"01 - Armageddon, the Musical (b)" - читать интересную книгу автора (Rankin Robert)

The series became an overnight success. The Phnaar-gian viewers took to this 'everyday story of simple folk' like Teds to a tapered trouser, and The Earthers became the most popular series in the history of the universe.

Now, on the face of it, this might appear to be harmless enough stuff, a race, hopelessly addicted to television, watching the exploits of another. And so it might possibly have remained, but for the Phnaarg viewing public's fanatical craving for 'a bit of action'. Much against their better judgement, the producers of The Earthers found themselves forced to help things along a bit.

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It all began in a small way, with fire, the wheel and language. The Earthers just didn't seem to be getting the hang of them. And as the series was now running prime-time, there seemed good reason to slip all these into one weekly episode, to get the ball rolling.

The fact that this was done has always been vigorously denied by the producers, as have suggestions that they have been doing likewise ever since. Continually tamper­ing with Earth history to keep the ratings up. The Phnaargian tabloids have made scandalous assertions that certain popular figures have been 'reincarnated' over the centuries, and even that some of the major roles have been played by Phnaargian actors dressed up to look like Earthers.

Whether there is any truth in this isn't easy to say, the producers of the series wisely having kept the precise location of Planet Earth to themselves as a simple pre­caution against nosy parkers. But the fact that next week's episode of The Earthers is always previewed in the television papers should be enough to raise the occasional suspicion.

However, by the Earth year 2050 viewing figures on Phnaargos were tailing off dramatically. And viewers, miffed that their favourites had got the chop in the Nuclear Holocaust Event, an episode which achieved the biggest ever ratings and won several much-coveted awards, were switching off in droves. The idea of watching a rather undistinguished cast of scabby-looking individuals, whose lives apparently revolved around watching television, was of very little interest. It was so far-fetched, for one thing.

And so it came to be that on a May morning, when summer was the season, the executive team of Earthers Inc. held a very special meeting. The boardroom perched,

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high in the spiral leafbound complex. The Phnaargian sun, Rupert, nudged a golden ray or two down towards the broad and membraned picture-window, where, tinted to a subtle rose-pink, they fell upon the exquisite table of Goldenwood which grew in the centre of the room. The room itself was another marvel of horticultural architecture. A masterpiece, designed and grown by the leading 'hortitect' of the day, Capability Crabshaw.

Crabshaw's current passion was for the work of the late and legendary Vita Sackville-West. This was reflected in this year's boardroom 'look'. The chairs were the product of painstaking topiary work, performed upon box hedges. The svelte grass carpeting the floor was sewn with thyme, camomile and other fragrant herbs, which released aromatic essences when stepped upon. Acacia Dealata and Aibizia Julibrissin flowered in weathered terracotta pots, arranged in pleasing compositions to every corner of the room. It was all very much just so. But whether the members of the board, hunched sullenly in their box-hedge baronials, had any appreciation what­soever for this Sissinghurst in the sky, must remain in some doubt. For these were desperate men. And he who had the most to lose was the most desperate of them all.

Mungo Madoc, station controller, surveyed his troops with a bitter eye. Mungo was 'Earthish' to the very nostrils. But for the greenly-dyed mustachios, waxed into the six points, befitting to his status, and the extra­ordinarily lush three-piece, clothing his ample frame, one might have taken him for an Earthman any day of the week. Except possibly Tuesday.

Of the executive board, little can be offered to the reader in terms of their variance from established Earth type. They averaged around the six-foot mark, some

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corpulent, others of that lean and hungry look once alluded to by a certain Phnaargian copy-writer of days gone by. There were six of them in all, and a right surly-looking bunch they were too. It may be of interest to note that while, at this time, all media on Earth was run by females of the species, here on Phnaargos, male chauvinism held sway. And a woman's place was in the greenhouse.

Mungo tapped his trowel of office upon the shining table-top. All conversation ceased as he drew breath and launched straight into the meat of the matter. 'Gentle­men,' he said, his voice having the not unexpected nasal quality of one addicted to the pleasures of orchid sniffing, 'gentlemen, we are in big schtuck here.'

Executive heads bobbed up and down appropriately. At the far end of the table Diogenes 'Dermot' Darbo, naturally bald, but resplendent in a vine-hair-toupe said, 'Yes, indeedy.'

'Viewing figures have sunk to a point beneath which even the Fengorian Flatworm might find squeezing a somewhat hazardous affair.' There were some nervous titters amongst those few who hadn't heard the remark before. 'And so I'm holding this special council, that you may favour me with your propositions for the revitaliza-tion of the series.'

Mungo's team made encouraging faces. But nobody spoke.

'You will offer me your proposals, I will mull them over and almost upon the instant decide who remains on the team, enjoying all the privileges, and who seeks new employment turning compost in the nursery beds, en­joying the fresh air.'

The heads remained nodless but the brains within them pulsed with activity.

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Tm waiting, gentlemen.'

Hook-nosed Gryphus Garstang rose tentatively to his feet and raised an arm, gorgeously encased in spring-flowering cyclamen. 'What do you say to another war?' he asked brightly.

Mungo Madoc eyed the young man almost kindly. 'Another war?' said he, tucking a soft green sapling behind his left ear. 'If it hadn't been for your brilliant concept of World War Three to celebrate the arrival of the twenty-first century, we wouldn't be in this mess now.'