“But that life sucked!”
“Indeed it did,” agreed God readily, “but if you are do to for me what I have asked, then it is the life from which it must be done.”
“Fine,” he acquiesced sullenly, “but if I am going to do what you have asked, then there is one thing that I want you to answer for me.”
“Shoot.”
“What is the meaning behind…”
“Life, the universe, and everything,” God interrupted.
“Tie clips,” he finished dramatically.
“Oh,” said God slightly taken aback for someone who is omniscient, “they clip your tie to your shirt.”
“Okay,” he agreed slowly nodding, “and could these so called tie clips, ever be worn if say, I happened not to be wearing any tie?”
“No.”
“Fine, thought not,” lied Pete.
“Anything else?”
“No, no, I think that’s everything.”
“Not quite everything,” said God cryptically.
“What do you mean? I’ve done everything you’ve asked.”
“You have young Pete,” agreed the Lord, “and for that I am eternally grateful. My remaining cause for concern is what you could end up doing were I to return you to your planet as you are.”
“Oh that’s easy,” he replied instantly “sell my story of course, I’m going to be rich!”
“And as important as that certainly is for you, I’m afraid it’s something which I simply cannot allow. If I were to wake up the next day to the headlines of “man travels the galaxies with pirate radio station, is killed dead multiple times, and manages to meet the Lord God Almighty” then what do you think that might do to my image?”
“Erm,” thought Pete hard.
“Nothing at all,” God answered, “on the other hand, what it could do to your image might be catastrophic, and for the quest I have tasked you with, this is simply not permissible.”
“So I can’t sell my story?”
“Yes, though I think I will sleep a little sounder knowing that you won’t sell your story, because there isn’t actually any story to sell in the first place.”
“But there is,” argued Pete.
“And now there isn’t,” replied God, jumping down from his hand.
Pete stood in front of the Lord and felt all of his memories of Renegade TM fall away. It was as though everything that had happened to him since the Co-leen had selected him as the earth’s representative, was but a dream within a dream. He felt like a candyfloss stick which had had all the rosy sugary goodness bitten away in one fell swoop by some fat kid who swallowed before chewing. Every single event since he had left his home planet had now been deleted from his memory, and everything he had since become, was yet again but a pipedream.
“Goodbye Pete,” said God, “and thanks again.”
“Wow a talking spider!”
And Pete vanished.
As he felt himself fall through time and space, Pete imagined that he was a slice of toast spinning gracefully through infinity. He imagined that the star-like lights he could perceive faintly if he focused hard enough, represented the sky, and as he tumbled through the vortex he then likened his ability to perceive them as if it was the butter side up. On and on he fell, and his understanding of time became like a child’s grip on superstring theory. On and on he fell, butter side up, butter side down, butter side up, butter side down.
59.
Pete fell backwards from the top wall of the Sutton car park, landing humorously on his coccyx. He had failed to take his own life and complete the suicide attempt that would end his apocalyptic day from hell. So far today he had lost his job, then his girlfriend, then his home, and he had just watched his Nissan micro explode without motive before his very eyes. As he lay there in a recently created puddle, staring up at the mocking, fancy free clouds, he made a promise to himself, that before the sun had set, he would be no more on this earth.
He raised himself from his wet embrace and made his way up onto the car park wall again. He then paused to consider the complexity of the dive he might perform. Would he back flip elegantly from the ledge whilst bidding adieu to the universe with a sonnet that would make Shakespeare green, or perhaps pirouette to his death in an austere silence that would rival that of any mute monk. Finally he decided on a belly flop, landing with a squelch outside a popular coffee chain, (that might raise an eyebrow or two above the rim of a laptop screen). As he stood there counting down from ten in his made-up mind, a man greeted him:
“Hello.”
Pete stalled and looked over to where the voice had originated from. A fabulously well-dressed gentlemen with his son in hand stood there, evidently waiting for his response. Perhaps he had thought that witnessing a suicide jump, was not in fact the most appropriate event that a young boy should have to observe on an idle Tuesday, and one which would prove difficult to imbue with an educational lesson for his boy, such as “this man is taking his own life, when it is actually life which is his to take” or maybe “see, like Daddy taught you at the swimming pool, hands and feet together before you dive in.” Neither of these would rightly cut it. Either way, he was now involved and would have to respond to this man in the time accustomed manner.
“Hello,” he replied.
“Can I ask,” the man began, “are you intending to jump?”
“Erm,” thought Pete, trying to imagine a more positive spin, “yes, good eh?”
“No, not really.”
“What can I do for you?” Pete asked, trying to lead events back on course.
“I was wondering,” he replied, “do I need to pay now, or when I return?”
Pete looked down at his shirt, and having failed to discover a Car Park Attendant badge located on it, responded in what he considered a measure tone:
“Listen you idiot, does it look like a give a fig about your parking problems?!”
“No need to be rude,” said the man, before addressing his son, “some people are just born ignorant.”
“Ignorant of the right way to pay in a car park?!” he shouted back, unable to let the slight go.
“I was talking about you, not to you.”
“Well then, you’re obviously a moron, don’t you agree Pete? Indeed I do, indubitably.”
“Sticks and stones,” replied the man.
“Daddy,” began the boy, “is that man going to jump yet?”
“Yes son, I think he is,” replied the man, before addressing Pete, “are you going to jump now?”
“I may do, what’s it got to do with you anyway?!”
“Oh it’s just I have this wager with my son.”
“What wager?” asked Pete, growing steadily more perturbed.
“My son is of the opinion that as you jump, a giant eagle will swoop down, grab you by its talons, and then fly you away on some epic avian adventure.”
“And you?”
“I think you’ll land with a splat outside Starbucks.”
“Right,” said Pete, alarmed at the casualness of it all “and what do you have wagered on it? “
“Just a sportsmen bet,” he replied, “I do not condone gambling.”
“But watching a man commit suicide is okay,” Pete mumbled to himself.
“Sorry, what?”
“Was there anything else?” asked Pete, eager to crack on.
“Perhaps,” said the man, lighting a cigarette, “can you tell me why you want to end your life?”
Pete almost wished now that he did in fact work at the car park, and was able to have answered his parking ticket question, and then ushered them on their way. Instead, it looked like he was now involved, and would have to justify his suicide bid to two complete strangers, strangers who considered it entirely appropriate to make wagers on the morbid outcome of what happens when a man jumps off the top floor of a multi-storey car park. Composing himself, he considered the most measured way he could frame his response, and answered:
“Listen buddy,
I don’t see how it’s any of your business, but if you must know, I am committing suicide today because the negative factors of my life have now become more abundant and prominent than the positive ones. Okay?!”
“I see,” replied the man, blowing a smoke ring, “and your considered solution to your current state of affairs is not to address any of the problems themselves, but instead, end the current state of affairs, and the possibility of any more future ones, come to think of it?”
“Exactly.”
“And you don’t think that your solution might be a little harsh?”
“Life is harsh,” replied Pete despondently.
“Ah, c’est la vie mon amie!” declared the man, adjusting his beret.
“Sorry what?”
“It’s not that life is harsh,” explained the man, “life is just life, it’s what we make of it that counts. If you decide to end your life, then you end the possibility to make it better altogether.”
“So?”
“Can I ask you Pete, what do you dislike about your life?”
“I’m unemployed, my ex-girlfriend is a psycho, and it just feels like I’m not going anywhere!” he answered without thinking.
Listening to himself say these words, Pete underwent a profound transformation. All along he had thought that he was going to end his life because he had become trapped by the day’s events. He had been sacked from his job and imagined that he would been thrown out and left for dead on the scrapheap of the unemployed, he had lost his girlfriend and envisaged a lonely future of singledom and microwaveable meals for one, and he had lost his home where he would sit and watch television night after night, interspersed by the odd occasional bath. All of these things had made him the man that he was, without them, he felt naked and unsure. There was something else in him now however, something that felt good and exciting. Suddenly he understood that everything he had lost today, he had never actually wanted anyway. Pete was a free man, and no longer had to waste his life in a dead-end job, or in a hate-fuelled relationship. It was as if God himself had seen his plight and removed all the detritus in one fell swoop, filling him with a new divine purpose, and opening up his life to unlimited possibility.
“Are you okay?” asked the Frenchman.
“Yes,” replied Pete, “I feel great!”
“So can you jump already, I don’t want to disappoint my son Ben here?”
“Erm, actually about that, think I’ll probably pass.”
“Zut alors! Make up you’re mind will you?!”
“Oh I have,” he replied confidently, “life is far too precious!”
“Well there’s nothing keeping us here then,” declared the man, “au revoir Pete Martin.”
And that said the man turned and left, his son closely in tow. Only later did it occur to Pete that the man had said his name, and that he had obviously known who he was, even though they had never met. This riled him for a moment, before realising, quite inexplicably, that he would meet this man again very soon.
60.
“Well that was unexpected,” began Crumble, Co-leen minion third class with fruit and vegetable privileges.
“It was,” agreed Mormid, before realizing that his minions really should not be addressing him so casually, “who are you anyway?”
“I’m Crumble sire, it is my delight to serve you.”
“Yes, yes, I’m sure.”
“Who’d have thought that a heron would be so convincing?!”
“I know,” concurred Mormid, “makes you think doesn’t it.”
“So now that the Co-leen are not the rulers of everything and anything else that may have been missed in the course of ruling everything, what next?” asked Crumble innocently.
Just moments before, Mormid had been on the verge of declaring his typical verdict of “inferior species”, and then condemning the planet below to immediate annihilation, when the Earth’s representative, (a heron), had mounted a devastating counter argument, which had forced Mormid to admit defeat, and fundamentally rethink the entire modus operandi of the entire Co-leen race. What annoyed him more than this however, was the fact that now when he thought back on this devastating feat of oratory, all he could remember of the details was a lot of squawking, interspersed with moments of flying around the room and then trying to eat a light fixture. Either way, the planet Earth was safe, and unusually, Mormid felt okay about this.
“What next?” Crumble repeated the question.
Dinkle Mormid thought for a moment, and then the answer to the question seemed to spring centre stage with all the pomp and ceremony of a royal wedding on steroids. The solution was so undeniable, that he could think of nothing else, and the sounds that he went onto make sounded something like:
“Thwisheng!”
“Sorry, what sire?”
He composed himself for a moment, before replying clearly and with undeniable purpose:
“Fishing!”
“An excellent idea your mighty Mormidness, shall I set course for the angling nebula of Oxcana?”
“Yes Crumble,” he replied, “oh and Crumble…”
“Yes sire.”
“Call me Dink.”
61.
““Hey there space heads, it’s your old mate Slip here, broadcasting today from the Milky Way, with hit after hit designed to enlarge the mind...”
“Slip,” interrupted Crinkle, “where’s Fendel?”
“Good spot Crinks, I’d have to say that I don’t know, least I know where he isn’t, which is here, but apart from that, I’d have to say, elsewhere, yep, Fends is without doubt, elsewhere.”
“Hang on there’s a note.”
“Well read it out then, don’t leave our listeners waiting.”
“Dear Slip and Crinkle,” she began reading out the note, “I have taken one of the scoutships and left in order to visit the planet known in local parlance as Earth. I hear that they have devices there that can open tins electronically, and also, that for one night of their year, they attempt to blow up the sky with a whole host of explosive fire missiles! Well as I am sure you’ll understand, this is something I must absolutely witness for myself, I also intend to bring back something called a pokemon, which I think would go nicely in one of Crink’s casseroles. Anyway, I’ve set the IM machine on autopilot so you’ll be able to broadcast as usual. If you have any problems, don’t hesitate to ignore them. If you need to contact me, trying whistling the chorus to “can’t buy me love”, and if that doesn’t work, you can always pick up the phone and dial a number. Lots of love, yours, Fendel.”
“Well that’s just typical!”
“Are we going after him Slip?”
“Well if we aren’t, then my name’s not Nick McSlippery!”
“It’s not.”
“Exactly!”
“I’ll go and pack then,” she sighed rolling her eyes.
“So there you have it my beloved Renegade rabble, yours truly will shortly be embarking on the quest to find Fendel. Incidentally the “Find Fendel” series is now available from the Children’s Sections of most good bookshops. So all I ask of you all, is that you stay loose, eat well, and so “no” to rugs, and Renegade TM will be back broadcasting on the thoughtwaves shortly. And to play us out here’s John Tomes, with “What’s Mew Pussycat?”, and remember people, that no matter who you are and what you do, there are still some things that make us all the same, I mean, who can honestly say that they don’t love playing naked twister?!””
And that said, the Humdinger set course for the planet Earth, and Renegade TM came off the thoughtwaves.
Epilogue
And as the sun sets over Sutton, and the rain retires for the night, and the people climb into their beds and kiss and cuddle and read themselves to sleep, one man still wanders the streets, entertaining notions of rebirth and unwavering hope. He marches purpose-filled from end to end, breathing deep on the now clean air, and savouring every moment as he would the first best food bite on a plate, or when church bells c
hime through the falling snow at Christmas, or lying on a sun baked beach when the only prior engagement remains pursing your lips around a straw to a delicious cool coconut beverage. He is now filled with a divine purpose, a purpose which has no set design, and could lead him down many faint and narrow paths, but paths that he will tread sure-footed, and paths that he will learn from and better himself on. The day had shown him where he had become stuck, and it was as though an omnipotent force had dislodged him from his stupor, and breathed new direction and focus into his hollow shell. He smiles as he walks, as though listening to something only he can hear, a bespoke radio station perhaps, which beams direct to his brain, broadcasting positive vibes and tunes to live to and die for. He clicks his fingers as he walks the streets, perhaps he is clicking a beatnik approval to the city delights, or maybe he is clicking along to some unknowable tune that rattles rhythmically round his mind. Crossing the road at a jaunty angle, he bumps into a terribly pale fellow, who introduces himself as an alien called Fendel, and asks him if he knows the whereabouts of any Pokemon. He nods and decides to help this intriguing character. The duo then advance together, both inexplicably pleased with themselves and their predicament. He turns to Fendel, and remembers that there is something pressing that they need to do before they can find any Pokemon, something requested of him by a particularly important person, but he cannot remember who. The alien agrees to help him, and they make a pact together, as a family might. He is ready now and itching to start, the man known by other men, as Pete Martin.
THE END
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