Something Rotten (Thursday Next 4)

The board members closed their folders in one single synchronised movement and then filed in orderly fashion to the far end of the room, where a curved staircase led down. Within a few minutes only the CEO and Brik Schitt-Hawse remained. He placed his red-leather briefcase on the desk in front of me and looked at me dispassionately, saying nothing. For someone like Schitt-Hawse who loved the sound of his own voice, it was clear the CEO called every shot.

'What did you think?' asked Goliath.

'Think?' I replied. 'How about "morally reprehensible"?'

'I believe you will find there is no moral good or bad, Miss Next. Morality can only be asserted from the safe retrospection of twenty years or more. Parliaments have far too short a life to do any long-term good. It is up to corporations to do what is best for everyone. The tenure of an administration may be five years – for us it can be several centuries, and none of that tiresome accountability to get in the way. The leap to Goliath as a religion is the next logical step.'

'I'm not convinced, Mr Goliath,' I told him. 'I thought you were becoming a religion to evade the seventh Revealment of St Zvlkx.'

He gazed at me with his piercing green eyes.

'It's avoid, not evade, Miss Next. A trifling textual change but legally with great implications. We can legally attempt to avoid the future but not evade it. As long as we can demonstrate a forty-nine per cent chance that our future-altering attempts might fail, we are legally safe. The ChronoGuard are very strict on the rules and we'd be fools to try and break them.'

'You didn't ask me up here to argue legal definitions, Mr Goliath.'

'No, Miss Next. I wanted to have this opportunity to explain ourselves to you, one of our most vociferous opponents. I have doubts too, and if I can make you understand then I will have convinced myself that what we are doing is right, and good. Have a seat.'

I sat, rather too obediently. Mr Goliath had a strong personality.

'Humans are moulded by evolution to be short-termists, Miss Next,' he continued. His voice rumbled deeply and seemed to echo inside my head. 'We need only to see our children to reproductive age to be successful in a biological sense. We have to move beyond that. If we see ourselves as residents on this planet for the long term we need to plan for the long term. Goliath has a thousand-year plan for itself. The responsibility for this planet is far too important to leave to a fragmented group of governments, constantly bickering over borders and only looking towards their own self-interest. We at Goliath see ourselves not as a corporation or a government but as a force for good. A force for good in waiting. We have thirty-eight million employees at present; it isn't difficult to see the benefit of having three billion. Imagine everyone on the planet working towards a single goal – the banishment of all governments and the creation of one business whose sole function it is to run the planet, by people on the planet, for the people on the planet, equally and sustainable for all – not Goliath but Earth, Inc. A company with every member of the world holding a single, equal share.'

'Is that why you're becoming a religion?'

'Let's just say that your friend Mr Zvlkx has goaded us into a course of action that is long overdue. You used the word religion but we see it more as a single, unifying faith to bring all mankind together. One world, one nation, one people, one aim. Surely you can see the sense in that?'

The strange thing was, I almost could. Without nations there would be no border disputes. The Crimean War alone had lasted for nearly 132 years, and there were at least a hundred smaller conflicts going on around the planet. Suddenly, Goliath seemed not so bad after all, and was indeed our friend. I was a fool not to realise it before.

I rubbed my temples.

'So,' continued the CEO in a soft rumble, 'I'd like to offer an olive branch to you right now and uneradicate your husband.'

'In return,' added Schitt-Hawse, speaking for the first time, 'we would like for you to accept our full, frank and unreserved apology and sign our Standard Forgiveness Release Form.'

I looked at them both in turn, then at the contract they had placed in front of me, then at Friday, who had put his fingers in his mouth and was looking up at me with an inquisitive air. I had to get my husband back, and Friday his father. There didn't seem any good reason not to sign.

'I want your word you'll get him back.'

'You have it,' replied the CEO.

I took the offered pen and signed the form at the bottom.

'Excellent!' muttered the CEO. 'We'll reactualise your husband as soon as possible. Good day, Miss Next, it was a very great pleasure to meet you.'

'And you,' I replied, smiling and shaking both their hands. 'I must say I'm very pleased with what I've heard here today. You can count on my support when you become a religion.'

They gave me some leaflets on how to join New Goliath, which I eagerly accepted. I was shown out a few minutes later, the shuttle to Tarbuck Graviport having been held on my account. By the time I had reached Tarbuck the mane grin had subsided from my face; by the time I had arrived at Saknussum I was confused; on the drive back to Swindon I was suspicious that something wasn't quite right; by the time I had reached Mum's home I was furious. I had been duped by Goliath – again.

16

That Evening

TOAST MAY BE INJURIOUS TO HEALTH

That was the shock statement put out by a joint Kaine/Goliath research project undertaken last Tuesday morning. 'In our research we have found that in certain circumstances eating toast may make the consumer writhe around in unspeakable agony, foaming at the mouth before death mercifully overcomes them.' The scientists went on to report that although these findings were by no means complete, more work needed to be done before toast had a clean bill of health. The Toast Marketing Board reacted angrily and pointed out that the 'at risk' slice of toast in the experiment had been spread with the deadly poison strychnine and these 'scientific' trials were just another attempt to besmirch the board's good name and that of their sponsee, opposition leader Redmond van de Poste.

Article in The Mole, 16 July 1988

'How was your day?' asked Mum, handing me a large cup of tea. Friday had been tuckered out by the long day and had fallen asleep into his cheesy bean dips. I had bathed him and put him to bed before having something to eat myself. Hamlet and Emma were out at the movies or something, Bismarck was listening to Wagner on his Walkman, so Mum and I had a moment to ourselves.