Douglas Adams's Starship Titanic (6 page)

'I knew it!' Lucy was going for guilt-provoking self recrimination. 'I knew we shouldn't have followed that dumb peroxide airhead!'

'Please refrain from shouting on the Embarkation Level. There may be First or Second Class passengers about. You may shout as much as you want on the Super Galactic Traveller Class decks,' said the Doorbot and he again indicated the way down.

Nettie was holding up her hands. 'Hey! Hey! Guys! Calm down!'

'Why should we calm down!?'Dan had hit Histrionic Mode. 'You've just destroyed our future home! You've forced us onto an alien spacecraft! And now we're not even on Earth any more! God knows how we'll ever get back!'

'Please!'said Nettie. 'I didn't destroy your future home…'

'No! No! I know! I'm sorry! I just got carried away!' Dan didn't know why he'd said that.

'And if we really are in the situation this robot tells us we're in, we'd better keep our heads and decide how to get out of it.'

'Arrrggggghh! Aggggggghhhhhh! Arrrrghhhhhhhh!!' Lucy had decided to set aside her admiration for the fabulous decor of the ship and had reverted to Primal Scream Mode.

'Please scream on the Super Galactic Traveller Class decks only!' urged the Doorbot.

'We must do something…' began Nettie;

'DO?!' shouted Dan. 'DO?! WHAT
CAN
WE DO?!'

'I suggest,' said Nettie firmly, 'we find the Captain — there must be one — explain our situation, and ask him to take us home.'

'Fine!Oh fine!' Dan was beside himself with sarcasm. 'FINE! Find the Captain! Why didn't I think of that? Oh yes! Brilliant idea!…Actually that
is
a pretty good idea.'

'Arrgh! Aaaaaagh! Arrrrrgh!' continued Lucy after a short pause.

'Shut up!' said Dan. It was the first time he had ever spoken to Lucy like that, and she shut up in surprise.

'Where can we find the Captain?' Nettie turned to the Doorbot, who was looking about anxiously to make sure that no other passengers were being incommoded by all this Super Galactic Traveller Class screaming.

'The Captain, madam or thing, is to be found on the Captain's Bridge,' said the Doorbot coldly with killing logic.

'And where do we find that?'

'You don't,' said the robot firmly. 'The Captain's Bridge is accessible only from the First Class accommodation.'

'Well surely we can just go through in order to get to the Bridge?' reasoned Nettie.

'I'm afraid not,' sniffed the Doorbot. 'All travelling area restrictions are strictly observed on this vessel.'

'Oh come off it!' exclaimed Dan. 'This is an emergency!'

'Over there!' said Nettie. She had just put on her translatorspecs and could now read the words —
FIRST CLASS PASSENGERS ONLY BEYOND THIS POINT
— on a door at the other end of the lobby.

'That's pretty neat!' exclaimed Dan, when Nettie had explained how she knew which way to go.

'Arrrrgh!' said Lucy. 'Sorry! I didn't mean to scream! It's just that robot moved so fast!' And it was true: the moment Dan and Nettie and Lucy stepped towards the First Class entrance, the Doorbot had overtaken them and was standing in between them and the doorway.

'I regret, sir, madam and thing…'

'Stop calling me a thing,' said Nettie.

'Super Galactic Class Travellers are not allowed beyond this point. Now if you'd kindly return to your own decks…'

'Get out of the way, Jeeves,' said Dan and he pushed past the robot.

'Sir will find the door sealed,' sniffed the Doorbot, 'and if you do not return to your own quarters I shall be forced to call the ship's security officers. They have vicious rabbits.'

Dan and Lucy were by now pushing and pulling on the First Class door, but it was clearly a pointless exercise.

'There must be another way of doing this,' said Nettie. Something about her tone of voice made Dan and Lucy calm down and return to rational thinking.

'OK!' said Dan. Let me handle this. After all, travel is — or has been — my business. What we have here is the commonest problem known to travellers the world over. How do we get a free upgrade?'

The Doorbot went silent.

'Ha!' Dan recognized the response immediately — corporate dumb insolence! 'If you don't tell us how to get a free upgrade immediately I shall report you to the Travel Association.' It was a bluff but it had worked many times before.

'I cannot help you there,
sir
.' The contempt in the robot's voice was now so palpable it made Dan's skin feel rough. You will have to inquire with the Deskbot.' And he indicated the desk lamp that Nettie had been talking to earlier.

'Huh!' snorted Nettie. 'That machine's about as helpful as a strapless ball-gown under g force!'

But Dan had already run over to the Deskbot, and was now preparing to humiliate himself on an heroic scale.

'Look,' he began. 'We have been misassigned our accommodation. This — as I expect you recognize — is Gloria Stanley, the actress.' Dan pointed at Nettie who immediately caught on to his drift and dutifully treated the Deskbot to a sultry look. 'I am her manager and this young lady is her lawyer.' Lucy really did look the part in her pinstripe power suit. 'We should have been given First Class tickets but our travel agent screwed up the booking. Can you reassign us immediately?'

The Deskbot raised its shade or head and stared with its two lamps straight at Dan. He squirmed but held his composure.

'And which travel agency would that be?' asked the Deskbot.

'Top Ten Travel.'Dan was well into his role by now.

The Deskbot blinked a few times, as if running through a file somewhere in its database. There was a sort of 'bing!' noise and it drummed its fingers on the desk. 'I have no record of such an agency in the Galaxy.'

'I can assure you it does exist,' said Dan, whilst thinking, 'Well, it
did
exist up to this morning.'

'Look, we must get an upgrade to First.' Lucy had decided to chime in.

'Oh yes, madam.' The Deskbot had become insolently polite. 'And to whose account should this "upgrade" be charged?'

'Mayem, Bader and Lizt,' said Lucy. It was the name of her law firm.

'We have no record of such a company,' said the Deskbot.

'You didn't even check your database!' exclaimed Lucy indignantly.

The Deskbot blinked a couple of times and there was another 'bing!' noise. The Deskbot leant forward: 'I can only upgrade you if you pay the difference in advance.'

'How much is it?' Dan felt they were on a slippery slope here.

'Seventy million pistres or two pnedes. Currency is not accepted and you may only pay by Galactic Gold Credit Card.'

'I don't think you quite appreciate who Gloria Stanley is…' Dan decided to change tack.

'I don't give a stuff who "Gloria Stanley" is,' said the Deskbot suddenly and rather surprisingly. 'I can only upgrade you if you pay in advance with a Galactic Gold Card.'

'Oh, let it go,' muttered Nettie, who hated this sort of thing.

'Look,' said Lucy in her best lawyer's conciliatory tone, 'there must be some way you could organize an upgrade for us. We're valuable customers.'

The Deskbot seemed to do a quick check this time on a small screen set in the desk. 'Super Galactic Traveller Class —
Complimentary
,' it read. 'You're on
free
tickets?!'

'Exactly! We're valued customers! Celebrities!' Dan had thrown caution to the wind. But the Deskbot shook its shade. If it had had a lip, it would have curled.

'I'm sorry, there is absolutely nothing I can do. You simply cannot upgrade to First Class from Super Galactic Traveller Class — let alone on a
complimentary
ticket. Perhaps if you were Second Class I could do something.'

'Look!' said Nettie to the desk light 'We don't care what class we travel…'

'I do!' said Dan.

'So do I!' exclaimed Lucy.

'All we want to do,' Nettie continued, 'is talk to the Captain. Can you put us through to him?'

'I have no means of contacting the Captain,' replied the Deskbot. 'And, in any case, it is against company policy to allow Super Galactic Class Travellers — especially
complimentary
ones — access to any of the senior officers.'

'God!' muttered Nettie to the other two. 'I can't stand this sort of thing. There must be some way of getting through to the Captain.'

'How can we get reassigned to Second Class?' Lucy knew now that Dan was well and truly in the grip of that most powerful force known to man: the desire for a free upgrade. Nothing could stop him.

'That, surely can't be too much to ask?' Dan was halfway between whining and cajoling.

The Deskbot started to look earnestly at the ceiling.

That's a pretty shade you're wearing.' Lucy had decided to try another approach.

'It's just the company colours,' said the Deskbot.

'But it suits you,' said Lucy.

Dan rolled his eyes.

'Look!' He tried to reassert control on the discussion, but the Deskbot interrupted.

'You have free upgrade vouchers in your rooms. Now,
please
, I have better things to do.'

'V
ouchers?'Dan was grunting this as they raced back through the loggia at the top of the Central Well. 'Isn't that the travel industry all over? Why do they never tell you these things in the first place?'

The Liftbot was in a cheerier mood — but only just. 'Down?' it said. 'That's what Chalky White yelled at me outside that fox-hole at Ypres. It was the last thing he ever did say. Buzz-bomb took him out — same bomb as took out my arm and leg."Down!" I can hear his voice to this day…

By the time the elevator had reached the Super Galactic Traveller Class deck, the three had heard a full account of the rudimentary medical facilities available at the Caen dressing station, the technical details of cleaning out gangrene from a deep wound and a near-complete itemization of the Allied Forces requisitioning techniques in Cyprus. For a robot from a civilization which knew nothing of the Earth, it was a very impressive performance.

'God, I just hope we don't have to use that elevator many more times,' groaned Dan, as the three raced off down the Super Galactic Traveller Class corridor.

'Primula… Dahlia… Chrysanthemum…' Nettie was reading the names with her translatorspecs.

'We don't even know what ours were called,' moaned Lucy.

'Ah! "Cabbage",' said Nettie. 'This is mine!'

She gained entry with her PET (Personal Electric Thingie) and found her upgrade voucher on the last page of her copy of the
Super Galactic Traveller Magazine
— just after the Duty-Free Shopping article.

'Look!' she said to the other two. 'While you're trying to find your rooms, I'll go and get my upgrade. I've had an idea.' She hurried back to the Embarkation Lobby, trying to ignore the Liftbot's account of life on an army pension and no disablement grant, and while the Deskbot reluctantly stamped her ticket with her upgrade to Second Class, she inquired:

'I suppose the Engine Room is aft, is it?'

'At the end of the Grand Axial Canal, Second Class, through which you are now entitled to pass. Here is another voucher entitling you to a free glass of Moon-swill at the Bar.' The Deskbot handed Nettie another ticket and switched itself off.

Nettie went as fast as she could — her high heels echoing round the loggia — towards the entrance to the Second Class Area.

Meanwhile, Lucy and Dan were trailing miserably round the SGT corridors pointing their Personal Electronic Thingies at each door in turn. But to no effect.

'What was Nettie's plan?' Dan decided to take their minds off the present hopeless task…

'She said something about the Engine Room,' grunted Lucy.

'Maybe she knows about engines?' said Dan.

'Nettie?! Oh sure! Hey! There was a click! I swear!' Lucy tried one of the doors, but it was resolutely shut against them.

'Well, you know, for one of Nigel's bimbos that Nettie's pretty bright.' Dan nodded to himself.

'Oh. I didn't realize you were interested in her mind,' replied Lucy.

'What's that supposed to mean?' Dan was taken by surprise.

'It’s opening!' exclaimed Lucy as one door seemed to give for a moment. 'Oh! No, it isn't.

'She's a nice girl,' said Dan.

'You ought to know. You've been ogling her ever since dinner… God! When
was
that? It seems like a lifetime ago!'

'I wasn't ogling her.' Dan's 'injured innocence' count was incredibly high some days.

'Anyway' Lucy was now working off her frustration — 'if Nettie's so bright, how come she allows Nigel to treat her like a Barbie doll?'

'Does she?'

'That sort of woman makes me sick! Why doesn't she stand up for herself?'

'She still might be quite bright,' Dan ventured without much hope. Lucy's powers of certitude always had a crushing effect on him.

'There is no correlation between size of brain and size of tits, penis-head!' Lucy had a cruel side.

'Got it!'Dan had just pointed his PET at a door and it had, wonderfully and graciously, swung open for them.

'Translatorspecs!'Lucy rapped out her order to the lampstand, found the
Super Galactic Traveller Magazine
stuck in a rack alongside a leaflet about aerobics classes, a list of self-operated washing machine facilities available to SGT passengers, a 132-page form in which to record your personal passenger-satisfaction rating, and a small leaflet entitled: 'What To Do In The Event Of Fire'. Evidently the recommended action was to stay extremely calm and remain cool at all times. You were advised to stay in your cabins and not to fly and contact any of the staff. And, once again, you were admonished to remain relaxed and enjoy the remainder of the flight.

'Do you think it's getting colder?' asked Lucy as she tore out the voucher from the magazine.

'Anyway,' said Dan, 'I was
not
ogling Nettie.'

Nettie shivered as she waited for the door to the Second Class Area to open. For a brief moment she wished her Gap T-shirt covered her midriff. But then, as the door opened and she stepped through, her mind was swamped by the sight before her. She found herself standing on the main jetty of the Grand Axial Canal, Second Class. It stretched out in front of her, under a simulated sky. Wide columns marked out the elegantly curved walls, and burning braziers dotted the canal embankments. All over the canal, automated gondolas plied lazily back and forth, their robot gondoliers singing pleasantly — a song that brought harmony and peace to the main thoroughfare of the
Starship Titanic
:

Nettie climbed into the nearest gondola and the singing stopped. 'Take me to the Engine Room,' she said.

'Si!
Work-Place Chum of Victorious Athletics Coach!' said the gondolier and off they drifted down the Grand Axial Canal.

'Tell me,' said Nettie. 'Shouldn't you be singing when you've got a passenger rather than the other way round?'

'Si!
Perspicacious Lady Orthodontist!' replied the robot, breathing evenly with the exertion of propelling the craft. 'There must be something wrong with the ship's central intelligence system.'

Nettie nodded and made a mental note of this.

The gondola took her straight down the very middle of the Grand Axial Canal. The pace was relaxed, and the whole ambiance so far away from what she ever imagined being on a spaceship to be like — let alone an
alien
spaceship — that Nettie found herself leaning back against the cushions and letting her mind drift…

She wondered why she didn't feel more distressed by her situation. It was almost as if she felt there was some benign presence in the Starship — something or someone that she knew would take care of them and yet it was not complete. Nettie shook her head — the thoughts were all a little too shapeless to make sense.

And then what about Nigel? Why didn't she miss him more? For three months now her whole life had revolved around him. She had made sure his diary was up to date and that he looked at it. She'd made him change his socks every day and had washed his underpants by hand. She must love him a lot! And yet she knew he'd just gone out of her life… Not just because they'd been kidnapped by an alien starship full of robots… Heavens above! She knew they'd return to Earth. She knew they wouldn't be harmed. But Nigel would not be there for her. Something was broken and yet she didn't seem to regret it.

The gondola bumped. They had reached the jetty.

…sang the robot gondolier, as soon as Nettie was out of the gondola.

'Thanks!' said Nettie.

'And that was when the lady lost her grip…' sang the robot.

Nettie adjusted her translatorspecs and immediately saw a notice which read:
CREW AND PERSONNEL ONLY
. She followed the sign down a stainless steel corridor towards a set of glowing blue doors.

As she approached there was no perceptible engine noise, unless that distant rustling of leaves was it — or was it the beating of a sea upon a distant shore? Nettie felt a thrill pulse through her, and then realized it was just a chill. It really was getting very cold in the ship. And was it her imagination or was her breathing getting more difficult?

At the luminous blue doors, Nettie waved her John Lewis Credit Card and said in a commanding voice that she had never ever used before: 'Special Customs and Excise Search Warrant. Open up!'

There was a slight hesitation. The glowing blue doors opened a crack and then shut again, hesitated, and then obediently opened up.

The Engine Room was so similar to the sort of thing you'd see in a science fiction film that Nettie felt she knew exactly where she was. Except what was that black, black darkness behind the thick window? There didn't seem to be anything there and yet all the wiring and so forth seemed to be connected to it.

Nettie looked around for the intercom. Her idea had been quite a simple one: if they wanted to communicate with the Captain, and they couldn't get up to the Captain's Bridge to speak to him personally, then she'd telephone him from the Engine Room. There had to be some sort of communication between the Bridge and the Engineers.

In the corner there was a small cabinet. Maybe that was it? She opened the doors to reveal two buttons. One read:
BOMB MONITOR
and the other:
PRESS TO ARM
. A sudden wave of cold, even colder than the current temperature of the ship, swept through Nettie's body.'Bomb!?' Was there a bomb on board?

Nettie pressed the button that read
BOMB MONITOR
. A polite voice said: 'Thank you for enquiring about the status of the Mega-Scuttler Corporation's 8D-96 Full Force Mega-Scuttler — 'A Bomb To Be Proud Of' — which has been installed, for your convenience, upon this Starship. It is my pleasure to inform you that the Mega-Scuttler is currently not activated. Thank you for showing an interest in bombs.'

'Bit of a relief,' thought Nettie. 'Now where's the intercom?'

What happened next is totally unclear. Certainly Nettie herself had no recollection. She remembered climbing up the ladder next to the armour-plated window. She could recall feeling colder than ever and finding her breathing harder and then feeling a force gripping her… a force pulling her sideways off the ladder… a force so vast that she thought she was being sucked into a Black Hole or something… as she felt herself falling horizontally off the ladder towards whatever it was behind the perspex window… The next thing she knew she was whirling round in blackness — fighting for her life…