Debatable Space

by Philip Palmer

  This, too, whatever later critics have said, was a solution to a problem: namely, how to stop criminals committing crime. One solution is to incarcerate them at vast expense for long periods of wasted life. The other is to hurt and terrify them so badly they are physically unable to sin again. Under my scheme anyone who committed a serious crime – murder, rape, kidnap, paedophilia, grievous bodily harm, armed robbery, or malicious extortion – would experience brain-frying. And anyone who became a repeat offender would be brain-fried daily, until either redemption or brain damage was achieved.

  It was cruel; but it worked. And, coupled with advances in forensic and thought-exploration technology which made wrongful convictions a thing of the past, it was fair.

  This was my brave new world. Mock it if you like; but I lived a long long time in the old world. And my world is, trust me, a billion times better.

  It was a strange and wonderful period. But looking back, I wish I had found myself some friends. People who could stand up to me, defy me, argue with me. Instead, I had legions of loyal acolytes. Eager beavers who were young and anxious to cling to my coat-tails. None of them were over the age of forty; all of them secretly plotted to take my job.

  But there was power enough for all of us. I hired one young man, Matt Evans, who called himself Mat X, after hearing his rap lyric on an album I downloaded on to my earpiece. He had such energy, such wit, such coruscating irony. So I called him into my office and quizzed him on what he would do to solve the problems of the world. He was an angry and passionate black man who spoke, angrily and passionately of course, about the shit that is dealt to blacks and mixed-race communities in today’s fucked-up society.

  So I made him Coordinator for Africa. His mission was to make Africa into the richest, coolest nation on Earth. He had the resources, he had the staff. And he had no fucking idea how to run an office or do a job; even getting up in the morning was a strain for him.

  But he learned, fast. He was streetwise, smart, a great people person. He sat down with African dictators and he visited mass graves created as a result of the frequent genocidal wars that were still taking place on a regular basis. He invoked the spirit of Mandela, but he also brought a young new energy to things. Secretly, I controlled his every move; but I used his charisma, his youth, his rap-artist credibility, to win hearts and minds. Billions of young blacks who hated authority idolised Mat X. They listened to his words; they admired his style; and they marvelled that he released his official Manifesto for African Redevelopment in the form of a ninety-minute rap single.

  And as a result, we got Africa in shape. It became what it should always have been; a fertile land rich in ideas and culture, in which cooperation between disparate tribes is ingrained in the heart of every native-born ’frican. We called it “the ’frican way”; it was not quite a religion, not quite a philosophy, but it became a way of life for billions.

  China was tougher. Eventually, I found a young woman who was abnormally empathetic; her ability to seemingly read minds and predict behaviour allowed her to introduce democracy and reform Chinese social practices. She later became a Demi-Goddess, revered by entire nations; and of course, by that point she was no longer returning my phone calls. Her name was Xan (you see, she even copied her silly name from me). Ungrateful bitch! Sorry. Moving on…

  Problems have solutions. It was my creed, my Machiavellian code. Yet the curious thing is: amnesia is the driving principle of all human behaviour. When things are bad, everyone will yearn for them to get better. But when things are good, it’s all taken for granted. And so entire generations grew up in my world assuming this was the natural order of things. Full employment, barely any disease, long lives, few wars, a warm and emotionally invigorating architectural environment – big deal! The world was still shit, and adults like me were arseholes and fossils to be mocked and despised.

  So maybe there is one problem that lacks a solution. Maybe human beings are just Not That Nice. They are selfish, venal, they have no gratitude. I did so much for the human race; but what has it ever done for me?

  Why, for instance, do I find it so hard to make female friends? And why do the men who are my lovers betray and patronise me? And why is it I keep having to fake orgasms? And how come no one ever laughs at my jokes?

  What the hell is wrong with me?

  She brought her death upon herself.

  Though I can’t deny I was wrong to do what I did.

  But how can it be, in a life lived so long, with so many good deeds to my credit, after so many years of self-restraint and self-denial and altruistic commitment, that a single trail of wrongdoing can be traced and tracked and used to destroy me?

  I admit my sin: I bribed officials to cover up my son’s rape of a young woman. And later, despite other rape investigations, I used my official position to quash any police allegations into his conduct. I pulled strings, and falsified records, and eventually got my son sent out into space where, I hoped, his wicked streak would burn out.

  And Congresswoman Cavendish, the scourge of liberals, made it her life’s work to find me out. She began with the assumption that I must be guilty, of something. She didn’t care what. She was a religious fanatic, a bigot, a hater of people of colour, a Muslimophobe. And for most of the last thirty years of my long tenure in power she attempted to destroy me with one fraudulent accusation after another. I found myself wearying of her lies, her black propaganda. And I could not think of an adequate solution to this, my own particular and painful problem. Her hatred of me was visceral, intense, and it kept her alive. Without the aid of rejuvenation therapies, which she disapproved of, Cavendish reached the age of eighty-eight with her energies undimmed, her hatred of me unslaked.

  And finally, she found a smoking gun. She found out all about Peter and my continuing role in concealing his criminality. The scandal broke, and I was disbarred from office.

  I can remember vividly the moment when it all ended for me. It was a Thursday. Or a Wednesday? No matter. It was morning. I’d just finished a cup of strong coffee. I opened up my emails, and found one that had the subject line: You have been impeached. I rose, stunned, from my desk and walked numbly out of my office… and Cavendish was there in the corridor to greet me. With an army of officials. Gloating. Gloating!

  At Cavendish’s insistence, I was formally censured in front of my colleagues by the Arbiter. My papers of office were ceremonially ripped up. It was all done by the book, in accordance with hallowed traditions. Except I knew it was all bullshit. I was the first person to hold this particular office. We had no traditions.

  But Cavendish had her way. I was humiliated. And, in the months that followed, as I read the press coverage, I realised that piece by piece my reputation was being stolen. A new President of Humankind was elected, and the impression was created that mine had been a caretaker administration. I had been not much more than a glorified civil servant; now a real politician was in charge.

  To combat this torrent of lies, I leaked stories, I briefed journalists, I called in every favour I was owed. But every time I thought I had a handle on how the game was played, the game tilted and I was utterly humiliated once again. I read entire books that argued that the triumph of the planet Hope was a victory of plucky settlers fighting against the meddling interference of jumped-up civil servants back on Earth – namely, me. I read that my principles and protocols of office were created by the person who succeeded me – a nonentity called Luigi Scarpio, who combined astonishing charisma with utter ignorance of science and was devoid of morality and common sense. Every achievement or insight or policy advance I had ever made was credited to someone else; every mistake or fiasco or instance of corruption which had occurred during my tenure was blamed on me.

  The people loved Scarpio. He was homespun, funny, a bit tubby, he liked to mock his own fondness for pasta and Italian women. Scarpio became a legend. Whereas I… I became a footnote.

  Cavendish had won; I had lost. And so, I admit, I lost control of myself
. My rage was intense. I tried suing her for libel, I tried tarnishing her own reputation. And then, eventually, in the full knowledge that she had a terminal illness that would end her life in less than nine months, I obtained an illegal gun and I went to her house, intent on murder.

  I stood outside the house, whipped by cold winds, trying to control my breathing, for six long hours.

  Then I smashed in the back door and went in. The burglar alarm was blaring. I was handling this all wrong, I could have been so much cleverer. A poison dart, a sabotaged car, a hitman.

  I blundered onwards. Here I was, the former most powerful woman in the world, seized by an irrational rage. How could she do this to me! How could she do this!

  I spent ten minutes playing “Sardines”, hunting for an old lady hiding in a big old mock twenty-first-century mansion. I discovered her eventually in the linen closet. When she saw me, her face uncrinkled in relief. “They’ve gone now,” I whispered. “You’re safe, come with me.”

  She held out her hand to me.

  And I shot her, repeatedly, in the body, till I was deafened by her screams. Then I blew her brains out. The explosion was awful. I was spattered with Cavendish. The sheer horror of the moment filled me with a childish glee.

  I heard sounds at the back door. The police had arrived.

  I wiped my prints off the gun, scratched my face on the side of the linen cupboard door, and concocted my cover story, involving masked gunmen and an heroic struggle on my part to save the old lady.

  It was a laughably bad cover story. The police charged me with murder. My own lawyer openly mocked my story of having arrived to offer Cavendish my forgiveness and friendship, only to find the aforementioned armed burglars on the premises. She urged me to plead insanity, in the hope of being offered a course of forcible therapy. Instead, I entered a plea of “Justifiable Homicide”.

  My lawyer, without my permission, changed the plea to temporary insanity, on the grounds I was totally raving mad and shouldn’t be listened to. She had a point. But the court ignored all our bickering, and I was found guilty of murder in the first degree. Fortunately, however, my lawyer managed to prevent the State from seizing my assets.

  I was sentenced to be brain-fried for two days.

  I knew exactly what to expect. I had studied this subject intensively, since I had of course introduced this particular punishment into the penal system. Electrodes in the pain centres and imagination centres of the cortex fire electrical currents for between twenty and a hundred consecutive hours. It is intended to be the nearest thing in life to being in Hell.

  But I think the night before was worse. Every nerve ending jangled. My skin prickled and itched and I felt as if I was being devoured by insects. I was in the hotel wing of the prison complex, I was well fed, my bed was soft and comfortable. But to know that in the morning you will be tortured is a torture in itself.

  My room was pastel pink. It had strange whorly patterns in the wallpaper. Ambient music played, that grated and scratched at my soul. I think it was meant to be relaxing, but for me, it was part of the torment. For years after, I was unable to travel in lifts in case muzak played and I started ripping out throats.

  Then dawn came. I was led into another room with equally comforting wallpaper. I was sat down in a chair. A helmet was placed on my head. My hands were restrained. A catheter was hooked into my arm to prevent me dehydrating. I realised I had urinated upon myself, but a nurse came and wiped me down. The “Play” button on the brain-modification helmet was pressed.

  At first, it hurt. But I could ignore that.

  Then I had an hallucination. I imagined that I was free. Walking across a green field, in the hot sun. Beautiful men and women walked beside me, stark naked. And then I realised my skin was peeling. I was burning in the sun. I rubbed a hot patch, and skin came away and I saw sinews and tendons underneath.

  I itched, all over. I rubbed myself. My hair come out, my nose fell off. My heart fell out of my ribcage and lay on the grass, beating hot blood.

  It started to rain. But there was salt in the rain, which burned into my raw skinless flesh. The agony was unbelievable. But then my mother appeared, smiling. She picked up my heart and ate it. I felt a pang of betrayal and self-hate. My mother smiled at me, my blood trickling down her jaw. Lightning struck me and sent millions of volts surging through my body.

  But finally, it was over. I was clothed now, my skin was restored. I recognised immediately that this was a ruse to prevent me becoming desensitised to pain. I knew I was still in the nightmare. But all my senses told me I was sitting in Starbucks, with a caffe latte and a caramel shortbread in front of me.

  I drank the soothing coffee, ate the cake. Don’t do this! I screamed at myself. The taste of pleasure was softening me up.

  A man with tattoos sat down at the table with me. He took my hand and sawed off my fingers one by one. “Daddy, don’t,” I whispered at him. He took out a club with spikes.

  He beat me for several hours, until every inch of my flesh was tenderised and bleeding. I tried to tune out the pain. I kept telling myself: this isn’t really happening.

  The pain continued, and continued. It got worse. And even worse. But eventually it was over. I heard gentle voices speaking to me. My straps were being unbuckled. A doctor was explaining that I was now ready to go into recuperative therapy. I was led out of the room. I insisted on staggering down the stairs, rather than using the lift. We left the building.

  “Am I free?” I whispered.

  You’re free,” my father told me. “But remember, no more bad behaviour.”

  “I promise, Daddy.”

  “Lying bitch,” my daddy said, and slashed my face with a razor. He peeled my face off and blew his nose on it. And then he walked away.

  A pack of hyenas surrounded me. I was in the middle of Piccadilly, with shoppers walking past. But no one stopped or raised the alarm. The hyenas starting biting at me. I shuddered and shrunk into a ball.

  Lightning struck me and seared my body with unbelievable pain. The hyenas ripped my flesh to shreds and ate me.

  I was in a lecture, at university. I was wearing glasses! This was the old me, the former Lena, before I became Xabar. I breathed deeply, shaking with relief. I was coming to welcome these respites, at least they…

  Everyone was staring at me. With hate in their eyes. “We despise you, Lena,” my fellow students were whispering. “You are pathetic, you are flawed, you are the worst person in the world.”

  “Sticks and stones!” I replied mockingly. A foolish thing to do because…

  My fellow students proceeded to beat me viciously with sticks wrapped in barbed wire and jagged stones. I gritted my teeth, as the pain escalated, and waited to die so that the next nightmare could begin.

  I was in a room, with a blonde-haired eight-year-old girl. She was giggling and playing with a pet dinosaur and a spider that you can move by pressing a rubber bulb. I sat down with her and played. “What’s the spider called?” I asked.

  “Spidey,” said the little girl.

  “I’ll be Spidey,” I said.

  “I’ll be Mr Steggy,” the little girl said. “My granny gave me these toys. My granny is dead now, some heartless monster killed her.”

  I looked up and saw Commissioner Cavendish staring down at me. Sorrow and love in her eyes. The little girl’s eyes lit up and she ran to her granny and kissed her. “Gran,” she murmured, “Gran, I love you,” as she hugged old Cavendish. And Cavendish’s harsh face relaxed into the gentlest and kindest of smiles, as she embraced her beloved granddaughter.

  Waves of remorse and self-loathing swept over me. “I’m sorry,” I whispered. And Cavendish’s head exploded and the girl was covered in blood, and she started to scream, and scream…

  And so it continued. I endured two days of these nightmares, but it felt like ten years. Eventually it ended, but for months afterwards, I was convinced that my life was just another dream, and any moment now, the next horror would arrive
.

  My “coercive therapy” punishment for murder was the most appalling experience that it is possible for any human being to experience; it’s programmed to be just that. It is a toxic blend of pain, self-loathing, guilt, remorse and physical agony… My soul was scorched and seared.

  But the punishment didn’t, in fact, work.

  Perhaps I was too steeped in sin. Or perhaps I am too canny, too experienced. But I found that my remorse ebbed rapidly. I am still able, as my warrior exploits have shown, to kill whenever I need to, or want to. I can sleep without bad dreams. My memories of the horror of my torture have been virtually expunged.

  I still feel spasms of agony when I least expect it. The pain of my punishment will never leave me. But the sheer joy of that moment will never diminish: Cavendish staring at me with her skeletal, withered face, full of contempt. I show her the gun and the contempt turns to fear and bewilderment.

  Then I shoot her in the leg. Then the other leg. Then in the body. Then in the head, repeatedly, so that her brains are sprayed over me. Then I sit and tell her wrecked skull stories of my debauchery until the police make it up the stairs and subdue me. It is exquisite delight. I savour every moment of my soul-degradation.

  Why did I do it? I cannot say, I cannot explain. It meant the total and comprehensive end of my reputation, it meant my damnation by posterity.

  Clearly, I was mad. But the question that then raises itself is: When did I become mad? Then, or earlier? Was I mad while I was in power?

  But then again, maybe I was just bored, and yearned for an experience more extreme than anything else in my long, long life. Murder; incarceration; brain-frying; public excoriation. Well, I couldn’t argue that my life was dull.

  After the brain-frying, a psychologist diagnosed me as unrepentant. I was sentenced to another course of treatment. But I bribed a guard, and left the prison disguised as one of the conjugal visitors.