Radiance

Guest Star: Araceli Garrastazu as the Finnish Fury

ANNOUNCER: Good Evening, Listeners, if it is indeed Evening where you are. Gather in, pour yourself a cup of something nice, and sit back for another instalment of the solar system’s favourite tale of adventure, romance, and intrigue on How Many Miles to Babylon? Celebrating our thirtieth year on the waves, Babylon is a joint production of the United/Universal All-Worlds Wireless Broadcom Network (New York, Shanghai, Tithonus) and BBC Radio, recorded at Atlas Studios, London.

This evening’s programme is brought to you, as always, by Uzume Brand Soap, milled pure and clean with soothing oils, invigorating herbs, and wild alpine flowers plucked fresh from the gentle fields of Europa. Additional promotional consideration provided by Hathor Co. Premium Callowmilk, Diver Owned and Operated since 1876; Red Chamber Specialty Teas, Bringing the Bounty of Titan Home; the East Indian Trading Company; and Edison Teleradio Corp.

Previously on How Many Miles to Babylon?: Our pioneer heroine, Vespertine Hyperia, having been taken captive by Venetian bandito-magicians in the Venusian pirate paradise of Port Erishkegal, was bound by unbreakable chains to the volcanic glass spire of Namtar Tower! The dastardly king of the banditos, Doctor Gruel, determined to make sweet Vespertine his bride, strapped her into his wicked Cartesian Splitting Machine, causing her to forget not only her beloved, Tybault Gayan, but her own twin brother, the great inventor Valentino. Valentino staged a daring rescue, soaring through the Venusian mists on his miraculous mechanical musk ox Braggadocio. Listeners gasped as Vespertine turned her face away from her own kin! They leaned in close when Braggadocio begged her with his tinny tongue to come and live with Valentino in his big belly and sail through the skies, safely home to Earth, where Tybault waited with the longing of a thousand hearts. And when she would not answer, the whole system wept.

VESPERTINE: [sounds of whistling wind and clanking metal] Begone, deceiver! I shall marry Doctor Gruel at the stroke of dawn! He is my one true love! How I adore his warty chin and heavy fists! I grow faint at the thought of his hunchback; I dream of nothing but his scarred and hairy brow! I will never love another for all my days! [long, mournful groan over clanking engine parts]

ANNOUNCER: Meanwhile, we find our stalwart hero, Tybault, having defeated a band of mercenaries and black alchemists bent on inciting war with Austria at any cost, recovering from his grievous wounds in a mysterious hospital, attended by buxom masked nurses and a physician revealed last week to be none other than his sworn enemy: the Invisible Hussar!

THE INVISIBLE HUSSAR: [music cue #3: minor key crescendo 2] Yes, it is I! None other could vanquish the Hero of the Crimea! And these masked beauties are my sisters, the Ninja-Nuns of Nanking! They thirst for the blood of good men. I really don’t know how long I can hold them back. But first, you must witness the magnitude of your defeat! Behold, this is not a hospital, but my ship! [sounds of howling space winds] You have slept soundly, my old foe, with the help of my sisters’ potions. We will soon rendezvous with my comrades—Doctor Gruel and his band of banditos! [music cue #4: minor key crescendo 6]

ANNOUNCER: Will Tybault escape the clutches of his nemesis? Can the Ninja-Nuns of Nanking resist their terrible bloodlust? Will Vespertine marry the devious Doctor Gruel or will her loyal lover reach her in time? Who is the Invisible Hussar? Will these long-suffering sweethearts—one untamed spirit enamoured of the stars; one true man, devoted to King, Country, and Mother Earth—find each other at last, or will they yearn on in vain? Find out now!

Come with me to the rough-and-tumble worlds of Venus and Earth in the early days of the Diaspora, a fantastical journey into that special place in the heart where history meets the imagination, hard science meets flights of fancy, love leads the way, and the impossible becomes—for a moment—true, on…How Many Miles to Babylon?

[theme music]

From the Personal Reels of

Percival Alfred Unck

[SEVERIN UNCK walks hand in hand with CLOTILDE CHARBONNEAU down Usagi Avenue in Tithonus. Christmas lanterns glitter all around them. The Actaeon Theatre is visible behind them, searchlights swinging wildly over the night sky. CLOTILDE and SEVERIN are bundled in thick coats. Identical furs frame their faces. PERCIVAL UNCK walks backward down the street, filming them as steadily as his camera Clara will allow. SEVERIN sucks the filling from a street vendor’s blin. CLOTILDE’S face is sullen. She scratches at ruby earrings. She will leave them within a month.]

PERCIVAL

How did you like the picture, pumpkin?

SEVERIN

I’m not a pumpkin!

CLOTILDE

Are so. If we put a candle in your head you’d be a jack-o’-lantern.

SEVERIN

Ew! There’s no room in my head for a candle, Mama.

PERCIVAL

All right, you are definitely not a pumpkin, and we will definitely not put any candles in your head or make a tart out of you or turn you into a coach at midnight. Now, did you like your papa’s movie? He made it just for you, his first one for children.

SEVERIN

[long pause] No.

PERCIVAL

But you were so wonderful in it, darling! Didn’t you have fun filming your little bit? Isn’t it nice to see yourself on that big giant screen?

SEVERIN

[bursts into tears] I’m sorry, Papa! But there just aren’t such things as octopuses that talk or wear spectacles and spats in real life. It’s only Uncle Talmadge in a suit with sequins stuck on him. I shall never meet a talking octopus like Mr Bergamot, never, never! [Tears roll down SEVERIN’s cheeks and into her blin. She dries her face on one furry sleeve, sniffing in the cold.] It’s just a lot of silliness.