt-smeared youngsters had climbed on top of the van with the family’s pet dog, a Jack Russel, and was attempting to tan himself. The problem was that the boy could not lie still long enough for the sun’s rays to catch the patches of skin that weren’t dirt blocked. A small girl in little more than grubby shorts and a singlet joined her brother on the roof and a tussle on the hot tin roof ensued. The mum, head clad with a brightly coloured beanie risked creeping forward the van to sort out her charges. Letitia tried not to stare directly at them from the deck in case she embarrassed the family. But she just had to point at the van and laugh, ‘What has become of the dog, Wilhelm? I wonder if dogs are even allowed on the ferry. How do you reckon the Kombi crowd have advanced this far with the dog in tow?’
Then she spotted the dog a few car lengths closer to-the-yet-to-be-opened opening of the boat and peeing with much satisfaction on some unsuspecting victim’s car tyre. Letitia looked back to the van. The kids were off the roof and squirming discontentedly in the hot car with only natural air-conditioning (open windows) to keep them cool. An older emissary, flowing long brown hair adorned with a red and brown headband and John Lennon glasses, hopped out the olive-green Kombi, and then wended his way in and out of the car jam in search of the dog.
Letitia never did find out the end of the hippie family’s story. After Will had excused himself in search of a toilet, a blonde girl with more make-up than sense began sneering at her.
Letitia locked eyes with the girl and pointed at herself. ‘Me? What did I ever do to you?’
But, she knew. Her dark skin tones marked her. Alien.
A midget-sized freckle-faced boy had sided with the blonde girl and together they made a formidable team ganging up against Letitia. She had never heard so much colourful language in her life, except perhaps when Jemima was asked to grow her shaved head of hair in Year 7 when she was thirteen. By 2017, in Mirror, shaved heads were the norm. Oh, that’s right! It’s not 2017, apparently; the date is sometime in January 1967. Letitia sighed and murmured to anyone near who would listen, ‘I didn’t realize how rude children can be, even in 1967.’
The evil duo were doing their worst to get a reaction out of her. She was almost embarrassed for them as they began cavorting before her, for her exclusive benefit with suggestive, rude gestures. Letitia thought, Are they for real? I cannot repeat what foul words are coming from their mouths.
The girl proceeded to hold up her cheap plastic camera, aiming it in Letitia’s general direction. Then she screeched, ‘Get out of my way! You’re ruining my picture!’ Followed by a barrage of insults aimed at Letitia.
The boy then raised his voice above the profanities. ‘Nice dress, Miss Fahrer, did you get it at an Op shop?’
‘What?’ Letitia glared at this menacing midget. ‘How did you know…’
The tart of a teenage girl minced up to her, still holding up the camera, and spat out the threat, ‘My mum’s going to get you for failing me in Science, Miss Fahrer!’
‘What? You must have the wrong person—I mean, teacher,’ she said. Me, teach science? Now that’s a joke!Or, is this what this world’s Letitia did? Teach bratty kids?
‘You can’t get out of it that easily!’ the boy sneered fiercely. ‘There’s only one Miss. F ‘n that’s you! ‘n you know it.’
‘They should sack you, Miss F. My mum is going to get you sacked for – for – for—how come youse are so dark?’ The girl bared her buck teeth as she poked Letitia’s shoulder. ‘Too much baby oil and suntanning, eh?’
‘Yeah, right,’ Letitia replied. ‘The sun’s strong down south in Tasmania.’
‘Yeah, sure,’ she snorted. ‘What give’s you the right to give me a detention for my skirt being too short? Huh?’
‘You’re just a perve!’ the cheeky boy added.
‘Yeah! Perve!’ the girl repeated. ‘And, what’s with the French accent? Why are you putting on a French accent? You sound so stupid!’
‘Er, I think you’ve mixed me up with someone else. I’ve never taught in my life.’ Letitia began to back away from this troublesome pair, searching for an escape.
A woman’s sharp voice stabbed Letitia verbally in the back. ‘That much is obvious.’
‘Yeah, I was just, just telling them, that they, that they have the wrong…’ Letitia turned and stammered to a grown up and more weathered version of the teenage vixen.
A cigarette hung precipitously from the stale yellow fingers, and the rotting plaque covered teeth ground angrily at her. ‘No, we have the right ‘un. My daughter worked bleeding ‘ard and what did you do? But fail ‘er!’ The woman with straw hair dark roots showing, jabbed the air with the cigarette butt and ash fell onto Letitia’s dress.
‘I’m very sorry for your daughter’s misfortune – but, but I – I mean – you’ve got the wrong person. I’m not a teacher. I never have been. I’ve been living in France.’
‘I’m goin’ to get you sacked! You’ll never teach again.’ The mother aged beyond her years to even be a mother of this teenage girl, hammered her fist at Letitia.
‘Fine. Go ahead. See if I care!’ Letitia replied and then darted past the wheezing woman. Before they could again accost her, she ducked through the nearest door, climbed several sets of stairs and raced along the narrow maze of cabin passages.
Finally, Letitia had found her cabin. After several nervous jabs at the hole with her key, she unlocked the door and bolted into her room. There she sat on the edge of the bunk in an effort to regroup her thoughts. She trembled. A rising sense of nausea overwhelmed her.
She rifled through her purse and popped a couple of travel-sickness pills Will had bought her at the local chemist in Devonport. Then she lay on the bed. The heat of the sun through the salt encrusted porthole made her stuffy and ill. She closed her eyes to ward off the urge for the complimentary paper bag.
[The continuation of the Survivor Short Story “project” in the War On Boris the Bytrode series. This time, back in time, 1967, following the adventures of middle-aged mum, Letitia…In this episode (6.2.2) while lunching in Launceston’s Cataract Gorge, Wilhelm and Letitia witness the harassment of peacocks.
Note: I have changed the character’s name from Will to Wilhelm to add an extra layer to this character’s personality and how in 1967, he had taken on all the airs and graces of a pseudo psychiatrist.
Just another indication that this reworked novel draft that had been marinating in the “drawer” for more than 10 years, is a rework in progress.]
Call Me Wilhelm
Wilhelm guided the steering wheel with one index finger. With his other, he conducted the orchestra playing Vivaldi, The Four Seasons, playing on the classical ABC Radio Station, thus masking the tape of his recent performance in his head.
While Frieda slept the previous night, Wilhelm had sidled up to the computer, switched it on, connected it to the IGSF satellite and then linked it to IGSF’s Admiral August Fahrer with face-to-face television-visual mode.
The Admiral reclined on a kangaroo-skin rug, eating a sausage in bread. In the background of the screen, Jemima, his granddaughter hunched over the flames of a modest fire.
‘You took your time there, Al,’ August said through a mouthful of bread.
‘It’s way past my bedtime, Wilhelm,’ Jemima grumbled. ‘Ten-o’clock! I hope you’ve been behaving yourself.’
Wilhelm rolled his eyes. ‘I have her. Your mum. You didn’t tell me she was such a whizz on the computer.’
Jemima laughed, ‘You didn’t ask. Better the less you know the better.’
‘Oh, and another thing,’ Wilhelm said, ‘My name’s Wil-helm, sir. Not…’
August smiled. ‘You’ll always be Al to me. Remember how we met?’
‘What? You mean your wife? Or me?’
‘No, you as Al. Remember I came home from war? And there you were, in my house. Everyone else had gone. Including my wife.’
‘What happened to your first wife, Grandpapa?’ Jemima asked.
‘Don’t ask,’ Wilhelm murmured.
‘She vanished into a parallel universe. Like our socks do, dear.’
Will rubbed his pounding temples. The snow of interference descended on August’s and Jemima’s images. Their voices distorted and muted. Wilhelm hammered the “enter” key, but the screen continued to fade.
Screaming added to the hammering in his brain. Wilhelm cradled his head in both hands and begged it to stop.
A small voice behind his ear wailed, ‘I’m right here!’
‘Go away! Leave me alone!’ he cried. Then rummaged in the medicine cabinet for the bottle of Valium.
[The continuation of the Survivor Short Story “project” in the War On Boris the Bytrode series. This time, back in time, 1967, following the adventures of middle-aged mum, Letitia…In this episode (6.2.1) while lunching in Launceston’s Cataract Gorge, Will and Letitia witness the harassment of peacocks.]
Pride and peacocks
The ensuing half hour whizzed past in a blur and soon they slowed and crawled through the weatherboard suburbs of Launceston. After travelling at the speed of Wilhelm’s light, they seemed to be standing still in the city. A massive rock wall loomed up beside the Aston Martin with only a thin strip of oncoming traffic between them and its rocky surface glistening with escaping subterranean water.
Wilhelm turned abruptly into a narrow road that squeezed through a gap in the rock and followed a creek embedded with lush eucalyptus green foliage to the concrete expanse that served as the park for cars. For all the recent minutes of agonising slowness, Wilhelm still managed to bring the car to a jerking halt. A stately structure towered before them.
Letitia carefully opened the door, mindful not to hit the gleaming chassis of a brown HR Holden Premier to her left. Wilhelm stood, key poised, waiting as she prised her body through the narrow gap left to get out of the car. Once she had nudged the door shut, Wilhelm twisted the key in the lock in the driver’s side door and all the doors locked with a satisfying click.
Letitia and Wilhelm watched the peacocks strut over the rolling green slopes as they supped on Wilhelm’s recommended Steak and chips. They admired the serene scenery and botanical beauty of the gorge and Letitia wished that she had time to traverse the suspension bridge. Wilhelm scorned the bus loads of tourists who littered the lawns, chased the peacocks with their Instamatic cameras, and swamped the gorge.
Wilhelm pointed at a pair of primary-school aged boys in Batman and Robin costumes. ‘Some parents have no control over their children.’
Letitia registered the avid foul harassment by a couple of cheeky boys clothed in red and armed with sticks. The cock darted to and fro and away from them, but the children remained in hot pursuit. The bird lurched in attack and fanned its magnificent plumage.
‘I wouldn’t get too close if I was them,’ Letitia muttered dryly. ‘You wouldn’t allow Johnny to get up to such mischief, would you, now, Dr. Thumm?’
Wilhelm pouted. ‘Of course not. I’ve never allowed my children to do such things.’
‘Children? Dr. Thumm?’
‘Pff! My patients, I mean.’ Wilhelm again blushed and then dismissed the naughty boy antics with a royal wave of his psychiatrist’s hand. ‘That’s nothing! I’ve had poo thrown at me by mad men, urinated upon by loonies, and exploded upon with blood and guts by constipated patients. This,’ he indicated with his pale doctor’s finger to the boys on the expanse of lawn, ‘is nothing! Why only the other day we had an illegal immigrant stowaway to Antarctica, escape from my very own hospital. Have you any idea how embarrassing that was for the management?’ Wilhelm’s knee bobbed up and down with agitation. ‘Parents have it easy, don’t they, Letitia?’
‘I suppose,’ Letitia replied, but kept wondering what Wilhelm must be hiding from his past.
‘I mean, you said you had a grown-up daughter. I’m sure, you didn’t allow her to chase after peacocks, did you, Letitia.’ Wilhelm swallowed the last dregs of coffee and wiped his upper lip with the back of his hand.
‘No,’ Letitia said, though remembering the time Jemima was abducted after answering an online dating ad. In an instant, boys poking a peacock seemed to pale into insignificance. How wrong I’ve been in my naivety of this time and universe. But Wilhelm what’s your story? I must ask my father when I catch up with him.
Lunch done, Wilhelm was desperate for Davenport. They had barely sucked down their concluding cup of tea, than this blonde lord of a doctor was eagerly paying the bill and hustling Letitia from the restaurant and herding her into the Aston Martin. Literally minutes later, before the steak and chips had digested, they were once again on the open road bouncing around in the cabin between fresh green hills as Wilhelm flew the car Davenport-wards.
‘Slow down, you are making me sick,’ Letitia cried.
But Wilhelm did not slow down. ‘We have a boat to catch,’ he said.
If Letitia had any idea what awaited her in Adelaide, she would have happily alighted, escaped to obscurity in the Southwestern wilderness and continued the pretence that she had expired in the South Pole. However, as the Aston Martin spirited them north-westwards, she was lulled into blissful complacency. After all, she missed Nathan. Missed her mother and father. Missed the challenge of another mission. Most of all, she missed her tranquil and complete life in Adelaide. And soon, out of time, she would miss out on the mystery surrounding Dr. Wilhelm Thumm.
She remembered her sister. Doris. Did she miss Doris? She didn’t miss the competition, that’s for sure. She murmured, ‘Doris, I wonder what became of Doris?’
Wilhelm chuckled, ‘Doris? Your sister is busy around the place tidying up your mess.’
‘My mess? What do you mean? I didn’t…’
‘Oh, you’re right. I guess, at the end of the day, your disappearance is down to Frieda.’ Wilhelm sniffed. ‘And you are aware that Gunter absconded? Straight into the arms of Boris, we believe.’
Letitia shook her head. ‘Now, there’s a surprise. Not.’
[The continuation of the Survivor Short Story “project” in the War On Boris the Bytrode series. This time, back in time, 1967, following the adventures of middle-aged mum, Letitia…In this episode (6.1), Wilhelm and Letitia begin their journey to Launceston in Will’s Aston Martin.]
Real-estate at Richmond
Letitia’s influence over the computer did not even last the night. The morning greeted her with barely four hours sleep, a hung-over and grumpy Wilhelm, his yacht bathed in an orange hue, and a computer in mutiny. The dream performance of yester-noon, was replaced by abject refusal to work. Clarke, the computer had downed tools, gone on strike, and short of blowing up in a puff of smoke, plainly refused to go.
After conceding that moronic model was a “lemon”, Wilhelm made a hasty trip home to settle a seedy and rather irate Frieda. Then, by mid-morning Wilhelm and Letitia could be seen, at speed in the Aston Martin, clipping across the vast dry plains of Eastern Tasmania, heading northwards to Devonport. Plans had been hastily altered and tickets for the ferry purchased through a very obliging travel agent friend of Wilhelm’s. For some reason, Wilhelm had been reluctant to sail the vessel without a functioning computer. And then, for some unexplained reason for which Letitia was most grateful, Wilhelm preferred to drive to Devonport rather than fly. Even though, he risked the ire of his wife who currently accused him of neglect while she was so poorly. Letitia asked no questions. After her not so distant altercation in such a craft, she had had enough of aeroplanes.
Morning tea and the pair who appeared as mother and son, picnicked on the banks of a river that accommodated the oldest bridge in Tasmania, if not Australia. Letitia admired the family of ducks that possessed this sloped grassy land, while Wilhelm wandered off to investigate some prospective investment property.
‘Real estate, that’s where it’s at.’ Wilhelm upon his return from wandering remarked. He unscrewed the lid from the thermos in the picnic basket and poured steaming coffee into two waiting metal cups. He then held up a tube of condensed milk. ‘Milk?’
Letitia nodded and Wilhelm squeezed a dose into her cup.
Chuckling Letitia remarked, ‘The ducks look as though they already own the bridge from the dawn of Tasmanian history.’
Wilhelm plonked himself down on the tartan blanket placed on the grassy slope and briskly shuffled through the recent acquisition of colourful real estate flyers. He admired his property prospects while Letitia silently sipped her morning coffee. Every so often he would mutter, ‘Hmm! Richmond. Now there’s a good investment.’
The ducks had waddled under the shadow of the bridge and disappeared. The coffee also vanished slowly consumed in the comfort of the mid-morning Richmond sun. Letitia was being lulled into a false sense of forgetfulness. Perhaps, she reasoned, nothing else mattered but basking in the sun on a grassy slope admiring an old stone bridge.
‘Where did you say your house was, Letitia?’ Wilhelm interrupted her dreaming.
Letitia looked up and frowned. ‘On Mirror? Or before? When I lived with Mum and Dad.’
Wilhelm blinked. ‘Before, I suppose. Before you went missing on us.’
‘Sydney, near Bondi,’ she said, ‘the house was walking distance to a park where the lion statues were.’
‘Sydney, ah, yes, of course.’
‘Your father came from a village in the Black Forest, though.’
‘Hmm, yes, I know. A long time ago. But my mother, Gertrude, came from Adelaide. He met her there in the Botanical Gardens, after the war.’
Wilhelm turned from his coffee drinking and studied Letitia. ‘Are you that old? I mean, you look older than I remember you, but…’
‘No, yes, actually, I was born 1935, technically…But I lived on Mirror twenty-six years. I have a daughter who is all grown up…’
Wilhelm sniffed and nodded. ‘Oh, yes, that makes sense, now. And then you travelled back in…’
‘Time.’ Letitia concluded. ‘It seems, unless this is an alternate…’ then as if to steer the direction of the conversation, she asked, ‘Did you know my father? August?’
Wilhelm blushed and mumbled, ‘Hmmm, yes, quite well, actually.’
Letitia noted the reaction. Her eyes widened. ‘Really? So what’s your story, Doctor Thumm?’
Wilhelm rose and stretched. ‘Well, must be getting on. Must be in Launceston for lunch. There’s a lovely little café in Cataract Gorge I want you to try.’
That was awkward, Letitia thought. With the picnic basket hooked over her elbow she followed him. His avoidance on the subject intrigued her.
As they left the picnic place, the ducks emerged from under the sheltered darkness of the bridge to possess the river reeds and banks of lawn.
[The continuation of the Survivor Short Story “project” in the War On Boris the Bytrode series. This time, back in time, 1967, following the adventures of middle-aged mum, Letitia…
In this episode (5.4) Celebration as Letitia fixes the computer… But is it all just a bit too easy?]
A Computer Called Clarke
Part 4
In the spacious cabin, spacious for a yacht that is, which Wilhelm had dubbed the “Phone box” as it appeared larger on the inside than it seemed on the outside, the computer blinked, goading Letitia. The inane IGSF symbol menaced the screen a touch longer than it ought to. Letitia shuddered. She had never contended with a computer of this particular vintage.
When she first arrived in the Mirror Universe of 1986, she had toyed with a Commodore computer, a deceptively simple machine Frieda had given her to play games of story puzzles and space invaders; a sort of easing into the digital world. The computers on the Mother Ship had admittedly been constructed centuries ago and modified by a computer engineer named Clarke and his protégé, John, Frieda’s son. But on Mirror, by 2015, the prevailing Mirror Computer monopoly had been dismantled and thrown to the four or more existing richest multinationals to encourage competition. It had long been established that Mirrorsoft Works (as it was known on Mirror World) was a conundrum, an irony, as in most cases the system did not work. The same problems seemed to be manifesting with the IGSF programming in 1967. Had Boris hacked into the system and sabotaged it?
She fiddled around the edges of the system wishing that she could get her mind grafted into it and pretend that she had her head around the problem at hand. Meanwhile Wilhelm disappeared to the deck for the purpose of tightening ropes and fixing sails ready to sail. His parting words to her before rising to the deck were, ‘We acquired this computer six months ago, it was state of the art, it had all the bells and whistles, how could it? I can’t understand how it could break down like this.’
‘Boris, I reckon,’ she mumbled to the obnoxious piece of useless circuitry and the screen that stared back at her, blank and prehistoric. There it was, that stupid blue screen and mindless blathering of words and formulas scrawled across the window.
‘Fatal error!’ she exclaimed. ‘I haven’t seen anything so ridiculous in all my years of programming and managing Mirror’s networks. Oh, what’s this sinister box announcing that I have made a “fatal error” and that the computer must shut down immediately and all my information lost? If the threat wasn’t so ridiculous, it would be pathetic. Wilhelm, my friend, you have been ripped off. You have a lemon!’
Once more, she glared at the blue screen of death. ‘Probably is sabotage by Boris.’ She hurled her hands in the air. ‘Wipe it out and start again. That’s all I can do,’ she hissed at the screen spraying droplets over the LCD screen.
‘How are you going there?’ Wilhelm poked his head down the ladder from above.
‘Do you mind if I wipe everything out and start again?’ Letitia scoffed as she dabbed the screen with a tissue.
‘Yeah, that’s alright,’ Wilhelm replied. ‘Go ahead, if that solves the problem.’
A pale blue Cradle Mountain and cartoon caricatures of icons winked at her, daring her to programme them out of existence. She began the process. Pressed “start”, clicked “control panel” and paused to begin the road to computer condemnation.
With finger poised over the delete key, she breathed, ‘Say your prayers, Clarke!’ Then, she remembered. Always save data, files…anything. While this archaic monstrosity had some glimmer of life in it, she must endeavour to save what she could. She fished out a USB stick stored in the tin box below the screen. In the side of Clarke’s box-like body, a quartet of receptacles where these vintage sticks could be plugged. She again paused the execution process.
‘Will, have you saved all your data?’ she asked.
‘Save? Save? Do I have to save something?’ Wilhelm called from above through the floorboards.
‘Um, I’m just wondering if it isn’t a good idea – I don’t think I would have time to programme it all back in. It’s like spaghetti code,’ she said trying to sound as in control as possible. After the computer had consumed the whole morning, Letitia was ready to eat this computer like pasta.
Wilhelm’s voice floated in from above. ‘Can those little sticky things I have in the tin box, will they be able to hold all the information?’
‘Only one way to find out.’
Letitia examined the tube. She pulled off the top and matched the probe to the plug on the box that held the menacing machine and proceeded to insert the device into the slot. ‘Do not crash! Do not crash!’ she commanded the computer as a mantra. It seemed to work. The computer obeyed and did not crash.
Several more hours dragged by. Saving. Wiping. Back to factory settings. And then finally, loading the multitudes of programmes back onto the device. She had discovered that to a certain extent she had picked up all the old IGSF computer system’s quirks and nuances. The basics of Clarke’s system were not vastly different from what she had managed on Mirror and was able to adapt to working and wrestling with this computer. Perhaps in hindsight, she should have been suspicious that she had become so adept controlling this yacht’s computer in such a short amount of time, but in the moment, it was an enemy that had to be subdued. After all, the system she had managed on Mirror, had been designed and run essentially, by Boris.
By four o’clock in the afternoon, with sweat dripping from Letitia’s forehead and soaking her back, she presented Wilhelm with a computer, baptised, cleansed from any Boris-contamination, and reborn to be fully IGSF-functional.
Wilhelm marvelled at the speedy IGSF satellite connection and lightning-fast processing.
Letitia mentioned in passing, ‘Oh, by the way, Clarke does not like the heat.’
‘You speak as if the computer is a person.’ Wilhelm remarked with mock surprise as he viewed a satellite image of Melbourne.
‘But, Wilhelm, he is,’ Letitia jested with only half her tongue in her cheek. She did not share with Wilhelm that she had put some of her mind and soul into the very core of the computer’s hard drive to stabilise it from further Boris attacks, and to cause it to run more efficiently. She wasn’t going to divulge to Wilhelm that she had ordered the computer to obey only her and Will’s command. After all, in Wilhelm’s early twentieth-century mind, computers were merely machines. She did not want to spoil for Will or anyone else in this time and place, any illusion that they were not.
***
Upon the triumph of Letitia over the computer, they spent one last night on shore celebrating. Wilhelm invited Letitia to join him for a function at the Cascade Brewery. Wilhelm was immensely popular and there was always a party in need of his presence. In that way, John, as Letitia remembered Mirror John, and Wilhelm were similar. The apple doesn’t fall far from the tree, Letitia mused as she watched Wilhelm entertain the other guests with his exploits as head psychiatrist at the Royal Hobart Hospital. Another old adage surfaced to describe both John and Wilhelm. She smiled remembering, You can’t have a party without them. After all, John is Wilhelm’s son on this Earth as well as Mirror World.
A different story for Frieda, though. Her absence was fobbed off as “not well”, “migraine” and actually, trouble finding a babysitter for Johnny. Although Wilhelm had confided in her that Frieda had been rather tired and sick in the mornings lately…
‘Here’s to Letitia, the Legend,’ Wilhelm toasted Letitia as they stood by the nineteenth century sculptured fountain in the middle of the lush green lawn.
‘Hmm!’ Letitia raised her glass of claret. If they only knew, she thought. If this is real Earth, my Earth in 1967, if only they knew what the next fifty years have in store for them…
Over by the wall of window that spanned one side of the historic building, Wilhelm entertained the cluster of elites from the hospital. They seemed perfectly at ease, perfectly comfortable in their space, time, and important positions. It was as if the plane crash in Antarctica had never happened; as if there were no terrorists; as if there never had been nor will be any nuclear attacks. As if Boris himself was null and void.
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