The Lunatic Messiah

by Simon Cutting

  New Zealand has launched a nuclear attack against the state of Victoria, destroying most of the inner suburbs of Melbourne, following a trade dispute between the two nations. Although the death toll is well over two million people, the New Zealand Prime Minister, Helen Clarke, today released a statement saying that she hoped that the dispute wouldn't interfere with the upcoming test match at the remains of the MCG.

  Joe folded his paper and put in his lap. It was hard enough to read anything recently. It was frustrating because what he was reading clearly wasn't true, and yet on the one occasion when he had commented on it to a neighbour on the bus, they had responded as if the story was perfectly reasonable, which made Joe suspect that his neighbour was little more than another hallucination. Despite his deteriorating mental state, he seemed to have placated Mary enough for her to allow him to continue going to work. When he arrived and placed his briefcase on the table, there was a quiet knock at the door almost immediately. He knew who it was before he opened it and feigned surprise when he saw Harry standing there.

  'Harry! Just the man I wanted to see!'

  'Why?'

  'So I could do this!'

  Joe slammed the door in Harry's face with an incredible amount of delight. He felt a surge of adrenalin, or liberation. Sitting down behind his desk he opened the briefcase and looked through his notes for the upcoming tutorial. He had given several since beginning his work on the guillotine, and there were some occasions when it actually looked like people were paying attention. Gabriel complained still, and fixed him with her fiery gaze of truth, but even that was becoming easier to take, and Harry had taken several of his lectures and tutorials when he'd failed to turn up or called in sick. There was another tapping at the door, even quieter than the first time, but Joe didn't respond to it. Harry tapped again, this time entering without waiting for a response. He looked sheepish, but also slightly scared of how Joe might react to his presence. There was a lot of that these days, Joe had noticed. Normally handsome, right then Harry just looked old.

  'Joe, we need to talk.'

  'True, Harry, we do. It's what got civilisation where it is today. Fire, the wheel and language. Everything stemmed from those three discoveries. Well spotted, old chap. I guess that's why you're the Faculty Head!'

  Confusion flickered across Harry's face momentarily.

  'No, Joe, we need to talk about you.'

  'I'm sure you and Mary can discuss my problems over a post-coital cigarette. Right now, as you're so fond of reminding me, I'm going to be late for a class.'

  'Joe, please don't start this again. I know you've been avoiding me. We've barely spoken in a week, and I know it's because you think I'm having an affair with Mary, but what the hell do I have to do to convince you I'm not?'

  'The only thing you could plausibly do is alter the fabric of reality so that you're not having an affair with Mary. You see, Harry, because you are, there is nothing else that's going to convince me.'

  Harry threw up his hands in exasperation.

  'I don't know what to say to you, Joe. I came in here because I wanted to warn you and all you've done is throw it back in my face with these ridiculous accusations. You're sick, Joe. You know you have a tumour, so why is it so hard for you to believe that I'm telling the truth? Mary said you've been having hallucinations, and denying it as well.'

  'So when were you talking to Mary?'

  Harry let out a cry, a sound of pure frustration, in such a distilled form that only one or two drops were required to flavour the whole person.

  'I talk to her every few days, Joe. About you. I call her and ask if there's anything I can do to help out because we’re friends and I care about your welfare. You're on the edge right now, and I'm the only person who's trying to pull you back. There's been complaints about you. From your students.'

  'From Gabriel Armaita...'

  'It doesn't matter who from, and it's not just one person either. The point is, the Chancellor is starting to take them seriously. You need to be careful. Better still, you need to not be here. Take some time off. Go on a holiday with Mary. Something, before you lose everything.'

  'In four months, I'll be dead, Harry. I lose everything no matter what.'

  Harry went quiet. People always went quiet at the mention of death because it was still a taboo.

  'Then you can have her all to yourself,' added Joe viciously.

  Harry glared at him sadly, a hard thing to do, as sympathy and anger are not compatible emotions, but to Harry's credit he managed it. He glanced at his watch.

  'Fine, Joe. I tried. I'm sorry you're dying, but that's the way it is. Don't make Mary suffer. You've got a tutorial to get to.'

  'I appreciate your punctuality, Harry. Thank you.'

  Harry turned to go and Joe sighed.

  'Okay, look. Why don't you come out to dinner tonight? We haven't seen you in a while.'

  Harry looked doubtful.

  'Best behaviour. I promise. Bring a date if you've got one.'

  Harry still looked doubtful but he nodded at the idea.

  'I have a date.'

  'I knew you would. What's this, the fifth girl this year?'

  'Sixth,' replied Harry.

  'Of course. Well, we'll see you at seven o'clock at Ganesh.'

  'Indian again? You must really hate your bowels to punish them so much. But I'll be there.'

  'Before you say anything, Gabriel, I would like to point out that I have three seconds before the tutorial is due to start, so if you would please stop looking at your watch, I would greatly appreciate it.'

  Gabriel, the menacing light completely absent from her face for the time being, looked like nothing more than a bratty over-achiever. The rest of the class was in attendance as usual. John Smith and Richard Jones were looking at him blankly, their indifference compounded by Joe's indifference to them. Tess and Leah were chatting about a message on Leah's phone, and from the brief few words that Joe had picked up as he entered the room it was something about 'that stupid slut' and Leah being 'so totally over' somebody. They went quiet as he entered the room. All five students were staring at him quite serenely and they reminded him of nothing more than bored cows, chewing at the cuds of their immediate needs and waiting for the slaughterhouse.

  'So where was Harry... Mr Tudor, up to?'

  Joe looked expectantly at Gabriel, knowing that she would be the only one who would even think to offer a response.

  'He's taken us through a lot more than you have. We've finished Joyce and moved on to Hesse.'

  'Ah yes. A banal literary tour through the most famous and therefore best writers in history. "Steppenwolf", I presume?'

  'We were discussing the rationale behind the Steppenwolf's actions. The fact that a man over the edge of sanity would still attempt to make a show of normality, despite the fact that it's perfectly clear he has lost his mind.'

  Joe smiled at the comment and at Gabriel's challenging stare, but the rest of the students didn't seem to notice the true nature of the remark. They continued to chew their cuds as their eyes glazed over.

  'Well thank you for that thinly veiled verbal assault, Gabriel. Does anybody have anything to add? Anybody at all? John?'

  John's eyes widened momentarily in panic but he shook his head vigorously.

  'You have nothing at all to add? You did read the book, didn't you, John?'

  John transformed instantaneously from a cow in the field to a deer in the headlights which was a more lively expression than his wooden features seemed capable of.

  'I did...' he stammered.

  'Then may I ask you what your thoughts are?'

  'My thoughts?'

  'Yes, John, your thoughts. You must have had one or two in your life. I'm asking for an opinion. There's no wrong answer. Just tell me how you would interpret the text.'

  'Interpret?' John echoed, hurriedly opening up his notebook and flicking through it, desperately searching for the combination of words that would make Joe and the three girls stop
staring at him. He knew that there was something he could say that would divert attention, but Joe could see that he was incapable of working out what it was. Gabriel snorted derisively.

  'Why are you picking on him, anyway? You haven't been here for the last three tutorials. What gives you the right to come in here and start demanding answers now?'

  'This is my class, Gabriel. It's not my right, it's my job.'

  'Well it shouldn't be. You have emotional trauma and Mr Tudor is more than capable of taking this class.'

  'God! You are just like your father,' Joe said, recalling Harry's warning of complaints about him and feeling the bile rising in his throat.

  'My father? What do you know about my father?'

  'I know that he couldn't be more self-assured about his opinions if he found them carved in stone at the top of a mountain. So tell me, Gabriel, what are you trying to say about me?'

  'I'm saying that you are no longer in charge of your faculties...'

  'And Harry is in control of the faculty? Is that some sort of pun, Gabriel? Are you punning me you pun-filled little punt?' shouted Joe, so viciously that it surprised even him.

  Gabriel gripped her desk tightly in alarm as Joe took an angry step towards her. John Smith simply looked happy to no longer be the centre of attention.

  'Calm down, Mr Finch,' said Leah hesitantly.

  'Don't tell me to calm down, Leah. I don't need some vacuous fashion-obsessed slut telling me to calm down.'

  Leah looked stung for a moment but then she got a spark to her and pounced back.

  'Fuck you!'

  'That's the best you can do? For somebody who spends all her time talking I would have thought that you could come up with something better than that. Or are you not so verbose in your social life? That's understandable. I'm sure it's difficult to talk with a drunk stranger's cock in your mouth, but I expect a higher quality of profanity in this classroom. Have I taught you nothing at all?'

  'Not recently...' muttered Gabriel under her breath, but it was Leah who still demanded attention.

  'You know what? I'm glad you're going to die. You're a horrible person and you deserve everything that happens to you.'

  Joe smiled.

  'That’s better.'

  John and Richard had begun to retreat into themselves at the start of the conflict, and now looked like turtles, their necks having been completely absorbed into their bodies. There was fear on both their faces, but Joe was having trouble telling which one was which. He glanced down at the class list on the desk to try and prompt some kind of memory, but his eye was caught by the sixth name on the list. The student that had never once shown up to a tutorial. Mohammed Ashhab.

  'You think you're so...' Leah was ranting, but Joe didn't hear what she was saying.

  Mohammed Ashhab. He looked back up to the class. Gabriel was writing ferociously on her notepad, presumably taking down every word he said as evidence for whatever tribunal she envisaged for the future, and Leah was still ranting at him with Tess throwing her own derogatory comments in at random intervals in support of her friend.

  'Who's Mohammed Ashhab?' he said suddenly, cutting Leah off mid-sentence.

  'What?'

  'Mohammed Ashhab? He's supposed to be in this tutorial. Do any of you know him from another subject? He's been on the list since the start of the semester. Who is he?'

  'I've never heard of him,' replied Leah, thrown off her stride by the random nature of the question.

  'Gabriel? Who is he?'

  Gabriel stopped writing and placed her pen down carefully in front of her, making sure it was parallel to the pad.

  'I want you to know that I've been taking note of everything you've said...'

  'I'm aware of that. Just tell me who Mohammed Ashhab is.'

  'I've never heard of him. Perhaps he dropped out and never came here at all.'

  She looked smug. Gabriel always looked so smug, like her father. When she looked at him now, the searing white light was beginning to dance around the centre of her pupils. It was growing slowly outwards as he watched.

  'I can see through your lies, Gabriel! You know things. You must know. You've got the light! You know the truth. You told me about the tumour. I could still feel the truth that night. That's how I knew about Harry and Mary. I just knew...'

  'The light?'

  Joe advanced on her table, unable to tear his eyes away from hers. The light was growing stronger now. It completely filled her eyes and was beginning to leak across the soft line of her cheek. Joe swallowed his bile as he stared at her. She was beautiful.

  'Tell me...' he pleaded, 'I need to know...'

  'Mr Finch!'

  Gabriel had stood up and was backing away from him, her hands crossed in front of her chest, holding her notepad close to her as a shield.

  'What's your boyfriend's name?'

  'My boyfriend?'

  'What's his name? The student activist. I met him outside the bank. It's Mohammed, isn't it?

  Gabriel was still backing away. The light of truth was fading from her eyes the more scared she became, and Joe desperately tried to keep it alight. It was like the embers of a fire, and if he could just give them enough fuel they would ignite again and give him all the answers. Such beautiful eyes.

  'Tell me! Who is he? Why is he in my head?'

  'I don't have a boyfriend. It would interfere with my studies!'

  'That's not why you don't have a boyfriend...' muttered Leah, but Gabriel was too fixated on Joe to respond.

  'Who was that boy outside the bank? Why did he say he was your boyfriend? Tell me, you bitch!'

  Joe lunged forwards but felt himself grabbed from behind. Strong arms grabbed both of his shoulders. It was John Smith and Richard Jones. Something had finally stirred them from their deep academic slumber and they had grabbed him. Gabriel walked quickly from the room backwards, afraid to take her eyes off Joe in case he made another lunge at her.

  'You're fucking crazy!' she screamed as she left, and then turned and fled down the corridor.

  The bland boys still had their arms on either side of him, but Joe could feel the urge for truth disappearing. It had left the room with Gabriel, attached to her and trailing away, becoming thinner and thinner until it finally snapped and left him feeling empty.

  'It's okay, boys. You can let go of me.'

  They seemed uncertain, and looked to Tess and Leah for confirmation. Both of the girls stood up simultaneously and walked towards the door, fearfully defiant and with a terrified confidence. Leah stopped just before leaving.

  'You know you're going to hell, right?'

  'I'm already there, Leah,’ Joe replied.

  Leah just shook her head, but he registered a brief moment of sympathy on Tess' face. A sad moment of pity for a crazy old man. The girls left the room and once the door was safely shut, the bland boys released him.

  'Thanks, boys. I didn't realise either one of you had it in you, but you did a good thing. Now get out of here before my head explodes.'

  It was the same feeling as the night before, when he had tried so hard to keep his focus on Mary, but had found it increasingly difficult to stop her from flying away towards the edge of the galaxy. The two boys were, like her, flung out of the door at speed and disappeared into the oblivion of bricks and mortar that made up Finchwood.

  Joe wasn't sure how long he had been sitting with his head in his hands, but it felt like an eternity. Eventually the deafening silence in his head was broken by a tentative tapping at the door. At first he thought he'd imagined it, but then the door opened to reveal the Chancellor of Finchwood, Paul Torres. Paul was a small man, who still wore tweed suits for some unfathomable reason, and apparently still used generous amounts of gel to keep his hair in a perfect side part. Joe hadn't had too many dealings with the man since being hired. One of the main reasons he’d allowed Harry to take the role of Faculty Head was to avoid contact with the Chancellor as much as possible. Paul looked at him nervously now, clutching a hand
ful of papers in his hands. Paul had been scared of Joe since the first day he'd met him, but now he looked absolutely terrified.

  'Joe, may I have a word?' he said softly, as if worried that Joe might try to bite his head off and drink his blood in an orgiastic ritual of death at any moment.

  Joe nodded, rolling his hand in a magnanimous gesture to signify that Paul could enter the room.

  'Are you feeling okay?'

  'I've felt better. Listen, Paul, I know what you're going to say and I can assure you...'

  'Actually, Joe,' interrupted the Chancellor, 'I'm not sure that you do. There's been some complaints against you.'

  'That is what I thought you were going to say.'

  Paul's cheeks flushed a bright red and he actually hiccupped. He had the look of a teenage boy asking out the girl across the street, despite being sixty four years old.

  'There's a list here,' he said, offering a piece of paper to Joe, 'which details the complaints. Continued lateness, erratic behaviour, deviating from the set syllabus...'

  Joe sat up, removing his hands from his face and ignoring to paper that was offered to him. There were red marks on his forehead from where his hands had been resting.

  'Paul, you know Gabriel Armaita as well as I do. She's always been a difficult...'

  'This is not just a problem student and you know it,' Paul said, looking intently at Joe to gauge his reaction, apparently worried that he might leap across the table and try and pull his spinal cord out through his chest.

  'These complaints come from all five of the students in your European Literature tutorial, and today's incident is the worst of all. Attempted assault, verbal abuse. I mean, how am I supposed to take this?'

  'With a grain of salt.'

  'Two of your male students had to restrain you! I can't just ignore something like that. Now I realise your... situation and I know that it must be difficult, which is why I've made some allowances for you at Harry Tudor's request, but I really don't see how I can sweep this under the rug. This is a seat of learning.'

  'Well a seat is inevitably filled by a variety of arses, which is exactly what has happened in this case. They're students, Paul. It's my word against theirs,’ Joe said.

  'It's not that simple. There's talk of suing Finchwood. As the Chancellor, it is my duty to protect this institution from exactly this sort of bad press.'

  'Suing? That's fine, Paul. Really. They can have a big fat lawgasm all over my face if they want but it doesn't change the fact that I've done nothing wrong. Who are you going to believe?'

  Paul had a pained expression on his face, and he rubbed his hands together nervously. He glanced once more at the list of complaints and then placed it in front of Joe on the desk.

  'In view of recent events, I have to side with the students,' he said, backing away almost imperceptibly as he said it.

  Joe didn't say anything for a while and simply stared at the piece of paper. Everything on it was true, but what it didn't say was that he was provoked. Gabriel was not what she appeared to be. She was some kind of creature in disguise, sent to torment him. Somehow, Joe didn't think that explaining this to the Chancellor would help his case at all.

  'Fine. What do you suggest?'

  Paul had not expected the reaction. He had been ready for anger, a torrent of verbal abuse of the kind detailed in the complaint. This calm acceptance confused him. He felt like a naked man holding a newspaper on his front lawn just as he hears the front door slam shut.

  'Well?' prompted Joe.

  'Ahem. Well, I have some forms here that I need you to sign.'

  'Right. And what are they?'

  'They're... assurances. Just some legal stuff to assure the complainants that the matter has been dealt with. We need three copies. One for us, one for the lawyers and one for the complainants.'

  Paul handed him the forms and Joe looked them over. It had some legal language book ending it, but it was, in effect, a notice of termination.

  'You want me to resign?'

  Paul shook his head.

  'I'm afraid it's beyond that. I have to... that is to say... you're fired.'

  Joe felt his heart skip a beat. He had been prepared for this, but it was still a shock to hear it coming from the tiny figure of Paul Torres.

  'You need three copies of this? I'll tell you what, why don't you take these back to the complainants and tell them they can go fuck all three copies of their assurances. A ménage à triplicate.'

  'Joe, it's out of my hands.'

  Joe got to his feet.

  'It's fine. You can fire me, but I am not going to sign those forms, so you can just forget about it. Now get out while I pack up my stuff.'

  The Chancellor looked at him uncertainly.

  'Get out!' screamed Joe, and Paul jumped back and then fled from the room, looking over his shoulder as he left, scared that Joe might fire a nail gun into his retreating rectum.

  After he had gone, Joe calmly packed his notes back into his briefcase. It was only to be expected. He had gone too far. He had crossed the line and now he had paid the price with his job. It didn't matter that he had only told the truth. People didn't care about the truth. In fact, most people spent the majority of their lives trying to avoid it. They dug little bunkers to live in where the truth couldn't reach them. The truth that their government was corrupt and that human rights abuses were happening right under their noses. The truth that corporate culture was exploiting the poor to make the products that they purchased or that their children were selfish, worthless individuals. Most commonly of all they ignored the truth that they were unhappy.

  That they were desperately, tragically, unhappy.

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