WARNING!
This chapter may contain flashbacks!
Peter Perkins had finished sketching
his ideas for the welcoming display that would serve as the centrepiece for the
Arnold Chemicals public relations event that was due to take place in the
Newtown Community Centre in one month’s time. He was behind schedule and that
worried him, not least because he was afraid that his boss, Clifford Stine,
might reject his latest design, as he had for the previous three attempts he
had submitted for his approval.
He had learned from bitter
experience that Clifford Stine was a hard man to please and he yearned for the
days when his life was much simpler. He missed his old friends Jim and Claire
and Emily Yip and wondered where the three of them were now. More than anything
though, after rebuilding his career and starting to work at Arnold Chemicals,
he missed his alter-ego, I-Think-Therefore-I-Am-Man.
He couldn’t understand it – he hadn’t thought about I-Think-Therefore-I-Am-Man since Everard Hinchcliffe, the head of
the Frontiere Corporation had
recalled Jim and Claire to New Zealand just weeks before their misguided government
enforced new legislation that made the playing of Trivial Pursuit illegal a few years earlier. Jim and Claire had
actually sent him a New Zealand edition of Trivial
Pursuit before the ban came into place but he found it difficult to play
owing to the lack any vowels on the question and answer cards.
As a result of his fear of Clifford
Stine and his yearning for any kind of adventure he took to the streets as a
vigilante, using his skills as a philosopher to combat crime wherever it raised
its ugly head in Newtown. He thought long and hard about the consequences of
returning to crime fighting, especially as I-Think-Therefore-I-Am-Man
was now a distant memory, a ghostly figure from his past that haunted his
dreams, causing him to relive every painful moment of his acrimonious divorce
and the estrangement from his children. He knew very well that it had been his
alter-ego that was to blame for it all.
After receiving a paper cut from a radioactive copy of The Boys’ Bumper Book of Western Philosophy,
mid-mannered philosophy student Peter Perkins from Sheffield became the fairly
well-known, reasonably celebrated and mildly irritating superhero I-Think-Therefore-I-Am-Man, capable of
diffusing any dangerous situation with carefully chosen words of philosophical
wisdom. With his costume of brown jacket with patches on the elbows, brown
corduroy trousers, striped shirt with a plain collar, spotted tie and
comfortable suede shoes, and his cry of “This looks like a job for I-Think-Therefore-I-Am-Man!” Peter
Perkins became a minor celebrity.
He married his sweetheart, Mary Jane Webster, but ten years
and three obnoxious children who had inherited his radioactive genes later the
marriage was over.
Peter was recruited into the New Zealand Secret Service (UK
Cheese Division) as the first point of contact for any Kiwi agents arriving in
the country. He put on some weight and lost some hair and preferred obscurity
to the limelight of his heady days as a superhero.
But he needed a new name and a new
costume. He needed to disassociate himself from I-Think-Therefore-I-Am-Man because none of the old philosophies
fitted in with the modern world of superheroes in the 1990s, especially those
of René Descartes. He needed an identity that was up-to-date, snappy and
dynamic. There were many new and strange philosophical movements he could choose
from for his new superhero name, but they just didn’t seem right.
There was Animisman (from Animism,
that states that when looking at souls and spirits, the two not only exist in
humans and animals, but also in rocks, plants, thunder, mountains and other
objects) but that made him sound like a beast; Next up was Atomisman (from Logical Atomism,
that says all truths are dependent on a layer of atomic facts and asserts that
language mirrors reality) but that was too nuclear; Phenomeman (from Phenomenalism,
that professes that physical objects do not exist as things in themselves but
only as perceptual phenomena) was too tongue-twisty; and Monoman (from Neutral Monism,
that theorises that the mental and physical are not two fundamentally different
things and the body and mind are made up of the same material, which isn’t
mental or physical) just made him
sound like a boring old fart.
And then he got it – Solipso! (from Solipsism
– the philosophical theory that states that a person can know nothing but that
he or she exists, and that the self is the only existent thing). It was
perfect.
Next was the costume. His old I-Think-Therefore-I-Am-Man costume was
too dull – he needed something that would attract attention, but wasn’t too
garish. The one thing he did want, though, was a cape. He liked capes –
Superman and Batman had capes – and although he didn’t have the powers they had
he thought that a cape would give him more gravitas (and possibly make
wrong-doers think he could fly). He drew up several designs that didn’t seem
right until he came up with the one that was perfectly suited to his new
identity – Solipso! This is what he
eventually decided on:
He spent days hunched over a sewing
machine, stitching together his new costume and when it when it was finally
ready he tried it on, viewing himself in front of the full-length mirror in his
tiny flat near the railway station. He twirled around, watching his cape billow
out as he did, and he knew he was ready.
His first (and last) night out as Solipso was a disaster.
After approaching a group of yobs
who were drinking cider outside an off-licence and abusing people as they
walked by, Peter tried to call up his philosophical super-powers but found to
his horror that he knew virtually nothing about the new-fangled philosophy he
had taken his name from and was therefore unable to say anything profound or
meaningful to diffuse the ever worsening situation. Instead of crumbling like
the villains of his glory days when he was I-Think-Therefore-I-Am-Man,
the yobs turned their abuse on him, calling him a big girly poof and his
brightly coloured costume he had worked so hard on stupid and gay. He had just
time to say, “Err . . . err . . . I think, therefore I am,” before they kicked
the living daylights out of him and left him lying semi-conscious on the
pavement.
It was a massive bow to his
self-esteem and he realised what a prick he had been deluding himself that he
still had what it took after years of idleness. He was getting too old to be
wandering around at night looking for trouble and this incident only reminded
him of that. He picked himself up off the pavement, wiped the blood from his
face and with grazed knees and elbows wearily shambled home to make himself a
cup of hot chocolate and get an early night.
The kettle had just boiled when
Peter heard the knock at the door.
“Who is it?” he asked.
“You don’t know me,” the voice on
the other side of the door said, “but I’ve been told to contact you by an agent
of the British Secret Service Cheese Division.”
The words ‘Cheese Division’ brought
back happy memories of his time with Jim and Claire and Emily Yip and he opened
the door, only to be confronted by a young man with a pudding-basin haircut and
wearing what appeared to be National Health spectacles.
“Hello,” said the young, extending
his hand in friendship, “my name’s Harry Potty and you, I believe are my
contact.”
“My what?”
“Contact – you know, secret agent
stuff and all that.”
Peter sighed and said, “Well, you’d
better come in, then. Would you like a cup of hot chocolate?”
“Have you got any Dr Pepper?”
“What’s that?”
“It’s a drink that tastes like Germolene.”
“Sounds awful.”
“It is, but everyone says they like
it in order to sound cool and hip.”
“Oh, right. Well, I haven’t got
any.”
“What have you got then?”
“I don’t know. Why don’t you take a
look in the fridge?” Peter pointed to the small fridge in the corner of his
apartment, and as he did there was a knock at the door.”
Harry looked over at Peter in
alarm. “Are you expecting someone?” he whispered.
“Not at this hour,” Peter whispered
back.
“Well, who is it, then?”
“I may have once been a superhero,
but unfortunately one of my powers was not x-ray vision.”
“Pity.”
“Yeah.”
“Well, you better get rid of him or
her or whoever it is.”
Peter stepped over to the door and,
with his hand on the doorknob, asked, “Who is it?”
“Is this the residence of Peter
Perkins?” came the voice from the other side of the door.
Peter smiled. He recognised the
voice and its use of words with its lack of vowels. “Jim?” he asked.
“Let me in, Peter.”
Peter flung open the door in a
state of jubilation. There stood in the doorway, as large as life, was his old
friend Jim. “I don’t believe it,” Peter said, “I thought you were back in New
Zealand!”
“I was, but something’s been
happening here in Newtown that’s important enough to involve me. There’s always
been a Frontiere operative in Britain – the last one was John Smith – and we
all know what happened to him. And as for the last one – Craig – well, he
turned out to be a religious maniac and a wanker to boot. Ordinarily they would
have sent me back to Braintree, but they thought what was going on here was
important of my attention.”
“Wow, it’s great to see you again,
Jim. Is Claire here too? What, then, is so important that they sent you here?
And how did you know I was here?”
“I didn’t – I was looking through
the Arnold Chemicals brochure and I just happened to see that you were their PR
man. Claire’s back in New Zealand working as my handler. As for what’s
happening here – well, people have been disappearing, people have reported that
they’re shrinking and there’s a strange pink blob-like thing that keeps appearing
that has Australian Bitey as one of its constituents. The whole town it seems
is under some kind of spell and we suspect it has something to do with where
you work. By the way, what happened to your face? And why are you wearing that
gay costume?”
“It’s a long, sad story, Jim, and I’m
not going to go into it now. First off I’d like to introduce you to Harry
Potty.”
“G’day,” said Jim, extending his
hand in friendship.
“But it’s the middle of the night,”
said Harry.
“He’s from New Zealand,” said
Peter, “just accept it.”
“It could be worse,” said Jim. “I
could be from Australia.” He shook Harry’s hand and chuckled to himself at his
witty and well-timed response. “And what brings you here?”
“I’ve been accepted into the Arnold
Chemicals School of wizardry.”
“The what?”
“The Arnold Chemicals school of
wizardry. They teach apprentice wizards about magic and stuff.”
“You do know that there is no such
thing as wizards and magic, don’t you?”
“That’s what John Langdon said.”
“John Langdon? We interviewed a man
called Paul Langdon, but he seems to have disappeared off the face of the
earth.”
“He was John’s brother. John works
for the British Secret Service (Cheese Division) and he’s investigating his
brother’s disappearance. He’s asked me to spy for him.”
“British Secret Service (Cheese Division)? Why wasn’t I informed of
this? I didn’t even realise they had a Cheese Division. These bloody Poms, they
never tell us anything?”
“Jim works for the New Zealand
Secret Service (Cheese Division),” said Peter to Harry.”
“Listen,” said Jim, “as your both
here, why don’t we work together. Peter, my old friend, I need you spy for me
again – I need information about what Arnold Chemicals and particularly
Clifford Stine is up planning. Are you up for it?”
“Am I up for it? Does a bear shit
in the woods? Of course I’m up for it!”
“Right then, we’ll meet here in two
days at the same time. Peter, find out what Stine’s up to. Harry, get me in
contact with John Langdon.”
“This is brilliant!” shrieked Peter.
“It’s just like the old days. All we need now is Emily Yip and the gang will be
back to together.”
Jim sighed. “I’m afraid there’s not
much chance of that happening. She’s got herself a plum job back in New
Zealand. I doubt very much if we’ll ever see her again.”
But unknown to Jim, Emily Yip was
already in the air and heading for Newtown.
And she was angry.
Very, very angry.
 |
| The Possum Book of Failed Superheroes, from which book this chapter was taken. |
No comments:
Post a Comment